since combustion is a major part of our damage, the fact it can only be cast once a minute feels rough, is there a way to get it under a minute?
Nope, though Fired Up Rank 3 extends the duration of combustion by 1 second per Hot Streak, while Savor The Moment (Sunfury only), extends the duration by a further 2 seconds. Add in 4 seconds of Hyperthermia (Sunfury only), and the gap feels much shorter as by the time Combustion and Hyperthermia have run out you’re probably looking at 30-40 seconds until Combustion is back up.
Except all that is useless because the increased duration of Combustion is meaningless without sufficient Fire Blast charges to fuel the instant cast spam. The 4 piece tier set bonus was nerfed as well so the CDR in provides is also inadequate resulting it an awkward period where you have to hard cast during Combustion effectively wasting the increased duration with the extra GCDs. Yet another example of how poorly the Mage specs were designed in Midnight.
…what?
Yes you typically need to drop in at least 1 hard cast during combustion, but added seconds are still added seconds and Combustion is still guaranteeing crits and providing rider benefits. Really not sure what you’re getting at.
I thought I was quite clear. What I am getting at is that it’s terrible design. What makes Combustion feel good isn’t the extra damage, it’s the fact that it makes your casts instant. It feels awkward to have to hard cast during its duration and if you’d played Fire during the times were that wasn’t necessary you’d know what is now missing. By removing Phoenix Flames and not providing enough Fire Blast charges or Fire Blast CDR to compensate for the removal they ruined that smooth and satisfying gameplay loop.