What specs to run for Mythic HFC? (General help thread)

[Deleted]

Hey guys, I am currently running Arcane / Frost. Was wondering if this is still correct or should I swap frost for fire.

http://eu.battle.net/wow/en/characte...Dkola/advanced is my armory any feedback is always taken constructively and appreciated.

Just any general feedback for me would be good, hope you all have a good day.

[JV Chequer]

With your ilvl I'd not recommended run Fire, mainly with u do not have appropriate trinkets.

With Manno' trinket + 4tp + class trinket u can easily go Arcane on every fight and beat Frost on Single target and target swap, even aoe with some pretty good trinket luck.

[Scyclone]

With your ilvl I'd not recommended run Fire, mainly with u do not have appropriate trinkets.

With Manno' trinket + 4tp + class trinket u can easily go Arcane on every fight and beat Frost on Single target and target swap, even aoe with some pretty good trinket luck.

Despite that, I am still ABYSMAL as arcane whenever I've tried it (at ilvl 735 now). I have screwed up playing it so much that I am easily outpacing it as frost in nearly every mythic fight. I am paying relatively close attention to my mana (casting arcane blast only when I am above 93% mana), arcane barrage at the right times and such. Though it feels like I am very horrible at the burn phase. More specifically, I am suffering from using my abilities properly during the burn phase. A lot of time, I would have Mannoroths trinket trigger RIGHT out the door which hurt me badly since (no charges, no arcane missiles), so in a rush to get to 4, pop arcane power and burn onto it. I ultimately find myself at about 65-70% mana with arcane power winding down, and I still haven't even gotten a chance to drop my crystal yet. The net result feels pretty bad...

I'd like any suggestions if you have them JV, though at the moment, I am thinking of going Frost/Fire. (Currently using the PVP Crit trinkets to supplement my lower crit, since I am not yet used to timing things for combustion).

[WarcraftMages]

You need 3 things. A good UI that shows mana breakpoints (not just looking at a mana bar), cooldown macros that bundle things (it's hit before/on the burn) and good keybinds. All that should be improved after finding problems and not just setup once and forget.

Ideally a good UI includes a proper indication of Arcane Charge and other important spells in a very obvious and clean manner (clean = away from other irrelevant spells like looking at the icon of Arcane Blast which is useless since Arcane Blast is never on CD).

[Wilderness]

Despite that, I am still ABYSMAL as arcane whenever I've tried it (at ilvl 735 now). I have screwed up playing it so much that I am easily outpacing it as frost in nearly every mythic fight. I am paying relatively close attention to my mana (casting arcane blast only when I am above 93% mana), arcane barrage at the right times and such. Though it feels like I am very horrible at the burn phase. More specifically, I am suffering from using my abilities properly during the burn phase. A lot of time, I would have Mannoroths trinket trigger RIGHT out the door which hurt me badly since (no charges, no arcane missiles), so in a rush to get to 4, pop arcane power and burn onto it. I ultimately find myself at about 65-70% mana with arcane power winding down, and I still haven't even gotten a chance to drop my crystal yet. The net result feels pretty bad...

I'd like any suggestions if you have them JV, though at the moment, I am thinking of going Frost/Fire. (Currently using the PVP Crit trinkets to supplement my lower crit, since I am not yet used to timing things for combustion).

More practice at Arcane would probably be a good thing, because its single-target burst only gets more crazy the higher your ilvl and the faster your fights.

But if you're that much better at Frost, then play Frost. Its a perfectly good spec for progression on just about any fight in HFC, and it will be better than Fire on progression fights. If you want to go Frost/Fire you can, but they don't complement each other very well in stat selection. Arcane/Frost can work well with a focus on haste as its best for Arcane on single-target and pretty good for Frost on multiple targets. Arcane/Fire with a focus on mastery can also work well, since Mastery is still very good for Arcane and great for Fire in cleave/AoE situations as well. But Frost and Fire have pretty conflicting stats for both single-target and multiple targets.

If you really want to play Fire then play Fire. Its still a decent spec, and you can progress on any fight in M HFC with it. But its not ideal, and both of our other specs are better suited for progression.

[Deleted]

Fire actually is now really similar to arcane gameplay, you have a huge burst each 2 minutes (with combustion+PC+ring+trinket) and then your damage is really low, so I'd only recommend fire if you like arcane style (burst with PC). For fire is (almost) mandatory to have inscription's trinket (with upgrades is 625ilvl), it's perfect because it has ICD of 2minutes so you will have it everytime ring is used (assuming ring is used on cd and at the start of the figth) and you will assure a decent burst (you will have almost 100% crit. with proc plus spec's multiplier)

Basically the best spec is arcane, fire is probably more "fun" (subjective topic) but lower numbers than arcane (because PoF as arcane can produce insane numbers), and frost has good numbers and is too easy to play so if you don't have practice as arcane/fire, the safer bet is frost.

