The Current State of Fire Mages

[Feloth]

Feloth I derive this from your statement:
Fire mages are doing bad compared to locks, even when there is a lock 1st, beating the mage by ~30k dmg. (literally 1 cast)
But thats ok, because all 18 of the dps are doing low dps compared to what you've seen so that is a pointless screenshot right?

That's our pre-heroic guild's current Argaloth:

http://www.worldoflogs.com/reports/r...?s=5225&e=5450

6 of our dps beat or matched your top 2. Not speaking from "the best" as a measure, but merely what I saw this week. I have 0 problems given my somewhat limited gear (only 353 equipped) hitting the 17-18k dps. There are just classes out there easily breaking the 20k mark fight after fight, same people, same classes/builds. Based on your snapshot of your Argaloth attempt versus what I saw of mine, your raid's dps is lower than what I am seeing in mine.

That is all.

[Stingray0011]

I'll go ahead an assume that, naturally, some of the higher dps do have slightly better gear then you. Just as the one destro lock beat the other destro lock by a 4k margin. I was in no way trying to be offensive or smug or anything along any of those lines in what I posted, I was simply showing that in our raids with equally geared dps, the fire mage is able to compete with the rest - which should mean they are in a good place, especially providing the incoming nerfs to the classes that are atop it.

It could easily come down to a number of different things, which cause you to be lower. Perhaps you lag during encounters? Maybe you aren't casting scorch as often as could be during movement phases(I know our top fire mage had 4 times the scorch casts of our lower mage on atramedes ..), etc etc. Only you (and I guess you're fellow raiders) know how you play, and it is hard to be .. I guess sympathetic when a mage is pondering the idea of being under powered when I have yet to see our top fire mage fall behind on any fight.

With the point about our atramedes fight, and the point about not seeing our TOP fire mage fall behind, it really does point to be human 'error' and not a class or spec based problem. I hope you don't read this as me saying you are bad at what you do, because that is not intended.

[Feloth]

I'll go ahead an assume that, naturally, some of the higher dps do have slightly better gear then you. Just as the one destro lock beat the other destro lock by a 4k margin. I was in no way trying to be offensive or smug or anything along any of those lines in what I posted, I was simply showing that in our raids with equally geared dps, the fire mage is able to compete with the rest - which should mean they are in a good place, especially providing the incoming nerfs to the classes that are atop it.

It could easily come down to a number of different things, which cause you to be lower. Perhaps you lag during encounters? Maybe you aren't casting scorch as often as could be during movement phases(I know our top fire mage had 4 times the scorch casts of our lower mage on atramedes ..), etc etc. Only you (and I guess you're fellow raiders) know how you play, and it is hard to be .. I guess sympathetic when a mage is pondering the idea of being under powered when I have yet to see our top fire mage fall behind on any fight.

With the point about our atramedes fight, and the point about not seeing our TOP fire mage fall behind, it really does point to be human 'error' and not a class or spec based problem. I hope you don't read this as me saying you are bad at what you do, because that is not intended.

It's okay. I have been playing a mage a long time and admittedly this is my guild's second week of raiding in Catacylsm and we just hit 10/12 on non heroics. We'll probably have Al'Akir down this week as well. I have something to learn to improve my dps in all these fights. Hell I've only done Magmaw a total of 3 times.

The point so much of my post wasn't saying that mages, given skill and gear can't put up competitive numbers. We can -- and I could have sworn I said that somewhere. I am saying that fundamentally speaking, there is a potential class design flaw in the way Fire Mages are structured and positioned that the moment that makes dpsing as one very inconsistent and challenging. Other classes who dps are not necessarily facing these kind of challenges. People are blaming the RNG, and I am blaming poor class design in our mastery and making our dot uptime hinge on a stat (crit) which is low until we get better gear.

I hope you don't take offense when I say that one mage, placing well in one guild dictates that mages are totally fine.

[Seefourdc]

Feloth I derive this from your statement:
Fire mages are doing bad compared to locks, even when there is a lock 1st, beating the mage by ~30k dmg. (literally 1 cast)
But thats ok, because all 18 of the dps are doing low dps compared to what you've seen so that is a pointless screenshot right?

