Just did 411k in an aa. Wish i could post logs. There was a fire mage in group and it did not go well for him lol
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Nice! I’m gonna catch up soon. I need to get my gear up too and drop the champion pieces, and craft a couple; so watch out next week.
my GOD this, i ran Nel with almost no orb procs, it was so sad i was falling behind just too damn much RNG with it
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i will AE A LOT when im close, when tanks are moving to grab adds ill just spam Abarr/AE on 4 charges, it really helps me maintain my damage
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I wish I could do 441k sustained but I seem to have the worst luck this season with healers. I’ve done roughly 50 keys and in 48 of them I’m dead last on healing taken; in around 40 of them, I’ve outhealed the healer on personal healing received. As a mage… I’m finding it difficult to dps when half my time is spent literally keeping myself alive. #puglifesucks
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I wish alter time healing showed on the meters.
Are you getting the most out of it? I find I basically use it on cooldown. It really helps make up for inattentive healers.
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I know that feeling…that’s where all my Vers gear came from, tryin to stay up. But man a good healer and good tank make me look great! This week sucks with the ghost affix. If the healer just handles them, it’s great, but if not and I’m fishing for ghosts while tryin to down the packs it sucks.
I use almost EVERYTHING on cd: ice block, greater invisibility, alter time, displacement, lock stones (if available), healing potions, mass barrier, barrier. I’m still dead last in healing taken 95%+ of the time and spend way too much time saving my own rear. While I realize this is 100% because of pugging, it’s still nevertheless frustrating.
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I could have 40% verse and it wouldn’t matter. If I take 700k from unavoidable damage and it’s reduced 20%, I’m still taking a 560k hit. If I then go 20-30s with zero direct healing, it generally isn’t ending well for me. I wish I could link the meters in 80% of my dungeons where I literally have more self-healing done than healing received from the actual healers. It’s frightening.
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Dang, thats rough. Are you pulling aggro? Mirror image can help with threat and also had a damage reduction.
I only pug as well, but i dont remember dying a bunch. At least not more than anyone else.
I think a lot of dungeons this season are managable without a healer if people use defensives and do mechanics
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Nope, it’s literally not getting healed. I’ve had dungeons where my own self healing is 50% of my healing received and the actual healer is doing 40% or less. It’s like healers somehow just don’t want to heal mages.
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Same for me but, the opposite, I die A LOT, lol. Biggest difference for me is staying in melee range actually tends to help get heals, especially from Druid and shaman heals with their circles and rain.
I actually prefer shaman heals, I played a shaman healer last season and got very familiar with their toolkit, so I’m pretty good at reading them and getting into the heals they throw. Also shaman heals tend to hit everyone.
Sometimes I wish I could be both my mage and my shaman, because I don’t let people die as shaman I throw heals at everyone all the time. I don’t know what the tier is this season, but last season I could just throw riptide on everyone back to back to back and tie in some chain heals, totems, etc. they’d be rolling in heals, then some rain spots and the giant green circle and the dust cloud defensive. I liked healing majority melee as a resto shammy. Healing is pretty fun after you play mage, because we are so in the habit of constantly casting something, that healing is pretty easy. It also taught me a lot of interupts to be on the heal side. I did often wonder where evocation was…like how am I supposed to get my mana back?
There are definitely some annoying areas where being in melee is rough. The first area in bracken comes to mind. You need to be close for arcane explosion but the gnolls will randomly target players and chase them. This area is probably where i died the most until I leatned to literally just watch for the eyes above my head the entire pull. Soon as I see the eyes I frost nova and book it out if there.
As a mage you have icey cold to basically negate a giant attack, plus heal you to full. Mirror image takes threat and reduces damage taken by 20%. Invisibility gives a 60% damage reduction while invisible and for a few seconds after. Prismatic barrier or mass barrier + alter time can basically cheese any mechanic that isnt a one shot +250k. Not only do you survive but it also brings you back to full health.
Alter time really is the super star and im suspecting if you’re dying a lot you’re not properly utilizing this spell.
Heres some of my favorite times to use alter time
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first boss in RLP, if you get the storm circle around you that drops a debuff and sucks the group in if theyre close. Alter time, shimmer twice until youre far away, drop the debuff and snap back to where you were at full health.
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first boss of HOI, when you get the static charge alter time, shimmer twice, drop the bad and take 50% damage, alter time back to the boss and full health.
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Earthquaking golems in uld, after he hits you for the ground smash effect move a bit and alter time. He will earthquake when you’re almost dead snap back to full health.
