Stormweaver - Arc - 35hours

Hello!

I started Sorceress - Stormweaver. I enjoy Chain Lightning spells in every game so I decided to make all the obvious decisions (and things I learned from thousands of hours of poe1). I decided to start as non-crit and see where the route takes me. I also wanted to go as vanilla as possible - no uniques, not building around complex keystone interactions (ofc I see the CI+EB+MOM combo, it is no secret)

First things first: The devourer Boss in a1n was a tough challenge. The way the Poison Vomit (and similar abilities form other bosses like the Chimera in A2) work was very unintuitive. I think it should be more of a "mortar" where it does not shotgun this fast in close range but arcs in the air and lands with more of a delay.

I also instantly saw that Spark is mechanically superior. It can hit multiple times, pierce easily and shoots 10 Projectiles. Even when linking arc with chain (which is abysmal in early game) there is no chance it stands up to the power of Spark.
But i wanted my Chain Lightning so i tryed to force Arc.

I hit a hard wall in A3N where i could not beat the next boss or finish my second Ascendancy. It was very discouraging. I had no tools to fix my build at that time.
This was before the patch to increase currency in the campaign - and I also had no idea i could salvage gear to get Artificer Orbs.

My character ramped from there on. I got myself sockets and fixed my resists.

But slowly the realization came over me: Most of the power comes from gear. There was a major shift in where character power originates.
There are maybe enough support gems to get one Skill supported with damage - but it is far less powerful than poe1 and the tree has very generic and weirdly double edged points (I don't think anyone should ever pick the +x spell dmg and -y cast speed node)

The main source of power in my opinion is gear and secondly combos

Now arc has one obvious combo and that is Mana Tempest. But at no point did I have the damage or mana to sustain this in a boss fight. I dont't mean staying in there, but just using it to cast 2-3 arcs drained my mana so fast my (carefully rolled +charge +mana gain) flasks where empty after 1/3 of the boss health.

Spark has flame wall, arc has the OOM buff.

In A1C the pace started picking up, I had enough points to start getting crit and Cast on Shock + Lightning Conduit hits really good - if and when it does.

I stopped playing now after entering maps.
The gameplay is mentally draining. I enjoyed dying to bosses (to some extent) in the campaign but having to tiptoe in every map is not at all enjoyable. Singular white mobs are dangerous and any rare at point posses a threat to lose both exp and the map.

I did 5 maps and I lost interest. The layouts are unnecessarily bad (I know you are working on that) - but I just do not enjoy the vigilant playstyle this game demands.
The mobs are too fast, they hit too hard. Their range is too far offscreen.
The damage of many attacks is overtuned in comparision to my ability to dodge it.

Slow moving big red ball one shots me? Okay
Almost instant Crossbow shot of a white mob (with 4+ in a pack) does 500 dmg offscreen in a white map? I hate it.

I had a blast up until now, but will take a break and come back in a few weeks/months. Arc Ignite with AoF looks spicy maybe i will try it, or level a monk.

Some of the bosses were great, epic fights. Many skills and Ascendencies look awesome, but the gameplay is draining in endgame. I will not finish 200+ maps if everything is dangerous, that is no fun.

I agree Light build are not viable currently especially in HC. You have not enough dmg to kills instantly as in POE1 and you are always OOM. You need archmage and invest tons of points in mana regen to try to play. But almost unplayable and like you said you can lose interest pretty quickly.

Well at the end all build have to be balanced to have a decent experience and it s hard indeed. They nerf all build which are OP so i hope they will boost all useless build (chaos / Light)

I tried similar build and i also like chain lightning in games. Also hours are similar, but im not in maps yet, i still struggle in act 3.

If i can run in circles than i usually can wear down enemies after some time. But if im surrounded, then oh boy, that ends quickly.

Some issues i've run into using Arc all the way to tier 6 maps:

It seems to sometimes not hit at all. (targeting issue porbably?)

The chaining range and speed just seem lackluster.

Sometimes obstructions prevent you from targeting mobs.

The chain support seems bugged.

Arc in PoE1 is my fav skill, but this version of Arc just aint it GGG.

