UVCatastrophe

Not to be pedantic, but those are 0.77% and 0.909% DPS increases, respectively. I don't want anyone coming into this discussion to get an inaccurate sense of how much haste and crit contribute to our DPS.

 

Quirrel

When debating the differences and similarities of haste and crit does the hot streak proc come into calculation? Getting crit instead of haste on an item increases your "normal" dps by a specific amount, but it also increases your chance to proc hot streak. Now I'm not a math wiz, but the chance of getting two crits in a row increases more the more crit % you have.

Mage A has a 30% chance to crit. So the probability of proccing hot streak is 0,3 x 0,3 x 100%= 9%

Mage B has a 35% chance to crit. So the probability of proccing hot streak is 0,35 x 0,35 x 100%= 12,3%

Mage C with 40% crit has a 0,4 x 0,4 x 100% leading to 0,16%

So going from 30% to 35% crit increases hot streak chance to proc by 3,3 point but going from 35% to 40% increases it by 3.7 point.

Now even though your ambition is to balance out your stats you will still often find yourself having to choose between crit and haste. My question is if the general calculations I've read in this thread take hot streak into account. Is haste still favored in most situations even when considering hot streak, which also gets buffed once you get the 4 x T8 set bonus?

 

Jept

For totw firehaste is still prioritized over crit with 4 piece T8; though it may vary with your gear setup; rawr can tell you if you need a bit more crit before prioritizing haste, since 4 piece does increase the weight of crit rating a bit.

Haste will increase the amount of hot streak procs per fight (because of more casts) just as crit will increase the procs because of having a higher chance for 2 consecutive crits. Having 4 piece proc and using multiple pyroblasts still benefits from haste by allowing you to return to fireballs faster.

 

Enthorn

Well, haste is valued by all specs because it's a straight 1% DPS increase per 1%, so it scales incredibly with both spellpower and crit. The only cap is the unrealistic 1 second global cooldown (1.5 seconds but haste reduces it), which really isn't a problem except with scenario specific buffs.

Concerning crit though, not only is it valuable for Hot Streak, but also for Master of Elements and 4-piece T8. While crit doesn't influence your chances for back to back procs, or even the first proc itself, it does increase the initial Hot Streak, naturally. And arguably the first one is the most important, since without it, you can't ever have huge chains of pyroblasts. (There is something hilariously awesome about 5 pyroblasts in a row.)

Naturally, if your crit was so low that you were only getting, on average, 4 Hot Streaks per fight, then also on average only one of those Hot Streaks would proc 4P T8. Thankfully, crit is remarkably higher than it was in BC. People see crit rates of 50-60% now compared to 35-45 (and seldomly above that). Due to this, the gap has closed in on the "chance to not crit" factor, which is an important one. I think it's one of the contributing factors in why haste is still valued so highly for both Fireball and Frostfire.

 

wingot

Hey Guys,

I've been doing a lot of reading over the past three or four days on these forums, and one thing that keeps annoying me is when I see people talking about "EP". It is apparently a 3% +hit, and a %6 +hit for FFB (undetermined as to whether this is a bug or intended). I have, however, been unable to figure out what EP actually stands for?

The closest I have been able to find is Precision at rank 3, which is on the second tier of the frost tree. This states that it gives a 3% chance to hit increase. Is it possible that this is what is being referred to as EP (whenever someone talks about EP they never mention Precision at the same time as a viable buff)? If so, what is the E for?

And finally, assuming Precision is the correct buff, has the to hit applying twice "issue" been fixed? I have been gearing for 11%, which in a 10 man normally results in a 14% chance, but should cap out in a 25 man (where it really makes the extra difference). It would be nice to know though that even at 11% every single FFB is landing (I doubt I would ever drop hit to 8%, it's easy enough to get 11% without sacrificing spell power or much crit, even without loot from 25mans).

 

Enthorn

EP stands for Elemental Precision and was renamed Precision in a previous patch to address Frostfire double dipping from it. It was named Elemental Precision because it affected Fire and Frost spells, but since no skill had been implemented like Frostfire, it was never a problem. They made the 3% apply to all schools and subsequently dropped the Elemental part from the name. A number of other talents had similar name changes specifically to cater to Frostfire (Empowered Fireball -> Empowered Fire for instance). This is also why Arcane specs now pick it up.

