Arcane is behind FFB in single target dps?

[Ramuh]

OK, commenting to all the first repliers:

- for gap and "bad gear": Arcane was considered better than FFB starting with ulduar gear. This mage's gear is on t9 level. So it should be way past the point where "arcane shines". The same applies to "you need more haste" comment: I have already about 150-200 more haste than arcane mages had in ulduar times.
- for LB hitting the other dummy: read carefully, I've already accounted for that, and around 400 dps is already substracted from FFB numbers.
- no the dummy was not under 35% health, so no bonus from MF is applied to FFB DPS
- to Malkhor specifically: if listed arcane priority is fucked, then which one is not?
- to Ashrana: since I've been measuring dps and not damage done, dpsing till oom sounds fine to me.
- gear: yes the gear is somewhat crit-centric. However, the only option to switch crit to haste is to replace those 6 sp/spirit and sp/crit gems. If I replace them to 6 haste gems, that'd be losing around 90 sp to get 120 haste. Do you really think such tradeoff will give me extra 500 or so dps?
- as for cooldowns, I've already said that I'll do a separate series of tests with cooldowns.
- TTW: agree, but would you expect it to be 100% uptime on a boss fight? If so, how?

As Poldara pointed out you get TTW from well having a tank. Thats 12% more dmg without doing anything different

Well, in Ulduar Gear Arcane was not considered better. Fire/TTW was considered better. Every Mage played Fire/TTW in Ulduar including me. Arcane did get the Top Spec in 3.2.0 or 3.2.2 when Arcane Blast charges could be stacked to 4 and MBAM did cost no Mana.

Additionally Living bomb hitting multiple Targets yields more Hot Streak Procs.

Gearwise, Both Trinkets are absolutely terrible for Arcane (they are absolutely horrible in general :>).

Arcane lives on Cooldowns (even more so with 4-t10) whereas ffb has only one. Why you did not use them lies beyond my imagination. Use those CDs!


Frostfire is dead since 3.1 when Fire/TTW outscaled Frostfire. It shined once more at TOGC25 Anub with incredible AOE but thats a specific fight with specific needs.

Since Frostfire is virtually the same as Fireball, switch to that, do more dps and it gets nice buffs next patch which bring it on par with Arcane.

[brettizzle]

...?

[Netherinfern0]

no CDs (wtf?)

So you want to see your average DPS, and ur actually using CD's...

[Ceara]

OK, commenting to all the first repliers:

- for gap and "bad gear": Arcane was considered better than FFB starting with ulduar gear. This mage's gear is on t9 level. So it should be way past the point where "arcane shines". The same applies to "you need more haste" comment: I have already about 150-200 more haste than arcane mages had in ulduar times.
- to Ashrana: since I've been measuring dps and not damage done, dpsing till oom sounds fine to me.
- TTW: agree, but would you expect it to be 100% uptime on a boss fight? If so, how?

Let me address these:

1. I think you're wrong about mages' gear in Ulduar. I had 550 haste in Naxx.
2. DPSing until OOM isn't fine when comparing these specs, because Arcane's DPS differs depending on the length of the fight. Arcane is more about mana management than it is a rotation.
3. TTW is almost always up because almost every tank has a slowing effect. Thunderclap, JotJ and (can't remember the DK talent) all give you the ToTW bonus.

[vlabakje]

- TTW: agree, but would you expect it to be 100% uptime on a boss fight? If so, how?

TtW will proc off of:

Deathknight - Icy Touch
Druid - Infected Wounds
Hunter - Concussive Shot, Concussive Barrage, Frost Trap, Wing Clip
Mage - Blast Wave, Cone of Cold, Frost Bolt, Improved Blizzard, Slow,
Priest - Mind Flay
Paladin - Avengers Shield, Judgements of the Just
Rogue - Blade Twisting, Crippling Poison, Deadly Throw,
Shaman - Earthbind Totem, Frost Shock
Warlock - Aftermath, Curse of Exhaustion
Warrior - Hamstring, Piercing Howl, Shield Bash, Thunder Clap

correct me if im wrong

[AnnulV]

Well, in Ulduar Gear Arcane was not considered better. Fire/TTW was considered better. Every Mage played Fire/TTW in Ulduar including me.

no.

[Ramuh]

yea well most of them

[Chaonar]

AnnuIV,

how about being constructive and instead of spamming "your <insert term here> is wrong", just tell how should it look like if it was right?

If you see the rotation as wrong, than what would be your version of the right rotation? ABx4, MB is currently listed as mana dump/highest dps rotation for arcane, and I'm using it.

