Cold of Cone vs. Fireball (in General)

I'd like to apologize in advance for asking a dumb, newbish question. My flame-retardant gear's is on.

In what round does Cone is Cold surpass Fireball in total damage? And what is needed to run an effective Cone-of-Cold-based team.

Just asking because I couldn't find it in the wiki. ;)

I believe about round 8 things turn to CoCs favor.

However you have to live to round 4 of missile if you use a HOC to even start to do damage,

That wait alone can mean the difference between winning and losing no matter how much damage you eventually do.

Small hint: 8 rounds of AMF backlash, with COC, is tough to live through.

I'm personally still a big fan of MM vs. CoC or FB. It starts hitting in ranged, albeit for reduced damage compared with CoC.

And if you survive the ranged rounds with those archers around. CoC has good damage potential. Much larger then FB, but AMF is not your friend in this case.
Those new gloves NS's can take lots away from AMF for that matter

To run CoC effectively, your best bet is to have a very, very good supporting team. And alot of experience under your belt. And a whole bunch of NW wouldn't hurt. And in all those cases, FB and MM would still probably serve you better.

I use to hit up to 2 million damage with Cone of Cold. Retrained to Magic Missle and now I make out at around 600k or something obscene like that. I have more people on my fight list and score is 100 - 200k higher on average than it used to be. But I didn't have the above things to make it work.

Truthfully, use FB or MM. Save CoC until you're feeling insanely experimental and don't mind having to inspect every team before you fight.

Okay, thanks guys, very helpfully answers.

Don't forget that FB singes your own team when melee starts -- a lot. FB splash is HUGE. So, unless you are talking a single fireball mage, CoC also has the advantage of no friendly-fire.

CoC has is best when combined with Decay, GA, and Lots and Lots of HP.