I'm fairly terrible, help!

Classes Mage
1

I’m Rhit, a fire mage. I’ve been a fire mage since Vanilla. Only have this toon. Played Vanilla, TBC, WotLK, Cata - skipped all the stuff in the middle - and have now returned for SL.

I’m ilvl 211/212, depending on trinkets, etc. Renown is Night Fae 40. You can see the rest online. My IO is 765, I think.

I used to be quite good in the Vanilla, TBC days. Top raiding guild. Top 1st or 2nd mage most raids. Always min/maxing my gear, etc. Life was good.

Now, I’m terrible. My DPS is always well below what RaidBots or my gut tell me it should be. Usually around 2.5k. I get quite happy when I’m over 3k DPS when in our guild Heroic CN raids. I should be pulling like 4.5k to 5k dps as a fire mage. Consistently. Doesn’t happen.

I try to follow Preheat’s Fire rotation guide, especially the opener. My haste has my Fireball down to 1.8s. Sometimes, I can’t get the last Phoenix Flame in, which is annoying. I have my level 3 legendary - the ring, which I understand is the right slot to have it in. So, you know, assuming pyroblast…frost spell, then fireball, then fireblast fireblast, then phoenix, then fireblast…alternating.

Then I drop Rune of Power. Do that. Then Shifting Power.

When do I use my trinket? It’s a GCD hit. During combustion? Before? During RoP? Do I Shfiting Power before Combustion or after Combustion + RoP? Do you guys do Discipline Command twice, or just when Combust is up? All these types of considerations.

Yes, I use Weak Auras to track most of these. But it’s difficult to track all of them plus raid mechanics. (Raids seem so much more chaotic now than they used to be, btw.)

I struggle with the rotations after the opener, I guess. And phasing/aligning cooldowns on trash up to bosses. And phases of boss fights. And whether to use cooldowns on mobs with 3+ targets, or save for 5+ targets, or until the boss? So I end up prolonging not using, which is detrimental to my DPS.

My opener is quite powerful. Usually between 9-13kdps. With the aforementioned dilemmas, I end up around 2.2k to 3.3k dps. Such a disappointing delta.

I’m in a guild that is melee heavy, so raiding strategies tend to favor them. So, that translates to a lot of movement. All of us casters have lower than desired DPS, except for the boomkin, of course. And our SPriest somehow.

Any insights you guys might have would be truly appreciated. Thanks in advance. I’ll be lurking and responding.

1 Like
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Or you can just accept the fact you are 10+ years older and that much slower. Yes, I know. Happens to the best of us.

7 Likes
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At 24% haste, you shouldn’t have any trouble getting the last PF in. Usually the trouble is getting that last pyroblast in the combustion window, but you have plenty of haste. If you’re getting less than 7, not counting your precast, you’re not optimizing your rotation.

Your DC opener doesn’t sound optimal if you’re pyroblasting, then casting a frost spell, and then getting into your combustion rotation. I think most players are using a frost nova with about 5 seconds on the countdown, and then going into their pyroblast precast. Then you go into your crit or noncrit opener from there.

I wouldn’t worry too much about weaving DC in-between combustions just yet. It’s more dps if you do, but you don’t want to delay combustion by not using it correctly. Your downtime dps is going to suck, there’s no way around it, so maximizing combustion is the name of the game.

You want to be careful with fireblast and phoenix flame charges. With combustion being around a minute, you’re probably never going to use PF outside of combustion. When combustion is about 30 seconds out, you need to start pooling your fireblast charges.

General rule of thumb is that at 0 fireblast charges, start holding at 30 seconds. Don’t use them, even to convert heating up procs. You really don’t want to get into your next combustion with less than 2.5 charges. You’ll really be hurting your damage if you do.

I’d start there if I were you. Maximize the combustion dps and don’t worry so much about the downtime dps. Pool your charges at 30 seconds out so your next combustion will be just as good as it was on the opener.

For your other questions, use shifting power after combustion. There may be some scenarios where you wouldn’t do that, but generally that’s the play. You really don’t want to be holding combustion either unless there’s a transition or something. Combustion tends to line up pretty well with how CN works.

For your trinkets, I think the min/max would tell you to use it right after combustion is activated. IQD doesn’t have a GCD so you don’t need to worry about that. You could activate it right before the cast you’re going to activate combust into…I don’t think it makes much difference.

4

I took a look at your logs and under wow analyzer, and the primary thing really just seems to be you don’t really know the fight mechanics, so you spend more time moving and less time casting. Here’s a few of the core things I’d focus on, and then maybe come back in a few weeks with fresh logs and see how you do.

(1) You need to be casting fireballs as much as possible. When you crit and get a heating up, remember to keep casting fireballs when you fire blast and use a hot streak. Try to avoid using a hot streak as an instant, and always use it with a fireball cast. It will greatly help your damage between combusts.

(2) Make sure to pool fire blasts and phoenix flames before your combusts. You really don’t ever need to cast a phoenix flame outside of combust unless you are capped at 3 and have a ways to combust. But you want to start pooling fire blasts maybe 20-30s before your combust is up.

