My original comment applied to the topic how Arcane mages do have a talent that is comparable to a fire mages 5% crit, and it's actually a 6% crit, as the previous posts have made clear. True the 6% does not have the same extent of raid utility that improved scorch does, but it's still a useful raid buff.
But fire mages (which most are these days) have Focus Magic too. This doesn't balance things out. Arcane is still left out cold when it comes to utility.
I have tried to sift past alot of the recent posts on arcane, (because to read the entire 91 page thread would take a few days.) And recently I havent seen any info on
1. Stat allocation information on mage tier gear. Is there an algorithm for the stats found on gear? For instance. If I have the mage Tier 8.5 head, and I dont need hit, how much of the 226 gear utility is lost becuase of not needing hit? And using the same numbers, how do you find the VALUE of each point of a piece of gear based on its gear rating of 213, 200, 226, 239, ect. Im pretty sure that a formula can be derived I just havent figured out a way to do it yet.
Something I have started to notice as an odd stat... Spirit. I have only been 80 for 2 months now, and I have only played wow for around... 5 months max. I have started to stack Spirit and haste with gear and gems. I honestly cant remember the last time I ran outta power in a 25man raid. It just doesnt happen anymore. And I routinely hit 5k dps, and have had sustained fights with 7.6k also. Im sure there were other factors, since it was a different day... but What I wanna know is as arcane spec, what gems give you the most value when putting gems in your gear? Haste someone said was 1.41 value compared to 1 spell power. So... what is spirit?
Hope its not to wordy. Just looking for straight numbers. Not "Your wrong do it this way."
Thx.
Sedare: Rawr has all your answers. Generally, 19sp provides the most benefit for Arcane, though it's common to see yellow sockets worth picking up socket bonuses with.
I'm playin Arcane mage, here's link to my armory The World of Warcraft Armory, they should be pvp gear on now tho. But in PvE one I have 2355SP, 484haste rating and 22,57% crit paired with 11.46% hit. I easly get 4-5k DPS in raid enviroment (depending on buffs). The problem is that my damage is incomparable lower than DPS would say. I don't feel like I'm slackin, my latency and FPS are ok too. Rotation I use is: 3xAB+ABrr, if Missile Barrage proc: 3xAB+AM+Abrr. I know something like this can happen on some fights, but not straight forward tank and spank fights. Any advice from you on this? I also have [Leggings of the Wanton Spellcaster] and [Leggings of Mortal Arrogance] (2x+19SP) in bank when it comes to legs (only part i feel i could change for something I have atm). I know i'm hit overcapped but I really can't find anything worthy to exchange t8.5/Dying Curse with it
DPS can be a misleading figure dependant on how it is calculated, such as the time window in which the meter checks that you are doing damage, whether DoT effects are counted and how, or pure casting time. It's also a stat that can be is easily padded dependant on the encounter. Best option really is to look at damage done, but even that can be padded as you often see at the start of Freya.
The Mage theme song.
<+icesurfer> this is the fucking security industry; if you want ethics, join the Red Cross
Remember the DPS you have on your recount is based on when YOU start combat. Everyone elses doesnt stop while you cast. Since you dont have dots, when your combat stops for more then 2 seconds... the DPS meter pauses. So when you evocate, it pauses. It doesnt reset tho. Since the RAID is still combat YOUR recount considers everyone in combat while even one person is in combat. So you cant trust the number recount gives you at all. Its not configured right.
A good way to look at raid dps and damage is wowwebstats. Someone in your raid has to have the addon for it . . . but it's a good way to track individual damage and dps as well. Plus it has charts and graphs if you're into that sort of thing
It is silly to type it all out. You make a choice with Focus Magic. You buff your own dps or you buff someone elses. We buff ourselves. Selfish? Sure. But then isn't it selfish on the healers not pick up Magic Absorption, or Frost/Fire Ward on every cooldown in elemental AoE fights. We all make a choice between our own dps and the greater raid utility. It's not as sqeaky-clean clear cut as you'd like us to believe, nor does your theorycrafting take into account the gear and skill levels of those benefitting from the buffs. Casting Focus Magic on a very well geared, very skilled, high dps Arcane mage is a better choice than casting Focus Magic on a lower-geared, lower-skilled, low dps shadowpriest. The crit might be more important to the shadowpriest but in this case the greater dps gain comes from giving it the Arcane Mage.
