What is the best Sorceress build in Lost Ark? A recent addition to Lost Ark's character class line-up in the South Korean version, the Sorceress is rumoured to be designed to provide an accessible entry-point for Western players in the EU/NA release. It's unsurprising, therefore, that she's proving a popular choice of starting character. Despite being a literal squishy wizard with her low defences and HP, she really does have a lot going for her - to the extent that we've described her as a solid A Tier character in our tier list.
The Sorceress might not end up leading the charge as a DPS main right through to the endgame, but she can still make a valuable addition to your combat roster thanks to her intuitive playstyle and high-powered burst attacks. On this page we'll give an overview of the Sorceress's skills, levelling guide, and which bonus class and engravings to choose when you reach the endgame.
The Sorceress possesses two identity skills that make up the cornerstones of her build: Arcane Rupture and Blink. Fellow Dishonored fans out there getting deja vu at those names might be interested to know that Blink does exactly what you might expect: instantly teleports the Sorceress by 15 metres. Since she can be quite vulnerable in combat, this skill can be used to get her out of danger in the short-term; but using it to charge towards (or straight through) enemies is often an even better call, as Blink deals piercing damage to foes caught in the direct line of travel.
Arcane Rupture has no such defensive utility, but is an extremely powerful offensive skill, allowing the Sorceress to enter a Magick Amplification state, during which she deals extra damage. While the skill is active, she also gains a mystic armour which specifically protects her against knock-back effects.
Both of the Sorceress's identity skills draw from the same mana sauce, the Arcane Gauge, which is charged during normal combat. You have the choice to fire off either skill once the metre hits 30%. Save up until it reaches 100%, however, and Arcane Rupture becomes Arcane Torrent, a more powerful version of the base skill that adds extra elemental damage to the Sorceress's attacks, and reduces both spellcasting times and cooldowns on her damage-dealing skills (except for Blink).
The Sorceress's normal skills are straightforward enough on the surface: each one corresponds to an element, and she can choose to wield earth, fire, ice, electricity, wind, or magick attacks at her (and your) discretion. You're not locked in to choosing just one element for her to specialise in, so feel free to mix-and-match or go all in on one type as suits you best. For our recommended skill set, we've elected to go for a few different elemental skills, to help you get the feel of what the Sorceress is capable of.
By the time you reach Level 50 you should have accumulated about 250 skill points, which is enough to put together a balanced normal skill build to take your character into the endgame. For the Sorceress, we recommend picking a few favourite elemental attacks and packing as many points into them as possible, advancing through to Tripod 3 wherever you can, as in the following example:
Lost Ark characters start out with a decent suite of early-game abilities, and new skills unlock fairly frequently as you progress through the first 20 or so character levels. Gaining XP and levelling up gives you skill points that you can spend on improving skill levels and unlocking "tripods". Tripods are enhancements to skills that become available at skill levels 4, 7, and 10; applying one gives that skill a new secondary function. Every tripod has three options for you to choose from.
There's a limit to how much you can customise any Lost Ark character's build until they reach Level 50 and you gain access to endgame Engravings and Awakening skills (see below). Until that point, the path each class takes will be relatively linear; so throughout the early game, selecting your normal skills and their enhancements is the key to setting up a build that's to your liking.
Once a Lost Ark character reaches Level 50, you can apply Engravings to them. Engravings are part of Lost Ark's endgame content, and allow you to apply a variety of buffs and boosts to customise your character's kit a little more. As well as generic engravings available to all characters, every class has two "class bonus" engravings unique to them. Effectively, these let you pick a subclass for them to specialise in.
The Engravings for the Sorceress class are Igniter and Reflux, which come with the following bonuses:
On the surface, Igniter is much more desirable than Reflux, if for no other reason than that giving up one of your identity skills always feels like a step too far. But really, it depends on what aspect of the Sorceress's kit you like to focus on: Igniter is completely essential if your build is focused on burst damage, but if you prefer sustained attacks and spellcasting, then Reflux might be worth considering despite its cost.
The number of engravings you can equip is variable, and depends on the engraving slots you have available. Class-specific bonus engravings require Learned Engraving slots, which you unlock by reading books you accumulate throughout your adventures in Arkesia. The two "generic" engraving types that can be equipped by all classes (damage boosts and utility buffs) are equipped according to how many engraving points you have available through a combination of your character's equipped accessories (such as necklaces, earrings, rings, etc.) and their Ability stones, all of which can be picked up as loot or from merchants throughout the game. Shuffle your loadout until you've maxed out your engravings points to 35 and you should be able to equip about three generic engravings in addition to your class bonus.
The following engravings work particularly well for a Sorceress DPS build, regardless of which class bonus you choose:
Like Engravings, Awakening Skills become available once a Lost Ark character has reached Level 50. Again, there are two options to choose from, and unlike with Engravings it's not an either/or proposition: you can unlock both Awakening Skills if you'd like, although you can only equip one at a time.
The Awakening skills for the Sorceress are:
Apocalypse Call is perhaps the more spectacular option, and has the potential to deal more damage under ideal circumstances. However, Enviska's Might still packs an impressive punch and is the more reliable choice, since it's hard to bank on the strike pattern of the Apocalypse Call meteors. If you do choose to experiment with Apocalypse Call, we recommend trying it out in PvE, since other players in PvP will likely be wise to the RNG element and subsequent vulnerabilites of a Sorceress wielding this skill.
Since you need to be at Level 50 to take advantage of most of Lost Ark's character build materials, be sure to check out our guide to levelling up fast in Lost Ark to help you get there as quickly as possible. If you choose to stick with the Sorceress as your DPS you're going to need some strong supporting characters, so have a look at our Lost Ark classes tier list to help you pick a strong set of friendly classes for her to play off of.
Rebecca can usually be found working through her latest fiction-induced anguish by recreating all those lovely doomed characters in The Sims. More recently she discovered a fondness for Genshin Impact, which she pitches to bewildered friends as "Pokémon but with hot people instead of made-up animals". She also loves horror games and will play them at any opportunity, despite the fact that they make her so panicked she once threw her controller in a self-defence reflex. (The controller survived; Rebecca's dignity did not.)
Subscribe and get access to supporter-only articles, an ad-free reading experience, free gifts, and game discounts. Your support helps us create more great writing about PC games.
Please enable JavaScript to see comments.
How to find and use Engravings in Lost Ark
Specialize your character with this key piece of customization
How to unlock and use Powerpass in Lost Ark
Jump two characters to level 50 free of charge
Elden Ring Dung Eater quest
The Dung Eater and the Seedbed Curse explained
Where to find Malenia in Elden Ring
Learn where to find the demigod Malenia in Elden Ring
Who Are Ya? is like Wordle but with football players
Who are ya? Who are ya?
How is the Steam Deck as a desktop PC?
Gotham Knights starts bamming, biffing, and powing in October
And where, and where, and where is the Batman?
Have A Nice Death is a fun roguelike that needs more meat on its bones
Lean with potential to be really mean
We've been talking, and we think that you should wear clothes
Total coincidence, but we sell some clothes
Copyright © 2022 Gamer Network Limited, a ReedPop company.
All rights reserved. No part of this site or its content may be reproduced without the permission of the copyright holder.