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first boss AA, during the second small tree add all the small adds will instantly spawn hitting the group for big damage. After time before germinate finishes, when the adds spawn and everyone takes damage, snap back to full health.
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first boss in av, after trees despawn he does a big stomp, use alter time before the stomp and go back to full health after the stomp.
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wing buffet last boss of uld, every second one you can cheese with alter time, preventing almost half the damage this boss does to non tanks.
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chain boss in nelth, when he targets you for the spear alter time, after it hits snap back to negate the spear hit entirely ( and refresh shimmer) so youre full health for the high damage phase and have shimmer refrshed.
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third boss NO, use it once youre stacked for the arrow shot that spawns tornados. Soon as you take the damage and the tornados spawn snap back to full health.
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Last boss no, either for the spear when you get targeted, or when he does the small circles and the frontal cone, alter time, move a few steps, take the hit and drop the circle, alter time back to safety and full health.
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last boss of AA, use it before he pulls everyone in, snap out of the bad around him back to safety.
Honestly I could go on and on and on about alter time. I use it basically every pull. These are just a few examples off the top of my head but there are many many many more.
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You can dragons breath those targeted mobs at the start of BH to completely stop them as well. The more dungeons you do you realize how often and the most effective spots to use Alter time. The golems thunder clap in uld can be line of sighted too.
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I use it, but not as well as you list in your breakdown I’ll have to get better at that. I think for me it’s been a good “I can’t trust this healer” spell, so any time I’m full health, I’ll put it up, and snap back on health, but that is only moderately effective, since I don’t base it around mechanics all that much. But your list is awesome. I do use it for some of the bosses whose mechanics I’ve learned well.
For sure, dragonsbreath, blastwave and counterspell should be used every pull. You can prevent a lot of damage from going out as a mage.
Also frost nova x2, and ice nova can be helpful for control. In AV you can nova the blue frogs to prevent them from jumping. A small blue swurl forms as they’re casting the jump. If you finish your cast and nova it freezes them right before they jump. The small mana snakes in AA and spiders in uld do a pounce and charge. You can nova or ice nova to prevent them from moving, which cancels the ability. Cone of cold is also great for the small frogs in HoI, the runners in BH, and the shade afflix.
Mages have a lot of tools to prevent damage, were like the most tanky dps class imo. It just takes a lot of practice. You need to use fire and frost spells as well as be proactive.
I cant stress alter time enough tho. Use it during the first boss in BH. At the start of the fight alter time at full health. Gashing frenzy goes out, when it hits you alter time back to full health. Healing the initial damage and getting rid of the aggressive dot. It will be off cooldown the next time he uses the ability. You can save ice cold incase he targets you for the assault. These two mechanics are the only problems with this boss and you can completely cheese them both.
Last boss in BH he puts a green circle around each group member that explodes for like 80% health. Use alter time soon as you see the green circle.
Last boss HoI, he does a templar blast or something like that that basically one shots above a 10. You can use prismatic barrier, alter time as he casts it, you go down to 10% health, then back to full.
The big blue dragons in HoI cast a group wide frost attack. Alter time and cheese it, then use your shield to remove the dot. You can literally cheese one of the worst mechanics in the dungeon during fort weeks, every single time.
Its honestly over powered.
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Yep and mass barrier at least 1 or two of those dragon breath dots off everyone in the group which helps the healer a lot, and the gauntlet before last boss with the one dragon there. Mass barrier is actually huge and if you look at damage prevented at the end of a dungeon it’s upwards of 20-30 million including our own barrier. Mages have so many good defensives
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I’m getting better at the defense side. Also realized today that my macro for ToM/NT/PoM was not applying NT during surge because I always unload barrage right before I cast the macros barrage will hit the ToM and ToM will immediately refresh charges, but NT can’t cast until the global cooldown passes, so most of my surges had ToM, but not NT on the main target. Granted it’s not a huge difference, but it is something. So now I am sure to hit my macro a couple times when I let loose, so I don’t miss it.
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I tried your spec avoiding spark and harmony and OMG I am having so much fun! Thank you Thank you Thank you. I think you saved mage for me! Spark and Harmony need to go. Its WAY better without, and I am doing MORE damage than I was previously due to cutting back on ramp time. I LOVE IT!
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Ayyy! Im glad!
Id rather blast for 10 seconds then set up for 4 and do slightly more damage for 6 seconds.
I always felt like it balanced out on the meters and was less clunky.
Spark especially just felt bad to me.
Glad you’re having fun!
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