Madness Sorcerer
Last Updated: 5/31/21
Table of Contents
Overview
About the Class
Madness Sorcerer is a DoT DPS class that can deal decent sustained DPS by a skilled player. Madness Sorcerer does not generally target swap well due to the need to re-apply DoTs, and has fairly poor mobility due to the need to channel Force Lightning. However, Madness does extraordinary AoE between DoT spreads and Lightning Storm spam. From a survivability perspective, Sorcs overall are in a better position in 5.0 and Madness has significant self-heal capability. As a result, despite wearing light armor Madness Sorcerer will frequently be the last person to die in a group wipe.
Utility and Mobility
Sorcs have Force Speed and Phase Walk to quickly move around the battlefield, and can also pull to aid other players in movement. They can off-heal, bubble, rez, and can CC any add type. A key to success in high movement fights is finding parts of the rotation (re-applying DoTs, Death Field, Force Leech) that can be cast while moving and being strategic as to when to turret cast Force Lightning.
Survivability
As mentioned, most ideal Utilities for Sorcs boost healing received or damage resistance. Combined with a self-bubble, instant self heal, and a hard bubble to avoid many mechanics, a skilled Sorc should be able to offset the disadvantage of light armor. That said, Sorcs need to be especially careful about following mechanics to avoid damage as much as possible. Madness Sorcs also bring self-heals through their rotational use of Death Field (heals 10% of damage dealt) and Force Leech (heals 50% of damage dealt).
Role in Operations
Madness Sorcs do not target swap well between disparate targets due to the need to re-apply DoTs, so generally they are best served to stay focused on damaging the boss. An exception to this is when adds can be grouped up or pulled to the tank, in which cases Madness does exceptionally well to AoE DoT spread.
6.0 Impact on Discipline
Sorcerer DPS received some interesting changings in 6.0. The overall class got a great set bonus in The Gathering Storm between making Force Speed apply a powerful damage buff to the next ability and increased uptime and duration of Polarity Shift and an accompanying damage buff during its entire duration. The Gathering Storm is arguably one of the best overall set bonuses in 6.x to date.
Madness Sorcerer as a discipline received a decent buff through the combination of a great class set bonus in The Gathering Storm and some useful tactical options. The discipline has suffered a bit in comparison to Telekinetic / Lightning, which does nearly as much DPS while offering better burst and mobility. That said, buffs in 6.1 and beyond are intended to buff the discipline to an appropriate level so it should continue to be a solid sustained ranged DPS discipline and offer very good sustained AoE DPS through DoT spreading.
Utilities
I usually take some combination of the following Utilities, though the optimal combination can change from fight to fight. As of 6.0, the tiers have been reorganized.
Skillfull Tier
You must take 3 to advanced to Masterful.
Sith Defiance - Increases damage reduction by 3%.
A straight boost to damage reduction is the best kind of damage mitigation. Take every time.
Empty Body - Increases all healing received by 5%.
A mandatory utility that provides a helpful survivability increase and synergizes well with other utilities that buff Unnatural Preservation as a powerful off-GCD self heal on a fairly low cooldown. I always take.
Corrupted Flash - Reduces the damage taken by all periodic effects by 15%.
Another helpful damage mitigation utility. I always take as a healer and usually take as a DPS unless I know the fight (1) has a lot of AoE damage potential; AND (2) does not have any DoT damage mechanics. In those cases, I will swap it for Tempest Mastery.
Tempest Mastery - Increases the damage dealt by Force Storm by 25%.
A situational utility that can be taken primarily for DPS disciplines where AoE DPS will be relevant to fight mechanics. That said, I usually do not take this utility as it requires sacrificing a survivability utility in the Skillful tree or a utility from a higher tier.
Masterful Tier
You must take 6 between Heroic and Masterful.
Dark Resilience - Reduces the damage taken by the target of your Extrication by 25% for 6 seconds after you rescue them. Additionally increases the healing done by Unnatural Preservation by 30%.
This utility synergizes well with Unnatural Vigor to buff Unnatural Preservation. The pull buff is nice but rarely useful in an operation, though it could be situationally used for big hitting mechanics where the pull’s aggro drop will not cause issues (i.e., either because the mechanic doesn’t follow aggro or because the boss can’t change targets mid-cast).
Suppression - Activating Cloud Mind grants Blockout, which increases damage reduction by 25% for 6 seconds.
This gives the class another defensive cooldown. A 6 second duration is fairly short, but when timed well for predictable unavoidable heavy/moderate damage can be very useful.
Lightning Barrier - Your Static Barrier crackles with Force Energy, blasting attackers for energy damage when it absorbs direct damage to you. This effect cannot occur more than once each second.
A situational utility. It is useful on any fights where you as a DPS or healer are likely to be directly attacked by adds or the boss to add incremental DPS. It is especially useful on fights where there is raid wide steadily ticking damage such that one shield can tick damage multiple times before collapsing. Only take if you know how to maximize its benefit. This is usually my third choice in this tier.
Electric Bindings - Overload unbalances its targets, immobilizing them for 5 seconds. Direct damage dealt after 2 seconds ends the effect prematurely.
A PVP utility that has highly situational use in PVE content. A few specific fights in Hard or Nightmare modes may benefit from this utility. The best example if Tyth in the Gods from the Machine operation, where using your knockback as a root is extremely helpful to root adds during the Inversion mechanic so they do not get cleaved by the boss. There are a few other examples and should only be taken when the root will be relevant to key mechanics.
If I need to take this utility for mechanics, I will let it replace Lightning Barrier since I would rather maximize my survivability as a healer over dealing additional DPS.
Surging Speed - Reduces the cooldown of Force Speed by 5 seconds, Force Slow by 3 seconds, and Force Barrier by 30 seconds. In addition, Force Speed lasts 0.5 seconds longer, Polarity Shift increases your movement speed by 100% while active, and the active cooldown of Force Speed is finished when Force Barrier ends.
