Frozen Orb Sorceress Dueling Strategy by Zharous

Last Revised:  June 23, 2005

The strategy behind dueling with an Orb Sorceress is a difficult one to master. For those who master it however, it still remains one of the most flexible and powerful dueling classes there are. Experienced Dii players who have mastered other dueling classes, including other types of sorceresses need to completely forget all they have learned in order to do well at playing a Orb Sorceress, and this guide will attempt to cover a few of the basics behind dueling with this class. Unlike most other dueling strategies, typically stacked on at the end of a PVP guide with a paragraph or two concerning how to duel typical opponents, this guide will be written "backwards". It will cover all the basic dueling tactics, which more or less apply to, just about any class duel, and then get into a few general guidelines for specific characters.

Let’s start out with a few basic guidelines. If you wanted to summarize this entire guide in a single sentence, it would be this: Always duel completely offensively, but be extremely defensive at all times. You want to remain on the offensive at all times, backing your opponent up and forcing them to do what you want them to do, instead of letting them take the initiative. Your attack spell, Frozen Orb, with it’s wide area of damage and decently long duration is perfectly suited to act as a deterrent, forcing people to retreat from it. At the same time you can take advantage of its auto-aiming tendencies to ignore your aim almost completely and concentrate solely on any incoming source of damage and your teleportation pattern.

A good, consistent Internet connection with very low lag.

A decently equipped PVP Sorceress with a good sized mana pool, 105%+ cast rate, and decently high orb damage.

Good reactions, the ability to randomize your teleport patterns, and dodge anything and everything that comes your way.

Frozen Orb is your primary attack spell. In just about in all cases it will be your only attack spell, so let’s leave it at that. Even though the cookie cutter Orb Sorceress has been a staple build in one form or another since Diablo II patch 1.0, it’s surprising how few people really know how the spell actually works.

To start with, Frozen Orb shots a "orb" that does nothing by itself but scatter small ice shards or ice bolts in a rough circular pattern until at a certain distance the orb will "explode" scattering 16 shards outwards from a single point. The explosion is often called the "apex" of the orb, and is the point where frozen orb will do the most damage. Orb shards are stopped and absorbed as damage by any hostile opponent it hits, but the "Orb" itself will actually travel through any opponents and keep firing off ice shards before and after it passes through or near a hostile monster or opponent. For this reason you can still hit with a shard or two an opponent standing off to one side or even behind you, but if the orb passes over a hostile target or if at best the orb "explodes" on a hostile target, it will do far more damage.

Orb "explosions" are shot outwards in all directions, as seen here:

Orb Blast #1 -  Orb Blast #2 - Orb Blast #3

If your aim is absolutely flawless, all 16 shards will hit your target. (aim at where your opponent’s feet will be) If slightly off to one side or another, only half the number of shards or so will hit. The exact distance you need to stand away from your opponent varies slightly depending on their angle, as seen here:

Orb Blast Down - Orb Blast Left - Orb Blast Right

Frozen Orb like all other timered spells in 1.10 has a ½ period post-casting delay. Unlike previous patches where you could immediately switch and start casting an untimered spell directly after a timered one, the timer delay now prevents that from occurring. What this means in real terms is that since the casting delay of Frozen Orb is 1 second, for exactly ½ a second afterwards, you will be unable to cast any spell, even teleport to dodge incoming attacks.

What you MUST do immediately after firing off a frozen orb is to run for a short distance before teleporting away. The alternative is to sit there like a frozen duck and let anything hit there while you stand around helpless, waiting for the teleport skill to start working again. If this is done properly then most of the difficult duels for an orb sorceress disappear. You can teleport into a field of traps, fire off an orb, walk parallel to the traps to cause them to miss, and teleport off without a single shot hitting you. You can also use this to dodge most melee tactics (walk, don’t run to dodge chargers and guided arrow, however you may frequently do better to run to dodge whirlwinds and other melee attacks by running)

The basic orbing strategy is very simple, and all variations lead off of this one. Teleport to your target to the optimum orb distance, and throw a frozen orb at them, hopefully bursting directly on top of them. If they are charging you, back up a bit further and let them charge into the apex. If they are running from you, teleport closer to them and let them run into the orb apex. If you are expecting them to dodge to one side or the other, shoot a leading orb off in one direction or the other, forcing them either to reverse direction quickly or take a lot of damage.

Many variations of this strategy exist. If you are fighting a ranged character that is firing back at you directly (fire sorcs, other orb sorcs, bowazons for example) then you typically want to chase them, firing an orb first on one side of them and then the other. This "scissoring" pattern you can tighten up around them, forcing them basically to run directly away from you and limiting their chances to fire back.

