Diablo 4 Season 9’s S-Tier Sorcerer Build is Surprisingly Easy to Accomplish

The start of Diablo 4 Season 9 has revealed the top contenders for the season’s best builds, but most come with steep gear requirements. For Diablo 4 players looking to jump into the Sins of the Horadrim season with a build that packs a punch from the get-go, their options may be limited. However, the Sorcerer has received a nice boost this season due to the buffs to the class’s Hydra skill, making it a great choice for both seasonal leveling and endgame content.

Although a class like Spiritborn may be dominating the top of Diablo 4 Season 9’s meta, there is plenty of room there for Hydra Sorcerers to find success. The best part about Season 9’s Hydra Sorcerer is that it doesn’t rely on one or more unique or mythics to function properly. Although players can still take advantage of Diablo 4‘s new Season 9 Sorcerer unique with this build, the beauty of the Hydra Sorcerer is that it is adaptable for all stages of the game.

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Diablo 4 Season 9’s Best DPS Build Comes at a High Price

Diablo 4 Season 9 has some standout builds due to its Horadric Spells and skill buffs, but one of the best may require some heavy player investment.

Diablo 4 Season 9’s Hydra Sorcerer is a Great Bang-For-Your-Buck Build

Hydra Sorcerer Has a Lot of Things Going for It in Season 9

The Hydra skill got a major buff in Diablo 4 Season 9’s patch, allowing the heads of the Hydra to attack immediately after being summoned. Additionally, the Invoked Hydra was changed so that it gains a 50%[x] Crit damage boost after you deal a Crit, with a 20% chance to Crit again for 3 seconds, though it isn’t necessarily the best choice for this build.

Hydra Sorcerer Skills

Invoked Ice Blades
Invoked Familiar
Mystical Ice Armor
Flame Shield
Roaring Hydra
Supreme Inferno
Shimmering Teleport (Enchantment)

Hydra is the obvious damage dealer in this Diablo 4 Sorcerer build, but Inferno is useful for grouping enemies together for the summoned Hydras to dispatch. Ice Armor and Flame Shield will help give the Sorcerer some survivability while their Hydras do their work, and Invoked Familiar will help give the Hydras an extra bit of damage buff. Invoked Ice Blades are mainly there to give the player some extra DPS while their Hydras take on enemies, and Teleport should be slotted into the Sorcerer’s Enchantment. It’s important to keep Ice Blades and Familiar active, since players will want to have the Primordial Binding passive to give their Hydras bonus damage per active summon.

The only real requirement for players to succeed with this build is the Serpentine Aspect, which increases the damage done by the Hydra by 0.5-1.5% [x] per Mana the player had when it was summoned. Using the Serpentine Aspect lets the Sorcerer get the most damage possible out of their Hydra skill, making it a cornerstone of this build. This aspect may require some light farming to obtain, but it is a far less laborious task than trying to target farm Tormented Bosses for uniques and mythics.

Diablo 4’s New Ophidian Iris Unique is Nice to Have, But Not a Requirement for Success

Of all the new uniques added in Diablo 4 Season 9, the Sorcerer’s Ophidian Iris amulet may be one of the best (second only to the Spiritborn’s Balazan’s Maxtlatl). This unique can be a huge boon for Hydra Sorcerers since it augments how Hydras are summoned to increase their damage output significantly.

Affixes

+30% Resistance to all Elements
Casted Hydras have +2 Heads
+11.5-15.7% Intelligence
+10.5%-15.0% Attack Speed
+77.5-100% Pyromancy Damage
+1-2 Primordial Binding

Unique Power

Hydra is now a Core Skill and always Summons a 3-headed Hydra whose attacks explode on impact.
For each head above 3 that it would have had, the Hydra instead grows larger and deals 50-100%[x] increased damage.

It can be tempting to obtain the Ophidian Iris for the fantastic damage scaling the Hydra can get as it grows in would-be headcount. However, players will need to farm bosses like Duriel, Andariel, and Harbinger of Hatred in order to find it. The good news is that the Ophidian Iris is largely optional in this build, as the use of Hydra alongside the Serpentine Aspect and the Primordial Binding passive is enough to carry this build well into the endgame.