Arcane Mage PvE Guide

[Blivy]

Ultimately if you are able to stay in your rune for the full duration, it's worth more damage than Invocation, even for the other two specs. And for Arcane specifically it's a joke because we can only play Mastery.

Doesn't Mishh's findings proof this wrong? An Innvocation build using Frost/Mage armour depending on each fight. I've seen his video and his dps is impressive. To me Rop is a really clunky mechanic and just shows Blizz ran out of ideas.

Also am I correct that its not worth thinking of switching unless I have 4 piece?

I am grateful tho for mages out their trying different things out and reporting their results.

[Zavri]

EDIT: Needing some clarification.

What the hell are all the top Mages doing?

I see Arcane, but I see serious Haste stacking. Is this because of the Legendary Meta?

Take armories with a huge grain of salt

[Soulstrike]

EDIT: Needing some clarification.

What the hell are all the top Mages doing?

I see Arcane, but I see serious Haste stacking. Is this because of the Legendary Meta?

theyve finished tier (assuming you mean paragon and BL mages??) so why not try out arcane

its really not as bad ppl thinks zzzz

[Zavri]

I highly doubt the informed mage community ( Informed meaning real mages that know how to properly theorycraft the class ) thinks that arcane is bad. We all know arcane is in fact good and usually surpasses our other specs in terms of average dps on a patchwerk type encounter.

The problem is that the fights this tier ( especially on heroic ) really limit arcane's viability vs Fire's superiority via movement. If they could just bake Rune of Power into Incanter's Ward and change RoP into something else ( Maybe a large DPS cooldown that gives no passive effects? ) to allow for niche playstyles, we would be far better off. And Arcane would be completely fine.

[Deleted]

theyve finished tier (assuming you mean paragon and BL mages??) so why not try out arcane

its really not as bad ppl thinks zzzz

You're misunderstanding my point.

I'm not surprised they're trying out Arcane - Sims (yes I do know they can be inaccurate) had always shown that Arcane would be very strong, possibly even stronger than Fire, in full BiS. It's also not just Paragon and BL, but ScrubBusters and others, too. Every Mage seems to be going over to Arcane at 535+. Whether it's something for Ra-Den or not, I don't know.
What confuses me, is that they are stacking Haste. That was what I was needing clarification about

[zomgDPS]

I highly doubt the informed mage community ( Informed meaning real mages that know how to properly theorycraft the class ) thinks that arcane is bad. We all know arcane is in fact good and usually surpasses our other specs in terms of average dps on a patchwerk type encounter.

The problem is that the fights this tier ( especially on heroic ) really limit arcane's viability vs Fire's superiority via movement. If they could just bake Rune of Power into Incanter's Ward and change RoP into something else ( Maybe a large DPS cooldown that gives no passive effects? ) to allow for niche playstyles, we would be far better off. And Arcane would be completely fine.

You are wrong, plus, your argument itself is disjoint and inconsistent.

In your first paragraph you say arcane is not bad, and state simulated simcraft results as your 'proof'.

Yet in your second paragraph you say "oh but yea in practice Arcane is bad, since it sucks in actual raids and looses out to fire/frost".


How is that "Arcane not being bad"?



"Informed" career mages do not care how well they perform on a spreadsheet or on a simulation whose credibility is vehemently debated. "Real" mages (as you call them) are much more interested in Real performance, which, in the case of Arcane, is crap.


It makes no sense telling mages "Arcane is good in simcraft but sucks in practice, so just try out Arcane will ya?".


Going off after that and saying "Well Arcane doesn't work in practice but if we make changes X and Y and Z to talent 1 2 and 3, then maybe it can work so you should try it anyway" is about as nonsensical a statement as any that I have heard yet.


People need to realize that when the greater mage community says something, in this case, when it says that really for all intents and purposes, if you care about raiding and care about progression, you should play either Fire or Frost, that they aren't just saying that for funzies.


More testing and theory work went into ascertaining the relative performance of the specs in 5.2 then you can even imagine. Almost the entire mage community contributed and many mages came together and did a lot of hard work to finally reconcile the conflicting reports of simcraft and to realize that Arcane is the sh!t spec for 5.2 and beyond.


You waltzing in here and just "saying so" otherwise, wont change that. It will just make you look like a fool.


Check my own posting history if you want to see the multi-page threads where a ton of work was done to really figure out the strength of the specs relative performances.

[Deleted]

I still think Arcane is stronger than both Fire and Frost on Horridon and Megaera. (And Primordius if not on boss duty)

[Deleted]

-snip-

Hey zomg, any idea regarding my initial query?

Arcane may not live up to Frost at lower levels of gear but it certainly seems to be doing "ok/good" at higher levels. The main thing that confuses me really is the Haste-stacking.

