Mage Bomb in 5.2

[Shangalar]

Dear all,

Since there is a significant change to our Bomb mechanics incoming, I am opening this thread for discussion on the matter as it might be a significant issue. (My planned 5.2 thread will be up the minute I see official notes released).

The topic:
Glyph of Fire Blast which allowed us to proc secondary Nether Tempest damage, spread Living Bomb and trigger the Frost Bomb explosion has been removed, effectively disabling all three mechanics.

What do you think about this change and how will it affect our bomb pick and gameplay?

[Polarthief]

LB is now crap unless you get like 0 Haste. NT is just vastly better with more Haste.

Also due to our trinket choices being pretty poor, and BoH being quite nice, FB won't be that great except fights that have a ton of huge-target-cap AoE (and I haven't seen a single ToT fight yet, so idk if there are any). Plus, that cast time. Blech.

NT wins, but that's just my two cents (and a few others that I've heard from)

[jtmzac]

I don't think we're going to really have a choice. With breath of the hydra being such a good trinket we have to use nether tempest.

We really need everything we can get to improve our mobility. I'm already dreading tortos and durumu.

I think the only reason to not use nether tempest will be if the cleave is causing problems with mechanics. (breaking cc, pulling threat etc.)

[Polarthief]

I think the only reason to not use nether tempest will be if the cleave is causing problems with mechanics. (breaking cc, pulling threat etc.)

Tell me what bomb WOULDN'T cause that issue.

My guild's pushing H Amber-shaper this week and we're doing the burn strat. I'm not even allowed to use a bomb when breaking people out/killing goo because of cleave issue.

[Deleted]

I will most likely be using NT on every boss.

[gallamann]

The difference with LB is ability to spread it to two additional targets via Gylph is removed. However I don't see this as drastic, more of a QoL change that is not in the mages favor. Prior 5.2 we spent 2.5 seconds to get up 3 Living Bombs, with 5.2 we will need to spend 3 seconds and tab target to do so. Another half a second get it on 3 targets when needed. Mainly a change to our AoE style, no impact on single target game play. Lately I have felt my AoE is more effective by spreading big Ignites and Pyro DoT's over using Fireblast and Blizzard, so this delays the launch of my first fireball by 1/2 a second.

Can't really comment on the other two as I have not given enough play time to do so. However, I may move to Frost Bomb for AoE packs (fire and forget) while staying with LB for single target encounters

[Polarthief]

The difference with LB is ability to spread it to two additional targets via Gylph is removed. However I don't see this as drastic, more of a QoL change that is not in the mages favor. Prior 5.2 we spent 2.5 seconds to get up 3 Living Bombs, with 5.2 we will need to spend 3 seconds and tab target to do so. Another half a second get it on 3 targets when needed. Mainly a change to our AoE style, no impact on single target game play. Lately I have felt my AoE is more effective by spreading big Ignites and Pyro DoT's over using Fireblast and Blizzard, so this delays the launch of my first fireball by 1/2 a second.

Can't really comment on the other two as I have not given enough play time to do so. However, I may move to Frost Bomb for AoE packs (fire and forget) while staying with LB for single target encounters

While true, keep in mind that Inferno Blast is part of Fire's rotation, and therefore, you still only spent 1 EFFECTIVE second spreading LB to 3 targets.

In addition, only LB's DoT scales with haste, which means only HALF of its damage goes up, unlike NT which is a 'normal' scaling DoT, and LB which decreases the detonation time and cooldown with Haste. LB will be left in the dust as it scales poorly with Haste, and FB will be gone too because of DoT trinkets.

There really is no contest. NT, unless you're Frost and not using either LotC nor BoH (in which case, FB)

[jtmzac]

Tell me what bomb WOULDN'T cause that issue.

My guild's pushing H Amber-shaper this week and we're doing the burn strat. I'm not even allowed to use a bomb when breaking people out/killing goo because of cleave issue.

They all cause cleave problems but frost bomb is still the easiest to manage. Nether tempest cleaves a lot more often then frost bomb or living bomb and its easier to hold off casting frost bomb then trying to time nether tempest to fall off at the right time.

I'm still using frost bomb and only noticed nt breaking cc because a guildie was on his alt mage during our normal lei shei kill this week. It caused us to wipe several times.

---------- Post added 2013-03-05 at 05:26 AM ----------

There really is no contest. NT, unless you're Frost and not using either LotC nor BoH (in which case, FB)

Even then nt might be worth it just for the extra mobility.

This tier is going to be very interesting without scorch. We really need a lower cd on ice floes.

[Polarthief]

They all cause cleave problems but frost bomb is still the easiest to manage. Nether tempest cleaves a lot more often then frost bomb or living bomb and its easier to hold off casting frost bomb then trying to time nether tempest to fall off at the right time.

I'm still using frost bomb and only noticed nt breaking cc because a guildie was on his alt mage during our normal lei shei kill this week. It caused us to wipe several times.

And Frost Bomb wouldn't cause that same issue?

[Elegiac]

Nether Tempest is the clear choice. It's quite silly, really - Living Bomb should, in all fairness, spread itself when it's cast.

[jtmzac]

And Frost Bomb wouldn't cause that same issue?