Theorycrafting on this site cares as much, if not more, about personal dps compared to raid dps. Unless your raid is consistently wiping at 1% on a boss then your decision to circle jerk the Focus Magic hasn't been a bad one and your own personal dps is higher. Yay.
Actually I am not sure if you are joking....
What's the point of a mage in a raid? To deal as much damage as possible. If you deal it, by preventing boss-heals throu decursing (Sapphiron), then you must decurse.
If you can't take it, turn of your damage meter for the fight.
If your shields bring more absorbed damage in a GCD, than a healer can heal, then you must shield up. If every DD uses his options like this, you can cut a healer and bring one more DD. This is a huge gain, alot more than your "wasted" GCD.
If the encounter brings so much elemental damage, that shields resisting 30% is valuable, you have to skill for it.
(Think of Mimiron Hard mode)
I am fairly sure, any cutting edge guild does it that way. That's also the reason you see so many funky skillings among raidmembers of Ensidia. They use the most beneficial skills for the encounter.
You get farer if everyone maximizes then if everyone is selfish.
Btw, is the formula for stats equivalence put in 1st post surly correct? Counted it few times and it seems 1sp is worth 0.87crit and 0.9haste for me, while it should be the other way I think.
I'm normally ttw/fire specced, but have been playing around with arcane for use in certain encounters. I've gathered that abarr's coefficient was nerfed somehow a bit ago, but can't figure out if the info in manly's first post regarding rotations is still accurate, or if rawr is using the correct info. I've heard conflicting things on whether you still use abarr in a normal rotation or not. Can someone clarify what the nerf to abarr was exactly? I only resubbed about a month ago, so I'm still playing a little catch up.
This is how I understand the current rotation:
unlimited mana cycle AB spam, ABx3 AM if AM barrage procs . . . can be unpractical to sustain but useful durring cd usage
ABx3 AM for max dps, regardless if AM barrage procs
ABx2 AM if mana needs to be conserved
ABx1 AM if mana REALLY needs to be conserved
The nerf to Abarr made the mana usage to dps output ratio of the spell kinda worthless in pve encounters, but it's good to cast if moving and you need to dump your AB stacks
If you have 4piece T8 cast AM barrage whenever it procs because if it does not get consumed due to the set bonus you get a little boost in dps. The math for all this is in the previous posts in this thread if you're into the mathy stuff.
Ok, that's what I've been following basically, but I've had some people mention doing ABx3 Abarr still. Couldn't tell if they just didn't get the memo on the abarr nerf or not.
ABx3 AM for max dps, regardless if AM barrage procs
Actually, it's ABx3, AM if MBarr procs, else ABarr for max DPS
ABx3, AM regardless is for better efficiency.
RE: the ABarr Nerf. It used to have a coefficient of a 3 second spell, but has since been nerfed to 2.5.
It's still a nice spell, but harder to justify using in a raid setting.
^Add ABrr after AM for max DPS^^ it's lowering mana efficiency but increases dps nicely
Enough of that ancient rotation already, ABrr died in 3.08. Yes it's slightly more DPS but it is also much more mana expensive, so you're better off using AB3AM and the mana you save can be used for longer AB spam cycles.
As long as you don't have mana problems it's better, if you have roll FFB. Using 3ABAM rotation results in 200+DPS loss and it won't let you spam AB much more, as AB on 3 stacks is costs ~7-8% of ur total mana raid buffed...
As long as you don't have mana problems it's better, if you have roll FFB. Using 3ABAM rotation results in 200+DPS loss and it won't let you spam AB much more, as AB on 3 stacks is costs ~7-8% of ur total mana raid buffed...
Using your gear and full raid buffs, Rawr shows that the top 3 optimal Arcane cycles are:
Cycle
dps
mps
dpm tradeoff vs next cycle
ABSpam3MBAM
5832
389.5
1.99
AB3AM
5364
154.2
3.53
AB3AM2MBAM
5322
142.3
n/a
AB3ABar3MBAM is 5432 dps, 191.4 mps for a tradeoff of 2.02 from the max dps. So, no, you shouldn't be using Arcane Barrage, the optimal play is to mostly use AB3AM and then use ABSpam3MBAM to drain off extra mana.
As always, you should use Rawr to get advice for your specific gear setup, but I believe that not using Arcane Barrage except when on the move is likely the right thing to do for most Ulduar geared Arcane mages.
