Cataclysm Fire Mage Compendium - Page 33

Lyeel · 05/10/11, 12:11 PM

Originally Posted by ocdebnam

Surprisingly enough, Rawr is indicating that I should reforge for haste for both fire and arcane, so no need to worry about reforging if you wish to switch between the two.

In any case, mastery seems of relatively little use for both. For arcane, this is due to things like Lightweave embroidery, Power Torrent, Volcanic Potions, and other intellect procs that severely decrease our remaining mana ratio, thus making mastery less useful. Mastery might be worth reforging if your cooldowns are on use/straight spell power bonus.

In regards to Frostfire Bolt vs. Fireball, my crude calculations confirmed my suspicion that the 5% crit bonus from Glyph of Fireball outweighs the DoT component of Frostfire Bolt. You can check my math below.

← Click Here

Keep in mind as well that more Fireball crits = more Hot Streaks = more DpS.

Again, though, the difference is so small that you can choose whichever nuke you like for purely aesthetic reasons.

Another thing to consider is that the FFB DoT will continue to burn if you have to move/cast Living Bomb/etc.

First time poster, long time reader, you've heard it all before.
I'm curious, is there a breakpoint where FFB would be sufficiently more powerful in AoE fights (Maloriak comes to mind, or multi-dotting V&T possibly) via impact spreading to warrant using it, or will the 5% crit gain in ignites to be spread always out-pace any gains you can get from a somewhat weak FFB dot?

Rashka_Adam · 05/10/11, 1:51 PM

You cant simply say haste is better for both fire and arcane, remember that since the 4.1 changes to AB that there is a haste "cap" now with raid buffs and hero/lust that puts AB at the hard cap of 1 sec. So stat values will vary depending not only on spec but on your current gear as well (be sure to check that your raid buffs are correct in rawr).

I guess the FB vs FFB choice will come down to a per fight basis, as the choice is as simple as replacing a glyph and moving a spell to a hotkey.

Nfariessence · 05/10/11, 3:08 PM

Question from a non-Mage here:

Can someone tell me why Pyroblast! hits consistently and significantly harder than Soul Fire?

It would seem that the base damage of Soul Fire is higher, and since the base cast time is higher, the spellpower coefficient should be higher than that of Pyroblast! as well. It's not the talent tree passives (Warlock Cataclysm and Mage Fire Specialization are both 25%), or the Mastery (Warlock Mastery is Fiery Apocalypse which buffs Soul Fire while Mage Mastery is Flashburn which doesn't buff Pyro). It's not other talents or passives that I can see either:

Warlocks have Improved Soul Fire for 8% damage, plus Mastery Rating of about 16% (each point of Mastery increases Fire damage by 1.35%).
Mages only have Molten Fury for 12% more damage on targets below 35%.

On top of that, most warlocks should have more spell power at equivalent gear levels to mages, due to Fel Armor.

So why is it that Pyroblast! hits for about 23,625 (non crit) while Soul Fire only hits for about 16,424 (non crit)? Can anyone explain why it seems that Pyroblast! is getting an estimated 210% SPC versus Soul Fire getting 100%? Not trying to pick a fight here, legitimately curious.

(also, why does it seem [anecdotal] that the Pyroblast! proc hits harder than the hard casted Pyroblast?)

Durendal · 05/10/11, 6:55 PM

I realize this isn't specifically a fire question but I am kind of confused..

I'm looking at a lot of top mages and I see them reforging/gemming to mastery for arcane for single target/non movement fights but I'm assuming they go fire for aoe fights. So I guess my question is, should I reforge/gem arcane and continue to switch between fire and arcane depending on the fight?

cbags · 05/11/11, 9:46 AM

I would run your character through an optimization in RAWR for each spec. Once completed, switch to the other spec and see which is the highest for your offspec. For me I found gemming/reforging for Fire, was better for my Arcane offspec than gemming/reforging for Arcane, and having Fire be pretty weak, as it sacrificed a lot of crit for mastery.

ocdebnam · 05/11/11, 3:48 PM

The DoT component of FFB is so small that it wouldn't be worth the DpS loss to spread seldom extra DoTs wtih Impact. Even then, we'd only be talking about a DpS increase of around 100 or so, if even.

Regarding haste, it's going to be very hard NOT to go below the haste cap for Arcane Blast during Time Warp: 37.5% haste is required to get a fully buffed Arcane Blast to 1 second casting time. That leaves around 2% haste from gear, which no one would say is ideal. Exactly 55.55% haste is required to get 4T11 Fireball down to 1 second casting time, which during Time Warp and accounting for Netherwind Presence and raid buffs translates into only 11.06% haste from gear, also not an ideal haste rating. Maybe we should switch to Pyroblast as our primary nuke during Time Warp....

Given this, I don't think we should be eschewing haste because of this haste cap. I could be wrong, and in fact I will be wrong if it turns out we do more damage during Time Warp than the rest of the fight. I doubt this is the case, but it still needs confirmation. Keep in mind that more haste = more casts = more chances for crits, so haste provides an "indirect" crit bonus.

