[Tich/Horde]The Core - Recruiting healers

Falhawk told me about this thread. All I can say is

I don't look down on people for wanting to play with like-minded people, I think that's fine. I do, however, look down on people who use the word "terribad." Zeph, please never type that again.

I care, really.

loto said:

clearly rogues are op, duh

mage raid spec is arcane, really? bluh. i liked FIYAH!

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It is still better to have 1 mage as Frost fire bolt spec for improved scorch, the crit bonus to all casters more than makes up for dps drop from being fire spec.

Here are some easy upgrades Data for your gear, rep items are key for fast upgrades, rep is easiest way to get fast upgrades, join 3 heroic instances that drop stuff you need and head off and start doing quests or dailys that give rep for factions you need. Cooking quest gives Kirin Tor rep which is great.

Ancestral Sinew Wristguards - Item - World of Warcraft - Wyrmrest Revered

You get the bracers on your way getting these from Wyrmrest Exalted, ranked number 2 in the game for pretty much every caster dps class and spec in the game.
Sandals of Crimson Fury - Item - World of Warcraft

Weapon is very easy to get, and is better then a lot of epics. With the rep you have you could pretty much pick any heroic and toss on the kirin Tor tabard and be able to get it.
Flameheart Spell Scalpel - Item - World of Warcraft Kirin Tor Revered

When you get some more hit you can change over to the kirin tor cloak if you haven't gotten something better.
Shroud of Dedicated Research - Item - World of Warcraft Kirin Tor honored

Pants from heroic Halls of Lightning are great until you get a drops in Naxx 25 on pants better in Naxx 10 are the T7 pants.
Woven Bracae Leggings - Item - World of Warcraft

Offhand is obvious from badges, I picked it up after getting the badge belt.
Ward of the Violet Citadel - Item - World of Warcraft 25 heroic badges.

3rd best wand in the game drops from Heroic Azjol-Nerub, which is great because even a half assed pug group can clear the place in 15-20 minutes.
Rod of the Fallen Monarch - Item - World of Warcraft

This chest also drops in there, it is very similar to what you have right now though.
Egg Sac Robes - Item - World of Warcraft

This trinket is worth doing Heroic VH everyday until you get it, expect to roll against other casters when it does drop, pre raiding everyone is going for hit cap and this trinket helps a lot.
Mark of the War Prisoner - Item - World of Warcraft

I get a idea of what is good gear for arcane from http://www.maxdps.com/mage/fire.php it isn't that accurate for arcane only because fire specs stack crit over haste.

Data said:

Not for an Arcane build. Please L2P.

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Please explain to me how Magic Absorption, Improved CS and Prismatic Cloak benefit your DPS over Precision and Icy Veins. Every other PvE Arc Mage I see has the latter two talents, they must all be terribad.

Data said:

Seems like I'm using ABarr more than you. What is your rotation?

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I use the typical AB, AB, AB, ABarr.

If I get a Arcane Missle proc I do AB,AB,AB AM and then ABarr.

Just saw something that said with the 3.0.8 patch that AB, AB, AB AM is better, I need to look into that.

Improved CS is for utility, not DPS. I don't know how else to answer that. A 4 second silence should be obvious. I spend 1 GCD counterspelling a heal and get a 4 second bonus silence out of it (for mobs not immune to silence). It's a given.

Magic Absorption and Prismatic Cloak are for saving my ass. 80 spell resist (all schools) has a noticeable impact on how much spell damage I take in a raid. You know that AoE magic stuff that almost all bosses do? Yeah, that. I typically resist 20-30%, and up to 75% on some fights. And in a roundabout way that contributes to my DPS... Because I can't cast if I'm dead.

Prismatic Cloak gives me an "oh shit" button. If I need to drop threat instantly I just pop Invis. It also means I'm sometimes the only one standing after a wipe. Ever been rezzed by a Mage?

Data said:

Improved CS is for utility, not DPS. I don't know how else to answer that. A 4 second silence should be obvious. I spend 1 GCD counterspelling a heal and get a 4 second bonus silence out of it (for mobs not immune to silence). It's a given.

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This is the kind of crap that makes good players laugh at you. Grats on tacking a 4 second silence to the front of an 8 second lockout, I'm sure that's working great for you.

