Firewall Sorcerer Endgame Guide
Welcome to the Firewall Sorcerer Endgame Guide!
Firewall received some buffs last season to allow it to be a more comfortable Endgame build, while it is less powerful than Incinerate it has the benefit of not being a Channeling Skill. Familiar will provide a damage bonus with Invoked Familiar, try to keep one Fire Familiar active. Flame Shield makes you Immune for a few seconds which is invaluable for avoiding dangerous stacks in Pits along with providing Unstoppable, which will break active crowd control. Teleport will allow you to reposition for damage or defense along with providing Unstoppable. Ice Armor will provide a large Barrier and a damage increase thanks to Storm Swell. Inferno gives a large damage bonus and removes the Mana cost from Pyromancy Skills with Supreme Inferno, use this whenever available to group enemies and deal more damage.
Tal Rasha's Iridescent Loop is a large part of your gameplay, requiring you to stack your three different elements to gain a large damage bonus and then rotate two to maintain it. Ice Armor will provide your Frost Skill and Teleport will be your Shock Skill and main rotation with your Pyromancy Skill Firewall.
This build guide assumes you have a Level 60 Character and unlocked Torment 1. To get there, level up with one of our Sorcerer Leveling Guides. See how this Build compares against others with our various Build Tier Lists.
Witchcraft Powers
Season 7 is the Season of Witchcraft. It features two separate borrowed power mechanics in the forms of Witchcraft Powers and Occult Gems. Both Seasonal mechanics are unlocked and improved by new NPCs found at the Tree of Whispers after collecting resources from Headhunt Zones, Seasonal areas similar to Helltide that appear across Sanctuary.
There are 25 Witchcraft Powers, 6 of which can be equipped at a time. Each Power belongs to one of four Schools (Eldritch, Growth & Decay, Psyche, and Lost), tags that promote synergies within themselves and with Occult Gems. Each School has a single Unique Witchcraft Power, only one of which can be equipped at a time. These Unique Powers max out and gain an additional effect at rank 5, while the other Powers max at rank 21 and gain their bonus effects at various levels. To unlock and improve Witchcraft Powers, defeat Headrotten or complete Whispers within the Headhunt Zones to collect Restless Rot. Lost Powers are an exception, requiring you to randomly encounter a Forgotten Altar in Dungeons to unlock them.
Best-in-Slot Witchcraft Powers
- Soul Harvest - Increased primary stat for each nearby enemy when using a cooldown, the duration will stay active while enemies are nearby.
- Decay Augmentation - Witching Hour will convert your Firewall to an Eldritch Power, allowing it to benefit from this damage bonus.
- Purging Touch - Witching Hour will convert your Firewall to an Eldritch Power, allowing it to benefit from this damage bonus.
- Hex of Whispers - Fortify for defense along with the negative status effect removal applying to the Pit and Tormented Boss stacks in PTR make this a good choice.
- Shaken Soul - Consistent Vulnerable is important for Frigid Fate.
- Doom Orb - Three Eldritch Powers are needed for Witching Hour and we choose to take this unique power due to there being more desirable Growth & Decay Powers.
Alternate Witchcraft Powers
It will be difficult to change any Witchcraft Powers because the recommended Occult Gems require three Eldritch Powers along with three Growth & Decay Powers.
- Aura of Siphoning - This will provide some potential healing.
Occult Gems
Rarely, Headrotten Bosses appear with a still-attached Fugitive Head stolen from the Tree of Whispers. Slay these enemies and return the Heads to Gelena to unlock and upgrade Occult Gems. These Gems are socketable in Jewelry and each provide +160 Armor and +8% Resistance to All Elements. More importantly, each Occult Gem grants a unique effect that synergizes with your equipped Witchcraft Powers to provide a variety of Offensive, Defensive, and Utility-based bonuses.
Best-in-Slot Occult Gems
- Witching Hour - Convert your Firewall into an Eldritch Power once every second. This is used for the damage bonus of Purging Touch.
- Friend of the Bog - More primary stat will provide more damage combined the benefit of moving Unhindered through enemies along with a health increase make this an easy choice.
- Wicked Pact - This will empower your Purging Touch.
Alternate Occult Gems
- Toadling's Wish - Boosts Decay Augmentation and Soul Harvest.
- Dust Stone - A minor damage increase.
- Hungering Void - Helps group enemies.
Learn more details about the season theme in our full Season Guide.
Skills & Gameplay
- Firewall is our primary damage skill. This creates a line of burning damage on the ground. You can stack these and lure enemies into them, enemies will continue to take damage for a few seconds after leaving the burning area thanks to Mage's Firewall.