← Click Here

Following up on the potential of using Pyroblast as your nuke during Time Warp... If you have at least 22% from gear, 3/3 Netherwind Presence, 5% raid buff, and Time Warp, you can get Pyroblast down to 1 second cast time. That is some insane DpS given the 20% crit chance bonus for Pyroblast. Goblins will only need 20.73% from gear.

• EasirokThunderpants · 05/12/11, 12:25 PM

Originally Posted by Durendal

I realize this isn't specifically a fire question but I am kind of confused..

I'm looking at a lot of top mages and I see them reforging/gemming to mastery for arcane for single target/non movement fights but I'm assuming they go fire for aoe fights. So I guess my question is, should I reforge/gem arcane and continue to switch between fire and arcane depending on the fight?

It is not very expensive to reforge when respecializing. As a mage it only takes a moment to teleport back to a capitol city and reforge (and there are addons to automate it). A warlock can summon you back in, usually before trash has been cleared. So just because you see someone forged/gemmed for mastery on armory doesn't mean that they don't reforge to something else when switching to a secondary spec.

Also, your assumption that Fire is always used for AoE fights is incorrect. The only fights I am not doing as Arcane yet are heroic Cho'gall and Sinestra and only because we simply aren't working on those yet (still on council). Even heroic Halfus and Maloriak are fine as Arcane, and those two are the poster-children for Fire AoE. And dare I say it, but melee-range AE/AB weaving is infinitely more "fun" than hoping and praying for a good Ignite+Impact lineup at the right time to power a solid Combustion.

With the right alignment of procs and crits, Fire will certainly outperform Arcane on those two fights still, but a number of mages are just preferring the consistency of Arcane there since it still performs well in those situations.

Shendow · 05/16/11, 7:17 AM

Mage 4-piece bonus stats: +15% proc chance to Brain Freeze, +30% chance on single critical effect to Hot Streak, and Arcane Missiles will always proc by the 4th cast.

What is the future of T4 Hot Streak with 4 piece bonus? Is the bonus additive with T4 hot streak (meaning you can get HS proc with 2 crits in a row and 30% on a single crit?)?

With this bonus, can we expect fire spec not to be surpassed by arcane spec?

Luné · 05/17/11, 7:30 AM

I'm guessing that those +30% chance on HS T3 will be affected by the same decrease and will just push the limit of effect of the T3 HS to 63% crit before being useless.

Assuming Shaewyn's maths (and k(c)= -1.7106c + 0.7893 + 0.3), at 40% crit we will end up with a +12% HS proc chance (~16.2%) against actual ~4.2% from single crit cast.
Following this, I obtain :

No-4p HS (T3+T4) 40% crit : 17.01% chance
4p HS (T3+T4) 40% crit : 21.86% chance

(FYI : 10.81%(No-4p) / 19.34%(4p) at 30% crit)

I don't have tools to show you using a graph values you may have, but I think it'll improve our dps in a better way that it does for Arcane spec but not enough to become the main dps spec.

Trel · 05/17/11, 7:32 PM

Using the last T3 formula:
k(c) = -2.73c + 0.95

then:
4T11 k(c) = -2.73c + 0.95 + 0.3

though an alternative interpretation is:
4T11 Alt k(c) = 1.3 * (-2.73c + 0.95)

I won't repost my math, but I plotted T3+T4 HS Proc chance per cast vs. Crit rate and obtained:

Luné · 05/17/11, 8:07 PM

According to your maths, the 4T12 is a nerf in our total HS proc chance...

We can see an approximative 17% on old graph and a lesser value on your graph, mind to explain ?

Zaldinar · 05/18/11, 2:00 AM

Luné, his scale is roughly correct, certainly not off by 17%, what graph are you referencing? I'm trying to locate what I used to produce my graph originally to work these two potentials into it. In general though he looks to have the right idea, and it is in no way a nerf.

Finkum · 05/18/11, 4:12 AM

I may be interpreting the graph incorrectly, but it suggests to me that the DPS value of 4T12 diminishes to nothing at about 45% crit chance, which is not unreasonably high (I'm around 37% chance raid-buffed right now, and haven't touched any hard modes).

Are Blizzard really likely to code the bonus such that it has no value at achievable levels of crit? Perhaps the 30% bonus proc chance does not decay as the regular T3 HS proc chance does?

Nathyiel · 05/18/11, 5:53 AM

If we make a graphic with the previous formula:

%HS=c.k(c)+c².[1-k(c)] with k(c)=-2.73.c+0.95

We can assume 4T12 will be k(t12)=k(c)+0.3.

If we draw HS(t12)-HS(t11), we obtain a parabola where the submit is +7.5% at c=50% and is superior at 7% between 37.5% and 62.5%.

← Click Here

Zaldinar · 05/18/11, 6:34 AM

Another potential for the end formula where it does not stop providing benefit, is that proc chance is calculated as max(0.0,-2.73*C + 0.95) + 0.3. Where you will always have a 30% chance of a HS proc per crit even when you pass the point where T3 HS would normally make the chance zero.