Another strategy, very effective vs. other teleporting casters is the "V" defensive orb method. Similar to scissoring, which is the offensive form of the maneuver, is to fire an orb initially towards the left, teleport back then teleport forwards to the right and fire forwards again to the right. The defensive move of retreating will tend to bring your opponent closer to you and as long as you keep the "field" up, your opponent will be forced to charge either nearby or through a frozen orb to get to you.

For those very offensive characters who charge, teleport, or jump on you directly, such as assassins, barbarians, wind druids, etc, most of the listed strategies above do not work. Several methods exist to counter them, the simplest being your teleport speed. If you teleport quickly close to them taunting them to attack you and then instead of orbing, you teleport a second time and shoot behind you, you’ll often catch them directly where you were a second ago. Another strategy is a bit more dangerous, and could be called "teleporting along your orb". From a moderate distance, shoot a frozen orb towards your opponent, and teleport quickly but short distances into the range of where the orb is currently shattering ice shards. Your opponent will typically attempt to teleport on top of you, landing in an orb shard blast and if you are quick enough, have decent enough block, or lucky enough, can get away before taking too much damage.

At all times keep in mind that frozen orb is a very slow spell. You are not as much hurling a fast moving bolt of damage at your opponent as laying a mine for them to either trip over or walk into.

Due to Frozen Orb’s ½ second teleport delay, you never want to teleport too close to an dangerous opponent before firing off an orb. Always place your orb between yourself and your opponent when possible for the orb to act as a deterrent, and always err on the side of teleporting too far away rather then getting too close. The majority of Orb sorceresses always will err on this one. Most battles will generally consist of teleporting moderately close and then backing off a bit in a random direction to fire an orb off, run/walk a short distance and continue teleporting.

This may seem obvious, but think before you teleport. Plan a direction, pattern, and landing point before you actually do it. Unlike the instant reaction based combat of most other characters, you typically need to think before you act, and your opponents actions should only modify the actions you plan to take, not determine it.

Enough has been said over the years about the element of randomness. It’s obvious that if you teleport in the exact same positions over and over again, your opponent will know where to expect you. What can’t be stressed enough is your "landing position" or where you will end up when you fire off an orb. If you teleport like mad but only fire an orb off when you are to either the left or to the right of your target, guess where you will be expected? Practice teleporting to random positions, top, left, bottom right, occasionally alternating from stopping at opposite sides to "orb" your opponent, other times landing near the same place.

Also make sure you practice your aim as well. A good method is to pick a stationary target, for example a rock, and teleport around, land at random positions and fire orbs off at it as if it was an opponent and see how often the "apex" of the orb hits the rock. As mentioned above, always avoid teleporting too close before firing off an orb, and if the orb "apex" goes through and explodes past the rock, try to avoid doing that again.

A good rule of thumb is to always teleport at least 3 times between every orb shot, and vary the number of teleportation casts you do before you "land and fire". It’s one thing to teleport in random directions, and it’s another thing to shoot orbs off and random angles, and it’s yet another to randomize the timing of your orbs. Of course there are many times when you want to orb very offensively towards a retreating opponent.

Basic patterns include circling your opponent, often switching back and circling the other direction. Another ploy that works well if not overly repeated is the "hook", to teleport and swing around one side of your opponent, teleport instantly to the opposite side and orb backwards. Make sure for autoaimers and namelockers that you frequently teleport away and out of visible automap range of your opponent, especially when dueling FOH paladins. Keep in mind that diagonals let you teleport faster then in straight lines, and to vary your range from time to time. Run a number of "fake passes" where you do nothing but teleport by your opponent without actually orbing,

Remember your skill as a dueler improves by how long you can successfully survive against a skilled opponent who is trying to kill you. You do not improve your own skills if you can slaughter your opponents easily. Often your best friend would be an opponent who stacks on a ton of absorb (2 raven frosts, snowclash, 4-Psapphire shield) and becomes invulnerable to your damage. Feel free to see how long you can survive against a dueler of that type instead of worrying about who is winning. And beyond everything else, don’t ever worry about goldstealing. I’d typically drop all the gold I have right before dueling just to prevent the tendency of certain public duelers to naked-kill you.

