The purpose of this guide is to detail a only fire based build, this will by no means be the best and most optimized build you could use for sorcerer as it is fueled by theme over success, however sorcerer is one of the easiest classes to pilot so this is ok and you won't feel underpowered compared to the average sad pitiful meta slave.

You won't have to care about this part till late game but once you get there if you care about not being useless then you must adhere this sacred sets

https://lostarkcodex.com/us/itemset/12202404/ and https://lostarkcodex.com/us/itemset/12102402/

The Select/Evening set(you want Select but Evening is the same just worse stat wise) is one that grants you high burst damage for explosion and mobility via your dodge/space bar this is what it grants:

Decreases Movement Skill's cooldown by 10%. This is massive, if your hands don't work like most sorceress players then this will be extremely useful to you
+12s of Festival when using a skill This is just the basic mechanic of the set, each time you use a skill you get a stack.

At 6 stacks, gain Finale: +10% damage to foes for 1m. Additionally, when the skill is used 17 times, gain Mayhem: +15% damage to foes for 20s. Mayhem and Festival do not stack This is what you need to pay attention to and probably the hardest part of the average gameplay you will experience, don't touch Explosion until you get 6 stacks and once you do let it loose for absolutely massive damage and also for maximizing purposes you'll need to pay attention for when you use this 6 stack ability 17 times, before you do unsure that you have you're highest damage spells off cooldown or at least very close to it as you'll enter mayhem which increases damage but only for 20 seconds as opposed to a minute.

https://lostarkcodex.com/us/itemset/12202405/

The Resolve set is what you'll use if you were born with opposable thumbs.

On hit, gain Solar Power for 6s every 2s.
Solar Power: Crit Rate +3% (Max. 5 stacks. Cannot be used in conjunction with Lunar Power) Basic mechanic, the 15% crit rate is nice but what we are after is midday and solar eclipse
At 5 stacks of Solar Power, gain Midday.

If a party member with an effect that is activated with 5 sets of Oath is within 3 meters while Midday is active, you will gain Total Solar Eclipse.
Midday: Crit Rate +25% for 15s.
Total Solar Eclipse: Crit Rate +25% and Crit Damage +50% for 15s. Ex-PLOSION...is what I would say if this was on the Western servers, if for some reason you are reading this from RU or KR then go ahead but till this comes to West use the Select set or one of the crit sets

Accessories just have passive stats so max out intelligence and whatever damage based stat you are lacking in with a priority for crit rate.

MP Efficiency is necessary otherwise have fun with auto attacking.

Campfire is really nice but for hard content where things will one shot you ensure you have Time Stop Potion--its mandatory.

Mag. Defense Piercing is great, it works as a percentage so if you find yourself having trouble against creatures that are seemingly impervious to your damage especially when you crit maybe consider this stat. Additional Damage is additional damage, essentially if you dislike RNG of crits go for this instead of crit chance/damage. Bonus vs. X is typically more efficient but you need to know you will be fighting X thing and even then the damage will only be slightly higher maybe not really worth it vs crits but again if you dislike RNG go for it.

Stagger damage is a trap, this is not a high cooldown build nor are the abilities and stagger damage doesn't scale with base damage it is it's own entity. Damage increase on incapacitated is also not very good but if you run with people who have a lot of crowd control then it could be worth it, probably not though.

You will press this button a lot, make sure its in a very natural place on your keyboard for your hand so that you don't exhaust or injure yourself, for most people this would be wherever your ring finger is on the keyboard when playing.

Tier 1
Ignite Core, not really a good reason to take anything else
Damage Amplification BAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA WTF ARE YOU A BARD?!?!?!?!
Mind Enhancement Pretty Useless unless you have bad MP--which hopefully was in trade of a good stat like crit rate/damage.

Tier 2
Charge Flame Really good seeing as this is your spam ability
Flame Expansion Also really good but only if you have one of the sets that gives you a temporary buff to critical stats/damage or another consistent way to get way to much damage output from Explosion
Blazing Wildfire Cool but that's not what we want

Tier 3
Weak Point Detection This is only here in case you didn't take charge flame
Undying Flame Insanely good, absolutely broken with charge flame and ignite but obviously doesn't work against the toughest things.

Suggested Effects
Ignite>Charge Flame>Undying Flame

Skill Runes
Use Conviction for Explosion. Nothing else don't even think about it.

Darker than black, darker than darkness, combine with my intense crimson. Time to wake up, descend to these borders and appear as an intangible distortion. Dance, dance, dance! May a destructive force flood my torrent of power, a destructive force like no other! Send all creation to its source! Come out of your abyss! Humanity knows no other more powerful offensive technique! It is the ultimate magical attack! Explosion!
Tier 1
Ignite Core, not really a good reason to take anything else
Mind Enhancement 28s cooldown that you save for when you can maximize damage does not need MP reduction
Laws of the Jungle Would be good if our intent for this ability wasn't to kill anything but weak enemies

Tier 2
Backfire Decent but not good enough
Whirlpool Wildfire Extra damage and bit of crowd control in case it doesn't kill, not good
Weak Point Detection Do you like damage?

