Ragnarok Online 2 Sorcerer Guide

Ragnarok Online 2 Sorcerer Guide by The Red Roses

The Sorcerer

The sorceror is one of the most versatile classes to play, in such a way that your skill build varies to your playing style as well as what you'd like to bring forward in parties and raids.

Sorcs are one of the only two classes in the game people depend on for healing (the other obviously being the priest). What makes a sorceror's heals different from a priests is that it ffocuses more on Area of Effect and Heals over Time.

Sorcerors also provide other types of support in the forms of defense buffs, ressurecting other players, targetted heals (not as good as priests of course).

And of course hailing from the mage class, sorcerors also pack their own arsenal of spells to whittle down the enemy via combinations of spells, instant cast or double damage procs.

The Spellbook

The sorceror has 4 tress that can be followed namely: (1) Water, (2) Fire, (3) Wind/Lightning, aand (4) Earth. How you go about the skills depends on your heart. Captain Planet pun aside, I'll be giving some insight on all of the skills and suggestions to skill levels in this section.

Water:

Cold Bolt ●●●●●

Second fastest/strongest of the three bolts; it has a 40% slow debuf which is the same across all the levels. This is the bread and butter skill for all Ice-Lightning sorc builds because it triggers Wind Arms. Unless you're a full support Sorcerer, this skill should be at level 5.

Frost Driver ●●●●●

Your first disable. Freezes your target for 2/4/6 seconds and during that time all Lightning spells do double damage. ALL. Including your party's. The only thing bad about it: diminishing returns. Your next frost lasts half duration, and the third frost will miss. The diminishing returns is counted by the monster so if another mage freezes it it will be counted towards the 2 freeze rule.

This is your key to burst damaging anything that can be frozen, Frost Driver into Varetyr Spear and Jupitel Thunder usually does a ridiculous amount of damage. Great for taking out small adds, and absolutely necessary for disarming the Devil Bomb in Baphomet's Garden (Hard).

Water Arms ●●●●●

The popular approach to the Elemental Arms would be to ALWAYS have ONE on. Although there have been builds suggesting getting both Wind and Earth Arms so you can shift into heal or dps modes, that still attributes to the same approach.

Water arms has HP and SP regeneration. We don't care about that. That's what heals and Mana Potions are for. What's important about water arms is the -10% damage it provides. So you might be saying to yourself "Well, I'd rather be doing double damage lightning attacks" or "I need to have my heal up or I wont heal enough" or even better "I wont even be getting hit as much anyway, why bother.

The answer would be Water Arms. The question: Boss AoEs. There are boss skills that are designed to kill some unlikely souls outright. Stick around in the wrong places and you die. And if you find yourself in the awkward position of not being able to escape, then there's nothing left to do but drop a Deluge and brace yourself with Water Arms. Then go back to your regular arms after.

Summon Aqua ●●●●●

This is your automatic mobile Cold Bolt turret. Summons a water elemental that is immune to everything and doesn't go away until his time is up. It's pretty much an extension of the sorcerer as its damage is based on your stats; and not to mention it can even do critical hits. It will unleash 15 cold bolts over 30 seconds (one every two seconds) at whatever you targeted when casting this. He doesn't stop, he doesn't die, he doesn't need you to do anything, he'll chase your target down. And when the target is dead, he'll move on the the next closest one. Amazing skill for long term burst damage.

Healing Wave ●●○○○

Your basic point and click heal spell. Considerably Much weaker than the Priest's Heal. Only for full support. I personally do not advocate sorcerer doing point and click heals, since they do damage much better, and really, AoE heals from Deluge and Land of Recovery is what is expected. But if you want to go for a full support sorc, it's definitely possible.

For Hybrid builds, if you find yourself needing to choose between Healing Wave and Earth Arms. Just get Earth Arms. Since the 10% affects all of your heals. That and the difference between level 1 and level 5 Healing wave is right about 10% anyway.

Soul Cleansing ●●●○○

Removes status such as stun and freeze from my testing which can be useful. Example's would be Final Boss in Culvert Abyss stun and Blue Crab in Arena's Freeze. Only issue is that the number of status removed is actually spread across the AoE. So at level 2 if you target 4 frozen players (poor saps) only 2 are set free.

Not sure if it works on Silence etc.

Meditation ●●●●●

Ever since this skill was changed it's been pretty amazing. At level 1, it gives you 340% of your (Accuracy -95%) as critical. This skill truly shines later in the game when you're geared out with accuracy pumping equipment. Level 1 should suffice, but if you're looking to do a full Agi/Dex critical build, then feel free to take it to higher levels if you have the excess skill points.

Deluge ●●●●●

The sorcerer's "oh s**t" skill. This skill saves lives during raids and is absolutely necessary to have if you plan on going raiding. If you don't have it, don't expect people to be happy with you. What makes this better than the priest's sanctuary is the fact that it boosts the party's maximum HP as well, this can be a real blessing (pun intended) when you can anticipate bosses using their AoE's (learn to watch the raid icons, it warns you). Don't skip this skill, it's pretty high priority, get it at level 1 at the very least. But the higher the level the better.

