Arcane Mage PvE Guide

[Envyadams]

Ok i keep seeing the rotation when using Alter Time as <AM-Blast-AM-Barrage reset> but why use missiles wouldn't just AB spam till Barrage and reset be better dps? cause given whatever situation i am in i can push out 4 blasts and a barrage before AT is up (with EoT/Berserk can push 5 blasts and barrage before reset) and since you return to the amount of mana you had before AT i just don' see the benefit of mixing AM during AT.

BTW i use Hast/Rop w/Frost Armor that prolly makes a difference now that i think about it and if that AT rotation is just for the Mastery build then okies ^.^

[Deleted]

Ok i keep seeing the rotation when using Alter Time as <AM-Blast-AM-Barrage reset> but why use missiles wouldn't just AB spam till Barrage and reset be better dps? cause given whatever situation i am in i can push out 4 blasts and a barrage before AT is up (with EoT/Berserk can push 5 blasts and barrage before reset) and since you return to the amount of mana you had before AT i just don' see the benefit of mixing AM during AT.

BTW i use Hast/Rop w/Frost Armor that prolly makes a difference now that i think about it and if that AT rotation is just for the Mastery build then okies ^.^

Missiles has the same cast time as Blast, costs 0 mana and does more damage with the 2set, therefore weaving it in around Blasts means you Barrage with a higher mana % and therefore do more damage. It's also the reason why it's best to AT with 2 Missiles procs up.

[Shangalar]

As Serene said, no matter what you do as far as gear and buffs go, Missiles and Barrage do more damage than Blast.

[Envyadams]

Missiles has the same cast time as Blast, costs 0 mana and does more damage with the 2set, therefore weaving it in around Blasts means you Barrage with a higher mana % and therefore do more damage. It's also the reason why it's best to AT with 2 Missiles procs up.

Aye but i run with a haste build with Frost armor not mastery with Mage so my barrage doesn't hit for as much as a mastery build would. And if your argument is that its better to not cast Blast (rather have those 400k+ crits vs the maybe 200k crit that missiles does) so that i have higher mana to get a better Barrage i don't think its going to be much difference when even using it with max mana it doesn't hit for as hard.

Now there are some situations where i can use a gem before i barrage (and i have done that before) but i just don't see the dps increase of using missiles during AT.

---------- Post added 2013-01-24 at 08:21 AM ----------

As Serene said, no matter what you do as far as gear and buffs go, Missiles and Barrage do more damage than Blast.

Ok im confused why does missiles do more dps vs blast spamming? Either i am just missing something or what but from what I know Blast is our biggest nuke yea? so why are we not suppose to use our biggest nuke during a time where its free dmg? and again if its for to make sure barrage hits with the highest amount of mana then i say shenanigans cause like i said in above post even if i crit with it its still not hitting for very much.

[Shangalar]

When Patch 5.0.4 went live, Blast lost it's position as the most powerful single target spell in the universe, sometimes also known as Mage Taunt. It was toned down and Missiles and Barrage have been toned up to encourage a more diverse playstyle to cast other spells. Our rotation is currently based on maximizing max mana Missiles casts.

[Imnick]

Yeah Missiles is an Arcane Mage's second highest DPS spell now, though I can understand you being confused because half my guild didn't seem to realise this when I pointed it out to them last night either (they were wondering why people were getting to such low health after convert on Vizier and I posited that the travel time of Arcane Missiles might still be hitting them when they were turned back into allies).
Arcane Blast actually hits for the least damage of your rotational spells, bar Scorch.

Even Arcane Barrage is a monster of a spell, instant cast and in terms of Damage/Cast Time hits for more than both. The problem is that you still don't want to cast it rotationally until next patch because you lose the damage you'd gain when you have to build back up to six stacks :P
Next patch the stacks will be reduced to four and Scorch weaving is being killed off, so we'll return to a more varied rotation which presumably features Barrage more heavily (unless someone figures out another way to cheat the system and stay at full stacks constantly), which I'm actually rather pleased about.

At 1000 Spellpower

Arcane Blast: [2 sec cast] 755 (+ 100.8% of SpellPower) = 1763/2 = 881.5
Arcane Missiles: [2 sec cast] 379 (+ 28.5% of SpellPower) * 5 = 3320 / 2 = 1660
Arcane Barrage: [1.5 sec GCD] 1749 (+ 119.2% of SpellPower) = 2941 / 1.5 = 1960

[Dissemoen]

At what # of mobs do you replace single target rotation with AE?
At what # of mobs does crit guarantee of blast become worth the GCD of Frost Nova?
At what # of mobs does Frost Bomb surpass Living Bomb with FB glyph? (Only relevant in 5.1)

I'm curious about this myself. Anyone qualified that could answer this one?

