On the subject of PvE specs for mages, I was wondering a few things.

My original character was a mage (up to level 43 lawl) until I made a total of three 60 rogues, two 60 warriors, all of whom are alliance, and a 70 priest. Hence, I haven't paid much attention to caster mechanics in a long time, and as a shadow priest I've been looking more at warlock mechanics than mage mechanics. So I'm certainly no expert on this subject (or even knowledgeable).

My guild has recently demanded that the mages go PvE spec. We killed Gruul post-nerf last week, and have cleared Karazhan including Nightbane, killed Kazzak, and gotten Doomwalker to 10%. Despite the fact that we haven't even tried Mag or SSC, we're still the most advanced guild on the server, which is rather pathetic to me, but Lethon isn't a major server. I say this to show what gear our mages have access to (though tailoring items are obviously better than most raid counterparts at this point).

The announcement they posted on the forums is now at reply 1878.

Seeing this surprised me, as I thought that Fire was the best PvE DPS spec after guilds were past fire immune/resistant mobs in old WoW endgame, and that Ice was more of a PvP spec with its high survivability. I know that the new high-tier arcane talents have made 40/x/x builds popular with the +50% spell crit bonus and +damage bonus from 25% of a mage's intellect. But I was under the impression that deep Fire, with all of its multipliers, ended up as the best PvE DPS spec in raids.

Apparently, though, this has changed. So, could someone enlighten me as to what has changed and what the best PvE builds for a mage are?

I read through parts of this 75 page thread, but didn't see a clear explanation of the new BC builds. If I missed it, could I be directed to the relevant post?

You might want to quote that link - I found myself at a forum login/registration screen.

Oh, you're right, my apologies. One second.



It was decided in a recent officer meeting that the most beneficial spec for raiding mages to be was either 40 arcane/21 frost, or 10 arcane/51 frost. We are beginning to get tired of mages coming to raids as PVP spec, as it really doesnt befit someone in a hardcore PVE guild. one 51 frost mage per raid will greatly increase the dps of all the 40 arcane mages, so if you believe you will be a reliable addition to 25 mans you may wish to go 51 frost, otherwise 40 arcane is ideal for overall damage. I myself will be going 51 frost, so it shouldnt be a problem for most of you to go arcane if you choose. If mages continue to come to raids as a spec not oriented towards PVE content, there will be consequences.

Arcane/damage spec : http://www.wowhead.com/?talent=Ri0Vc0fzxIziZZVA0zof0o

Frost/Winters chill spec : http://www.wowhead.com/?talent=Rf0VZZVArfofxsiot

these specs are not set in stone, but the general concept should not be changed. only pvp oriented talents (I/E improved counterspell, shatter, etc) should be removed or changed.

Vontre,

I think the highest rank of Divine Spirit now gives 50 spirit, right?

Also, max level MotW gives 14 int, not 16, correct? I'm just grabbing these numbers off of thott, so if I'm wrong, I apologize.

I think where you account for the nerfed spell dmg coefficients for fireball and frostbolts, it ought to reference the cells that hold the final talent values, not the manually entered values. This could potentially trick people into thinking fire has a bigger edge on arcane that it does.

I'm using a different base value for fireballs as well. I got my base off of thott when I divided the sum of the low end and top end of the rank 13 fireball by 2.

(805 + 633)/2 = 719

Edit: My base numbers for AM (1300), frostbolt (620), and arcane blast (700) differ as well. I'm not saying I'm right. I'm just wanting to know where the discrepancy came from.

Yes, on the 50 spirit.

The 14 from MotW is untalented, though a 35% bonus wouldn't be 16...so...I'm not sure on that one. I think he's counting rank 7 (12 of each stat, with a 35% bonus making it 16).

That's wrong on many many levels. Frost is a viable raid build (I'm 10/0/51 myself), but a heavy fire build (10/48/3) is generally considered the best raid build. I'm always nervous when I guild announces a required spec. I'm even more nervous when they announce the incorrect spec for what they're trying to do.