[Scyclone]

Fire actually is now really similar to arcane gameplay, you have a huge burst each 2 minutes (with combustion+PC+ring+trinket) and then your damage is really low, so I'd only recommend fire if you like arcane style (burst with PC). For fire is (almost) mandatory to have inscription's trinket (with upgrades is 625ilvl), it's perfect because it has ICD of 2minutes so you will have it everytime ring is used (assuming ring is used on cd and at the start of the figth) and you will assure a decent burst (you will have almost 100% crit. with proc plus spec's multiplier)

Basically the best spec is arcane, fire is probably more "fun" (subjective topic) but lower numbers than arcane (because PoF as arcane can produce insane numbers), and frost has good numbers and is too easy to play so if you don't have practice as arcane/fire, the safer bet is frost.

Yeah, I tried out fire for a little bit, and it seems to be really hit and miss (and VERY dependent on your groups strategies). During an initial at pull burn, my damage is awesome, but it feels like afterwards I begin to suffer quite dramatically on damage. Cooldowns/trinket procs/etc don't seem to sync up (doubly so when our group does some wierd stuff with it like wait on ring for phase changes of mythic iskar.)

I've kind of put it into my head that Fire has no real control over "when" they do their burn/combustion, and that may actually be something to dissuade me from it. I guess I should give Frost/Arcane a shot huh?

I've also seen frost players lately completely forgo multistrike in favor of haste (they still gear MS, but all enchantments/gems/gear leanings point to haste now) any thoughts on that?

[WarcraftMages]

To have control you require Arcane (trinket luck excluded). Frost can have control de facto since there is little that can go wrong with it. Arcane can in some cases lose some of the control if the timings are really off. e.g. I recently noticed Socrethar is a very un-synced fight for it if the team does not use the ring at all on pull because it can stay doing low dps on conservation phase until the first dominator.

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Let alone the crystal is very unreliable (or rather partially-inapplicable) on it but that's a separate issue.

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It's like Socrethar is tailor made to suck on Arcane if the team uses rings on dominators only.

[Scyclone]

To have control you require Arcane (trinket luck excluded). Frost can have control de facto since there is little that can go wrong with it. Arcane can in some cases lose some of the control if the timings are really off. e.g. I recently noticed Socrethar is a very un-synced fight for it if the team does not use the ring at all on pull because it can stay doing low dps on conservation phase until the first dominator.

- - - Updated - - -

Let alone the crystal is very unreliable (or rather partially-inapplicable) on it but that's a separate issue.

- - - Updated - - -

It's like Socrethar is tailor made to suck on Arcane if the team uses rings on dominators only.

Yeah, so if I was to go Frost/Arcane, which fights should I use which. And what should I do (gear wise) to better accommodate both. Currently, this is my mage: http://us.battle.net/wow/en/characte...Azurena/simple. Don't mind my gem on my helmet (I think I was playing around with Fire spec when I got the helm, so I threw crit in it right away, in hindsight, probably shouldn't have bothered). That aside, I have a multitude of trinkets (Goren, 725 Sandman, Mythic Gaze, Mythic DSI, Heroic Prophecy).

What do you suggest I gear towards if I wanted to try and become more effective in raids. I am generally sitting at the middle of the pack in damage (low on things like Iskar, though high on things like Kormrok, Council, Socrethar [only as frost, and only when I am not on adds], and Velhari [Our current progression boss])

[WarcraftMages]

Now that I read it again, it was a selfish statement. Even an Arcane Orb Arcane Mage can be better than Frost on Socrethar if the rings are used only on Dominators (probably the sanest strategy for reliability reasons) because the single target damage on those few seconds will be superior to any other spec. It's only the overall damage meter that might be cruel.

Yeah, so if I was to go Frost/Arcane, which fights should I use which. And what should I do (gear wise) to better accommodate both. Currently, this is my mage: http://us.battle.net/wow/en/characte...Azurena/simple. Don't mind my gem on my helmet (I think I was playing around with Fire spec when I got the helm, so I threw crit in it right away, in hindsight, probably shouldn't have bothered). That aside, I have a multitude of trinkets (Goren, 725 Sandman, Mythic Gaze, Mythic DSI, Heroic Prophecy).