[Deleted]

Aye but i run with a haste build with Frost armor not mastery with Mage so my barrage doesn't hit for as much as a mastery build would. And if your argument is that its better to not cast Blast (rather have those 400k+ crits vs the maybe 200k crit that missiles does) so that i have higher mana to get a better Barrage i don't think its going to be much difference when even using it with max mana it doesn't hit for as hard.

Now there are some situations where i can use a gem before i barrage (and i have done that before) but i just don't see the dps increase of using missiles during AT.

Mastery build or not; your mana % increases your DPS, end of story. Personally what I do (as a Troll) is I go Haste to NT breakpoint (6,343) then all out Mastery. Using Gem during AT leaves diminished returns as it means you can't use it to regain mana back after burning with APower AFTER AT reset.

But your ABlast might not crit, and you can't factor crit into the discussion because it is a % chance per spell cast.

Simple fact: Missiles hits for 379+(28.5% of SP)
Blast, on the other hand, hits for (at maximum) 755+(100.8% of SP)

So, if we take your SP from your Armory:

Missile damage per wave (non variable): 379+(28.5% of 23511) which is: 30590.64 damage per wave.
Blast damage per cast, assuming MAXIMUM hit: 755+(100.8% of 23511) which is: 24454.1 damage per cast, at MAXIMUM value.

At 6 stacks, the difference between these two is only going to be amplified.

24% Damage per stack, therefore meaning that at 6 stacks it is doing 227594.4 Damage
Blast, on the other hand, is only doing 181938.5 Damage at 6 stacks.

(Might have done the maths slightly wrong when it comes to additive/multiplicative regarding stacks, either way the result is still going to be the same).

Again, this is even before Mastery is also calculated which, as it's a percentage again, would AGAIN amplify the difference between the two.

I honestly don't see how you're going to argue that Blast > Missiles, ESPECIALLY as Missiles is Mana-free.

[Shangalar]

Okay let me answer the AOE question now:

The specific AoE rotation as listed in the guide is usable only on aoe trash packs. Arcane Shatter is completely useless in a raid setting because there is so much damage going on that the freeze is instantly broken before your global cooldown ends.

You can switch from Glyphed LB to FBomb when above 4 targets.

But lets look at it from the standpoint of the only serious AoE fight in T14 - Wind Lord Mel'jarak:

There are so many mobs present that FBomb seems like the perfect choice. However, the damage requirement for phase 2 is really high and FBomb as a apell sucks in Arcane's "we don't have any instant spells" single target rotation except Barrage which we currently don't use on single target.

Nether Tempest above 3 targets is difficult to manage so we opt for glyphed Living Bomb and we focus on one specific target which is usually a mob from the target set that we want to die. You use LB on it, fire blast and then continue with a single target rotation with 6-Charge Barrage cleave. There is no room in this tightly packed rotation for any kind of flamestrikes or explosions.

[Dissemoen]

Okay let me answer the AOE question now:

The specific AoE rotation as listed in the guide is usable only on aoe trash packs. Arcane Shatter is completely useless in a raid setting because there is so much damage going on that the freeze is instantly broken before your global cooldown ends.

You can switch from Glyphed LB to FBomb when above 4 targets.

But lets look at it from the standpoint of the only serious AoE fight in T14 - Wind Lord Mel'jarak:

There are so many mobs present that FBomb seems like the perfect choice. However, the damage requirement for phase 2 is really high and FBomb as a apell sucks in Arcane's "we don't have any instant spells" single target rotation except Barrage which we currently don't use on single target.

Nether Tempest above 3 targets is difficult to manage so we opt for glyphed Living Bomb and we focus on one specific target which is usually a mob from the target set that we want to die. You use LB on it, fire blast and then continue with a single target rotation with 6-Charge Barrage cleave. There is no room in this tightly packed rotation for any kind of flamestrikes or explosions.

Thank you for very informative answer!

I do have one more question however. At how many mobs does it become "correct" to use Barrage as a cleave?

[Deleted]

Good stuff Shangalar. Some followup questions:

• You say we should opt out of NT because of the complexity of multi-dotting; personally I don't mind, but I'm not sure how many targets I should be multidotting for max output. Has this been theorycrafted?
• You suggest that we should ignore Flamestrike on Wind Lord, but it appears to me to do a lot of damage. Has this been simulated and proven worse some place that I don't know about?

[Shangalar]

For me personally at 3. I have no way to prove it by math, but that's just how I do it.