(3) Practice your combust rotation on dummies. I do it even still. Your logs show that you aren’t fully utilizing your combusts, so you want to make sure that when you do combust, it’s big boy time and nothing gets messed up.

(4) Know fight mechanics. When I raid, I have a notebook that I use to help me track timers - like if I’m consistently being interrupted with combust from a mechanic, or I’m not timing something correctly, I make a note of it. The key thing here is making sure you are not combusting when a fight mechanic will stop it or void the damage because the boss goes immune, or transitions, or whatever.

There’s more to go over too, but generally you want to start small and work from there. If you did these four things, you’d easily jump up to green / blue parses.

3 Likes
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^^^^^ x1000

The notebook thing is a great idea as well. If you have dual monitors then notepad works as well.

6

The biggest DPS loss for any caster (not just fire mage) is casts lost due to unnecessary movement or improper positioning. Not gear, not rotation, not stat weights. Movement. Now the only way to improve your movement management is to become more comfortable with the fights.

For fire mage specifically, our damage is extremely front loaded, 99.99% of our damage occurs during combustion phase. So you need to make sure that when you combust you are executing your rotation as close to perfect as possible, that means knowing the fights so you know when to combust and when you need to hold it.

For example, on SLG if Kaal phases at 50% and your combust comes back up when the boss is at 52% do you combust or do you hold it? You would hold it because it is highly likely the boss will phase during your combustion which is a massive dps loss. Decisions like these have a greater impact for fire mages because like I said our damage is extremely front loaded.

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Hey, a few things I’ve noticed about your logs.

  • You press Combustion way too early into your Fireball cast. It seems like you’re pressing it at the very beginning. Simcraft does it when Fireball has around 0.7s left. That will allow you to get your last Phoenix Flames in.

  • You should be proccing Disciplinary Command in between your Combustions. I only see you proc it during Combustion.

  • Soul Igniter is not on the GCD. You want to cancel it as soon as you have two Infernal Cascade stacks so the cooldown keeps lining up with Combustion. A lot of people use a cancelaura macro with Phoenix Flames. I recommend eventually getting a separate macro to cancel it, but it’s not a bad idea while you’re still learning.
    #showtooltip
    /cancelaura Soul Ignition
    /cast Phoenix Flames
    This macro can be put over your normal Phoenix Flames keybind. You activate Soul Igniter as soon as you can during Combust (ideally during the Fireball cast you Combust on, but the CD won’t always line up that way. You need to pay attention to that), and this macro will take care of reactivating it as part of your normal Combust rotation.

  • Your raid being mostly melee should have nothing to do with the amount of movement. Moving the boss hurts melee uptime, too. Learn the encounters, utilize Shimmer and Alter Time better. Have to move off of your rune for a mechanic? Drop Alter Time, Shimmer off, take the Alter Time back as soon as it’s safe. I don’t see a single Alter Time use in any of the handful of your logs I looked at.

  • And finally, what’s up with your Soulbinds? Why are you running Niya? Korayn is better for Fire in all situations.

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(1) You need to be casting fireballs as much as possible. When you crit and get a heating up, remember to keep casting fireballs when you fire blast and use a hot streak. Try to avoid using a hot streak as an instant, and always use it with a fireball cast. It will greatly help your damage between combusts.

(2) Make sure to pool fire blasts and phoenix flames before your combusts. You really don’t ever need to cast a phoenix flame outside of combust unless you are capped at 3 and have a ways to combust. But you want to start pooling fire blasts maybe 20-30s before your combust is up.

(3) Practice your combust rotation on dummies. I do it even still. Your logs show that you aren’t fully utilizing your combusts, so you want to make sure that when you do combust, it’s big boy time and nothing gets messed up.

(4) Know fight mechanics. When I raid, I have a notebook that I use to help me track timers - like if I’m consistently being interrupted with combust from a mechanic, or I’m not timing something correctly, I make a note of it. The key thing here is making sure you are not combusting when a fight mechanic will stop it or void the damage because the boss goes immune, or transitions, or whatever.

Hi Mac,

Really appreciate the time you took in writing this response.

On Point 1, I’m not sure I follow. I to ABC. I think I rely on Scorch too much, probably b/c I move too much, probably b/c I don’t know the mechanics well enough. (Our raids are also unnecessarily chaotic.) But, I assume you’re talking about casting Fireball and Fireblasting while casting? If I cast a Fireball, get a heating up, wouldn’t I want to Fireblast, then Pyro? Then go back to Fireball? Or is that mini-rotation a DPS loss?

What about when a target is below 30%? What’s the rotation there? I keep reading Scorch+Scorch+Pyro, or Scorch+Fireblast+Pyro (time permitting), or Combustion rotation. Is that it? The Scorch+Scorch+Pyro just seems low dps when I do it. Any PF to throw in there?

Are there any options for when there’s more than one target, like main mob plus maybe 1-2 trash?

On Point 2, I have a Weak Aura that has bars to shows my FB and PF statuses, and another Weak Aura on top which tells me when to pool with visuals and timers. So it’s helpful. I have the opposite problem I think of double-tapping or trying to go through too fast or even going through the cycle and seeing the rare non-crits and not knowing how to respond appropriate, which weakens my combustions. Any advice here?