Auto-Aimers are your best friends. If you meet a typical auto-aiming or name locking opponent, you will either lag slighly and die almost instantly, or have a chance to hone your skills on a perfectly consistent, perfectly predictable opponent. Always run parallel to the AA’er, always orb directly at them, and teleport less often, orb more often. AA’ing Druids, Blessed Hammers, Barbarians are typically a bit more dangerous then ranged-attack AA’ers, but then you can always know exactly what they are going to do. Expect them to teleport directly on top of you at the first opportunity when you happen to get close enough. Teleport off their automap, teleport back on, orb once or twice, and repeat.

Cold Resist stacking by your opponents reduces cold spell damage by a factor of 8X (or 87.5%). (-100 resists to 75% resists, or 200% damage taken to 25% damage taken).

A raven frost reduces all cold damage by 40%, a second raven frost reduces it by 80%.

Snowclash or other +max cold resist gear is either totally worthless if used by itself, or overkill when combined with enough +Cold resist stacking.

Damage to Mana equipment is nearly worthless for most PVP ES Sorceresses, as it only applies to physical damage that actually gets past your energy shield.

For those with a mana pool > 1800, increase warmth. For 1500 or less, first get +teleport up to level 24 (1 mana cost per teleport with lidless, as you don’t need mana as much with a blocking shield). If you teleport a lot at a high cast rate, the benefits of adding to +teleport further increase.

Telekinesis should ALWAYS be maxed. With 0 pts of telekinesis, every 1 damage diverted to mana reduces your mana pool by 2. With 20 actual real skillpoints into telekinesis, every 1 damage diverted to mana reduces your mana pool by 0.75.

Energy Shield can be "pre-buffed" in town with a lot of +skill/+lighting skill and +energy shield items.

Energy Shield is typically 4X more effective against physical or pure magic damage then vs elemental damage. Your character therefore should be built to counter your most difficult duels. (large mana pool/mana regen helps more then stacking damage reduce equipment and MDR/PDR)

There is no absolute guideline on going with a very high +eshield and low mana regeneration vs a moderately low eshield and higher mana regeneration. If you typically die due to small amounts of damage over a very extended period of time, a higher eshield level is better. In my dueling experience, typically it’s the rare but massive amounts of damage that generally are more deadly, so I generally build low +ES level sorceresses these days.

Very skilled wind druids, absorb+cold resist stackers and extremely defensive casters should be your only difficult or impossible duels.

A good life/mana ratio is 1:2.5. For physical duels you can easily take that nearly down to 1:1, and swapping on magefist + a blocking shield reflect this. For elemental/magic duels a good 1:3 is just about perfect. (Frostburn + Spirit or Frostburn + Lidless)

For all other character build strategies, alternative equipment builds, discussion of skills, stats, and equipment mods, see my existing "PVP Energy Sorceress Guide".

Primary Hotkeys:

F2: Frozen Orb
F4: Teleport

Never use leftclick, I keep it on ice blast for the few occasions that warrant it. Press your Frozen Orb hotkey a second before you fire it, and instantly switch back to the teleport hotkey even before the orb has traveled anywhere to prepare you for the next direction you are going.

F1: Glacial Spike
F3: Static Field (memory staff only)
F5: Energy Shield (memory staff only)
F6: Chilling/Shiver/Frozen Armor (memory staff only)
F7: Enchant (memory staff only)

USWest Battle.Net: *Zhduels (Crystallys)

Helm: Cold Facet Nightwing’s Veil / Thul Kira’s Guardian
Amulet: +2 Sorc 18% cast, 102 mana, 25% fire resists
Weapon: Cold Facet Death’s Fathom
Alternative Weapon: CTA or a +9 Energy Shield Staff
Armor: Cold Facet Vipermagi
Shield: Whistan’s Guard (see alternatives)
Gloves: Magefist/Frostburn/Death’s Hand
Belt: Arachnid Mesh
Rings: 2 Sojs
Boots: Resist Boots/Waterwalk/Sandstorm Trek

Um Whistans
3-socket Ptopaz Tower Shield
Sanctuary Shield
Pemerald Whistans
Cold Facet Whistans
Um Lidless
Sur Lidless

Str: 96 after +str gear
Dex: (enough for 75% blocking, currently at 172)
Vit: None
Energy: (Rest, currently at 368)

Orb: 20 Pts
Cold Mastery: 20 Pts
Ice Bolt: 20 Pts
Teleport: 11 ~ 24 pts after +skill items with lidless
Warmth: (Rest, currently at level 7)

Other reference materials can be found at www.d2tables.com including tables for sorceress cast rate, hit recovery, and cold stack/mastery damage, and other calculators and reference materials.