For the Reset...

[Rhd999]

Which do you think would be better to start off with?

A FireSorc to MF, or a LightSorc to MF? Just your personal oppinion, im not asking for a guide.

[Taurean]

Haven`t tried any of them, so i could only tell you what i think from what i`ve seen and know from builds\guides.

There are most fire immunes in the game, so i guess lightning would be your best bet.

Teleport and energy shield is also lightning skills, so you might benefit from it that way.

[Rhd999]

thanks, if you dont play sorcs what else could be useful?

[bdkies]

I have a light sorc, but I have never made a fire sorc. All I know is with my light sorc I was able to MF anything I really wanted too. There was nothing I just couldnt do. You have to have a decent merc at the hell diff stage of the game but for the most part a light sorc can power through a lot of content and get a lot of different things mf'd and dead.

A few spots where I had a little trouble were Andy's room, with the mishapen's those mobs will give you some grief unless you got a strong merc and pot feed him to get them cleaned up. And On countess runs sometimes her guardians are lightning immune, and when they are it makes it diff to take care of business, but she always stayed back and her guards were always faster then hell, so what I did was lure them out telel in blast her real quick then loot and tp out.

The Storm casters in Hell chaos suck also, but I never used chaos to MF. However with a good merc at the end it is fairly efficient.

I hope this helps, this is just some sorc experience with my light sorc. I see all kinds of stuff early that is immune to fire. Making it tough to deal with when you can't MF stuff to take care of the problem. If it is later in the ballgame then you are able to MF things to help solve the issue moreso then if you couldn't.

And just like Taurean mentioned. You are going to essentially waist 3 or 4 skill trains just by getting static and teleport with a fire sorc. The synergy/pre-requisite skills you will never use. However if you go lightning all but one of those trains act as synergies to your lightning skill. So instead of 3 skills going to waist, you are putting the 3 skills you already have to train to work and making more dmg for ya.

[Taurean]

Necromancers that only focus on Summoning skills, since they can equip almost anything without getting hurt, the summons take all the beatings. Therefore, they are good starter\MF characters. You must follow a guide though, if you want success.

Amazons that focus on the Lightning tree, called Javazons. They deal very good damage to both crowds and bosses and require little to no gear. The downside is Lightning immunes, but every build will have a downside. The Javazon is my personal favorite, since Amazons in general are sexy :D

And last but not least, i`d say a Hammerdin, although i might be wrong here. They are the most popular MF-builds out there, but you might need better gear to be successfull.

There`s probably tons more but i`ll let others have a chance here too.

[bdkies]

Ya, it is hard to beat a hammerdin for their ability to cremate everything in the game basically. But you are correct they are really gear dependant. I myself wouldn't mess with a hammerdin until I at least had an enigma to give him. The sole purpose of being able to MF is to have teleport and get around a lot quicker. You can do it without for sure but the effectiveness and time you cut down by having TP and some FCR is just priceless.

I also have a javazon which is really fun to play. That I can also vouch for as a good possibility. Just know this when you are restarting there isn't hardly any +to skills items, and getting them takes a lot of time. So you have to have something that can get the job done without them for awhile. Putting just a couple trains into something is futile until you get the +skills to boost it to a necessary standard. A 2 or 3 point valk isn't going to do you much good in hell mode with no +to skills I don't think. I could be wrong, I haven't dealt much in valks but it would surely pose as a problem until you got 5-10+to skill levels.

[cmlogu01]

I'd say a lightress. They are pretty good. I have a level 54 on single player
(as seen in my signature)
and if it'll make it to that level and still own then it has to be a great build.
for a general idea of how to make it:

charged bolt-max
lightning-max
chain lightning-max
lightning mastery-max
nova-max
static field-1
teleport-1

This is a great build. Better than a fire sorc since theres so much fire resist in diablo, and hardly any lightning res. Plus static feild is your standard boss killer.

[mephiztophelez]

for a "first-build-of-a-new-ladder" sork?

meteorber.

max: fb, f-bolt (max this last), orb (max this asap), meteor.
1pt: tele, static, cold mastery (1pt here asap).
spares (if any) to fire mastery (1pt asap)

gear: whatever you find, look for survivability and kill speed, then look at mf. aim for full-tals/105fcr further down the track.

stats: be very stingy. load up on str charms as you find 'em (you'll get a torch sooner or later, unless you love rebuilds....). pump vit heavily.

[skyeye]

meh ive tried a orb sorc, light sorc and blizz sorc so far this season. the light sorc can kill things but has alot less mf, the orb sorc is aight for norm, but even in nm she cant do as ez as the blizz sorc.

u get a tarn helm with 40%+ mf on it and ptopaz it, then u get vmagi and topaz it, a gull dagger,a gold wrap, 2x nagels, and a rhyme. that should turn out around 325% mf. with those , your blizz will do about 3.4k dmg if i remember right, enough to make nm meph a joke