[Fire] 5.1 Combustion

[Deleted]

I am not sure how people are saying 70k is easy or average.. Lets say your Pyroblast is critting for 250k on average, and you hit 4 in a row (I am assuming 16.94% mastery as that is what I have at iLvl 488 (28.96 crit, 8.64 haste)

Pyro 16.94% Ignite Running
250000 42350 21175
250000 42350 21175 42350
250000 42350 21175 63525
250000 42350 21175 84700

You are forgetting 3 things
1) ignite will tick in that mean time
2) The already excisting ignite prior to the 4 Pyroblasts
3) At the start of this 4 pyro's there is a Fireball>Pyro which hit at the same time big Ignite booster right there.

[Deleted]

I am not sure how people are saying 70k is easy or average.. Lets say your Pyroblast is critting for 250k on average, and you hit 4 in a row (I am assuming 16.94% mastery as that is what I have at iLvl 488 (28.96 crit, 8.64 haste)

Pyro 16.94% Ignite Running
250000 42350 21175
250000 42350 21175 42350
250000 42350 21175 63525
250000 42350 21175 84700

Even with this 'best case' 4 crits in a row, you are getting a 85k ignite (very nice). BUT this is a perfect case. More likely you are coming in around 40-55k. Either everyone's pyro's are hitting for much much higher then mine, my mastery is too low or I am just missing something.. or I just don't crit 4 time in a row with Pyro as my combustions aren't nearly 70k+ average on a normal non +dmg debuffed boss.

In addition to the post above, you're forgetting the Mastery buff. 5% additional mastery pushes you to 21.94% and changes your maths; then add in a hardcast Fireball into the equation which can crit for ~200K at your gear, not so difficult to imagine now.


Personally, I'm running 22.46% Mastery (sub-par itemization) and 27.73% crit raid-buffed; my Pyros crit for 250K fairly regularly.

BEST case scenario on-pull.

HS + HU procced, PoM, Berserking, Alter Time Popped.

Hardcast Fireball + Insta Pyro!, both crit. 450K
Pyro! crits. 250K
Alter Time (no PoM as it'll hit/crit for less)
Pyro! crits. 250K
Pyro! crits. 250K.
Combust.

Immediate Damage  22.46%  Ignite   Running Total
450K             101070   50535
250K             56150    28075     86610
250K             56150    28075     114685
250K             56150    28075     142760

So, your theory of '70K Combustions are rare' isn't really valid, no offence.


EDIT: Fixed my maths (as my Mastery value was wrong, realised this), even so my 'best' case scenario is a 142K Combust, which is still double that of 70K. Considering getting HS+HU isn't rare and considering that, if you build Ignite properly and get a few crits here and there (so not even a perfect scenario), it's not 'difficult' to get 70K combustions regularly.

[azzgunther]

The rankings look very similar to DS where fire dominated most of the fights, if not all of them.

Only based on the fallacy that the lottery winners in the top 100 parses were representative of the entire class; a fallacy that exists because the player base as a whole has not yet educated themselves on how to use WoL's numbers.

I checked last spring and summer on raidbots (and just checked again now) and Fire was between 5th-8th best DPS spec on the whole, with some fights that were especially good and others that were very difficult. This was based on using the 'all parses' option which...you know...takes into account all players, and not the 100 people who had 1/10,000 odds occur in their favor.

There's no disputing that it's the #1 DPS spec right now though.

[Pulski]

It was suppossed to compensate for the pyro nerf that never made it in. I think mages like Lhivera noted that they may have over compensated.

What is truly disappointing and disheartening, is seeing how this makes the rift between mage damage and everyone else's damage bigger.

How can we non mages honestly compete?

The Combustion change came before the proposed Pyro nerf. The idea was simply to keep the damage the same while changing the mechanic. Lhivera did say they may have overdone it though.

[announced]

It was suppossed to compensate for the pyro nerf that never made it in. I think mages like Lhivera noted that they may have over compensated.

What is truly disappointing and disheartening, is seeing how this makes the rift between mage damage and everyone else's damage bigger.

How can we non mages honestly compete?

