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#1 2010-10-12 02:59:25

Obscure
Founding Member
From: Norway
Registered: 2005-07-23
Posts: 6853

Need awesome mage advices

We have fantastic mages in TEO, so this should be no problem right? big_smile

1. Spec for instances, mostly 5 man. Small packs that die extremely fast and bosses that are not that hard either.

2. Suggestions for rotation for said spec.

3. Glyphs.

4. What stats to look for? Haste, crit, hit?

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#2 2010-10-12 03:36:15

Grimbold
Guild Member
Registered: 2010-03-07
Posts: 442

Re: Need awesome mage advices

Im guessing your question regards the approaching changes...

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#3 2010-10-12 03:43:48

Obscure
Founding Member
From: Norway
Registered: 2005-07-23
Posts: 6853

Re: Need awesome mage advices

eh.. actually, no.

guess since we're getting new talents tomorrow, maybe I should just see the video guides cryo linked. big_smile

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#4 2010-10-12 05:18:24

Cryonic
Founding Member
From: Steinkjer\Oslo, Norway
Registered: 2005-02-13
Posts: 1467

Re: Need awesome mage advices

1. Since 5 man is so easy now a days, pretty much any spec goes, though arcane and fire specs gives you more dps then frost spec. Fire is nice once you get a high crit%, at around 50-60%, and since you need good gear for that, arcane would be better early on when you're gearing up in 5 man instances.
2. Sinken has both optimal fire and arcane pve specs, with optimal glyphs. If you're going arcane, you basically spam arcane blast until missile barrage procs, then you cast arcane missiles, repeat. You could also use arcane barrage in the rotation, right after the arcane missiles, but that's a matter of taste i think, if you have set bonuses favoring missile barrage procs, then you might wanna skip arcane barrage for more procs.
3. I suggest Glyph of molten armor, Glyph of arcane missiles, and Glyph of arcane blast
4. As for hit, any caster want to be at the hit cap, not above, not below, but that's kinda tricky. Technically against raid bosses, you need +17% to be at the cap according to wowwiki, but if you're in a raid, you also get hit bonuses from several places. i'd say go for around +11-13% hit, works for me, i have +11,47% hit, which is 301 rating, it's around what seems to be the cap, i had slightly lower and got misses, but i don't see misses with +11,47%. A good mix of haste and crit is a good way to go, if you get good gear and go fire, then you might wanna lean towards crit%. As arcane i'd get a good mix of haste and crit, but perhaps lean towards haste.

I wouldn't dig too much into this, big changes are coming, frost looks really fun and viable pve spec with that frostfire orb in the rotation smile


http://www.zetbit.com/sig-619204.jpg

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#5 2010-10-12 21:03:39

darkfear
Guild Member
Registered: 2010-06-24
Posts: 191

Re: Need awesome mage advices

thy are destroying my class /cry

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#6 2010-10-12 21:42:57

Cryonic
Founding Member
From: Steinkjer\Oslo, Norway
Registered: 2005-02-13
Posts: 1467

Re: Need awesome mage advices

Actually the least interesting build seems to be arcane, a few months ago it was the most interesting..


http://www.zetbit.com/sig-619204.jpg

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#7 2010-11-01 02:08:14

Wrion
Leading Team
From: Finland
Registered: 2007-08-23
Posts: 466

Re: Need awesome mage advices

Bumping and hijacking the thread as I find myself dangerously clueless about the class I've spent close to 200 days playing.

A few questions about arcane PvE and mage PvE in general - frost and fire likely to follow once I've had a chance remember how they work and learn why what I remember is not true anymore:

First, how much +hit do the raid buffs of an optimised or close to optimised raid group give?

Second, I've been using a mana efficient general rotation of barrage when not on cd and arcane missiles when they proc using blast only as a kind of a filler combined with an active blast spam and cooldown useage to get mana down quickly for evocation and mana gem.
With that I've managed to get around 5k dps on a lvl 80 dummy in fights lasting all the managem charges plus the time it takes to nuke my mana away after.
Would my DPS significally increase if I were to adapt the blast spam proc missiles as the general approach? And would the increase justify the lessened control of my mana useage? With my current rotation I can stay close to full mana for most of the time burning my mana pool quickly - though not very DPM-effectively - should the need arise.

Here is the recount date from one such fight, but do bear in mind that my gear - though decent for its time -  is now at least 1.5 years outdated.

Wrion 1642925 DMG, 5103.5 DPS

Ability                    Crit           Count                    Damage              %
Arcane Blast           29.6%           108                   1323917            83.4%
Arcane Missiles       32.2%             90                     139164            8.8%
Arcane Barrage      34.8%             23                     125275            7.9%

All replies are appricated, helpful ones even more so. And feel free to point out if I've misunderstood something fundamental about arcane play or how terribly I fail as, though painful it is to admit, I most likely do.

