Arcane Blast is a blastFollow

I have not posted for a while but feel compelled to open up a discussion on this.
In the past I have read a lot of complaints about the Arcane tree being ineffecient on Mana.

Please note this is purely based on Instances damage. Not PvE or PvP.

I found that with full fire I was having a hard time against other classes such as Hunters and Warlocks on the damage meters.

Scorch is a 1.5 second cast, but I found I had little else to do on mobs but spam scorch hitting Fire Blast when the cooldown was up. This led to low damage output on trash mobs as I never really had time to cast fireball. Also the crits never really had time to tick over as the MoBs drop pretty fast.

So I changed spec and gone 40/21/0
My damage output now is sick. From the off I can cast Arcane Blast. The 40% threat reduction means I can cast straight away. As it kicks it the casts become quicker (and yes the mana more expensive).
The other night I chained 3 2500-2700 Crits (I was in the 1.5sec cast time, so about 7.5k in 4.5 secs) then dropped a PoM trinket Pryo for 5500 then a FB which didnt crit then back to Arcane Blast which crit for 3100.
The thing is becasue you can rattle so many out at 1.5 sec cast then your crit strikes occure more often.

Just to give you an idea though before you say I spend all my time on my *** drinking. My mana pool is around 9.5K buffed and I can come out of a 4-5 mob battle with about 4k left. (taking into Account that Mob's are sheeped, sapped etc). As we prepare for the next fight I just down some water as the group marks and pulls. As my sheep target comes into range I will stand up sheep then cast on the main target.

Give it a try you might be suprised.


BTW for Boss fights I use Stones, potions and evocation.

This may not work in raids, but for instances im having soooo much fun.

Anyone else using this method?

I was deep arcane spec'd too for a while, but i found that in cases i was going OOM if we accidentaly pulled too many, wheres if i were fire i'd have the mana to use some of my kick *** CC and we might have not got wiped :/ If you cast 2 (or 3?) Arcane Blasts, then go to fireball spams till the debuff you can get a decent mana efficienty. Also, it is very nice if you have say, 30% mana and the boss is on 10-15%, just spam the arcaneblasts till he's gone.

If you'r having trouble keeping dps up on trash mobs, dont scorch spam. Use your mana pool. Personally I fireball, fireblast, blastwave if they'r near. Thier HP is too low for scorch-spamming to rack up high dmg. Even with me using all of my spells i almost never go far under 50% mana.

The point I am making isnt about the mana pool its about the damage it does.

With +836 Damge gear it goes (These figures are based on an average over a 100 casts). Crit rate 29.85%

1st Cast = 648 DPS and 9.24 DPM
4th Cast and onwards = 1081 DPS and 2.85 DPM
Average 1-4 casts = 810 DPS and 4.35 DMP

4th Cast and onwards = 1081 DPS and 2.85 DPM
in comparison
5x Scorch debuff fireball = 825 DPS and 6.47 DPM

Note thats +31% dps offered by the Arcane Blast. Take at look at your damage meters and wonder what they would look like if you had +31 dps factored in.

Therfore if you have the mana (and most of us do),,,, then why not put it to some use.
No one stands there and says "wow look at how much mana youve got left after that big boss fight" Never mind the fact we wont be fighting for another 5 mins as we cheer and sort out the loot.

But they do say "Frak me you totally pwned the damage tonight m8, good effort"

I assumed a gear setup that brings the crit average to what you said on a 40/21/0 and plugged that into a 10/48/3.


You're a little off on the numbers. The DPS I found with a 40/21/0 was higher than your numbers showed.

Completely ignoring the DoT from the fireballs, I end up with just under 1000 DPS on the fireballs on a 10/48/3, and that's before we count Molten Fury or using Combustion and a trinket at the same time. And the DPM I ended up with was about 8.17 for 40/21/0 and 9.37 on the 10/48/3.

I missed out combustion ...DOH.

Based on 10/48/3

Fireball rank 13 base dmg = (633+805)/2 = 719 Avg
Figures for fireball from Alakazam and Thotbott

+715 Damage gear. Therefore emp fireball = +(715/100)*15 = 107
Total damage adds = +822
Base Crit = 15.85%

Im not sure if there is a reasonable calculation for combustion but im going to go conservative on this one and say +15%. I didnt include this before :O

So with 5x Scorch up we get +32% Dmg, Crit chance = 42.85%
Fireball 719 + Gear 822 = 1541x1.32 = 2034 Avg Non crit.
Therfore avg crit = 2034x1.5 = 3051 avg ingnite = 1220
3051+1220x42.85 = 183012
2034x57.15 = 116243
(116243+183012)/100 = 2992.55 x.97 spell hit chance = 2902

2902/3 = 967 DPS - Without scorch Debuff = 871 dps

So I agree the DPS is higher for fireball than I first stated.

