Fire Mage 7.3

[Guest Thalandria]

Hey, so I have a question concerning the cast of the immediat  pyroblast together with fireball to get a crit: Everytime I cast fireball I got the feeling, that sometimes I time pressing pyroblast right and sometimes I dont...is there someway to maybe time with through and add on ? because they both need to hit at the same time and I honestly believe I am doing something wrong....somebody also told me I could maybe time it through a script, but I am not so sure about that...

[Furty 51]

7 hours ago, Zadina said:

It has been said in the Class Discord forum (which contains mostly Altered Time regulars) that UM is good for 1-2 targets and Living Bomb for 3-4. With the recent Flame Patch nerf and without the Archi class trinket in Legion, LB pulls ahead in multitarget.

That's correct!

[Guest Orcoftheyear]

Say Furty, can you link us your weak auras, with which you play maybe ? Everything is so confusing..

[Guest gazmage]

So is second prio versatility or mastery? the list says versatility but the description says mastery. Also haste is way down last. Is this an error? it could be my tiny brain ofc.

[Zadina 923]

The funny thing with Mastery is that it's the worst stat for Single Target (it's not total garbage, just not as good as the other ones) and the best for multitarget. I'd say to prioritise it as your second stat, since nowadays most bosses have some kind of add with them, it's good for Mythic+ and world content. Not sure if Furty agrees or not, he might like Versality better.

Haste has a breakpoint at 1800 for Fire, which is pretty easy to get, so I'd say it's probably our least interesting stat.

Other than that, the best way to find out the stat weights and priorities for you is to sim your character.

[Furty 51]

5 hours ago, Guest gazmage said:

So is second prio versatility or mastery? the list says versatility but the description says mastery. Also haste is way down last. Is this an error? it could be my tiny brain ofc.

 

4 hours ago, Zadina said:

The funny thing with Mastery is that it's the worst stat for Single Target (it's not total garbage, just not as good as the other ones) and the best for multitarget. I'd say to prioritise it as your second stat, since nowadays most bosses have some kind of add with them, it's good for Mythic+ and world content. Not sure if Furty agrees or not, he might like Versality better.

Haste has a breakpoint at 1800 for Fire, which is pretty easy to get, so I'd say it's probably our least interesting stat.

Other than that, the best way to find out the stat weights and priorities for you is to sim your character.

Basically what Zadina said. I think it also says this on the stats page (other than the bit about Haste).

[Guest Vig]

From my understanding, mage is in a really bad spot now (mythic dungeons). Done a lot of dungeons since I reavhed lvl 110 and can't remember being other that 4. place on both total damage or boss fights. My rotation with fire is not perfect, but I'm pretty sure it's not the reason why I can't top meters as i WoD. Tried frost in the beggining, but to me it seems to be even weaker than fire. A lot of times I even have less than half of the damage other classes have (even though I know DH's, monks and hunters are OP). I guess I lose a huge amount of damage by using Incanter's Flow as tier 45 talent, since it fits better for dungeons, and a large amount of fire's damage come in burst. But since you can't change talents in dungeons without tomes I guess thats how they work. I can add that I don't see many mages, and that the only time I can remember seeing a mage. Actually I can only remember seeing one. Anyway, based on these observations I have some questions I'd like anyone to answer.

1. Are my thoughts about mage/fire right or am I doing anything terribly wrong?

2. Will fire be better in raids? (probably, because of the tier 45 talent) And if so, how much? Will they be descent, on the top etc.?

3. WIll they be viable in 5-man later?

 

I know this is hard to saysince it might depend on Blizzard buffing or nerfing classes, but I'm happy for every answer. =) 

 

[Zadina 923]

I can't really help you at the moment, because I haven't progressed to heroic or mythic dungeons yet (busy September this year). I have also been playing without addons to improve performance during leveling and Suramar quests on my old laptop (so not even Skada), so I haven't seen how my damage fairs. (Although I've had enough of that and I put them back last night)

From lurking in the class Discord and talking to fellow mages, I see that other people share your concerns. From my understanding, Fire Mage is certainly not top 3, but definitely can fit in the top 5. It's definitely not as powerful as we thought it would be or as it was in pre-patch.

What I often see suggested is that you actually use Rune of Power and not IF, it's much better. Use it during trash, but make sure you have 2 charges back for bosses. Other than that, you are probably using it already, but I have to ask: are you using Living Bomb? Lastly, Kindling vs Cinderstorm is a very big debate, but I think Cinderstorm wins for dungeons (just be careful where you aim it).

I am afraid to even type these words, but it might be worth taking a look at Arcane and see how it feels for you.