- Familiar will provide a damage bonus if used after a Pyromancy Skill thanks to Invoked Familiar, try to keep one active.
- Teleport is great mobility and it provides Unstoppable to break crowd control if you are caught, the Enchantment version will not provide Unstoppable.
- Flame Shield makes you Immune for a few seconds, a mechanic to avoid any damage and also provides Unstoppable to break crowd control, you can use this to avoid dangerous stacks from Pit bosses.
- Ice Armor provides a large Barrier along with damage bonuses from Storm Swell and Mystical Ice Armor, it can also make you Unstoppable with Snowveiled.
- Inferno will pull enemies together to group them, remove the Mana cost of your Pyromancy skills and also provide a large damage bonus while active, cast this as often as possible.
Skill Rotation
- Cast Ice Armor and Teleport to activate Tal Rasha's Iridescent Loop, rotate Firewall with Teleport to maintain your stacks. Use Ice Armor when available and maintain one Fire Familiar. Use Inferno when available to group enemies and gain bonus damage.
- (On Elites & Bosses) Consider saving Flame Shield for dangerous moments to avoid death or deadly stacks from Pit bosses.
- (On Bosses) Keep an eye on the stagger bar and prepare to nuke right when it fills as many of our damage modifiers rely on crowd controls.
Sorcerer Enchantments
Incinerate is our first Enchantment. This will give us extra damage with Conflagration.
Teleport is a useful Enchantment for adding more mobility to your gameplay. This replaces your evade with a shorter range Teleport than doesn't make you Unstoppable.
Learn more details and how to unlock this system in our full Sorcerer Enchantment Guide.
Paragon & Glyphs
Carefully check your Paragon Boards to ensure correct board rotation. Glyphs go from a radius of 3 to 4 at level 15 and from 4 to 5 at level 46. Some of them cannot be activated before reaching these thresholds! Progress through The Pit to rank up your Glyphs.
Use the slider to see the progression steps. At around Paragon 200, leveling slows down significantly and all important Rare clusters, Legendary nodes and Glyph sockets should be unlocked. Afterwards, you can min/max your build with minor tweaks and by picking up additional smaller nodes.
Firewall Sorcerer Endgame Paragon
Some Glyph position swaps, board changes and other pathing adjustments may occur as you unlock your full potential. The setup displayed by default is the final version of the build before spending additional points that do not significantly impact your character's power.
Glyph Leveling Priorities
To Level 15
- Eliminator
- Torch
- Tactician
- Pyromaniac
- Exploit
To Level 46
- Torch
- Eliminator
- Tactician
- Pyromaniac
- Exploit
There are a total of 328 Paragon Points. After reaching level 60, you gain up to 300 Paragon Levels, 24 from Renown and 4 from Altars of Lilith. Check out our dedicated in-depth guides to learn more about Paragon Boards and Glyphs.
Runes
You can have up to two Runewords in your setup, each consisting of one Ritual and one Invocation Rune. Socket them in Two-Handed Weapons if your build calls for them, otherwise place them into your Armor pieces to replace normal gems. The Firewall Sorcerer Endgame build focuses on the following combos:
Best in Slot
- Cir + Thul will cast a Mystical Frost Nova after using 5 skills every three seconds.
- Igni + Zec will reduce your Ultimate cooldown to help uptime.
Alternative choices
If you haven't unlocked the final setup or found the top runes, you can also benefit from these options:
- Neo is another great choice for offering if you can maintain your Barrier.
- Ohm can provide more damage at the cost of Ultimate cooldown reduction.
- Kry can help group enemies.
- Grand Topaz will give you a flat damage increase.
Learn more about Runes and how they work in our dedicated Runewords Overview and Runewords Tier List.
Mercenaries
Mercenaries are unlocked during the Vessel of Hatred campaign and assist you in battle. There are 4 separate Mercenaries to choose from, each with their own skill trees and abilities. You can have one hired (permanent) mercenary during solo play and a reinforcement who assists you from time to time in certain situations.
Hired: Subo
- Subo is a great choice for casual gameplay thanks to his passive Seeker that reveals enemies and objects, this is a nice quality of life addition and also gives some Mana sustain. Grab Molotov along with Scorched Earth to boost your damage over time. Next you pick Snipe along with Incendiary Bolt to trigger the Scorched Earth as well.
- Raheir is a great alternative if you don't mind dropping the maphack, Valiance is an amazing defensive tool that will prevent damage from large hits along with give you Unstoppable. Take Ground Slam and grab Raheir's Aegis for extra defense. Next you want Bastion with Inspiration. Valiance is a very powerful mechanic for pushing more difficult content or playing on Hardcore.
