Above all else it's fun. In Dungeons I think it's best played as a Heal Tank in a 3 DD party. Twilight Matriarch is the best full range heal in the game if you have the bar space, and focusing on wards entirely over the traditional block holding makes it not only more fun, but also more diverse and interactive than any other tank.

With the classt masteries I can increase the recovery of my allies and protect them better in harder content by spamming wall of elements to give them the new group shield passive, and the Twilight Matriarch.
Playing it as a traditional tank is not going anywhere in my opinion, because you don't offer anything to the group other pure classes don't do far better or do better even without it.

So you have to make up for the lack of passive damage and buffs you can provide by having a 3 DD party and show that you are the best by not only tanking, but also keeping the party healed. Now you have the tools. Other tanks should also step up their game and start becoming Heal Tanks. Being a bullet sponge is outdated and no longer enough for a tank.

And I think this is the only real niche Sorc has in pve. DPS has been nuked even against dummies, (One of, if not the lowest parsing specs now I believe) and in group play you offer nothing and have no cleave. It also offers nothing worthwhile as a healer other classes don't do better. With class masteries, there is no way someone would welcome a Sorc Healer when we have Warden and even Necromancer potentially.

Overall, pve looks as dire as it has for years, and actually even worse now where other pure classes give their groups the only thing we had going on (Major Berserk) and they do it better. So with other pure classes in mind, Sorcerer is more insignificant than ever before in pve. At least its ability to tank heal got improved.

Pure Sorcerer tank lacks a lot of buffs you would have gotten from subclassing. The only unique group buff you could have given out is now more easily provided with better uptime by Dragonknight (Major Berserk). Great damage mitigation tools though and great traversal tools in streak/expedition. Might be used to provide calculated defense for organized groups, but there are better dungeon tank setups.


I imagine Sorcerer healer performs extremely poorly compared to Warden, Arcanist, and Necromancer due to lack of utility buffs and lack of proper toolkit, including active and passive skills. Likely not remotely going to be used.


Solo Sorcerer will be a mixed bag. You will likely wind up with Font of Power + either Calculated Defense or Conservation of Energy, depending on your needs. I did some solo vet dungeons on PTS with non-pet Stamina Sorcerer with the Font of Power + Calculated Defense passives and there was a tangible power increase over my same setup on live, but it wasn't as much as I anticipated, honestly.


In organized groups, you won't want a Sorcerer DPS for dungeons or trials. They simply don't have enough cleave or enough utility, and they really need to have one or the other to be taken over something like Necromancer (cleave), Arcanist (cleave + utility), or Warden (utility, some cleave).


I'll still be happy to have the power gain for my solo builds, but definitely still eager for the class rework to update some core problems with the class.