Previously a utility primarily limited to PVP, in 6.0 it offers a strict DPS increase for DPS players running the Gathering Storm set bonus. As the set bonus causes Force Speed to provide a +20% damage buff to the next damaging ability and to reduce the cooldown of Polarity Shift, this utility’s reduced CD means more frequent usage of this buff and thus higher DPS potential.
Heroic Tier
A maximum of 3 utilities
Shapeless Spirit - Reduces all damage taken while stunned by 30%. Also, reduces damage taken from area effects by 30%.
Another powerful survivability utility that should always be taken as very nearly every operation has AoE damage.
Force Mobility - Thundering Blast, Innervate, and Force Leech can be activated while moving.
A mandatory utility. All Sorc disciplines struggle at times to be mobile and this utility makes a big difference. Always take.
Unnatural Vigor - Unnatural Preservation increases your damage reduction by 15% for 6 seconds. Also, reduces the cooldown of Unnatural Preservation by 5 seconds.
I like to take this utility whenever possible to synergize with Dark Resilience. When combined with Suppression as well, that gives me two extra defensive cooldowns between Cloud Mind (25% damage reduction for 6 seconds) and Unnatural Preservation (15% damage reduction for 6 seconds and a buffed self-heal on a reduced cooldown).
Emersion - Force Speed grants Egress, removing all movement-impairing effects and granting immunity to them for the duration.
A highly situational utility, I rarely take this utility in PVE except if a fight has a stun/root/slow. The best example is HM Underlurker where the adds AoE damage imposes a very powerful Slow debuff, and this utility lets me Force Speed behind a rock if the adds are still alive.
Example Utility Build
Here is what I run for most encounters, though I frequently take other situational utilities for specific fights.
Key Passives
Madness - Force Lightning no longer has a cooldown. Also, your Resurgence increases your armor rating by 30% while it heals you.
Force Lightning is used nearly 3 times per rotation by Madness, so eliminating its cooldown is necessary.
Sith Efficacy - Reduces the pushback suffered while activating Force Leech by 75% and Force Lightning by 100%. Also, each time your Force Lightning deals damage, you recover 2% of your total Force.
This passive streamlines Force Lightning as a filler and ensures Force will almost never be an issue for this class.
Deathmark - Madness now suppresses resistance to the Force, increasing the amount of damage the targets suffer from your next 15 damaging abilities by 15%. Lasts 30 seconds.
This is a key to max DPS for Madness by ensuring that maximum uptime for all DoTs after Death Field (Demolish, Creeping Terror, Affliction).
Wrath - Dealing damage with Force Lightning produces a stack of Wrath. At 4 stacks, Wrath causes your next Lightning Strike, Crushing Darkness, or Demolish to activate instantly, consume 50% less Force, and deal 25% more damage.
You should always cast Demolish when procced in this manner, and strive to only cast Lightning Strike when procced as well.
Pestilence - Death Field spreads your Affliction and Creeping Terror to the targets it damages, as long as it damages targets already affected by your Affliction and Creeping Terror. Also, Death Field overwhelms its targets for 45 seconds. Overwhelmed targets take 10% more damage from area attacks.
This passive makes Death Field your DoT spread. It’s AoE circle is fairly small so careful positioning becomes critical to maximizing AoE DPS. It also provides a helpful debuff that will make targets take more damage from Death Field.
Lightning Burns - Damage dealt by Force Lightning has a 20% chance and damage dealt by Force Leech has a 60% chance to restore 2 Force and deal low kinetic damage to the target.
This passive makes Force Lightning a spammable way to deal damage and recover energy. As of the 5.X content expansion, Madness does not struggle with energy management as in past versions of the game, so additional spamming is typically not necessary.
Creeping Death - Increases the damage dealt by periodic effects by 15% on targets below 30% of max health. Also, Force Leech restores 15 Force when used on a target affected by your Deathmark.
This passive provides an automatic DPS increase when in the execute range without any rotational change. It also makes Force Leech net positive to energy while a target is affected by Madness (which should have nearly full uptime of the Deathmark buff, aka the 15 stacks of damage increase).
Parasitism - Increases the life stolen by Death Field and Force Leech by 100% and causes Affliction and Creeping Terror to reclaim life from enemy targets, healing you for 10% of the damage they deal.
This passive explains why Madness provides enormous self heals. When a DPS player can play optimally to avoid damage, they will usually have the best overall survivability of the raid team due to being a ranged player with surprisingly strong defensive abilities and the enormous self heals.
Lightning Barrage - Force Lightning channels and ticks 33% faster but deals 25% less damage.
This passive explains why the Madness rotation can be so wonky due to the weird channel time for Force Lightning being 1.33 GCDs instead of 2.
Devour - Force Leech deals 30% more damage when used on a target affected by your Affliction. In addition, each time a charge of your Deathmark is consumed, you gain 2 Force.
This passive provides an automatic DPS increase when in the execute range without any rotational change. It also makes Force Leech net positive to energy while a target is affected by Death Field (which should have nearly full uptime of the Deathmark buff, aka the 15 stacks of damage increase).
Fulminating Current - Dealing damage with Force Lightning increases critical chance of DoTs by 3% for 10 seconds. Stacks up to 4 times (so 12% max boost). Should strive for continuous uptime of this buff.
This passive should have 100% uptime within the Madness rotation to provide a continuous 12% critical chance buff. The base rotation should never go more than 5 GCDs between uses of Force Lightning so it should have full uptime.
Dark Echo - Targets hit by Death Field have a 50% chance to emit a Dark Echo, damaging itself and up to 7 targets within 5 meters for internal damage.
This passive should have 100% uptime within the Madness rotation to provide a continuous 12% critical chance buff. The base rotation should never go more than 5 GCDs between uses of Force Lightning so it should have full uptime.
Gearing in 6.0
Gearing Stat Allocation
Please see my Gearing Guide for a detailed overview of gearing in 6.x in SWTOR. Please also see my Alacrity Guide for a much more in-depth look at alacrity.
