When to swap to Fire?

[Shandodo]

Hey guys, I'm making this thread cause I'm at a crossroads on what do to with my Mage currently.

From what I've seen Fire is doing better then Frost. Now with that said, I would like to know when is a good time to swap from Frost to Fire. I went frost so I could pull better numbers is lower gear, but I think I'm nearing a point where I should swap to Fire, but I'm not 100% on that.

This is my Armory - us [dot] battle [dot] net / wow / en / character / lightninghoof / Eggos / advanced (sorry it wont let me post links :/)

I am currently doing a Test of Valor, and wont finish it till the week after next. (I'll be at 2730 this upcoming week ._.) So I'm currently pretty far from my Meta Gem.

Any help is greatly appreciated, even if you think I should swap to Fire, could you also include some tips. I haven't played Fire since Cataclysm. ^-^

EDIT - Also my groups progression is only 4/12 Normal. We've only been raiding for 2 weeks.

[Kenbud]

Hey guys, I'm making this thread cause I'm at a crossroads on what do to with my Mage currently.

From what I've seen Fire is doing better then Frost. Now with that said, I would like to know when is a good time to swap from Frost to Fire. I went frost so I could pull better numbers is lower gear, but I think I'm nearing a point where I should swap to Fire, but I'm not 100% on that.

This is my Armory - us [dot] battle [dot] net / wow / en / character / lightninghoof / Eggos / advanced (sorry it wont let me post links :/)

I am currently doing a Test of Valor, and wont finish it till the week after next. (I'll be at 2730 this upcoming week ._.) So I'm currently pretty far from my Meta Gem.

Any help is greatly appreciated, even if you think I should swap to Fire, could you also include some tips. I haven't played Fire since Cataclysm. ^-^

EDIT - Also my groups progression is only 4/12 Normal. We've only been raiding for 2 weeks.

There have been numerous threads about this exact topic and all end in anger and infractions. At the risk of starting another one of these I will say don't try swapping till at the least 530 ilvl, provided of course you are well itemized for fire at that ilvl. Click on my signature and look at my logs, you will see frost does very well even past 530 but before anyone starts their "yur bad if you don't play fire" rant and telling me I'm wrong fire will surpass frost the higher ilvl you get

[Pyromelter]

Hey guys, I'm making this thread cause I'm at a crossroads on what do to with my Mage currently.

From what I've seen Fire is doing better then Frost. Now with that said, I would like to know when is a good time to swap from Frost to Fire. I went frost so I could pull better numbers is lower gear, but I think I'm nearing a point where I should swap to Fire, but I'm not 100% on that.

This is my Armory - us [dot] battle [dot] net / wow / en / character / lightninghoof / Eggos / advanced (sorry it wont let me post links :/)

I am currently doing a Test of Valor, and wont finish it till the week after next. (I'll be at 2730 this upcoming week ._.) So I'm currently pretty far from my Meta Gem.

Any help is greatly appreciated, even if you think I should swap to Fire, could you also include some tips. I haven't played Fire since Cataclysm. ^-^

EDIT - Also my groups progression is only 4/12 Normal. We've only been raiding for 2 weeks.

What time is "good" is dependent on how you like to play. At 515, frost and fire won't be much different, except with really good RNG. The absolute earliest you can switch and not hurt your raid team is 505, so if you are a fan of fire maging, now would be fine. If you prefer frost, you can really play frost well into heroics without hurting your raid team.

The time you want to definitely look into switching would be over 530, fire starts really pulling ahead with more consistently when you hit that level.

If you are really bent on going for fire, make sure you use your coin on Dark Animus to go for a normal version of Cha-Ye's which is a sick trinket for fire.

[Polarthief]

There have been numerous threads about this exact topic and all end in anger and infractions. At the risk of starting another one of these I will say don't try swapping till at the least 530 ilvl, provided of course you are well itemized for fire at that ilvl. Click on my signature and look at my logs, you will see frost does very well even past 530 but before anyone starts their "yur bad if you don't play fire" rant and telling me I'm wrong fire will surpass frost the higher ilvl you get

This sounds about right.

I'd say 35% crit ABSOLUTE MINIMUM with AB/MA on your character sheet. You want to shoot for 40-45% though (once you start gathering heroic gear, you should be 48-50%, and in BiS, around 52% or so)

[syandell86]

I had to wait until I was at about 45% self-buffed.

[Vellox]

I tried doing the switch around 35-36% crit but that didnt quite cut it. I tried again at 38% crit and that was much better. At that point fire is playable but it is still about the same as frost. Fire doesn't definitively pull ahead until about 40% crit.

[Quilm]

I didn't switch till 40% crit with 4 piece, 4 piece is a little much but I knew I was getting it so i could wait with frost giving such consistent numbers at the time, 535itlvl with 44% crit now and the dps numbers are great itlvl isn't as big of a deal as having the right gear to make the switch

[Smigel]

When ToT first came out, a lot of people said don't switch until 510-515. Some will tell you not to switch until 515-520. The first person here is suggesting you not switch until at least 530 (which means basically half of your gear is heroic). Someone else said the absolute earliest is 505.

So if you take in to consideration everyone's advice, the right time to switch is somewhere between 505 and 530 ilvl.

But really, the answer is: play Fire if you like playing Fire.