I'm not sure if this will work, because even the 2pc says that the stolen time buff will be lost when AP expires. But I'm looking forward to test this, if 4.3 hits the PTR probably this week.
Interesting part is that tooltip says 30s on Stolen Time, but looks like that we are going to have it for 15s? (18 glyphed) Isnt it just lame?
Yes, Heroic Will of Unbinding & Shard of Woe are both BiS for Arcane. The nerf applied to healers, 205 mana for Arcane was already nerfed in T11, afaik.
Another problem i have in mind with that is, that our soft haste cap would be at 1268 - which is, taking an increased itemlvl into account - pretty low. Furthermore this will weaken our burn while TW is active for the first 10 spells after poppinjg AP. Even if flameorb would increase the stack I don't know if the 4p bonus is worth it or if it's better to get some offpieces to have an flat 500 haste increase..
So with the t13 set bonus, should you reforge your haste to 1268 to gain damage increase from mastery etc.? Or is that kind of reforging actually a dps loss?
Regarding Tier13 4pc, this is more or less a answer to a post from Maje in the Fire Mage thread, but the more interesting aspects affect the other 2 specalizations.
As long as you are faster in creating x stacks after the buff ( combustion/icy veins/arcane power ) expires, one would assume that x would be the desired number of stacks to gain before activating mentioned buff.
So let's say for combustion with 10 stacks you have a cooldown of 70s. You can start to re-gain Stolen Time after Combustion expires 10s after activation, so you have 60s left to regain 10 stacks. That sounds doable for all fire mages even with low haste/#Pyros.
A frost mage has a icy veins cooldown of ( 180 - x * 15 ) * 0.8 cooldown that leaves ( 144 - x * 12 ) - 20 seconds to regain x stacks.
For x=7 this would mean 40s to regain 7 stacks, the maximum x which looks reasonable.
Same goes for Arcane with 90 - x * 5.25 - 15 resulting in the most interesting case, as the deviation by x is the lowest and numbers will probably be between 7-9. A more exact analysis of the cast frequency would be needed, and to achieve even more perfection Arcane Mage might have to differentiate between phases with and without bloodlust.
Of course one should also not forget about the effect of delaying the first use of the ability in a finite fight.
In SimulationCraft currently only the Frost Mage specialization accounts for the Tier13 4pc Bonus ( but profiles are not yet regenerated ). Better profiles with changes to gear or action priority lists are always appreciated, especially in this case for Arcane.
Hi, i have now T4 Bonus of T13 and try to check out if arcane spec or fire is stronger with this bonus. It is quite hard to keep the mage at full mana when having the AP running when possible. I am asking me the question wether fire is better regarding the bosses in DS, which require quite a lot movement. What do you think?
With 10 stacks of Stolen Time my Arcane power CD is reduced from standard 1.5mins (90sec) to a 37sec CD. This is a reduction of 53sec meaning that each stack grants a reduction of 5.3sec and not the 10sec stated in the tooltip. Is this a bug or a tooltip error or something I missed?
The cooldown is reduced by 7sec per stack, before talents.
EDIT: Err, yeah, 7, not 10. Sorry, copied the error from the poster above. Point is, it's affecting the pre-talents cooldown. Talents are applied afterwards.
So, do we have a consensus on when to pop Gem+AP in relation to # of stolen time stacks when using 4pcT13?
In my case, I've got Will of Unbinding which stacks to 10 as well.
I'm wondering if it makes sense to postpone popping Gem+AP until I've got 10 of both, despite the reduction in length of other procs by doing so (Power Torrent/Lightweave).
A brief test as arcane shows that missiles stacks Will of Unbinding on a per-missile basis.
Flame orb does not activate it whatsoever, so an "opener" as arcane if you have this trinket will now end up being pot/precast AB -> up to 2 more ABs to fish for missiles procs -> missiles -> AB x3 -> POM AB -> AP / SoW / gem burn
This will give you 5-6 AB casts (minimum) before using AP. What this allows for is usage of AP while pot / trinket procs / lightweave etc are still up, and while you have 10 stacks of Will up for all ABs cast during AP/gem. 6 AB casts will reduce the cooldown of AP to about 1 minute. At the 1 minute mark, SoW will come off cooldown as well and be available again to do another burn or mini-burn depending how you're playing.