What do you suggest I gear towards if I wanted to try and become more effective in raids. I am generally sitting at the middle of the pack in damage (low on things like Iskar, though high on things like Kormrok, Council, Socrethar [only as frost, and only when I am not on adds], and Velhari [Our current progression boss])

With 4XTier and class trinket and possibly a Prophecy of Fear for Arcane I don't think the likely factor that needs improvement is the gear per se. I would look into the best rotations for particular fights (that's usually done by reading special threads about it or directly searching for logs). I'm not an expert myself about it, I keep researching most bosses for the latest trends.

[Fenryn]

Despite that, I am still ABYSMAL as arcane whenever I've tried it (at ilvl 735 now). I have screwed up playing it so much that I am easily outpacing it as frost in nearly every mythic fight. I am paying relatively close attention to my mana (casting arcane blast only when I am above 93% mana), arcane barrage at the right times and such. Though it feels like I am very horrible at the burn phase. More specifically, I am suffering from using my abilities properly during the burn phase. A lot of time, I would have Mannoroths trinket trigger RIGHT out the door which hurt me badly since (no charges, no arcane missiles), so in a rush to get to 4, pop arcane power and burn onto it. I ultimately find myself at about 65-70% mana with arcane power winding down, and I still haven't even gotten a chance to drop my crystal yet. The net result feels pretty bad...

I'd like any suggestions if you have them JV, though at the moment, I am thinking of going Frost/Fire. (Currently using the PVP Crit trinkets to supplement my lower crit, since I am not yet used to timing things for combustion).

You're playing Arcane wrong, the correct opener would be getting 1-2 arcane charges and then placing crystal and nuking it, if you happen to get doom nova on the boss all you do with that is use your arcane missiles on the boss and everything else on the crystal. You never burst without placing your crystal, thats all wrong.
Other than that in the burn phase you simply spam arcane blast and arcane missiles untill arcane power runs out, then you evocate and conserve mana again, its not complicated. Arcane is all about stacking your cooldowns, so stacking your crystal + ring + arcane power together.

Also while conserving, dont worry too much about exactly never dropping below 93%, its not the end of the world to drop to 89-90% mana either, ideally you keep your mana within 90-99% and you're all good. Other than that, save missiles for a potential doom nova proc but make sure to cast them before they expire, it's also okay to use missiles on crystal just dont use missiles when the crystal almost expires because of the travel time they will not hit anything.

I honestly think arcane is superior to frost in nearly every situation, so mastering it would definitely be valuable for someone raiding Mythic.

[Scyclone]

You're playing Arcane wrong, the correct opener would be getting 1-2 arcane charges and then placing crystal and nuking it, if you happen to get doom nova on the boss all you do with that is use your arcane missiles on the boss and everything else on the crystal. You never burst without placing your crystal, thats all wrong.
Other than that in the burn phase you simply spam arcane blast and arcane missiles untill arcane power runs out, then you evocate and conserve mana again, its not complicated. Arcane is all about stacking your cooldowns, so stacking your crystal + ring + arcane power together.

Also while conserving, dont worry too much about exactly never dropping below 93%, its not the end of the world to drop to 89-90% mana either, ideally you keep your mana within 90-99% and you're all good. Other than that, save missiles for a potential doom nova proc but make sure to cast them before they expire, it's also okay to use missiles on crystal just dont use missiles when the crystal almost expires because of the travel time they will not hit anything.

I honestly think arcane is superior to frost in nearly every situation, so mastering it would definitely be valuable for someone raiding Mythic.

I had spoken to a few other mages yesterday and one suggested that I open by dropping my crystal and just nuking on it. Now, for the sake of handling arcane missiles and doom proc, is there a way to properly macro for a situation like that where you'd AB on crystal and missiles on the boss?

What is the proper opener for Arcane, and the proper way to handle the burn phase? (I have 4 set, trinket and prophecy for this)

[Deleted]

You're playing Arcane wrong, the correct opener would be getting 1-2 arcane charges and then placing crystal and nuking it, if you happen to get doom nova on the boss all you do with that is use your arcane missiles on the boss and everything else on the crystal. You never burst without placing your crystal, thats all wrong.

I think most top mages just pop crystal on pull and burn everything on it. It seems that getting a doom proc on the boss is worse than nuking prismatic crystal without arcane charges.

[Fenryn]

I had spoken to a few other mages yesterday and one suggested that I open by dropping my crystal and just nuking on it. Now, for the sake of handling arcane missiles and doom proc, is there a way to properly macro for a situation like that where you'd AB on crystal and missiles on the boss?

