Fire Mage Opener -> Guide for Beginners

[Zauberdings]

Hey guys,

i took the time to create a Fire Mage opener Flowchart.
It is aimed for beginners, guys who got problems with their opener or other interested people.
As a disclaimer i pointed out, that this is only ONE version of an opener. There are more and there are better ones - but as i said, this one is for complete beginners

My advice for everyone interested: Use this opener and learn your timings. If you feel comfy enough, alter it for optimal timings and uptimes. Feel free to ask me for advice or tips. I will help you with altering and optimizing this opener for your needs.

Feel free to discuss this chart here, i will alter and optimize it regarding to constructive input
Hope you like it.

https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B4Kzp7 ... sp=sharing

[Unreal]

A chart like this would look pretty complex if you'd add in other talent combinations such as cinderstorm/Pyromatic or other legendaries such as the legendary head on a multi target fight.

On another note, isn't it better to cast your first phoenix flames inside your rop?

[Zauberdings]

I know, thats why i kept it simple. But i noticed, that i forgot to add my talents. Will do that now.

And, yes, it is better to cast phoenix first, so you get another phoenix up. But, i wanted to keep it simple. Two FB, FO, Two FB, continue with phoenix.

[Falq]

Hey!

Great job on chart! looks nice and hope will help many people.

I'm not sure thou if this rotation before Burst is accurate.If you are unlucky you waste a lot of time sitting at max PF stacks. Also to see if your Fireball crit and cast PF instead you need to wait for it's travel time so you wasted some seconds.

What I usually do is:
cast Fireball,
cast Fireball (2nd fireball to get rid off sinew stacks)
RoP + Combust + PF

If your second Fireball crit you have your hotstreak up, if not you have to use FB to get HS proc but you are not waiting on anything because you can see it already after RoP cast. and it's much easier for begining people

You got quite some arrows there which are over complicating it in my opinion I'd do just
Fireball -> Fireball (2nd)->RoP -> Combust -> PF(FireBlast if 2nd Fireball didnt crit) -> Pyro -> etc.

In this case you always do very similar thing and you don't sit on 3 stacks of PF for long time.

[Zauberdings]

@Falq:
Normally you dont need to wait, since the first or second fireball should proc. This is just the worst worst case, if you need more than 2. Just keep spamming it, dont waste any time "waiting" for procs.

I know that there are quiet a lot of arrows But packed together, i do the same thing as you
2 Fireball, ROP and go.

[Falq]

Yeah and since you wanted to keep it Simple, throwing away 3 blocks and deleting 6 relations would be good idea just always cast PF there, and cast FireBlast only if you don't have HS proc yet. You are prob looking at it as creator but as someone who see this chart first time I can say that everything on the right before BurnPhase does not look like "easy chart" so people may stop looking at it after first few seconds just because begning is more complicated than it should be. And this part is not even worth it's complexity. You also show Pyromaniac in choosen talents and you haven't really took it into count once in this chart. Just for your own peace I'd choose Conflag in this picture so people won't ask you questions about Chart and Pyromaniac reactions

[Zauberdings]

You are right. Damn it´s hard to create an easy understandable chart

[Falq]

You are right. Damn it´s hard to create an easy understandable chart

Keeping things easy is hardest thing because peoples point of view may vary a lot!

[Unreal]

What I usually do is:
cast Fireball,
cast Fireball (2nd fireball to get rid off sinew stacks)
RoP + Combust + PF

I do the same, though with bloodlust I don't cast the second fireball and just go straight into my burst. Also I usually activate combustion during PFs flightphase so it's more like rop+pf+comb for me.

[Kintoun]

Amazing chart and thanks for the hard work!

Chiming in to reinforce what has already been said. I would not suggest starting by casting fireball until you get a crit. Just follow the Simulationcraft APL and cast one fireball then make a decision based on if it crit (RoP -> PF+Fblast or RoP -> Fblast). The reason is because after casting the first fireball you have no idea if it will crit due to travel time unless you're RIGHT on top of the boss. So thus you must assume it will not crit and start casting another fireball to ensure ABC (Always Be Casting). Now what happens if it turns out your first fireball does crit? You're mid-cast on your second fireball. The only choice is to stop casting that second fireball. Because if you let it fly, it may not crit and ruin your Hot Streak chance. But stopping casting breaks the ABC rule and loses you one GCD of DPS time. Also as mentioned if you have a bad streak you're sitting on max FBlast and PF charges for too long.

