"Unless you've already got an ignite on the mob, which is true about a third of the time!"

"Suckers!"

"That's what you get for not keeping your mob sheeped!"

Don't forget that that 12 int is ~0.15% crit as well and things get better with int increasing talents, gnome racial, and spellfire bonus. I almost didn't bother putting spellpower on bracers as an arcane mage.

No no no. More int is not better in shorter fights. Extra int is only good when you would be sitting at 0 mana without that extra int. In which case, it contributes the 180 mana. In short fights, no one really runs out of mana, so all 12 int gives you is 3 dmg and a fraction of a crit.

15 damage on bracrers is superior. period.

I run out of mana nearly every fight, even single pull trash mobs. That's the true power of arcane blast, remember?

I agree +dam is superior, but unless I'm going to wear the bracers for a looong time, the 550g isn't worth it. Period! lol

Translation, 15 spell power is better but I'm cheap, so no way =)

Haha, what's funny is that I agree, and I'm currently repping +9 stam on my bracers until I get a pair that I'm proud of. So far, nothing really has jumped out at me, although the pair that came with the pre-made mage gear on the PTR were quite nice.

(Oh, and I could care less about maximizing my DPS on trash. I want to do well, but the reason we theorycraft is for bosses, not to drop trash mobs 0.5 seconds faster - I don't consider ending trash fights with zero mana very important).

(that part was mostly tongue in cheek I need an smiley for that.....although, it's fun what you can do to the damage meters in kara abusing AB. You're not anti fun, are you? )

Hey.

I just need some advice on gem choices.

Im currently using a 33/28 spec. I have spellstrike and spellfire sets, gemmed atm with 12 gleaming golden draenites(+6 spell crit rating), to up the crit% (vital for 33/28 as i understand it).

Currently, buffed only with AI and MA, i have 741 +spell damage and 35.95 %crit.

Should I stay with the +crit gems, or rather get +spell dam ? I would trade off (in green gems) 84 + spell damage for 72 +crit rating. What would work better for a 33/28 build ?

Also, is there clarity on the ultimate raiding dps build ?? 10/48/3 or 33/28 ? Obviously (again as I understand it) 10/48/3 gem choices are +spell dam all the way.

All your input would be appreciated.

Thanks.

PS Yes I do intend to replace my green gems with blues asap.

Crit rating is highly overrated. No matter which (fire)-build you use, hit rating or spelldamage will yield a better result.

So for raiding I suggest using spelldamage sockets over crit rating sockets.

Crit was once a vital stat for firemages, to keep those high ignites rolling, but that changed with TBC. Ignites gives you a flat amount of 40% additional crit damage, no matter how high or long you "roll".

I think that's too arbitrary of a thing to say, honestly. In many cases crit rating is very much worth it. This, however, depends almost totally on your current stats, spec, and spell usage. Running it through a spreadsheet to see which one adds more DPS is really the only viable option.

There have been plenty of times where I have run the +dmg gem vs. the +dmg/crit gem and had the +dmg/crit gem come out ahead. It really depends heavily on your current situation.

That said, hit% is almost always going to yield the largest gain against bosses if you are not capped...simply due to it being fairly cheap in the item budget formula vs. +dmg and crit% for how effective it is. (Since spec'ing Fire, I've whipped out some of my alternative hit% rings and such, and found they were substantially better than the rings I was using with Arcane/Frost.)

Realistically, +dmg/crit gems tend to pull ahead at high-end base +dmg with a deep Arcane "big crit" build. For deep fire builds, +dmg is often better.

Eh? Depends if you're soloing or looking at it from a raiding perspective with coe/misery/imp scorch up and your fireballs begin to hit way more than they would vs. when you're soloing. Solo/most 5 mans/maybe even some 10 mans, +dmg wins out, full blown raid scene with locks and shadow priests, +crit should win out.

