Best Sorcerer builds in Diablo 4 Season One

Diablo 4‘s first season—the Season of the Malignant—is out now and the Sorcerer class is the perfect fit for players who prefer long-ranged characters. But with an extensive skill tree and build customization options, many Diablo 4 Sorcerer players remain on the lookout for the best build. That’s where we come in.

One of the best things about Diablo 4 classes is that you can highly customize your character’s abilities to suit your playstyle or preferences. This means there are a ton of different paths for you to follow when building your character.

Diablo 4 Ice Shard Sorcerer build and leveling guide

This ice-and-fire build maximizes damage dealt when enemies are frozen and is a terrific build for solo leveling in season one, providing plenty of crowd control and damage.

By chilling your enemies with the basic Frost Bolt attack, both Frost Bolt and Ice Shards become so much more powerful and freeze enemies in place so you can really hit them with powerful fire abilities.

Basic skill: Frost Bolt

• Enhanced Frost Bolt
• Flickering Frost Bolt
• This basic ability set will chill enemies, freeze them, make them vulnerable, and even make them explode.

Core skill: Ice Shards

• Enhanced Ice Shards
• Destructive Ice Shards
• The added ricochet potential and vulnerability benefits make Ice Shards extra viable.

Defensive skill: Frost Nova

• Enhanced Frost Nova
• Shimmering Frost Nova
• A quick freeze option that also replenishes mana per enemy hit.

Conjuration skill: Hydra

• Enhanced Hydra
• Summoned Hydra
• This ability is a lifesaver and a fun way to cheese dungeon bosses. Plop the Hydra down in the center of the room or in the center of a pile of enemies. With the enemies chilled or frozen or vulnerable, or all of those, the Hydra will have plenty of damage to deal out.

Mastery skill: Meteor

• Enhanced Meteor
• Mage’s Meteor
• This is one of the best AoE abilities, as it strikes a large area and does burn damage. And if you hit three or more enemies, there’s a chance another meteor will fall. Use this to punish frozen enemies that can’t move.

Ultimate skill: Deep Freeze

• Prime Deep Freeze
• Supreme Deep Freeze
• With this ultimate, you can encase yourself in ice and become invulnerable for four seconds. And enemies around you get cold damage and can potentially freeze, which can be game-changing in certain situations. 

Ice Shard Sorcerer build skill point assignments

Follow the table below to build the Ice Shard Sorcerer after acquiring more skill points.

In Season One, you may find that you need to adapt the skill point assignment to suit your needs. For some, getting the Flame Shield, for its defensive capabilities and DoT, is more beneficial at level 13 than Hydra.

Related: Best Diablo 4 Sorcerer leveling build

So, if you find that you’re dying too quickly or aren’t able to tank a lot of damage, switch it up and take Flame Shield at level 13 with Enhanced and Shimmer Flame Shield. Then, for your remaining points left from Hydra, get Ice Armor and then Enhanced Ice Armor. Otherwise, if you’re surviving just fine, you can keep the skill point assignment as is.

Best Ice Shard Sorcerer aspects, gems, and enhancements

Aspects go a long way toward maximizing the build. Here are some ideal ones for the Ice Shard Sorcerer build:

• Aspect of Piercing Cold: Ice Shards pierce three times, dealing 25 percent less damage on each subsequent hit.
• Aspect of the Expectant: Attacking enemies with a Basic skill increases the damage of your next Core skill cast by five percent, up to 30 percent.
• Aspect of Biting Cold: When you freeze an enemy, there is a 25 percent chance they become vulnerable.

These are your ideal gems for the Ice Shard Sorcerer build:

• Topaz (Weapon): Increases Basic skill damage
• Ruby (Armor): Increases max life
• Diamond (Jewelry): Increases resistance to all elements

The best enhancement for this build is the Frost Nova enhancement, which gives Conjuration skills like Hydra a 30 percent chance to instantly cast Frost Nova. As long as you keep Hydra active, these extra Frost Nova casts will go a long way.