Arcane: 6% (3% from Precision and 3% from Arcane Focus)
FFB: 3% (from Precision)
FB/TTW: 0%

 

wingot

Thanks guys,

One more that I've come across that I can't even guess what it means, but normally get's dumped in along with ignite in discussions (so some sort of DoT or possibly crit buff from reading) is CSD. I wouldn't even really know where to start looking for this one, nothing that I can think of from the fire talent tree would abbreviate to this. Of course, I could just be missing something obvious. Crtical mass (don't know if this one was renamed like EP/Precision) is 6%, which could be the one given it may have increased with the name change (like Improved Scorch downwards). I know Pyromanic didn't change it's name.

Any clues?

 

Hotan

CSD = Chaotic Skyflare Diamond - the meta gem (or in oldschool situations Chaotic Skyfire Diamond)

 

Amaroese

What would be a good gem to put in 8.5 gloves to fit a yellow slot? I'm thinking a sp/(hit/haste/crit) orange gem, just wanted to see if I was right or not. And yes, I'm a JC.

 

Kelfar

It should be obvious, you would only put a hit gem if you aren't hit capped.

Are you hit capped? If not gem for it, if yes continue down
Are you FFB spec? If yes gem spellpower/crit, if not continue down
Are you FB spec? If yes gem spellpower/haste

Really though, the answer should be, are you hit capped(since the socket bonus is 4 hit), if you are hit capped then just gem 19 spell power.

 

wingot

Just correcting this for you, safe to assume you meant to say "Are you NOT hit capped?"

Should read: "Are you hit capped? If not gem for it, if yes continue down"

 

Fogge

Does Arcane Missiles stack the Singed buff on every tick? If so, what is the worth of chaincasting it to gain a high amount of stacks quickly? The same question applies for Scorch - when does it become beneficial to have a high amount of casts rather than stacking the buff more slowly with higher DPS spells? It fell off and/or stacked quite slowly in last nights Ulduar-10, we had me (fire the first umpteen attempts, arcane the last umpteen ones) and a destro lock as casters.

It boils down to RNG of course, but could a general rule be worked out? My gut (oh, dear gut!) tells me that one should stack the debuff using a normal rotation, but strive to have many casts towards the end of cool down on Flash freeze. This is to make sure you get a refresh and with it, maximum time to get the mage(s) out to continue the casting from a fire. This way the buff is only ever stacked once, with max DPS doing so, and has a high chance of never falling off.

Does my reasoning hold, or have I overlooked something?

 

Arcdragon

Is FireballTTW spec really viable in a ten man raid where a shaman mana totem and or wisdom or a spriest might not be available?

My guild focuses on 10 man content due to our member numbers and efficiency as a tight knit group. So we may have one or even two of the above three, but almost never all three and sometimes only wisdom.

I currently am dual specced ffb / arcane and have been considering fireball since many declare it to be awesome, but I lack the hit needed to be capped without a spriest. Also what would be the best aoe rotation for a fireball mage? I was thinking LB, combustion, blastwave with the minor glyph that prevents knock back, followed by arcane explosions since both are affected by playing with fire, spell impact and molten fury.

Lastly, how much hit do I need to be capped as a draenei mage, if I go FireballTTW spec with no spriest or boomkin?

 

Fogge

As anecdotal as evidence comes, I ran Uld-10 yesterday as Fire/TTW with no mana problems. No spriest, no BoW, no shaman, no source of replenishment.

I won't speak on the AoE, but from what I've read on the forums, people rotate FS8/FS9. I stick up LB on the longest living target, throw FS9 and then Blizzard, might finish off with a few AE if there are several mobs at like 20% health or so rather than wasting cast/channel time.

Spell hit - WoWWiki - Your guide to the World of Warcraft <-- you can find a very useful table there. You'll find that your hit cap is 420 if all that is affecting your hit is gear and racial.

 

Anaxo

Arcane explosion isn't very good for AOE now that blizzard can crit and fire/frostfire mages have living bomb at their disposal. If you look at Manly's opening post in http://elitistjerks.com/f75/t37364-f...updated_3_1_a/ and go to the section marked 'Interesting data points from spreadsheet', arcane explosion barely ranks better than frost nova, with blizzard being leaps ahead for damage.
Personally, I skip flamestrike entirely. Flamestrike's small radius makes it an issue for targeting, plus my guild tanks have a tendency to drag around the mobs, which will either cause the initial blast to miss or the subsequent dot ticks to miss. Fully optimizing my AOE damage wasn't worth the hassle of constantly yelling at the tanks to stop being spastic about positioning.

 

Elemento

First post here. I'm a big fan of elitestjerks and I've learnt a lot on your forums over the past year. But I have a few proposals (sorry, not sure which thread this would best fit):

You have a thread for frost spec, arcane and FFB. Any chance of a fire spec thread? - Ideally with the kind of opening page Manly did for arcane specs thread. Being the current top DPS spec, it seems kind of a big ommision.