If missiles doesn't proc off the first or second AB cast then you would likely just do 3 more ABs, POM AB and start an AP / gem burn as normal.
Previously, Flame Orb was the highest DPET during a conserve phase since it was a good way to burn clearcasting when you had no AB stacks as it did more damage than a 0 stack AB for significantly less cast time, and cost no mana if used that way. Now, with the tier bonuses and Will of Unbinding, Flame Orb isn't as attractive to cast until you've gotten your 10 stacks of Stolen Time up.
So, what are peoples oppinions for 4s T13?
I was thinking of sticking to 2s T12 (heroic pieces) and 2s T13 (for stolen time).
This would give me more uptime on the stolen time, and I wouldnt burn unnessecary mana due to extra usage on the arcane power.
Personally I dont really see Arcane Power being worth 'spammed' unless u got evo ready along with other cds, whats peoples oppinions on this?
Considering going back to arcane when I saw 4.3.2. nerfing fire again so:p
So, what are peoples oppinions for 4s T13?
I was thinking of sticking to 2s T12 (heroic pieces) and 2s T13 (for stolen time).
This would give me more uptime on the stolen time, and I wouldnt burn unnessecary mana due to extra usage on the arcane power.
Personally I dont really see Arcane Power being worth 'spammed' unless u got evo ready along with other cds, whats peoples oppinions on this?
Considering going back to arcane when I saw 4.3.2. nerfing fire again so:p
The lower cooldown on AP is definitely useful, and you do want to essentially spam it. When using AP in a conserve, you just want to use as many ABs as you can during AP, and then do your best to regen with AM once AP is finished. You basically just do a mini burn every time AP is up, and a regular burn when AP and evoc line up.
Just go to the buff details tab and buffs gained tab, and select the uptime for arcane power, arcane blast, and evocation, and you can see that it is pretty clearly sustainable.
I see, I guess you are probably right on that part. Was just sceptical that the lower mana/mastery dps would suffer cause of that mini burn, but then again I am thinking maybe this can be solved with lowering haste aswell? But then again that would mean you restacked T13 2s faster. Which is again a bad thing, hmm.. My problem atm however is I got too many crit / haste pieces in general and not nearly enough mastery, hehe. So for now I'm staying fire:-P
I didn't say you shouldn't use AP on cooldown (except when near 'true' burn phases, then depending on fight length you could/should delay it a bit), but what I've done while specced Arcane on Ultraxion was trying to keep my mana steady high, even with AP running. In short, I'd still be in a conserve phase, and rotation wasn't altered much.
Here is a log in which I did that and I guess the results were pretty good.
So I'm sure most of us mages, regardless of our main spec, are playing Arcane on Heroic: Spine. FOr optimization on that fight I've found a few things to be useful.
Right before tendons come out, switch from Mage Armor to Molten Armor. The mana regen you get back isn't worth 5% crit, especially since our crit will be pretty low assuming we've reforged to mastery.
The VP trinket is great for spine, the on use portion of the trinket is an insane amount of spell-power and is up for the entire duration of the tendon burn phase.
Procing incanter's absorption from Mage Ward can be another spell power boon if used correctly right before a tendon phase.
Getting a 4 stack by dpsing the amalg/tossing 1 one arcane blast on a random blood, then maintaining that 4 stack by POMing AB onto the tendon assures you have 4 stacks all the way through the tendon phase. And you regain all the mana lost by going into the phase with 4 stacks by popping your mana gem, giving yet another spell power increase.
Make sure not to pop MI until you're on the tendon as to avoid your MI's attacking bloods and corruptions instead of the tendon.
Anyone got anything else to add for spine max dpsing?
Right before tendons come out, switch from Mage Armor to Molten Armor. The mana regen you get back isn't worth 5% crit, especially since our crit will be pretty low assuming we've reforged to mastery.
