Incanters Ward - Is it really viable?

[Deleted]

Hello.

One of the thing that keeps me from playing my mage atm, is my hate towards RoP and Invocation, especially as fire.

However, I just checked some logs - And to my surprise, a very good mage used Incanters Ward on all fights, but Elegon - where he uses RoP.

This includes Garalon Heroic, Blade Lord heroic, Imperial Heroic, etc - + All MSV fights.

http://eu.battle.net/wow/en/characte...aralove/simple

http://www.worldoflogs.com/guilds/128785/

This makes me excited, anyone else experienced this as viable?

I know its lame, but I dislike playing something in a subpar way, so its important to me

[Deleted]

When you have a lot of movement and a lot of predictable damage for 100 % uptime I don't see why it wouldn't be viable. I use it a lot myself especially for fights like garalon where I am chasing legs.

Elegon for good range players is a very movementless fight besides maybe for pillars.

[mrgreenthump]

When you have a lot of movement and a lot of predictable damage for 100 % uptime I don't see why it wouldn't be viable. I use it a lot myself especially for fights like garalon where I am chasing legs.

Elegon for good range players is a very movementless fight besides maybe for pillars.

Only viable if there is stable raid damage going on, and well mage as a class is based on dodging that damage, so there are only a few fights that its usable on, and in most cases there are as good or better options for the same fights, only fight that people seem to agree on that incanter's have a very small leg up is garalon and that is only if you are kiting the pheromones

[Deleted]

Only viable if there is stable raid damage going on, and well mage as a class is based on dodging that damage, so there are only a few fights that its usable on, and in most cases there are as good or better options for the same fights, only fight that people seem to agree on that incanter's have a very small leg up is garalon and that is only if you are kiting the pheromones

I am well aware how it works. I can however conclude, that he uses it on every fight, but Elegon.

With jade up, Stone Guards have Jade+Overload to trigger it.

Feng have random AoE (I don't know if you have to get a stopcasting macro, and do it as you see the animation), aswell as alot of AoE dps on hc.

Garalon have random bolts, I don't know if this is RNG or not to use it here. (As the realm should be cleared - However he gains it as he enters if he pops it, and I guess its useful while having Vodoo doll too.

Spirit Kings. Well, I don't know. Maddening, Coward, Qiang's slash. Besides that, there might be a few abilities, it can get clunky on a few of them.

Elegon seems ok aswell, every spark you can do it, every Cele protector u can do it, should trigger in p3 aswell from the AoE, as well as the burn phase.

Will Hc with constant AoE makes it prime.

Imperial Viz only really have AoE on Force platform, and on the middle.

Bladelord have every (40?) seconds you stack up, aswell as every time you get the bleed.

Garalon have constant AoE dmg.

I haven't tryed other fights, so yeah

[Imnick]

I always use it on Garajal and it will always break very reliably after the first 30 seconds, even if you are not a voodoo doll.

[PPN]

With Incanters ward u have to know the fight better and always have an eye on the timers. What i dont like, that sometimes i get very nice combustions cause its the strongest buff from the final talents. but sometimes even when i time it perfect, the 15 secs that incanters absorption lastsare just to short to setup a nice combustion when u are unlucky on crits

[Deleted]

Incanter's Ward is simmed alot less than Invocation, when I did a sim on my mage yesterday it was around 15k less DPS and thats with using Incanter's Ward on CD and breaking the absorb instantly.

[mrgreenthump]

Incanter's Ward is simmed alot less than Invocation, when I did a sim on my mage yesterday it was around 15k less DPS and thats with using Incanter's Ward on CD and breaking the absorb instantly.

I have a feeling that incanters just doesnt work in sims atm, at least ones that dont count for incoming damage..

---------- Post added 2012-11-13 at 02:59 AM ----------

Hello.

One of the thing that keeps me from playing my mage atm, is my hate towards RoP and Invocation, especially as fire.

However, I just checked some logs - And to my surprise, a very good mage used Incanters Ward on all fights, but Elegon - where he uses RoP.

This includes Garalon Heroic, Blade Lord heroic, Imperial Heroic, etc - + All MSV fights.

http://eu.battle.net/wow/en/characte...aralove/simple

http://www.worldoflogs.com/guilds/128785/

This makes me excited, anyone else experienced this as viable?

I know its lame, but I dislike playing something in a subpar way, so its important to me

1 thing to take into consideration aswell is that he is 1 of the best geared mages out there that have open logs in his guild.. Thats not to say he is doing something wrong but with that gear you should prolly have more than 4(not counting heroic HoF) top 100 ranks.. just saying

[Deleted]

As some one already said even if you do use it on every CD and it does get triggered for full amount 15s is not enough time to set up combustion ignite reliable. Its great when you do get the crits, cause its 5% stronger than Invocation, but if you dont get enough crits within those 15s then the next ~10s is dead water with 0 benefits not even the passive.

