What it's like to play as a sorcerer in PvP.

[.Stream]

I'm just saying what my experience is as a sorcerer ( Not a pure sorcerer, but more like a battle mage. ) in PvP. I'm quite curious what everyone else's experience is too as any of the caster roles, pure or otherwise. ( Pure miracle, Pure Pyro, Half Pyro, Support miracles only, etc )

Again, this is just a for fun thread, not really hating or complaining about anything, I just want to hear what others think about being or playing against other casters.

- Viability - A LOT of casters complain that casters are not viable in PvP... but they also only use the biggest spells that cost high FP and are easy to dodge or they use the same tactic over and over until their opponent knows the exact counter to it. In reality, casters are very viable if you have a fairly diverse ( 3 minimum is what I've found ) set of spells/pyros/miracles. Baiting, mixups and mindgames are the main tactics of casters, and this is where most players who're used to DS3's more straightforward pvp fail at.

- The hatred from others - Remember when I said casters are about mindgames?... Yes, most PvP'ers and duelists hate casters who play smart. Most players define duels as a battle of "Skill" and not exactly mind games. If you even so much as try to keep distance from your opponent in a duel, most will either look down on you or taunt you/mock you for being afraid to fight in their territory. Not to mention, depending on your kit ( Looking at homing soulmass(es) and dark serpent + manual aim vestiges ), you might even get hatemail.

- Feeling like the boss - You're the V.I.P...kinda. If you go into team fights, most of your allies will do their best to keep you alive as you're a good asset to any team fight. That said, your enemies will look at you as their priority target that needs to be killed asap.

- Running out of FP - If you're a caster, you know the pain of going through your FP bar. And you probably also know how it feels to have it empty and have no ashen estus left. For pure casters, they've become nigh useless at this point and for hybrid casters, they've lost a very important part of their kit. Not to mention the stupid animation when you try to cast spells without FP.

- One shot capability - If you have a pure caster build, you also know how awesome it feels to one shot players who fell for your bait or you simply hit via manual aim. It feels ecstatic. Again, you'll get hate, but it's not really much different from the spin2win + bleed combo or the WA spam of other weapons. At least here, you actually outplayed your opponent. Also, eating boss(es) HP like nothing from a safe distance.

- The mixups - If you have a bigger kit, you're pretty much a jack of all trades. Use it properly and no opponent can even predict what you'll do... you can counter nigh any tactic or playstyle in the game with the right kit too.

- Not worrying about the parry or critical hits too much - The best thing about being caster... no fear of parries ( Except flash sword... ). You can bait and punish as much as you want and you won't get riposted, this gives you much more confidence and sway over the fight as opposed to physical weapons who have to be careful about parries so they'll play more defensively/cautiously... and in PvP, being overly cautious can mean defeat.

[JuiceySpice]

How it feels to fight casters:


They cast soul mass-
While it pops they either rush in with a fast weapon or cast a spell like soulsword or crystal soul spear

Sometimes they don't face you and just hold it until you get close

They run backward until they can safely re cast soul mass even if this takes all day

If you try to agress them while they are retreating to recast soul mass, they spam a fast weapon or spells to punish the aggression

If you do not agress they recast soul mass and the cycle repeats

They keep spamming soul dart if they don't agress with soul mass combo or you or if you don't agress them.

This chain of events repeats functionally infinitely until you make a mistake and take 1000 damage or you painstakingly dodge all their bull while some how managing to hit them with there extremely passive play style a couple times

[.Stream]

Originally posted by Spooky From Hell:

How it feels to fight casters: Words

Yep, that's playing smart for sorcerers, and we get a lot of hate for it because we don't follow the normal flow or things and very few people know how to counter the soulmass spam. But here's a tip, if you see a person like that, just equip a crossbow, fire once and dodge. If you reload immediately, you eat their soulmass, if you dodge instead of loading, you just wasted their soulmass. Plus, like I said, most casters don't have a lot of FP. You can outplay these people :D... or you can keep running into them and spamming roll, that's the worst way to deal with these types.

[thebigkabooa]

Greater Magic Barrier

[Skeleton]

Originally posted by Zerberius:

- Viability - A LOT of casters complain that casters are not viable in PvP... but they also only use the biggest spells that cost high FP and are easy to dodge or they use the same tactic over and over until their opponent knows the exact counter to it.

