Fire Cataclysm Discussion: OP Updated for Release - Page 47

GnomerTerp · 12/04/10, 7:00 PM

that's true now - but probably not as true during the first week of hardmodes after lich king was killable. Marrowgar was a pretty easy fight, but health pools were significantly lower, as was healing output. His bonestorm did a much higher % of damage to the raid back then at 0% and it was easy enough for someone to take an extra tick of cold flame plus the bone storm to kill them.

elluminea · 12/04/10, 7:40 PM

There are quite a few one-shot abilities out there in cataclysm that are not threat/debuff/aoe based. It would come in extremely handy on certain fights:

- cheesing a full sound bar on Atramedes
- taking a full damage spit on Chimaeron either below 10k health or removing a shot from the raid during the collapse
- nefarian's single target nuking during his phase 2
- eating quake/thunder after being the victim of nasty spawn rng on the ascendant council

Once you see the encounters you can see there being a lot of possibilities. The encounters are of course designed for you not to need it at all, but to answer the above question yes, it has its places in cataclysm raiding.

Maje · 12/05/10, 6:53 AM

Something I thought of today is that given the new Arcane Concentration proc chance and ICD 1/2/3 points are not of similar worth. Assuming simcraft models it correctly and as far as I've checked it does (15s ICD with 13/27/40% proc chance) the results might seem surprising but they are not really:
3/3 AC: 16.3 procs, every 18.6s for a total of 49491 mana -- 100%
2/3 AC: 14.7 procs, every 20.5s for a total of 40060 mana -- 80.9%
1/3 AC: 11.2 procs, every 26.5s for a total of 34271 mana -- 69.2%

Comparison MoE (2 points) returns about 34000 mana. So comparatively speaking 1 point of AC is worth 2 in MoE in full 359 gear, the ratio will of course change with better gear (read higher crit ratings). However as points go 1 point in AC is actually worth slightly less than 1% dps while the other two are much lower which brings a case of taking 1/3 AC.

DPS wise it's:
3/3 0
2/3 -0.16%
1/3 -0.28%
0/3 -1.25%

To be honest the same point usage could be utilised with frost or even arcane not sure how 'expensive' their trees are.

EDIT: as an addendum it's worrying how swingy fire DPS is compared to how it is today, looking at Simcraft data for all the classes fire mage DPS is twice as swingy as other classes.

Tyrian · 12/05/10, 7:32 AM

If true, the standard build suggested could be: Talent Calculator - World of Warcraft . People could shuffle around situational or utility talents as necessary (pyromaniac, cauterize) - to put more range into Improved Fire Blast or flesh out Netherwind Presence.

If you're happy with the accuracy of these findings, i'll edit them into the OP to suggest including 1 point of AC into builds. The OP now says: (edited)

This is a good starting spec for lvl 85 fire mages: Talent Calculator - World of Warcraft

- No points in Improved Fire Blast were taken. This means you'll need to be within 30 yards to use Impact, the base Fire Blast range. Whether you deem this unacceptably low for AOE fights is subjective. If so, drop one point from Netherwind Presence and place it here. You will suffer a minor (around 1%) DPS loss.

- Molten Shields and Blazing Speed are skipped completely. These are PvP talents that will find very limited use in raiding.

- Cauterize is included. During new Heroic and Progression content, this talent will prove extremely useful. Cauterize is not only passive, but on a 1 minute cooldown. Remember that Cauterize can also be aggressively used for DPS, even if situationally, in addition to its survival benefits.

- Pyromaniac is included, but be mindful that it's still very situational. You could drop Pyromaniac and spend the points instead in Arcane Concentration - resulting in a minor (~1%) DPS gain on single target fights. However, you'll need to respec back for any fight that gets use out of Pyromaniac, because the talent is very strong when 3 mobs are present.

Arcane Concentration can be considered a minor DPS subspec talent for Fire mages. Any talent that improves Fire's mana efficiency, such as Arcane Concentration, will allow Fire Mages to tweak their Scorch VS Fireball casting ratio in favour of more Fireballs. Fireball is higher DPS than Scorch, so the more you cast the higher your DPS will be.

Furthermore, the DPS value for each point of Arcane Concentration is not equal. The first point can improve DPS by up to ~1%, whereas the second and third are much lower. The first point of Arcane Concentration is of comparable DPS value to Netherwind Presence for subpsec points, the second and third though are not.

If anyone disputes Majes comments or any of the above, please go ahead. We can hopefully get a consensus within the next day before Cataclysm release.

Maje · 12/05/10, 9:00 AM

I wouldn't drop that point in Netherwind Presence, both are of about equal value (last point in NwP and the first in AC) when you're at 359 gear level. I understand how alluring it might be to find the one good build, however it seems to me we'll have to make sacrifices or create two builds.

