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Cold Sorceress build

Cold Sorceress build is often used in early to mid game for the low gear cost and high magic find rate. With the cold sunder charm, this build can also perform well for late game now. However, unlike commonly recommended Blizzard and Frozen Orb builds, the build here mainly casts Glacial Spike and is more powerful and versatile.

Character stats

• Strength: A total of 156 with all gears/charms to weild the Monarch shield with Spirit runeword
• Dexterity: None
• Vitality: All other points
• Energy: None

Skills

Add 20 points to each of the following skills

• Ice Bolt (synergy skill to increase the damage of Glacial Spike and Frozen Orb)
• Ice Blast (synergy skill to increase the damage of Glacial Spike). It makes single-target high damage and can be used to deal with bosses
• Glacial Spike (main attack skill, makes area damage and freeze non-boss enemies)
• Frozen Orb (main attack skill but needs cooldown, so cast Gacial Spike during cooldowns)
• Cold Mastery (reduce enemies’ cold resistance, still worth being maximized despite its effect is reduced to 1/5 for cold immune enemies)

Add 1 point to each of the following skills

• Warmth
• Static Field
• Teleport
• Frozen Armor
• all necessary passby skills

Remark: Cast Glacial Spike and Frozen Orb alternately (the latter has cooldown) can make huge damage to enemies. Need to pay attention and make sure to cast Frozen Orb as soon as its cooldown is over.

Gears

• Shield: Monarch shield with Spirit runeword: +2 All Skills, +35% Faster Cast Rate, +55% Faster Hit Recovery, +35% Lightning/Cold/Poison Resistance, +112 mana.

• Helm: Nightwing’s Veil for its +2 All Skills and +15% Cold Damage. Socket a cold facet for +5% Cold Damage and –5% Enemy Cold Resistance.

• Gloves: Trag’Oul’s Claws for its +20% Faster Cast Rate and +30% Cold Resistance.

• Belt: Arachnid Mesh for +1 All Skills and +20% Faster Cast Rate.

• Armor: Ormus’ Robes for its +20% Faster Cast Rates, +15% Cold Damage, and possibly also +3 Glacial Spike skill levels. Socket a cold facet for +5% Cold Damage and –5% Enemy Cold Resistance.

• Rings: Stone of Jordan on both hands, each providing +1 All Skills, 20 mana, and +25% Maximum Mana.

• Boots: Rare Boots with Lightning, Fire, and Poison Resistances. Additional +30% Faster Run/Walk Speed and +10% Faster Hit Recovery are also beneficial. Poison Length Reduction and Half Freeze Duration are also useful attributes.

• Weapon: Death’s Phantom for its +3 Sorceress Skills, +30% Cold Damage, +20% Faster Cast Rate, and up to 40% Fire and Lightning Resistances. Socket a cold facet for +5% Cold Damage and –5% Enemy Cold Resistance.

• Amulet: Mara’s Kaleidoscope for its +2 All Skills and +30 All Resistances.

• Switch Weapon and Shield: Crystal Sword or Flail with Calls to Arms runeword to bump all skills by 1 and life/mana for 60%+, and Monarch shield with Spirit runeword to increase the skill levels on Call of the Arm.

• Inventory: Sorceress Torch, Annihilus, Cold sunder charm, 7 Cold Skill grand charms with life or Faster Hit Recovery, All Resistance small charms with life or Faster Hit Recovery to make 65% Faster Hit Recovery, and max out Fire/Lightning/Poison resistances, and more life the better.

Mercenary

Use Act II Mercenary with Prayer Aura and the following gears:

• Weapon: Ethereal Thresher/Giant Thresher/Great Poleaxe with Insight runeword for its Meditation Aura.
• Helm: Ethereal helm with high defense and the Cure runeword for its level 1 Cleansing Aura to reduce poison length,
• Armor: Ethereal armor with high defense with the Chains of Honor ruenword for boosting all resistance and life leech.

Remark: The combination of Andariel’s Visage and Fortitude runeword can be an alternative for high defense at the cost of losing the Cleansing Aura.

Summary

• Attack: Cast one Frozon Orb and several Glacial Spikes alternately. These two skills at 43+ levels and sufficient reduction of enemies’ cold resistance at +105% Faster Cast Rate make huge damage. This build does not require Infinity runeword, and the key gears such as Death’s Phantom, Nightwing’s Veil, and Ormus’ Robes are relatively cheap to obtain in late game.
• Survivability: The Fire, Light, and Poison resistances should be maxed out to 75%. The Cold resistance is at a high level over 30%.
• Supply: Mana can be regenerated quickly with the Meditation Aura. The life can be slowly regenerated by the combination of Prayer Aura, Meditation Aura and Cleansing Aura from the mercenary.