EDIT; Me - Mana:             21813
                Spell Damage: 2168
                Crit Chance:    23.92%
                Haste Rating:   521

Last edited by Wrion (2010-11-01 02:13:02)


Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from a completely ad-hoc plot device.

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#8 2010-11-01 04:33:44

Busm
Guild Member
Registered: 2010-09-11
Posts: 32

Re: Need awesome mage advices

since 4.0.1, all casters need 17% hit from gear (to hit 83) with all specs (draenei 16%) - there are no longer any +hit talents or raid buffs. Ofcourse for strictly 5man use, you only need something in the order of 6% hit (to hit 82).

Arcane works in 2 stages, the burn phase, and the conserve phase. For very short fights like 5man boss fights, you'll never go beyond the initial burn phase (that's why you see those insane boss dps numbers from 5mans). However, in "proper" fights (2+ min), you'll need to alternate between phases.

The burn is basically pure AB spam, with all cooldowns active. You should keep this up untill you reach approx. 30% mana, then hit MBAM if you got 2 pcs bonus, and then evocate to full mana.

Then you switch to the conserve phase while you wait for evocation and cooldowns. The basic idea is to keep your mana pool near 100% (85+%), by using mage armor and sticking to a AB3-4 MBAM/MBarr rotation. This will ensure you get the highest return from mastery.

Once evocation is about ready again, you initiate another burn phase, by popping all available CDs and going full AB spam to 30% mana - whereafter you evocate, and start another conserve phase - rinse repeat.

You'll always want to end the fight with a burn phase, irregardless of evocations readiness. With optimal arcane play, you should end the fight at or near 0% mana.

Arcane play is all in the planning, and about having a good insight into the encounter (duration and mechanics), and the raid (overall dps, heroism timing etc). Taking advantage of breaks in the fight (transitions etc.), where you can aim to place your evocations, or simply knowing in advance when its likely safe to use evocation, can greatly improve your overall performance. Allso timing a burn phase with heroism is vital to arcanes performance.

While I agree that arcane is somewhat of a dull spec, now that 90% of its damage has been placed in AB. It is definitely not an easy spec to fully master. Very few arcane mages play the spec to its full potential - in my oppinion it is one of the hardest specs to excucate flawlessly. I think I can count on one hand the times I've been able to time everything perfectly.

It is fairly easy to get within 80-90% of it's potential though. But to put it over the top, takes very carefull timing and planning.

Last edited by Busm (2010-11-01 04:47:58)


AKA Shishkebab

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#9 2010-11-01 14:37:07

Wrion
Leading Team
From: Finland
Registered: 2007-08-23
Posts: 466

Re: Need awesome mage advices

No more three sets of gear for different raid setups to optimise your hit chance? No more regemming when a progress raid's boomkin doesn't show up? And even switching between builds doesn't affect the hit you need? And you can actually get 100% hit for really really real? Amazing stuff, I can hardly believe this.
Although it does leave my hit rating lacking quite a bit I can't help but to love it.

As for the arcane play, seems like I got the basic idea right though the execution could use some work, I'm sure.

Appriciate the reply, real helpful.

EDIT; Now that I think of it, the 100% cap may have been included even in the early WotLK, not quite sure though.

Last edited by Wrion (2010-11-01 15:14:58)


Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from a completely ad-hoc plot device.

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#10 2010-11-01 15:43:13

Busm
Guild Member
Registered: 2010-09-11
Posts: 32

Re: Need awesome mage advices

Yeah the 100% hit cap has been in since wotlk started. It's true that you can now stick to one set of gear for hit. However, every spec has slightly different stat priorities. So for optimal play, you should optimize your gems/gear to the spec you play the most.

For a fast hit fix, if you're geared/gemmed for the old arcane hit cap, grap the +hit trinket from justice points, and regem all blue sockets to int/hit. That should put you pretty close to the cap. Also remember you can (and should) reforge some stats to hit, if you come up short.

Stat priorities look somthing like this...

Int is always on top for all specs - so gemming int where possible, is a safe bet.

Arcane:
Hit to 17%
Haste
Mastery
Crit

Fire:
Hit to 17%
Crit
Haste
Mastery

Frost:
Hit to 17%
Crit to 33%
Mastery
Haste

Last edited by Busm (2010-11-01 15:59:03)


AKA Shishkebab

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#11 2010-11-01 15:54:05

Wrion
Leading Team
From: Finland
Registered: 2007-08-23
Posts: 466

Re: Need awesome mage advices

Aye, obviously the priorities still exist, however since hit is pretty much a "must" cap for for any serious raiding, having its requirements vary from raid to raid was rather annoying. The rest of variables are all fun and give gearing a nice flavour.
That's how it is in theory anyway, we'll just have to see if Blizzard might finally make multiple viable PvE specs from the beginning of an expansion.


Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from a completely ad-hoc plot device.

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#12 2010-11-08 02:36:45

Wrion
Leading Team
From: Finland
Registered: 2007-08-23
Posts: 466

Re: Need awesome mage advices

Fire
What I think I know:

The general single target play is a Living Bomb followed by scorch for the crit buff after which it is Fireball spam keeping the bomb up and hot streaking a pyro when it happens thus keeping the crit buff up as well. Obvisouly using cool downs accordingly but that should be rather obvious though highly fight specific. Is that about correct?

The general aoe play is either blast wave/flame strike spam on low hp mobs or Living Bomb combustioned and spread followed by the blast wave/flame strike spam and spreading of ignites with fire blast procs on higher hp mobs. How wrong did I get that?

What is unclear:

The proper use of combustion in a boss fight where it is not needed for aoe.

A few target fights and how balance aoe and single target as well as how to use living bomb on such occasions.

More coming up once I realise what more I don't know, replies greatly appriciated as with fire it's rather easy waste its potential with a few improper spell casts.

Cheers

EDIT; fail sentences win'd, getting too tired to type >.<

Last edited by Wrion (2010-11-08 02:49:06)


Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from a completely ad-hoc plot device.

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#13 2010-11-08 14:12:34

Busm
Guild Member
Registered: 2010-09-11
Posts: 32

Re: Need awesome mage advices

You got it pretty much right.

For single target, you might on occasion want to throttle your pyroblasts a bit, if they come back to back. By waiting a fireball or 2 before casting the second pyro. This will stretch your 2pcs bonus a bit further, but the longer you go without using it, the higher the risk you run of overriding the proc, and thus losing a hotstreak.

For single target combustion, you'll want to have a good ignite rolling, and a fresh LB on target before using it. Normally I simply use it after one of my hotstreaks while all my CD's are popped in the start of the fight, and then again at <35% boss health. So FB Crit -> FB Crit -> HS Pyro -> refresh LB -> combustion.
This should ensure that you have a fair amount of dots up, before applying it.
There are some addons available somewhere, that will give you an overview of active dots, but I find it easier to simply use the HS proc as an indicator, and it seems to produce fairly consistant results in the 80-120k range for me.


For AOE, you rarely want to spam Flamestrike. Blastwave should ofcourse always be used when ready, but flamestrike should realy only be used 1 time in between blastwaves (unless you need to cover more areas, because tanks are far apart).
The rest of the time, you'll want to find a tough mob in the pack (make sure it's properly tanked though), and use a single target rotation on it, while spreading your ignites/LB/combustion whenever possible.

So Blastwave -> single target dps for 7-8 secs while spreading dots -> Flamestrike -> single target dps for 7-8sec while spreading dots -> Repeat.

For boss  fights with adds close by. It really depends on what priorities you have. If you want high damage on boss, you should only spread dots with impact, and not use blastwave/flamestrike. If you want to put your focus on adds, you pretty much do an aoe rotation, with the boss as your main target.

The only fights where this seems relevant though, is currently only LK, and RS HC. On all other current fights with adds, they're either too far away to keep anything other than LB rolling on boss (like Deathwhisper), or you want to focus 100% on 1 add at a time (like putricide).


Proper use of LB is a bit more tricky. It's very broken atm, especially when used with impact. So I rarely bother to maintain it on more than my primary target, then let impact do it's buggy business, and refresh it when it falls of.

A bit on LB and Impact:

LB can only be applied to 3 targets. Upon applying it to a 4th, it will randomly remove 1 LB from 1 of the previous 3 targets. (very frustrating behaviour)

LB explosion itself, will only hit 3 targets.

Refreshing LB too early will cut off the explosion.

Another mages impact, can remove YOUR LB from the target - it does not spread, it simply dissapears.

Impact will spread your LB to ALL targets, and then remove LBs at random, untill only 2-3 are left (it should leave 3, but sometimes only leaves 2 for some reason).

Last edited by Busm (2010-11-08 14:21:10)


AKA Shishkebab

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#14 2010-11-08 16:26:53

Wrion
Leading Team
From: Finland
Registered: 2007-08-23
Posts: 466

Re: Need awesome mage advices

Good stuff, the 3 target limit of LB I was aware of but the extent of its bugs is news to me. Thank you.


Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from a completely ad-hoc plot device.

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