Hmm that acutally makes sense yes, a punishment for using hurricane on 2-3 mobs, free spell when used on 4,5 or more mobs, where it should have a better chance to proc.

I've been wondering the exact same thing. having a static rotation while having to rely on a proccable effect won't be effective, since even with 50%+ raidbuffed crit it will happen that you won't get a starfire to crit if you're casting 3. actually since moonfire lasts 27 seconds with nature's splendor, 2xt6 and glyph of starfire and eclipse having a 30 second hidden cooldown makes only the second and third starfire able to proc Eclipse.

I don't have excell on this computer so I can't check out certain spreadsheets, but just from crude calculations wrath does seem to output more damage than starfire after the nerf to glyph of starfire. though I would like to read up on this more, since I'm not much of a numbercruncher and I'm still curious about things like scaling and mana efficiency for starfire vs wrath. also outside of a raidsetting where you won't always have all the buffs and debuffs. though it won't matter much there since it doesn't matter much in heroics and so if your damage isnt 100% optimal but still. starfire does have a 3% crit benefit over wrath, since afaik using unglyphed IS pre 2xt7 isn't worth casting. glyphing it would also mean you won't get the -3% hit debuff, which hunters will not be providing, because of the steadyshot glyph, which makes them have to use serpent sting. and afaik Eclipse utilizing is a significant dps increase.

so a rotation like: MF - SFxN (min 3, max to proc eclipse), WrathxN (till moonfire falls off) like Miim said seems to make a lot more sense to me opposed to the static MF - SFx3 - WxN till moonfire falls. and where, if at all, does IS fit in? most logically I'd say IS - MF - SFxN (min 3/max Eclipse), WrathxN and refresh IS? adding (i)FF to that would make things a little more complicated because of the 40 sec duration. having a feral/resto druid cast it would make it easier but still there's the speccing.

with all the damage talents and OoC/Master Shapeshifter it seems so hard to get that magic spec working. intensity, lunar guidance, owlkin frenzy, iFF, brambles.. things like dreamstate, typhoon, starfall and gale winds don't bother me much, but those others are just hard to value since they have different strengths. as it is now at 70 I've never had any manaproblems in raids with 61 points balance, without dreamstate, will that change at lvl 80?

anyhow, these are just things on my mind, I apologize if things are explained already, I might have either missed it or misunderstood it, or for stating things someone already stated (captain obvious \o>)

If I understand you correctly, your proposal is to use SF more to proc an Eclipse. The error in this reasoning is twofold: First of all, Eclipse has a 30-second internal cooldown, and secondly, Wrath is a higher DPS spell than Starfire. Period. So really, if Eclipse is on cooldown, you'll want to run MF/SFx3/(IS)/WxN until the Eclipse CD is up, at which point I would assume you'd hit SF to force a proc and then Wrath spam until Eclipse is over. I'm not sure as to the math of what's optimal for Eclipse proccing in the new rotation, whether it'd be better to proc the SF buff (this is what Rawr does) or to proc the Wrath buff (which it can be changed to do).

The issue with Intensity is that you need to take the 5 points over Furor in order to get to it and OoC. I've been fiddling around with talent builds all day (in between doing work), and eventually settled on this.

Points to note:

- I feel that the 5 points up to OoC/Intensity probably aren't worth it (this is assuming that regen is a small issue, not a major one) - I'd take Imp MotW and Natures Focus for the 5 up to them. I don't feel that Natures Focus is worth it over Owlkin Frenzy (considering the enhanced damage benefit of Frenzy) and Imp MotW will, for the most part, be redundant due to Resto druids taking it.

- The spec takes all the major damage enhancing talents, and picks up both 3/3 Moonglow and 3/3 Dreamstate for regen. It's possible that regen won't be an issue, in which case I'll be picking up Brambles and the last point of Frenzy.

- I don't see a spec without Starfall, Typhoon and Gale Winds being generally useable. The 4 points you spend gives a major boost to AoE. I'm just waiting for a possible glyph to remove knockback on Typhoon (source) so I can use it on trash without people getting annoyed, but it's still a good spell for movement, when not mana limited.

On the topic of using Wrath is raids - I really don't see how people are finding that it's more DPS. With even a small amount of haste (there's 11% from talents/raid buffs alone), there's too much "clipping" of the duration on Wrath to make it better than Starfire. The only time I will admit that it may be worth it is when Eclipse procs (or to cause an Eclipse proc, which is what I will be using it for almost certainly) - even then, under heavy haste (bloodlust + raid buffs + sunwell gear) Wrath comes down to ~0.6 seconds with Grace for me, which means a ridiculous amount of lost time (compared to chaining starfire at 1.7 sec without grace, 1.5 seconds with). Sitting at a training dummy doing spam of Wrath (500 casts) compared to spam of Starfire (250 casts) came out at approximately equal DPS over the periods. This is without any additional haste (WoA). lower crit than in raids (no FF (3%) or mage buffs(10%/3%)) or Bloodlust, which would swing things even further in favour Starfire. Is there something major that will be happening to Wrath in WotLK that will suddenly make it do a lot more damage?