Reinforcement: Raheir
- Varyana is a good choice to maximize offense. Bloodthirst will give some extra attack speed and you can set it to activate on any skill in combat.
- Raheir will potentially save your character with his reinforcement Bastion. Setting this to trigger on Injured can keep you going in difficult encounters.
Learn more about Mercenaries and how they work in our dedicated Mercenaries Overview.
Stat Priorities & Item Progression
To enable the Firewall Sorcerer to perform optimally, hunt for these stats on your gear with good rolls and aim to Temper ⚒️ & Masterwork Crit ↑ them accordingly. Keep in mind that certain stats, such as Armor, Resistances, Extra Size Tempers, Attack Speed and more, have caps that may affect your priorities according to the items and Paragon points available at that moment.
Recommended Endgame Stat Thresholds
- 35%+ Cooldown Reduction
- 500+ Damage Over Time
- 30%+ Attack Speed
- 40%+ Pyromancy Attack Speed
- 2000+ Intelligence
- Armor Capped 1,000
- Resistance Capped 70%+
- 3,500+ Life
Item Progression Goals
Before you dive into the Endgame with the Firewall Sorcerer, take a look at this overview of the items used in the build. See below for further details about the different progression steps and variants. Some of your Skill Tree choices depend on what Legendary Aspects and Unique items are available to you. Keep in mind that while we can guarantee that everyone has access to the same Codex of Power Aspects, the exact progression is different for everyone.
Learn more details and how to farm Legendary Aspects and Uniques in our General Farming Guide.
Build Variants
This section is designed to guide your Firewall Sorcerer from a fresh level 60 into the very late endgame using the three variants Starter, Ancestral and Mythic. At the final step, you should be fully decked out with a great all-rounder build. From there, follow the other min/max variants if you want to optimize around certain activities such as Pit Pushing, Speedfarming and more.
If you are fresh in Torment 1 coming from a leveling guide, this is where you begin. Since only some Aspects can be guaranteed from Dungeon unlocks for the Codex of Power, focus on acquiring the additional aspects via gambling with Murmuring Obols.
Gear & Skills
- Early on in your progression, focus on Armor & Resistances to survive. Each Torment difficulty adds a penalty of -250 Armor and -25% all Res and it's recommended to keep both capped (1000 Armor, 70+ Res) at all times. As you unlock higher power gear, masterworking levels and more Paragon points, you naturally scale your character into the higher difficulties and can start replacing some of these rolls with offensive or utility stats.
- Damage Over Time is a priority for your Combustion scaling, this will help you start to find your first Unique items.
The goal here is to progress through the Torment difficulties as you unlock Ancestrals, Paragon points, all Legendary Aspects, Temper mods and the most important Uniques to pilot this build. Some Legendary Aspects are used temporarily to fill slots that may be replaced with more Unique items later on.
Gear & Skills
- As you upgrade your gear to Ancestrals with more masterworking levels and reach higher paragon, you can focus more and more on replacing Armor & Resistance rolls with better stats, but ensure to stay capped at 1000 Armor and 70%+ Resistances for the difficulty you're currently in.
- Flickerstep quickly reduces your Teleport Enchantment cooldown and helps reset your Inferno.
- Tal Rasha's Iridescent Loop will require casting your Ice Armor for your Frost stack at the beginning of combat and then rotating Shock and Frost to maintain it.
- Raiment of the Infinite is an option that will pull enemies near your Teleport location, making it easier to group enemies. Beware of being trapped in the enemies. If you actively move away from the direction enemies are mainly being pulled from then you can avoid the trap.
This is the final version of the build's progression, including all regular Unique items, Mythic Uniques, Legendary Aspects, Temper mods and Masterworking, leaving you with a great all-rounder build for all content in the game. Additional variants use this as a baseline to optimize around certain activities.
Gear & Skills
- Shroud of False Death provides damage and a good amount of defense thanks to it's bonus to Passive Skills.
- Ring of Starless Skies provides great damage and drastically reduces our Mana cost.
- Heir of Perdition provides a massive damage increase at the cost of cooldown reduction.
This Speedfarming variant optimizes the build for easy activities like Helltides, Whispers, Nightmare Dungeons and lower Pit Tiers after you have finished the Mythic variant and reached a plateau in your progression.
Gear & Skills
- Remains the same as Mythic.
This setup optimizes the build to push the highest possible Tiers in The Pit after you have finished the Mythic variant and reached a plateau in your progression.
Gear & Skills
- When fighting monsters in high tiers of the Pit, remember that after crowd controlling elites for 5 seconds, they become Unstoppable for 8 seconds. This may be the right moment to start kiting them around because your damage done goes way down and they can freely retaliate.
