TTW/Fire Mage Guide

[Anubis Black]

The talent is called Torment the Weak, not Torment of the Weak. That type of mistake was made at the start of the expansion 2 years ago, I thought it was long gone, but I was wrong.

Another reason for Fire's superiourity is the poor itemisation for Arcane in BiS gear. There are no good ilvl277 Bracers for Arcane, since LD 25man HM ones don't have Haste and the next best are the Rotface 10man HM ones which are ilvl264. Also, before the latest patch, Arcane had to use an ilvl258 Trinket in their BiS list, now the Halion 25man HM Trinket helps with this issue, however the Tier items as well as most ilvl277 loot still favours Fire.

Arcane is NOT more mobile. This is utterly incorrect. In fact, this is one of the reasons Arcane falls behind Fire in ICC. The mobility of the fights makes Arcane suffer a lot, due to the lack of strong instants and the reliability on keeping up a steady rotation. Fire on the other hand grants invaluable mobility through Hot Streak, Living Bomb and a strong Fire Blast alongside a priority rotation rather than a dynamic one.

Also, Arcane is definetly not mana efficient. If you want to keep up competitive dps you need to cast as many ABs as possible at 4 stacks and this is extremely mana consuming. The biggest mana concerns arise when you do LK 25man HM as Arcane. This is when you realise this specialisation cannot compete partially due to the mana inefficiency.

Flame Throwing is a must for every self- respecting Mage raiding ICC. This talent is one of the biggest strengths of the Fire specialisation. Being able to stay so far away from the boss leaves you a lot more space for reaction to random events (e.g. tank death, boss abilities, adds etc.) as well as being able to be as high as possible on the threat list before actually pulling aggro. Not including it in your specialisation is a huge mistake. The actual dilemma is between Magic Absorption and Student of the Mind and it depends on your healers and your survivability.

Gemming: Blue sockets: Purified Dreadstone if the socket bonus per blue gem is >= to 5sp; Runed Cardinal Ruby otherwise.

BiS lists are highly subjective. You should state the race (this gives you an idea for the hit cap as well as the racials used) and professions for every list that you make and include the fact that it is dependent on them.

I will comment on the other parts of your guide when I have time to read them.

Regards

[Ryoushi]

Back, and with Heroic DFO! Woot! Almost pulling the highest DPS in my raid, just a little behind the boomkin & 2 rogues. Another trinket, please!


I was just wondering, is there a point at which 63SP will be better than Black Magic? The mage closest to BiS gear on my realm is using 63 rather than BM, so I thought I'd check here if it was preferred once again at higher levels of gear.


Cheers,
Ryo.

[Sky]

AnubisBlack-

You're right about Torment the Weak, I changed the guide to reflect this.

You bring up some good points about Arcane's mobility and you're right about gear suitability in ICC.

I don't agree that Arcane is that mana inefficient, DPS is very similar by using Missile Barrage on proc to spamming Arcane Blast. There is a good amount of adds on LK25HM anyway, so there's little reason to be Arcane compared to Fire anyway on that fight.

As for Flamethrowing, I understand your point about being able to react to boss abilities, but I don't understand what you mean by "being as high as possible on the threat list before pulling agro." There's only two threat limits, which is 110% in melee range, and 130% beyond melee range. Flamethrowing isn't going to affect this.

I'm not sure what you're trying to say about gemming. If you mean that if the socket bonus is equal or bigger than five spell power, use a Purified Dreadstone to get the socket bonus, it's the same thing that I'm saying in the guide. The difference is that that Haste and Crit Rating socket bonuses would also be worth gemming for because they have similar values to spell power.

I did mention the Hit cap difference for the BiS list.




Ryoushi-

I'd switch to 63 SP if Rawr suggests you should, but I don't think 63 SP will ever become better than BM for Fire as long there isn't a strange combination of gear. I'd run Rawr on that mage and check what it says.

[Ryoushi]

Can't seem to find this for certain anywhere.

Do the ticks/explode on Living Bomb all scale with the spellpower from when LB was applied or by the spellpower at the time of the tick/explode?


Thanks,
Ryo.

[Sky]

I did some somewhat unscientific testing. I went to a training dummy in SW, applied Living Bomb when I had less than six seconds left on Siphoned Power, and compared the dot ticks before and after Siphoned Power wears off.

Recount -suggests- that the dot ticks have the same spell power before and after the buff wears off, so I would say that-

Living Bomb dot/explosion scale with the spell power from when Living Bomb was applied.

[Andreah]

A fascinating and highly informative read, thank you very much BlueSkies for an excellent post.

I have a question about AoE rotations for my Fire Mage, during trash clearing. I know it's not nearly as important as Boss fights, but I'd like to make my Mage as efficient as possible during my Daily heroics and while clearing Trash in ICC and other raids.

Obviously, for trash that lasts less than 12 seconds, Blizzard is probably most efficient, as Flamestrike and Living Bomb are too slow to do any real damage.

However, for 10+ trash mobs that last say 20-30 seconds, is it better to living bomb everything in sight, pure Blizzard them, or alternate between Blizzard and Flamestrike. And is there a break point in the number of mobs where it is better to Living Bomb, or better to use an AoE spell?