On eclipse procs: If regen is an issue, using Wrath to proc the Starfire buff is certainly worth it, due to mana back on crits. Even without this, the gains of Grace procs combined with increased damage (crits) surely outweighs the damage increase on Wrath. There will be lower uptime though, because of the 60% proc on Wrath crits compared to 100% proc on Starfire crits, which needs to come into it aswell, but I don't see how proccing the Wrath effect could be better than proccing the Starfire effect.

question, have you even thought about Master Shapeshifter? You dont mention it anywhere and i would like to know why.

The latest Talent calculator tooltip says:

Rank 1:
When you critically hit with Starfire, you have a 33% chance of increasing damage done by Wrath by 20%. When you critically hit with Wrath, you have a 19.8% chance of increasing your critical strike chance with Starfire by 30%. Effect lasts 15 sec and has a 30 sec cooldown.

Rank 2:
When you critically hit with Starfire, you have a 66% chance of increasing damage done by Wrath by 20%. When you critically hit with Wrath, you have a 39.6% chance of increasing your critical strike chance with Starfire by 30%. Effect lasts 15 sec and has a 30 sec cooldown.

Rank 3:
When you critically hit with Starfire, you have a 100% chance of increasing damage done by Wrath by 20%. When you critically hit with Wrath, you have a 60% chance of increasing your critical strike chance with Starfire by 30%. Effect lasts 15 sec and has a 30 sec cooldown.

And in the official patch note it says:
Eclipse: Buff duration extended to 15 sec and bonuses doubled. The cooldown has been increased to 40 seconds.

TBH i think Blizz just did a typo on the patch note. I trust more in the tooltip.

Ofc if anyone know for sure let us know

I don't feel that there are the points available to allow getting Master Shapeshifter while still picking up everything else that I want to get. It's effectively 7 points for 2 points of effect (or, at best, 5 points for 2 points of effect). If you're going for OoC/Intensity, then it's a possibility (although it means having to take Natural Shapeshifter over Natures Focus), but I don't think going that route is worth it unless regen is a very serious issue - with Moonglow / Dreamstate / Moonkin Form and the potential of using the Innervate glyph, along with JoW and Replenishment, I don't see it as a likely issue.

Let me boil it down for you: Unless your Wrath casts are sitting at 1.0 seconds WITHOUT Grace, Wrath is simply more powerful than Starfire. Wrath has _always_ been a higher DPS spell than Starfire, it's just that in TBC there were more multipliers on Arcane damage than on Nature damage. In addition, TBC Starfire outscaled TBC Wrath by a mile. The spell has been quite a bit buffed in 3.0, in addition to the equalizing of spell power multipliers across all schools of magic. Now, when I say "more powerful", I'm not talking in the hundreds of DPS. Most models show Wrath and Starfire within 50 DPS of each other even in max buffs. However, it is simply not true that Starfire is just plain better than Wrath anymore.

actually if I'm understanding correctly, which I explained further in my post he means that you won't always get an eclipse proc off those 3 Starfires you'll be casting.

in short; moonfire lasts 27 seconds max, gcd of eclipse is 30 seconds so by the time the first starfire hits, eclipse can be still on the cooldown, depending on haste/grace being put up cuz of the last wrath. then you'd have to proc at least 1 out of 2 starfires in order to get Eclipse going, otherwise it will proc on wrath.

that's where it gets tricky for me. you could simply switch to starfire if it procs off a wrath or keep casting wrath if one of those starfire procs it, or you could cast extra starfire(s) in order to proc the wrath effect. which is tricky because when it procs and you're chaincasting, you're prolly already casting something when you notice the proc coming up and it'd be a waste to cancel and switch

Between the Ashtongue Talisman, 4t6, and the NG/latency issues, Starfire easily comes out on top in the current environment. I assume that in WotLK, only the NG/latency issues will remain (as 4t7 is both Wrath and Starfire, and the trinket will devalue), but that still might be enough to swing things in Starfires favour. If pushback becomes an issue though (which currently I don't believe it is), Natures Focus may gain Wrath some value while not under the effects of Frenzy. Glyph of Starfire is being fixed to only have 3 casts affecting Moonfire (see above discussions on MF/3xSF/(IS)/NxW rotations), but I'm still not sure about how the comparison between Wrath and Starfire will pan out with the stats and boss fights at 80.

mm if I look at wrath vs starfire I see an increase in overall damage for wrath at a cost of mana. 2 wraths do more damage than 1 starfire and if you have 2 casts, you'll have 2 chances of critting for 209% dmg and reducing the cast of the next one by 0,5 sec

glyph of starfire will be changed and I've only had latency problems big enough to make a difference there on very rare occasions

edit: 4xt6, ashtongue trinket and the current starfire glyph do seem to make starfire superior, (like dukes posted when I was typing) but I'm thinking about the future

I assume there will be a new thread once WOTLK comes out. until then, read along like the rest of us...




I was thinking for tonight to go with the MF and SF glyphs and make my rotation look like this:


Wrath(to get E&M up), IS, MF, Wrath until Eclipse procs and then spam Starfire

As long as Eclipse procs before the MF falls off, starfire will refresh it.

Any thoughts or ideas on this?