[arizonapriest93]

On a different note of things what's the value of t14 2pc and 4 set? I'm pondering going arc and I have multiple thunderforged crit mastery pieces but I'm also wondering about the strength of 2pc t14 7% missles boost if it's worth losing some of the crit and mastery for some haste/ hit combo (I'd be wearing shoulders hit/ mast and legs haste mast) I have TF Lightningweaver gauntlets Chilblain spaulders leggings of the pulsing blood all of those Normal TF. the tier I have is all 496 besides helm (lfr) I only have t14 shoulders hands legs and helm. Over the t14 helm I'd be wearing Xaril's Hood of Intoxicating Vapors.

Thanks for the help!

[zomgDPS]

Hey zomg, any idea regarding my initial query?

I checked, while there are a few of them running the haste build, not many others are.

That being said, the reason they are doing it is because of the abominable situation that is the bombs. They are just maximizing Mana Adept and NT ticks. Its funny, it 'says' that they are Arcane, but they are actually just using NT, which is a talent.
They aren't actually playing arcane, they are just exploiting a scenario that exists due to Blizz's rather silly buff to the bombs. It will not stand in time, and when the bombs are re-normalized again (don't fool yourselves, they will be brought back in line), you will see things clear up.



As a side point, it is interesting to note that the only times mages have used Arcane in this expansion is when there is some exploit due to some unintended interaction and/or behavior with some talent or another. First, it was with scorch (allowing the abomination that was 'scorch camping' to exist) and now its with these bombs ('NT tab dotting').
Arcane has never actually stood up on its own two feet as a spec. A sad observation indeed.


But yea, they are just experimenting with maximizing NT ticks, since bombs are so disproportionately powerful right now (and Arcane's mastery just makes them stronger).
Funnily enough, it is exactly this very reason why our guild has not had mage in our raids for the past ~2.5 raid lockouts now. Nabal, our resident magelord, actually quit playing his mage ~1week after the bombs hotfix went in.
His reason? I believe his exact words were something along the lines of, "Blizzard has lost their minds. They have taken my class, which is supposed to be a nuker, and turned us into multi-dotting, tab targetting, nether tempesting fools. I cannot play this class knowing that my optimal strategy is to spam NT on targets like an idiot for maximum DPS".
While we have tried, we still cannot get him to return to raid with us on his mage. Following suit, Shin (our other regular mage) also quit playing her mage. She cited similar reasons. On the plus side, our raid now has 1 more extremely skilled warlock and 1 more off-the-wall boomkin.

To be fair, they both have a valid point. Nabal is a fire mage and Shin is frost, yet both were actually doing the same thing in raids, i.e. multidotting and tab targeting spamming NT.
Both had their bombs be one of the highest damage they did on multiple fights. It is like this bomb buff has totally consumed the mage class and all three specs wholesale, eclipsing any semblance of playstyle spec identity. There is little to no distinction between mages of any spec anymore, since they all just end up tab targeting and spamming bombs. Whats the point then?



Rest assured. Arcane with haste and invocation is sub par (exploits and stupid hotfixes aside) w.r.t 'regular' mastery RoP Arcane.

[Deleted]

I honestly think Mastery Arcane still has its place on some fights.

http://worldoflogs.com/reports/rt-7l...&e=8023#Cycobi

That's R1 overall Mage parse, beating both top Fire and top Frost parses by 3K and 10K respectively. Sure, it's AE spam, but I think that's why Mastery Arcane is better; it buffs our AoE a bit more.

[Drooul]

To be fair, they both have a valid point. Nabal is a fire mage and Shin is frost, yet both were actually doing the same thing in raids, i.e. multidotting and tab targeting spamming NT.
Both had their bombs be one of the highest damage they did on multiple fights. It is like this bomb buff has totally consumed the mage class and all three specs wholesale, eclipsing any semblance of playstyle spec identity. There is little to no distinction between mages of any spec anymore, since they all just end up tab targeting and spamming bombs. Whats the point then?

I guess if they want fireball damage to be higher than NT then yes, but I'm ok with NT being 15% of my damage on most fights as fire (20% on fights like Horridon and Council obv). It's all opinion though so can't say anyone is wrong for wanting more or less fireball/NT.

[Soulstrike]

On a different note of things what's the value of t14 2pc and 4 set? I'm pondering going arc and I have multiple thunderforged crit mastery pieces but I'm also wondering about the strength of 2pc t14 7% missles boost if it's worth losing some of the crit and mastery for some haste/ hit combo (I'd be wearing shoulders hit/ mast and legs haste mast) I have TF Lightningweaver gauntlets Chilblain spaulders leggings of the pulsing blood all of those Normal TF. the tier I have is all 496 besides helm (lfr) I only have t14 shoulders hands legs and helm. Over the t14 helm I'd be wearing Xaril's Hood of Intoxicating Vapors.

Thanks for the help!

t14 2pc is roughly 2% overall increase if you dont have double upgraded shoulder/pants 517 then just replace it with tot gear or even t15 4pc

[Trinost]

Thank you I've been looking for some good info for my arc mage

[zomgDPS]

I guess if they want fireball damage to be higher than NT then yes, but I'm ok with NT being 15% of my damage on most fights as fire (20% on fights like Horridon and Council obv). It's all opinion though so can't say anyone is wrong for wanting more or less fireball/NT.

