How to proceed to Nightmare

Sorceress
1

So, I guess its one of those gazillion posts of “Help me papa I am stuck” (Ahem)…

Anyways heres the gist of it:

39 year old fart, returning to this game after barely finishing it back in the day. Most leveled chars I had were a 42 necro and 35ish Pally. Never knew what I was doing, didnt spec up correctly, died a billion times.
Now I bought the game a couple weeks ago and created a sorceress (never touched yet in the past) and a Barb (likewise). I watched videos, read articles (found out about how the freaking runes are not glorified gems as I believed) and here is where we stand:

She now is 39 with 25 stat points and 4 skill points banked (as in not used) STR45 DEX40 VIT130 EN35

And a couple ‘decent’ normal equipment that I farmed. My build is mainly blizzard, BUT I have questions.:

-First of all, is my skill specking up to now mostly correct (see screenshot). Do I need to max blizzard, cold mastery or one of the spikes first?
-Do I need to invest into a secondary tree (lightning/fire) for those immunes or will eventually manage to lower their resistance so much it doesnt matter?
-What is an estimation of attribute base for STR and DEX? Everywhere I read is “For gear”
-You can see weapon and circlet equipment so far (my armor is stealth). My other staff are generic yellows.
-I build a leaf staff after reading a bunch, but aside a cold resistance elite that I used firewall to take it out, I think for a non fire sorc is not that much worth it? Thoughts?

TLDR: What Do I respec? In what order of skill/stat progression do I continue? Need I craft build anything? Need I branch into another skill tree?

Thanks for your time.

EDIT: How do we attach pics here?

2

If you are new to sorceress and you want a decent starter build to get you through and start mf’ing, I recommend full blizzard sorceress. This is the easiest build.

20 into Blizzard
20 into Glacial Spike
20 into Ice Blast
20 into Ice Bolt
20 into Cold Mastery
1 in Warmth
1 in Static Field
1 in Telekinesis
1 in Teleport

  • Immunities: Forget dual element builds. With two elements, you may be able to handle any monsters in Hell, but you will be slower at killing stuff because your skills will not be fully synergized. You do not need to kill every monster you encounter. None of the quest monsters you must kill have immunity. For ancients, you can use town portal to reset them until you get immunities that you can handle. There are some great zones without any cold immune monsters and eventually, you will get a cold sunder charm.
  • Teleport: This is your greatest strength. Teleport is why people love to start the season with this class. You can use teleport to skip cold immunes and reposition your merc out of harms way and kite bosses (Even Duriel). Blizzard → Teleport → Blizzard → Teleport. If you do this right, they can’t catch you.
  • Freeze: With many points into Glacial Spike and Ice Blast, you can freeze non-cold immunes like Cows. Spam Glacial Spike at mobs near your merc in between blizzards. Your merc survivability just went through the roof because frozen monsters can’t hurt your merc or you.
  • Blizzard is a persistent AOE skill. You do not need to stand in place to use this skill. You pause briefly to cast it and then you can move away. Blizzard keeps raining at the spot for several seconds. Use this to your advantage when facing archers or other deadly projectile monsters. If you can freeze them with Glacial safely, do that too.
  • Starter Gear: Spirit Sword, Lore Helm, Insight polearm (Act 2 merc). Once in hell, try to find a white monarch and use act 5 socket on it to get 4 socket monarch. That will be your spirit shield base. Vipermagi armor is pretty cheap (Non perfect ones are cheap) and easy to find. Magefist is easy to find too. Find any rare movement/resistance/magic find boots. Use aldur set boots if you can find it. Give your merc a tal rasha helmet for resist/life leech and make a treachery armor for him.

Zones/Bosses for Cold Sorceress

  • Andariel
  • Stony Tomb (Just one super unique immune to cold)
  • Ancient Tunnel
  • Arachnid Lair
  • Mephisto
  • Chaos Sanctuary if your merc is strong enough to handle one cold immune type
  • Cows
3

First of all let me thank you for the reply and advice.

I more or less have been trying that. As of right now I have finished act1 of nightmare with little to no problems (run twice in cold immunes and one dual fire/cold immune but my rogue merc took care of them).

Buildwise I am doing what you suggest. My progression looks like this currently: (lvl 49):

15 into Blizzard
7 into Glacial Spike
11 into Ice Blast
5 into Ice Bolt
2 Frost nova
15 into Cold Mastery
1 in Warmth
1 in Static Field
1 in Telekinesis
1 in Teleport
2 Energy shield

Note that all skills are increased by one due to items and Energy shield is granted by the weapon. You think I should start leveling the glacial spike and ice bolt/blast or outright finish blizz/mastery first?

-The spirit sword looks like a formidable upgrade to my current weapon (a deamon gyre Jareds stone), but so far had no luck with a four socket weapon. I suspect I might have to sacrifice my act5 quest, but I read that in normal you get only 3 sockets. Is that true?
If it doesnt drop by then, I guess ill have to make do with whatever till I reach NM ACTV.

-Regarding the Lore Helmet: I am currently decking a circlet that gives 10% cast rate, +4all resistances, +13 energy +4 mana (and some other useless for sorc stats). Do you think it will be that much of an upgrade? My rings have both magic find, +10% cast + some resistances, so I think it synergizes? I also have a wall of the eyeless as my shield.

-Regarding the merc: So far no luck with a good socketed polearm and I think I missing some runes over there. I took a cedar bow and socketed an EDGE on it for my merc. Seems to be working so far. I think ill keep her around till I build that polearm. I have an ethereal soul Harvest that I can upgrde if needed though. Think it will be effective on an Act2 Merc? Also a suggestion for their aura?

Also what about stat progression? Currently I sit at (base values):

STR 65
DEX 40
VIT 150
Energy 35

And have 35 points to distribute if needed.

Again thanks for the advice and your time.