But to address Tempestra's questions:
Can't think of any constant differences off the top of my head that would favor something like 33/28/0 over 11/47/3 or vice versa. With a good group set up and good playing wouldn't expect 1 build to out dps the other with any sort of meaningful repeatability on any of the SSC fights save for Vashj, the only fight I haven't encountered first hand. I've been a long time 17/31/3 --> 10/48/3 mage and have gave 33/28/0 a shot in SSC but was just too used to deep fire to be effective with a hybrid build.
Why I like deep fire to raid with for SSC thus far would probably focus primarily around Dragon's Breath.
Vs. Hydross, it can save your life on the adds if you pull aggro on an add if it isn't stunned -or- can be used to save a healer's life that is about to get assaulted by a loose add in conjunction or as a substitute if your nova is down (have seen an old guildy do this very, very effectively if adds are loose here).
Vs. Morogrim its another AoE spell you can throw in to the mix when he eq's murlocs awake, also a nice spell to throw in if you see them turn towards another aoe-er.
Vs. Leotheras its another very nice interrupt / dmg spell you can use to set up your next shot on your inner demon.

The other bosses (Lurker Below and Fathomlord) have little use for dragon's breath, but I feel can be lumped together with every other SSC bosses which all have high HP (well, not Fathomlord himself but him + his adds) to have molten fury be more effective. While I can't mathematically show results of it, the nature of most of the fights involve you (the mage) going all out at 20% solely on the boss whereas any health percentage before that you may not be able to burn the boss full time (ie have AoE duty or add watching/killing duty) with a single target nuke to have the 33/28/0 gain dps ground over 11/47/3 pre execute range.

Maybe a 33/28/0 raiding mage can provide his/her experience and throw in why they like their spec in this raid setting.

Only 2 gems I use is the +5 dmg +6 sta blue one (glowing nightseye) in blue/red spots and the +5 crit rating + 4 dmg (potent noble topaz) in yellow spots. I have yet to find better gems for those spots.

The 2.10 patch will include hit/dmg orange gems. (Blue - 4 hit/5 dmg, Green - 3 hit/4 dmg). There will also be a Yellow +hit gem (8 hit, 6 hit).

Until the patch comes out, it's really not worth it to go for socket bonuses on gear that require yellow gems. Of course, now I'm wondering on the math of 5 dmg vs 4 hit rating. Or 9 dmg vs 8 hit rating.

I can't agree with this. At best, +9 dmg is marginally better than +5 crit/+4 dmg and almost any decent socket bonus makes up for the difference.

I could see making the argument for the dmg/stam gems, as they are less devoted to maximum DPS...but skipping out on crit/dmg gems instead of pure damage at the cost of a socket bonus is almost never worth it from what I have seen.

Very simple example, for instance, is that I recently ran the spreadsheet math on crit/dmg vs. dmg gems with the 2 crit rating bonus on the Bracers of Havok. +7 crit/+4 dmg ended up being slightly higher DPS than +9 dmg. +5 dmg socket bonuses are even more straightforward. With my current gear/spec, a pure +dmg gem is worth about .7 DPS more than a +crit/+dmg gem. In this case, the +2 crit rating bonus makes using the yellow gem .12 DPS higher. It's really quite close.

However, running the numbers for my current gear...if I had 3 yellow slots with a +5 dmg socket bonus, it's .7 DPS higher to match the socket bonus with dmg/crit gems than it is to socket for pure +dmg. So, it is highly situational.

The only answer for gems is simply: run your current stats with your current gear and spec and see which one is better. There is no one-size-fits-all solution to them.

Edit: I would also say that when the +hit gems come out, they will wipe the floor with the other gems for Fire/Frost specs. 27 +dmg vs. 15 +dmg/12 hit rating is about a 1.33 DPS increase with my current stats.

Flat damage multipliers don't matter at all. No matter what the distribution of your "natural" damage looks like, CoE gives you the same increase. Incidentally your conclusions are exactly reversed. Soloing/5mans benefit the most from crit, because mobs have such low hp that small increases from +dmg don't make any practical difference, whereas against a "real" raid boss that you're dpsing for several minutes +dmg starts to add up.

The only things that affect the proper weighting of dmg/hit/crit are your spec, and the amount of each you already have.

some extensive discussion on +crit vs +dam
http://forums.subcreation.net/viewtopic.php?id=3262&p=1

end result:
+hit > all till capped
+dam > +crit for <all> specs, until you have over 1k of it
then +crit = +dam for 33/28/0

Has anybody worked out how good the new Pendant of the Violet Eye is? They have added 34 Int and increased the Mp5 to 21.

