Augmentation Evoker Best Augmentation Evoker Buff Targets — The War Within Pre-Patch

This page contains more in-depth information on how Augmentations Buffs work as well as information on who to buff.

Almost all of Augmentation Evokers buffs stack fully with other Augmentation Evokers. Assume it stacks unless it is specified otherwise.

• Prescience increases an allies Critical Strike Chance by 3%.
• There can be at most two Prescience's on a player from any source at any one time. You may still only have a single prescience on each player. You will be unable to cast Prescience on a player who already has two.
• The Fate Mirror talent enhances Prescience and grants allies with Prescience 10% chance to deal 15% of the damage of the triggering ability.
• Prescience and Fate Mirror works on non class damage like trinkets and embelllishments
• Prescience works fully with Pets and Guardians.
• Prescience will automatically target the nearest DPS player if cast on an enemy.
• Ebon Might will prefer to go on allies with Prescience letting you more easily fine-tune who you buff. This is the main way you control who gets your buffs.
• If Sense Power is active Prescience will prefer players with the buff active.
• Evoker Augmentation 10.2 Class Set 2pc makes every third Prescience cast last twice as long.
• Evoker Augmentation 10.2 Class Set 4pc means that casting Prescience gives stacks of Trembling Earth based on the number of active presciences you have, including the one you just cast. This increases the damage of your next Eruption by giving it small fissures that deal damage and extend Ebon Might by 0.2 seconds each.

• Ebon Might has two main effects, granting 6.5% of your primary stat to your allies and increasing your own damage by 20%.
• Just like with Prescience, Ebon Might has a maximum cap of 2 buffs on a player at any time from any source, including yourself, other raid members or even other players in the open world.
• The Evoker Augmentation 10.1 Class Set 2pc makes Ebon Might also increase the damage of your empower spells by an additional 30%.
• The Evoker Augmentation 10.1 Class Set 4pc makes Ebon Might give another 1% primary stat
• Close as Clutchmates increases the power of the damage amplification effect for all spells and the Primary Stat buff but not the 2pc effect. Close as clutchmates is a 10% increase and applies after the Season 2 4pc bonus for the primary stat, increasing it from 7.5% to 8.25%. Without the Season 2 4pc it increases from 6.5% to 7.15%
• Ebon Might prefers to go on DPS with Prescience
• Ebon Might Mastery: Timewalker prefers to give Shifting Sands to allies with your Ebon Might.
• Ebon Might does not snapshot and updates every second.
• Ebon Might will extend the duration of all currently active Ebon Mights if cast while it is still active.
• Ebon Might will pandemic letting you cast Ebon Might with 30% or less of the base duration remaining and not lose any uptime.
• The Primary Stat provided by Ebon Might does not increase the size of another Augmentation Evokers Ebon Might. This is why buffing another Augmentation Evoker is highly not recommended.

1. Ebon Might will always extend any currently active Ebon Mights overbuffing new targets.
2. Ebon Might prefers to go on the nearest DPS with Prescience, as long as they have less than two Ebon Mights from any source.
3. Ebon Might prefers to go on nearest Tanks / Healers with Prescience, as long as they have less than two Ebon Mights from any source.
4. Ebon Might prefers to go on the nearest DPS without any Ebon Might, even other peoples.
5. Ebon Might prefers to go on the nearest Tanks and Healers without any Ebon Might, even other peoples.
6. Ebon Might prefers to go on the nearest DPS as long as they have less than two Ebon Mights from any source.
7. Ebon Might prefers to go on the nearest Tanks and Healers as long as they have less than two Ebon Mights from any source.
8. If Ebon Might failed to find a valid target following the above priority, any extra targets do not happen.

• Shifting Sands is a Versatility Buff based on your Mastery, Mastery: Timewalker, and is triggered by casting empower spells.
• Shifting Sands does not snapshot Mastery and instead update the Versatility buff provided to your current Mastery Percent every second.
• Shifting Sands prefers to go on the closest nearby DPS player with Ebon Might that does not already have Shifting Sands from any Evoker, including other players. If every player with your Ebon Might already has a Shifting Sands, it will go onto the nearest DPS Player.

1. Shifting Sands prefers to go on the nearest DPS with Ebon Might and without any Shifting Sands
2. Shifting Sands prefers to go on nearest Tanks / Healers with Ebon Might and without any Shifting Sands
3. Shifting Sands prefers to go on the nearest DPS without any Shifting Sands
4. Ebon Might prefers to go on the nearest Tanks and Healers without any Shifting Sands.
5. Ebon Might prefers to go on the nearest DPS.
6. Ebon Might prefers to go on the nearest Tanks and Healers.

