Rouncer

It's not though - heck I normally just hit the channel button the instant the 5th one leaves my hand and the channeling animation never goes away at all.

Guess when I get home I'll parse out a couple Dr Booms and make sure but I really don't think there is any way you are losing that much time to the animation to start the channel.

I bet they just spread out the missiles among the channel so that there is a small gap at the start but the last one flies right at 5 seconds. So instead of being 1 second between missiles it would be something like 0.8s between each one or something like that.

 

tedv

That's not how channeled damage spells work. Arcane Missiles or Mind Flay deal damage once per second for N second. The first damage always takes 1 second. Here is what a lagless timeline looks like:

0.0: Channeling starts
1.0: First damage
2.0: Second damage
...
N.0: Last damage, channeling ends.

Arcane Missiles really is 5 missiles in 5 seconds. It takes one second for missile number 1 to fire and five seconds for missile number 5 to fire. It's 5 seconds total, not 6.

 

Castia

that makes great sense

there 4 words

 

Zure

Just to be clear, AM relies heavily on MSD and to a lesser extent ashtongue to really shine, so you should run any mana calculations with those in the mix. Without at least MSD, AM is just not a viable dps spell compared to, say, fireball spam or AB rotations.

Over time, excluding the first AM, since it's effect is dependent on length of fight, with 0.2 lag and chain casting, you'll cast AM every 4.3 with no haste beyond MSD and Ashtongue. So you're looking at considerably higher mana use than a zero haste setup. With just MSD, you'll cast AM approximately every 4.5 seconds. Of course, all of your regen except JoW and CC stays constant.

At this MSD + Ashtongue level of haste, JoW exceeds what you can expect to get from a shadow priest: you'll get about 216 mp5 from 100% JoW uptime.


Edit: Assuming a 15.7 value for haste rating to haste %

 

Castia

6 minutes with no MSD or Ashtongue = 72 Volleys

6 minutes with Ashtongue(Assuming 100% uptime):
145 haste rating/15 haste rating = 9.66%
AM Volley time = 5 * 0.903 = 4.51 seconds
360 seconds / 4.51 seconds = 79.7 Volleys in 360 seconds

6 minutes with MSD:
1-0.95^6 = 26.5% chance per Volley to proc Focus
72 Volleys will proc Focus 72 x .265 = 19 times, shortening the time it takes to cast 72 volleys by 47.5 seconds.
Those 47.5 seconds can then cast 9.5 more Volleys, of which 2.5 will proc Focus, granting another 6.3 extra seconds, letting us cast a final volley
Total Volleys = 72 + 9.5 + 6.3 = 87.8 in 360 seconds

6 minutes with MSD and Ashtongue:
Using the 79.7 volleys from above as a base..
79.7 x .265 = 21.1 focus procs
21.1 x 2.5 seconds = 52.8 more seconds to use
52.8 / 4.51 = 11.7 more volleys, of which 3.1 will proc focus, freeing up another 7.75s
7.75 / 4.51 = 1.7 more volleys
Total Volleys = 79.7 + 11.7 + 1.7 = 93.1 Volleys in 360s

Ashtongue uses 10.7% more mana (5,433 more mana)
MSD uses 21.9% more mana (11,146 more mana)
Ashtongue + MSD uses 29.3% more mana (14,888 more mana)

So yes, to sustain Ashtongue + MSD you will need an extra 94.3mp5
Equivalent to 377 more DPS from your shadow priest, or 41% JoW uptime.

This is also 1904 DPS, with all of my previous assumptions (no resists, no partial resists, 100% uptime of Wrath of Air, Exalted Hyjal Ring, 4pcT5, CoS, Misery)

Compared to 1476 DPS without Ashtongue/MSD

Midyit drop ur gild

 

Zure

Castia,

My model, which:

assumes for 0.2 lag;
factors in resists (1% and partial);
models Ashtongue up time;
and derives a TLC damage value based on hit/crit/arc instab/misery

yields an expected dps of 1722 (assuming your 1800 spell dmg and 33% crit after arcane potency), which seems to comport pretty well with your numbers. The pre-resist results are a hair under 1800 dps, which makes sense, given the addition of lag.

So good job on the calculations.

 

Rouncer

Thanks Hope for clarifying about the channeled spells, saved me a trip to Dr Boom on the PTR.