To be certain I ran a sim. with both specs and they are within single digits of each other, 2/3 NwP + 1AC vs 3/3 NwP. In short if you only want to allocate 3 points in the Arcane tree I would probably go with 3/3 NwP but you have to know what you're giving up.

I still find the whole design of being tied to two points in Imp. Scorch completely obnoxious, if fire is supposed to be using scorch than I see no reason not to place it into the 'fire' package by default.

Tyrian · 12/05/10, 10:16 AM

Thanks for clarifying. I kept the standard suggested build in the OP as 3 / 35 / 3: Talent Calculator - World of Warcraft and included notes explaining that the first point of Arcane Concentration only - is roughly of equal value to a point in Netherwind Presence. Furthermore, a build that drops AOE talents (Pyromaniac, Improved Flamestrike) and picks up 3/3 Arcane Concentration for a single target Patchwerk type fight - might yield a ~1% DPS increase.

An example build which wanted that ~1% bonus from Arcane Concentration, for a Patchwerk style 1-mob encounter, is: Talent Calculator - World of Warcraft . This build sheds much of Fire's AOE power for a very minor DPS gain. You'd only spec into this build for very specific reasons, like for Brutallus during progression.

Maje · 12/05/10, 10:22 AM

To be honest even for single target I wouldn't pick 3/3 AC as fire, the last two points and especially the last one are very weak, I would probably just go with 4/34/3.

Shaewyn · 12/05/10, 1:09 PM

I'm quite enjoying this discussion - the fact that there are reasonable options for some subspec points is fantastic, and I think evidence of blizzard being at least somewhat successful in their goal of "providing more choice" in talent specs.

However, as a question, how prevalent is pushback-inducing damage in Cataclysm raids? Is it worth dropping one (or two) points in Burning soul for Improved Fire Blast?

Draemon · 12/05/10, 4:53 PM

Tyrian, I realise there isn't currently anything for Frostfire Bolt, which is more or less why I included it in my post. Once you have enough Crit to not have to resort to the Glyphs of Fireball and Pyroblast, using Glyph of Frostfire Bolt for the DoT component to scale with your Mastery would just make sense. Once every 10 seconds you would need to cast Frostfire Bolt to refresh the stack, but that's a further 9% of FFB's damage that gets dealt over time, increased by Mastery - this would also provide higher Combustion ticks. Remember, what I posted was for mid-end game of the first Raid Tier, not what I think people should run with as soon as they jump into Heroics.

You also state in your Original Post "Prime - Glyph of Frostfire - Recommended if you use Frostfire Bolt as main nuke. If that's the case, this Glyph replaces the Fireball one". This should never be the case, ever. The only reason you would ever use this Glyph is if you're able to get roughly 35% crit without the need for the Fireball of Pyroblast Glyph. As Frostfire Bolt does less damage than Fireball anyway, and Frostfire Bolt's DoT only stacks to 3 times, it would be a DPS loss to continue casting it after you have 3 stacks of the DoT on the target, unless you're refreshing the DoT towards it's end. So even with this Glyph, it should never be your primary Nuke, and should only ever be used to apply the debuff, and also only ever used once you have enough Crit to not have to Glyph for Fireball or Pyroblast.

Tyrian · 12/05/10, 5:09 PM

You also state in your Original Post "Prime - Glyph of Frostfire - Recommended if you use Frostfire Bolt as main nuke. If that's the case, this Glyph replaces the Fireball one". This should never be the case, ever. The only reason you would ever use this Glyph is if you're able to get roughly 35% crit without the need for the Fireball of Pyroblast Glyph. As Frostfire Bolt does less damage than Fireball anyway, and Frostfire Bolt's DoT only stacks to 3 times, it would be a DPS loss to continue casting it after you have 3 stacks of the DoT on the target, unless you're refreshing the DoT towards it's end. So even with this Glyph, it should never be your primary Nuke, and should only ever be used to apply the debuff, and also only ever used once you have enough Crit to not have to Glyph for Fireball or Pyroblast.

Interesting point. I don't feel qualified to really say whether it's right or wrong, hopefully others will chime in and respond. What i'm going by currently for Frostfire Bolt is from: Simulationcraft Results

Glyph of Frostfire is listed in Simulcraft's Frostfire Bolt setup, which is razor-close DPS to the Fireball setup. The FFB rotation used never casts Fireball at all, appears to chain cast Frostfire Bolt even if 3 stacks of the DOT are up. Is all of this correct? Or were you implying nobody should ever use FFB as main nuke, ever, as it's simply not viable. Going by simulcraft (Which i'm aware is being improved in accuracy each day, and could still have bugs) it appears FFB-as-main is extremely close in DPS to Fireball-as-main?

