Fire Mage Best Covenants, Soulbinds, and Conduits — Dragonflight 10.2.5

Last updated on Jan 15, 2024 at 15:00 by Dutchmagoz 63 comments
General Information

Covenants, Soulbinds, and Conduits are the most important character customization options in Shadowlands. They have a substantial impact on your toolkit and performance as Fire Mage. This page's purpose is to help you pick the right options according to the content you intend to do in Shadowlands.

1.

Dragonflight Disclaimer

Please be aware that as of the Dragonflight Pre-Patch and Dragonflight expansion, all Covenant abilities, Soulbinds, and Conduits will only function while within the Shadowlands. This page will temporarily remain as a reference.

2.

Introduction: Prerequisites

This page assumes that you are already familiar with Covenants, Soulbinds, and Conduits. If that is not the case, we have a number of pages that can help you get up to speed:

  • Covenants Guide, which explains what Covenants are, what perks they bring, and how you can join one;
  • Mage Covenant Abilities, which lists all the abilities that Mages gain by joining each Covenant;
  • How To Change Covenant?, which tells you how you can switch Covenant (rejoining a former Covenant will require you to perform a number of tasks to regain their trusts);
  • General Soulbind Guide, which explains what Soulbinds are and how you can pledge yourself to them to open up their Soulbind tree;
  • Mage Conduits, which lists all of the Conduits available to Mages.
3.

Summary of the Best Covenants, Soulbinds, and Conduits

Below we have listed a general guideline to the best Covenants. However, we strongly recommend reading further to help you pick the optimal Covenant and Soulbind, as depending on how much Renown you have, both the priority changes and the optimal tree changes.

Focus Covenant Soulbind Advised Tree
Raiding Venthyr Theotar the Mad Duke Fire Mage Dreamweaver Raiding tree
Mythic+ Night Fae Dreamweaver Fire Mage Dreamweaver Mythic+ tree
Torghast Night Fae Dreamweaver Fire Mage Dreamweaver Torghast tree
3.1.

Fire Mage Covenant Choice

Generally speaking, the best choice for most PvE scenarios for a Fire Mage is either Night Fae or Venthyr. Generally Venthyr will be on top for single-target, with Night Fae winning out in AoE situations.

3.2.

Best Conduits for Fire Mage

In the list below, you will find the best Conduits, organized by type. For more information, please refer to the Conduits section of this page.

  • Best Potency Conduits: Infernal Cascade Icon Infernal Cascade is the best Potency Conduit for all situations, with Controlled Destruction Icon Controlled Destruction (cannot be used with Controlled Destruction Icon Controlled Destruction talented) as second best for pure single-target/low cleave and Master Flame Icon Master Flame as second best for AoE situations. Discipline of the Grove Icon Discipline of the Grove (Night Fae only) and Siphoned Malice Icon Siphoned Malice (Venthyr only) are good hybrid options, and can often be better in single-target situations than Controlled Destruction as well, depending on timers. Since you can use 3 Potency Conduits, you should generally take Infernal Cascade + Controlled Destruction + your Covenant conduit, swapping Controlled Destruction for Master Flame on pure AoE scenarios.
  • Best Finesse Conduits: Most of the options here are good choices and largely come down to personal preference. However, Flow of Time Icon Flow of Time is useful in all situations and arguably the only one that increases your DPS by increasing mobility.
  • Best Endurance Conduits: This is largely personal choice. All of them are very good defensive options.
4.

Why Venthyr and Night Fae are the Best Covenant for Fire Mage

Night Fae and Venthyr are the best 2 Covenants in all PvE situations for Fire Mages. Venthyr is the best on single-target, with Night Fae being best on AoE situations.

A primary reason which makes Night Fae a great Covenant is the class ability Shifting Power Icon Shifting Power. This ability is good in both single-target and AoE situations. It reduces the cooldown of all your cooldowns, including the cooldown of Fire Blast Icon Fire Blast. Combine this with 3 solid Soulbinds that all have 3 Potency Conduit slots and good damage boosting abilities, and it is clear why Night Fae is such a strong choice.

Venthyr is takes the spot as best single-target option due to its relatively strong Covenant-only Legendary, Sinful Delight Icon Sinful Delight, whereas Night Fae's Covenant Legendary is generally weak on single-target.

We cover our thoughts on the other Covenants and their Soulbinds in this section further below.

4.1.