- Concussive Strikes provides more damage over Snowveiled.
FAQ & Mechanics
Once a guide is released, many players have questions on why and how we are approaching certain choices. In this section you can find the answers to the questions that have been asked the most.
The build works really well when you decimate everything in seconds, but may get overwhelmed if fights are long against high level monsters. There are several adjustments you can make when you have trouble with more difficult content:
- Check if your Armor & Resists are capped.
- Use defensive consumables.
- Roll Maximum Life instead of offensive stats on as many pieces as possible.
- Kite enemies when they become Unstoppable.
Sorcerers has two primary sources of Unstoppable with Teleport and Flame Shield. You can also use the Snowveiled to add it to Ice Armor.
Generally hardcore and softcore share the same builds. Outside of being more prudent in your gameplay, you can also tweak the setup slightly to raise your survivability:
- Focus more on Armor & Resists, making sure that they are always capped especially as you transition into higher torment difficulties.
- Focus more on maximum life rolls, for example replacing DPS stats like main attributes, attack speed, critical strike chance and additive increased damage rolls. Also masterwork life more than normal if no other crucial stats have priority.
- Focus on adding defensive skills, passives and paragon nodes first as you level up.
- Play on a slightly lower difficulty than normal, don't push into difficult territory. As long as you can deal with all enemies swiftly, they can't retaliate.
- Save a source of Unstoppable if possible to get out of crowd controls.
- Use defensive elixirs and incenses instead of offensive ones.
Permafrost's tooltip is currently bugged. It increases the damage of all your skills, not just Frost ones.
Shredding Blades will increase your damage against Vulnerable enemies even if you don't use Ice Blades.
Mechanics
- Deals damage 2 times per second for a total of 16 ticks over the 8 second duration.
- When an enemy leaves a Firewall, the DoT from Mage's Firewall starts ticking for up to another 6 ticks of damage.
- Firewall snapshots all damage buffs and debuffs on an enemy when it's applied (when Firewall is cast or when an enemy enters an existing Firewall).
- Same applies to the Mage's Firewall's DoT. The damage is snapshotted when an enemy leaves the Firewall or when it expires.
- Tal Rasha's Iridescent Loop provides a stacking damage increase for each of our elemental skills. After casting all three elements you only need to cast two different elements to maintain all three stacks. For Firewall sorcerer you will most commonly rotate between Teleport > Firewall > Frost Nova > Firewall > Ice Blades > Firewall. At this point you simply always try to have a Frost skill available within every 5 seconds to weave into our Firewall. Once you have enough cooldown reduction it won't require as much timing.
- While all the exact mechanics are much more nuanced, there are two separate Attack Speed Bonus caps of +100% that apply to all builds for a total potential of +200%. For Sorcerers, these two caps are distributed in the following way:
Cap 1
- Moonrise
- Elixir of Advantage II
- Attack Speed (Gear Affix)
- Andariel's Visage
- Culler
- Swift Conjurer
- Ancient Flame
- Artillery Shrine (100% AS)
Cap 2
- Accelerating
- Rapid
- Prime Unstable Currents
- Basic Attack Speed (Gear Affix)
- Gloves of the Illuminator
- Pyromancy Attack Speed (Tempering)
Read up more on Attack Speed in our dedicated guide by Ava.
Bosses are immune to Crowd Control (CC) effects and instead take Stagger Damage when hit by one. The amount of stagger damage dealt depends on the type of CC and is proportional to its duration. After being hit by a CC effect, the Boss will temporarily take less Stagger Damage from a CC of the same type.
Effectively, this means that when you're just spamming one type of CC you don't need to spam any more of it than what you need to keep a normal enemy permanently CC-d. To stagger the Boss quickly you need to use as many different types of CC as possible. After the Boss is staggered it gains a certain amount of stacking Stagger Damage Reduction for the rest of the fight:
- After 1st Stagger: 20%
- After 2nd Stagger: 40%
- After 3rd Stagger: 60%
- After 4th Stagger: 90%
Bosses naturally regain 1% of their Stagger HP every second and when that regen is combined with 90% Stagger Damage Reduction it becomes borderline impossible to Stagger the Boss again unless you bring a serious amount of crowd controls.
Video Guide
Summary
The Firewall Sorcerer has received some buffs to make it a more viable Endgame build.
- Maintain your Tal Rasha's Iridescent Loop stacks easily with Teleport while setting the world on fire.
- Plenty of Defensive Skills help keep your fire going, Familiar will also provide a barrier with Protection.
Credits
Written by pandaglassjaw