[Arcane] Doesnt seem that bad!!

[Minimemage]

For what its worth, I believe the arc model in SimC was still using +75% (not +150%) increase in Arcane Charge mana cost until very recently (e.g. yesterday, and it might still be in). So SimC arcane results are likely incorrect.

[dementor]

However - don't try and compare a top notch player to me.

How about a top notch tank to you?

It also had me at >120kdps burn and 72kdps overall on Jin'rokh normal 10.

Tanks in my raid did 85k on Jin'rokh normal 10.

[Deleted]

Just from some quick time on the dummies today, comparing dps from a week ago to tonight, the burst felt weaker (by about 3k in my gear) and the overall was down about 4k. its not a huge amount of 70k area, but without any burst, not playing it since TBC my fire is already kicking out about 68k with only 26% crit, vs the mastery build i had with RoPcane of about 45% mastery I think I will change to fire.

Its a balance between playing what you enjoy and what will let you get in to slightly better raiding, as too many higher end raid leaders want their set ups min/maxed as well as the players who they have with them, 2k dps might not seem a lot, but it can be the difference between a wipe and success at lower gear levels in progression.

[Deleted]

How about a top notch tank to you?


Tanks in my raid did 85k on Jin'rokh normal 10.

Vengeance is still OP.

[schwarzkopf]

Tanks in my raid did 85k on Jin'rokh normal 10.

And just out of interest, your top notch tank - how often did he get the targeted lightning and have to head off somewhere and discharge it ?

Look - I can't play frost, fire is just as crap at my iLvl - and I'm certainly not going to just give up because a few elitists tell me to.

[Soulstrike]

dps is fine.......................until you have to move lol was topping dps on megaera most attempt (150kdps ish) on kill attempt had to move every few 10s and screwed my dps over so yea arcane is fine until there is heavy movement (even icy floe wont save you :P)

[Fichek]

And just out of interest, your top notch tank - how often did he get the targeted lightning and have to head off somewhere and discharge it ?

Look - I can't play frost, fire is just as crap at my iLvl - and I'm certainly not going to just give up because a few elitists tell me to.

That's a great and positive attitude, it's commendable. But what you are doing is refusing to play specs other than arcane for whatever reason (you like arcane or hate other specs, doesn't matter). Don't confuse your determination with thoughts that spec is still good. It's not. It's in the gutter atm.

[velde046]

The trouble is that Arcane was on top...
The nerf wont put us on bottom... this would happen if arcane wasn't a good spec in 5.1
Arcane was one of the top 3 DPS specs.. so 23% nerf dont KILL us.. got it?

Well it kinda seems that buffing other and nerfing mages has done just that. Last night 25m raid we were with 4 mages.... Consistently at the bottom of the DPS list as opposed to before where we would occupy to 6 at least. Nerf was deserved somewhat but this is overkill.
Also I think that rotation has become even more boring. You kinda have to stick to your rotation, less room for experimenting. And I miss the building to six stacks, less charges on my barrage. Really, not liking it at the moment. Most of all with the boring fixed keypresses we have now and the big loss of DPS doesn't help really.

[Mnevis]

If there was some actual data or even some basic math to back up the OPs assertion

http://www.worldoflogs.com/reports/r...e/?s=696&e=919

Here's a (hella-geared) RoP Mage doing quite well. WoL doesn't have actual rankings up yet, and it seems the majority of Mages have gone Fire, but because simulationcraft has it as the worst Mage spec, I've been looking for counter-examples to the prevailing "Arcane is dead, time to go Fire" wisdom.

[dementor]

And just out of interest, your top notch tank - how often did he get the targeted lightning and have to head off somewhere and discharge it ?

Not sure, I was sat on the first boss. The dps goes from 188k in first place to 165k in last place, and I am sure one of the dps got fucked with RNG (bad procs and/or fixated with lightning tons). You didn't want to be compared to "top tier players," yet you claimed arcane was fine doing 72k. I just thought I would put it in perspective for you. Like Fichek said, if you enjoy it, then play it, but I will make counter arguments to things like "Arcane is fine," when your proof is 72k.

@Velde: For sure! For how "easy" arcane was, frost is way easier. I spend all my time waiting for frozen orb to come off of cooldown because I am sick of spamming frostbolt. At least arcane had a somewhat dynamic rotation. Despite people saying that fire is better for anything over 500 ilvl, I find frost to be better at 510 ilvl. I have about 22% crit with arcane brilliance fully reforged and regemmed which just isn't enough to stack high combusts for good ignites or to reliably proc pyroblast. To me, fire becomes good when pyroblast and pyroblast dots out damage fireball. With my gear, even with good rng, that just isn't the case.

The beginning of this tier is definitely frustrating, especially for me because I just joined a new guild at the end of last tier. Despite ranking on most every fight of last tier both as an arcane mage in 5.1 and as a fire mage in 5.0, I am not afraid to admit I am definitely struggling at the moment. All I can say is hang in there. I mained a hunter in cata, and going into DS it felt exactly the same way. All the melee got a buff, all the casters had a legendary and hunters just sat by themselves. But mid/end tier hunters were competing with everyone. We just have to get some of the new gears, and we will be just fine.

[Polarthief]

IW-Mastery-LB Arcane Mage here, and I'm resorting to weaving in Frostfire Bolt and Fire Blast to fish for AM procs.

It's certainly made the spec more interesting without adding too many buttons.

Firebert.
Wat r u doin.
Firebert.
Stahp.

