Questions about a mage that is back after 4 months.

[Deleted]

1) Hello guys , i havent been playing since 5.1 and i just came back with my 483 ilvl and in one week i reached 494.
I always play fire and i was always pulling great number even with sucky gear ... but now i tottaly suck and i want to know if its because i do something wrong or its because of my shit gear. I pop evocation-> hard cast pyro while pulling -> spammin fireballs till i get heating up ->inferno blast->spammin fireballs till i get heating up again, and when i get it i cast fireball and at the same time the pyroblast i got from hotstreak (of course i use PoM/Combustion when its a big ignite on target/Alter Time etc.)

2) My biggest problem is in aoe ...i hard cast pyroblast-combustion when big ignite -inferno blast to spread them and nether tempest

I would really appreciate some help to get fast back on track, i am playing only LFR these days since i dont have time for normal/hc raiding, but i always have this obsession to top the dps meters xD cheers

[Deleted]

Fire mage is one of the weakest at aoe until solid ilevel.

Flamestrike, fireball, living bomb, inferno blast, combustion inferno blast and single target rotation with inferno blast off cooldown is my usual AoE rotation. Oh and cone of cold/DB off cooldown.

Make sure you set up an alter time macro when you have a pyroblast proc ready:

#showtooltip Alter Time
/cast Presence of Mind
/use 10
/use 13
/use 14
/cast Alter Time
/cast Pyroblast

Don't wait for heating up proc after you already have a pyroblast proc, it's a loss of dps as big ignites turn into big combustions.

[Deleted]

Thanks for the tips mate, i already have this macro for AE/POM. So AoE dps for a fire mage is still basically single target rotation with spreading the dots like 5.1.

[The Kao]

(of course i use PoM/Combustion when its a big ignite on target/Alter Time etc.)

Be careful with PoM Pyro when you already have a big Ignite on target, since you don't have the extra damage from the Pyroblast! proc you might destroy your Ignite if it doesn't crit, and this is especially bad since PoM is always used up last. I personally avoid using PoM Pyro right before Combustion when Ignite passed a certain threshold.

2) My biggest problem is in aoe ...i hard cast pyroblast-combustion when big ignite -inferno blast to spread them and nether tempest

I might be reading this wrong, but as I understand it you're hardcasting Pyro to have the Inforno Blast CD free to be able to spread Combustion. However, when Combustion is used Inferno Blast's CD is reset so that you can always spread. Feel free to use Inferno Blast to generate Pyroblast! procs.

Also, for AE situations it might be interesting to know that Living Bomb is now used majorly for single target fights while Nether Tempest works best on 3 - 5 targets and Frostbomb on anything above. If an encounter justifies going away from single target DPS you might want to switch bombs.

[Deleted]

I might be reading this wrong, but as I understand it you're hardcasting Pyro to have the Inforno Blast CD free to be able to spread Combustion. However, when Combustion is used Inferno Blast's CD is reset so that you can always spread. Feel free to use Inferno Blast to generate Pyroblast! procs.

Also, for AE situations it might be interesting to know that Living Bomb is now used majorly for single target fights while Nether Tempest works best on 3 - 5 targets and Frostbomb on anything above. If an encounter justifies going away from single target DPS you might want to switch bombs.

I Meant that i start with hard casting pyro to get the pyro DoT .
The thing that i dont understand about nether tempest is... do i have to pick one target then another then another and apply it to all of them...it kinda takes time from the encounter and does it worth it ? :/
And something last, can someone give me an example of what a big ignite must be when you use your combustion ? mine is at 25-30k :/

[Deleted]

Examples of Ignite is quite retarded tbh. It's always different for everyone, at your gear level it's probably going to be something like 30-40k? There has been a lot of time since i was 494 or near, so i cannot tell. Always aim at high ignite tho, but don't overexaggerate it because you might end up waiting too much and losing dps.

[The Kao]

I Meant that i start with hard casting pyro to get the pyro DoT .

The Pyro DoT is not very high though, ticking with like 1 - 2k. Might be not worth it compared to a proper Ignite.

The thing that i dont understand about nether tempest is... do i have to pick one target then another then another and apply it to all of them...it kinda takes time from the encounter and does it worth it ? :/

Yes you'd apply Nether Tempest to all targets and it is worth it when we talk about 3 - 5 targets within 10 yards of each other since each bomb will spam additional attacks to all others. However if adds go down too quickly or won't come frequently enough it might not be worthy.

And something last, can someone give me an example of what a big ignite must be when you use your combustion ? mine is at 25-30k :/

Well that depends. While encounter mechanics can have a major impact on Ingnite (like Horrdon's stacking damage taken debuff) you'll generally have to find out that value for yourself by observing the DoT during fights, and especially how high you can get with PoM and Alter Time. For me personally I'd consider 120k - 150k a very high Ignite on a normal encounter while I wouldn't cast Combustion below 50k. But I guess these values are way off for your gear, so you'll have to work with what you get.