Sage/Sorcerer Leveling: 10-20 Healing

For the first 10 levels of playing a Sage/Sorc healer, you’re no different than any other Consular/Inquisitor out there, so I’m going to refer you to my 1-20 DPS Guide for information about how to level and what spells you get during the 1-10 range if you feel you need it.

This guide is aimed specifically at leveling as a healer which takes place from level 10 on, so that’s where this guide is going to start. I will be discussing how to deal damage in the healing spec, and how to go about questing and so forth, I’m just going to assume that you’re already at least level 10 for the purpose of this specific guide.

 

Sage/Sorcerer Leveling: 21-40 DPS

In the 1-20 guide I went over two specs for DPS leveling but this time around we are going to look at three. The first two will be Full Telekinetics/Lightning and Full Balance/Madness, and the third will be a hybrid of the two which is also my personal favorite.

For those of you who are interested I do have a healing version of these guides in the works that I will also be posting Soon™. I’ve got a level 30 Sage that I just switched over from Balance that I had a lot of fun healing with, so now I’ve got a baby Sorcerer who’s going to level as a healer to give me a view of the 10-30 range so that I know what the crap I’m talking about.

 

Sage/Sorcerer Leveling: 1-20 DPS

Playing a Sage/Sorcerer
For the most part, playing a Sage/Sorc is much like playing a spell caster in any other MMO. In the world of SWTOR, they’re the only real spell casters in the game. While you can get a caster feel from some of the ranged classes (Trooper, Smuggler, Bounty Hunter, Imp. Agent) most of what they do doesn’t really feel like casting, at least not to me, unless you’re playing their healing spec.

Concerning Sage/Sorc DPS, there are two primary trees available to you and they each have their own feel. The Telekinetics/Lightning tree is the turret casting tree, where you’ll spend the majority of your time remaining stationary while you simply turn left or right as needed while you spam-cast your spells. You do have some spells that you can use on the move, but you’ll have a loss of overall DPS if you use them without needing to move. The Balance/Madness tree relies on damage over time (DoT) effects and channeled spells for the majority of it’s damage and is much more mobile as most of the spells you’ll use in those trees are instant cast either by design or thanks to talent-based procs.

When you reach level 10 and take your advanced class of Sage/Sorcerer there’s going to be a complete change in how you handle combat. Out of all of the classes and advanced classes, the Sage/Sorc AC has the largest shift in playstyle because you’ve just spent 10 levels killing things primarily with melee attacks with some occasional spells thrown in (maybe) and now you’re never going to use another melee attack again. Some players do play low level Consulars/Inquisitors trying to focus on spell casting, but since both of your damaging spells have cooldowns you’re really better of just beating things up in melee.

In addition to the switch from melee to casting you’re also going to notice that your spells now actually have a decent range on them. Telekinetic Throw(Force Lightning) jumps up to 30 meters by default as does Project(Shock), and your new spam-cast spell, Disturbance(Lightning Strike), is a 30 meter cast as well. You also get to quintuple your Force pool from 100 to 500, and your primary crowd control spell Force Lift(Whirlwind) goes from an 8 second duration up to 60 seconds. All of these changes combine to make one heck of a shift in playstyle, so you’ll want to find a few things to kill to get a feel for your new life as a real caster.