[dioneslol]

Amazing chart and thanks for the hard work!

Chiming in to reinforce what has already been said. I would not suggest starting by casting fireball until you get a crit. Just follow the Simulationcraft APL and cast one fireball then make a decision based on if it crit (RoP -> PF+Fblast or RoP -> Fblast). The reason is because after casting the first fireball you have no idea if it will crit due to travel time unless you're RIGHT on top of the boss. So thus you must assume it will not crit and start casting another fireball to ensure ABC (Always Be Casting). Now what happens if it turns out your first fireball does crit? You're mid-cast on your second fireball. The only choice is to stop casting that second fireball. Because if you let it fly, it may not crit and ruin your Hot Streak chance. But stopping casting breaks the ABC rule and loses you one GCD of DPS time. Also as mentioned if you have a bad streak you're sitting on max FBlast and PF charges for too long.

Well if the first fireball crits and you're mid cast on the second, just fireblast > Rune > combust > pyro and do your normal burst from there, I see no downside, actually you have one extra phoenix for the second rune doing it that way

[Kintoun]

Amazing chart and thanks for the hard work!

Chiming in to reinforce what has already been said. I would not suggest starting by casting fireball until you get a crit. Just follow the Simulationcraft APL and cast one fireball then make a decision based on if it crit (RoP -> PF+Fblast or RoP -> Fblast). The reason is because after casting the first fireball you have no idea if it will crit due to travel time unless you're RIGHT on top of the boss. So thus you must assume it will not crit and start casting another fireball to ensure ABC (Always Be Casting). Now what happens if it turns out your first fireball does crit? You're mid-cast on your second fireball. The only choice is to stop casting that second fireball. Because if you let it fly, it may not crit and ruin your Hot Streak chance. But stopping casting breaks the ABC rule and loses you one GCD of DPS time. Also as mentioned if you have a bad streak you're sitting on max FBlast and PF charges for too long.

Well if the first fireball crits and you're mid cast on the second, just fireblast > Rune > combust > pyro and do your normal burst from there, I see no downside, actually you have one extra phoenix for the second rune doing it that way

You shouldn't waste a fireblast outside RoP. Fireblast can be cast while casting. In your example, PF uses a GCD which could have been a Pyro.

[Zauberdings]

I understand your concerns.
But, for beginners it is just easier to force the first proc by a fireblast. So you are guaranteed to do your opener right.
Me personally: I dont wait for the first one procs. I cast about 3 fireballs (for sinew proc), but even without sinew, you should just cast 2 and go from there on.

Again, there are a lot of little tweaks and things you could to. But this would destroy the purpose of a simple, beginner friendly, rotation.

[dioneslol]

Well if the first fireball crits and you're mid cast on the second, just fireblast > Rune > combust > pyro and do your normal burst from there, I see no downside, actually you have one extra phoenix for the second rune doing it that way

You shouldn't waste a fireblast outside RoP. Fireblast can be cast while casting. In your example, PF uses a GCD which could have been a Pyro.

Yeah you lose the 50% bonus on the fireblast by casting it before RoP (the reason is so you dont rely on the second fireball not critting) but you gain that later by have more things to use on your second RoP (the one right after you the first expire)

Also what does PF has do to with this? you dont lose any pyro at all there, at best you might gain 1 more, since you start with pyro instead of PF

My sugestion for opener is, Fireball > Fireball keep casting there, if you see that one fireball crit, use fireblast and save the pyro > cast RoP > Combust > Pyro > fireblast > Pyro > Flame On > fireblast > pyro > fireblast > pyro > PF > pyro > PF > Pyro >If rune expired RoP > PF > Pyro > If pyro crit FB > Pyro if it didnt crit > Fireball and ur normal rotation

I do 1 PF after flame + 1 fireblast just to make PF cd start counting, but that does not change anything at the end really

[Kintoun]

I understand your concerns.
But, for beginners it is just easier to force the first proc by a fireblast. So you are guaranteed to do your opener right.
Me personally: I dont wait for the first one procs. I cast about 3 fireballs (for sinew proc), but even without sinew, you should just cast 2 and go from there on.

Again, there are a lot of little tweaks and things you could to. But this would destroy the purpose of a simple, beginner friendly, rotation.

How is a one time decision of Fireball -> Did I crit? more complicated than what you're proposing? Also it is not good to sell "beginners" the non-optimal opener when the optimal one is so easy as well.

