Opinion: Min-Maxing Mythic HFC

[Zelendria]

Rinoa as I have seen in ur comments that u are a really expierenced mage, I would like to hear whats ur opinion regarding this topic?

Quite a few of the peeps who have commented are 13/13M mages.

[Liandry]

It's not a coincidence some word first tier players went frost in some archi kills. Some fights theoretically good at that spec, make it worse than frost if your particular raid team isn't perfectly consistent in execution because the spec relies or reproducibility and predictability, before going into the unreliability created by pof.

Example..tyrant. Fire and Arcane both demolish frost

No. It sims worse than frost on the primary target on arcane and that's the most important part on second phase that defines the whole fight outcome (and frost is better in overall damage in some cases). I haven't simmed fire but I wouldn't be surprised if it splits damage near-50-50 and it's worse than arcane on that.

https://www.warcraftlogs.com/reports/WQ ... Dv#fight=9" target="_blank

From our raid last night. Fire does work on Tyrant.

[Curnivore]

^I was looking into logs yesterday and there are various fire mages failing to go near the top fire mage in their team. I can understand why. Similar situations exist with Arcane AOE though there control is better.

[Rinoa]

Rinoa as I have seen in ur comments that u are a really expierenced mage, I would like to hear whats ur opinion regarding this topic?

Quite a few of the peeps who have commented are 13/13M mages.

Yup. I'm flattered that my opinion is requested, but it's important to keep in mind that a great deal of posters here are very knowledgeable and experienced. Their thoughts and opinions are very much worthwhile to read and absorb.

In terms of progression I will say this; progression right now is different to what it was when the raid was first released. Gear levels are generally significantly higher across the board which ends up having an impact on which specs become the top performers. It's also vital to keep in mind that your raid composition and ring timings further alter the balance of the specs. For example, Fire usually has a hard time keeping up with Frost and Arcane in terms of doing very valuable damage (read: not padding insignificant adds on Iskar for example) whenever the ring usage does not line up with Sandman's Pouch and you don't have Bonemaw's Big Toe. Arcane also pulls ahead of frost in scenarios where Frost might be the superior spec before a high itemlevel Nithramus enters the equation.

It's difficult to just lay out a list of which spec is the best on each boss, because there are so many factors that are particular to each different raid. For example, I went Arcane quite early on in Archimonde farm because we had enough Hunters, Warlocks and the likes for the efficient cleave damage from Frost to not be as valuable as the higher single target from PC Arcane. I also did Tyrant progression as Frost. If my raid had an additional 10-15 itemlevels and lots of legendary rings I likely would have been Arcane instead. Every spec has some value though, none of them are straight up outperformed in literally every scenario a progression setting has to offer. It's important to be able to - or at least make an honest attempt - to recognize which spec would be the most helpful in the scenario you're struggling with.

[Raikoh]

thanks for ur answer. it confirmed my opinion. so I will stay frost for mythic progression. Currently we are progressing gorefiend. actually I play evanescene/alter time/cauterize/ice nova/i-flow and comet storm. IN und CS for adds. Does anyone have any special talent or gameplay tips for gorefiend?

[Rinoa]

Purely in terms of consistent add control, which is the be-all-end-all when progressing on Gorefiend, I'd personally probably go something like Ice Floes, Greater Invis, Ice Nova, Incanter's Flow and Comet Storm. This presumes you already have good enough boss damage, which is likely as the enrage is after the third feast is complete. It's also quite a boon to be able to use Prophecy of Fear when running Comet Storm, though the effect is likely lessened when swapping to adds often.

[Raikoh]

currently I have PoF unequiped and got the heirloom orb of voidsight because except feat phase I mostly target single adds running around and ppl told me its better for controlled cristall killing. For what reason u would like to use ginvis? well we are in the beginning of gorefiend progress and I have evanescence nearly on cooldown otherwise I would die. If we are getting better and not eating this much damage I will change to Ice floes.

[Rinoa]

It's completely personal preference of course, but I think you can get much closer to optimal casting uptimes with Ice Floes + Greater Invis than with Evanesce and Cauterize. Basically every scenario in which you would die is one you can see coming with enough time to spare to Greater Invis it, and it means you have Ice Block on top of that if you need to immune some damage or remove the Touch of Doom debuff.

[Raikoh]

okay thanks, so with ice block i can remove touch of doom, but with ginvis i cant?

I will try ginvis + ice floes this evening. lets see if it works smoother for me

[Wilderness]

okay thanks, so with ice block i can remove touch of doom, but with ginvis i cant?

I will try ginvis + ice floes this evening. lets see if it works smoother for me

Correct. GI will make it so you take less damage from it and can stack them up, but Iceblock completely removes it, which saves your raid a good 1.5m+ damage when you do. You can also stack doom wells fairly easily just by running in at the last second and blinking out, or using alter time to the same effect. I'd take Cold Snap over GI on that fight for progression.

[Tristful]

I just want to say that I appreciate ANY and ALL responses on this topic. I can't believe it got the views and response it did, and this is still somewhat of an unspoken discussion in my guild. We are currently progressing SO SLOWLY through mythic Mannoroth and I'm still frost! Some fights I destroy the meter and sometimes I'm just running with the pack, but overall I don't feel like a hindrance to my guild's progression. Overall, we are fighting execution of mechanics and developing our own strategies. A lot of the mythic videos at this point don't account for much higher gear levels that, at times, cause a significant disparity in pushing certain timers. This causes an overlap of mechanics that simply aren't represented in some videos which is difficult to account for. Such is the life of a guild like mine, who usually takes the entire tier to progress through a dungeon. Honestly, and I know I'm not speaking only for myself, but this sort of progression works for me. Killing bosses we spent excess time on is extremely fulfilling, and we never have a lot of down time before the next big patch. Cheers to everyone on both sides of the spectrum though, and again, thank you for all the logical, drama-free responses to a topic that can certainly cause an emotional reaction. ~Trist