As usual, when a consensus is reached the OP will be updated/edited as needed. If anyone notices other things mentioned in the OP which are inaccurate, or is simply bad advice, please point them out!

Maje · 12/05/10, 5:29 PM

There is no point casting Fireball when you're glyphed FFB (assuming you don't have both glyphs which would be silly), that is simply because glyphed FFB does the same damage as Fireball the only difference between the two spells is the Glyphs.

Fireball grants 5% crit and FFB gives 15% damage (which makes it equal unglyphed Fireball) and the dot which in Blizzard's mind should at some point equal the 5% crit as to if that would happen or not I don't know, but at the moment with the gear sets we know of and the talents being what they are it's not there.

The only reason to cast Fireball when you have FFB glyph was when the glyphs were bugged and you could realistically get both Fireball and Frostfire. They even cost the same in mana which was not the case pre 4.x.

For instance on my mage Fireball is tooltiped (the new tooltips are extremely accurate as far as I've seen up till now) as 6347-6631; while a _glyphed_ FFB is 6345-6630 so it's for all intents and purposes the same damage.

Vontre · 12/05/10, 5:35 PM

Glyphed Frostfire Bolt and unglyphed Fireball deal exactly the same damage for the same mana cost. This is easily verifiable in game right now and worked that way in the beta too. Fireball and Frostfire Bolt compete for a glyph slot, and with Pyroblast and Molten Armor being so amazing there's no way you could fit both. So the only reasonable option is to pick one and completely ignore the other. Simulations right now give Fireball a slight edge, and it's easier to manage anyway.

Where are you getting the idea that 34% crit is some kind of magic number for fire specs? Even if this were some kind of plateau point for Hot Streak, which I don't think it is, everything else that's tied to crit would work just as well. There's no reason to ever drop Glyph of Pyroblast.

Tyrian · 12/05/10, 5:56 PM

Going to edit the OP with this section, regarding "Primary Nuke: Frostfire Bolt VS Fireball". Let me know if anything is inaccurate, wrong, or should also be mentioned.

Primary Nuke: Fireball VS Frostfire Bolt

Fire Mages can cast either Fireball or Frostfire Bolt as primary nuke in their rotation. The most recent findings place Fireball as the superior primary nuke. However, the DPS difference between using Frostfire Bolt and Fireball as primary nuke is trivial: Less than 1%. Why's the difference so small?

- Fireball and Frostfire Bolt cost the same amount of mana
- Fireball and (Glyphed) Frostfire bolt do the same amount of damage

The only other notable difference stems from Glyph of Fireball and Glyph of Frostfire. Glyph of Frostfire Bolt adds 3% damage (stacks 3 times) whereas Glyph of Fireball adds 5% crit. The periodic damage of (Glyphed) Frostfire Bolt can also crit, leaving an ignite for additional damage.

For expected Tier 11 levels of gear and combat ratings, the 5% crit from Fireballs Glyph is very slightly superior to the extra damage from Frostfire Bolts Glyph. There's no other difference, aside from aesthetics.

Glyphed Frostfire Bolt's DOT damage is affected by the Flashburn mastery. Future levels of tier gear with higher combat ratings may therefore cause the situation to change. However, for entry level and Tier 11 Cataclysm content, we can sum the Frostfire VS Fireball Primary nuke debate up in 2 points:

- Fireball as primary nuke is better, but only very slightly. The difference between this and Frostfire bolt is trivial. You could be forgiven for choosing the spell you find most pleasing visually.
- Maybe in future tiers Frostfire bolt will prove a superior option, but not for Tier 11 gear and combat ratings.

For interest, does anyone have an idea of what sort of Combat ratings levels are needed for Frostfire Bolt (Via the Glyph) to unquestionablly become the superior primary nuke? Tier 12, 13 - or so far down the track it's not something to even consider on the radar for the foreseeable future?

Draemon · 12/05/10, 6:49 PM

Last I tested on Live of 50+ casts, Fireball seemed to do more than Frostfire Bolt - and this is what I based my theory on. If the damage is indeed comparable then I retract some of what I said, in that FFB should never be cast except to refresh the duration of the DoT. I would guesstimate that once you reach ~35% crit on your character sheet, FFB would become more viable than FB.

Maje · 12/05/10, 7:05 PM

I manually ran a couple of sims with 372 gear for fire/frostfire and with the same gear +500 of each stat including Intellect and 600 of crit since that's the strongest secondary stat for both specs, which is probably worth about 2 more tiers. The results are at around 1% to fire if anything with better gear it pulls slightly ahead.