[Guest Vig]

You have many good points. :-) I can't see mage being viable in either dungeons or raids without a buff or nerf on certain classes but guess that might happen. Seems like we just have to wait and see.

I will try rune of power for sure. I like it more when I think about it, but when I chose it felt a bit clumsy because I didnt think of how much of my damage actually comes in such short time. Only a rune with combustion is almost worth IF I guess. And yes, I'm using Living Bomb. Usually I prefer passives, and I had Unstable Magic most of my time in WoD exept in the beginning when I was in love with the high damage from Ice Nova (Blast Wave, I didnt play fire in WoD). But when the bombs spread it's pretty delicious as well! :D

I do agree that I believe Cinderstorm is better than Kindling, but I guess it depends a bit on playstyle. Kindling make me use combustion more i.e on trash where I usually wouldnt, and sometimes I don't have combustion ready for boss fights. Guess it works the other way as well, when I actually have it ready because of Kindling. I guess Kindling will be better in raid, at least since we don't have the 2 min cooldown from the legendary ring which I guess made Kindling useless. (As I said, I didnt play fire in WoD) 

I might try arcane, but as is I still believe fire is better. It's the mage spec I'm not comfortable at all playing, just tried it a few times in WoD for the opening/burst - but since I didnt manage to play it after the opening I always did way higher damage with frost. ACtually I very very rarely lost on damage in any HFC-fight to an arcane with about the same gear. Of course I had no chance against the 750 arcanes staying outside of nether on Archimonde etc etc. Thanks for the answer, your thoughts will for sure help me (especially the rune of power), but in the end I believe Blizzard is the one deciding our destiny. =))

 

[Guest Vig]

One more thing.. My relics are still only 805. I've seen quite a lot 830 relics from world quests, but all of them are frost (even though I always have fire as loot spec) and I only have place for fire-arcane-fire. Am I only really unlucky?

[Guest Tulio]

So, I have actually been feeling the same: In dungeons fire mages don t really seem to live up to what you described in the guid. I explicitly followed the guid and held dear to the stat recommendations. I put so much work into my fire mage and get the uncomfortable feeling all of this was for nothing now. I barely came through leveling, as the easiest enemys took so much longer for me to kill. In dungeons although always minding my critical strike in the stats I still feel like not being able to properly chain my pyro fishing. Am I doing something wrong ? I take very specific notice of my actions in combate and my armorment, as well as enchants and other important aspects. I feel like my damage is non existens and the guid :/ well I get the feeling the fire mage is getting left behind, all of the leveling was exhausting and the progression is very slim...Dungeons are a painful and with all the situational based changes you have to take into consideration it seems the fire mage is one of the least best specs. I do not want to re-role, seriously I like my mage. Blizz has to change something, I always feel like I am doing something wrong and get depressed, although everything should be working fine. My rotation, my movement all of this is practiced and trained, but still it feels like I am getting left behind.

 

I am really depressed with the fire mage right now, I mean I got good crit stats and still have to cast fireball several times before anything happens and the chains don t work as well either.

Do I really have to re-role arcane ? I got to know fire mage, got into it and leveld it up, worked on it and everthing and now you tell me " maybe I should go with arcane" ? This really is just depressing, I do everything I can to imporve and calculate the best way possible for damage output and reactions to certain circumstances, yet all I get in return is disapointing....

[Zadina 923]

@Vig

To be honest, a friend of mine made a really good point to me yesterday. In dungeons, you may spend more time fighting trash than bosses, but it's the bosses that matter most. And let's face it: you aren't going to outdps a DH or a Rogue in an aoe fight. So it might be better focusing on the single target talents to maximise boss performance. I have to agree with him, at least for heroic dungeons.

Yes, Kindling is more valuable in a raid (especially single target). CiS is much better in a dungeon: everything dies so fast, you aren't going to use Combustion in a boss fight twice even in mythic. And about the relics, I think you might have been unlucky indeed!

@Tulio (and Vig)

The problem with Fire is that we have extremely good burst, but our sustain dps sucks really bad. And the gear from the first raid doesn't have a lot of Crit, which is also bad. Fire is definitely still better than Arcane (for now), but I do feel that people overestimated Fire's potential. I think all Mage specs need either a bit of help (Fire, Arcane) or a lot of help (Frost ;_; ). Arcane is not that far from Fire: if they decide they want to buff it, we will have to respec (ugh).

[Guest Tulio]

So I should rather save all my artifact power ;-; blizz why you do this ? I wanna play mage, especially fire. This is really devestating.

I can´t play arcane, I am not fit with it and re rloing my class now is also not something I want to.....I loved mages since vanilla and don´t want to have to play warlock......just doesn t fit me, I´d miss most of the new content and would be lagging behind yet again.

