Season 8 PTR Sorc patch notes

Sorcerer
1

NEW

  • Hail of Verglas (Unique Helm)

Affixes:

Inherent 1: 7.5% Maximum Cold Resist
Inherent 2: 50% Cold Resistance
+10.5-15% Intelligence
13-17.5% Maximum Life
+10.5-15% Attack Speed
+4-6 Ranks in Ice Shards

Unique Power:

Ice Shards now spreads out with 2 additional shards. You deal 1-1.5%[x] increased damage for each time Ice Shards damages an enemy for 5 seconds, up to 50-75%[x].

  • Shivering Aspect (Offensive Aspect):

    Enemies take up to 25-40% increased damage based on how much they are Chilled or Staggering. You apply 15% more Chill.

Balance

Skills

Greater Fireball

Previous: Fireball deals 10% of the Burning damage you've applied to enemies as additional damage.
Now: Fireball deals 10%[x] increased damage to Burning enemies. When a non-Boss enemy takes this damage while below 25% life, they are instantly killed.

Blizzard

Adding new terms Frostbiting / Frostbitten for Cold Damage over time.
New Description: Call forth a frigid blizzard that deals 210% Frostbite damage and continually Chills enemies for 18% over 8 seconds.

Deep Freeze

Rank 5 Bonus capped at 200%[x] damage increase.

Passives

Convulsions

Previous: Shock Skills have up to a 7% chance to Stun enemies for 3 seconds.
Now: You deal 5/10/15%[x] increased damage while you have Crackling Energy. You periodically pick up nearby Crackling Energy.

Crackling Energy

Added Shock skill tag.

Shocking Impact

Added Shock skill tag.

Combustion

Added Damage to Burning as part of the calculation.

Developer’s Note: This now functions the same as the Flamefeeder Glyph.

Unique Items

Fractured Winterglass

Now only spawns equipped Conjurations on your Action Bar.

Starfall Coronet

Meteor’s Cooldown changed from 10-3 to 5-2.5.

Legendary Aspects

Aspect of Piercing Cold

Previous: Ice Shards pierce 10 times, dealing 4-10%[x] more damage per subsequent enemy hit.
Now: Ice Shards pierce 5 times and deals 35-50%[x] increased damage, and an additional 10%[x] more damage per subsequent enemy hit.

Aspect of Shatter Stars

Meteorites now do their own damage.
The bonus damage from Meteor now applies to all Meteorites while this is equipped.

Aspect of Frozen Wake

Previous: While Ice Armor is active, you leave behind exploding Ice Spikes that deal X damage. Your Ice Spikes deal 15%[x] increased damage to Frozen enemies.
Now: While Ice Armor is active, you leave behind exploding Ice Spikes that deal X damage. Spawning an Ice Spike increases your Ice Spike damage by 3%[x] for 2 seconds, up to 30 times.

Paragon

Static Surge

Previous: Hitting enemies at least 8 times in a second with Shock Skills restores 30% of your Maximum Mana and increases your damage by 50%[x] for 8 seconds. This cannot be refreshed while active.
Now: Hitting enemies at least 8 times in a second with Shock Skills restores 30% of your Maximum Mana and increases your damage by 50%[x] for 8 seconds. This can only be reapplied every 1 second.

Enchantment Master

Previous: Your Enchantments are 30% stronger.
Now: Your Enchantments are 30% stronger, and each equipped Enchantment grants 30%[x] increased damage with their main element.

Frostbite Glyph

Renamed Cryopathy Glyph.

Miscellaneous

The damage of Ice Spikes has been standardized across Blue Rose, Frozen Tundra, Frozen Wake, and Glacial aspects.
2 Likes
2

If this could be stacked would do a lot more damage.

3

I loved this change too, it will be great for Chain Lightning builds.

The damage is on par with the other boards, the problem here was the Mana regeneration happening only once every 8 seconds. Now this board is 8 times more useful.

1 Like
4

I like the fireball changes, the static surge one and their try to make ice shards stronger. Those are all the build I’d like to try after chain lightning.

1 Like
5

Frostbite taken from Last Epoch?

Unique Sorc HELM? HELM? Seriously? You guys don’t know what you are doing it’s clear.

Plenty of other spots to create a new Unique, yet like Meteor, you block the Shako/Perdition and even HYDRAS!! Time to give HYDRA lots of LOVE FFS! *lol season 9 they’ll make a Hydra Helm… SMH…

Man, yeah, I expected not much since season 3, but you keep disappointing. Hope you’ll see that fault on an Helm and fix that before Season 8, you got plenty of time.

  • Glad you bring back Execute (which I LOVE) but now it makes it clear that Fireball will take an Enchantment spot.

Speaking of Enchantments, since when reaching lvl 50 it shows we unlock the third one like in the Beta, (ok I know we’re still in Beta phase, right? This game cannot be release as is, right?)

→ Will you finally reopen that 3rd spot? We could enjoy Sorc instead of Meta Barb, Necro and Rogue, thank you!

  • Good improvement with crackling energy, I guess…

Really if your plan included to make one class to be the season’s META every time, Sorc should fit that spot now, about time.

5 Likes
6

Will the changes to Fireball and Meteorites have a meaningful impact on these 2 builds?

