7.1.5 - Arcane Mage Guide - Updated: 02-16-2017

[Kythos]

@Rue good insight... and good questions.

please forgive all the shorthand... I have NOT done alot of testing... this is a GENERAL overview of my thoughts on rotations. Legendary and gear WILL change your experience.

Burn/ opening is still very similar....
[with AMP, Slip, RoP, Res, Chrono, ErsN, OP ]

abx4, MOA, RoP, AP, AM (s), PoM AB, AB, AMs...


Sometimes after OP i am at 100% mana...(especially with good AM procs)
so I start burning with ABs till i have 2 AMs, then RoP mini- burn the AMs, ... down to 0% mana.... Barrage, EVO (slip movement with chrono speed) ... then Ang.Acendance on their face

now.... with AP/Evo on CD:
its all about managing mana for a minute... barrage!!!

I think everyone should be able to ABx4, (AMs) barrage for ST...
more casts = more chances to proc, crit, trickets, etc..

when OP is starting to come back you can widdle down to 30% mana, pop everything on your second AP and burn everything. evo ...

I dont know if this helps at all... on heroic Ursoc a 2:14 minute fight I barraged 5 times ( after the 1 minute lust on pull burn)... on Mythic Odyn a 7:18 min fight 17 times... mainly to get a speed boost during the rune/protection/add phase.

TLDR: mana problems? barrage! xD

[Sol]

Wait are we supposed to always use MoA with AP? I thought it depended on fight length. If the fight is 3 minutes long for example you save MoA for AP, but if it's 4 minutes you use it on a CD with a rune

[Kythos]

Wait are we supposed to always use MoA with AP? I thought it depended on fight length. If the fight is 3 minutes long for example you save MoA for AP, but if it's 4 minutes you use it on a CD with a rune

good question. I asked the same question during 7.1...

typically I try and delay the 2nd MoA the 30 seconds for the 2nd AP... by delaying the 30 seconds, get 70% more damage...
however
On longer fights this might not be the correct min/max move... anyone run some numbers?

(balancing a 1 min cd and a 1.5 min cd)

AP on CD AP at 10 seconds (MOA)
AP at 100 seconds (MOA)
AP at 190 seconds (MOA)
AP at 280 seconds (MOA)
AP at 370 seconds (MOA)
AP at 460 seconds (MOA)

MOA on CD. 10 seconds. (AP)
70 seconds
130 seconds
190 seconds (AP)
250 seconds
310 seconds
370 Seconds (AP)
430 seconds

with Overpowered (especially with RoP) for a 8 minute
6 MoA +70% dmg VS 8 MoA (3+70% dmg and 5 without)

I do not want to crunch the actual numbers... please feel free to do so... my GUESSTIMATE is maximizing the OP burst windows is going to be better for us for now.

what about 2 minute fights? what about 4 minute fights?
What about Incanters Flow? Arcane Orb? temp flux?
about about cleave/ multi target bosses?

good question Sol... goood question.

[x1xruex1x]

Awesome information Visk & Kythos. I'll give it a whirl and see if I can't improve on myself there.

Thank you for the input.

And yea, I'm already hearing that NH isn't fairing very well for magi of any spec honestly.

We will see through it though,.. unless I end up having to tank again hopefully our main tank won't go MIA due to real life tho. <3 my magey-poo!

[Asara]

I think arcane mage isnt going to be kicked from doing NH, atleast thats what i felt when i did NH 6/10 N last night. Our baseline damage is pretty good, even if it was the first time we did a boss, and the timings got botched (AP and evocation just dont line up properly in most of the fights) i still was able to pull atleast 300k dps. So i really feel our floor was raised and we will be able to dish out the damage required. Are we neccesary though? No, not really. Other classes can do what we do better, but there is no reason you can't bring an Arcane mage.

https://www.warcraftlogs.com/reports/7J3q8VCYZF9xkyBd/#" target="_blank Logs from last night, keep in mind that was our first time and the high botanist is a biatch haha

http://eu.battle.net/wow/en/character/b ... ara/simple" target="_blank Armory

[Haruichi]

Other classes can do what we do better, but there is no reason you can't bring an Arcane mage.

Thank you for sharing your numbers. I have to say, though, that based on the logs you've shared, I'm not quite sure your above remark holds up.