I don't think this is good advice. The following is using data from my stats in Spine gear (as currently logged off), and my Spine logs from last night.
First, the expected benefit from 5% additional crit from Molten Armor for me would be 1.403/1.353 = 1.037, 3.7% more damage.
Now let's calculate the expected benefit from Mage Armor over the same period. My mastery of 21.48 gives a base multiplier of 32.22% extra damage at full mana. Observationally, using Mage Armor I ended most full tendon burn phases at around 60% mana last night. Switching off Mage Armor, I would have lost 4 ticks and ended at 40% mana. So on average let's assume that a tick of Mage Armor will provide the extra damage gained from going from 70% to 75% mana: (1+(0.75*0.3222))/(1+(0.70+0.3222)) = 1.3145% extra damage.
Now we can calculate the benefits of Mage Armor by how long during the tendon burn the extra mana (and thus damage) provided is there for. The worst case would be ticks at 20, 15, 10, and 5 seconds before Seal Armor Breach finishes casting. We calculate the extra damage gained by (20+15+10+5)*1.3145/23 = 2.9%. Compare this to the 3.7% gain from Molten Armor. However, this requires you to have cast Molten Armor at precisely the right time to have gotten the Mage Armor tick at 25 seconds and still been done with your GCD for the Arcane Blast cast at 23 seconds. If your ticks are earlier compared to the end of Seal Armor Breach, it's easier to have gotten Molten Armor off in time, but Mage Armor is worth additional damage by virtue of the extra damage from ticks applying to more Arcane Blasts. For example, with ticks at 23, 18, 13, 8, and 3 seconds, it's worth 3.76% additional damage, about the same as Molten Armor. If you did clip a tick while switching, comparing to ticks at 25, 20, 15, 10, and 5 seconds mean Mage Armor is worth 4.34% additional damage.
In summary, Molten Armor is worth at best 0.8% additional tendon damage (3.7% vs. 2.9%) if you never miss more ticks of Mage Armor than required to switch to it. I don't think the risk is worth the small potential benefit.
Originally Posted by Crowl
If you have to control a robot dinosaur that fires lazers and there's a time when you shouldn't be shooting those lazers then the encounter is clearly flawed beyond hope of fixing.
In a such small timeframe, dps increase calculations of 5% crit bonus is very RNG. You might aswell get a lot of crits, thanks to the extra 5% or no crit at all, whereas mage armor provide a flat damage bonus due to mastery. In the end, you have to choose between RNG big damage or stable middle damage.
While heroic Madness is incredibly easy compared to spine, arcane is by far the best class/spec to bring for burst DPS on parasites, elementium bolts and blistering tentacles if that's a problem for your raid. Incanter's Absorption is a guaranteed proc with the constant damage going out and with T13 4pc + SoW you can do the following "rotation":
- first parasite on a given platform: full AP/mana gem burn. SoW can be used here
- bolt spawns: you are still mid-burn, pop mage ward / mana shield preemptively for large IA spellpower proc which compensates for you being at 50-60% mana
- evocate with ~9 sec left before second parasite spawns
- second parasite: AP miniburn, SoW comes off cooldown 1 second in
- conserve to regen mana till arm/wing tentacle is at 70%
- blistering tentacles @ 70%: miniburn
- blistering tentacles @ 40%: mage ward, AP, burn tentacles then burn boss tentacle to dead, SoW can be used again here if you're on the fourth platform (it's not particularly useful on the deathwing platform as you'll have the haste buff again)
- jump to next platform, pop flame orb on new tentacle, spam missiles and regen to ~90% mana then repeat cycle
I found this rotation to work out best in our raid due to parasite/bolt dps being weak. Your aoe on regenerative blood is low but irrelevant. In addition your burst AOE on congealing blood on the deathwing platform will generally be higher as arcane than as fire.
Blizzard is also a suitable AoE for Congealed Bloods, particularly if you do not have improved Arcane Explosion (or raid with 200ms+ latency and the lowered GCD still doesnt compete with Blizzard ticks).