I have four theories as to why I get higher damage output using arcane blast.

One
In the build up to the 4th AB my DPS is higher than a mage preping his target for the x5 scorch debuff. I have landed my Max AB DPS after 8 seconds of the fight begining. 5x Scorch debuff takes 9 secs to prep. So a max buffed fireball is not hitting untill 12secs + travel time. If the fireball hits on count 12.5 then I have cast 7 AB's in that time. The fireball casts will only win if the fight outlasts my mana pool.
And if you are going to count fireball as 1000dps then you HAVE to apply the scorch debuff. Rember I am talking instance dmg here and I doubt youll get a mage along every time to put up scorch for you.
I calculate 6 scorches to = total 774 dps (774x9=6966)
and 7 Arcane blasts to total = 908 dps (908x9 = 8172)

Two
My AB debuff can be swwitched to new targets. The scorch debuff cant. It has to be re-applied.

Three
AB has 50% less chance of fizzling out on a target than a fireball

Four
I can cast fireblast and PoM trinket pyro in and around those blasts just like any other Arcane/Fire mage. And I do.

Im not trying to start a whats better Fire/Forst/Arcane argument. I just want people to see that although Arcane is mana hungry it can also be used to dump a serious amount of damage on to a target in a small amount of time. Especailly if you have opted for the +dmg boost and Crit boost that the Arcane talent tree provides.

best example of the worst attitude. you're a huge *****. and nobody cares about YOUR epenis.

just mean that raids aren't everything, and uber guild raids are far less. i think it's more than a little insulting that people can't play the game the way they want without "powergamers" sneering and/or telling everyone else how the game "ought" to be played.

I love it when a post fires everyone up.

To quote my OP.



I am well aware of the more hardcore scene associated with this game, only I am not playing that style at this moment in time. When the time comes I will change, but only if it stays fun to do so.



You posted. :)

I think you are wrong though. People can and should be able to talk about whatever they like. These forums are the best thing that ever happened for me with regards to WoW, and if that was reserved for "serious" discussions only then that would be a very sad day.


Anyway thanks for your input.

My concluesion.
Right now im having fun with it. We are not losing instances nor am I sherking my mage responsibilities, I am not draggin aggro and I enjoy seeing the big numbers peel across the screen.
If and when the time comes that it is no longer possible to take this approach then I will change playstyles.

I'll say this much, I really wish I could get more use out of Arcane Blast, I had such high hopes for it when I first heard about it going into the game.

My hope was that each tree would have at least one main nuke they could use if they specced that way. Sadly, it didn't happen.

a sizeable portion of the population does instances with pugs. for those without a strong guild or for those who's guild is just trying to run 5mans more often, handling trash *could* be a challenge.

i remember not too long ago that scholomance pugs failed 50/50 (moot now because no one does instances <65), and much as everyone hates pugs, players still wanna be able to go and do what and when they want.

the rest of the game's content doesn't just dissappear because powergamers have already hit "end game". because of my experiences with "hardcore" raiding guilds and farm groups, i've really lost all interest in anything "above" casual 5mans. so then, i'm an example of the population who values pve strategy which is NOT heroic/raid boss encounters.



the only gameplay that truly matters is the content that YOU enjoy. otherwise, don't play the game. seriously. in all my time between bloodlord (lawls, i remember we went months and couldn't down him...), rags ony and up to nef, bosses only got more boring and more stale. tagging along for nax and AQ there at the beginning of tBC, i was only more convinced that "end game" is such a huge waste of time and gold. competing against every other player in the raid who wears your armor type -- not terribly rewarding when it takes months and months to gear a whole raid. and worst yet, you only need that kind of gear if raiding is all you do and you're getting ready for the next batch of content. for those who don't raid constantly, or who only casually raid the easier encounters, or for those who just @#%^ing can't stand to raid anymore, you don't need to. it's perfectly possible for someone to find something they like to do that doesn't require >700 spell damage (or whatever arbitrary level of gear you'd prefer to name) and it does not make them a loser, or a lamer, or stupid or even a worse player.

i know people who think it's the brink of impossibility for anyone to AoE twelve mobs solo, so for them that's pretty challenging content. these same people could and can be the most valuable healer (and in one case, dps and in another tank) for all of our 5mans or raids. besides. when you get right down to it, bosses are nothing but a little damage-flow equation. as long as you hurt the boss faster than your healers' mana runs out, you'll win the fight. to me, trash and farming is more complicated (sometimes harder) and therefore i enjoy overcomming that challenge more. so my capability in non-instance content is important to me more than my sustained raid dps.

which isn't to say that i don't still resent warlocks' and priests' positions on the damage charts.

Edited, Apr 29th 2007 1:53am by FractalSynapse