I assume that you're a good player; your gear is quite good for Normal, although you've been a tad lucky with legendaries. Apart from the Tichondrius encounter, you're either no. 11 or 13 on damage. Even on Krosus, which is a fairly straight forward, single target, single phase encounter, you're 13th with 320K dps. You can get unlucky with Orbs of Destruction, of course, but doing a cursory glance at how many times the different dps players were targeted by OoD, you were even quite well off. Most were hit 5 times, you were hit 3 times.

I haven't gone over the armory of the other players of your raid, and the explanation might simply be that they're better geared than you are. And I hope this doesn't come across as my trying to single you out; I'm really not. I'm sure you're a great player, and that many others, myself included, wouldn't do any better.

My comments are directed at the comment I quoted: There might be no reason you *can't* bring an arcane mage, but, if your logs are representative, there seem to be good reason why a raid leader wouldn't. And you offer that reason yourself:

Other classes can do what we do better

.

I hope that you're correct, of course: That Arcane Mages are viable and competetive in NH. I must admit, though, your logs in and of themselves don't underline that notion.

[Asara]

Other classes can do what we do better, but there is no reason you can't bring an Arcane mage.

Thank you for sharing your numbers. I have to say, though, that based on the logs you've shared, I'm not quite sure your above remark holds up.

I assume that you're a good player; your gear is quite good for Normal, although you've been a tad lucky with legendaries. Apart from the Tichondrius encounter, you're either no. 11 or 13 on damage. Even on Krosus, which is a fairly straight forward, single target, single phase encounter, you're 13th with 320K dps. You can get unlucky with Orbs of Destruction, of course, but doing a cursory glance at how many times the different dps players were targeted by OoD, you were even quite well off. Most were hit 5 times, you were hit 3 times.

I haven't gone over the armory of the other players of your raid, and the explanation might simply be that they're better geared than you are. And I hope this doesn't come across as my trying to single you out; I'm really not. I'm sure you're a great player, and that many others, myself included, wouldn't do any better.

My comments are directed at the comment I quoted: There might be no reason you *can't* bring an arcane mage, but, if your logs are representative, there seem to be good reason why a raid leader wouldn't. And you offer that reason yourself:

Other classes can do what we do better

.

I hope that you're correct, of course: That Arcane Mages are viable and competetive in NH. I must admit, though, your logs in and of themselves don't underline that notion.

Well, what i meant with that quote is that arcane isn't so bad that you can't bring it at all, and raid leaders would shun from taking you. If you have high ilvl, and you apply to pugs, im pretty sure at this moment people wouldn't mind taking you. Maybe if later on in the expansion the numbers dont increase, we will get passed on though. So better make sure you get those achievements soon.

Tbh i'm a kind of guy who gets better by doing the fight many times, to get the timing down and everything, so im sure the numbers will rise a bit. But yes, as far as i noticed, other classes just do better, and i think we end up somewhere in the middle of the pack with dps. What we as arcane mages are though, is reliable in dps. We have no problem with pulling out 300k+ dps every fight, while other classes are way better at some encounters than others, but suck at another one. I think (dont quote me on this) that all mage specs are going to be somewhat close, if you dont count the fire living bomb dps cheese on skorpyron and the likes.

[Asara]

You can get unlucky with Orbs of Destruction, of course, but doing a cursory glance at how many times the different dps players were targeted by OoD, you were even quite well off. Most were hit 5 times, you were hit 3 times.

Also, as far as i know, it only counts as a hit if youre hit by the explosion, so not if you're the one who the orb is on. This means we had 5 in total (im pretty sure this is accurate, as the other would mean we had 200 orbs, which is highly unlikely) and the orb was on me twice (hence, i only got hit 3 times). So 2/5 orbs were on me, which is correct, as i remember i had to run back twice. This corresponds with the numbers in total, as a few others have been hit 4 times, which adds up to 5 in total. Which in conclusion means my rng was hella bad xD

[Mage]

Arcane is viable for anything available right now.
Might not be optimal for world 1st mythic race.

Anyway, mages are doing quite well so far, fire is inflated by Skorpyron logs, in reality it sits just above/equal to arcane on all other bosses. Good time to be a mage.

https://www.warcraftlogs.com/statistics/11#dataset=90" target="_blank

[Asara]

Arcane is viable for anything available right now.
Might not be optimal for world 1st mythic race.

