hypetech

1) Most of that looks good considering your choices. The footpads are definitely more dps than the velvet boots though as you suspected. Also if you use Mantle of Elven Kings instead of the T5 shoulders you should be able to convert some hit gems into damage gems and end up with a net damage increase.

2) The only badge loot you would benefit from would be some of the new 2.4 stuff. Probably only the legs would be a clear upgrade. [Legwraps of Sweltering Flame] or [Corrupted Soulcloth Pantaloons] depending on your hit situation by the time the vendor becomes available. [Fused Nethergon Band] is also available on the new 2.4 vendor.

3) Subtlety is really the only raiding enchant. I keep a spare cloak with spell pen for supremus, but that's about it.

 

◊ manly

No I haven't. For the most part I still curse the stupid skull not stacking with other trinket change and haven't bothered rechecking the math.

Well, I'm vastly oversimplifying things. I'm kinda 'assuming' fireball spam in there, but its not quite the case in practice. Theres a lot of finer-grained details that are more a matter of personal preference, such as something I personally do for drums, ie:

cast drum of battle
since I don't get to see my GCD-affected-by-haste and don't like popping cooldowns 'approximately when not in GCD anymore', I instead cast 1x fireball to 'test the waters'.
then I pop my cooldowns, resume fireball spam.

Another detail is managing combustion. You want, if possible, to avoid casting combustion while a fireball is mid-air. One trick to work around the issue is to either activate after a scorch, or after activating a drums of battle (since it incurs a GCD). Then also, you can 'abuse' the combustion giving 4 crits bug as long as you do at the very extreme end of the fight (read: before the ignite gets to tick, so 2s before the fight ends).

Theres lots of smaller grained details like that that I'm skipping over for sake of simplification, but I think that one was giving somewhat an idea of what the guideline was. Now granted, pre-casting combustion is also something you typically do to avoid amassing a too high ignite at the end of the fight that falls off, although I am not going to lie that it is unlikely to happen on brutallus. In any case, I'll take your word for it that my calculations were outdated and that that small combustion pre-cast does not apply anymore.

Log on with different model:
1- Create a character of the desired model. Log on/off.
2- At character selection screen, select your actual character; mouseover the new, desired model character, and hold down left click; hit enter and release left click at the same time.
bug Arcane Potency only applies to the first Arcane Missile bolt.

 

Cwealm

I will switch to the footpads, then.

As to legs, I am hoping the [Leggings of Channeled Elements] drop one of these damned days. Same with the [Mana Attuned Band]. If that drops, I will use that and the [Band of the Eternal Sage], which Ishould have next week with the silly rep gains in MT post 2.4.

Manly, any thoughts?

 

Gheed

Avoiding combustion stacking up by using it just after a scorch doesn't work always, Manly. I have noticed several times when i have stacked up scorch and for example the last one critts and i do combustion right after that it still takes 1/3 crit charges from combustion.

 

Xalanor

Thanks Allanonn I'll check it out.

~Xalanor

 

CHeeSY-CrAfT

I've just recently picked up both the [Belt of the Tempest] and the [Bracers of the Tempest], and am having a tough time creating a configuration in which I can either get rid of overflowing hit, or remain at 4pieces instead of 5 and somehow reap the benefits. For reference, my typical setup involves a draenei restoshaman, meaning 1% free hit. Any thoughts on how to properly setup?

The World of Warcraft Armory

 

Akuman

Well cheesy..you could wait up on sunwell gear like [Leggings of Calamity] or [Pantaloons of Growing Strife] or [Sunfire Handwraps] etc...

And then then gem up for the lost hit rating.

<@Terror> "It's easy to forget what a sin is in the middle of a battlefield."
<@cky> opposite over hypotenuse

 

Scruffykinds

Hello, I raid 40/0/21 and have had overwhelming sucess with it, after quite a few raids worth of practice. My question is this, should I undervalue haste due to IV/Quag's eye/BL and any other haste effects that might throw of a rotation or two. It seems damage would carry more weight than expected in a raid situation, off the spreadsheet. Am I right to think this? and to continue to get damage over haste where I can find it.

 

Dollar

For the trash waves I usually go with mage armor and spam AE, I usually go oom anyways depending on whether I have pot/gem up for that wave and then I switch to molten armor on all the bosses. I used to use mage armor on Kaz'rogal but after the first couple of kills we just started killing him so fast that I switched to molten armor.

"Oh he's a sad little man? He's thrown a kettle over a pub, what have you done?"

 

mmaxwell

Okay, 40/0/21 folks.