The argument about inviability is quite valid. Compared to a standard melee build with an offhand crossbow, a sorcerer has to put in twice the effort for the same yield.

In PvE, magic is the most commonly-resisted damage type by far. Miracles offer the widest variety of elements (lightning, magic, blessed, and dark) which decreases the chances of being resisted outright, while pyromancy has the advantage of many enemies being weak to fire and the unique flailing reaction on some mobs.

In PvP, your options are to chip people to death with Darts and Soulmasses, or try to burst them down with Crystal Soul Spear. Sorcery doesn't quite have the zoning capability of Pyromancy (Floating Chaos, Black Serpent), so it's comparatively harder to hit an aware target. As such sorcerers will often go after distracted targets - which is where the bulk of the hate comes from.

It's the most stylish way to play, though, so I manage.

[.Stream]

Originally posted by Skeleton:

Mmm, in terms of viability I mean it in the sense of "It can be used to great effect". What you're referring to seems more like efficiency or the ratio of effort to result.

Agree with PvE on everything you said.

As for PvP, I mostly duel, and so far, what you say is correct, however it also is only accounting for players who can't mixup their timings, manual aim or roll catch. Much like how a straightsword user who can only walk up and do R1 is easy to kill whilst a good player who uses timing mixups, charge attacks, etc, are a force to be reckoned with. I agree with what you say about the hate, that and also from people who don't know how to deal with or counter the soulmass. ( I never expect my soulmass to hit, but they do force people to roll, which is nice, and also they're amazing for punishing washing pole/spear running attack spam. )

[Herbalacious]

In Dark Souls, I'm pretty sure that every character capable of magic is also using a weapon as well. Even Big Hat Logan had a scimtar. Karla may not use a weapon? But then we never see her do anything really besides rest and sell you darkness.

Anyways my point is that it's best to have a solid weapon along with casting. I think it's more efficient and you will get more kills if you keep a weapon handy especially when you are out of estus or being rushed down by a quick foe. Plus in DS3 there are a few really cool weapons made for casters in the game already. Weapons I recommend are the Cleric's Candlestick, Heysel's Pick, Greatsword of Judgement, Moon Light Greatsword, Witch's Locks, and the Onyx Blade. I'm sure there are more that I missed but you get the idea.

I PvP a lot as a caster of all types and I can say they are all 'viable' it just depends on your playstyle. You like to bring it up close and do trades then maybe go for a Miracle build since you can benefit from hp regen and blast people with lightning stakes. Like ranged? Pyro or Magic are both very good at range and have very different approaches to fighting. Pyro's will make you dodge a lot with Black Snake and then blast you with a free aimed chaos orb/vestige. When the fight gets up close Black Flame can ruin anyone's day. Mages will cast some kind of spell that will provide cover or space so they can setup a crystal soul spear. Crystal Hail can give you the space you need to cast Soulmass saftely every time and then it's on your timing on how you connect with CSS. Can use spells like Frostbite/Mercury that can provide a cover too so you can cast a sneaky CSS sometimes.

There's a ton of ways to play a caster in this game..got a build that uses Crystal Chime in the right hand and a shield on the left. I swap out the shield for whatever I'm feeling at the moment lol. Sometimes I'll swap out for Cleric's Candlestick or Heysel's Pick. I cast Great Magic Shield and use Faron Flashsword and Soul Greatsword along with Soulmass, Great Homing Soul Arrow, Faron Dart. Using Great Magic Shield in PvP can be hilarious sometimes..will block pretty much everything.

[76561198359476007]

On my pyro build I feel squishy and weak, at least in any 1v1 scenario, and because my spells are the easiest thing in the world to avoid I almost never use them. In team battles I obviously feel pretty strong, but those are few and far between considering nobody does them in arena.

I never actually play my pyro anymore, because it sucks so bad. I will say that playing my pyro makes me better at playing my main melee character, because it is so bad I have to learn to play better and that translates a lot better on my melee character.

[Hunubul]

On my pyro I feel like a god.