• Blistering Scales is a buff that grants 30% of your armor to an ally, as well as stacks of scales that explode for uncapped AoE damage when they receive auto attacks. You can only have one Blistering Scales at any time.
• Blistering Scales has a 2s icd on proccing the damage effect when receiving an auto attack.
• Blistering Scales scales entirely with the Augmentations stats. For example, the damage done is based on your Intellect, Versatility, and Critical Strike Chance despite the damage being sourced from the target.
• If you cast Blistering Scales on an enemy, it automatically targets their target, which helps smooth out gameplay. This means you do not need to swap off the boss in raid to cast this.

• Breath of Eons is an ability that applies a debuff to enemies hit that will store 10% of the damage dealt to them by your allies with Ebon might and then explode at the end of the duration for the stored amount.
• Breath of Eons often has a cooldown less than 2 minutes from talents like Time Skip or Interwoven Threads reducing the cooldown, but you still always want to use it every two minutes paired with DPS player cooldowns. Breath of Eons is a short-duration damage multiplier, so stacking it with other cooldowns is how to get the most effect.
• Breath of Eons only stores damage from class abilities and auto attacks and does not amplify damage from Trinkets, Enchantments, Embellishments, Consumables, or Gear Procs.
• Breath of Eons works fully with pets and guardians with their damage counting as if it were dealt by their owner directly.
• Breath of Eons always critically strikes but gains no damage from doing so.
• Breath of Eons does not gain damage from other Breath of Eons going off from other Augmentation Evokers nor Fate Mirror procs from yourself or others.
• Breath of Eons will apply Ebon Might if it is not currently active obeying normal targeting rules. The duration of this Ebon Might is always 5 seconds and is not increased by Mastery, nor can be increased by Sands of Time. However, if Ebon Might was already active then it extends it by 5 seconds, and this is affected by Sands of Time. This is one of the main reasons why it is suggested to cast Breath of Eons while Ebon Might is already up.

• Spatial Paradox is an external buff for healers, giving you and them the ability to cast while moving with double range.
• Spatial Paradox if cast on an enemy, will default to the nearest healer.
• Spatial Paradox does not stack.

• Draconic Attunements is a talent that gives you the two stances Bronze Attunement and Black Attunement. Bronze Attunement gives you a 10% increased movement speed, while Black Attunement gives you 4% increased maximum health.
• The auras from Draconic Attunements apply to you and your 4 nearest allies.
• Draconic Attunements does not stack.
• Swapping stances between Bronze Attunement and Black Attunement is off GCD, letting you do it any time, but it It has a 3-second lockout after swapping.

Augmentation provides multiple temporary short-duration buffs and is therefore incentivized to cast those buffs on burstier classes to maximize the effect of its own buff windows. This is because a burstier class will be able to pack more damage into the short windows offered by talents like Breath of Eons

Augmentation Evoker has five DPS buffs:

• Ebon Might - A Primary Stat Amplifier
• Shifting Sands - Augmentations Mastery, Versatility Percent
• Prescience - A Critical Strike Chance buff
• Fate Mirror - A general damage amplifier
• Breath of Eons - which acts as a cooldown dps multiplier.

A common misconception people have is that because Augmentation provides Crit and Versatility buffs that classes that invest in Crit and Versatility will like the Augmentation buffs. This, for the most part, is not true.

The more Versatility a class has, the smaller the increase provided by Mastery is. Say you provide 25% Versatility with your Mastery, going from 0% to 25% (25% More DPS). Versatility is a much bigger DPS increase than going from 25% to 50% (20% More DPS).

This means that classes that invest in Versatility by necessity are usually inferior choices for buffing. This is because they do not have any other good stats and are therefore forced to use Versatility to scale their damage and usually have a significant amount. This includes classes like Windwalker Monk and Outlaw Rogue, to name a few.

It is also worth considering that your main way to target Ebon Might onto specific players is via Prescience, and Critical Strike chance has virtually no value for some specializations, which makes targeting them with Prescience inefficient compared to trying to buff them via proximity. Classes with poor Critical Strike Chance scaling include Frost Mages (Unless they gear around receiving Prescience) and Fire Mages. You do not wish to give Prescience to these DPS classes if you can avoid it.

On the other hand, some specializations also perform better with Critical Strike Chance than expected, such as Frost Death Knight and Devastation Evoker. This increases the value of giving them Ebon Might as well as they usually come as a combined package deal.

These rankings are based off of Season 4 Simulations. All of these rankings are based on Augmentation using its own Season 4 set as well as the dps being buffed using their Season 4 sets. These are still subject to change as tuning occurs and as more information becomes apparent and will be updated accordingly to maintain as high accuracy as possible.

These rankings have not been updated for prepatch to take into account class changes. This list will be updated with the start of The War Within and will receive continuous updates during the the first season.

This ranking is not absolute. Player skill and gear have a large impact on how good classes are; use your own judgment in combination with the list to work out who you wish to receive. Classes receiving Power Infusion gain significant value.