Castia, I plugged your numbers into Lhivera's calculator this afternoon (using 1650 as the amount of damage, capping the hit and using 30% as the crit since the calculator adds the 3% from Arcane Instability back in - the 1650 turns into 1900 due to Mind Mastery) and ran both Deep Arcane and Deep Fire specs. I dropped 3% crit from Deep Fire to account for the additional hit needed to reach the cap.

The calculator showed the Arcane Missile spam to give you 1354.87dps and Fireball spam 1668.64 (trying to figure out the 8xFB+1xSc rotation with MDS was starting to make my head ache and Fireballs is more dps if someone else was maintaining the debuff anyway). If you add MSD into the Arcane Missile spam you get 1718.27dps. For Fireballs you would get 112.5 casts over the 360 seconds with 5.63 procs. The procs would take the place of 2.82 regular fireballs which would give you 115.32 fireballs over the 360seconds or 1710.46dps.

Ashtongue should add about 80dps to Deep Arcane and 59dps to Deep Fire. The Capacitor would add another 65dps to Deep Arcane with Deep Fire benefiting more from Skull or Crusade, which would add 59 or 53dps respectively.

With JoW in place AM gets 21dpm and Fireballs get 18.6dpm. Without it AM drops to 13 and Fireballs hover around 17.

All of those numbers are with Arcane using Mage armor and Fire using Molten. They were run using 200ms as the latency and they are also including 4pT6 which really doesn't matter that much since they are just comparing AM to Fireball and both benefit equally.

Doesn't look too bad for Deep Arcane in 2.2 if you have an MSD and you can get a Pally to judge the target does it.

Lhivera's Calculator - Lhivera's Theorycraft Script

 

Stirius

I have a question regarding stopcasting ("/stopcasting /cast AB" with Quartz) a <3xAB AM scorch>-rotation:

When I stopcast the first AB and start casting the second AB, is the AB-debuff applied in time, so that the second AB receives the shorter casttime?
If not, then using stopcasting seems to be a bad idea, because i'm losing the 0.3 second castspeed and gaining something between 0 and about 0.3 seconds (approx. my castlag without stopcasting on Dr. boom) from stopcasting. Correct?

I tried looking at a few combatlogs, but I got no conclusion yet.

AB-spamming profits from stopcasting of course...

 

Rouncer

Yes the AB debuff is applied. In order for the debuff not to be applied you would be interrupting your first AB cast.

/stopcasting is not a way to trick the server to cast faster then real casting time, it is a way to try and deal with the latency present between your client and the server. You are basically sending the signal to start the next cast early in the hope that it gets there AFTER the server has sent out the [spell has finished casting] signal but before that signal gets to your computer.

If your /stopcasting gets there even 0.00000001 seconds before the server sends that [cast has finished] command all you have done is waste the entire time spent "casting" that last spell since that cast just got interrupted and nothing was cast at all.

 

Stirius

Thanks, but this was not my question, I'll try harder

When I start the second AB before the client receives [cast finished], I start the second AB before receiving [You gain Arcane Blast (1)]. Are you sure that I'm getting a reduced casttime then? Or is the casttime of the second AB determined on the server-side?

Maybe an example:

without stopcasting:
0.0: start casting AB (0 debuffs, 2.5 sec cast)
2.5+lag: received "your AB hits xxx for yyy"
2.5+lag: received "you gain Arcane Blast (1)"
a bit later: start casting AB (1 debuffs, 2.2 sec cast)

with stopcasting (option 1) [client determines castingspeed, this would be bad]:
0.0: start casting AB (0 debuffs, 2.5 sec cast)
2.5-epsilon: /stopcasting, start casting AB (0 debuffs, 2.5 sec cast)
2.5+lag: received "your AB hits xxx for yyy"
2.5+lag: received "you gain Arcane Blast (1)"
2.5+lag: received already casting AB with length 2.5 at time current-lag
=> result: second AB finishes at 5.0

with stopcasting (option 2) [server determines castingspeed, this would be great]:
0.0: start casting AB (0 debuffs, 2.5 sec cast)
2.5-epsilon: send "/stopcasting, /cast AB"
2.5: server thinks cast has finished, applies debuff "Arcane Blast(1)"
2.5: server receives "/stopcasting" (ignored)
2.5: server receives "/cast AB", you begin casting AB (1 debuffs, 2.2 sec cast)
2.5+lag: received "your AB hits xxx for yyy"
2.5+lag: received "you gain Arcane Blast (1)"
2.5+lag: received already casting AB with length 2.2 at time current-lag
=> result: second AB finishes at 4.7