DPS talents: Good
"Utility" talents: Bad

So mobs only cast from 1 school now? Is this a Lich King change?

zeph said:

Please explain to me how Magic Absorption, Improved CS and Prismatic Cloak benefit your DPS over Precision and Icy Veins. Every other PvE Arc Mage I see has the latter two talents, they must all be terribad.

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I use the cookie cutter arcane build, last week I was looking at every mage that was in pugs with me, I think 8 of 10 were arcane with pretty much my same build, or they were FFB spec.

Zeph is right, Precision and Icy Veins are part of the fire raiding specs as well, with precision you can drop items with hit for pure dps items, with my spec you need 168 hit to be capped while in a raid because of other buffs.

Icy Veins is on a 2.4 minute cooldown with 3 points in Ice Floes, like I said before having just so you can use evocate while getting hit by aoe damage makes it worth having for a arcane mage, it is even more important when lack of gear makes for mana issues and raids that lack dps make fights long enough that might have to evocate twice before it is done.

Icy Veins is nice, but I'm not wasting 10 points to buff a school I rarely use just to get it. 3/3 Precision but only 1/3 Arcane Focus? That's dumb. 2/3 Frostbite and 2/3 Ice Shards means 4 COMPLETELY WASTED points in the cookie cutter build. That's gay as hell.

If Precision was in the first tier I'd already have it.

Data said:

So mobs only cast from 1 school now? Is this a Lich King change?

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Bosses are immune to silence, and the only thing that matters from trash are heals. Hell, I can't even think of anything that I interrupt other than KT's frostbolts.

I use it all the time. The whole party benefits. It's 2 points, get off my sack.

Data said:

I use it all the time. The whole party benefits. It's 2 points, get off my sack.

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Using it doesn't make it good. Lots of rogues use Shadowdance, but it's still fucking terrible.

Well I'm sorry you feel that way.

DeadlyRabbit said:

I use the typical AB, AB, AB, ABarr.

If I get a Arcane Missle proc I do AB,AB,AB AM and then ABarr.

Just saw something that said with the 3.0.8 patch that AB, AB, AB AM is better, I need to look into that.

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I was using AB, ABarr to conserve mana. Maybe that was a little too conservative, but I was still popping mana gems and Evoc during boss fights because our raid DPS was so slow. I'll do some more practice dummy tests on 2x AB and 3x AB rotations. 2x didn't seem to hurt my mana too much, so maybe that's my sweet spot for right now.

I use hungering cold. Normally I would say play what you think is fun. But then I'm not sure why you're discussing this in a min/maxer recruitment thread, so you kind of have it coming.

I'm giving Nat some free bumps.

And also telling a good (and true!) story about the awful players I game with.

And also letting TribalWar get a good chuckle at my gear.

Data said:

Icy Veins is nice, but I'm not wasting 10 points to buff a school I rarely use just to get it. 3/3 Precision but only 1/3 Arcane Focus? That's dumb. 2/3 Frostbite and 2/3 Ice Shards means 4 COMPLETELY WASTED points in the cookie cutter build. That's gay as hell.

If Precision was in the first tier I'd already have it.

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2/3 frostbite and 2/3 Ice Shards are there just to pickup precision and icy veins, when you are doing a boss fight and a shaman casts Bloodlust/Heroism you use Icy Veins, arcane power, and use your trinkets.

Icy Vein is 20% cast speed increase for 20 seconds every 2.4 minutes in fights you can use it, it is a major dps buff, I have a macro that uses Arcane Power and Icy Veins at the same time.

When a boss fight starts I like to use mirror image, then hit my trinket and then the macro for arcane power and Icy Veins, which would leave all the cooldowns done for the 20% burn when Bloodlust/Heroism is cast. Not every fight is the same but a half decent raid leader is going to know when the shamans are going to use Bloodlust/Heroism ahead of time instead of just randomly calling out for it.

Raiding dps builds have nothing to do with pvp, heroics or trash, they are designed to max out the dps of yourself and the raid for 3-7 minutes it takes to kill a boss. Having a higher resist to spells is completely pointless, a mage isn't meant for survivability, that is a tanks job and healers job is to heal everyone through whatever damage they take, even when it is the games glass cannon.