Tier 3
Magick Amplification Really good, combine this with Doomsday's Magick Amp, and a temp boost to damage or crit and you will show 1945 who's boss
Final Strike If you want to reserve your Magick for blink that's understandable and perfectly viable as this is a crit build and dying reduces your damage

Suggested Effects
Ignite>Weak Point Detection>Final Strike

Skill Runes
Assuming you are using Conviction this is what you use Judgement on, it's insanely good and you have 0 reason to use anything else. Literally.

Explosions's less cool but nearly as effective cousin has a slightly longer cooldown and a little bit more MP cost but also has a knockback which is really nice for people who care about that, we don't.

Tier 1
Ignite Core, not really a good reason to take anything else
Mind Enhancement MP Cost down on your most expensive ability, jeez I wonder if this is useful, not really actually considering it's cooldown and how much you will prefer other abilities over this one
Insight Why?

Tier 2
Flame Area This is just a lower damage Overheated meteor but increases Doomsday fall speed
Asteroid Pure damage, nothing bad about this but you should probably pick overheated meteor unless your crit rate/damage is insane
Overheated Meteor Go to option, use when the thing you are fighting has just used it's mobility or is crowd controlled and you will output a lot of damage

Tier 3
Magick Amplification Really good, combine this with Asteroid, Explosion's Magick Amp, and a temp boost to damage or crit and you will show 1945 who's boss
Final Strike If you want to reserve your Magick for blink that's understandable and perfectly viable as this is a crit build and dying reduces your damage to say the least

Suggested Effects
Ignite>Overheated Meteor>Final Strike

Skill Runes
Wealth for a Magick Amp build or just in general, if using Overheated Meteor Overwhelm is really good

You will likely only ever use this against bosses for Weak Points

Tier 1
Ignite It's good but...
Rift Acceleration Ok but just get better at the game
Weak Point Enhancement Necessary, this is a mechanic a lot of bosses have that you must overcome and this allows you to do so faster.

Tier 2
Flame Area Boost to damage is normally good but this is a utility spell for weak points
Weak Point Detection This is Good
Charge Flame But this is better

Tier 3
Firepower Expansion A lot of extra damage, MP Cost, and cast time. Normally things that delay you doing damage for the trade of more damage are good but in this case it's not
Firepower Supplement Not as much extra damage but faster, pick this.

Suggested Effects
Weak Point Enhancement>Charge Flame>Firepower Supplement

Skill Runes
Chances are you will use this before dealing your big damage to a boss, Conviction is good but there is a case to be made for Judgement because if you miss it still has a chance to proc whereas with Conviction it doesn't and you will probably be gaining more Convictions then you can cast explosion. Wealth is generally good though.

You shouldn't need to use this ability but you might depending on where you take your build, such as a Magick Amp build.


Tier 1
MP Recovery Core, not really a good reason to take anything else
Tide's Fury Don't
Quick Prep Would be useful if we didn't get this the same exact tier as MP Recovery

Tier 2
Swift Footwork Go from A to B 10% faster
Laggard Are you a tank? No, so don't take this
Focus Produces Specialty Meter aka Magick Amp

Tier 3
MP Training Abusable, use only when your mana bar is full though
Shield Enhancement Not useful for this build

Suggested Effects
MP Recovery>Focus>MP Training

Skill Runes
Focus, none of the other runes work unless you take Tide's Fury but why would you

Useful for mana regen and decent damage for mob clearing

Tier 1
Agile Cast Not as good as free mana
Damage Amplification You are the main character don't take this
Charge MP yummy mana

Tier 2
Condensed Wildfire There are no other options

Tier 3
Energy Bombardment Extra damage which isn't needed, your other abilities cover that
Energy Rampage With Charge MP it grants extra mana

Suggested Effects
Charge MP>Condensed Wildfire> Energy Rampage

Skill Runes
Rage, Conviction, Wealth depending on what you need

Starts as an ice ability but you can upgrade it into a fire ability and it gives you benefits none of the other fire abilities get

Tier 1
Mind Enhancement MP Cost -50% is cool but
Enlightenment Special Meter +45% is cooler
Quick Prep cooldowns are overrated

Tier 2
Wide-Angle Attack Bigger AoE
Additional Explosion Delayed secondary explosion that knocks back, remember that CC is for side characters
Evolved Hail mo damage

Tier 3
Weak Point Detection I guess if you didn't take Explosion and Doomsday and aren't making a fire based build?
Red Hail Makes it fire and inflicts a DoT

Suggested Effects
Enlightment>Wide-Angle Attack>Red Hail

Skill Runes
Wealth

Esoteric Reaction
has a boost to crit damage and MP Regen, go Charge MP>Final Strike>Shockwave and take Focus

Frost's Call
Top tier mob clear ability with crit, mana heavy

Ice Shower
eh

Lightning Bolt
Fat damage, vital point hit>voltage boost and judgement

Lightning Vortex
yawn

Punishing Strike
so much good about this ability there is nothing bad about it literally do anythign

Reverse Gravity
This one actually has a fire themed skill but its a defense ability, still good just not great

Rime Arrow
Really fun ability and gives an insane special meter boost

Humina Humina holy god in christ I sure do love damage

If you are unaware Arcane Rupture when used correctly can turn you from the average nerd wizard to a walking god, it reduces spell cast time and increases elemental damage dealt as well as enables T3 skill effects from Explosion and Doomsday if you picked them, but even if you didn't pick them it is still incredibly good but considering that blink is one of your only escape/safety tools especially with your extra long dodge cooldown do it only when you are confident in your safety.