Few possible problems as I didn’t see things mentioned in your post

1 did you ever gem swap for bosses? Chain support is somewhat of a bait for arc because while targets 1-2 will be okay damage, all targets beyond that will actually take less total damage from your arc due to the downside of the support, even if it is hitting much more total mobs. I found I did t even use Chain while leveling with arc. I relied on mana tempest and orb of storms to support myself in clear and it felt much better

2 What ascendancy nodes did you pick up? The permanent arcane surge and arcane surge effect per max mana is extremely strong for dps and mana sustain since you chose not to go crit. If you chose double shocks, it is kind of a bait as the new ailment calculations are tricky and you don’t actually shock a lot with arc. The ailment thresholds as a whole I feel need a lot of clarification on what backend calculations go into them

3 power does come from gear, yes. This is an ARPG. The new support gem tiers drops gated behind monster level is meh to me. It artificially gates the power the first playthrough and from every alt onwards you can just cut any support gems you want from the tier 3. This could be why you didn’t feel you had enough support gems to funnel damage into multiple skills. But even then, arcane tempo, controlled destruction, considered casting, hourglass are all very viable supports. You just have to be willing to use more than 1 skill to do clear and boss damage.

3.a. What supports did you put on mana tempest? You can slot inspiration on it and reduce the mana drain by 40%

4. Did you use any sort of curse or exposure to lower monster res? You said your mana was poor while inside mana tempest, how much did you invest into mana regen soecifically? By t1 maps I had about 250-300 mana mana regen and could blast in the storm for a while

5 I began dying in maps too until I stopped using a staff and went to wand / shield instead. I gave up a little damage but picked up 60% block chance and never looked back. Consider what options you have available instead of quitting when your idea doesn’t pan out

You need to really invest in mana regeneration. I'm currently in tier 9 maps, but my regen is at 683.7. It's a while since I've had mana problems, but it's definitely a thing during the campaign. Permanent arcane surge and especially Force of Will helps a ton.
You can also use Font of Mana on Orb of Storms. That should help to.

I'm then running Ball Lightning with Coursing Current, Conduction and Lightning Exposure to inflicts shocks and exposure. That's working really well.

I should probably try out Lightning Conduit with that actually, but I'm really enjoying Arc at the moment.

I tried lighting on my chronomancer and actually the gameplay itself is not bad. You drop mana tempest and cast chain lighting till you proc arcane surge and oom than use chrono skill temporal rift and hp/mana is full again. Quicksand chrono skill provide an insane damage boost.

But all general lighting issues are the same. Mobs are so fast that when you drop tempest and start casting lighting mobs are already hitting you. No CC like with cold when all mobs are permanently in freeze. Mobs drop a lot of aoe skills and you are forced to move tempest and start your rotation from 0 lacking damage but receiving hits. Electrocute does not exist even with all nodes in skill tree. Chain support is a complete shit, damage reduction is not worth this additional chain. Orb of storms additional damage is a joke in the endgame.

Hello, I'm playing Arc too since I like that theme. I'm now level 79 and was playing Arc only. I've done maps till T12, that was the highest Waystone that I had. I tried a lot of different things, and Arc seems to be on the weaker side, it lacks in single target department. It just feels really "fair", and that doesn't cut it since the game is rather unfair :)

I'm respeccing to Spark as soon as I get a greater jeweler orb for it.

Thanks fo all the suggestions guys, I know what the build needed. I just had no interest in farming maps. They are no fun right now, thats okay.

I removed the chain link after half a zone, it is bait (but i theorycrafted an Avatar of Fire Ignite Arc becuase it only reduces hit damage but arc's chain counter should increase the dot)

I used Spark to debuff with exposure, on rares and bosses self casted Conductivity. I Chose the Arcane Surge ascendancy and specced both mana regen and arcane surge effect.

I had spark apply exposure, and for some time also tried electrocute on spark.

My Problem wasn't that i could not progress - I just had no fun doing so.

My feedback was more about Arc being underpowered in comparison to Spark and Lightning Conduit.

The chaining range is bad and there are no stats for it. There are no additional forks like in poe1 to help its clear. The number of chains is low, the cast time high and the mana cost + scaling per level is too high also.