Also there is a great thread for optimal sets of fire/frostfire. Could this be expanded to include arcane too?

Finally I'd love to see a thread on dual spec choices and why people are making them. For example I love Arcane on Mimiron, but as a proud owner of 4 T8.5 I've been forced to go fire spec for most of Ulduar to avoid languishing at the bottom of the metters due to poor scaling. Also Frost spec with imp blizzard is great for medium mode council (runemaster going last) and solo killing waves of adds in deconstructor. Also I've heard frost is the way to go for hard mode Vezax due to efficient mana usage.

 

Enthorn

Elemento, there is basically one thread per spec at the moment, but it just happens to be that the Fireball thread is actual the "Optimal FB/FFB gear" thread. This works fine though -- the rotations and priorities for Fireball and Frostfire are exactly the same, they just have different main nukes, but the core of the specs revolve around Hot Streak and Living Bomb -- not the main nukes.

As far as dual specs go -- I'm not really sure how useful such a thread would be. Since there's already threads on the various specs, it's kind of rehashing things people have already said. The benefits of all the different specs have been clearly discussed in each specs' thread.

As far as Vezax goes, Frost is effecient, but Frostfire (minus Living Bomb and Pyroblast) will net more damage, assuming the fight doesn't go too long. Frostbolt has survivability going for it -- Magic Absorption, Improved Amplify Magic, and possibly Frozen Core. It also has the benefit of Clearcasting and Brain Freeze, essentially allowing you to cast free in the event you aren't in a shadow crash. But I suspect most guilds are working to perfect hard mode, in which case shadow crash uptime would be near 100% and raid input damage would be near zero.

 

Zerstorung

Ive got some questions on upping damage on a few fights in Ulduar, I must be doing something wrong. The fights that I don't list here, I am very competitive on and usually near top. Unfortunately I don't have any WWS to go off.

Ignis - Flame jets should drop me below melee and hunters, but I am consistently lower than other casters (locks) on this fight who I can normally compete/beat on other fights. Is there something significant about this fight that I'm missing? I'm usually on add explode duty, but I'm not sure if it hurts dmg that much.

Razorscale - Obviously, the add phases are what hurt. On Razor phases, I'm close to top damage on her. As a fire mage, what's the best damage to be doing to the adds? What rotation do you use to remain competitive during the add phase?

XT - Again, not sure why I fall so far behind on this fight. Unlucky RNG during heart? Whats the best aoe control for adds and such? Should I go FFB for stronger AoE later in the fight?

Freya - I've heard many times this is bad for mages and I feel it, but any tips to improve performance beyond where I'm at would help.

 

Menestheus

A mage I raid with actually did some math (full credit goes to him and not me).

http://falconbk.net/GSpod/glyphquestion.pdf

Basically: it's higher raid DPS to use the Fireball glyph over Imp Scorch taking into account the lost DPS of the mage thanks to 4 extra scorch casts AND the lost raid DPS due to the time without the full buff. This is assuming the fight lasts longer than 126s and that you have 25 people all gaining DPS per spellcrit similar to mages (reduce this to 12 people and it comes down to ~63s). There are a number of approximations present in this model but it is valid enough to warrant posting.

Note: having multiple mages stacking to 5 at the beginning will reduce T even further

 

Kir

I believe there was a post saying to use imp scorch over molten armor glyph if anything, depending on gear. Forget if you use molten armor over fireball at worse or better gear.. But I agree that having imp scorch utility is just nice overall. More freedom of movement while maximizing dps is always good for non-farm attempts. It's more forgiving for mistakes. The other thing to consider though, is you have a destro warlock 100% of your raids. If so, drop the scorch glyph entirely, since you aren't even going to be scorching. Kind of common sense really.

 

Enthorn

Except it's not always just 4 extra scorch casts. Consider mimiron with 4 phases. That's not 4 extra scorch casts. It's 16 extra scorch casts. It's 24 extra scorch casts if I scorch all three units in phase 4 (which I do, because I have scorch glyph). Furthermore, Fireball glyph is pretty static in DPS, varying between 200-250. Molten Armor glyph, however, varies wildly depending on your level of spirit. In that case, the DPS being "lost" by taking Scorch glyph is significantly less, if Fireball glyph is giving 225 DPS and Molten Armor glyph is at 150.

Next, it doesn't look at situations in which you must apply it multiple times. The heart phase on deconstructor lasts 25 seconds, for instance. Unless you reapply scorch right before he goes into heart mode, and then right after he gets out, it will fall off. Furthermore, 5x stacking scorch on heart phase takes 6.25 seconds at 1.25 seconds per cast, compared to, well, 1.25 seconds. Since you're doing 100% more damage, the raid DPS being lost is doubled.