I don't think they were neccesarily talking about which spell does most % damage on the logs, i.e. I don't think Nabal was talking specifically about "damage done percentages by spell" with his complaint. Instead, I think what was bothering them was the fact that the actual 'actions' they were taking in the fights were really amounting to nothing more than "spam NT on everything".

From what I understood, his issue was that the bomb buff made putting bombs up on everything such a massive benefit, that you would be nerfing yourself if that's what you didn't do (which is, mathematically at least, correct. The bombs do so much relative damage now, that you must put them up on everything to stand a chance to remain competitive).
From his perspective (and I tend to agree, even though I do not actually play a mage full time) this is unacceptable for a 'nuker' class, i.e. the 'optimal' gameplay for mages shouldn't be "put your dot on everything". He believes that this is a 'devolution of gameplay', turning the entire mage class into a nerfed vanilla/BC era affliction lock (where it was all about just putting dots up on everything).


I play a lock, a destrolock to be precise, and from my perspective I can understand the issue. I would probably be feeling the same way if my 'optimal' destro playstyle (which was head and shoulders above everything else) was to 'spam immolate on all targets'. This is, obviously, not the case. As a destrolock, my actual rotation and the interaction between my spells, my planning, my positioning, and my CD usage, all have much more of an impact on my performance compared to how many targets I have immolated.

Mages now just run around, DoT everything and are 'competitive'. For Nabal, Shin, and many other career mages I know, this is a travesty of events. What makes it worse is that you cannot even escape this 'optimal spam NT to win' playstyle by switching specs, since no matter which spec you pick, spamming bombs will still be optimal.
And that is the core of the issue. Mages now are just a completely one dimensional class wrt raiding as far as playstyle is concerned (not neccisarily as far as the numbers or %s are concerned).
You either spam your bomb on everything and produce respectable numbers, or you fail.


It is certainly a very poor place to be. Especially for a pure class. The irony in all this, is that with the bombs buff, the one thing Blizz said way back in the beta about what they didn't want from talents, is actually what the talents have become for the mage class. Blizz specifically mentioned back in the beta that they didn't want the talents to heavily influence the dps process of a spec, yet, for mages, that is precisely the case, since it is a set of talents, the bombs, that are now defining what it means to be a mage.


I shudder to think what would happen if the same thing happened to locks. I would drop my lock in a heartbeat if that were the case.

[Deleted]

I shudder to think what would happen if the same thing happened to locks. I would drop my lock in a heartbeat if that were the case.

I think that's what's partly annoyed me over the last few months now.

Warlock QoL (in comparison to Mages) is just so, so much better. The numbers are relatively similar and are fight dependent but that doesn't mean that Mages are "fixed".
I too have a Warlock alt and it's funny for me because one of our Warlocks has a Mage alt, and he was complaining near-consistently in our raid yesterday because he didn't have his self-heals, his absorbs, his this and his that. It's actually now stupid how much better QoL Warlocks have in PvE compared to Mages. Sure we have good survivability when played to our full potential, but it's still nothing in comparison to Warlocks and they still have so, so much more of everything besides numbers.

People joke, saying stuff like "oh but you have blink you'll be fine" - sure Blink's great but it's now also no longer unique to Mages.

[Libretto]

Top mages are showing as speccing arcane for Ra-Den, because the cheeze strat on that fight more or less involves standing in one place almost the entire time, and arcane is stronger at fast target switching for orbs than the other specs are.

[Arcanegod]

I need help with regard to my mage, I use Mr.Robot and recently changed mastery for Hast, and really liked the results, my damage increased significantly, but now a doubt arose between increasing intellect or mastery. I changed the weights acceleration and mastery of the standard that Mr robor recommended. Here are the weights:
Intellect: 4:43
Spell Power: 3.68
Spell Hit: 3.19
Rod: 2:49 Soft Cap: 0.2 Soft-Capped Weight: 0
Mastery: 2.2
Crit: 1.67

Adding all the bonus along with heroism, my arcane impact reached 1 second to launch, which is ideal. So I believe I got a threshold for optimal acceleration.

Now, I know what I have to attribute that increase. Stir in a little more Mr Robot and increasing the weight of mastery to 2.4 I will have a gain of 7:47% mastery but I lost 1164 magic power, my question is what pays more between them.

If anyone wants to check my equipment, I'm warning progression have not yet.

gallywix-Arcanegod

[adnre]

Wushoolay's Final Choice LFR
Volatile Talisman of the Shado-Pan Assault
Breath of the Hydra LFR
(Light of the Cosmos Heroic)
(Essence of Terror Heroic)
Cha-Ye's Essence of Brilliance LFR
(Relic of Yu'lon)

is relic 2/2 upgraded possibly almost as good as the 522 rep talisman ?

[fearist]

When would you make the switch from fire to arcane?