It reminds me a little of the guild on Aggramar from MC days that forced specs. It forced a 30/0/21 mage spec that didn't include Improved Frostbolt. That guild's claim to fame was a 43 minute (and two repair bot) Baron Geddon kill for their first kill of him.

Edit: Actually, now I'm really curious. The mage responsible for the Imp Frostbolt free raidspec transferred to Lethon several months ago. He's not a Female Undead mage named something like "Polaris" or "Northstar" or anything like that, is he?

If someone asked me what the two most common PvE raid specs were I would say:

10/48/3 is probably the most common pure PvE raid spec. (You can migrate 2-3 points from fire to arcane)
40/21/0 is probably the second most common, but as your gear gets stronger mind mastery doesn't scale as well as percent damage multipliers in deep fire, but respectable damage.
(38/23/0 is in the same catagory)

I'm sure the frost specs would do fine, but from a dps only standpoint (with acceptable sustainability) the fire specs are usually the defacto.

What exactly does a 10/48/3 spec look like? Something like this?: http://www.wowhead.com/?talent=kbhVZxghzfcIoeRt0h

I think the issue is that the officers feel the mages should be doing more damage.

On our Kazzak kills, High King kills, and Karazhan clears (at least with group 2, ie my group) I'm usually at or near the top with 2-3 warlocks and two well geared rogues. I can't recall a mage in the top 2 Karazhan slots on the meters, or in the top 5 on the 25 man raid meters. Though, my memory isn't perfect, of course. However, I have been wondering what the mages have been doing, since I expected rogues, mages, and warlocks to all be ahead of me...at least I'd hope they would be.

Maybe some of their gear is bad, maybe they have bad talent specs, but their dps seems to be lacking...

A few are tailors, I know at least two mages run a few heroics. Not sure how much this helps you figure out the issue.

How much, from a DPS standpoint, is a mage losing by being frost? 50 dps? 100 dps?

Does better gear widen or decrease this gap?

It's most likely some involuntary addiction to ice block. A lot of non-mages especially seem to think that ice block is the be-all end-all of mage talents, for any aspect of gameplay, ever.

Arcane/Frost is fine, I'm going to do that myself for a pvp build that can also raid decently, but Fire based or Arcane/Fire based will do more damage straight up.

Give us their names and we can pick apart their specs using the armory =p

I kid I kid, but that might be something useful for you to do. I found out that the reason my new guild was pushing to recruit me was to replace one of thier current *ahem* bad mages. I looked up his spec and, well... fun at the expense of others... should be morally in the wrong, yes, but. The other mages and I had a good laugh anyway.

Can you fathom a build with only 32 points in arcane? Think about that for a moment.

More or less. I would go with Arcane Focus 3/5 over Improved Arcane Missles, personally. Though, I probably only cast Arcane Missles once in a great while (the first boss in Auchenai Crypts is the only one I can think of!). Remember, that additional 6% applies to things like Counterspell, Spell Steal which are used in a number of encounters.

As I'm sure you know, spec is only part of the answer. We happen to have a Shadow Priest that tops the meters with the Warlocks/Mages/Rogues right behind. But he is geared quite well and is also a very good player. I'm mildly retarded, but I believe I do a good job for the spec and gear I have.

Well, the Spellstrike/Spellfire set combo is pretty much just raw damage. Deep Fire is raw damage. Throwing a Blade of Wizardy and Quagmirran's Eye into the mix gives you periodically hastened raw damage. And, it's pretty simple to play -- keep stack Improved Scorch, hit Fireball 7 or 8 times, throw in a Scorch to refresh. Rinse and repeat.

If I were a Tailor, there is no question that's the spec I would choose (I'd also be broke from buying a Blade of Wizardy, but that is neither here nor there).