 

wingot

Enthorn: Thank you for the above. Caused me to think about the below, sorry if it's a bit long (if it should be in another thread please let me know).

I currently have the glyph of Living Bomb, Frostfire Bolt and Molten Armo(u)r equipped, but looking at my wowarmory I have a total of 211 spirit, making Molten Armor near useless. If however I swap up to a glyph of Improved Scorch I will be able to save ~5.4 seconds, or to translate, 2 FFB casts. This is probably the best way to think about the difference if stacking Imp Scorch to full at the start is that you are dropping two casts of your primary nuke in order to build it up.

What I have resorted to doing is to cast a LB, then 2 Imp Scorch, then doing FFB until LB is up, casting LB, Imp Scorch, then back to FFB. However, this is sub optimal for three reason:
1) The first rotation is only at +2%, second is +3%, and third is +4%. During this time all spell casters in the raid are losing the 3%/2%/1% buffs. With normal maximum time between scorches of 30s, this will result in 1 1/2 minutes of sub optimal crit debuff on the boss.
2) If for whatever reason I miss the Imp Scorch cast (normally because I'm casting a HS proc and forget about it) and it drops off, it then takes the same rotation to get it back up, with another up to 1 1/2min loss to crit. This of course also comes up with bosses that prevent you from casting for a given length of time like you mentioned, which works the same as missing it for all effects and purposes.
3) I lose the extra DPS of FFB while casting all those scorches every ~12 seconds instead of every ~30 seconds. This equates to an extra FFB every 30 seconds.

Another (minor) added bonus to the glyph is that you no longer have the issue of having to get scorch cast >1sec before it expires, which can add a minor benefit to the dps over time.

Course, the above is all based on the fact that I am only getting about a 1% crit increase (42.2 points) from Molten Armor glyph due to the change to using Spirit. Maybe with better gear this would become more profitable, but for now in half-heroic, half 10man gear, this is a negligble boost relative to the above.

Based on all of the above I have now come to the conclusion that unless you have >500 spirit as a mage, glyph of improved scorch is more beneficial than glyph of molten armor. This is especially true if your group is heavily caster based. The only time I would recommend glyph of molten armor over improved scorch if spirit is less than ~500 would have to be if you know that you will ALWAYS have a destucto lock or someone else casting the crit debuff on the boss.

 

thunderstung

Can anyone confirm that Rawr 2.2.6 is undervaluing [Elemental Focus Stone]? I'm at 1 hit rating away from cap and it said I'd only gain 0.58 dps from that trinket. Seems from that and from the tooltip that it's not taking the proc into account.

 

ash2ash

Minor correction: The only lock raid specs that pick up ISB are metamorphosis or affliction specced. Most locks are destruction and don't even pick it up (they rely on fire dmg talents).

Unless you're doing Patchwerk, you're probably better off having a mage glyph scorch. You can crunch the numbers all you want but with the amount of target switching in ulduar, the personal and raid dps loss without the glyph is going to be more pronounced:

FL - irrelevant
Razorscale - Lots of adds. Lots of target switching.
Ignis - You can probably get away without glyphing here.
XT - Spending 5 scorch casts on the heart phase sucks. Really sucks if you want to get hardmode done.
Kologarn - Can probably get away without glyphing although you do switch targets periodically.
Iron Council - Same as Kologarn.
Auriaya - Lots of target switching to adds.
Hodir - Some target switching but you can get away without the glyph as long as you ensure you refresh it right before you switch to iceblocks.
Thorim - For the only phase that matters, you can probably get away without it.
Freya - Lots of target switching. Hard mode is the superbowl of target switching.
Mimiron - Can probably get away without glyphing it unless you're having problems with dps in P3/P4.
Vezax - Spending 5 casts getting scorch up every time you get a shadow crash sucks; however, frost is king for this fight so it's a moot point if you're min/maxing.
Yogg Saron - Lots more target switching. Badly timed lunatic gazes can let your scorches drop off in P3.

Personally I raid with a stack of fireball/frostfire glyphs as well as scorch glyphs in my inventory. I very rarely replace my scorch glyph with a nuke glyph.

Edit: I misread your post, but this is good information in the same vein: FFB/FB glyph VS MA glyph for Scorch glyph replacement (Enthorn)

Ghostcrawler - "I'm the asshole that nerfed your class" - Blizzcon 2009

 

Saphya

Rightclick the item and select "refresh from Wowhead", in the setup I'm using it shows me about 141 DPS for the proc of [Elemental Focus Stone] and 224 DPS for the proc of [Dying Curse].