My guild recently moved to MH
We had no experience there but we 1 shoted 1st boss and downed the 2nd boss after a couple of tries.

I find the use of mage is very diferent, bacause we are centered in most AOEing trash, to have a clear start at the boss.
I have read the 2 first trash pulls are easier, and only gets worse after.

So my question is, should I move from 2/48/11 to a deep arcane build for better AE spamm?
I dont have set bonus, have a piece of hre and there, making me 1k fire damage with 176 +hit.

I know arcance spec only needs 76 +hit and my crit is not that high (around 22% unbuffed)

Thank you for the help in advance

We are running BT/MH these days with 2-4 fire mages in the raid. I have been working on trying to tighten up my own rotations and optimizing the mages as a whole given haste etc. However we have mages that scorch way too much and those who never ever scorch after the initial stack.

As per Manly's advice on this thread, the raid leader and I downloaded scorchio last night but could not get it to work at all. Has anyone had any success with it post 2.4 or with another addon to track the scorch debuff?

Hex Shrunken has no competition.
I'd say Crusade is better than Serpent, if are not hurting for mana and reasonably sure you won't lose the stack too much.
Not sure how to evaluate TLC. For a firemage, at least, it is not a good trinket.

From the forum posts I've seen, Scorchio has stopped functioning post 2.4. Right now I'm making do with Quartz and Natur Enemy Cast Bars, but neither tracks the debuff as nicely as Scorchio. Hopefully someone updates Scorchio for 2.4.

Yeah i noticed this also deeply saddens me because i had only just downloaded this mod and enjoyed it no longer than a few weeks

Hopefully someone makes a new version but im going to make do myself with dottimers, and tell other mages in group whoever gets the first scorch to keep it up for the duration etc

I've been reading this discussion with full interest. I am curious as to whether now speccing Fire with Icy Veins would be a DPS increase for myself (Armory Link).

Right now I am 40/21 and in the content I'm in (Kara, etc) I do pretty decently on the overall damage charts (top 3 usually - WWS - Recent Kara), but as I do not have any T5 at the moment, I was wondering if Fire with IV would be a better DPS spec for the content I'm in. So would 0/40/21 or 10/47/3 be the better Fire spec if I was going to go Fire or would it just be better to stay Arcane?

Thank you for your time and advice,

~Xerces

Yes. Fix scorchio ASAP. I am having the same issue, although to be honest I don't think I can blame the other mage either since I am having myself a hard time scorching when I don't see the time left, its kinda like doing a shot in the dark. I guesstimate it looking at my other cooldown bars, but its technically terrible.

The only fix is to get someone to bring back scorchio form the dead. I couldn't care less about it not working with combat logs. Just make it work only with players having scorchio installed. All you need to do is track on what mob GUID you cast a scorch onto, then broadcast the 'scorch cast' to all scorchio users. It can't be that hard to patch. I realise tehres the handling of mobs dying, immunity effects, and resists, but even so, that would be a phenomal upgrade to have it work that way, even if imprecise on many respects.

I have been using x-perl, and it has the ability to show buffs, and DE-buffs as HUGE, and I mean HUGE icons under the target, especially ones added by you. Not sure how it would handle a scorch debuff not applied by you(I am only fire mage right now). The icon is big enough that I can clearly see without having to look real carefully (countdown timer from ten) the debuff, and have been able to reapply without losing it.

Quartz debuff timers are also a handy way to watch the scorch debuff. It seems to refresh sometimes when I'm not the one to cast scorch, so it leads me to think that it syncs with other quartz users, but I'm not positive about that.

The problem with non-scorchio timers (specificially cooldowntimers2), is that they only show the debuf if you are the one to cast the first scorch.

It's weird actually, sometimes quartz shows the time debuff timer when someone else applies it, sometimes it doesnt. And the other mages in my raids DO have quartz so dunno whats goin on :P

It's the same with pitbull.

Scorchio doesn't show up sometimes, so i found the best way of reapplying the scorch buff is counting 8 fireballs, and then scorching.

Obviously this wouldn't work so much on non tank and spank fights

Coming back to this, I saw your post regarding matching the sockets if it was 1 with a +2 bonus or 3 with a +5 bonus. Assuming there weren't too many blue sockets, of course. Would you still match for bonuses or disregard for 2 with a +4 bonus? I am talking about items like T6 shoulders with 1 yellow/1 blue. I was discussing this with someone and it seems that (assuming the pyrestones are now the equivalent of spinels) Spinelx2 > Pyrestone + 6 spelldam + 4 from the bonus, from a dps standpoint.