For Madness Sorcerer, I gear as follows:
Set Bonus: Gathering Storm
Tactical: Tempest of Rho (I usually keep Tempest of Rho even for heavy AoE since Madness has great AoE already)
Amplifiers: Force Sensitivity
Mods: Unlettered Lethal Mods
Relics: Devastating Vengeance & Primeval Fatesealer (Serendipitous Assault & Focused Retribution for Dxun/PVP)
Stim: Proficient
Adrenal: Critical (Attack for Dxun only)
For Madness Sorcerer, I allocate my tertiary stats as follows:
Accuracy: 1,585 - 1,630 (anything outside this approximate range and I usually try to re-optimize by swapping around enhancements and augments)
Alacrity: around 1,400 (at least 1,895 if the Zeal guild perk applies)
Critical: all remaining tertiary points go into Critical
Shield: None
Absorb: None
Set Bonus
Gathering Storm
Increased drop rate from operations.
(2) +2% Mastery
(4) Force Speed makes your next Force attack deal 20% more damage and Force attacks deal 20% more damage while Polarity Shift is active.
(6) Activating Force Speed reduces the cooldown of Polarity Shift by 5 seconds. Polarity Shift's duration is extended by 5 seconds.
Analysis:
Gathering Storm is an amazing set bonus. The 4-piece set bonus alone is quite strong. Force Speed has a cooldown of 15s with the Surging Speed utility (reduces CD by 5 seconds), so this provides a very frequent 20% damage buff to your hardest hitting abilities. In addition, the 20% damage buff during Polarity Shift is quite strong even before the 6-piece set bonus based on its 15s duration and 105s cooldown.
Enter the 6-piece set bonus to provide a massive synergistic buff to the 4-piece. Using Force Speed on cooldown for the 20% single ability damage buff should significantly reduce the effective cooldown of Polarity Shift from its base 1:45 minute cooldown. Combine that with extra 5 seconds of duration and together you get much higher uptime on a very powerful cooldown and its 20% damage buff.
So to recap, using Force Speed on cooldown and Polarity Shift on cooldown grant a 20% buff to your high damage abilities once every 9-10 GCDs and grants high uptime on a 20% damage buff to ALL abilities.
Impact on Rotation:
No impact on the priority of damaging abilities. Force Speed should be used very close to on cooldown. Polarity Shift should be used on cooldown and always within 10s after using Force Speed (while it is glowing) for the extra duration.
When to Take:
Recommended in all cases for Sorc DPS.
Tactical Items
Tempest of Rho
Increased drop rate from flashpoints.
Lightning Strike has a 100% chance and Force Lightning has a 50% chance to cause Creeping Terror to tick an additional time whenever they deal damage.
Analysis:
This tactical is very straightforward in that it provides frequent chances for additional ticks of one of the discipline’s two main DoTs, thereby providing a strict DPS increase. It provides the greatest single target sustained damage increase and is preferred in most PVE encounters.
Impact on Rotation:
No changes.
When to Take:
Recommended for all PVE encounters.
Mystic's Ruthless Blade
Increased drop rate from operations.
Demolish deals 20% more damage on initial hit. Additionally, under Polarity Shift, Demolish resets the cooldown of Force Leech and causes the next Force Leech to activate instantly.
Analysis:
The 20% buff to Demolish’s initial hit sounds nice but is underwhelming due to the ability doing a lot of its damage via a short duration DoT. The second buff to DPS is by enabling periodic bonus casts of Force Leech while under Polarity Shift. Replacing a GCD of Force Lightning with a second Force Leech each rotation is definitely a DPS increase.
The challenge for this tactical is you can only get 2 (maybe 3) bonus casts of Force Leech per use of Polarity Shift, and that bonus cast only provides incremental DPS based on it dealing more damage than Force Lightning. The much increased uptime of Polarity Shift via the Gathering Storm set bonus is the only thing that might make this decent by providing 25s of uptime out of every minute.
In comparison to Tempest of Rho which provides predictable and consistent extra ticks of damage, Mystic’s Ruthless Blade provides a 20% buff to part of an ability used once every 10 GCDs and around half the time lets you use a higher damaging ability over a filler.
Impact on Rotation:
If using this tactical, the player should try to delay use of Polarity Shift until right before Demolish to maximize the number of cooldown resets on Force Leech. The idea for this rotation is to normally cast Force Leech right before Demolish then while under Polarity Shift get a reset and use it again right after Demolish. Force Leech has a cooldown that is 3s shorter than Demolish so the timing lines up that if you get a free extra use right after Demolish, then it will be up again in it’s “normal” spot in the rotation.
When to Take:
Not recommended for any encounters.
Slow Mercy
Increased drop rate from Onderon and Mek'sha daily missions.
Death Field spreads Force Slow's effects. Demolish hits all nearby targets affected by your Deathmark and Force Storm does 15% more damage to targets affected by your Deathmark.
Analysis:
This tactical provides a helpful buff to AoE DPS in several ways. Death Field applies 15 stacks Deathmark that are consumed each time the target takes damage and buffs the damage by 15% each time until the stacks are consumed. This tactical ensures that Demolish should always be an AoE as long as any stacks are remaining from using Death Field. Second, it buffs Force Storm by 15% as well.
This leads to a very powerful rotation where the Sorcerer applies DoTs to one target, uses Death Field to spread DoTs and apply the Deathmark debuff and stacks, then can use Demolish for AoE damage and then can spam Force Storm for one or two channels before repeating the sequence.
Impact on Rotation:
Move Demolish after Death Field in the rotation to ensure it deals AoE damage via the tactical. If going all out for AoE damage, replace Force Leech and the second partial channel of Force Lightning with channels of Force Storm.
When to Take:
Recommend only for fights with very high AoE DPS requirements, or if the group composition has fairly week AoE DPS on a fight where it is necessary (e.g., Hive Queen or some Dxun fights in Hard Mode).
The Rushdown
Increased drop rate from flashpoints.
When Force Lightning generates 4 stacks of Wrath you gain Wrath Rush, allowing your next 3 Volt Rushes to deal 25% more damage and cost 50% less Force. Volt Rush consumes all stacks of Wrath.
Analysis:
This tactical introduces various buffs to your new filler ability. Sadly the ability is far too weak to be useful in nearly any situation, so it is not recommended.