I know a frost dk thats the same ilvl as me at 482.. he consistently pulls the exact same dps i do.. sometimes slightly less as a mage but overall hes really strong.. should we therefore nerf frost dks? every class can pull decent numbers if u are really good... we have an enh shammy thats doing really high numbers as well.. and hes only 479 ilvl.. great dps depends on taking advantage of the fight like cleaving combustion on garalon from body to legs.. and such. any class can pull good numbers.... some mages just got super lucky.. or were on fights like elegon where combustion double dips cause of increased dmg taken.

[Deleted]

I know a frost dk thats the same ilvl as me at 482.. he consistently pulls the exact same dps i do

then you have to be playing way worse than him. thats the only explanation

[Arghh151]

In addition to the post above, you're forgetting the Mastery buff. 5% additional mastery pushes you to 21.94% and changes your maths; then add in a hardcast Fireball into the equation which can crit for ~200K at your gear, not so difficult to imagine now.


Personally, I'm running 22.46% Mastery (sub-par itemization) and 27.73% crit raid-buffed; my Pyros crit for 250K fairly regularly.

BEST case scenario on-pull.

HS + HU procced, PoM, Berserking, Alter Time Popped.

Hardcast Fireball + Insta Pyro!, both crit. 450K
Pyro! crits. 250K
Alter Time (no PoM as it'll hit/crit for less)
Pyro! crits. 250K
Pyro! crits. 250K.
Combust.

Immediate Damage  22.46%  Ignite   Running Total
450K             101070   50535
250K             56150    28075     86610
250K             56150    28075     114685
250K             56150    28075     142760

So, your theory of '70K Combustions are rare' isn't really valid, no offence.


EDIT: Fixed my maths (as my Mastery value was wrong, realised this), even so my 'best' case scenario is a 142K Combust, which is still double that of 70K. Considering getting HS+HU isn't rare and considering that, if you build Ignite properly and get a few crits here and there (so not even a perfect scenario), it's not 'difficult' to get 70K combustions regularly.

Fully agree with your noted about haste, existing ignite, etc. I was looking at a very simple case. However even with your new calculations, we have to see how difficult the odds are... Especially when you are trying to line them up with procs, and optimal use of combustion.

E.g. At 29% crit (where many of us are right now) the odds of getting 5 consective crits (using the 1.5 multiplier) are

First Crit	43.50%
2 in a row	18.92%
3 in a row	8.23%
4 in a row	3.58%
5 in a row	1.56%

So even with your example, getting the 86k crit has an 8% chance and getting the 5 is a 1.56% chance. Yet everyone is saying, 70k is average..... to me it seems to involve a boat load of luck with crits at the right time, versus if you aren't getting 70k-130k crits consistently, you fail. To get > 70k with this set up, you are looking at less then a 10% chance... and that is if you time it right and don't have a mechanic stop you from being able to string it all along and combust.

I have seen the great combustions, in fact I have had some great ones myself where I am just blown away when things line up. But it seems the rhetoric here is that huge combustions are the norm. I my view when if you look at the odds, they are stacked heavily against you. This is why I believe that Mages can't be said to be crazy OP right now, cause the logs are only showing the 1% where things went perfect, when in reality the majority of players will be around a 50%.

However I do believe the new ignite mechanic is going to get the nerf bat, clearly when the stars align it is unreal dps... i just wish they aligned 20 seconds before a 1% wipe!

[Deleted]

Fully agree with your noted about haste, existing ignite, etc. I was looking at a very simple case. However even with your new calculations, we have to see how difficult the odds are... Especially when you are trying to line them up with procs, and optimal use of combustion.

E.g. At 29% crit (where many of us are right now) the odds of getting 5 consective crits (using the 1.5 multiplier) are

First Crit	43.50%
2 in a row	18.92%
3 in a row	8.23%
4 in a row	3.58%
5 in a row	1.56%

So even with your example, getting the 86k crit has an 8% chance and getting the 5 is a 1.56% chance. Yet everyone is saying, 70k is average..... to me it seems to involve a boat load of luck with crits at the right time, versus if you aren't getting 70k-130k crits consistently, you fail. To get > 70k with this set up, you are looking at less then a 10% chance... and that is if you time it right and don't have a mechanic stop you from being able to string it all along and combust.

I have seen the great combustions, in fact I have had some great ones myself where I am just blown away when things line up. But it seems the rhetoric here is that huge combustions are the norm. I my view when if you look at the odds, they are stacked heavily against you. This is why I believe that Mages can't be said to be crazy OP right now, cause the logs are only showing the 1% where things went perfect, when in reality the majority of players will be around a 50%.