I’m dreaming of making a Fireball with Meteorites build one day that’s strong and fun to play :stuck_out_tongue:

7

Sadly that is impossible because there simply aren’t enough aspect slots to create a build that focuses on more than one skill as the main damage dealer. They would first need to give us at least 2 more aspect slots.

1 Like
8

You’re completely right ofcourse. But a girl can dream, right? xD

1 Like
9

Interesting :thinking:… how would this build work (if it were possible to create)?

1 Like
10

I think I’ll start with a chain lightning sorcerer next season. The two enchantment slots can be covered by chain lightning and teleport for 60x more damage, then the new aspect to do up to 40% damage to frozen enemies is gg, combine it with the axial conduit pants and the journey to the new T4 shouldn’t be a problem. I can cap 100% crit chance even without heir of perdition.
Greater fireball might land on my skill bar for the execution of the burning enemies. The question is how make to make them burn in the first place?

11

There are a few Boss Powers that apply burn. Also, the Familiar, use the upgrade that change its type on cast. You will have to pay attention to the current Familiar type, but it’s not that bad and when the type resets it defaults to Fire.

PS: And after typing all that I remembered that Fireball itself applies burn…

12

I forgot about the enhanced fireball, then it’s great. You can build a fireball overpower and execute build, should work really well. The idea would be to group enemies and hit them with bouncing fireballs until one of them gets injured (Ahu + Xan). Then you start overpowering and whatever falls bellow 25% hp is instantly executed.

13

This combo will better in Season 8

Ahu:

Previous: Lucky hit: 100% when hitting an Injured enemy.
Now: Lucky hit: 100% when hitting a non-Healthy enemy.
Offering gained reduced from 25 to 15.

Xan:

Previous: Your next skill critically overpowers. Overflow: 1% damage per 10 Offering.
Now: Your next attack will cause your hits to be a guaranteed Critical Strike and Overpower for 0.25 seconds. Overflow: 0.35% damage per Offering.
Offering required reduced from 700 to 300.
14

Yeah, no snapshot BS anymore, RIP druid snapshots :smiley: But this combo works particularly well with bouncing fireballs and the execution of the new greater fireball.

1 Like
15

Frostbite is in the game since the beta…

16

Not sure, I haven’t tought this in much detail but I would want Core skills to work with Mastery skills and vice versa when taken as enchantment slots.

For example, in my case Fireball would be my main skill but I would take meteorites as my enchantment skill so everytime I cast fireball, meteorites would spawn around my fireballs making the aoe field bigger and more damage.
This would be fun if you wanted a Meteor build with Fireball as echantment slot too. Meteors would hit the ground then Fireballs would spawn at meteors impact and bounce twice before disappearing.

I would like more fun builds like these like a Frozen Orb build with Blizzard as enchantment etc. I really want more synergy between these 2 categories (Core and Mastery) that can compliment eachother and are good too.

But this is a pipe dream of mine, will probably never happen. Still cannot help but keep wondering about “what if’s” :laughing:

1 Like
17

Something like this?

Core Enchantments and Mastery Enchantments skills can be paired up for a combined effect. This effect replaces the normal Enchantments effects.

Incinerate+Firewall: Serpents cast Incinerate over your casted Firewalls. A Firewall will exist under your Incinerate while at max power.

Fireball+Meteor: Casts a Fireball at a nearby enemy when a Meteor falls. Meteorites fall per Fireball explosion. ( all Fireballs are affected by uniques)

Frozen Orb+Blizzard: A 2 seconds Blizzard appears at your casted Frozen Orb explosions locations. Your Blizzard’s casts constantly explode with Frozen Orb.

Ice Shards+Blizzard: A 2 seconds Blizzard appears at the first enemy hit by a cast of Ice Shards. Ice Shards constantly fly at enemies affected by a Blizzard.

Chain Lighting+Ball Lighting: A static Ball Lighting appears for 2 seconds at the last hit location of your casted Chain Lighting. Your casted Ball Lighting will shoot out a Chain Lighting after hitting 5 times. (Shoots 2 CL on Super Ball Lighting impact, Shoots 1 CL every 5 hits while BL is circling you)

Charged Bolts+Ball Lighting: A static Ball Lighting Ball appears for 2 seconds when a Charged Bolt surges. Ball Lightning constantly releases Charged Bolts. (Super Ball Lighting releases 6 CB on impact, You constantly release CB while a BL is Circling you)
(I have not used the new “circling ball lighting” unique, I’m not sure how the quantity of Balls affects the hit count)

2 Likes
18

Love convulsions and enchant master change.

19

Aww I love these idea’s, you really thought them through. I appreciate this so much, if you get further ideas to expand on this, feel free to do so. You might even make it its own thread, see what other people think hehehe :smiling_face:

I wanted to add something, since fireball and meteorites are my favourite playstyle. In meteorites build when taking fireball as enchantment, fireballs fall in X formation around the meteorites on meteorites impact and bounce twice before disappearing.

20

I adapted my no snapshot chain lightning build with convulsion tempers to PTR 8. T4 isn’t hard at all, however leveling glyphs is gonna be a pain. Pit 76 in S8 already feels like Pit 103 in S7:
Diablo IV 2025 PTR Season 8 Chain Lightning Sorc Testing

1 Like