As people said the only fight were it should be considered is on Garalon, and even there its not ahead of invocation its just on par, i use invocation my self, it lines up pretty well with our crushes and its a good help for healers that i pop 40% hp after a crush and they can focus elsewhere(well barrier negates most of crush dmg any way)

[sef24]

As some one already said even if you do use it on every CD and it does get triggered for full amount 15s is not enough time to set up combustion ignite reliable. Its great when you do get the crits, cause its 5% stronger than Invocation, but if you dont get enough crits within those 15s then the next ~10s is dead water with 0 benefits not even the passive.

As people said the only fight were it should be considered is on Garalon, and even there its not ahead of invocation its just on par, i use invocation my self, it lines up pretty well with our crushes and its a good help for healers that i pop 40% hp after a crush and they can focus elsewhere(well barrier negates most of crush dmg any way)

11% higher isnt it? with the flat out 6% passive

[Deleted]

11% higher isnt it? with the flat out 6% passive

Did you even read the tooltip?

"Passive:
Increases spell damage by 6% and increases mana regeneration by 65%. This effect is deactivated while Incanter's Ward is on cooldown."

[Deleted]

As some one already said even if you do use it on every CD and it does get triggered for full amount 15s is not enough time to set up combustion ignite reliable. Its great when you do get the crits, cause its 5% stronger than Invocation, but if you dont get enough crits within those 15s then the next ~10s is dead water with 0 benefits not even the passive.

As people said the only fight were it should be considered is on Garalon, and even there its not ahead of invocation its just on par, i use invocation my self, it lines up pretty well with our crushes and its a good help for healers that i pop 40% hp after a crush and they can focus elsewhere(well barrier negates most of crush dmg any way)

Using barrier is not great, its a loss of a dps gcd! Rather use that Temporal Shield - That skill is OP and win. (Off GCD)

The only thing I can see is RNG can screw you over, which is a legit reason.

[sef24]

Did you even read the tooltip?

"Passive:
Increases spell damage by 6% and increases mana regeneration by 65%. This effect is deactivated while Incanter's Ward is on cooldown."

Did you even read my post? It was answered in a "?" which either is a question or unsure statement. I did not state it as a fact. Sorry.

[Deleted]

Using barrier is not great, its a loss of a dps gcd! Rather use that Temporal Shield - That skill is OP and win. (Off GCD)

The only thing I can see is RNG can screw you over, which is a legit reason.

First of all I understand what you are saying.
Though raiding is not all about DPS, Barrier will save your life/Cauterize proccing, were as temporal shield does not. If you are at 100%hp then its no problem however if your in death range of crush/pheromone damage temporal shield procs your Cauteize. I Do realise that if you use temporal just before a hit that sends you into Cauterize it will heal for insane amounts.
Barrier negates the damage to not stress out your healers/saves your life if cauterize is on cd.
Imo cauterize cd should be saved for mistakes like getting the frontal cone, or when you choose to purposely proc it due to what ever reason, this could be a tank dying and you need to soak frontal cone, or you need to kite boss in a way that you will be likely to get it, or that you need to kite in a way the healer might not be able to get in range of u etc etc.

Actually there was a post somewhere about this exact topic of temporal vs Barrier on garalon, i have tried searching the forums to the best of my memory / knowledge but i cannot find it. And i am not the strongest in laying out math my self, what i can say is the post summarized it something like this;
Crush does 150k damage, the poster had SP equal to barrier absorbing 114k damage.
Temporal of cause heals all the damage.
Both have same CD.
But temporal is a 6s time frame window only, Barrier can be applied Before pull, and have cd up again straight after first crush. Over a whole fight he math'ed out the amount of uses that could be gained, and in the end barrier would have absorbed more damage than temporal would have healed.

Personally i find that i can use barrier just before a crush, and at such a short time before the stun(stun hist during the GCD that follows barrier), that i would not be able to do anything but refresh a bomb witch is usually already running. In the end it is mostly a choice, I did try out both during our progression, and at that time barrier just seemed like it was helping the raid more than temporal enrage was never a problem for us.

[Deleted]

First of all I understand what you are saying.
Though raiding is not all about DPS, Barrier will save your life/Cauterize proccing, were as tempest shield does not. If you are at 100%hp then its no problem however if your in death range of crush/pheromone damage tempest shield procs your Cauteize. I Do realise that if you use tempest just before a hit that sends you into Cauterize it will heal for insane amounts.
Barrier negates the damage to not stress out your healers/saves your life if cauterize is on cd.
Imo cauterize cd should be saved for mistakes like getting the frontal cone, or when you choose to purposely proc it due to what ever reason, this could be a tank dying and you need to soak frontal cone, or you need to kite boss in a way that you will be likely to get it, or that you need to kite in a way the healer might not be able to get in range of u etc etc.