 

Blizzard sometimes really get the worst possible situations for me...

[Guest Talonic]

You listed that we should use at least one +200 int gem (since it's unique-equipped) then the rest crit, but crit is at 1.3 and int is 1.0? Shouldn't we ignore the +200 int gem altogether then?

[Guest June]

So I have a question about the rotation in dungeons and pre-raid content for the fire mage in general:

In the gaps between cooldown usage I try to keep up my dps in boss fight with cinderstorm, but generally because of the low critical strike you get from most items I find myself casting more and more fireballs without or only one chained pyroblasts. How would you recommend me to keep my dps up in the gaps between rune of power and combustion burst damage, or can you make an efficient dungeon/ single target dungeon boss rotation all together ?

[Guest June]

So I actually have a question concerning dungeons and filler between the cooldown usage of combustion and rune of power.

I seem to find myself regularly in situations were i have to try and keep my dps up in the gaps that the cooldowns give you. Because of the mediocre items you get at the moment for fire mage with less and less critical stirke I have got the problem, that my pyroblast fishing isn´t working out too great. A lot of the time it takes some time to get heating up and most of the time I only get 2-3 follow up hot streaks, if at all. So in the time where I haven´t got my cooldowns I use cinderstorm for example, because well the fight are over very quickly most of the time, so I can only use combustio once. I wanted to ask you if you could maybe give me some advice on how to keep my dps high in dungeons and maybe a new dungeon/single target boss dungeon rotation over all.

Because I have so less cs through the gear " pyrofishing" simply takes too much time and my dps drops quite low, I have already read into other possible talent builds and rotation possibilitys, but still am not so sure on how to keep the sinlge target dungeon boss dps stabile.

I mean I know the rotation you have given us in the guid is mainly for raid bosses, that take longer and allow several cooldown usages, but how can you actually fill the gaps in between, efficiently ?

There has to be a way to overcome this periode in which you basically are out of pyroblast options and can barely chain the criticals.

I have already tampered with Incanter´s Flow but found it to be unreliable for solid gap filling phases, since it depends on your crits and the movment and or cast interuptions all together. So most of the time, although predictable, it gets interference

So what would you recommend me to do in those gaps were I normaly would start my pyrofishing, but can currently only try to bypass ?

[Sibelius 1]

After you've spent everything on burst and Phoenix Flames, Fire Blast, Flame On, and Combustion are on cooldown, how should our rotation proceed?

I can burst well, as you explained how to, but sustaining damage after the burst is a problem... I'm not sure what to do. I'm just throwing random spells as they come off cooldown. Should I just cast fireball until I can burst again?

[Guest Kimblee]

9 hours ago, Guest June said:

So I actually have a question concerning dungeons and filler between the cooldown usage of combustion and rune of power.

I seem to find myself regularly in situations were i have to try and keep my dps up in the gaps that the cooldowns give you. Because of the mediocre items you get at the moment for fire mage with less and less critical stirke I have got the problem, that my pyroblast fishing isn´t working out too great. A lot of the time it takes some time to get heating up and most of the time I only get 2-3 follow up hot streaks, if at all. So in the time where I haven´t got my cooldowns I use cinderstorm for example, because well the fight are over very quickly most of the time, so I can only use combustio once. I wanted to ask you if you could maybe give me some advice on how to keep my dps high in dungeons and maybe a new dungeon/single target boss dungeon rotation over all.

Because I have so less cs through the gear " pyrofishing" simply takes too much time and my dps drops quite low, I have already read into other possible talent builds and rotation possibilitys, but still am not so sure on how to keep the sinlge target dungeon boss dps stabile.

I mean I know the rotation you have given us in the guid is mainly for raid bosses, that take longer and allow several cooldown usages, but how can you actually fill the gaps in between, efficiently ?

There has to be a way to overcome this periode in which you basically are out of pyroblast options and can barely chain the criticals.

I have already tampered with Incanter´s Flow but found it to be unreliable for solid gap filling phases, since it depends on your crits and the movment and or cast interuptions all together. So most of the time, although predictable, it gets interference

So what would you recommend me to do in those gaps were I normaly would start my pyrofishing, but can currently only try to bypass ?

I dont see the issue tbh...maybe i have just been lucky every single dungeon. But full clearing heroics with guildies that are more geared than I am I am constantly top 2 on the charts with that first spot not being very far behind. I am at 820 ilvl with a 41% crit chance and am constantly pulling around 250k dps even with the fall off after the opener. My opener puts me at around 380k-420k...ive even had a great chain of crits multiple times that put me over 500k dps...are you guys sure you are doing the rotation properly and after opener using ur spells properly as well? Ive only cleared 2 mythics and still stay competitive on the charts...are you all fishing for first proc...open with combust>fireball till proc(unless first combust gave it)>fire blast>RoP>combust>pyro>fire blast>pyro>flame on>fire blast>pyro>fire blast>pyro>phoenix>pyro>phoenix>pyro...thats not including LB or cinder. That opener alone should put u at over 250k dps.