You can indeed increase the damage of your Mages by making them change specs. But, the issue might be that they're not maximizing their damage with their current specs. In which case, no matter what spec you choose, you're going to be leaving some damage on the table.

It widens the gap. Deep Fire has a bunch of %-based talents which increase damage and/or crit. Deep Frost just has Empowered Frostbolt. Deep Fire has an Empowered talent as well, though with a higher % and no crit (which you get elsewhere from Pyromaniac, Combustion, Critical Mass).

Lethon is a PvP server, and Aggramar is a PvE server, no?

Are you sure it was Lethon he transferred to?

And no, I don't know anyone with a name like that, in any case. Armory him, though, perhaps. For some reason, Armory does not get along with my computer, else I would do it.

Point taken.

Well, I'm only sitting at 987 damage (Armory me if you'd like) but I do think I am the best geared Shadow Priest on the server. So perhaps I'm being unfair to some of the mages.

And the last point might be the issue. For whatever reason (and with all the melee dead to hurtful strikes), I did 20% more damage on our Gruul kill than anyone else. I did have a Flask, Adept's Elixir, Major Shadow Power Potion, and Brilliant Wizard Oil, but I think the other DPSers were similary buffed. I wasn't going all out, though, in the hope I'd only have to blow one mana pot. So it's probably others having lesser base gear and not maximing their spec.

Good call. I'm really curious to see where he ended up, but I forgot the server (I thought it was Lethon, but I guess not), and he changed his name. Anyway, it's not worth worrying about in a mage min/maxing thread.

For the numbers I've seen and the testing I've done, a 51 Frost build will outdamage a 40/0/21 build once you reach high levels of +damage. Part of this is the value of Winter's Chill/Empowered Frostbolt, and part of this is the lack of Arcane damage on the Shadoweave set.

Right, I was more contrasting it with 41 point deep frost builds rather than the arcane specs. That does bring up a frost pet peeve of mine though, the other 20 points after the lolemental just don't spend well on things that provide damage. Even ArcMed, which I loved forever, is pretty useless at 70 given present itemization.

Oh well.

The points go into frost instead of arcane because, like you said, there's very little to be gained in the arcane tree. While they don't add a lot to the frost tree for raiding, they flesh out the frost tree quite nicely for farming, for instancing, and (yes) for PvP.

That's really the appeal of the 10/0/51 frost build - it's not only a top contender for non-fire mage dps, it also does very well at the other aspects of mage life. The other frost builds may compete with 10/0/51 for frost dps, but they get no significant gains over a 51 point build. Meanwhile, 51 frost does much better in non-raid settings.

Having spent a fair amount of time as both 40/0/21 and 10/0/51 now, I can't say there's much in 40/0/21 I found preferable; AP burst is nice, but then again, WEle burst is nice too. Frost threat reduction and range boost, on the other hand, are nice to have, and WC/Empowered more than make up for the arcane damage boosters. I thought I'd miss ArcMed more than I do, but I don't.

I'd like to play with fire, but Frozen Shadoweave kinda locks me into frost builds for now.

Spellfire belt can be easily substituted by Girdle of Ruination and T4 gloves are decent, even though they do not quite match the Spellfire quality. The biggest consern is the chest, which I find the most difficult to replace.

I see no point in going 40/0/21 over 10/0/51, WE is good for raid damage and winters chill + empowered frostbolt is imo better than anything you can hope to get from arcane tree. If you can leech someone elses winters chill, then it might be different. And AB + Frostbolts just don't seem to fit well in rotations.

Btw: Do you calculate human racial spirit bonus in spreadsheet? I see no mentions of it.

You only need 1 mage with winter's chill though.

If you have at least 1 mage already providing Winter's Chill, and assuming he doesn't die and keeps the debuff up, is it more beneficial to have the others 40/0/21 or 10/0/51?

And, on a side note, are deep frost and deep fire builds going to provide more dps than deep arcane builds, as gear gets better?