On Point 3, I do almost daily. I’ve noticed in RaidBots that simulations have lower dps scores for Training Dummies than actual bosses. Any clue as to why?

On Point 4, no matter how much I tell myself otherwise, I think you’re right. I believe I know the mechanics of most fights well enough to survive, but not well enough to actually optimize for my dps - if that makes sense. I do find myself wasting half of my combustions or half of my shifting powers - or more even. Or I get stunned when I shouldn’t, etc. I think there’s also some element of our raid group being much more melee friendly, but it’s probably only 5-10%, so not a viable excuse.

Thanks again.

10

Scorching less is more about learning the encounters to be able to minimize your own movement, as well as utilizing movement tools available to you (Shimmer and Alter Time) so you need to rely on Scorch less. You still want to always be casting, to use Scorch in execute, and to chain Fireballs into Pyroblasts. You just want to rely on Scorch less to handle movement.

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Yes you always want to use a fireblast for a heating up while casting a fireball. The goal though is to always be doing this as much as possible. Also, don’t ever burn a hot streak proc (where you get the instant pyro) as an instant cast. The point I was trying to make is you always want to use this in combination with a fireball cast, because if they double crit, you get another hot streak.

One of the most powerful tools to keep casting but move is to blink while you cast fireball. It takes practice but if you know the fight mechanics, blink to a safe spot and keep casting. Also, stutter step between casts. There’s always a brief gcd between casts that let you move a little between each cast, and it can help reposition, especially if you know a mechanic is coming.

It’s okay to double tap fireblasts if you just came out of a combust and it won’t be up for a while, especially if you have 3 (this sometimes happens right after you shifting power). Otherwise, you just gotta suck it up if you get an unlucky row of non crits. But it’s a much, much bigger dps loss to not have your fireblasts pooled for your next combust, so around the 20-25s marker when combust is about to be back, you should stop (again unless there’s a mechanic that will buy you more time, like waiting on shriekwing transitions or something).

Simming is great and all, but I wouldn’t be fretting over it at the moment. Improving yourself through raidbots can also be a bit misleading - it’s more about itemization and stat optimization than anything else. Instead, focus on studying your raid performance through warcraftlogs and wow analyzer. You’ll see the biggest play improvement there than working through sims (but naturally if you like playing with sims it doesn’t hurt, I just think for you your time is better spent elsewhere to see faster improvement).

It always comes down to this, for every mage. Those 99 parsers do that because they know the mechanics at every inch (or the guild hands them the parse just for them).

Even just getting full combusts out and not get dogged by mechanics, regardless of how you do in the non combust rotation, you’ll likely see big dps improvements.

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RE: Combustion too soon - I noticed that and am working on it.

RE: Disciplinary Command - I’m trying too, but means you really need to nail the timings down, doesn’t it? 20s+10s+20s+10s? Or you miss proccing it again? And what do you use to proc it? FN? Frostbolt?

RE: Soul Igniter - I have a macro that casts it and cancelsaura. It doesn’t work. I have to tap it twice. Looks like your macro requires the same? Or are you recommending I create a Combustion macro with Soul Igniter tied to Combustion, and another macro to cancelaura?

RE: Alter Time - 100%. I’ve never used it. I wasn’t sure how/when to use it - or even the value.

RE: Souldbinds - thanks. Will make changes.

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I’d grab a Disciplinary Command WeakAura. You proc it on CD, unless you need to hold it for Combustion for w/e reason (i.e. first Sludgefist pillar).
https://wago.io/UCLYg_X6W
This helps with knowing when to pool Fireblast charges, too. Assuming your haste isn’t too low, you’ll get a Combust every minute in single target. If you’re proccing this on CD, your Combust will be up when the CD is up for Disciplinary Command. So you can use that cooldown to know when to pool Fireblasts.

Frost Nova can be used to proc it, but it’s a minor gain to use Frostbolt. Frostbolt does damage, and it procs DC at the end of the cast. Nova, on the other hand, procs it as soon as you press it-- this means you’ll be on the GCD for the start of the DC proc. If you’re not comfortable Frostbolting, just use Nova.

Also, as a general aside-- I find it much easier to play with high Fireblast charges. You can dump in Rune (assuming Combust won’t be up soon), but otherwise sit at 2 ish charges (obviously not capping). That way when you need to pool for Combust, you’ll already be at a high number of charges. It removes a lot of guess work with Kindling for knowing when you need to pool.

You can’t macro trinkets into Combust. You press Combust during a cast-- trinkets can’t be used mid-cast. You have to use them before the Fireball you press Combust on. So I have a macro that uses both trinkets.
#showtooltip
/use 13
/use 14

I have the cancelaura macro’d into that, and I mash that again to reactivate the Soul Igniter. But the Phoenix Flames macro should also be fine for most use cases. Due to how the cooldown of Soul Igniter works, the cooldown will usually be desynched with other trinkets. You’ll usually need to hit two buttons to use it.

You just have to play around with it. Once you’re comfortable with using it, it’s one of your most powerful tools as a Mage for both survivability and mobility.

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This is me x 100. I have accepted it.