Night Fae Soulbinds

Night Fae has three very capable Soulbinds, since all of them contain three Potency Conduit slots and have damage boosting abilities in it. However, Dreamweaver is the best overall Soulbind, as it contains both 3 potency conduit slots, and some great damage-boosting other traits. On-top of being the best DPS, it also has great utility in the form of Podtender Icon Podtender and Waking Dreams Icon Waking Dreams. We suggest using this tree for all situations.

4.2.

Venthyr Soulbinds

Venthyr has a bit less flexibility when it comes to Soulbinds, as you will basically always play with Theotar the Mad Duke. We suggest this tree for all single-target situations.

5.

Best Conduits for Fire Mage

This section only covers which Conduits you should pick. For detailed explanations on what all of the Mage Conduits do, check out our Mage Soulbinds and Conduits Page below.

5.1.

Best Single-Target Potency Conduits for Fire Mage

  1. Infernal Cascade Icon Infernal Cascade
  2. Controlled Destruction Icon Controlled Destruction (if not talented into Controlled Destruction Icon Controlled Destruction) / Discipline of the Grove Icon Discipline of the Grove (Night Fae only) / Siphoned Malice Icon Siphoned Malice (Venthyr only) / Ire of the Ascended Icon Ire of the Ascended (Kyrian only)
  3. Flame Accretion Icon Flame Accretion
  4. Gift of the Lich Icon Gift of the Lich (Necrolord only)
5.2.

Best Cleave / AoE Potency Conduits for Fire Mage

  1. Infernal Cascade Icon Infernal Cascade
  2. Master Flame Icon Master Flame
  3. Discipline of the Grove Icon Discipline of the Grove (Night Fae only) / Siphoned Malice Icon Siphoned Malice (Venthyr only) / Ire of the Ascended Icon Ire of the Ascended (Kyrian only) / Gift of the Lich Icon Gift of the Lich (Necrolord only)
  4. Controlled Destruction Icon Controlled Destruction (if not talented into Controlled Destruction Icon Controlled Destruction)
  5. Flame Accretion Icon Flame Accretion

In practice, this means you will run the following 3 conduits in all situations: Infernal Cascade Icon Infernal Cascade, Controlled Destruction Icon Controlled Destruction, and your Covenant Conduit, swapping Controlled Destruction for Master Flame in pure AoE situations, which, since Patch 9.1.5 can be done freely in your Covenant Sanctum.

5.3.

Best Finesse Conduits for Fire Mage

Finesse Conduits are mostly mobility and utility focused and are therefore largely personal preference. Having said that, Flow of Time Icon Flow of Time is indirectly a damage boost as it allows you to use Blink Icon Blink (or Shimmer Icon Shimmer, if talented) more and thus spend less time moving and not doing optimal DPS.

5.4.

Best Endurance Conduits for Fire Mage

Endurance Conduits are all Conduits that improve your survivability. All of the Mage ones are strong so you can mostly pick this based on personal preference and circumstance.

6.

Other Covenants for Fire Mage

6.1.

Kyrian: Radiant Spark

Kyrian is generally the third best Covenant for Fire Mages. The Kyrian ability (Radiant Spark Icon Radiant Spark) is one of the worst Covenant abilities for Fire Mages, but the Soulbind Pelagos is a pretty strong Soulbind, which makes Kyrian a decent alternative to Night Fae on pure single-target. On single-target, Kyrian is around 1-3% behind Night Fae at most Renown levels. However, in cleave and AoE situations, it falls significantly (7-15%) behind. Kyrian is only second best while using Pelagos. When using any other Soulbind, Kyrian falls behind much more. (5-8% on single-target and 5-15%+ in AoE)

Although picking Kyrian instead of Night Fae will not really put you behind on pure single-target, it will put you significantly behind in AoE situations and make you much less flexible, as Kyrian only has one good Soulbind, while Night Fae has three.

6.2.

Necrolord: Deathborne

Necrolord has the worst single-target Covenant ability in the form of Deathborne Icon Deathborne, and the second worst in AoE. This is however partially made up with its relatively strong Soulbind, Emeni. With the optimal setup, Necrolord is around 2-4% behind Night Fae. Necrolord does however not have any other good Soulbinds, and has due to this the same lack of flexibility as Kyrian has, with the second best Soulbind being 5%+ behind Night Fae in every situation.

7.

Other Soulbinds for Fire Mage

Below we go over the Soulbinds of each other Covenant and in what situations you might consider them. The advice below applies to all Renown levels unless otherwise specified.

7.1.

Kyrian Soulbinds

7.2.

Necrolord Soulbinds

8.

Changelog

  • 24 Oct. 2022: Updated for Dragonflight pre-patch.
Show more
Show less