Best Malignant Hearts for the Ice Shard Sorcerer

While working through the quests in Season One, you’ll encounter enemies and obtain Malignant Hearts. The best ones for the Ice Shard Sorcerer include the following:

• Caged Heart of Creeping Death—Your Damage over Time (DoT) effects will increase for every CC you have on a target. However, the monsters that are Unstoppable or Staggered will take more of the DoT effect.
• Caged Heart of Tal’Rasha—For each unique element you deal damage with, you’ll deal additional damage for a short duration. This is one of my favorites this season because, with this build, we use so many elements, so we can truly maximize its benefits.
• ‍Caged Heart of the Malignant Pact—For every 20 kills, you will cycle through these bonuses:
  • Vicious: You’ll gain attack speed.
  • Devious: Your core and basic skills have a chance to fully restore your primary resource.
  • Brutal: Every 20 seconds, you’ll get a Barrier that absorbs a specific amount of damage

Diablo 4 Arc Lash Sorcerer build and leveling guide

Feeling electric? This build based on Arc Lash and other lightning-based abilities maximizes critical hits and chaining damage across multiple enemies. In this build, we’re going to skip on a Mastery active skill.

Basic skill: Arc Lash

• Enhanced Arc Lash
• Glinting Arc Lash
• Maximized for stuns and additional swipes after critical strikes.

Related: All Sorcerer Legendary Aspects in Diablo 4 and where to get them

Core skill: Chain Lightning

• Enhanced Chain Lightning
• Greater Chain Lightning
• Extra bounces mean more damage and more critical strike opportunities.

Defensive skill: Teleport

• Enhanced Teleport
• Shimmering Teleport
• Transform into lightning and become unstoppable, then deal damage when the teleport ends and earn damage reduction.

Defensive skill: Ice Armor

• Enhanced Ice Armor
• Mystical Ice Armor
• Form a barrier of ice that absorbs damage, while regenerating mana to fire off more Chain Lightning.

Conjuration skill: Lightning Spear

• Enhanced Lightning Spear
• Invoked Lightning Spear
• More damage and more critical strike opportunities, plus stuns on critical strikes.

Ultimate skill: Unstable Currents

• Prime Unstable Currents
• Supreme Unstable Currents
• With this ultimate, either Chain Lightning or Lightning Spear will be cast randomly. The upgrades also increase attack speed and cause Crackling Energy.

Arc Lash Sorcerer build skill point assignments

Follow the table below to build the Arc Lash Sorcerer after acquiring more skill points.

Just like the Ice Shard build, if you find that you’re dying too often in season one or are taking too much damage and want to increase your survivability, you’ll want to get Flame Shield and Frost Nova instead of Chain Lightning and Lightning Spear.

This will give you the defense and DoTs you need to help you survive. The downside is that you won’t have the same DPS output. So you’ll need to watch your positioning and work on your Teleport, Frost Nova, and Unstable Current combo to ensure you’re maximizing your abilities.

Best Arc Lash Sorcerer aspects, gems, and enhancements

Here are some ideal aspects to use with the Arc Lash build:

• Aspect of the Expectant: Attacking enemies with a Basic skill increases the damage of your next Core skill cast by five percent, up to 30 percent.
• Aspect of Retribution: Distant enemies have a chance to be stunned. Deal increased damage to stunned enemies.
• Aspect of the Bounding Conduit: Gain increased movement speed after using Teleport.

These are your ideal gems for the Arc Lash Sorcerer build:

• Topaz (Weapon): Increases Basic skill damage
• Ruby (Armor): Increases max life
• Diamond (Jewelry): Increases resistance to all elements

The best enhancement for this build is the Arc Lash skill enhancement, which stuns enemies around you for half a second when you use a cooldown.

Best Malignant Hearts for the Arc Lash Sorcerer

To maximize your Arc Lash build, you’ll want to get very similar Malignant Hearts to that of the Ice Shard Sorcerer. Here are the best Malignant Hearts for the Arc Lash Sorcerer:

• Caged Heart of Tal’Rasha: For each unique element you deal damage with, you’ll deal additional damage for a short duration. This is one of my favorites this season because, with this build, we use so many elements, so we can truly maximize its benefits.
• ‍Caged Heart of the Malignant Pact: For every 20 kills, you will cycle through these bonuses:
  • Vicious: You’ll gain attack speed.
  • Devious: Your core and basic skills have a chance to fully restore your primary resource.
  • Brutal: Every 20 seconds, you’ll get a Barrier that absorbs a specific amount of damage
• Revenge: 10 to 20 percent of incoming damage is instead suppressed. When you use a Defensive, Subterfuge, or a Macabre skill, all the suppressed damage is amplified by 250 percent, and it will explode, dealing up to 1,360 fire damage to all the nearby enemies.

Related: How to farm Malignant Hearts fast in Diablo 4

Ultimately, the final decision is yours on what skill to pick, but it’s nice to have a reference for building any current or future classes. Happy grinding!