Fire:

Firebolt ○○○○○

Cold Bolt is better.

Fireball Mastery ○○○○○

You are not going to use Fire Bolt.

Fire Arms ○○○○○

Wind Arms is better.

Fireball ○○○○○

This skill says 30% damage burn. That 30% isn't 30% of your MATK. It's 30% of the 56% you did with the skill initially. That's 72.8% damage. That's 8.8% more damage than what Jupitel does. If you think 5 skill points are worth 8.8% of damage while you could have just been using Cold Bolt at least 3 times (Which is more than 72.8%) while casting to set up a double damage Jupitel. Go ahead. But my professional advice: No.

"Animation what? Dual what? This is Ro2, double cast was a Ro1 skill". Check out The Necronomicon section when I post it.

Wind / Lightning :

Lightning Bolt ●●●●●

If you're looking for a "cheap" source of DPS so that you can spend your points into being a support sorcerer, look no further. This is as cheap and efficient as it gets. Don't be mistaken though, this skill spammed alone can't hope do deal more damage than the Ice-Lightning build of course. That and it's pretty mana intensive, so get ready to spam those Mana Potions.

Thunder Storm ○○○○○

No. Just. No.

Wind Arms ●●●●●●

Yes those are 6 ratings. This skill is amazing. Forget about how it makes you cast faster (actually no, don't forget it, it's awesome), 30% chance to do DOUBLE DAMAGE on your next TWO LIGHTNING ATTACKS after using Cold Bolt? Nothing says burst damage like double damage.

Best part is, it's not a de-buff on the monster that says "the next two lightning attacks done to this monster do double damage" it's a buff on you that says "the next two lightning attacks you do inflicts double damage". This is the cornerstone of all Ice-Lightning builds. This is the reason we spam Cold Bolt.

Jupitel Thunder ●●●●●


This is the skill that follows all Frost Drives and all Double Damage procs. 128% Damage? Yes please.

Don't use this skill unless you've got the Wind Arms proc or if the monster is Frozen. This is a good skill that has synergy with other good skills. Max it if you're doing DPS. There's really nothing to talk about here.

Jupitel Thunder Mastery ●●●○○


Same as Fireball Mastery 5%/10%/15% chance to get an instant cast buff for Jupitel Thunder after using Lightning COLD BOLT. Did I mention how cold bolt triggers wind arms? If you have the excess skill points to toss into here, go for it if you want more DPS. Low priority skill, but if you've got the points to toss in here go ahead.

Foresight ●●●●●

Rating of 5. But only for PvP/WoE. Otherwise it really doesn't have any use. Frost Drive -> Jupitel -> Varetyr -> Jupitel is about as burst damage as you can get. Most players will drop dead from it.

Until PvP/WoE becomes implemented and unless you're making a PvP build: leave this skill at 1.

Lord of Vermilion ●●●○○


Okay. So this skill is the much better Thunderstorm. It does as much damage as the Warrior's Brandish Storm, and Priest's Magnus Exorcismus. I personally don't like maxing it. simply because Sorcs can Nuke Adds/Mobs/Summons better than they can AoE them; I like to leave the mob clearing to Wizards and Warriors personally.

Biggest downfall of this skill? The AoE has you in the center. Normally you don't want to be standing in the center of the adds.

Varetyr Spear ●●●●●

NUKE. That's what this spell is. No requirements, you push the button and the spell flies out and does a ridiculous amount of damage. 30 second cooldown is nothing to worry about. If you're leveling up, you'll probably only use this once per monster anyway. Great generally killing anything. It also has a 3 second stun! In PvP Frost Drive->Varetyr+Jupitel pretty much spells the end for most opponents. 80% damage on demand is nothing to laugh at.

Earth

Earth Arms ●●●●●

Absolutely necessary if you're going to go for the healing route. +10% Heal goes into your LoR, your Deluge, your Healing Wave, your Rejuvenation. The heal over time (HoT) triggered by the critical only gets triggered by single target heals. This skill is kind of silly with stats since it depends on you landing a crit, as well as having high MATK. The HoT isn't based on the amount your healed (like Fireball's DoT) but based on your MATK so this is constant.

Soul Binding ●●●●●●

6 Stars. Level 3. No questions asked. 3 minutes is a lot shorter than 5 minutes. And in a raid, one of the most common reasons for wiping out is because resurrect hasn't cooled down yet.

Rejuvenation ●●●●●

If Healing Wave is to the Priest's Heal, then Rejuvenation is to the Priest's Highness Heal. This used to be worse, since there was this whole dance involved in casting this "instant" heal. But they've sped that up and it's speed is comparable to Healing Wave and the amount it heals makes up for any difference.

Earth Shield ●●●●●

I'd like to rate this lower. Because really this skill works on percentages. Meaning, it's better for tanks, but kinda whatever for people who aren't stacking up on defense. Unlike wind arms that gives you a solid 20% to your speed this skill is based on how much defense you have. But you know, people like their buffs, and every little bit counts, so get it at 5, otherwise you'll have to depend on another sorc to have it at 5.