Anyway, mages are doing quite well so far, fire is inflated by Skorpyron logs, in reality it sits just above/equal to arcane on all other bosses. Good time to be a mage.

https://www.warcraftlogs.com/statistics/11#dataset=90" target="_blank

quite well? you linked a log where we are bottom half, if not last xD

[x1xruex1x]

Ok children, don't fret so much over log numbers still. As I've said last week and now going to repeat with Nighthold. It's way too early to state that the mage is suffering.

Plus, looking at the log above by @Mage, Arcane is 82.8, and most numbers are only a point or two difference. We're 8 points from near top, but most people are within a very small distance.

I don't really view this as we're at the bottom of the barrel or anything. I see this as an excuse to get our logs out there, and find rotations and scenarios that help us to increase our rankings beyond what they currently are.

I agree with Haruichi, Asara, and Mage on all your statements. There is no correct one right now, or correct way for any of the arcane mage.

If we stick to our guns with this, keep working on a rotation and scenario lineup that gives us better odds of increasing our overall damage output, then that's what matters most

Give the logs about 3-4 weeks before we start calling it how it lands tho. That'll give more than enough spreads of information to go off of. Not to mention, some people will be deterred by the initial logs, and not go in logging under arcane for example. then in turn we dont see them represented and their numbers drop because of that. and for the ones that do represent, if we're still figuring out the builds, then that'll curve the results as well.

hang in there everyone. we're gonna get it and we're gonna find out where we specialize and once we do, we'll let em have it ^_^

[Cauldron]

Talking about logs, here are mine from yesterday (just missing Skorpyron cause was late to raid).
I've used all the tips from here and really improved on performance. Still can do more, but... It's just normal, we decided to go for it first to easily get some Tier pieces. I have an 875 2 tier piece now, will see how it sims (replacing 880 pieces).

https://www.warcraftlogs.com/reports/bG ... amage-done

I'm still running incenter's flow, cause I love it. I made some weak auras to replace the Arcane Missiles procs from blizzard. If incenter's flow stack is 4 or 5 the proc has different color so I know is going to get the most out of it.
Working good so far.

[loonatiq]

To add my two cents you shouldnt really worry about Arcane mage place in NH Raid. Sometimes I am top 5 dps sometimes around 7-8 but still its alright.

My tip is to take Ressonance for AOE fights its making your dps way higher. Some fights have dmg buffs like Tichondrius fight or Elisendare - if you take them and pop cooldowns you are going to skyrocket during AP. Also if it happens with added Time Warp then easily you go top dps.

Last night I got my 2 set piece bonus - one item 885 other one sadly 875 still the bonus is amazing. It's 10% more chance to proc AM on your arcane blast. Currently I am sitting at 51% chance to proc AM using AB which is honestly pretty awesome. Sims show that AM with 2 set piece bonus deal more damage during the whole fight than AB which is true with so much chance to proc them. Being free spell to cast and fact that I have kilt mana is not an issue. I dropped mastery to around 20-25%.

Also you shouldnt worry about 15% nerf on whispers in the dark it's still very good trinket. I have 880 version and 35% haste when it procs is godlike.

[x1xruex1x]

Talking about logs, here are mine from yesterday (just missing Skorpyron cause was late to raid).
I've used all the tips from here and really improved on performance. Still can do more, but... It's just normal, we decided to go for it first to easily get some Tier pieces. I have an 875 2 tier piece now, will see how it sims (replacing 880 pieces).

https://www.warcraftlogs.com/reports/bG ... amage-done

I'm still running incenter's flow, cause I love it. I made some weak auras to replace the Arcane Missiles procs from blizzard. If incenter's flow stack is 4 or 5 the proc has different color so I know is going to get the most out of it.
Working good so far.

@Cauldron,

Thank you for the log and insight. I was peaked by your note about the Weak Auras for the IF stacks and combo'ing with a customer alert for AM procs while within 4-5 IF stacks. Your damage avg'd around 365k for the night, but peaks were in the 600k's and lows were near 317k. Definitely seems like you were more often around 400's though from what I see. I think this lends itself to some thought. I'd like to see what your Weak Auras looks like if you may. Would you be able to provide a screencap of it?

As for the overall damage output, I like what I'm seeing there. So definitely some rays of hope for getting out of that 300-400 rut we seem to keep getting stuck around.

Since I'm at work, it's a bit hard to cycle back through right now, but I don't recall if you've posted a rotation or sequence of events based on criteria for how you're utilizing your IF during burns and out of burns.