However I do believe the new ignite mechanic is going to get the nerf bat, clearly when the stars align it is unreal dps... i just wish they aligned 20 seconds before a 1% wipe!

I personally am not saying 70K is AVERAGE, I'm simply saying it's not rare
Your maths is correct, but USUALLY people are getting their largest combustions with Alter Time and (assuming they are decent players) HS+HU both up, therefore the MOST amount of crits that they "need" to get in a row is 3 (initial Fireball doesn't have to crit, either), with the usual amount being 2; therefore meaning that under Alter Time conditions the rough % chance of you getting your stupidly large combustion is 18.92%. The only reason why this occurs is because chain critting relies on HS+HU both being up and then going on a crit streak; but Alter Time allows this to reset and therefore resets the odds as the second two crits aren't related to the first 2 (or 3).
It's hard to argue that this isn't a tad out of line when you consider the rewards.

Yes, the RANKS show where people are getting consistently high Ignites into Combusts; but even the general state of Fire DPS has gone up as a whole. Lowered Combustion skillcap has made it far, far easier for anyone to get good Ignites and therefore good Combustions. This buff was far from needed. Fire was still one of the better specs single target, arguably best 2-3 target cleave in the game (Combat Rogues better on 2, worse on 3), and competitive AoE where raid situations have presented it (currently Wind Lord is only *realistic* AoE fight). To have a buff, especially one of this magnitude (when taking into account the potential consequences) was rather unnecessary.

[Melwen]

Like 30mins ago i was in LFR 2nd part of Heart of Fear. Anyway i think blizz hotfixed ignite cause my combustions were HALF of the my ignite. I did 80k ignite but my combustion was 40k.

[Ardolas]

Like 30mins ago i was in LFR 2nd part of Heart of Fear. Anyway i think blizz hotfixed ignite cause my combustions were HALF of the my ignite. I did 80k ignite but my combustion was 40k.

maybe u forgot about glyph?

[TheProxy]

Like 30mins ago i was in LFR 2nd part of Heart of Fear. Anyway i think blizz hotfixed ignite cause my combustions were HALF of the my ignite. I did 80k ignite but my combustion was 40k.

Mage in my guild is reporting the same nerf.

[Deleted]

I can confirm this as well, just tested on dummy, ~16k ignite 8k ticks.

[usiris]

Just finished 2nd half of HoF LFR, reporting same ignite/combust change

[Arghh151]

Its official and we also took a huge nerf to Crit... My first run post this nerf was showing a 20%+ decrease in damage.....

http://us.battle.net/wow/en/blog/792...ch_51_Hotfixes

Mage
-Fire
The periodic damage from Combustion has been reduced by 50%.
The critical strike chance multiplier from Critical Mass has been reduced to 1.25 (was 1.5).

[LocNess]

Its official and we also took a huge nerf to Crit... My first run post this nerf was showing a 20%+ decrease in damage.....

http://us.battle.net/wow/en/blog/792...ch_51_Hotfixes

Mage
-Fire
The periodic damage from Combustion has been reduced by 50%.
The critical strike chance multiplier from Critical Mass has been reduced to 1.25 (was 1.5).

Combustion should have been reduced by 33%. CM wasn't needed at all. Time to go frost.

[Rinoa]

Ugh. Why on earth did they reduce Critical Mass to a mere 1.25? >_<

[MrExcelion]

The nerfs do the following for me:

-Lowers the damage of Combustion by about 50%, a spell that is 15-20% of my damage

-Takes away 8.5% crit from Fireball, Scorch, and Pyroblast

Should be at least a 15-20% nerf in damage for me. I feel they may have overshot.

[Rinoa]

Yeah indeed, I have a feeling the CM nerf was a bit over the top seeing as they already killed Combustion.

[Deleted]

Combustion nerf, allright, CM nerf? dafuq.....
Fire is/was cool on several encounters for sure, but for an example, try fire on Will of the Emperor, a freaking twink warlock outdps'd me easily....

Time for Frost it seems.

[jtmzac]

There's no way they'll leave it with such a big nerf. It will be buffed in hotfixes sooner or later. I just hope they don't buff it too quick so that some more mages get to try frost and realise it's actually pretty good.