Is option 1 or option 2 correct? Or maybe formulated a bit different: Is the castingspeed determined on the client or the server? I hope my question is clear now

 

Sancus

You definitely do not gain the reduced casting time client-side if you /stopcast Arcane Blast while you're ramping it up.

However, it might be possible that you can stopcast 0.3s earlier than normal(since the server should already consider you to have the buff obviously)... I haven't tried this. If it works, however, that's the only way you could get the benefit of the reduced casting time buff, as if you /stopcast you gain it after you begin your new cast.

<Vontre> I removed the cooldown on evo
<sancus> and what happened?
<Vontre> DPS went down rofl

 

Stein

This is my understanding as well. I've had a fair amount of success casting AB doubly early during ramp up.

All anecdotal evidence obviously.

 

Rouncer

Except that the debuff is applied when the mana is taken and since the mana is taken before the next cast is begun you have the debuff before the next casting bar appears.

I'm at work so can't test it to be completely sure but I know (anecdotal evidence true) that the casting bar that pops up on the 2nd AB of a rampup is shorter then the one associated with the first cast.

Real easy way to make sure though - either just enlarge the casting bar so that you can see the remaining time the instant the 2nd cast appears or use the script that Zaldinar used to test Haste effects on the WoW forums to see the actual remaining cast time reported to the cast bar.

WoW Forums -> [Theorycraft] Random thoughts on Spell Haste

API UnitCastingInfo - WoWWiki, the Warcraft wiki

That should give you a definitive answer as to what happens with /stopcasting and ramping up Arcane Blast.

 

Zure

One additional comment on AM heavy rotations:

I believe you can improve your damage per mana by about 4% by switching from AM spam to AM and then AB whenever you don't have a clearcast, MSD proc, or double stack AB debuff that will not expire before the cast ends. Total mana per second used goes down by almost 10%. Of course there is a dps loss, but for those who can't sustain the mana for consistent AM, there is an alternative in this dynamic AM/AB cast rotation.

The 2.5 second AB is actually a net mana gain when you count the tick of full spirit regen, plus the potential clearcast proc for a subsequent AM.

 

Alvira

I have been doing alright in SSC/TK with Arcane despite not having any T5 (luck of the draw). However, I am seriously considering getting mystical sykfire diamond and then just going AM heavy in the next patch.

Instead of doing rotations, I will then mainly spam AM. If I find that mana is an issue, I might throw in one single cast AB into the mix occasionally. Only at the last 10% of boss health, if I still have excess mana, then I will spam AB.

If AM DPS is really so good just with the new AM changes and meta gem procs. Then I would definitley go that route since I don't have T5 yet. It also offers significantly more flexibility in terms of gearing options if I don't need to rely on a two peice set bonus.

Not that I won't eventually try and get at least 2 pc T5. Just that I won't feel like I am forced to focus on getting it first above everything else.

Also, you don't lose as much when you break off from AM spam to move. Break off an AB rotation, you have to start over again. Breaking off AM spam just means you lost some mana and that's it. YOur DPS actually doesn't get affected.

 

Stirius

Thanks for the idea, this is what I did and i got some interesting results: [mage] Arcane Blast-mechanic seriously broken?!

 

Zure

Again, while AM spam doesn't require 2 pc T5, a lot of the numbers you see thrown around assume Ashtongue Talisman or 4 pc T6. AM+MSD+Haste also requires a very aggressive mana regen setup, especially with the anemic stats found on much pre-T5 damage gear.

 

Malakov

I'm looking for some pointers on arcane dps. My guild is currently 5/6 SSC, 1/4 TK, and I have yet to get any T5, but I would like to stay arcane regardless. I've been running a rotation of ABx2, AM, Scorch, and my DPS seems to be lacking in comparison to the rest of the raid.

There are several gear changes I still have yet to make if you take the time to look at my armory.