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.
Actually, it's ABx3, AM if MBarr procs, else ABarr for max DPS
ABx3, AM regardless is for better efficiency.
RE: the ABarr Nerf. It used to have a coefficient of a 3 second spell, but has since been nerfed to 2.5.
It's still a nice spell, but harder to justify using in a raid setting.
Ah! Kinda funny, when I heard it's coefficient was nerfed, but couldnt find the exact numbers, I correctly guessed that abarr must have previously based it's coefficient on it's cooldown instead of it's instant cast status. Anyway, the information everyone has posted matches up with my rawr info too, so I have renewed faith that rawr is using the correct info and can tell everyone who tells me otherwise 'lrn2play' if they still going by the old info.
I have been using abarr when I need to move around though, in the same situations I use fireblast when fire/ttw spec. Glad to find out my instincts were right, and I've been basically doing the correct thing even if I didn't theorycraft it out perfectly.
I'm not theorycrafter, but would giving Arcane 100% crit damage instead of 50% crit damage through talents make it entirely overpowered? I'm just thinking of ways that Arcane would value crit more (since this is apparently something the developers would like to achieve), but I have no idea if 100% crit damage to spells would render it too much. It would also help in Arcane's lacklustre AoE.
I'm not theorycrafter, but would giving Arcane 100% crit damage instead of 50% crit damage through talents make it entirely overpowered? I'm just thinking of ways that Arcane would value crit more (since this is apparently something the developers would like to achieve), but I have no idea if 100% crit damage to spells would render it too much. It would also help in Arcane's lacklustre AoE.
It was my suggestion to GC in the Q&A. He stated he was not happy with the huge gap in preferred gear between Arcane and Fire (as most of Arcane is) Giving us a 100% talent really is the only way for Arcane to "value" crit rating more, even if our proc has nothing to do with it. I am pretty certain it is the only PvE tree without a +100% crit damage talent.
No, the T8.5 Chest is not ideal for Arcane either. You're much better off with Umbral Brute or Raiment of Iron Council. My current BiS list includes T7 Helm and Legs, T8 Gloves and Shoulders, and offset Chest. The only one of the four set pieces that doesn't have Haste is the T7 Helm, but at least that has Crit, as opposed to the T8 Helm that only has Hit and no Crit or Haste. And what's even more important, you'll be able to wear a Robe instead of that stupid Tunic, haha. :P
I dont know what kind of results you are getting from rawr but im getting around 7k dps from the bis list i compiled which to my surprise suggests 3 t8.5 (legs, hands and tunic)
new version of rawr is now available though, lets see what it has to offer.
Last edited by johnnythorpe : 06/25/09 at 12:01 AM.
It was my suggestion to GC in the Q&A. He stated he was not happy with the huge gap in preferred gear between Arcane and Fire (as most of Arcane is) Giving us a 100% talent really is the only way for Arcane to "value" crit rating more, even if our proc has nothing to do with it. I am pretty certain it is the only PvE tree without a +100% crit damage talent.
That would be a nice addition, or they could make us value crit more if they allow a portion of our mana be restored based on crit.
I'm not going to get my hopes up for a 100% crit change, simply because that could make Arcane far too bursty in pvp, something Blizzard is definitely against. Having mana return on crits is already available to the fire tree and it would seem rather boring simply to copy that talent over, as well as having crits apply a dot, or a spell that can be made available after crits. At the moment I'm struggling to think of an original way to make crit valuable, so maybe they'll just go with something that already works.
edit: Unless Arcane gets something stupidly elaborate, such as having criticals summon mirror images. That might be fun.
edit: Unless Arcane gets something stupidly elaborate, such as having criticals summon mirror images. That might be fun.
Lmao. And at almost 50% crit to Arcane Blast raid buffed slightly overpowered. :p
I don't see how 100% crit damage would se too overpowered in PvP. Most classes already have it, including frost, the dominant spec which also has a huge crit chance on frozen targets. Arcane on the other hand probably has 20% crit max in PvP gear. Against many opponents with decent resilience this will amount to around 10% effective crit. Critting for 100% damage 10% of the time wouldn't be particularly overpowered.
Arcane is in need of a boost of some sort. I'm just hoping we get thrown a few bones before 3.2 goes live. It's hard enough to justify staying Arcane as it is. It's only going to get harder.
06/20/09, 3:55 AM
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