Actually there was a post somewhere about this exact topic of tempest vs Barrier on garalon, i have tried searching the forums to the best of my memory / knowledge but i cannot find it. And i am not the strongest in laying out math my self, what i can say is the post summarized it something like this;
Crush does 150k damage, the poster had SP equal to barrier absorbing 114k damage.
Tempest of cause heals all the damage.
Both have same CD.
But tempest is a 6s time frame window only, Barrier can be applied Before pull, and have cd up again straight after first crush. Over a whole fight he math'ed out the amount of uses that could be gained, and in the end barrier would have absorbed more damage than tempest would have healed.

Personally i find that i can use barrier just before a crush, and at such a short time before the stun(stun hist during the GCD that follows barrier), that i would not be able to do anything but refresh a bomb witch is usually already running. In the end it is mostly a choice, I did try out both during our progression, and at that time barrier just seemed like it was helping the raid more than tempest, enrage was never a problem for us.

Obviously, depends on your group.
On progression however, the extra dps is more often than not, the deciding factor if you defeat the boss.

While Cauterize is nice, if this is being procced - Your healers (Or you if you stood in shit); did a poor job.

You obviously have it, because its the best of the tier - But a well timed Greater Invis would be awesome for Crush.

Temporal is great, because its off the gcd, and you can use it just before the stomp, to negate all the dmg you take, while also getting healed for tons if you die (Duo to Cauterize)

Tight enrages, aswell as Temporal actually healing, is why I believe Temporal is better. It is obviously a timing spell, and requires thought to gain the maximum use, but so is nearly every min - max scenario.

You can use whenever you like, I believe that this tier nearly every talent is viable, just that some might be slightly better than others.

[Deleted]

First of all Lol i did say tempest all the way through my post =O Temporal ofc.. ill edit that =)

My point was, if you time Barrier right and get stunned in the GCD you wont lose much, specially since assuming using temporal at this time and then try to cast any other spell than a bomb at this point would get interrupted by stun any way, plus as i tried to describe(however badly it was) Barrier will absorb more damage than temporal will heal on garalon. I am not arguing that temporal is not a dps gain, though i think its small to non existent on garalon.

While you say you wipe more often than not to enrage timers i can not really think of any other fight than H Garaj were we had troubles with enrage, mostly i find enrage timers to get beat with a proper execution and less people dying in the raid. In Garaj case and many other fights i am using temporal shield.

[Spectral]

Using barrier is not great, its a loss of a dps gcd! Rather use that Temporal Shield - That skill is OP and win. (Off GCD)

Mitigating damage is still superior to healing it. Healers are often looking at health bars and don't have any idea if you've used something that will heal you; they see your health drop and decide to fix it as quickly as possible. There are very, very few fights that are DPS races, saving ~100K healing for one GCD can be an excellent play decision.

[Imnick]

Ice Barrier seems the superior choice for Empress, you can't be healed in the zone but absorb effects still apply and you can sit in there for ages.

[dennisdkramer]

Mitigating damage is still superior to healing it. Healers are often looking at health bars and don't have any idea if you've used something that will heal you; they see your health drop and decide to fix it as quickly as possible. There are very, very few fights that are DPS races, saving ~100K healing for one GCD can be an excellent play decision.

You're right that mitigating damage is better, and you're right that healers often don't know about things like this. The problem is you're neglecting that the ability itself is amazing when used right and accounted for. Lightwell was the strongest healing ability in a priest's arsenal as long as people used it, you jst have to communicate to your raid the importance of it. Same goes for healthstones. As a feral, I often communicate with my healers that they don't have to worry about getting range on me because I heal myself well enough with predator's swiftness. As a mage, you need to communicate with your healers and let them know when you are going to be able to heal yourself.

[Spectral]

You're right that mitigating damage is better, and you're right that healers often don't know about things like this. The problem is you're neglecting that the ability itself is amazing when used right and accounted for. Lightwell was the strongest healing ability in a priest's arsenal as long as people used it, you jst have to communicate to your raid the importance of it. Same goes for healthstones. As a feral, I often communicate with my healers that they don't have to worry about getting range on me because I heal myself well enough with predator's swiftness. As a mage, you need to communicate with your healers and let them know when you are going to be able to heal yourself.

You're absolutely correct, I didn't mean to suggest that self healing abilities aren't great as well. I think this comes back to the part where you have to know who you're playing with. If you're in a pug, just go ahead and take Ice Barrier and make your healer's lives easier without making them think about anything extra. In a casual guild, it can go either way, to some extent. If you think you have good healers and they're comfortable with recognizing fairly complex (in the context of thing dealing with other fight mechanics) things in a quick hurry, letting them know your plans is great. Just make damned sure you follow up on those plans! In an advanced raiding guild, competence of healers can be pretty well assumed, and simply informing them of your intention before a fight should be something they can deal with.