Could someone link me to some relevant posts about rotations, gear, etc.?

I'm not entirely sure what I'm doing wrong.

 

Stirius

AB-rotations or AB-spamming without 2pc T5 are not worth it. Fireball-spamming with 10/48/3 will be on top with equal gear. I tried it because of Al'ar myself before 2pc T5. 2pc T5 is a huge jump forward!

 

Malakov

Like I said, I don't want or plan on changing back to fire. How can I maximize my DPS before T5?

 

tedv

Summarizing from earlier in the thread, the general consensus on Arcane Blast style arcane was that you needed two piece T5, and the arcane missile version require the spell haste stuff from black temple (eg. Ashtongue trinket). That is not the gear you have.

Until you get the two piece T5 bonus, you can pick ONE of the two options but not both:

1) Do competitive raid damage
2) Stay Arcane

If you want competitive damage with your current gear, spec fire. Since you've chosen to stay with Arcane, you'll have to accept that your DPS will be significantly worse than the rest of the raid.

 

Phalanx

You're likely not dumping your mana via AB spams enough. If you're just using the rotation throughout the entirety of the encounter, you've missed the point.

The idea is to spam AB. That's where your DPS is. You can't do that on most of your encounters because:

1. You can't sustain that because of the mana requirement.
2. Your raid DPS isn't high enough to cut into that requirement.

I'd say right now, given your progress and gear, you need to look at encounters this way: There are windows where I can spam AB and have enough time to regen mana and resume a rotation where I can still contribute DPS.

So, what I would do is dump your mana via AB spam early in the encounter. Regen your mana via Evocation and maybe a pot/gem/both. Resume your rotation and time your next AB spam to coincide with the death of the boss. Once you get a feel for learning how to dump your mana and recoup it while not wanding or being otherwise inept, you'll factor in the raid DPS and adjust (increase) your spams accordingly.

You have Evocation (sometimes two), 3 gems, mana pots and hopefully a Shadow Priest/Shaman/JoW (or a combination thereof, the SP is your best bet really). Use all of them. But also, monitor your raid DPS. As it gets higher, the more damage you can do. I say 'can' because its up to you to realize this and make use of AB spam.

 

Athemeus

I have to disagree here. I skilled Arcane for Al'ar (3 days ago) and liked it straight away, even when my DPS were lower at the begining (of course without 2 T5). I quickly (just yesterday) got 2 T5 for further testing, but even without it, I could do close to 1200DPS at Karathress with still not really optimal execution (yes I know, Karathress is hard to lose as an arcane mage).
So I would conclude, that even without 2 T5 you still can do competitive DPS, you just may be slightly better of beeing deep fire.

 

Logun

This is not necessarily true. I'm close to your level of progression and I've been raiding as 48/13 without 2 piece T5. But that is because we have 3-4 raiding SP's and Aff. Locks. You need to be AB spaming 60% or so of the fights. You need to be using Arcane Power while you are AB. ABx2 AM is not going to top any meters. You should be using ABx3 AM Scorch in between your AB spams. You should be drinking Super Mana pots like they are water.

You are clearly not AB spamming enough.

 

◊ manly

I'll just chime in that what was said earlier is as close as it gets to reality. Much like I said quite a few times in this thread, only 1.9s and 1.5s AB's compete with fire spec dps, which means you need some massive amount of AB spamming to compete. This is also why if you check the few arcane parses I posted earlier, usually 70-75%-ish of my damage comes from AB.

With this said, I strongly recommend you download Vontre's spreadsheet:
Vontre's Mage DPS Spreadsheet
And then enter your stats in there (and don't forget to remove 25% of your int to your spell damage). Then, very important, enter the expected fight duration. The spreadsheet will tell you the best possible cycle available for you, which typically will be something like (for example):

5x AB, AM, scorch
which means, basically, that you can do '3x AB, AM, scorch' the entire fight, then finish the fight with a 1.5s AB spam equal to the sum of all the remaining 'unused' 2x ABs, and you should finish the fight with close to 0 mana.

Log on with different model:
1- Create a character of the desired model. Log on/off.
2- At character selection screen, select your actual character; mouseover the new, desired model character, and hold down left click; hit enter and release left click at the same time.
bug Arcane Potency only applies to the first Arcane Missile bolt.