Impact on Rotation:
N/A not recommended.
When to Take:
Not recommended for any situations.
Amplifiers
Force Sensitivity
All Madness attacks deal force-based damage so this is an easy one. Lightning is the same so synergizing amplifiers for both disciplines is much easier than many other classes.
Key Abilities
Telekinetic Blitz NEW IN 6.0 - Deals energy damage to your target and energizes you for up to 5 seconds. The Energize effect can stack twice, with each stack increasing Telekinetic Blitz damage by 30%. The ability has 3 charges and recharge timer of 10 seconds.
The new ability in 6.0. It offers lackluster damage so is not highly useful in most situations. It can be used on the move so represents a useful ability when other abilities are on cooldown. It is best to use all 3 charges consecutively to ensure the 2nd use does +30% damage and the 3rd use does +60% damage.
Death Field - Deals moderate internal damage to the target and steals life from the affected target to heal you for 10% of the damage dealt. Strikes up to 8 enemies within a 5 meter radius.
Death Field is the signature ability of Madness. While it does not deal exceptional damage by itself, what makes it so powerful is the Deathmark passive. This passive causes Madness to to apply a debuff that makes your DoTs tick for 15% more damage for the next 15 ticks. This ability is your top overall priority in the rotation to use on cooldown. Various other passives also cause this ability to apply a debuff to AoE attacks,increase the self heal component, and enable it to spread your DoTs to other affected targets.
Creeping Terror - Deals moderate internal damage over 18 seconds.
The first DoT for Madness is unique for Sorcerers but is shared with Assassin Hatred. It deals slightly more damage for significantly less Force. Any time DoTs need to be reapplied after they have fallen off, Creeping Terror should be applied first.
Affliction - Deals moderate internal damage over 18 seconds.
The second DoT for Madness is an existing ability for all Sorcerers. It is slightly weaker than Creeping Terror. It should have 100% uptime on the boss and be refreshed as close to its expiration as possible.
Demolish - Deals moderate kinetic damage initially and moderate additional kinetic damage over 9 seconds. The target also becomes Vulnerable for 45 seconds, increasing the damage taken by Force attacks by 5%.
This ability replaces Crushing Darkness. It has a 1.5 GCD cast time so should only be hard cast in the opener. In all other instances, it should only be cast with 4 stacks of Wrath that make it an instant cast, deal 25% more damage and cost 50% less Force.
Force Leech - Deals moderate internal damage to the target and heals you for 50% of the damage dealt.
The last signature ability for Madness, Force Leech is your top priority filler. It deals strong damage and is buffed if the target is suffering the effects of Madness, thus we try to always use in the GCD right after it to guarantee it is always buffed. The self heal is very powerful as well.
Force Lightning - Deals moderate energy damage to the target over approximately 1.5 GCDs.
The spammable filler for Madness, Force Lightning is buffed by several passives that buff Force regeneration (making it effectively limitless for the rotation), generating stacks of Wrath that enable an instant cast of Lightning Strike and Demolish, creating and maintaining up to an 8% critical chance buff to DoT damage. It should be used within the rotation to enable an instant cast of Lightning Strike, then again to enable an instant cast of Demolish, and then is typically channeled a third time but clippped at 0.2 seconds to cast Demolish.
Lightning Strike - Deals moderate energy damage to the target.
The lower priority filler, Lightning Strike is below Force Lightning in the Madness priority due to an absence of passive ability buffs. However, the rotation allows for one buffed instant cast between DoT application and big hitting ability uses. It should never be used unless it is buffed and instant with 4 stacks of Wrath.
Cooldowns & Other Abilities
Polarity Shift - Grants 20% alacrity and immunity to pushback and interrupts for 15 seconds. 1:45 cooldown prior to any reductions to passive abilities.
Recklessness - Grants 2 charges of Recklessness, which increases the Force critical chance of your direct attacks and heals by 60%. Each time a direct Force ability critically hits or each time a channeled Force ability is activated, 1 charge is consumed. Lasts 20 seconds. 1:30 cooldown.
Expunge - Cleanse
Static Barrier - Applies a force shield around the target that absorbs a high amount of damage and lasts up to 30 seconds. The target becomes Deionized and cannot benefit from Static Barrier again for 20 seconds.
Force Barrier - Force bubble channeled ability that makes you immune to most damage and controlling effects for 8 seconds. 3 minute cooldown (prior to utilities).
Cloud Mind - Threat drop for all enemies. 45 second cooldown.
Unnatural Preservation - Instant off-GCD self heal. 25 second cooldown.
Resurgence - Provides low immediate healing and a low level of healing over time over 9 seconds.
Dark Heal - Spammable healing ability that heals moderate damage.
Extrication - Lowers the targets threat by a moderate amount and pulls them to your location. 1 minute cooldown.
Rotation
Opener
1
3
5
7
9
11
13
2
4
6
8
10
12
14
Demolish - DoT, hard cast for opener, otherwise should use when procced, debuffs target to take 5% more damage from Force attacks
Recklessness OFF GCD - Recklessness should not trigger on applying Dots, so using right after Demolish to get it on cooldown early
Polarity Shift OFF GCD - Use before DoTs to accelerate their tick rate and minimize "wasted" DoT duration
Force Speed OFF GCD - Used after Polarity Shift to buff Death Field and reduce its cooldown.
Creeping Terror - 1st DoT, does slightly more damage than Affliction thus comes first
Affliction - 2nd DoT
Unlimited Power - OFF-GCD
Death Field - AoE damage, self-heal, also buffs DoTs 15% damage for 15 DoT ticks
Force Leech - high damage filler, self-heal
Force Lightning - filler, completing a cast enables an instant cast of Lightning Strike or Demolish
Lightning Strike - instant-cast via previous Force Lightning
Force Lightning
Lightning Strike - instant-cast via previous Force Lightning
Force Lightning
(begin main rotation instant proc of Demolish)
This opener is essentially identical to the main rotation except for needing to hard cast Demolish, an extra use of Force Lightning and mixing in offensive cooldowns.