Is it possible that you are comparing your numbers to those of the best and are coming up short? What kind of dps are you pulling then, if hitting 18-19k on argaloth in pre-heroic gear is easy for most dps classes? I assure you this, at the time of this screenshot the mage had just hit his 4pc the previous week, none other dps have 4pc (not saying that it makes the difference) and there is absolutely no heroic gear in the raid.

Not going to post screenshots but here is top 5 from a couple other fights with dmg done + dps(rounding dmg done). If we are able to consistently take down these bosses doing the dps I've shown, perhaps "This doesn't prove much other than that raid's dps is low?" isn't a very accurate statement now is it.

All of these are 1 shot attempt bosses on 25 man. We have zero problem with enrage so our dps must be on par with what is required for our current gear level.

Omnotron:
1) Aff lock: 8.85m, 20467 dps. (yeah soul swap ftw )
2) Fire mage: 7.5m, 17590 dps.
3) UH DK: 7.35m, 17006 dps
4) Destro lock: 7.16m, 16633 dps
5) Fury war: 6.86m, 15962 dps

Magmaw (heavy aoe for range):
1) Aff lock: 8.1m, 23270 dps
2) Demon lock: 7.69m, 22446 dps
3) Fire mage: 7.5m, 23207 dps
4) UH DK: 7.4m, 21017 dps
5) UH DK: 7.38m, 20790 dps

Maloriak (more aoe)
1) Demon lock: 10.28m, 26260 dps
2) Aff lock: 7.7m, 19472 dps (I guess I can't win them all D:<)
3) UH DK: 7.4m, 18925 dps
4) Mut rogue: 7.4m, 18754 dps
5) Fire mage: 7.3m, 18683 dps

I hope you see the point I am trying to make. A 25 man group, with equally geared members are all doing very similar dps on every fight. Movement fights, aoe fights, multi target (but none aoe) fights. INCLUDING the fire mage. Now, you can sit there and say that all the other dps in my raid are doing low numbers, but we down bosses so we must be doing something right.

I'm going to do my best to address this w/o being offensive so here goes. The first thing is you picked 3 fights where fire mages have some huge bonuses. The thing that is kind of shocking to me is we had people in my guild pulling the numbers you posted the 2nd week of this expac in pretty much only 346 gear. The third thing is all of the numbers your mage posted were pretty darn low, but here is the kicker. The part that should shock you isn't that your mage is ranking so high in your raid but how poorly your locks/hunters/dk's/boomkins are doing. The only 2 fight mages should legitimiately have a chance to top the meters on right now is halfus and then if you can get your guild to do a little dps to arcano when his shield is up on omnotron defense. Outside of that the only chance a mage has to be in the top 5 is in a 10 man. I pull 21-23k dps on maloriak and that only gets me #7 on the dps meter in my guild.

The reality is your guild's OP dps classes have pretty low standards atm except for maybe that demo lock who pulled some nice numbers on maloriak.

[Makarena]

u must be kidding with omnotron and firemage, really. I did 43k dps on this fight ...

[Whymeman]

I'm a fire mage, I don't have any problem at all keeping up in DPS with any of the any classes in a 10man HC raid.
This is from Halfus. (Yes, I know this is a somewhat bad example, but a demo lock is pretty damn close to be.)
I also managed to keep around 19k on Theralion and Valiona.

[Eschatonin]

Should be a talent that increases the amount of Ignites you can have on your main target. That makes it not overpowered in AoE, makes an existing mechanic more interesting, and buffs it just enough to be balanced on Patchwerk/Halfus fights.

Edit: Halfus without whelps.

[Pandorox]

A Fire Mage's dps is going to increase by alot from 10 man to 25 man. I'm thinking that the OP is giving examples of a 10 man. Where Fire Mage's are hurting a bit but they are still in the top 3 in the least.

[Champloo]

Just wanted to say this little bit, then I'm off to bed.....

I hate fire-spec now. The only spec that I actually enjoy playing is frost, unfortunately, you pretty much have to go fire or you're not getting a raid spot(in top guilds at the least). We went from a huge nuke class, to a loldot class. I don't play mage for dots, and as the OP has stated...that's a very substantial portion of our damage now.