Any info would be appreciated.

Thank you ^_^

[Pewboom]

Hi fellow arcane mages right to the point,with my raid group we did 8/10N during our offraid nights with some alts and trial and i've been pulling steady 400k+ on most bosses (437k@Krosus if that matters and no damage at all at Chrono/Trilliax since i'm the raid leader and I was busy explaining spells as one of us ninjapulled ) and when aoe was possible my dps skyrocket to firsts position in details.Since i have Shard/Fire Belt but kinda dislike the Fire playstyle i'm trying my best to master arcane on every possible fight (Scorpyron aside i guess) while i hope for a Kilt to drop.Still my problem lays with Erosion since most of the fights requires fast target switch and/or low health adds that surely don't favor Erosion that much.Are we sure that UM doesn't pull ahead in this kind of scenario even if we consider that with our 2p we'll tend to cast less AB over all?
Those are my logs,if you can help me anyway that would be awesome
https://www.warcraftlogs.com/rankings/c ... 64/latest/" target="_blank

Sorry for my english,i'm a sad mage from Italy

[Timelorde]

Overall I feel arcane is doing alright in Heroic and Normal NH. I definitely feel we are not the best dps but we do offer some great burst potential on high priority adds which is in alot of these fights and have an immunity and good dmg reduction from invis. I really like how we are solid in both ST and AoE but could always be better. Here are some of my logs from the first clear through Normal and still progressing through Heroic. https://www.warcraftlogs.com/rankings/c ... 43/latest/" target="_blank

Most of the parses above are with having the 2pc and running the 2 best legendaries I have currently (shard and cord). After 7.1.5 I have significantly lowered my Mastery in favor of Crit. Now currently running around 37% Mastery and 31% Crit and have even starting enchanting Crit and eating Crit food. The reasoning for this is due to Overpowered and I have found with higher levels of Mastery it is just taking too long to burn through my mana after AP to get Evocation on CD as well as the damage throughput Crit can have with Overpowered. Granted I believe I need around 1% more Haste to get an additional cast in my RoP. I have found with running Erosion it is crucial before my burn phase that I have a AM proc (or go into burn with max Erosion stacks) to stack up my Erosion stacks to max to maximize my dmg output right away. I have also found myself saving 1 AM charge before switching to high priority kill targets so I can near instantly get to max stacks on that target. Another thing I have found that in my burns I do NOT cast my 2nd RoP until my AP has expired to maximize the amount of casts I can fit into AP. The only real gripe I have is that our CDs are all over the place and take some tracking to get them to line up how you want (which with running Overpowered you really want as many to line up in that window as possible)

[x1xruex1x]

Hi fellow arcane mages right to the point,with my raid group we did 8/10N during our offraid nights with some alts and trial and i've been pulling steady 400k+ on most bosses (437k@Krosus if that matters and no damage at all at Chrono/Trilliax since i'm the raid leader and I was busy explaining spells as one of us ninjapulled ) and when aoe was possible my dps skyrocket to firsts position in details.Since i have Shard/Fire Belt but kinda dislike the Fire playstyle i'm trying my best to master arcane on every possible fight (Scorpyron aside i guess) while i hope for a Kilt to drop.Still my problem lays with Erosion since most of the fights requires fast target switch and/or low health adds that surely don't favor Erosion that much.Are we sure that UM doesn't pull ahead in this kind of scenario even if we consider that with our 2p we'll tend to cast less AB over all?
Those are my logs,if you can help me anyway that would be awesome
https://www.warcraftlogs.com/rankings/c ... 64/latest/" target="_blank

Sorry for my english,i'm a sad mage from Italy

@Pewboom,

Don't be a sad mage from Italy, be a proud mage from Italy ^_^

Anywho, so just to the point of UM v Erosion. Erosion typically always stays ahead when you're single targeting. It can be beneficial in AoE fights where you're continually cleaving on high health targets that take a long while to kill. However, that's far and few in-between at this point in WoW.

What I'd personally recommend, is switching to UM or Nether Tempest based on the volume of adds that you have.
If it's a massive amount, surrounded by 1 large target that doesn't die easily (like Helya w/ the Grimelords), then NT on the big target, and then do your normal cleave/AE on the rest. If it's a modest amount of adds with fair health, stick to UM, especially if they're surrounding the boss.

This should bring about higher output. Granted, I have not gone into Nighthold yet (going tonight around 8pm eastern standard time [USA east coast]).