Please note that another option for the opener is to ignore Lightning Strike and just spam Force Lightning until Demolish comes off cooldown to begin the normal rotation.
Single Target Rotation
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
Demolish - DoT, should be instant due to procs from opener or previous rotation, debuffs target to take 5% more damage from Force attacks
Creeping Terror - refresh 1st DoT
Affliction - refresh 2nd DoT
Death Field - AoE damage, self-heal, also buffs DoTs 15% damage for 15 DoT ticks
Force Leech - high damage filler, self-heal
Force Lightning - filler, completing a cast enables an instant cast of Lightning Strike or Demolish
Lightning Strike - instant-cast via previous Force Lightning
Force Lightning - channel here to ensure we can instant cast Demolish when it comes off cooldown
Force Lightning - generally will need to clip channel per main rotation
(begin main rotation instant proc of Demolish)
Please see the "Lightning Strike v. Force Lightning" discussion below. Replacing Lightning Strike with extra Force Lightning will be a DPS increase in most circumstances. However, I recommend learning this rotation first since it is more mobile before working on more advanced rotations.
I think it is important to note that this single target rotation is a bit inefficient but will probably be the best rotation for the majority of players due to its simplicity and ability to consistently execute it.
The inefficiency comes from us committing the first sin of a DoT class...refreshing our DoTs early?!?! Yes, most rotations for Madness refresh their DoTs based on the 15 second (before alacrity) cooldowns of Demolish and Death Field rather than the 18 second (before alacrity) duration of Creeping Terror and Affliction.
Why do most rotations do this? It is a pain to float DoTs through the Balance rotation due to Force Lightning's 2 second / 1.5 GCD channel time. Balance is the only DoT class that has key abilities floating through the rotation along with multi-GCD channel abilities. Let's compare to other DoT classes:
Vengeance Juggernaut - All rotation abilities are instant and consume 1 GCD, Shatter floats through the rotation
Annihilation Marauder - All rotation abilities are instant and consume 1 GCD, Force Rend floats
Hatred Assassin - All rotation abilities are instant and consume 1 GCD, Death Field and Leeching Strike float
Virulence Sniper - Cull is channeled but its cooldown is 1/3 that of your DoTs so you can refresh them without any conflict or overlap
Engineering Sniper - Unload is channeled but it has the same cooldown as Plasma Probe, only minimally conflicts with Corrosive Dart and Interrogation Probe only has to be applied once with the Ruthless Interrogation tactical
Lethality Operative - All rotation abilities are instant and consume 1 GCD, Toxic Blast floats
Innovative Ordnance Mercenary - Unload is channeled but Incendiary Missile and Serrated Shot have the same cooldown so they do not conflict
Pyrotech Powertech - All rotation abilities are instant and consume 1 GCD
Is it possible to change the rotation to be more efficient? In theory this should be possible but in practice it has a lot of potential trade-offs and difficulties to execute properly. For example, any other rotation would involve more clipping of Force Lightning that can be difficult to do properly and a significant DPS loss if done incorrectly. Demolish and Death Field take higher priority generally than your DoTs, so most attempts to restructure the rotation would leave to occasionally not having DoTs active. Having a tiny bit of downtime on DoTs might be okay but leaves us open to forgetting to refresh them and destroying our rotation.
I've outlined some alternative approaches to the rotation below for your consideration. Please note that I recommend following the above rotation unless you are a highly advanced player or are really comfortable with much more complicated rotations. It is slightly sub-optimal particularly with regards to using Lightning Strike (see more below on that) and the early refresh on DoTs but it will still deal high damage, is easy to execute and can clear virtually all content in the game.
Advanced Single Target Priority Rotation
If refreshing DoTs early bothers you as much it does me, then you can try running Madness as a priority rotation. The idea here is to let our DoTs, Creeping Terror and Affliction, float and only refresh them as they expire if possible. Demolish and Death Field take higher priority.
The upside to this approach is that you will gain a few extra GCDs due to less frequent application of DoTs, which will enable more frequent channels of Force Lightning. The downside is that you will occasionally have to either refresh them a bit early or let them drop off for a GCD due to Demolish or Death Field coming off cooldown. I have also found this makes use of Force Lightning difficult by requiring much more frequent clipping. As discussed in detail further below, there is some weird ability activation delay that commonly occurs that can make this priority rotation less efficient than it should be in theory.
My experience has been that playing Madness as a pure priority rotation discipline is roughly the same DPS due to the benefits and costs mostly offsetting or being within the margin of RNG on damage, crits and how often Tempest of Rho and Lightning Burns trigger. I do not recommend it as being better than the fixed rotation above, so would generally recommend newer players run the fixed rotation and then try this out later to see if it fits better after you know the discipline well.
Ability Priority
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
Demolish - Deals by far the most damage per activation, should always have the Wrath buff that makes it instant, consume 50% less Force and deal 25% more damage.
Death Field - Deals less base damage than either DoT but it contributes more total damage after considering the Deathmark charges it applies that buff 15 DoT damage ticks by 15%.
Creeping Terror - Deals slightly more damage than Affliction and can be ticked by Tempest of Rho by Force Lightning and Force Serenity. I suggest applying this DoT slightly early to avoid it falling off due if Vanquish or Force in Balance will come off cooldown when it needs to be refreshed.
Affliction - Deals slightly less damage than Creeping Terror and cannot be ticked for extra damage. I suggest letting this one fall off for a GCD before re-applying if that is more convenient.
Force Leech - Deals significantly more damage than Force Lightning so we want it to use it on cooldown. Force Leech can be used 1 GCD more often than Demolish or Death Field, so it will tend to float until eventually it gets "stuck" behind either Demolish or Death Field under this priority system.
Force Lightning - Filler for most situations since it deals more damage after considering bonus damage from Tempest of Rho and Lightning Burns.
Lightning Strike - Filler that should only be used with 4 stacks of Wrath to make it instant and deal 25% more damage. I only recommend Lightning Strike when you need to DPS on the move or the target will die in a few seconds. Be really careful not to use Lightning Strike with Wrath unless you know you will have time for a full Force Lightning channel before Demolish, as if not you will have to delay Demolish which is a big DPS loss.