Pendant of the Violet Eye
Binds when picked up
Unique
Trinket
+34 Intellect
Requires Level 70
Use: Each spell cast within 20 seconds will grant a stacking bonus of 21 mana regen per 5 sec. Expires after 20 seconds. Abilities with no mana cost will not trigger this trinket.
Cooldown: 2 min


I assume it's situational at best; mana is only worth something in a raid if you needed it to kill the boss etc.

34 Int ~ .425 crit ~ 8.62 Crit Rating
With spellfire set (7% total Int = +damage) you gain 2.38 damage .
If you had MM 5/5 you would gain an additional 8.5 damage.

I would use it with the typical 10/48/3 raid build and use it at the beginning of the fight while putting up the scorch debuffs, then use it with heavy scorch each 2 mins.

Guesstimating mana gained back while spamming scorch when the trinket is up:

Note: the below is based on the idea that mana ticks ever 2 seconds. This could be totally wrong and it ticks ever 3 seconds, so bare in mind that it's my best guess.

[PopTrinket Maco to cast scorch]
1.5 Scorch + .2 lag ~ 1.7 21 Mp5
1.5 Scorch + .2 lag ~ 1.7 42 Mp5 3.4 Time Elapsed <Mana Tick of 8>
1.5 Scorch + .2 lag ~ 1.7 63 Mp5 5.1 TE <Mana Tick of 25>
1.5 Scorch + .2 lag ~ 1.7 84 Mp5 6.8 TE
1.5 Scorch + .2 lag ~ 1.7 105 Mp5 8.5 TE <Mana Tick of 42>
1.5 Scorch + .2 lag ~ 1.7 126 Mp5 10.2 TE <Mana Tick of 50>
1.5 Scorch + .2 lag ~ 1.7 147 Mp5 11.9 TE
1.5 Scorch + .2 lag ~ 1.7 168 Mp5 13.6 TE <Mana Tick of 67>
1.5 Scorch + .2 lag ~ 1.7 189 Mp5 15.3 TE <Mana Tick of 75>
1.5 Scorch + .2 lag ~ 1.7 210 Mp5 17.0 TE
1.5 Scorch + .2 lag ~ 1.7 231 Mp5 18.7 TE <Mana Tick of 92>
Buff expires. I tested this on Live a few times, and managed to cast 11 scorches and see [You] ++ Enlightenment (11) before it fading. Depending on when the final tick is would change the mana gained back by a large amount.

I'm not so clear on the mana you would actually gain back per tick before it fading though?

Assuming the above is correct, you would gain back roughly 360 Mana per 2 Minutes form the On Use. I’m thinking that clearcasting would lower it’s effectiveness depending on when it proc’d.

240

No, crit's notably weaker than both hit and spelldamage in nearly any situation (that doesn't involve the Lightning Capacitor) for deep Fire.

With my current setup (click char name for Armory), I estimate

1 +fire damage = 0.9 hit rating = 1.4 crit rating = about 0.5 DPS

Just remember that crit requires 75% more rating for a percentage point that hit. Ignite doesn't provide enough returns from crit to make up for that.

Yeah, I realized that a few days later, it's 1600%, not 1500%.

Last Magtheridon kill I was present for dps 9 minutes and in those 9 minutes I got back The Pendant would've given me 1440 mana back if your math is correct, MoD is just really good and I can't see me deequipping it for a long time. I wish they would make an upgrade for it somewhere in the raiding scene, not gonna hold my breath though.

If you did have the Lightning Capacitor could crit become more important then spell hit? For example with a build like this. And perhaps even using the LC and Shaffar's Nexus Horn. If you have a 30% at least crit chance then that means every 3rd scorch you would be getting a LC proc. And the horn would be proccing pretty often with so many crits. Could the extra damage from the LC and the horn make up for the loss of hit you'd have from stacking +crit rating gear iinstead?

Oh, and how did you calculate how much 1 fire dmg = crit/hit?

I've read a fair bit of this thread, and I noticed that there are a few mentions of using stopcasting to increase the amount of dps we can pump out.

In my testing with stopcasting since TBC launch I cannot seem to get any extra performance out of it due to, what seems to be, Blizzard stopping another spell to be cast until the actual bar is completed. I simply get this "This spell is not ready" when i try to start the next cast. Have people found ways to make this useful again?

Apologies if this is covering something already said, but this thread is huge!