What is the proper opener for Arcane, and the proper way to handle the burn phase? (I have 4 set, trinket and prophecy for this)

I personally simply manually swap targets when I want to use my missiles on the boss and the arcane blasts on the crystal, but you could probably use a focus target macro or a macro to target last target. With lust on pull you could open with crystal and 0 charges but in general, 1-2 charges sims the highest. On fights where you lust on pull and also move the boss, say Zakuun, I personally open with a pre-casted arcane blast then place crystal + pop arcane power and start nuking the crystal. If you luck out, you get the doom nova on the crystal and you can simply use everything on that, if its on the boss you simply spam all your missiles on the boss and the doom nova will splash on the crystal and the crystal will splash back on the boss.

So in the burn phase, simply pop everything and nuke the crystal and unload your missiles on whatever has your doom nova, if nothing has doom nova just use the missiles on the crystal unless its about to expire, because of the travel time of the arcane missiles and you wouldn't want to waste them. You can use your Presence of Mind to squize in a last arcane blast right before the crystal expires, once arcane power runs out you use evocation and start you conserve phase again.

@ Buzuki

Dropping crystal on pull can work with lust, since you can build the stacks very fast but it's still no guarantee you'll get doom nova on the crystal, the splash damage of the crystal can actually apply doom nova on the boss too. If you happen to get unlucky and doom nova goes on the boss anyway, a 1-2 charge opener would have been better. Although this also depends on when the ring gets popped, if your guild pops the ring instantly on pull, crystal on pull does get better.

[Scyclone]

I personally simply manually swap targets when I want to use my missiles on the boss and the arcane blasts on the crystal, but you could probably use a focus target macro or a macro to target last target. With lust on pull you could open with crystal and 0 charges but in general, 1-2 charges sims the highest. On fights where you lust on pull and also move the boss, say Zakuun, I personally open with a pre-casted arcane blast then place crystal + pop arcane power and start nuking the crystal. If you luck out, you get the doom nova on the crystal and you can simply use everything on that, if its on the boss you simply spam all your missiles on the boss and the doom nova will splash on the crystal and the crystal will splash back on the boss.

So in the burn phase, simply pop everything and nuke the crystal and unload your missiles on whatever has your doom nova, if nothing has doom nova just use the missiles on the crystal unless its about to expire, because of the travel time of the arcane missiles and you wouldn't want to waste them. You can use your Presence of Mind to squize in a last arcane blast right before the crystal expires, once arcane power runs out you use evocation and start you conserve phase again.

@ Buzuki

Dropping crystal on pull can work with lust, since you can build the stacks very fast but it's still no guarantee you'll get doom nova on the crystal, the splash damage of the crystal can actually apply doom nova on the boss too. If you happen to get unlucky and doom nova goes on the boss anyway, a 1-2 charge opener would have been better. Although this also depends on when the ring gets popped, if your guild pops the ring instantly on pull, crystal on pull does get better.

With that having been said, do I continue my burn phase until AP wears off or until I reach 50% mana? I had always seen guides reference burning to 50%?

[Fenryn]

With that having been said, do I continue my burn phase until AP wears off or until I reach 50% mana? I had always seen guides reference burning to 50%?

Just burn untill AP wears off, which usually is at around 50% mana anyway unless you get extremely unlucky with missile procs and only get to arcane blast for the entire duration, then you might drop a bit lower which is not a huge problem either.

Make sure you don't use glyphed AP, its generally not worth using because of the ring being a 2 min cooldown and the class trinket making you spam arcane blast so fast you'll drop too low in mana to make good use of it anyway. (Not saying you are using it, just a side-note)

[Zelendria]

I think most top mages just pop crystal on pull and burn everything on it. It seems that getting a doom proc on the boss is worse than nuking prismatic crystal without arcane charges.

Like I said in a different thread about the same thing.
It's much worse dropping PC on pull and STILL getting MoD on the boss. Now you've wasted the better part of your burn, and ring doing low dmg AB's without gaining the precious MoD on PC.
Crystal on pull is the high risk high reward approach.

[Scyclone]

So following all of this. Gear wise, what should I be looking for in terms of an idea best in slot for Frost/Arcane, including enchants. (Trinkets are easily swapped, armor pieces not so much)

Thoughts?

[Alroxas]

Arcane is all about stacking your cooldowns, so stacking your crystal + ring + arcane power together.

The problem is that Arcane is incredibly RNG dependent for damage output. Getting procs of AM (which lead to procs of 4pc) and Doom Nova procs on the right target greatly affect your DPS especially on the opener.

One thing I did find useful is to have macro AM so that it will channel AM to the focus target (boss with Doom Nova) with a modifier (i.e. ctrl) and channel AM to the primary target without a modifier. This way you can have the best of both worlds of being able to burn AM on the boss (w/ doom nova) without having to target switch.

[Scyclone]

Should I instead start trying to prioritize haste pieces over everything?

Any ideas as to what will be the Best in Slot to allow me to switch between Frost/Arcane as needed would help a lot.