My own experiences tend to show that 4-6 mobs tend to be better as Living Bombs, but more than that, I use Flamestrike / Blizzard in rotation. I can't find any way of testing with consistent results that tells me if this alternation is better or worse than just using Blizzard, or whether I would be better to just continually Living Bomb everything?

[leethaxor]

On festergut:
You can invis out of pungent blight, you can use this avoid ever having to gather spores, unless of course you get spores.

[Sky]

Andreah, use as many Living Bombs that will explode. If a mob pack lasts 20 seconds, use 8 seconds to apply Living Bomb, then do Flamestrike, then Blizzard. This way, all of the Living Bombs you applied will explode.

Living bomb is the single best AoE ability AS long as it explodes.

Leethaxor- Seriously? I wonder why this would work. I had the impression that Pungent Blight is a AoE ability, not a single target ability that just single targets everyone in the raid.

Can anyone else offer a similar anecdote?

[Goros]

Tear Gas in PP normal is an AOE ability that can be invis'd/cloaked off. I would imagine the effects would be similar.

[feralminded]

Tear Gas in PP normal is an AOE ability that can be invis'd/cloaked off. I would imagine the effects would be similar.

It can't be invis'd "off", but rather around. I guess that's semantics though, just trying to convey the proper message.

[Xcuse]

Tear Gas in PP normal is an AOE ability that can be invis'd/cloaked off. I would imagine the effects would be similar.

It also has to be vanished and can't just be cloaked^^

[Sky]

The guide was changed to include a mod/spreadsheet section and to add Halion to the list of boss fights.

Please give me feedback about the mod section, I think it's pretty weak.

[Sky]

Take note that I DO plan on updating this guide for Cataclysm raiding. Take notice, -raiding- because my computer died on me, so I probably won't be updating this within the next couple weeks.

[Goros]

Let me tell you that mages will be getting a massive nerf...especially fire mages... and that whatever you would write now won't matter shortly.

Big changes for those looking to be fire in 4.0.1 - Gem blue sockets as int/hit, yellow as int/crit, and red as int.
Check your enchants as many got deleted in the patching and will need to be replaced. Blizz says "oops, sorry".
Glyphs - yes, we only have 2 prime glyphs at the moment for fire. Living Bomb & Pyroblast. Major - Fireball, Molten Armor, Mirror Image.
Items - the 5pc is worth using now. I reforged hit off items to get to the 25 man raid hit (368) but you can stay at 17% if you are concerned with 5 mans. All the hit went right into mastery.

Unbuffed - 3433 spellpower, 824 haste, 369 hit, 42.62 crit, 10.33 mastery, unbuffed. Hit a boss target dummy for just over 3 minutes without using any cooldowns and sustained 10k dps. Nerf incoming.

[Goros]

Nerf wasn't as bad as I thought it would be.

Anyway, I reforged everything to mastery, except I ended up at a 16% hit with only about 40% crit. Went to 17 mastery for the extra dot damage, and it helped.

I moved some haste off heroic DFO and made it mastery, and took crit off of heroic spyglass and made it haste.

I aimed for 850-ish haste for a 2 sec fireball, and wound up at 838, which is fine for now.

Pulled 12k in a 25 VoA, so in ICC i'd expect almost 16k? We'll see how everything scales out.

Moved my target dummy dps to the mid 11.5k range up from 10k pre-nerf, but that includes cooldowns and going OOM

[Goros]

15.7k on Saurfang 10N.

The next nerf went in this morning. See what it looks like later today.

[Goros]

Ok so I've done a mess of research and it seems that mastery at level 80 has different benefits for different classes & specs, and in the case of Fire Mages might not be worth it.

What I've done is reforged as much crit & hit as I could to haste (because of the way haste effects DoT's now) and still maintained 16% hit and over 40% crit. 16% because I have dranei in both my 10&25 man raids.

Then I gemmed anything that was only 5 spellpower socket bonus to 20 int, and kept my gems to activate the meta in the int/hit purple, and used them in items giving 7 or 9 sp bonuses. Yellow gems went in as 10int/10haste

Will post results later this week.

[Potvora]

Hi.
Can you post here your armory link?

[Potvora]

aaa..i found you http://www.wowarmory.com/character-s...onde&cn=Aliiza
but i think armory isnt working..your last activity is on Oct 9, 2010. mine on 12-Oct-2010
My dsp on Saurfang 25HC was 11k with this equip http://eu.wowarmory.com/character-sh...ire&cn=Potvora .when we are in raid im seventh in dps with just + 2k dps with all the buffs(icc buff too)..i dont know what im doing bad. so i reforged everything to crit ..now i have about 41% crit, 16.7% hit, 22.63 haste, master 8.63 and 3130 sp unbuffed + i resocketed blue gems, now i use 10 intel and 10 hit. I do about 10k dps on boss dummy..thats more than anyone in my guild..My rotation is: scorch, LB, Fireball, Fireblast(impact or when theres no CD) and pyroblast when hotstreak procs. im casting fireblast bcs it has a big chance to crit. After the reforge of my items i wasnt in raid but im sure i would not be in top5.

[Xodiv]

16% because I have dranei in both my 10&25 man raids.

Heroic Presence no longer provides a hit buff to party/raid members.