Originally Posted by
Kildragon
Lava burst is guaranteed to crit, plus it can proc from overload and eote if you spec it. In full BiS gear, lava burst will crit for around 160k, which can trigger overload for around 120k, eoe for 160k and eoe overload for 120k. Total damage: 560k in one global. Overload procs almost 50% of the time, with eoe not really proccing all that much. So on average, your lava burst will do 220k damage, roughly 45% of the time doing 160k and 45% of the time doing 280k. Oh you also get around 85 lava bursts off during a roughly 7.5 min fight.
Starsurge on the other hand crits for around 310k, hits for 145k and crits 25% of the time (all assuming bis gear here). On average, it will do 165k. Roughly 75% of the time it will do around 145k and 25% of the time it will do around 310k. During a 7.5 min fight you get around 50 of these off.
Why did I just do this whole numbers thing? Mainly cause I'm sick of seeing people bitch about starsurge being op and lava burst sucking. They are different spells, they serve different purposes, but numerically speaking, lava burst is superior for single target. Don't even mention about twice as reliable. (10 man elegon, boomkins causing a wipe cause starsurge didn't crit and the spark got through).