@Lachtobi - I have absolutely no idea is the answer to both your questions. I don't deal with theorycrafting, I just test on live and find what works and adapt when needed.

But I can tell you this - Mel'jarak is not a pure aoe fight in phase 1, there is always some target prioritizing going on, especially on heroic. So it's not only about maximizing your damage.

[Elegiac]

When Patch 5.0.4 went live, Blast lost it's position as the most powerful single target spell in the universe, sometimes also known as Mage Taunt. It was toned down and Missiles and Barrage have been toned up to encourage a more diverse playstyle to cast other spells. Our rotation is currently based on maximizing max mana Missiles casts.

The problem with Arcane's changes, unfortunately, is that (speaking in Cataclysm terms, of course) while the conserve rotation has been made somewhat more interesting, the death of the burn playstyle means that Mana Adept has become oversimplified as a mechanic and we rarely have an incentive to dip below a certain percentage as used to be the case with the burn phase.

[Deleted]

Hi guys

Something is still not clear in my mind after reading many of the posts in this thread.

In the OP, it is said that Haste is somewhat 'capped' and at some point it is better to switch on other stats. However, does this also apply to the Haste-build Arcane Mage playstyle? If we use this build (both with ROP and with Invo), do we continue to stack haste beyond the cap mentioned in the original post ? Or there is still a magic number best suited to switch from haste to mastery priority?

I currently have 5059 haste before Frost Armor. With FA I reach 19.7% haste. I use Haste-Arcane with ROP on most fights. Is it time to switch or reforge?

Thank you.

[Shangalar]

Well... that's really not easy to say. Let's break it down to some possible builds:

Haste to 3059 (first breakpoint) - Mastery - more Haste - Crit (with Mage Armor)
Infinite Haste - Mastery - Crit (with Frost Armor)
Haste to 6414 (second breakpoint) - Mastery - more Haste - Crit (with Mage Armor)

However if you go for the lower Haste breakpoint, you'll have some Haste overflow from gear naturally which is perfectly fine. I'm currently playing at 4000 Haste with everything else into Mastery coz I'm not able to reforge anymore.


The issue I've encountered is that with similarly geared people every build does just about the same damage. It's about playing what you prefer, but it boils down to "full mastery" or "full haste". You don't have to switch to anything.

[Deleted]

I've fixed the armory if you wanted to see:
http://eu.battle.net/wow/en/characte...ranzk/advanced

I tried my best to get a weapon, had 3 coins today, rolled 1 on Elegon HC, Elite Protectors and Tsulong N, not 1 weapon. Did LFR after, no drops.
I guess RNG is RNG. But then when my friends alt goes in after and gets the dagger and staff from lfr god dam it!!!!!!!!!!!

[Deleted]

I've fixed the armory if you wanted to see:
http://eu.battle.net/wow/en/characte...ranzk/advanced

I tried my best to get a weapon, had 3 coins today, rolled 1 on Elegon HC, Elite Protectors and Tsulong N, not 1 weapon. Did LFR after, no drops.
I guess RNG is RNG. But then when my friends alt goes in after and gets the dagger and staff from lfr god dam it!!!!!!!!!!!

Ah OK, you're going Mastery build - in this case use Mage Armor over Frost Armor, but reforge to 3056 for an extra tick of Nether Tempest first, then go all-out Mastery.

I would suggest getting some professions; Engineering and Tailoring work best, although Blacksmithing is good as well.

Final thing: Take glyph of Arcane Explosion. At the moment it's important for us to be able to not drop our stacks; Arcane Explosion refreshes the stack timer and having an extra few yards on it can really help. Everything else seems fine, you just have to replace those blues.

[Deleted]

Ah OK, you're going Mastery build - in this case use Mage Armor over Frost Armor, but reforge to 3056 for an extra tick of Nether Tempest first, then go all-out Mastery.

I would suggest getting some professions; Engineering and Tailoring work best, although Blacksmithing is good as well.

Final thing: Take glyph of Arcane Explosion. At the moment it's important for us to be able to not drop our stacks; Arcane Explosion refreshes the stack timer and having an extra few yards on it can really help. Everything else seems fine, you just have to replace those blues.

Thanks for all your help!

[Deleted]

Thanks for all your help!

Sorry, one final thing.

I think (pretty sure Shangalar will correct me if I'm wrong here) that Glyph of Mirror Images (minor) is also a slight DPS increase because they fixed some of the issues with them.

[Shangalar]

They should be. They also go to 6 Charges and cast a couple of max-Charge Blasts before they expire. I tested it at level 85 when 5.0.4. came out but I could revisit the tests. It's just that waiting for them to come off cooldown is so depressingly boring.