Anyone else thought about the benefits of using Leggings of Polarity, Rime Covered Mantle and The Soul Harvester’s Bindings over Frostfire? You lose a lot of stats and 1 hit for 4 crit and a couple damage. Really seems like it's not worth it this time, but I just can't get it out of my head.

Curious if any others had given thought to it.

There's no question that full frostfire doesn't give you the most dps possible. I'd probably go for 4 pieces (head/robe/boots/ring), with a questionable 5/6 bracers/gloves if the 6-piece bonus is worth it. The head/robe/boots/ring are definitely the best or nearly the best in their slot for a fire mage, but the bracers/gloves don't lag *too* far behind - especially if you're at the +hit cap.

I think when all is said and done a few mages should go for 6 piece frostfire because that proc will boost total raid magic dps probably more than a mage with the +dmg non-set piece naxx items. Thot says it has a 20% chance to proc.

Yeah but the 6-piece Frostfire is a consumeable charge that will end up getting consumed by the first spell that hits it after it procs (which, in my understanding, is any spell regardless of the source or cast time. So an Arcane Shot or a Fire Blast could hit it and completely waste the charge since they don't get full benefit). Not sure how much of an advantage that is to raidwide dps, someone should do the math. It doesn't really strike me as being as great as I once thought it was, though.

That said, I've always been a fan of sets. I like secondary stats. The idea of having nearly 4k unbuffed HP on top of capped spellhit and 750ish spelldamage when donning full Frostfire is very appealing.

I'm not sure there's any point in looking at it from a raidwide perspective. Just think of it like Hemo. Every x% of your spells do 200 more damage.

EDIT: 20%? Okay, so when chaincasting Frostbolt, it procs every 12.5 sec. 16 DPS. Equivalent to about 70 +damage.

Except it won't necessarily be your spells that get the benefit, and it has a higher chance of getting wasted on a short cast spell than anything else, I think.

I'm pretty much set on 4/9 FF + random stuff, http://www.ctprofiles.net/2211191 will be the end result
However I do plan on eventually picking up bracers + gloves for pvp, where I'm more likely to get the use of that +200

Never been someone to get full sets anyway... skipped magister for pieces of dreadmist and random stuff, skipped arcanist for pvp pieces + random stuff, skipped NW for random stuff + enigma... heh

At the same time, my alt rogue completed her first set at lvl 29, full defias ! :P

Ara - the problem is that a hunter's serpent sting consuming the +200 dmg debuff makes the set debuff much less desirable. Now if you had it where only direct damage spells consumed it... even it were a lock or another mage, that would be worth it.

edit - Darkchani, that's my exact Naxx dream set as well, depending on the stats on Kel'Thuzad's necklace that is supposedly pretty sweet. =)

Fire mage perspective

Soul harvesters bindings > Frostfire
Rime covered mantle >>>> Frostfire
Leggings of Polarity >>>>>>> Frostfire
Eyestalk Waist corde > frostfire

Not sure about the gloves, I'm considering to stick with netherwind just for the crit. Frostfire gloves could use a crit since most people won't use them over Dark Storm gauntlets. The frostfire set overall has too much stats, gloves being a good example since a crit can be added to them if they just lower the silly stats a bit.

The rest? Chest, Helm, Boots and ring are all awesome.

I think it's quite boring that they pretty much added gear that is optimal for almost all specs and classes. Just check my wishlist @ http://ctprofiles.net/10977 , everyone has pretty much the same.

Re: Tempestra

Even that seems poor design to me. The whole thing just seems poorly implemented. It should either be a short-duration debuff on the mob that modifies all incoming spells for a small period of time, or a consumeable self-buff like Netherwind Focus. The current design is just lackluster.

Agreed Falcon, I was just thinking of ways that they could tweak the current set-up to make it viable. I would *vastly* prefer a self-buff a la Netherwind Focus, as I know I could make better use out of +200 spell dmg than any other caster in my raid.

bleh? This is, like, the most perfectly min/mixed thing possible.

Just sacrifice some +dmg and use Seal of the damned + Gem of trapped innocents and your stamina should be fine if you care about that.

i mean yes its really good, but i wish i wasnt losing so much stats all along on some pieces, then having like frostfire pieces suck because they put everything into stats

if you took like 5dmg off that neck, and then gave it some int and stam id be really nice, same as FF gloves where taking some stats to add a crit would make them really good and "tier 3", or FF circlet losing that 1dmg that costed 12spirit from the original version etc

I'm too lazy too go find the thread, but hasn't it been stated that T3's primary use will be to "speed up leveling" from 60 to 70 and that blue gear acquired at 70 will be better than T3?

If that's the truth, might as well max up on damage and crit rather than worrying about raiding-focused set bonuses, I think.

Yeah, the 6 piece bonus for FF really should be self buff like 8/8 NW.

i'm not a fan of arcanist, netherwind on the other hand is incredibly tempting for me (at the moment my mage wears no set + damage items in favour of arcanist).

Frostfire (and most tier 3 for that matter) is superiour in terms of stats because nothing goes onto resistances. Nearly every piece is an upgrade to anything in AQ or BWL. But, that said, how important are things like health? Also, will you be wearing 8/9 Frostfire against Kel'thuzad? Probably not or there isn't realy a reasn for all the frost resistance gear except for a solitary one trick dragon.

If they change the 6 piece bonus to only effect the next spell you cast, every mage should realisitcally be looking to go for a 6/9 Frostfire (i know i would). Also, bear in mind that for leveling 60-70, instance runs will probably be most efficient. On a 5 man scale, if a mage isn't getting hit you want them to be doing as much damage as possible whilst making water.

In the end, i think it comes down to each individual mage. No desecrated item is going to be wasted by a guild due to their nature. My mage won't be in Nax before the expansion so i can't realistically look at any items in there, but if you're killing 6+ bosses now you probably should be thinking about maxing a good 4 frostfire for leveling. If you can kill Thaddius, Loatheb and The Four horsemen by then head chest and legs would figure prominently in that for me anyway

i think you are mixing up 2 statements by blizzard posters
1) T3 gear wont immediately be obsolete, alltho T3 raiders will probably get some up/sidegrades along the way to 70 but the real 'upgrading' is going to happen in karazhan (so far no idea about the item quality in karazhan)
and
2) people in tier 3 gear are going to have an easier time leveling up than others who just hit 60 thanks to the quality of their gear

afaik blizzard never said T3 was meant to be the 'level up gear' for TBC and this most certainly does not hold true for Healers/Tanks
also stuff like the 8 piece Frostfire set bonus clearly is meant for a raid setting
for DPS its obvious that whatever gives you the optimal mix of sustainable dps and survivability is what you are going to level fastest in

If Frostfire had a lot more spirit, i'd consider wearing it over non-set items, with current stat distribution its just not worth it.

I don't think they've said that as it would be completely untrue for healers

AQ sets are probably a better choice for healers (Priests for sure). That or PVP sets.

I just can't not wear FF shoulders for the offchance of a arcane crystal falling into my inventory.