[Guest Flay]

You sure you aren't making things up?

 

http://www.simulationcraft.org/reports/Raid_T19P.html

 

Theoretical (ie standing still ignoring mechanics) DPS raid buffed with full auguments and 840 iLvl gear for fire is 268k. Seems fishy at 820 you are pulling 250k in dungeons, imo. Maybe you are reaching that occasionally when you get lucky with Crits, but seems suspect.

With the amount of stats you missing and the scaling a ser simcraft the theoretical Mean is like 210k at your ilvl.

[Guest June]

Hm my stats might be behind, but i can assure you my combustion works perfectly and does bring in some good dmg, but after that I seem to struggle, the pyrofishing really doesn t work that well..As said it might be because of the gear you get when trying to grind up, also it is hard to find dungeons outside the gild.

My problem is how do you sustain the best and most fluent dps in the gaps between combustion ?

I, as stated, tried pyrofishing, but either my gear won´t allow it or I need a whoe different apporach to a gap filler.

The rotation really is exactly as described.

[Guest markusbob]

8 hours ago, Guest Kimblee said:

I dont see the issue tbh...maybe i have just been lucky every single dungeon. But full clearing heroics with guildies that are more geared than I am I am constantly top 2 on the charts with that first spot not being very far behind. I am at 820 ilvl with a 41% crit chance and am constantly pulling around 250k dps even with the fall off after the opener. My opener puts me at around 380k-420k...ive even had a great chain of crits multiple times that put me over 500k dps...are you guys sure you are doing the rotation properly and after opener using ur spells properly as well? Ive only cleared 2 mythics and still stay competitive on the charts...are you all fishing for first proc...open with combust>fireball till proc(unless first combust gave it)>fire blast>RoP>combust>pyro>fire blast>pyro>flame on>fire blast>pyro>fire blast>pyro>phoenix>pyro>phoenix>pyro...thats not including LB or cinder. That opener alone should put u at over 250k dps.

Why you lie? I have 840 and can't have stable ~200k dps. Even your rotation is shit.

[Guest Kimblee]

10 hours ago, Guest Flay said:

You sure you aren't making things up?

 

http://www.simulationcraft.org/reports/Raid_T19P.html

 

Theoretical (ie standing still ignoring mechanics) DPS raid buffed with full auguments and 840 iLvl gear for fire is 268k. Seems fishy at 820 you are pulling 250k in dungeons, imo. Maybe you are reaching that occasionally when you get lucky with Crits, but seems suspect.

With the amount of stats you missing and the scaling a ser simcraft the theoretical Mean is like 210k at your ilvl.

Not making it up, I reach that on most fights..I believe helya and another boss I am drawing a blank on that has a decent amount of movement i only do about 200k but other than that i reach a consistent 250k. The lowest ive gotten and that was with horrible luck(4-5 stacks of pyromaniac) it was something like 186k.

 

5 hours ago, Guest June said:

Hm my stats might be behind, but i can assure you my combustion works perfectly and does bring in some good dmg, but after that I seem to struggle, the pyrofishing really doesn t work that well..As said it might be because of the gear you get when trying to grind up, also it is hard to find dungeons outside the gild.

My problem is how do you sustain the best and most fluent dps in the gaps between combustion ?

I, as stated, tried pyrofishing, but either my gear won´t allow it or I need a whoe different apporach to a gap filler.

The rotation really is exactly as described.

As for the gaps I typically fish for that first proc drop the second RoP upgrade with fireblast if i get the proc again use the last phoenix flame to upgrade again..thatll typically hold my dps so its not dropping off when just casting fireball and give u a good boost when talented into kindling for lowering the combust cooldown...then I just typically do the pyro fishing upgrade when i have fire blast until about 20 secs on combust cooldown I dont use fire blast to make sure I have two stacks for the combust chain again.

[Guest mage]

On 18.7.2016 at 5:44 PM, Guest Tagain said:

So is intellect or crit better? which should I gem and prefer in trinkets?

[Guest Firemage]

Hey! Great guide! Thanks alot for that, but i am a bit confused: is crit or int better? I mean which I should gem and prefer on trinkets..

[Malvenue 0]

The artifact tree graphic for 1.3 is the same as for 1.2. It doesn't show the final traits.