1. #1

    [Arcane] Is there a mastery amount you feel comfortable

    Got cloak a few weeks ago and have a 563 Ilvl, and have been playing fire with good results. But recently got a try out for arcane for a heroic prog team. So reformed and re gemmed. Was curious if there's a certain mastery number you arcane mages feel give you a noticeable boost in dps. I sit at 73% unruffled right now! that's all I can squeeze out of my gear ATM. And I was beating my dps as fire by at least 25k each fight....just curious if I get a few more mastery pieces and bump up to 80%+ if it will be more noticeable?

    If you wanna check out my armory it's malfanira on vek'nilash, on phone so can't copy link

  2. #2
    Herald of the Titans Shangalar's Avatar
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    At the moment some more Haste would benefit your dps possibly more than some more Mastery. But you shouldn't worry about it at the moment, it's a common problem at your item level. When you get up to 568-570 with the proper SoO items, all the problems magically disappear. Haste goes near 10k and Mastery goes with it too.

    Are you starting heroic progression soon? Because if you're not, then it might just be a good idea to collect as many various normal and warforged items you can from Normal:
    Helmet - Ebon Ritual Hood from Garrosh (and use it as your off-piece)
    Necklace - this one is good
    Shoulders, Legs, Gloves, Chest - set items
    Cloak - you have it
    Bracers - Avool's Ancestral Bracers from Spoils
    Weapon - Gaze of Arrogance from Sha of Pride
    Belt - Belt of Ominous Trembles from Iron Juggeernaut
    Boots - Bone-Inlaid Sandals from Galakras
    Rings - you have them
    Trinket 2 - Kardris' Toxic Totem. You lose stats, but with increased haste from items it amounts to 4-4.5% of your damage with the normal version.

    If an item has Haste and Mastery it can fit better into your gear than a Warforged item that doesn't have those two stats. Try to loot them as much as possible. I hope this answers your question to a degree.
    My magic will tear you apart.

  3. #3
    Deleted
    Arcane mastery as other pure damage increasing masteries work with one simple rule - the more the better. Higher numbers=higher damage. Nothing more to say.
    No. Really. I mean it.
    Nothing more!

  4. #4
    Deleted
    To be honest the optimal Arcane is indeed only gemming/reforging mastery. But for 10 man I have figured that going for a certain amount of haste (like Shandalar mentioned +- 10-11k Haste) helps your mobility problems. It isn't strictly a direct dps increase but it does reduce your damage downtime due to movement and recasting RoP or even finishing your casts.

  5. #5
    9522 haste breakpoint and the set bonuses are the only things that changes the "feel" of an arcane mage. Mastery is linear improvement, you wont feel anything at all, you can only see your meters looking better over time. Haste changes the armors you use in many circumstances, your mana regen and makes missle fishing at the beginning of a PBOI proc easier to do so you can AT with plenty of time left on the trinket.

  6. #6
    So as you guys were saying, a little more haste at my ilvl would be better than stacking complete full mastery? The reason im asking if cuz AMR has me reforging/gemming to where I lose 1.21% mastery but gain 4.34% haste...also I didn't see in the Arcane guide (might have missed it). Do I need to change stat weights for AMR at all from the cookie cutter build of arcane on AMR?

  7. #7
    well mastery and haste perform very closely on single target, with haste ahead slightly until 9522. This is largely because of the DPET of LB in single target, and haste adds two ticks to that (with frost armor). Post 9522 haste in single target, and in all AOE cases, mastery is the clear winner. Also reaching for 9522 haste early in gearing sets you up for how your character will "feel" for the rest of this gearing cycle. I felt it was a good move to reach for 9522 haste, personally.

    The side benefits of the haste make themselves clear pretty quickly. You can notice you have PBOI up and you can cycle your arcane charges twice if you have to for building missles and still get an alter time off to prolong your PBOI. The additional haste makes arcane much more playable IMO.

    See below for why to reach for 9762
    Last edited by hatchetman240; 2014-04-02 at 03:17 PM.

  8. #8
    Quote Originally Posted by hatchetman240 View Post
    well mastery and haste perform very closely on single target, with haste ahead slightly until 9522. This is largely because of the DPET of LB in single target, and haste adds two ticks to that (with frost armor). Post 9522 haste in single target, and in all AOE cases, mastery is the clear winner. Also reaching for 9522 haste early in gearing sets you up for how your character will "feel" for the rest of this gearing cycle. I felt it was a good move to reach for 9522 haste, personally.
    Get to 9762 instead.

  9. #9
    Yeah, sorry, I should edit my post.

    The reason for 9762 is with mage armor on (for AOE fights) you're going to get one more tick out of NT, which is the bomb you're using for multi target situations.

  10. #10
    Quote Originally Posted by hatchetman240 View Post
    Yeah, sorry, I should edit my post.

    The reason for 9762 is with mage armor on (for AOE fights) you're going to get one more tick out of NT, which is the bomb you're using for multi target situations.
    Correct. It's just easier to get to 9762 and forget about it rather than regemming/reforging per Armor swap. Although, most of us just run Mage Armor all the time bc numbers.

  11. #11
    The benefits that you might find from haste over mastery, cited here as helping with some of the movement challenges of the spec, are offset by familiarity with the encounters where you'd be attempting to play Arcane. Mastery is a stronger stat for Arcane. Why would you even consider sacrificing Mastery in an effort to reach haste breakpoints with a legendary meta gem eludes me, but to each their own.

    That said I would encourage any mage progressing in H SoO to play Fire. Arcane (played optimally) has in my experience produced higher damage than Fire but(!) that's entirely based on predictable movement. That's not just you, it's the group around you as well. A fire mage is much better suited to making adjustments on the fly to their positioning than an arcane mage (all other factors considered equal), and any arcane mage who is playing well will see better numbers from Mastery than Haste.

    I've cleared 14/14HM many times as both Arcane and Fire, typically swapping week-to-week just to stave off boredom, and I wouldn't consider playing Arcane until you're in a place where you're very comfortable with the encounters (ie, farming). It's just my opinion, but progression is where you just can't overvalue movement. Arcane is also a spec that lends itself to "scumbagging" much more, and there's no value to this in progression.

    The good news is that we have three specs that are playable and produce competitive damage suitable for H SoO raiding.
    The bad news is that we still have lots of H SoO raiding. Play around with different specs/builds, and have fun!

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