Advanced Single Target Rotation & DoT Spacing
If this guide has not yet convinced you I am a bit crazy, this part may do the trick. Let’s assume that you (like me) really dislikes having to refresh DoTs early but finds the priority rotation a bit clunky. Can we design a rotation that follows the priority but leads to a fairly smooth rotation?
I think we mostly can by looking to Madness' cousin, the Hatred Assassin. Hatred's rotation is designed around refreshing its DoTs and letting Death Field and Leeching Strike float. Madness is the opposite where Demolish and Death Field have a fixed location and both DoTs float.
The key to Hatred's rotation is spacing the DoT application apart far enough to let abilities float without being delayed. We can do the same for Madness.
Prior to alacrity, Death Field and Demolish have a 15 second / 10 GCD cooldown while Creeping Terror and Affliction have a 18 second / 12 GCD duration. That means each DoT will float backward 2 spots in the 10 GCD rotation each block. As such, we can design a rotation where we let Demolish and Death Field take GCDs #1 and #3 and then as long as we apply DoTs in even numbered GCDs then they can float and be refreshed as they expire without ever delaying Demolish or Death Field.
This rotation design leads to 6 blocks that repeat until the DoTs get back to the same position. The major downsides to this rotation are the much higher complexity and blocks 2-4 involving a LOT of clipped Force Lightning. That is pretty messy to do effectively.
I do not necessarily recommend this rotation as I have not had significantly better DPS with it than the base rotation. I do recommend considering it as a way of visualizing how your rotation would eventually look if you tried to avoid refreshing DoTs early. I think it can outperform the base rotation when played well and I think helps one understand how the abilities work even if not.
KEY NOTE - The numbering below is per ability activation. An unnumbered Force Lightning represents the partial GCD for a full channel. A numbered Force Lightning without an unnumbered Force Lightning after it means the channel should be clipped by activating the next ability.
KEY NOTE #2 - I have outlined the use of Lightning Strike with Wrath below to illustratively show how it would move around. As discussed elsewhere, I generally recommend replacing Lightning Strike with additional channeling of Force Lightning due to the extra damage from Tempest of Rho and Lightning Burns. I feel this rotation should replace Lightning Strike with Force Lightning anytime doing so will avoid clipping Force Lightning, but where only one GCD is available continue to use Lightning Strike. For example, the third block below goes Creeping Terror / Lightning Strike / Affliction. I would suggest keeping that even if most of the time you avoid Lightning Strike.
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Lightning Strike v. Force Lightning
Lightning Strike has long been a key ability in the Madness Sorcerer rotation due to the Wrath passive skill. Force Lightning builds stacks of Wrath each time it deals damage. A full channel of Force Lightning deals damage 4 times and will build 4 stacks of Wrath. When you have 4 stacks of Wrath, you can instantly activate Lightning Strike or Demolish and the ability costs 50% less Force and deals 25% more damage.
Historically the approach to Madness was to use one buffed Lightning Strike per rotation cycle then build another 4 Wrath stacks to use Demolish instantly when it came off cooldown. This rotation goal was complicated in 6.0 due to the Tempest of Rho tactical and Lightning Burns passive skill.
Before we think about the other effects, let’s first compare Lightning Strike with the Wrath buff and a full channel of Force Lightning. The numbers quoted below are from some baseline parsing without using any cooldowns like raid buff, adrenal, Recklessness, Force Speed or Polarity Shift. This was done so the “normal” damage by abilities could be compared without needing to worry about whether some were buffed more often than others, so are probably a bit low compared to a full-out parse.
Force Lightning usually did around 17k damage per full channel prior to any critical bonus damage or bonus damage from tactical or passive skills. This damage was over a 1.87 second channel with alacrity just past the 1.4 second global cooldown breakpoint. So the DPS by Force Lightning alone was around 9.1k.
Lightning Strike with Wrath did around 16.5k damage per activation prior to any critical bonus damage. Lightning Strike is instant with Wrath so consumes one 1.4 second global cooldown, which leads to DPS around 11.8k.
So Lightning Strike is the winner and we should always try to use a buffed one when we can without delaying Demolish? Not so fast!
Lightning Burns is a passive skill that gives Force Lightning a 20% chance and Force Leech a 60% chance to restore 2 Force and trigger some bonus damage. In my testing Lightning Burns typically ticked for around 1.7 - 1.8k damage. A full channel of Force Lightning deals damage 4 times so gets 4 rolls for bonus damage at a 20% probability. A quick analysis indicates it is around 60% likely we get at least one tick of Lightning Burns per full channel and around 50% likely we get at least one tick per clipped channel. It is also possible we get really lucky and all ticks deal damage…
Tempest of Rho is a tactical item introduced in the 6.0 Onslaught update for Madness Sorcerer and is the recommended tactical for all encounters except very high AoE DPS fights and possibly PVP. Tempest of Rho gives Force Lightning a 50% chance and Lightning Strike a 100% chance each time they deal damage to tick Creeping Terror to deal damage. In my testing Tempest of Rho typically ticked for around 4.1k damage. A quick analysis indicates we should expect at least two ticks of Tempest of Rho on average per full channel of Force Lightning and it is almost 94% likely we get at least one tick per full channel.
So let’s revisit the math. So let’s revisit the math. Lightning Strike still dealt around 16k base damage plus a guaranteed tick of Tempest of Rho for 4k, which works out to a total of 20k damage over 1 GCD or a bit over 14.3k DPS before alacrity. Force Lightning deals base damage of around 17k, plus it should average 0.9k damage from Lightning Burns (assuming 1 tick every other channel) and 8.2k damage from Tempest of Rho (assuming 2 ticks every channel on average). Force Lightning's total damage contribution of 26.1k damage over a 1.87 second channel results in DPS of 14k DPS.