Seriously though, please stop before it catches on and they end up nerfing FFB somehow, thus causing Frost and FFB Mages (Fire using FFB glyph) to hate you D:


On a semi-related note though, how's that for DPS? It workin' at all?

[naowin]

Duno about you guys but since 5.2 i have been struggeling to get above 135k on most fights. i Find it super hard to beat those locks and spriests up in the 170k+ dps range (single target).

[Deleted]

spriests up in the 170k+ dps range (single target).

Spriests got way overbuffed, they need some of their buffs reverted.

[Elegiac]

From the front page of MMO-Champ, regarding the Dev inteviews:

"Blizzard feels that a highly skilled player can take almost any spec and do very well with it."

Have fun, those that stuck to Arcane.

[Firebert]

On a semi-related note though, how's that for DPS? It workin' at all?

DPS is low, but I don't know if I've got the priority right. As AB costs a huge amount of mana at 4 stacks, I'm doing:

0) ABarr to prevent wasted stacks after being CCed/etc.
1) AB at 5s remaining on AC if AM isn't up
2) AM at 5s remaining on AC
3) LB
4) FFB after refreshing AC
5) Fire Blast
6) FFB

[zomgDPS]

For a spec that "doesn't seem so bad", its curious that we find it at the very bottom of all specs this tier.

The WOL results are out. Arcane is, well, dead last. Seems pretty bad to me, but then again, I'm not actually surprised. I pretty much called it like a month ago?

[schwarzkopf]

For a spec that "doesn't seem so bad", its curious that we find it at the very bottom of all specs this tier.

The WOL results are out. Arcane is, well, dead last. Seems pretty bad to me, but then again, I'm not actually surprised. I pretty much called it like a month ago?

Firstly zomg, I'd like to apologise. I am frequently targeted as someone who is a very negative person - so I try to purposely maintain a positive outlook on things. Seems it is time to face reality

Here is my executive summary of how right you are:

Current top 200 contains TWO mages, that's 1% - 1% is also called a statistical anomaly (meaning they don't belong there at all). Mages represent 3 out of 24 dps specs - making 1% a clear manifestation of the overkill Blizzard has done on mages this patch. Half the nerf was all that was required.

Top five spots  on the dps rankings for post 5.2:
1 Rogue/Assassination	137kdps
2 Death Knight/Unholy	        127kdps
3 Paladin/Retribution	        125kdps
4 Warlock/Affliction	        125kdps
5 Warlock/Demonology	124kdps

Last four spots on the dps rankings for post 5.2:

20 - Frost @ 108kdps
21 - Fire @ 107kdps
23 - BM Hunter @ 107kdps
24 - Arcane @ 94kdps <----------

http://raidbots.com/dpsbot/Overall_D...14/60/default/

I've recommended my own immediate removal from the raid team until there is a reason to bring a mage to a raid again. We now provide NO unique buffs, or produce - and the lowest DPS possible. As for getting more gear, I've got to get from 480 to 520 iLvl without doing any normal raiding, before I can do normal raiding, I hope you see the fatal flaw in that process.

The sample size is statistically significant, giving a 99%+ chance of systemic problems, and a lower than 1% chance of it being an aboration.

PS: I'm going to continue playing an arcane mage, no I'm not going to quit over this - enjoying the new solo content. But I can't even imagine not being kicked from LFR for this crappy amount of dps.

http://us.battle.net/wow/en/forum/to...7728?page=2#27

---------- Post added 2013-03-08 at 12:05 AM ----------

That's a great and positive attitude, it's commendable. But what you are doing is refusing to play specs other than arcane for whatever reason (you like arcane or hate other specs, doesn't matter). Don't confuse your determination with thoughts that spec is still good. It's not. It's in the gutter atm.

I don't refuse to play other specs, I moved to fire - just before it was nerfed. However I am very poor at managing a pet, so frost seems questionable.

I'm staying arcane, because (back to being positive again) - I cannot imagine that these nerfs will remain that long, specifically for Arcane which is the only DPS spec to be unable to get a median DPS over 100k. If blizzard's history is anything to go by, when they do something the inevitably over do it. So I expect to be back in the middle of the pack within 4 weeks.

[zomgDPS]

Firstly zomg, I'd like to apologise. I am frequently targeted as someone who is a very negative person - so I try to purposely maintain a positive outlook on things. Seems it is time to face reality

Here is my executive summary of how right you are:

Don't worry about it old friend. I long ago realized you were the more 'excitable' type and that I shouldn't really beat you up about it.

I was just working through the numbers, after having spent so much time testing things out on the PTR, things just were a hell of a lot clearer for me :P

But moving on, you are right, this is a systemic problem. I guess now the wait starts. The wait to see what Blizz's fix will be.

[Methusula]

So if history is any indication, we will get a round of buffs for Arcane and Fire which will likely put us right back on top. This of course will lead to(somewhat justifiably) the "OMG Mages are Blizzard's Golden Child" crowd to come out in full force...again.

[schwarzkopf]

But moving on, you are right, this is a systemic problem. I guess now the wait starts. The wait to see what Blizz's fix will be.

I just noticed something else, Arcane DPS is closer to a healer/tank as it is to the top dps.

TOP DPS : 138kdps
ARCANE : 94kdps - difference is 31% (from top dps base)
TOP TANK: 68kdps - difference is 27% (from arcane)
TOP HEALER: 66kdps - difference is 28% (from arcane).