Fire Mage Guide

[mrgreenthump]

I disagree and here's why.

Invocation lasts 40 second and has 6 second channeling time. During the channeling you won't be doing any damage, which means your dps is 0. The first 40 second you're doing 25% extra damage and after that you are doing 6 second no damage. In other words:
(1.25 * 40 + 6 * 0) / (40 + 6) = 50 / 46 = 1,0869
This means you're actually doing only 8,7% more damage than unbuffed, because:
1 * 46 / 46 = 1

The WOULD be true if there was no thing called haste. As it is now invocation on a 350 sec fight: you precast invoc, that is 37 sec, you do first invoc while hero, thats around 44,1 sec, after that you do 6x ~5,3-5.35 sec invocs making it ((350-4.1-5.3*6)*1,25)/350= ~1.122

[morbidjbyrd]

I am confused about a few things regarding the guide.

1.1.a) Keep your mage bomb up
1.1.b) Keep Pyroblast dot up (yes, that means if you go 18 seconds without a crit, you hard cast Pyroblast for the dot)

Scenario 1: Alter Time and PoM
- Fireball until you get a crit.
- Inferno Blast queue that crit into a Pyroblast Buff.
- Make sure Pyromaniac debuff (via mage bomb) is up.
- Pop all trinkets/Synapse Spring buffs
- Hit the Macro - At this point it will fire 1 pyroblast (using up the buff), you will have a PoM buff, and 6 seconds till Alter Time ends.
- Hit Pyroblast - this will use up the PoM buff (sending out pyroblast 2)
- Hit the Macro - This will preemptively end your Alter Time countdown and reset you to: Pyroblast buff and PoM buff and then it will fire insta pyroblast 3, consuming Pyroblast buff.
- Hit Pyroblast for insta pyroblast 4 (consuming PoM buff for the 2nd time).
- Hit Combust



#1 What is the point of this? The debuff lasts 15 seconds, and at least my living bomb doesn't hit for much on single target. Maybe, that changes with mastery?
#2 It seems incredibly unlikely that you won't get an instant pyro within 15 seconds (Actually more like 20+ if you consider the probability you get a proc afterwards).

#3 Wouldn't it be better to do it the old fashioned way and reset combustion?

[Windry]

1) "Mage bomb" does not mean "Living Bomb." It means whatever spell you choose for your 75 talent.
2) It is very unlikely that you don't get a crit in that duration, but if it does happen, mathmatically, it's better to hardcast a pyro.
3) I don't understand what you mean by the "old fashioned way" of combustion.

[TomDeBaere]

Why not make this a sticky? Come on Shizzle

[Hankscorpio]

Fantastic post and special thanks to all those computing the numbers.

I just have one question: Does casting the macro with Alter Time and PoM make more sense than keeping the alter time buff longer so you gain an extra 6 seconds of a trinket+pot ?

[TomDeBaere]

I just have one question: Does casting the macro with Alter Time and PoM make more sense than keeping the alter time buff longer so you gain an extra 6 seconds of a trinket+pot ?

I personally also think it's better extending dps buffs then just a chande of aving a slighly higher combustion. Though I'll allways try to combine it with a hot streak proc and cast pyro just before Alter time ends.

[Wushu]

1) "Mage bomb" does not mean "Living Bomb." It means whatever spell you choose for your 75 talent.
2) It is very unlikely that you don't get a crit in that duration, but if it does happen, mathmatically, it's better to hardcast a pyro.
3) I don't understand what you mean by the "old fashioned way" of combustion.

#1 Ok, who cares, you are just arguing semantics instead of answering my question. I could easily do the math myself, but I assume you already did since you made a guide.
#2 Where is the math that shows this? You are talking like a 20+ second duration! Even in the infinisimally small probably it happened, you would increase your dps by 0.0000000000000000000001% or some shit. In other words, it should be removed as its irrelevent 99.99% of the time and inconsequential the rest.
#3
Old, as in before 90 and before alter time. Also, isn't this going to be irrlevent in a couple weeks anyways?

[Ivalen]

Pyro and funky combustion macros become null after 5.1. Pyro on cooldown and doesn't affect Combustion anymore.

Sad day.

[mrgreenthump]

#2 Where is the math that shows this? You are talking like a 20+ second duration! Even in the infinisimally small probably it happened, you would increase your dps by 0.0000000000000000000001% or some shit. In other words, it should be removed as its irrelevent 99.99% of the time and inconsequential the rest.

1 in 250 you mean? Its small but can still happen

[Windry]

#1 Ok, who cares, you are just arguing semantics instead of answering my question. I could easily do the math myself, but I assume you already did since you made a guide.
#2 Where is the math that shows this? You are talking like a 20+ second duration! Even in the infinisimally small probably it happened, you would increase your dps by 0.0000000000000000000001% or some shit. In other words, it should be removed as its irrelevent 99.99% of the time and inconsequential the rest.
#3
Old, as in before 90 and before alter time. Also, isn't this going to be irrlevent in a couple weeks anyways?

