Ice Shards Sorcerer Leveling Guide

Season 6 is the Season of Hatred Rising. It features the Zakarum Remnants faction which hunts Realmwalkers, massive behemoths that roam outdoor zones and beckon Mephisto's hellspawn. Participate in these zone events and take down the Realmwalkers to spawn a portal to a Seething Realm. There you can acquire Seething Opals, new consumables that stack with Elixirs for a XP buff and the chance to gather extra rewards when defeating enemies. The types of Opals are:

Use these Opals at all times to earn reputation with the Zakarum Remnants faction and unlock further rewards.

Enchantments

At level 15, you unlock the Sorcerer Enchantments class mechanic. Finish this Priority Quest as soon as possible to get Fireball Enchantment. Any enemy that dies will explode with a Fireball, providing a chain reaction that destroys weaker enemies and sometimes elites if they are surrounded by weaker enemies.

Mastery Skills

You don't take any skills here but will grab some passives from previous categories. Take Protection passive to provide additional barriers on all skills that have a cooldown. You also take ranks in Ice Shards. You can move on once you unlock Ultimate Skills.

Ultimate Skills

You don't take any ultimate skills for this build but you should prioritize getting the Warmth passive. This will heal you for each enemy burning around you and allows you to save Healing Potions for important moments. You also take Glass Cannon and ranks to Ice Shards. You can move on once you unlock your Key Passive.

Key Passive

Enlightenment is your key passive. This will give additional damage, Mana regeneration, and attack speed. It requires you to rotate between different elements to gain stacks until you become Enlightened. The buff will last 10 seconds, during this time you will do not need to rotate your elements and instead can focus on dealing as much damage as your Mana allows. Once the buff falls off, you should go back to rotating between different elements.

Priority Passives

You prioritize passives that will have a more direct impact. You take Conjuration Mastery, Permafrost, and Hoarfrost for extra damage. Pick up Mana Shield and Icy Veil for extra defense. Grab Frigid Breeze, Snap Freeze, and Evocation for extra utility.

Final Journey to 60

Your final passives will include Elemental Synergies, Icy Touch, Hoarfrost, ranks to Frost Nova, Shimmering Ice Armor and Shimmering Teleport. You can change your order of passives if you feel the desire to, focusing on all damage before grabbing extra defense.

Sorcerer Enchantments

Unlocking Enchantments

Once you reach level 15, you have to complete a short quest line starting west of Nevesk, Fractured Peaks. A Priority Quest leads you there to seek out Mordarin. You will enter a dungeon to find a quest item and then finish a short encounter in a nearby shack.

To get started with the Ice Shards Sorcerer Leveling build, always use your highest DPS Staff available for more damage. You can use one hand and offhand if they both have higher item power than your current Staff but will be less likely to find consistent upgrades for two items instead of one. Otherwise, follow the priority list below. While you don't have all of the desired temper manuals available, simply try to get anything useful on your gear until you acquire the right ones. For example, % Damage, Damage to Close, Vulnerable Damage, etc. all work as long as you activate their conditions. Likewise, you can temper multiple defensive options such as Resistances, Life, Armor to fill gaps in your survivability. Tempering low level gear is relatively cheap and the results can be very impactful.

Tip: For the early game, Elemental Surge Weapon Tempers are very powerful due to their high base damage, especially if you are twinking. If you find these, you may want to keep imprinting them on your weapons for an easy time.

The Codex of Power is a collection of Legendary Aspects you can imprint onto Rare or Legendary items at the Occultist. They unlock after completing specific Dungeons located around Sanctuary or salvaging items with these powers. Check out our Map Tool to locate these Dungeons.

For leveling, there are a few powers that can significantly help us if we have the funds to imprint them. In addition, keep an eye out for powerful Unique items you may find for this or other builds.

First Season Journey Cache

• Elemental Constellation
  • This Aspect will easily carry any build through leveling and into the early Torment difficulties. To get started with this aspect you can simply cast Hydra instead of any leveling build's main skill for burst damage. After casting a skill you will form a dagger on your shoulder that will be empowered by each matching element that is Cast. If you get enough Mana sustain you can use other skills as well but Hydra or a Basic Skill will be easiest when you first find this item.

Must-have Dungeon unlocks

1. Piercing Cold

Nice-to-have Dungeon unlocks

1. Control
2. Disobedience
3. Snowveiled

Great Uniques for this build

1. Tal Rasha's Iridescent Loop
2. Esu's Heirloom
3. Penitent Greaves

Jackpot Drops

As you level up, you may get lucky and find some great random drops. Some of these can massively amplify your power and speed up the leveling by switching to another build. Keep in mind that there are many more Aspects and Uniques that can be useful to multiple builds; this just lists some of the most impactful ones. While we usually recommend starting with Endgame Builds at level 60, you often can make them work earlier with these drops:

Build-defining Aspects

• Elemental Constellation (enables Elemental Constellation Endgame)
• Glacial / Frozen Tundra (enables Blizzard Endgame)

Build-defining Uniques

1. Fractured Winterglass (enables Frozen Orb Endgame)
2. Blue Rose (enables Blizzard Endgame)
3. Gloves of the Illuminator (enables Fireball Endgame)
4. Axial Conduit (enables Chain Lightning Endgame)

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 Ice Shards Sorcerer Leveling build focuses on the following combos:

Best in Slot

• Tam + Wat for additional damage reduction combined with Xol + Ohm for additional damage.

Alternative choices

As long as you haven't unlocked the final setup or found the top Runes, you can also benefit from these options:

• Moni, Cem, Cir, and Poc are good options for Ritual Runes.
• Ton, Tal, Gar, and Lum are good options for Invocation Runes.

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 Wire Trap along with Ready At Hand for some mobility. Next you pick Cover Fire with the damage increase from Opening Fire.
• 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

• Raheir will potentially save your character with his reinforcement Bastion. Setting this to trigger on Injured can keep you going in difficult encounters.
• Varyana is a great alternative to Raheir if you are either using Raheir as your hired or if you just want some extra damage. Bloodthirst will give some extra attack speed and you can set it on any attack.

In Diablo 4, you can level by completing the Campaign, collecting Grim Favors for the Tree of Whispers, completing Helltide activities, grinding Dungeons, clearing Strongholds, fighting in the Undercity of Kurast or interacting with the Seasonal Mechanics. While there are many ways to level up in Diablo 4, not all of them are equal.

Paragon & Glyphs

Use the slider to see 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.

Glyph Leveling Priorities

Coming soon.

The Ice Shards Sorcerer Leveling build is an engaging playstyle that can scale well into the Endgame. It comes together once you start getting later passive skills to help freeze enemies faster.

• Freeze enemies and watch the Ice Shards ricochet everywhere.
• Use Hydra for support and as a rotation for Enlightenment.
• Crowd control enemies and use your defensive skills and cooldowns to stay alive.

Written by pandaglassjaw