My spells: DLC pyromancy, fire whip (yes, really), profaned flame (again, yes, really), and bursting fireball. I also have chaos bed vestiges to punish cheap tactics like oni&uba weapon art spam. There is nothing sweeter than stepping back a little, waiting for the weapon art to land and BAM, -half hp for them. I also use the Onyx blade obviously.

I'm SL129 and I have enough survivability to trade if I must. I have only rags so I can't trade with everything: against slower weapons I use fire whip and DLC spell to throw off their timing.
Against mages DLC spell is awesome because they can't cast spells and I can be agressive against them.

I also utilize the weapon art. I don't need incredible damage, because with these spells I can rolecatch and react to their vulnerable state easily. I don't just use mistakes: I create opportunities. I feel like I'm in control. That's one of the biggest differences between this build and the usual 1-shot spammer.


I also want to create a mage, but I don't have the time rigtht now. It would be a dex-mage. I would use farron hail, white dragon breath, pestilent mercury and crystal hail. I'll my swap one or 2 spells. My weapons would be (max 3 of these): dancer sword (1handed obviously), infused quill, sage rapier, crescent moon sword, DLC scythe. I'll have 36 vitality, which is enough to survive. Only 50 int tho.

[Merilirem]

How do people get hit by soulmass in pvp? I mean i play as a caster mainly, but the counter is just to roll in front of them. Its just like all spells, easy to dodge on its own. If you spam roll you can dodge 90% of what a caster throws, and they probably run low on fp after awhile, so charge em.

Its just strange to me that people can't dodge something so simple.

[Nitron]

My experience fighting pure magic builds. The other guy run, uses homing soulmass exposes back (expecting me to backstab him?) His Plan fails? -> run spamming CSS, Farron darts when low health enemy, R1 spam with flashsword

My only "magic experience" was with miracles and that was really fun! I personally prefer pyros and miracles than magic, as they need to get closer to the enemy. Pyro has fast casting, miracles have poise. Magic is basically the "sniper" of the bunch.

[Merilirem]

Originally posted by Nitred:

My experience fighting pure magic builds. The other guy run, uses homing soulmass exposes back (expecting me to backstab him?) His Plan fails? -> run spamming CSS, Farron darts when low health enemy, R1 spam with flashsword

Yeah. thats pretty much the basic easiest way to win kit. Its hard to hit with alot of spells afterall, so flashsword is a must for most people since its just a sword.

[TrueArchery]

Originally posted by Merilirem:

How do people get hit by soulmass in pvp?

Avid backstep tricks'n'flips and they get fired from the weirdest angles. It looks really goofy. Even the roll-spam isn't that effective, as said using bolts and staying at range, not playing their game is countering it pretty hard, but it's a very tedious fight tbh.

[Hunubul]

Originally posted by TrueArchery:

Originally posted by Merilirem:

How do people get hit by soulmass in pvp?

Avid backstep tricks'n'flips and they get fired from the weirdest angles. It looks really goofy. Even the roll-spam isn't that effective, as said using bolts and staying at range, not playing their game is countering it pretty hard, but it's a very tedious fight tbh.

I usually don't wait for them to come to me with that soulmass. I always bait it out myself so I know when to roll. Pretty easy to counter it. And with my pyro I don't find it dtedious to fight them. Soon they realize there is no point in running back and casting spells because my forbidden sun is faster than their CSS, and my DLC spell can annoy them enough so they don't use any spell really. There is no mindgame there, they simply have to adapt and try to attack me. But I have a greatsword so with my hyperarmor they have no chance. At least it's over quickly most of the time

As with how to counter it with melee... Equip a quickstep weapon and win. Use a weapon that can rollcatch and win. Well that's the only 2 things I can think of at the moment.

[Meat Man (Alfons)]

Try this, Dartcasting. Look up a video on it, its a Sorcerer tech that kind of revolutionises some spells. Its a hard to do thing but you can cast things with Farron Dart speed. Inclusively Healing spells and Soul Spears. You can also cast Farron hail which for some reason shoots the same spell twice in a quick succession, for very high damage potential.

Seriously, try it. Will change how you see Sorcerers.

[Dragalen]

Originally posted by The Meat Man (Alfons):

Dartcasting Healing spells

don't encourage this

dartcasting offensive spells/buffs = fine

dartcast healing is for scum