What do you mean by "your restrictions on mana use"? Elaborate.

To all:

for god's sake, read the initial post in full before replying to it. I've already mentioned multiple times that LB and Ignite damage on 2nd target is ALREADY EXCLUDED from ffb's numbers, yet people still speak about it.

So far, we have the following summary (trolls and unconstructive replies excluded)

- should add 12% more damage to arcane numbers due to TTW
- arcane rotation used (abx4, mbarr) is not optimal - someone post optimal rotation then
- should include cooldowns into the picture (I've already said I'm doing so next test)
- gear difference, crit->haste switch (I've already mentioned that)

if you account about 400 dps for #1 (12% TTW) and another 150 (I'm really being generous for 90sp to 120 haste), it'd end up with arcane doing about 8-10% more dps than ffb in comparable gear. Is it what you would expect? or you'd expect a bigger gap?

[Ceara]

if you account about 400 dps for #1 (12% TTW) and another 150 (I'm really being generous for 90sp to 120 haste), it'd end up with arcane doing about 8-10% more dps than ffb in comparable gear. Is it what you would expect? or you'd expect a bigger gap?

The gap tends to grow during movement fights as well if I'm remembering my mage properly.

[Ramuh]

With absolutely no raid buffs. well maybe. Arcane scales better than FFB.

the cooldowns will add a bigger chunk to Arcanes DPS as you might think, stacking those is incredible. if you got the emblems to spare buy the 245 ilvl int trinkets, that one is relatively good for arcane.


Rotation wise, in a Raid Situation with Replenishment and other means of mana gain, you spam ABlast until Mbar proccs mostly. On a target dummy, this will oom you really fast but its better in a Raid.


Edit: Frostfire is not terrible, but Arcane is just better

[Squishei]

Arcane also gets Focus Magic which is a 3% crit bonus usually up for 90% of any fight. Also, the T10 2-set bonus will greatly increase arcane's dps over fire as it gives 12% more haste after Mbarrage proc.

Arcane needs to stack haste. Around 900 and above is decent so that should help with arcanes dps.

Arcane is very bursty. Most cooldowns should be blown at the same time to maximaze their usage, however not to the extent of going below the GCD. Especially with T10 4 set, this just ups arcanes nuke time.

[shasira]

For arcane, the rotation priority was:
- ABx4
- Arcane missiles (wherever Missile Barrage procs or not


you should never use AM when mBarr is not up.
Use ABx4 => AM (if mBarr up) otherwise ArcaneBarrage
or ABx4 => continue AB till mBarr procs then AM or AM if it is up

the second variation is much more mana costly but yields a higher dps.
the first rotation is mana costly too (not that much tough) and yields a good dps too.

not using cooldowns distorts your test results complete. so you can forget them. use
you cooldowns intelligently (for example use Arcane Power always in conjuction with icy veins and just use AB until the last second of Aracne Power has arrived (you were not able to cast an additional AB then) where you should activate your procced mBarr)
Using Presence of Mind is also not that easy, you should use it with AB when its debuff is already fully stacked to maximize your profit from the improved crit chance.

also the missing raid buffs distort your results, so you are missing the Scorch debuff which you had in your fire tests.

[Pasture]

Testing on a dummy in the way you have is nothing short of ridiculous.

1. Torment the Weak won't activate on dummies for Arcane, dropping dps by 12%.
2. You're excluding cooldowns, which Arcane dps is based on.

If you do a stupid method of testing you're going to get stupid results. Rest assure in any other single target scenario Arcane will completely decimate FFB - a spec that has been dead for anything other than Anub hardmode for a long time.

[Chaonar]

For arcane, the rotation priority was:
- ABx4
- Arcane missiles (wherever Missile Barrage procs or not


you should never use AM when mBarr is not up.
Use ABx4 => AM (if mBarr up) otherwise ArcaneBarrage
or ABx4 => continue AB till mBarr procs then AM or AM if it is up

EDIT: just quoting EJ doesn't bring value, sorry; they've already been proven wrong about coa being better than coe for aff and crit being better than mp5 for healadins.

Another popular opinion on this is "you should never use ArcaneBarrage unless you're moving" - and that's what I did (obviously don't have to move on a dummy). But OK, I can change to this.

As for missing Scorch (or other 5% crit buff) on the target for arcane: I can exclude that from FFB, but then I'll have to exclude 3% bonus damage from Arcane Empowerment talent in arcane spec as well, to even things out. Since if scorch can be up from somebody else while I'm arcane, then of course AE can be up from somebody else as well while I'm FFB. For the same reason I didn't count FM to the picture - either having it myself or having it put on myself by somebody else is basically the same 3% bonus to crit chance.