Here's my mage currently. Sleight - The Scryers, (currently running this for BGs, but it's done decently in 5-mans and in SSC, though clearly not 100% optimal on raids). My guild is 5/6 in SSC currently, farming up T5 pieces while we work on Vasjh. As you can see, I don't have a lot of time to get heroic gear (or arena gear, the mechanics of which I just didn't like playing).

My question is, how are you making an arc/frost spec work if you're limited to damage schools by frost or arc/fire on the tailored gear? I have FSW, but am running Spellfire in raids given my spec. Seems that you either have to pick up generalized +damage gear or have one of your damage schools suffer. Is the 40/0/21 spec something you run in FSW/Spellstrike. And how much flexibility do you lose without a deep frost mage in the raid to work off of? Or is the frostbolt spam just to manage mana consumption?

I've had experience in 40/0/21 waaay back in the early parts of BC, when I specced out that way at 70 in FSW, but found it unsatisfactory overall. Given the changes to mechanics, I'll take a look again.

Further, we generally only have two warlocks in raid, which means CoS and CoR, but no Elements. I usually have either a shadowpriest or a shammy in group for mana management (which hasn't been much of a problem, to tell the truth, so I need to look at Destruction pots and not mana pots now.) Still working on my 2xT5, which makes my current spec questionable, but still matches my playstyle in BGs a lot better than frost ever did.

Is 40/0/21 a good idea or should I hold at vanilla deep fire for raids? We're not a hardcore guild, but I do want to pull my own weight.

EDIT for clarification of a point.

 

Elyasviel

Hi I'm currently raiding 4/5 MH and 4/9 BT.
2/48/11 Specced.
just unsure if i should stack haste now or should i get more spell hit in order to regem my gear with +12 spell dmg gems and forgo the spell haste.
my dilemmia is btwn using [Brute Cloak of the Ogre-Magi] + [Boots of Blasting] or [Footpads of Madness] + [Ruby Drape of the Mysticant].
also, I'm using [Runed Spell-cuffs] and [Mantle of Nimble Thought] for spell haste. I feel it isnt giving me much more dps after factoring latency and human reaction time even though on theorycraft it is better dps.

here's my armory link : The World of Warcraft Armory

 

Prod

Damage and crit are also affected by human reaction time.

 

Elyasviel

thanks for the fast reply prod. so what you're saying is that i should go for spell haste if its theoretically more dps for me?

 

Brendan

I've been dying to ditch my spellfire set for what seems like decades. However, my guild is only at 1/5 SSC and 2/4 TK, and it's been difficult to find anything that I feel can justify breaking the set bonus. However, today I managed to snag [Scarlet Sin'dorei Robes] out of heroic Magister's Terrace. My question is: If I use these robes in conjunction with the [Belt of Blasting], would it be worth switching out the [Spellfire Robe] and [Spellfire Belt]?

I was originally planning to wait for the new from the SSO badge vendor, but I'm also now wondering whether I should spend badges on other things first (boots, pants, dagger, etc.) and keep either the Scarlet Sin'dorei Robes or the Spellfire Robes.

Any toughts or advice would be greatly appreciated.

 

hypetech

With the new builtin stopcasting mechanics, latency and reaction time aren't really going to lower the dps of chaincasting. Improved Fireball is only .2 seconds per talent point, but you wouldn't pass that up would you? :p Just keep your hit capped and remember that haste is slightly better point for point than spell damage and see what you come up with. I would recommend plugging your gear into Vontre's dps spreadsheet and switching things around to see how it all compares.

 

hypetech

Assuming you already have a decent pair of gloves to replace your spellfire gloves ([Studious Wraps] are nice), then I would say that upgrading those items would be a good move. I personally cringed while I upgraded my T5 robe from 25-man KT to a damn heroic drop from 5-man KT, but an upgrade is an upgrade.

 

Elyasviel

thanks for the helpful reply hypetech!
I've been trying to try to plug it into Vontre's dps spreadsheet but it isnt updated for 2.4 yet is it?

 

hypetech

Good point. The 2.4 gear isn't there yet, but he's working on spreadsheet version 3.0 :p If you plug in your current gear, using close substitutes for 2.4 gear, you'll still be able to see how the stats relate to each other so you can be better informed in making gear decisions.

 

Evoline

40/0/21 is a superb build which does exceptionally well in TK aswell as some bosses in SSC.
however this build is only good providing you have a deep frost mage in your raid keeping Winters Chill up.
it is a high dps, mana efficient build (if you have a spriest/mana spring totem - even better) you can afford to AB spam towards the end of a boss fight to throw in those extra numbers.

 

Vhad

I'm having a hardtime calculating and applying the benefit of haste. I know the value of 1 haste varies and is relative, but I'm having it vary from 1,25 spell dmg to 1,02 in endgame gear setup. How are the rest of you guys valuing spell haste compared to spell dmg?