Frost bomb doesn't cleave anywhere near as often as nt which makes it a lot easier to manage.

I wonder whatever happened to that glyph that decreased the cleave/aoe range of our bomb spells? It could be useful and we definitely could use more glyphs.

[Deleted]

I always used LB, just because it was so convenient spreading it...in the few hc bosses i have seen i switched to NT, depending on the encounter.

I'm going to use NT if i stay arcane(some issues.. :> ), and i'll use LB if i switch to fire. FB on massive aoe fights, but just because i'd probably mess up multi targetting with NT.

[Polarthief]

Frost bomb doesn't cleave anywhere near as often as nt which makes it a lot easier to manage.

I wonder whatever happened to that glyph that decreased the cleave/aoe range of our bomb spells? It could be useful and we definitely could use more glyphs.

It was intended to "not break CCs", which they scrapped for some dumb reason.

Granted, it should just be built into the spells.

---------- Post added 2013-03-04 at 01:37 PM ----------

I always used LB, just because it was so convenient spreading it...in the few hc bosses i have seen i switched to NT, depending on the encounter.

I'm going to use NT if i stay arcane(some issues.. :> ), and i'll use LB if i switch to fire. FB on massive aoe fights, but just because i'd probably mess up multi targetting with NT.

Idk why you would bother with LB regardless of specc; there's no point to use it.

- Only half of it scales with Haste, while both NT and FB scale 100% with haste
- Ticks once every three seconds (before haste); NT ticks once every second. (Quicker proccs from trinkets)
- Spreading is gone
- More annoying to manage than NT

[Firebert]

The topic:
Glyph of Fire Blast which allowed us to proc secondary Nether Tempest damage, spread Living Bomb and trigger the Frost Bomb explosion has been removed, effectively disabling all three mechanics.

What do you think about this change and how will it affect our bomb pick and gameplay?

I already knew about this change.

It's going to be annoying for me, because I used to group up targets, LB, spread with FB, and then Frost Nova before the three bombs explode to boost my damage with Shatter. I'm not sure if it was rrrrrrridiculous damage (as it depended on targets near you).

Going to be sticking with LB, though, Fire Blast might end up being removed from my bars (or at least moved further to the right).

---------- Post added 2013-03-04 at 10:37 PM ----------

Idk why you would bother with LB regardless of specc; there's no point to use it.

Instant cast.
Doesn't have an annoying sound artifact if you cast it too closely to other spells.

[Polarthief]

Instant cast.
Doesn't have an annoying sound artifact if you cast it too closely to other spells.

Ignoring sound effects because I don't play with sounds on anyways, NT is instant cast too, and just a hell of a lot better, so again, I fail to see the point in LB until they buff the explosion to scale with Haste.

[Malfecto]

They could not buff the explosion and remove the target limit? I dunno... seems that these changes to inferno blast/fire blast have destroyed the uniqueness of each bomb.

[Polarthief]

They could not buff the explosion and remove the target limit? I dunno... seems that these changes to inferno blast/fire blast have destroyed the uniqueness of each bomb.

Removing the target limit would make LB too strong in AoE and keep it too weak in ST.

If they buff the base damage of the explosion, then at lower gear levels, it's too strong when compared to NT/FB.

The ONLY thing they can do at this point is either make the explosion scale with Haste, or a (much) higher SP coefficient. As it is right now, at low gear, all 3 bombs are roughly equal ST. NT and FB start leaping ahead of LB once you get geared, which then makes it inferior. Letting it scale with haste will bring it back up to speed, but if they don't want to do that, they could give it a higher SP coefficient. Either way, it'd accomplish the same thing.

[Elegiac]

They could not buff the explosion and remove the target limit? I dunno... seems that these changes to inferno blast/fire blast have destroyed the uniqueness of each bomb.

None of them are particularly unique. In fact, that Tier of talents should be scrapped, Living Bomb made baseline for Fire again.

[Deleted]

Tell me what bomb WOULDN'T cause that issue.

My guild's pushing H Amber-shaper this week and we're doing the burn strat. I'm not even allowed to use a bomb when breaking people out/killing goo because of cleave issue.

Then your guild is doing it "wrong*", or people are cleaving/single targeting the boss, We do burn tac as well, Nuking on the 8th scalpel tanks eat 4 pools each. I have been using NT on reshaped tanks, has never been a problem.
*but then again if you have proper raid dps, reshaped tanks should go down fast enough without NT, so its not a "problem" any way, as its only burn and not loosing stacks on monstrosity that is important in that strat. I do not use AP during the ramp up in ph1 because when i do tank goes down so fast i get in trouble with stack timer before next scalpel :P

*edit: Gz on zorlok btw(what a bitch ><)

On topic ill agree the change to FB glyph and the Proc on dot trinkets(again.. facepalm) makes anything other than NT pretty useless. The only thing that made LB come out very slightly ahead on 2 fights this tier was the glyph and nothing else. Guess blizzard felt our aoe was too strong(lol)

[elpadrino293]

Guess blizzard felt our aoe was too strong(lol)

i think it was more along the line of fire mages using living bomb in every situation, and it didn't make it feel like much of a choice between talents. same trouble with the lvl 90 talents, every fire mage took invocation.