So our conclusion is that Force Lightning should be a DPS gain over Lightning Strike given the extra ticks of damage from Tempest of Rho and Lightning Burns. This is subject to RNG but absent terrible luck it should still be a DPS gain and could be a big DPS gain if you get lucky. This is supported by most top parses that only use Lightning Strike at the end of a parse if an instant cast can end the parse a second or so earlier than a channeled Force Lightning.
The only exceptions to this analysis is that Lightning Strike with Wrath can be activated instantly so can be used on the move. Many fights will require DPS on the move unexpectedly to move out of damage AoEs.
Clipping Force Lightning
Force Lightning normally has a 3 second / 2 GCD duration. The Lightning Barrage passive skill causes Force Lightning to channel 33% faster, leading to a 2 second / 1.33 GCD channel duration for Madness Sorcerer.
Force Lightning deals damage 4 times during its channel. I noticed the exact timing for some ticks of damage varies a bit but overall was fairly consistent. When I gear just enough alacrity to get a 1.4 second GCD, I had the following results for a 1.87 second channel of Force Lightning:
First tick @ 0.002 seconds (beginning of channel)
Second tick @ 0.67-0.70 seconds (1.1 - 1.2 seconds left on the channel)
Third tick @ 1.20-1.30 seconds (0.6 - 0.7 seconds left on the channel)
Fourth tick @ 1.87 seconds (end of channel)
A common strategy for Madness Sorcerer players is to clip Force Lightning after the third tick of damage, since the rotation usually requires clipping to use Demolish as it comes off cooldown.
An important observation from the above results is that a full GCD for these purposes was 1.4 seconds (or 0.4 - 0.5 seconds left on the channel), so we deal 3 of our 4 ticks of damage after one GCD and 4 out of 4 after 1.33 GCDs. Mathematically this should work out to the same damage whether we do a full channel or a clipped channel.
I tested clipping a fair bit and had some interesting results:
You cannot clip Force Lightning via re-activation of Force Lightning. Whether spamming the button or trying to hit at the right moment, the ability queue loads the ability but will not interrupt the first channel.
You can move to break a channel of Force Lightning then channel again. This will always be a DPS loss due to the delay imposed by movement. The best I could consistently do with this strategy took the same time as a full channel of Force Lightning only with just 3 ticks of damage.
You can consistently clip Force Lightning with another ability. It works most consistently with instant abilities, of which all Balance abilities are instant or become instant via procs except Force Leech. Spamming the button is less consistent than simply hitting the ability key around 1 second into the channel, which let me semi-consistently clip the channel at 0.6-0.7 seconds and always get the first three ticks of Force Lightning.
Despite clipping Force Lightning within 1 GCD, I consistently had some delay activating the next ability. Instead of 1.4 seconds from Force Lightning to the next ability as I was hoping, it was usually 1.5 - 1.6 seconds. I suspect this there is a “mini-GCD” imposed from the last tick of Force Lightning causing the delay.
Even using full channels of Force Lightning nonstop for a few minutes still caused some delays between ending one channel and beginning another channel. Despite my alacrity causing Force Lightning to have a 1.87 second channel time, it was usually fairly close to 2.0 seconds. I noticed roughly similar results at various alacrity levels, so again I suspect there is a “mini-GCD” imposed from the last tick of damage from Force Lightning, which is either the third tick happening at the end of a clipped channel or the fourth tick happening at the end of a full channel.
Sorry if that is not super helpful. The lesson I learned from playing the discipline and testing clipping in a few ways is that it is theoretically a DPS gain if you can do it right but it dramatically increases the difficulty and can even be a DPS loss if done poorly.
So my conclusion and belief thus far is that a perfectly clipped Force Lightning is a slightly DPS gain over a full channel. However, I noticed some ability activation delays with both a clipped and full channel as discussed above. The delay was usually bigger with a clipped channel than a full channel. Thus I feel like trying to constantly clip Force Lightning will be a DPS loss for most players in most circumstances. The only time clipping Force Lightning will be a DPS increase is if it lets us use an ability closer to its cooldown, as is usually the case to align our rotation with the cooldowns of Demolish and Death Field.
Force Speed
Force Speed is a great ability for Sith Inquisitors (Sorcerers and Assassins) for mobility. Using Force Speed increases your movement speed by 150% for 2 seconds. Force Speed has a 20 second cooldown.
Force Speed can be buffed by a few utilities. Surging Speed is a Masterful utility that buffs Force Speed by lowering its cooldown by 5 seconds (down to 15), increases its duration by 0.5 seconds (up to 2.5 seconds), and allows Force Barrier to reset Force Speed’s cooldown. The Emersion Heroic utility also causes Force Speed to cleanse the player of movement-impairing effects and makes them immune to them for its duration.
I recommend Sorcerers always take Surging Speed for the cooldown reduction on Force Speed. Emersion is great for fights where you need to use Force Speed to deal with knockbacks, slows, etc., but otherwise is not required for most fights.
Thanks to the Gathering Storm set bonus, Force Speed is a very powerful offensive cooldown that can and should be used very often. The Gathering Storm set bonus has the following effects:
(4) Force Speed makes your next Force attack deal 20% more damage and Force attacks deal 20% more damage while Polarity Shift is active.
(6) Activating Force Speed reduces the cooldown of Polarity Shift by 5 seconds. Polarity Shift's duration is extended by 5 seconds.
This means we want to use Force Speed nearly on cooldown to buff attacks by 20% and to get Polarity Shift back up as quickly as possible for its powerful alacrity boost and extra 20% damage boost from the set bonus. The buff applied by Force Speed is called Galvanized and has the buff listed here next to Force Speed.
Fortunately for our rotation, Force Speed has a 15 second cooldown with the Surging Speed utility. Our rotation is designed around the pre-alacrity 15 second cooldown of Force in Balance and Demolish, so this all lines up to let us use Force Speed once per rotation.