Another addition: just did 2 tests with using cooldowns (2 each spec). Ironically, the gap is still the same or similar: 3.9k ffb (after excluding 2nd target damage) vs 3.8k arcane. Yeah yeah, TTW will add 12%, all right, no need to repeat that. That'd still bring arcane about 8-10% better; yeah, it might scale with raid buffs better than FFB - can't actually easily model that.


I really appreciate people who add informative facts to the discussion, such as clarifying rotation questions (as opposed to just saying "your rotation is bad"). And just saying "arcane will be even better with t999 100-piece bonus" adds absolutely nothing, sorry.

[Deleted]

Crappy Haste. 2 and 4 piece T9 bonuses which greatly favours FFB over Arcane. No slow on the target = no TTW so 12% less DMG for Arcane. No cooldowns either, and Arcane got better cooldowns than FFB.

So yeah.. Not really hard to figure out why Arcane was behind.

[therealpeni]

Crappy Haste. 2 and 4 piece T9 bonuses which greatly favours FFB over Arcane. No slow on the target = no TTW so 12% less DMG for Arcane. No cooldowns either, and Arcane got better cooldowns than FFB.

So yeah.. Not really hard to figure out why Arcane was behind.

yer trying to hard, op is way to stubborn to actually know that dummy dps is irrelevant.

[Raidenwrath]

living bomb hitting multiple targets triggers way more pyros, so just excluding the dmg on the other dummy isn't enough

rotation:
ab till it procs -> missiles
you shouldn't have any real mana problems in a raid situation if you use that rotation

And just saying "arcane will be even better with t999 100-piece bonus" adds absolutely nothing, sorry.

but it is like they said
the uptime of the 2t10 setbonus is far higher on arcane, not to mention that arcane benefits more from haste
and with that set bonus it's even more the reason to use the rotation mentioned above

you forgot focus magic as well


last but not least arcane scales way better with raid buffs

[Promark]

for god's sake, read the initial post in full before replying to it. I've already mentioned multiple times that LB and Ignite damage on 2nd target is ALREADY EXCLUDED from ffb's numbers, yet people still speak about it.

Maybe before you get so bent out of shape, you should take your own advice and re-read what Ramuh stated, "Additionally Living bomb hitting multiple Targets yields more Hot Streak Procs." You took out the damage portion of LB, but if it crits the other dummy when it explodes, that could result in additional HS procs, which would skew the numbers.

[Exera]

No FFB is not even close to arcane, your target dummie test only proves how pointless the target dummie is, all the target dummie is good for really is practicing rotations, trying different gear setups for the same specc and NOT trying to see what specc is best. I'll give you a few reasons why.

1. No TTW(yes you will always have a 100% uptime if not... well your tanks has serious problems)

2. The gear used is sverely lacking for a propper arcane specc.

3. no FM

4. Your arcane rotation alone is reason enough to make your test completely irrelevant. At least if you're going to test something and compare things and least to both rotations right and not just one of them. You NEVER use missiles if no procc EVER, 4 x AB and missiles regardless of procc or not will make your DPS suffer like a rat feeding on rat poison while swimming in acid.

It cant be said enough, if you're going to compare 2 vastly different speccs at least do it right, your arcane rotation was fubar, you're lacking buffs you'll have 100% of the time in any given boss encounter as arcane(1 being TTW).

Simply put: Test only proves how pointless the target dummies are for comparing speccs.

Here is roughly what your DPS as arcane would be with TTW(which you will always have): 3673 and with a propper rotation it would be even higher. So my point really is now Arcane > FFB /thread

Edit: No you did not use a typical standard Arcane specc. http://www.wowhead.com/?talent#osoVfz0IzxGurxedcZMhf0o this is a typical arcane specc(however in this case it wouldn't be much of a difference though).

[Nut]

@OP

It is always good to see people doing some TC but you are late. There has already been 1000's of people who have done this and came to the conclusion that at this time Arcane is top DPS. Stop being stubborn. Plenty of people have already pointed out your flaws in your thinking and testing. If you want to look at the data just go to any parse site and look at the logs. There is a reason you see Arcane all over them.

http://www.wowmeteronline.com/rank/clazz/dtb/mag/9/0/3

Go here and click "more" on any boss then you can look through the top DPS parses for each spec.

http://www.worldoflogs.com/rankings/...n_Citadel/dps/