Are you morbid?
1) If so, I'm not trying to argue semantics. Your wording on the question is vague, and I apparently do not understand what you're asking about. Can you rephrase the question?

2) In 20 second window, you should be casting Mage Bomb two to three times, and you should have about 8 fireballs in that window. Let's say you have 25% crit while raid buffed. Then your actual crit on boss would be (25-3)*1.5 = 33%. So your chance of not getting a crit in a 20 second window would be (.67)^8 = 4% of the time. Like I said, not a very big chance, but it does happen.

As I proved on the 1st page, Pyro, with ticks of the DoT is higher DPET than fireball.

Now, YOU PERSONALLY can choose to ignore this step. That's fine. It's your choice. I'm writing this guide for mages who really want to maximize every bit of DPS and are looking at serious enrage timers.

3) It doesn't matter if the patch comes in a couple of weeks, or even tomorrow. Your play in raid TONIGHT, and each passing night *SHOULD* matter to you. You *SHOULD* be trying to get the most of your DPS each and every night using whatever strategy/rotation is the best at the time. Then you can adjust to a new strategy/rotation once it does change.

Again, YOU PERSONALLY can choose to ignore this step. That's fine. It's your choice.

[Wushu]

I concede. However, i do think a guides purpose should be simplicity, BUT THAT IS JUST A DIFFERENCE OF OPINION. Perhaps a note to suggest that hard casting pyro is optional for maximizing?
Overall a good guide thought, thanks.

[huth]

blabla

The only thing you just changed was correct the cast time for Invocation from 5s to 6s.

[Underskilled]

Pyro and funky combustion macros become null after 5.1. Pyro on cooldown and doesn't affect Combustion anymore.

Sad day.

No need to spread misinformation, the Pyroblast dot doesn't, but Pyroblast itself does. And the macro most certainly isn't null, you simply swap out two pyros for Fireballs.

[Deleted]

Posted this in the trinket thread, but that's becoming buried under nerf-QQ posts. I'm missing Jade Magistrate Figurine among the trinkets listed, would be lovely if you could include it. Thanks!

[Windry]

Posted this in the trinket thread, but that's becoming buried under nerf-QQ posts. I'm missing Jade Magistrate Figurine among the trinkets listed, would be lovely if you could include it. Thanks!

Jade Magistrate Figurine is the exact same thing as the Shado-Pan Valor Trinket. Since it's trash drop, there's no heroic version either.

The math is on post#61 of page 4.

[Charlooo]

Great guide and its helped me alot, I'm just unsure on one thing. My gear has now gotten pretty good and is at 477ilvl. Since the start of this expansion I have just reforged hit>crit>haste>mastery but wiith this guide have seen the soft haste cap. I've done 2 reforge options and was wonjdering if you could help me choose the best path to take.

Option 1. Reforging hit > crit and not going for haste cap.
Mastery
2004
Spell Hit
5104
Spell Crit
6750
Spell Haste
2213


Option 2 Going for haste cap.
Mastery
2004
Spell Hit
5100
Spell Crit
5909
Spell Haste
3058

[mrgreenthump]

Great guide and its helped me alot, I'm just unsure on one thing. My gear has now gotten pretty good and is at 477ilvl. Since the start of this expansion I have just reforged hit>crit>haste>mastery but wiith this guide have seen the soft haste cap. I've done 2 reforge options and was wonjdering if you could help me choose the best path to take.

Option 1. Reforging hit > crit and not going for haste cap.
Mastery
2004
Spell Hit
5104
Spell Crit
6915
Spell Haste
2213


Option 2 Going for haste cap.
Mastery
2004
Spell Hit
5100
Spell Crit
5909
Spell Haste
3058

guessing you do 1x 160 crit gem aswell and use that gem as int otherwise on the haste cap thingy, but either the case 1k crit rating > 1k haste rating pretty much allways

[austen1oo195]

Can anyone explain to me why Flashfrozen Resin Globule is ranked so low? I would think that it would be much further up the list because we can line it up with "Scenario 1" combustion. I would expect it to be right before light of the comsos.

[Charlooo]

guessing you do 1x 160 crit gem aswell and use that gem as int otherwise on the haste cap thingy, but either the case 1k crit rating > 1k haste rating pretty much allways

Yea I messed up a little with the stats basically I need to sacrifice 841 crit and reforge that into haste to reach the cap but I'm guessing that is still to much to sacrifice for reaching the cap.

[mrgreenthump]

Yea I messed up a little with the stats basically I need to sacrifice 841 crit and reforge that into haste to reach the cap but I'm guessing that is still to much to sacrifice for reaching the cap.

it wont sacrifice your dps that much, its haste is a very good dps stat for a fire mage, it is just not even near crit even before the "haste soft cap"..