[Kintoun]

Well if the first fireball crits and you're mid cast on the second, just fireblast > Rune > combust > pyro and do your normal burst from there, I see no downside, actually you have one extra phoenix for the second rune doing it that way

You shouldn't waste a fireblast outside RoP. Fireblast can be cast while casting. In your example, PF uses a GCD which could have been a Pyro.

Yeah you lose the 50% bonus on the fireblast by casting it before RoP (the reason is so you dont rely on the second fireball not critting) but you gain that later by have more things to use on your second RoP (the one right after you the first expire)

Also what does PF has do to with this? you dont lose any pyro at all there, at best you might gain 1 more, since you start with pyro instead of PF

My sugestion for opener is, Fireball > Fireball keep casting there, if you see that one fireball crit, use fireblast and save the pyro > cast RoP > Combust > Pyro > fireblast > Pyro > Flame On > fireblast > pyro > fireblast > pyro > PF > pyro > PF > Pyro >If rune expired RoP > PF > Pyro > If pyro crit FB > Pyro if it didnt crit > Fireball and ur normal rotation

I do 1 PF after flame + 1 fireblast just to make PF cd start counting, but that does not change anything at the end really

You don't want to cast a fireball when you already have a Hot Streak proc. That is called munching and should be avoided. Fireball is our lowest DPET (damage per execution time) if Hot Streak is already active. Pretty bad usage of a GCD. In addition using the Fireblast outside the RoP + Combustion means you have one less Fireblast to use inside the cycle to convert a Heating Up into a Hot Streak. This means you need to use something ON the GCD to do that. You suggested to use PF, which yes would work, but it does not beat a Pyro. That PF is better used during the 2nd RoP. You want as many Pyros as possible while under Combustion since they give the highest DPET in that window. More haste (lust, set bonus, troll) lets you fit in PFs during that time too, but they're not as important as more Pyros.

I don't have a "suggestion" of my own. I'm merely citing the research and conclusions that have already been done and are baked into the Simulationcraft APLs.

[Curnivore]

Honestly it might be faster and more complete to just read the APL.

[dioneslol]

You don't want to cast a fireball when you already have a Hot Streak proc. That is called munching and should be avoided. Fireball is our lowest DPET (damage per execution time) if Hot Streak is already active. Pretty bad usage of a GCD. In addition using the Fireblast outside the RoP + Combustion means you have one less Fireblast to use inside the cycle to convert a Heating Up into a Hot Streak. This means you need to use something ON the GCD to do that. You suggested to use PF, which yes would work, but it does not beat a Pyro. That PF is better used during the 2nd RoP. You want as many Pyros as possible while under Combustion since they give the highest DPET in that window. More haste (lust, set bonus, troll) lets you fit in PFs during that time too, but they're not as important as more Pyros.

I don't have a "suggestion" of my own. I'm merely citing the research and conclusions that have already been done and are baked into the Simulationcraft APLs.

I dont understand, on your example and mine you use the first fireblast to get a pyro, on your example or mine you start the combust with a pyro, the only diference is you force a crit by casting a PF if your first fireball does not crit, on mine you fireball until it crits then do it normally, we do the same amount of pyros on the burn phase, the only diference is that at the end if your fireball did not crit I have one extra PF and delayed my combust by one fireball cast, if you get lucky and your fireball did crit, your opener is better, if it didnt I will have 1 more PF and probably 1 more pyro than you on my second rop, I just like my opener because it is consistent, but I think it does not change the overrall damage at the end

[macca]

Honestly it might be faster and more complete to just read the APL.

Whats APL. ?

[Lahrast]

action priority list, the priority list SimC works with...

also: with enough haste you can fit two hardcast pyros into the 2nd rune of power (i can with 18% which is a lot i know) even with the gcd needed to release a potential instant pyro between the two

optimal is:
1st rune runs out, you have heating up and legendary bracer proc (almost given)
cast 2nd rune, begin casting pyro, use fireblast to keep PI up, giving you hotstreak -> hardcast pyro+HS pyro cast
legendary proc? (20% chance, so not too unlikely yes) hardcast pyro, optimally before the previous two land (requires good reflexes) so you have with a bit luck a second round of hc pyro + hs pyro

if all this works out (and it does for alot of pulls for me) i practically keep the combustion spike-dps for another 5-6s which is a huge dps benefit