Will of Unbinding & Shard of Woe are both BiS for Arcane.
Apparently not.
There's been some (clumsy) debating in MMO-Champion and this message of Kavan probably deserves a place here (responding to someone noticing if one manually equips SoW in Rawr, there may be a benefit):
Originally Posted by Kavan
That can sometimes be the case if you're using incremental optimizations without simple stacking. In that situation when comparing gear Rawr won't consider significant changes in burn/conserve/cooldown stacking. Since SoW can cause a significant change in mana consumption it can require a big change in the burn/conserve so it'll only be forced to completely recompute everything once you equip it.
If you have simple stacking enabled (which I would recommend for arcane), then incremental optimization setting is ignored mostly as the whole stacking is determined dynamically for each comparison. So in this situation you wouldn't see this kind of behavior from the comparison charts.
And no, SoW is not BIS, at least based on the tests I've done. If you've run the tests some time ago you should know that simc for a long time didn't take multipliers into effect for damage proc trinkets such as mana adept and arcane power, so that may be why you got a wrong result. (actually this was only just fixed on 2/2/2012 so it's not even in the live build yet)
I don't think this is good advice. The following is using data from my stats in Spine gear (as currently logged off), and my Spine logs from last night.
First, the expected benefit from 5% additional crit from Molten Armor for me would be 1.403/1.353 = 1.037, 3.7% more damage.
Now let's calculate the expected benefit from Mage Armor over the same period. My mastery of 21.48 gives a base multiplier of 32.22% extra damage at full mana. Observationally, using Mage Armor I ended most full tendon burn phases at around 60% mana last night. Switching off Mage Armor, I would have lost 4 ticks and ended at 40% mana. So on average let's assume that a tick of Mage Armor will provide the extra damage gained from going from 70% to 75% mana: (1+(0.75*0.3222))/(1+(0.70+0.3222)) = 1.3145% extra damage.
Now we can calculate the benefits of Mage Armor by how long during the tendon burn the extra mana (and thus damage) provided is there for. The worst case would be ticks at 20, 15, 10, and 5 seconds before Seal Armor Breach finishes casting. We calculate the extra damage gained by (20+15+10+5)*1.3145/23 = 2.9%. Compare this to the 3.7% gain from Molten Armor. However, this requires you to have cast Molten Armor at precisely the right time to have gotten the Mage Armor tick at 25 seconds and still been done with your GCD for the Arcane Blast cast at 23 seconds. If your ticks are earlier compared to the end of Seal Armor Breach, it's easier to have gotten Molten Armor off in time, but Mage Armor is worth additional damage by virtue of the extra damage from ticks applying to more Arcane Blasts. For example, with ticks at 23, 18, 13, 8, and 3 seconds, it's worth 3.76% additional damage, about the same as Molten Armor. If you did clip a tick while switching, comparing to ticks at 25, 20, 15, 10, and 5 seconds mean Mage Armor is worth 4.34% additional damage.
In summary, Molten Armor is worth at best 0.8% additional tendon damage (3.7% vs. 2.9%) if you never miss more ticks of Mage Armor than required to switch to it. I don't think the risk is worth the small potential benefit.
This is wrong, you are already dealing with percent by the "1.3145". (20+15+10+5)*1.3145/23 = 2.8576 or 186% increase. I don't even know why you're doing this calculation in the first place. You've already demonstrated the approximate damage gain from each tick as 1.3145%, multiply this by 4 ticks and you get 5.258% damage gain.
Here's a simpler calculation: You end with 20% more mana when you have Mage. 20% of your mastery of 32.22% is .2*.3222 = .06444 or 6.444% damage gain from having that extra 20% mana.
The damage gain from 5% extra crit is fine at 3.7%.
So Mage gives you a 2.74% more damage increase compared to Molten given your numbers.
With my numbers, since I'm reforged for Fire. I have 43.39% crit and 13.37 mastery (20.05%). Molten gives me a 3.49% increase. Mage gives me 4.01% increase.
10/09/11, 4:29 PM
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