Also if spinels are still appropriate for items with 2 sockets described above I'm thinking T6 helm is a good place to use a seaspray to meet CSD reqs. I'd rather get the two blues from Kaz pants/chest, however I may have to make do with lesser option.

X-Perl can only show you the amount of time left on the debuff if you are the one who applied it. Since you are the only Fire Mage, this will always be the case.

Ok, I feel there should be some sort of warning here. This is barely tested. What testing has been done is by people with english clients.

Download This and put it in your scorchio directory. It should do everything the original did, with extra stuff to handle mobs with the same name, and scorch falling off targets properly as theres now a message for that. Any bug reports please feel free to PM me. It'll even create bars for people who are using the old version and handle their refreshs if you are in range. The scorch stack counts actually done off the debuff message, so should be completly accurate.

Hi RoboStac. First, let me begin by thanking you for your efforts to fix scorchio. I haven't tested it yet, but you can be sure that is at the top of my priorities as soon as I get back to wow from work.

Also, about your fixed scorchio version, I would love to know if it requires all mages to have that version installed ? (I assume so, but just want to be sure)

I wanted to mention that scorchio used to bug out when you were switching target during your scorch cast. Its as if the code neded you to target only one mob to work, but multi-mob tricks got it confused. I don't know what the fix was to make this fixed scorchio was, but hopefully with mob GUID those issues should not happen anymore.

It'll show bars on people with the old version as long as one person has the new one. They'll have an annoying guid attached to the end of the mobname, but other than that it'll be correct. What won't work is refreshs from people with old versions (though as long as they're in combat log range, the new version should pick them up). Every mob is identified by a unique identifier (<name>_<guid> (the name is there so people with old versions don't just get a screen full of guids)).

The fix I've done is to only display scorch stacks if someone with the mod sees the debuff being applied (this is now a separate combat log message), then to count all scorches as refreshing that stack on that mob (using the same blacklist code as before to try and stop people scorching without talents refreshing it). This means things should always be properly assigned to the mob they are on, but as I say, its not been hugely tested. There is a small issue if the bar expires but you refresh the buff (eg the scorch combat log message is more than 30 seconds since the last scorch, but the scorch landed just in time), the bar won't reappear.

The new JC neck is BOP and was changed to JC requirement on the PTR so you won't be able to craft it and leave JC. The tailoring robes are in the same boat. The tailoring gloves however are BOE and no tailoring requirement if I'm not mistaken.

I have never used either addon before 2.4 and with all the issues and bugs going about right now, have no intention of adding more addons until what I do have is stable again. But, this could be something to try down the road. If a macro solution exists, however, then I would like to go that route.

Jewel Crafting Items:
[Pendant of Sunfire] is the BOP neck. Notice it also requires a JC skill of 350 to even wear.
[Loop of Forged Power] is the BOE ring. It is unique-equipped, but not unique in itself.

Tailor Crafting Items:
[Sunfire Robe] is the BOP chest. Notice it also requires a Tailoring skill of 350 to even wear.
[Sunfire Handwraps] is the BOE gloves.

All of them are excellant pieces but you are limited in what you can go for. I myself am a tailor/enchanter. If I thought it was possible, I'd get the ring pattern, drop enchanting to pick up JC, make the ring, drop JC and pickup enchanting again and enchant the ring, and then drop enchanting again to pickup JC and get the neck. Thats ALOT of work however, not to mention I would be far from the only one competing for the patterns when they drop.

For fun my guild went into MH the other night i'm a devout 2/48/11 but specced arcane for AOE I have a couple other mages who are specced arcane all the time...with no 2 pc t-5 no less . They were rolling in mage armor instead of molten and casting flamestrike instead of AE.

From what iv'e read Mage Armor is crap and AE should be used instead of flamestrike whenever possible.

So who is noobsauce me Molten/AE or Mage/Flamestrike?

Since AE got buffed in 2.4 to increase it's damage cap by 50%, I'd say it's definitely the way to go now. As far as the choice between mage and molten on these pulls, just use what you can without going oom into pulls.

AE got buffed by the changes to the haste and the GCD as well. Not only is AE far more dps and dpm than flamestrike or blizzard, its also easier to use (larger area of effect than flamestrike) and produces far less threat thanks to it being in the arcane tree. Your mages need to go back to school.

I normally have a shadow priest, and a shaman in my group. I raid 4/46/11. I chain pot and mana gem and often have to evocate. Despite all that I still go OOM on the trash waves in Hyjal and I maintain Mage Armor up. Based upon my own experience, my own recommendation is to use Mage Armor on the trash while you spam Arcane Explosion (for reasons explained above,) and then switch to Molten Armor on the bosses.