So yea. The biggest thing is going to be trying different strategies on the same boss with similar scenarios. That way you can see where you performed better or worse. Again, it's why I think logs won't be fully accurate representations until we get 3-4 weeks under our belts.

Use those tomes to swap talents and try different variations out Let us know how you do when you try the alternate styles though.

[x1xruex1x]

Overall I feel arcane is doing alright in Heroic and Normal NH. I definitely feel we are not the best dps but we do offer some great burst potential on high priority adds which is in alot of these fights and have an immunity and good dmg reduction from invis. I really like how we are solid in both ST and AoE but could always be better. Here are some of my logs from the first clear through Normal and still progressing through Heroic. https://www.warcraftlogs.com/rankings/c ... 43/latest/" target="_blank

Most of the parses above are with having the 2pc and running the 2 best legendaries I have currently (shard and cord). After 7.1.5 I have significantly lowered my Mastery in favor of Crit. Now currently running around 37% Mastery and 31% Crit and have even starting enchanting Crit and eating Crit food. The reasoning for this is due to Overpowered and I have found with higher levels of Mastery it is just taking too long to burn through my mana after AP to get Evocation on CD as well as the damage throughput Crit can have with Overpowered. Granted I believe I need around 1% more Haste to get an additional cast in my RoP. I have found with running Erosion it is crucial before my burn phase that I have a AM proc (or go into burn with max Erosion stacks) to stack up my Erosion stacks to max to maximize my dmg output right away. I have also found myself saving 1 AM charge before switching to high priority kill targets so I can near instantly get to max stacks on that target. Another thing I have found that in my burns I do NOT cast my 2nd RoP until my AP has expired to maximize the amount of casts I can fit into AP. The only real gripe I have is that our CDs are all over the place and take some tracking to get them to line up how you want (which with running Overpowered you really want as many to line up in that window as possible)

@Timelorde,

I like what you have here, and it kinda lines up with my thoughts of holding a burn phase til you have 8 erosion (which if i cast only AB and don't get lucky AM procs, usually puts me around 50% mana). I may need to ditch a large chunk of my mastery at this point though, as most people are showing more interest in crit than mastery and seemingly 30-35% seems to be the goal area for mastery, and similar for crit.

Will be playing with a lot of these advisory posts later tonight when I hit up Nighthold.

[x1xruex1x]

Ok, so here's my log for Nighthold (Normal). Got 1st three bosses down.
I'm not really thrilled with my performance. had a lot of issues with mechanics. Trilliax I got screwed up on bad due to a few external issues, but outside that, damage wasn't shabby, just tedious to maintain well.

https://www.warcraftlogs.com/reports/HDp8ZmwMKcJAzkPh#

[x1xruex1x]

So, just saw the upcoming class changes for 7.1.5 for this Tuesday, January 24th.

Mage
Arcane

• Increased the damage of most Arcane spells and abilities by 5%. ( Arcane Barrage, Arcane Blast, Arcane Explosion, Arcane Missiles, Arcane Orb, Nether Tempest, Supernova)
• Overpowered now increases the damage and mana cost bonuses of Arcane Power to 60% (down from 70%).
• Amplification now increases Arcane Missiles damage by 12% (down from 15%).
  
  Designer Notes: Arcane has been doing well in 7.1.5, but its numbers are lacking a bit. We're giving them an across-the-board damage buff, but tempering that with small reductions to a couple new talents that are proving to be too strong.

So what do you all think of this? A general +5% increase for consistency purposes it'd seem, so our non-burning low should bump up a smidge further. As far as the 70% > 60% for OP, I'm thinking it's to coincide with the previous notion for consistency and keep the burn peak from being huge, but limited to a 13~ second window. Sort of how they tweaked Fire with 7.1.5. They didn't want Fire to be focused around 10 seconds of glory and then minutes of "ugh".

As for the Amplification drop from 15% > 12%. I'm kinda mixed on this. It's going from a 60% > 48% when maxed at 4 AC stacks. So it's definitely sizable, and I'm hoping that in the mathematical sense, this was factored into the streamlined +5% increase to the bulk of the spells.

So yea, I'm thinking this might help us out a bit in the struggles we've been having, but will slightly diminish our burst output more. We'll know within 48 hours tho, but just wanted to let it be known there are some alterations coming if anyone hasn't noticed them yet.