This ranking includes the Prescience to force the buffs onto that class. Classes that mention weak or no Critical Strike scaling gain significantly if buffed via proximity (by standing near them as Ebon Might targets nearby allies).

Class	Brief Explanation
Unholy Death Knight	Incredibly strong 3 minute cooldowns. Incredible Power Infusion target. Nearly 10% ahead of Arcane (2nd best opener class) as a buff target. Optimal buff timing is delayed due to ramping Cooldowns and long setup time but still exceptional no matter what.
Arcane Mage	Incredibly strong 3 minute cooldowns. Optimal buff timing is very delayed, significantly lowering DPS gained on average. This is a lot more significant than the delay for Unholy and will typically want a 1-2 extra GCDs of delay if buffing an Arcane Mage on the opener but it depends on the other specialisations you buff if this outweighs the damage you lose for being later on those specialisations. Very compressed damage window that fits within Breath of Eons.
Devastation Evoker	Strong 2 Minute Cooldown. Great Power Infusion target. Incredibly strong tuning further pushes this as a good target.
Assassination Rogue	Incredibly powerful 2 minute cooldowns. One of the best Power Infusion targets, which further boosts the power of stacked buffs. The overall extremely poor tuning Assassination have lowered their damage outside of their 2-minute window immensely, making this the only desirable time to buff them.
Frost Deathknight	Good Bloodlust Opener. Very High Sustained DPS. Above average critical strike chance scaling for Prescience.
Beast Mastery Hunter	Strong Lust Opener. Decent Burst with Cooldowns. Very high sustained DPS. Very Good Power Infusion target.
Destruction Warlock	Potent 2/3 Minute Cooldowns (2 minutes with Grand Warlock's Design.) Crashing Chaos talent outputs frontloaded damage into Breath of Eons.
Subtlety Rogue	Very Strong Cooldowns. The Invigorating Shadowdust if played, causes their CDs to desync from Eons lowering value after opener. Weaker tuning in S4 drops their relative ranking.
Feral Druid	Strong Cooldowns no matter which talent they choose as their Main CD.
Frost Mage	Very strong 2 minute cooldowns. The Shifting Power Talent desyncs their Icy Veins and other cooldowns from Eons. Weak Prescience unless they have less than 30% Critical Strike Chance.
Shadow Priest	Very Strong 1 and 2-minute cooldowns. Relatively low on pull burst compared to the better specializations listed above. Shadow does decent sustained damage and good damage during its later cooldowns to make up for this.
Havoc Demon Hunter	Potent 2 Minute Coodowns. High Consistent Damage. Incredible AOE Damage.
Affliction Warlock	Potent 2 Minute Coodowns. Very good Power Infusion receiver.
Arms Warrior	Weak Cooldowns outside of execute. High Consistent Damage. Incredibly well-tuned. Damage heavily favours execute so opener is relatively weak compared to its overall output.
Windwalker Monk	Powerful Cooldowns that give high Breath of Eons damage. High portion of nonclass damage (Trinkets, Embellishments). Heavy investment in Critical Strike Chance makes the incremental gain of Prescience worse. Has High investment in Versatility which lowers gain from Shifting Sands.
Retribution Paladin	Powerful 1 minute Cooldowns. High portion of nonclass damage (Trinkets, Embellishments). Heavy investment in Critical Strike Chance makes the incremental gain of Prescience worse. Has significant investment in Versatility which lowers gain from Shifting Sands.
Enhancement Shaman	Good Bloodlust Opener. Very high Sustained Damage. Best Generic Buff Target at any fight time due to profile. Try to avoid buffing on opener unless the target is exceptional compared to other choices.
Survival Hunter	Poor Cooldowns/Burst. High sustained damage. Heavy investment in Critical Strike Chance makes the incremental gain of Prescience worse. Has significant investment in Versatility which lowers gain from Shifting Sands. Try to avoid buffing on opener unless the target is exceptional compared to other choices.
Balance Druid	Decent Opener with their 3-minute Cooldowns. Relatively weaker tuning lowers potential damage gained. Good Consistent Damage outside of Cooldowns. Try to avoid buffing on opener unless the target is exceptional compared to other choices.
Fire Mage	Fire Mage Combustion openers do significant damage over the the course of the first minute. Near Zero Critical Scaling from Prescience as Improved Combustion only converts stat ratings, not percentages. Recommended to only proximity buff Fire Mages. Try to avoid buffing on opener with Prescience unless the target is exceptional compared to other choices.
Marksmanship Hunter	Strong Cooldowns. Good Burst. Incredibly poor tuning compared to the top-performing specializations. Very Good Power Infusion target. Has some investment in Versatility which lowers gain from Shifting Sands. Absolutely incredible on AOE. Do not buff on opener.
Demonology Warlock	Decent 120s Cooldowns. Poor relative tuning. Demonology no longer has extremely potent cooldowns like it did in Season 1 and 2. It now has damage more spread out throughout the fight making it worse for Augmentation. Has significant investment in Versatility which lowers gain from Shifting Sands. Incredibly slow opener lowers value as Breath of Eons does not buff their damage window, and waiting loses damage from other classes. The slow opener causes Demonology to line up poorly for the rest of the encounter. Do not buff on opener.
Elemental Shaman	Weak Cooldowns. Low Burst. Has some investment in Versatility which lowers gain from Shifting Sands. Diminishing Returns on Critical Strike Investment lowers Prescience Value. Do not buff on opener.
Outlaw Rogue	No Cooldowns. Worst synergy with Augmentation. High proportion of nonclass damage (Trinkets, Embellishments). Highly tuned for ST, but still a bad buff target. Versatility specialization lowers gain from Shifting Sands. Diminishing Returns on Critical Strike Investment lowers Prescience Value. Do not buff on opener.
Fury Warrior	Middling Cooldowns that are incredibly short that fails to take full advantage of the opening Ebon Might. Damage heavily favours execute so opener is weak. Has significant investment in Versatility which lowers gain from Shifting Sands. Abhorrent Primary Stat Scaling so Ebon Might is extremely weak. High proportion of nonclass damage (Trinkets, Embellishments). Do not buff on opener.

