Need Frost vs Arcane advice from Raiders please

[Stunning 0]

I would really appreciate some help from other Mage players who are raiding Hellfire HC.

 

Up until the first few HFC Normal bosses, I was Arcane but found getting decent DPS challenging because of all the movement, so swopped to Frost. I immediately saw an increase in DPS so continued with Frost until now. Currently 6/13 HC (stuck on Socrethar atm).

 

Whilst I am staying ahead of Shadow Priests and Warlocks, I can't come close to any of the Hunters in our raid team.

 

Looking at comparison logs for DPS, I see a massive difference in classes in two different iLev brackets. At 690 Frost does well, but Arcane is slightly better. Looking at the chart for my iLev (705) suddenly Arcane is in the top 5 and Frost has fallen of the bottom of the list!!

 

So, is it unrealistic to try and continue as Frost as we progress through HC? I only have the T18 2-set bonus atm. I struggled with Arcane before as I could rarely stand still or stay within a Rune of Power - although I freely admit that is more down to my skill (or lack of it!) than the class I play.

 

What are your thoughts? Should I swop to Arcane, and if so, can you give me some tips on how to not let movement strangle my DPS?

 

Thanks guys

[Lily 23]

Frost is much easier to play and scales with lower itemlevels much better. If you have to move a lot while bossfights Arcane can be really difficult not to mess up your rotation, cause this is a real DPS killer.

Im raiding with 711 11/13 HC atm, but I'm seeing Frostmages as much as Arcane and both are doing good dmg (changing from boss to boss ofc). It's more about what you like to play or what your gear is optimized for. I got nearly no problems as Arcanemage, but it's quite randomish, from pull to pull. If your procs come to wrong times where you have to move or something, you got no chance in the DPS race.

Frost is more sustain and regular dmg. With some instants, it's nice for movement bosses.

But for single-target DPS bosses, Arcane is much better, especially if you"ll get the 4p bonus! Moreover if you're having problems with staying in your rune, just switch to incanters flow.

 

And comparing to other classes isn't really easy I think. Simcraft just shows you the raw, theoretical numbers. But infight it can change a lot. Hunters nearly have to DPS loss if they have to move, which is quite awesome for them

Hope I could clear some questions :)

Edited September 12, 2015 by Lily

[Pannix 1]

I'd just like to note there is a large amount of frost mages who switch between arcane and frost depending on the fight. Mostly because they can enchant haste on their gear which is best for arcane with 4 piece and a good secondary stat for frost. We only have to switch out a few pieces gear, our trinkets and and a tier for non tier piece at worst. This is good because frost can cleave pretty well but arcane still out dpses them on the 2 single target fights in the raid arguably 3 depending on your raid comp and strategy for socrethar