What!?

 

hypetech

I have my pawn set up to do spell damage as 1 and haste as 1.15, that's been working well for me.

 

Gukreb

I am currently a 10/0/51 deep frost build and am planning on respeccing Fire 3/47/11 once I get the Mats together to make whatever replaces my Frozen shadow weave set. But I figure as long as I am at it, I might as well drop my T-4 Head and gloves and look for other options that are out there. My biggest issue is that I am going to need a lot more spell hit than I currently have, and am not sure where I am going to pick up 40 odd +hit.

At this point I am thinking of switching to the entire spellfire set, and adding in the spellstrike hood. Then adding all +hit/dmg gems. And pushing as much +hit in enchants as I can. I am also planning on cashing in a bunch of badges on the new 2.4 badge loot whenever the vendor opens (I have 300 now), including getting the Fused Nethergon Band and the Scryer's Blade of Focus. I am thinking of holding off on the other badge loot since it would mean breaking either the Spellfire or Spellstrike set.

This leaves me with the Battlecast belt, and no idea what to put in my shoulder slot. So any suggestions would be appreciated.

Right now my guild is just breaking into Gruul's and had our first Magtheridon's Lair kill this week. We also have the first 2 bosses in ZA on farm, and are hoping to progress deeper there soon. Just to let you know what my gear options look like. I was just hoping to get some feedback on my plans, since I have always been a frost mage and am a little hesitant to make the switch over until I have a good plan for what I am doing next.

Thanks In advance
~Gukreb

Armory Link is

The World of Warcraft Armory

 

Akuman

Gukreb

You're losing out on 20 spell dmg by enchanting your gloves like that. Don't.
It's pretty easy to get hit capped without sacrificing large amounts of +dmg.

Get
- [Cloak of the Betrayed]
- [Ashyen's Gift] you're already exalted with Cenarion :P
- [Fel-tinged Mantle]
- [Boots of Incantations] if you get 25 more badges you should have enough for this as well
- [Veiled Noble Topaz] and regem your gear up with that (besides the +12dmg gem)

Obviously this will mean you will be over the hit cap, so just choose the ones you need and look around to see what would be easiest for you to get.

Good luck.

Vhad

Usually value it at 1.1

<@Terror> "It's easy to forget what a sin is in the middle of a battlefield."
<@cky> opposite over hypotenuse

 

inphared

Is the ghost EP bug still there in 2.4? I swore I noticed more resists last night than usual. Coulda been me just looking for them more than I used to as it was my first raid since the patch.

Also Im debating what to get with badges once the damn vendor opens up on my server. I am 2nd in line for the Vashj robe but its drop rate seems pretty craptacular so far so I was wondering if i should get the 50crit/62sp dmg robe with my badges first or if you guys had any other suggestions. My shoudlers seem to be the biggest thing IM having trouble finding to replace.

EDIT: I was thinking maybe get the new badge ring with +28 hit, drop the spellstrike pants and get the crit/dmg badge ones. Then i will have 0 badges and start saving up for the either the robe or hopefully get the one off vashj in that time. I also have the BoB and Mantle of Elven Kings in the bank to swap out for hit. This is why Im having trouble deciding which piece to replace first.

 

Korval

Looking at some of the parses for brutalis and the like really blows my mind. My gear obviously isn't on par with a mage who is going into Sunwell, but I can't for the life of me figure out how going from ~1100 Fire damage to ~1300 is going to make my fireballs hit 30% harder or how any other amount of stats is going to double my DPS with no other changes.

My guild has been in MH/BT for a a little over a month now. I can't find a recent decently representative parse to show you, but fire isn't exactly rocket science. I spam fireball while keeping scorch up. Recently I started adding Fire Blast since it seems to be a slight DPS increase for me, if mana and/or range is not an issue. I hover around 1250-1300 DPS on a good day.

I blow IV+Combustion+Trinket soon after I get crusade stacked, trinket again 1:30 later, and then save all cooldowns for execute range. I try to make sure I get bloodlust at 19% but obviously that doesn't always work out, especially on fights we're learning or only recently got our first kills on. I usually have CoE, always have a shadow priest, sometimes an elemental shaman, and sometimes a BM hunter with drums. The biggest thing that I know I could do but don't often do is destruction potions, I'm not often confident enough that I won't need the mana potion to use them. I never use flame caps because I use SCB.

I'm geared appropriately, as far as I know. I'm hit capped with a draenei in my group or I can swap some gear if not. I stack damage + haste and avoid crit. Am I doing something horribly stupid? Am I missing something big in my raid composition besides the obvious CoE/Misery/Elemental Shaman/Moonkin? Here's armory

The World of Warcraft Armory