Which ability should we use to consume the Galvanized buff from Force Speed? Force Speed should be used in the following priority based on its impact on each ability (note the numbers here are approximate as of some quick parsing in 6.2 without any offensive cooldowns and assuming no crits but the proportional impact should be consistent):
Force Leech - Base damage around 20k
Death Field - Base damage around 18-19k, Galvanized does not buff the DoT debuff applied to the target
Lightning Strike - Base damage around 12k with the Wrath buff from 4 ticks from Force Lightning
Demolish - Base damage around 9-10k for the direct damage, Galvanized does not buff the DoT applied by Demolish
Force Lightning - Galvanized only buffs the first tick from Force Lightning that is around 3.5k or so.
This ranking leads us clearly to use Force Speed to buff Force Leech if possible with Death Field being nearly as good for single target and even better for AoE. Using Force Speed on a buffed Lightning Strike is okay if the target is about to die or if down time will occur in a few seconds, but it is optimal to only buff Force Leech or Death Field. Do not ever use Force Speed prior to Force Lightning as it is a huge DPS loss, as the buff there is a few hundred points of damage versus around four thousand for Force Leech.
Please note that Creeping Terror and Affliction do not deal direct damage so cannot consume the Galvanized buff from Force Speed. As such, it is fine to use Force Speed prior to applying a DoT if the ability you want to buff will be used afterwards.
AoE Rotation
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Demolish - procced to be instant and more powerful
Creeping Terror - refresh 1st DoT
Affliction - refresh DoT #2
Death Field - AoE damage, DoT spread
Force Lightning - to proc/buff Demolish
Force Storm - spammable AoE
Force Storm - spammable AoE
Force Storm - spammable AoE (clip when Demolish comes off cooldown)
(begin main rotation instant proc of Demolish)
6.0 Note - If taking the Slow Mercy tactical, Demolish should be delayed in the rotation until just after Death Field to ensure it deals AoE damage.
Madness Sorcerer has really strong sustained AoE DPS. The discipline's DoTs tick pretty hard with the debuff applied by Death Field, which also spreads your DoTs and deals AoE damage.
The trick with Madness Sorcerer is determining when it makes sense to use Force Storm for extra AoE DPS. Since Death Field is used rotationally, Madness will generate high sustained AoE DPS just by doing its regular single target rotation.
I rarely execute the above rotation outside a couple very high sustained AoE DPS encounters. In nearly all situations, I use the single target rotation and use Death Field to spread my DoTs and often throw in one Force Storm in place of Force Lightning then go back to my single target rotation on my primary target.
The only situations where I would lean fully into AoE DPS per the above rotation, taking the utility to buff Force Storm and equipping Slow Mercy would be:
Hive Queen in Veteran Mode if the group does not include other DoT spread classes. The DPS check in this fight is really a single target check to kill the Hive Queen before she starts spamming you with Berserkers, so I prefer to avoid AoE unless my group has so little AoE DPS that adds die too slowly and start overwhelming healers.
Dxun Control Center (3rd encounter) in Veteran/Master Mode. There are a LOT of adds inside the control center and can be overwhelming in higher difficulties. Depending on group strategy and composition, you may need 1-2 DPS to focus moreso on AoE while others focus on single target to kill the big adds and droids. If so, this may be helpful.
If I want to fluff damage on fights with regular adds, such as the above in Story Mode or a few other fights with lots of adds.
Multi-DoT'ing
Some boss encounters have multiple bosses that are too far away to rely on DoT spread from Force in Balance to keep DoTs ticking on multiple targets. If so, you can easily replace one full channel of Force Lightning with applying Creeping Terror and Affliction on a second target.
This approach works great on Sarg & Jorno in KP (if they are too far apart to DoT spread), Zorn & Toth and Firebrand & Stormcaller in EC, the Dread Council in DP, Master & Blaster in Ravagers, the Revanite Commanders in ToS, Aivela & Esne in Gods and the Trandoshans in Dxun.
Any time you DoT multiple targets you should generally avoid using Lightning Strike at all, as you will not have enough channels of Force Lightning to use a buffed Lightning Strike and also have an instant cast of Demolish.
Normal Rotation (note that Telekinetic Throw is presented here by GCD so a full channel is 2 icons)
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Rotation to DoT 2 targets
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Please remember that applying DoTs to multiple targets reduces your uptime on your main target. Given that Force Lightning will generally tick your Creeping Terror DoT extra times via the Tempest of Rho tactical, DoTing multiple targets is less of a DPS increase than before since you lose Tempest of Rho ticks in exchange for extra DoT ticks on another target.
DoTing 2 targets is nearly always sufficient and DoTing 3 targets should never really be necessary in my opinion. The only fight where it might be useful is DoTing 3 Trandoshans in Dxun, though that should be done very carefully. The upside to the 3 DoT rotation is that it is entirely mobile except for one full channel of Force Lightning, so if used in Dxun could be helpful to kite Greus while keeping DoTs ticking on the other bosses.
Keep in mind also that the 3 DoT rotation will require a full channel of Force Lightning at the end, where normally that channel would be clipped. A full channel will require slightly delaying Demolish and Death Field, so again I do not really recommend it but list it here for completeness just in case you want to try it.
Tips & Tricks
Death Field has a smaller AoE circle than most AoE abilities, so be aware of its smaller radius and manually position as needed to maximize DoT spreading.
Static Barrier can be used as an offensive filler ability if taking the Lightning Barrier passive ability and if the fight involves predictable damage that can trigger the reflect.
Polarity Shift can cause issues with the rotation due to how the buff to Alacrity will shorten the duration of DoTs. To avoid/minimize this issue, try to use Polarity Shift right before Demolish and refreshing DoTs.
The best use of Recklessness will generally be prior to casting Death Field and Force Leech.
Movement heavy fights can make it difficult to keep your rotation going with Force Lightning. If so, your top priority is casting a buffed instant Demolish on cooldown, followed by keeping up the 8% crit boost from Fulminating Current.
Be aware of which parts of your rotation enable heavy movement and which do not. If you are about to instant cast Demolish > refresh 2 DoTs > Death Field > Force Leech, that is 5 GCDs of full mobility, followed by 3 Force Lightning and an instant Lightning Strike where very little mobility will be possible. Try to think ahead when you know you will need to move soon and do it during the front half of your rotation when you can do so without losing DPS uptime.