These rankings are based on a mixture of Simulation Data and Real World Performance. All of these rankings are based on Augmentation using its own Season 4 set as well as the dps being buffed using their Season 4 sets. These are subject to change as tuning occurs and will be updated accordingly to maintain as high accuracy as possible.

Augmentations opener lasts for approximately a minute unless you intentionally avoid refreshing your first Ebon Might by holding your Ebon Might cast until it falls off (typically around 32-34 seconds into the fight, this is common practice at high levels of optimization where you use tools like WoWAnalyzer to optimize each segment individually). You have opportunities to retarget your Ebon Might whenever it drops and it is a noticeable Single Target gain to do so, although not required to enjoy the specialization. Below are intervals into the fight for which classes cooldowns come back up to help you judge who to buff.

Cooldowns shown below are the cooldown required to be active or nearly ready for the class to be valuable to buff. Any class without a cooldown shown is always a good target, regardless of whatever cooldowns they have.

Class	Cooldowns
Unholy Death Knight	Army of the Dead with Army of the Damned
Arcane Mage	Arcane Surge
Balance Druid	Incarnation: Chosen of Elune
Destruction Warlock	Summon Infernal

Class	Cooldowns
Devastation Evoker	Dragonrage
Assassination Rogue	Deathmark
Feral Druid	Convoke the Spirits / Berserk
Shadow Priest	Power Infusion
Destruction Warlock	Summon Infernal with Grand Warlock's Design
Frost Death Knight	Breath of Sindragosa / Empower Rune Weapon
Subtlety Rogue	Flagellation - This has a varied CD between 1m and 1m30s. You always wish to buff this damage window with whatever you have available.
Havoc Demon Hunter	Metamorphosis
Affliction Warlock	Summon Darkglare
Frost Mage	Icy Veins - Do not use Prescience; only buff via proximity due to poor crit scaling.
Windwalker Monk	Invoke Xuen, the White Tiger alongside Serenity
Marksmanship Hunter	Trueshot

Class	Cooldowns
Arcane Mage	Arcane Surge
Subletly Rogue	Flagellation - This has a varied CD between 1m and 1m30s. You want to buff Subtlety during these windows if possible and there aren't other more impactful 2-minute cooldowns available.
Unholy Death Knight	Apocalypse

Class	Cooldowns
Subletly Rogue	Flagellation - This has a varied CD between 1m and 1m30s. You want to buff Subtlety during these windows if possible and there aren't other more impactful 2-minute cooldowns available.
Shadow Priest	Dark Ascension
Affliction Warlock ( Soul Rot)	Soul Rot
Retribution Paladin	Avenging Wrath
Assassination Rogue	Kingsbane

Class	Cooldowns
Arms Warrior	Boss HP <35%.
Frost Death Knight	Pillar of Frost
Beast Mastery Hunter	-
Havoc Demon Hunter	-
Enhancement Shaman	-
Arms Warrior	--
Balance Druid	-
Affliction Warlock	Vile Taint and Soul Rot
Destruction Warlock	-
Survival Hunter	-
Marksmanship Hunter	3t+
Fire Mage	Combustion / Sun King's Blessing - Do not use Prescience, only buff via proximity due to poor crit scaling.
Elemental Shaman	-
Outlaw Rogue	-

Arms Warrior has a talent called Fatality, which incentivizes making sure they have your buffs for when the boss goes below 30% health, as this does a large amount of instant burst damage.