I find the dot mechanics a lot less dynamic than proc based mechanics, and thereby a lot less intensive and a lot less fun.

(this is for single target, btw)

[Deleted]

I'll go ahead an assume that, naturally, some of the higher dps do have slightly better gear then you. Just as the one destro lock beat the other destro lock by a 4k margin. I was in no way trying to be offensive or smug or anything along any of those lines in what I posted, I was simply showing that in our raids with equally geared dps, the fire mage is able to compete with the rest - which should mean they are in a good place, especially providing the incoming nerfs to the classes that are atop it.

It could easily come down to a number of different things, which cause you to be lower. Perhaps you lag during encounters? Maybe you aren't casting scorch as often as could be during movement phases(I know our top fire mage had 4 times the scorch casts of our lower mage on atramedes ..), etc etc. Only you (and I guess you're fellow raiders) know how you play, and it is hard to be .. I guess sympathetic when a mage is pondering the idea of being under powered when I have yet to see our top fire mage fall behind on any fight.

With the point about our atramedes fight, and the point about not seeing our TOP fire mage fall behind, it really does point to be human 'error' and not a class or spec based problem. I hope you don't read this as me saying you are bad at what you do, because that is not intended.

Or maybe your firemage is just a better player than most of your other dpsers? Which is far more likely since all logs are showing firemages falling behind on non aoe fights.

No seriously, on single target fights Firemages can not keep up with Locks, Hunters, DK's and rogues, and with not keep up I mean 2-3k+ dps difference. I've had my fair share of top50 log in cataclysm so far to know I'm doing something right at least.

[Shampox]

Fire mages are fine >.> granted you need to play them properly to notice

---------- Post added 2011-01-22 at 04:59 PM ----------

u must be kidding with omnotron and firemage, really. I did 43k dps on this fight ...

So you did Omnotron in 25man with a guild that doesn't use WoL or you're Zhenek or claming to be, hmm

[Deleted]

Fire mages are fine >.> granted you need to play them properly to notice

---------- Post added 2011-01-22 at 04:59 PM ----------



So you did Omnotron in 25man with a guild that doesn't use WoL or you're Zhenek or claming to be, hmm

No actualy. If you take your time spellstealing the buff from Arcanatron, then get lucky and get poiuson cloud in teh next round along with hero/warp. Add the priest buff and you got yourself a gauss cannon.

[Deleted]

Should be a talent that increases the amount of Ignites you can have on your main target. That makes it not overpowered in AoE, makes an existing mechanic more interesting, and buffs it just enough to be balanced on Patchwerk/Halfus fights.

Edit: Halfus without whelps.

So if I don't crit when Combustion is up it'll be a 100% wasted cooldown?

[Deleted]

i found very annoying in single target with more gear than the locks of my guild, using pre-pot and execute pot, doing always less 3-4k dps, than locks and hunters and even the shadow priest is doing like more 2-3k in nefarion.
when i saw the patch notes than even shadow priest is being buffed lol... i cancel my subscription and start playing DCUO.
Wy bother when even our ignite is not being fixed patch after patch lol?

[Shampox]

No actualy. If you take your time spellstealing the buff from Arcanatron, then get lucky and get poiuson cloud in teh next round along with hero/warp. Add the priest buff and you got yourself a gauss cannon.

Yes, but the highest recorded DPS on WoL on 25man is just under 43k...so...

---------- Post added 2011-01-22 at 07:42 PM ----------

So if I don't crit when Combustion is up it'll be a 100% wasted cooldown?

Combustion combines all the existing DoTs on the target, the biggest factor being a large Ignite, which is triggered by a large crit. If you want combustion to be useful you need to have a big Ignite DoT on the target before using it (while all your other DoTs are up as well) to get the most out of it. What you do while it's up doesn't make combustion do any more/less damage.

[Makarena]

http://www.worldoflogs.com/guilds/66533/ - logs of my guild.
http://www.worldoflogs.com/guilds/80811/ - logs of my guildie who likes doing his own logs(Kamithin)
Yeah, i'm zhenek, feel free to wisper on my realm for any questions haha.