Land of Recovery ●●●●●●

Another 6 rated skill. The Sorcerer's signature skill. This is the skill that makes Sorcerers an auto include in any raid. The Land of Recovery can ALWAYS be on the floor since the duration lasts 10 seconds and the cooldown takes 10 seconds but somehow you can overlap your current and next casts to keep it going. Pro tip: ALWAYS keep Land of Recovery down. ALWAYS. Regularly you'll want to keep it on yourself, and regularly the RDPS and healers would be standing near you benefitting from this. On other occasions though the LoR's are dropped on the tanks, particularly for bosses without much AoE skills.

Core skills(25 skill points remaining) :

Level 3 Frost Driver
Level 1 Deluge

Level 3 Soul Binding
Level 5 Earth Shield
Level 5 Land of Recovery

Regularly I'd like to advocate the use of level 5 Deluge, but if you feel like a lower level is good enough, that's your call. As for Frost Driver, this skill truly shines later on in Hard Raids when you have certain mobs. Normal raids don't really call for Frost Driver so much, save for Baphomet's Horong, but that takes too long to kill to make Frost Driver relevant anyway.

Next you'll have to decide if you're going for DPS or Support: 

Support Skills (1 skill point remaining):

Level 3 Frost Driver
Level 5 Healing Wave
Level 5 Meditation
Level 5 Deluge

Level 5 Lightning Bolt

Level 5 Earth Arms
Level 3 Soul Binding
Level 5 Rejuvenation
Level 5 Earth Shield
Level 5 Land of Recovery

DPS Build (4 skill points remaining):

Level 5 Cold Bolt
Level 3 Frost Driver
Level 1 Deluge


Level 5 Wind Arms
Level 3 Jupitel Thunder
Level 5 Varetyr Spear

Level 3 Soul Binding
Level 5 Earth Shield
Level 5 Land of Recovery

You may distribute the 4 remaining skill points as you desire between Deluge, Summon Aqua, Jupitel Thunder Mastery, or Lord of Vermilion.

And then of course there's the choice to be a Hybrid

Hybrid Build (8 skill points remaining):

Level 3 Frost Driver
Level 5 Healing Wave
Level 1 Deluge


Level 5 Wind Arms
Level 3 Jupitel Thunder

Level 3 Soul Binding
Level 5 Earth Shield
Level 5 Land of Recovery 

The 8 remaining points may be distributed as you like among Summon Aqua, Deluge, Jupitel Thunder Mastery, or Rejuvenation.

In the end, it's really a huge mix and match of what you feel would be the better skill to play with. Summon Aqua is hands off, you drop it, and it does its job. Lightning Bolt is flexible and inexpensive, having no cast or cooldown, you won't find yourself stuck in the middle of a cast wishing you were dropping Deluge instead. JTM really is just reaching for more DPS, that's my last choice personally. Meditation only really shines later in the game when you've geared out with accuracy boosting items.

Stat build:
Int - 48/50
Agi/Vit - Remaining points.


Starting off, you want to have some Vit, around 25-40 should do, for the most part it's because you don't have any gear that boosts your health. And a dead sorc is a useless sorc.

Also, you need to have int more than you need Agi. Simply because your critical rate is pitiful to begin with anyway and you simply do more damage with more int, raw power wins out in this one.

HOWEVER! End game, when you're all decked out in the best gear, you want to have maximum Agi and the rest will go into Int. Simply because your gear will already give you truckloads of Int and you'll have enough HP to survive most things anyway.

The safest way you can go is to put 25 Int asap, then decide whether or not you want to force yourself to do a skill reset later on. You can hope to later just pick up Scratch Raider Cards so you dont need to put vit in, but trust me for those first few Raids you want the HP. Agi really wont help you out too much early in the game.

Another build, for those of you who want results asap, is to bring your Int all the way to 40-50. With your Int at 40 you can still raise Agi all the way to 40 as well, while not squeezing the juice out of your sorc completely, it keeps you from running around as a 25/50/5 (Int/Agi/Vit) sorc without the proper gear.

Cards:
Poisoner (DPS)
Scratch Raider (Fresh 50, or if you go for the support/vit build).

How to play your Sorcerer:

Rule Number 1: Always. Always. Always. Use Land of Recovery.
Rule Number 2: Don't forget you can heal. Even a level 1 Healing Wave and Rejuvenation can keep your Tank from dying while the healers are preoccupied.
Rule Number 3: Know who to resurrect. Priorities are Tanks and Healers (for chain resurrections).
Addendum to Rule Number 3: Be careful not to resurrect at the same time as others, communication is key in any party/raid.
Rule Number 4: Always drop Summon Aqua unless otherwise told not to DPS.

Otherwise, proceed to annihilate your opponents with your attack skills.

Skill Rotations and Combos:

Skill Combo 1: Foresight > FD > JT > VS > JT
Skill Combo 2: FD > JT > VS
Skill Combo 3: FD > JT > LB > LB, FD > VS

Use rotations when combos aren't available.

Skill Rotation 1: Spam Lightning Bolt.
Skill Rotation 2: Spam Cold Bolt. When Wind Arms triggers, use Varetyr if available, otherwise use Jupitel. Use Cold Bolt when Jupitel is on Cooldown.