My sorcy just finished Hell using Blizzard. I love it! I also like Fireball. I want to respec into a BlizBall. I’m torn between Blizzard as my main or Fireball. Most builds guides use Fireball a main but that seems to take a lot of skill points.
What would be the minimum skill point investment for Fireball to take out fire immune bosses? I’m thinking Max Fireball, Fire Mastery and Firebolt. Most guides max Meteor as well, is that necessary? It will go slower but I think it would be fine.
As for Blizzard, could I get away with maxing Blizzard, and one synergy (Ice Blast) along with enough points to get -100 Cold Mastery?
I plan on running mostly cows. with The Pit, Andariel, Mephisto etc. when I get bored of cows.
Does it really matter?
What is most fun for you?
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That’s generally because they are assuming you want to use Meteor too. Or are doing a pure fire build.
For a dual-element build you generally aren’t going to want to spend more than 60 points in the fire tree. Probably less if you want your second skill to be Blizzard.
And it turns out if you cap at 60 points in the fire tree, and want to maximize Fire Ball damage and don’t actually ever want to cast Meteor, then maximum Fire Ball damage is achieved by maxing Fire Bolt, Fire Ball, and Fire Mastery.
The reason? It takes an extra 3 skill points in prereqs to unlock Meteor. If you cap at 60 points in the fire tree, spending 3 points on prereqs takes away 3 points from Fire Ball synergies (i.e. Fire Bolt) or Fire Mastery. 20 points Fire Bolt + 20 Points Fire Ball + 20 points Fire Mastery ends up giving more Fire Ball damage than 1 point Fire Bolt/Inferno/Blaze/Fire Wall + 20 points Fire Ball + 20 points Meteor + 16 points Fire Mastery or 1 point Fire Bolt/Inferno/Blaze/Fire Wall + 20 points Fire Ball + 16 points Meteor + 20 points Fire Mastery.
If you play around in https://d2.maxroll.gg/d2planner/ or another skill calculator, you’ll see that this is the case: with 60 points spent on Fire skills, the highest Fireball damage you can achieve is with 20 points in Firebolt + 20 points in Fire Ball + and 20 points in Fire Mastery. Any combination including meteor and capped at 60 points will just lower your Fire Ball damage because the prereqs take away points that could otherwise be put in a synergy or mastery.
The only reason to put points into Meteor is if you a) are planning a dual-spec build where you actually want to cast Meteor or b) are doing a pure fire build and aren’t limited in how many points you are spending in the fire tree. If you only want to cast Fire Ball, and are planning to spend 60 points (or fewer) in the fire tree, then there’s no reason to put points in Meteor. You’ll get higher Fire Ball damage by just pumping Fire Bolt and Fire Mastery.
If you do 60 points in the fire tree, you actually won’t have enough points to max Blizzard + one synergy until you are into the mid 90s. And that’s with just one hard point in Cold Mastery and making up the rest with +skills! That’s the real problem with dual element with Blizzard, you just don’t have enough points to really pump two trees. One of your elements will end up kinda weak.
İf you are going to male dual element best bet is choose at least 1 attack which is not skill point intensive and that is
Frozen orb in cold tree
Firewall in fire tree
Pick one of these as backup skill and max the other attack
Or my suggestion is max out orb and dum the rest into fireball —> i am using one and very happy about it
I don’t think it matters, I like Blizzard best so I think I will pump that and see how it goes. I can always respec again 
this is the way!
after testing multiple build i ended up maxing FO and using Firewall too.
Firewall will deal huge damage (much more than meteor/fb) with less points.
I have trouble switching to my MF weapons on Diablo/Hell with Firewall because it kills him in one second and i did not even put a single point in warmth, just maxing firewall and mastery is enough …
Thanks for all the great replies!
Yea, true but I afraid of BOTH being kind of weak. I think I’m going to try pumping Blizzard and still put enough in Fireball to help the Merc take out CIs.
If you enjoy blizzard more, just stick with it.
And if you plan to have your merc take care of the cold inmunes i would go firewall better than fball no matter both blizz and wall are timered spells, coz merc will line up and hold mobs in a place just perfectly for firewall, and also it requires lot less points than fball being more powefull (pure dmg wise point per point)
That would free up more skill points also for beefing even more synergies for your main spell, blizz
Very good points so far.
Im going to try to give you an idea of your fear
“if it will be enough dakka”
At +10 skills from Gear and
the very wise advice given to max Firebolt, Fireball and Mastery.
A Fireball does
2259–2608 a fireball against a target dummy.
My enchantresses Explosion Arrow does
1655–2114 against a target dummy.
Most of the time on single or until players 2-3.
Your limiting factor on non fire immunes will be overhit.
And the lack of pierce.
Might need a few for a Batch of cows but nothing u cant manage with that sorta fcr.
Id +1 on Blizzard vs Orb.
Just take what you enjoy more and complements YOU playstile.
Technically Orb needs less to max.
But that doesnt mean same invest in Blizz isnt serious enough dakka.
Enjoy your Sorc 
Cheers
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