Greetings fellow mages! This guide shall teach you the basics and also the advanced tricks up your sleeves.
This guide addresses gameplay as of patch 5.1.xThe basics:Mage armor types:
Cloth. Mage preferential attributes on gear:
Stats that signalize gear NOT meant for mage class:
Critical Strike Rating
NOTE: you can equip an off-hand item with one-handed weapons!Your spells and what they do:[Living Bomb]
This spell deals half of its damage over 12 seconds and then hits again for its second half of damage upon expiring - this last damage can hit up to 3 targets in total, including the target the bomb was on. Living Bomb also applies [Pyromaniac] which lasts also for 12 seconds and increases your damage from [Fireball], [Frostfire Bolt], [Scorch] and [Inferno Blast] by 10%, this includes the damage over time effect applied by your [Pyroblast] spell.
NOTE: There are two other mage bomb spells to choose from if you so desire.[Pyroblast]
This spell deals significant damage up-front and then applies a damage over time effect on the target it hit which lasts for 18-20 seconds and deals a similar amount of damage over its duration.
This spell receives additional 25% bonus damage on both of its damage components when used in conjunction with the [Heating Up]
mechanic. To activate this effect you need to score two consecutive fire direct damage spell hits, your screen will indicate the readiness of this effect with bright visuals around the center of your screen. When used unter the effect of [Pyroblast!]
this spell also costs no mana and is instant cast.[Fireball] or [Frostfire Bolt]
This spell is the backbone of your arsenal, it deals good damage up-front and is used whenever your other single-target spells cannot be used.[Inferno Blast]
This spell does two things, first it spreads all your fire damage over time effects onto up to two additional targets within 10 yards around the target hit by it, secondly it will always score a critical hit which is important for your [Heating Up]
mechanic. Use this spell after scoring a critical hit with another fire direct damage spell to benefit from the [Pyroblast!]
buff provided by the [Heating Up]
mechanic. This spell does mediocre damage and is always instant cast.[Arcane Explosion]
This spell affects all targets within 10 yards around you and is your most powerful direct area of effect spell.
Beware that the total damage dealt to all targets hit by this spell cannot exceed the total damage normally dealt to 10 targets, so, if there are more targets, the damage per target will be reduced to stay inside that boundary.[Blizzard]
This spell is your only ranged area of effect spell, besides damaging all targets in its 10 yards radius area of effect it also slows their movement speed by 40%.
Beware that the total damage dealt to all targets hit by this spell cannot exceed the total damage normally dealt to 10 targets, so, if there are more targets, the damage per target will be reduced to stay inside that boundary.[Flamestrike]
This spell is a suportive area of effect spell which deals mediocre damage up-front and then ticks for 10 seconds on all targets it’s ground effect touches.
Beware that the total damage dealt to all targets hit by this spell cannot exceed the total damage normally dealt to 10 targets, so, if there are more targets, the damage per target will be reduced to stay inside that boundary.How to use your spells in your basic “rotation”:
You will be casting [Fireball]
or [Frostfire Bolt]
on your primary target while it is affected by [Pyromaniac]
from your [Mage Bomb] [Living Bomb]
(or other version of mage bomb).
Whenever you score a singular critical strike with your [Fireball]
or [Frostfire Bolt]
spells, you use your [Inferno Blast]
to turn your [Heating Up]
buff into [Pyroblast!]
When the [Pyroblast!]
buff is active on you, you cast [Pyroblast]
at your target and then repeat the process indefinitely.
On top of this very basic process you will need to put a new [Mage Bomb]
on your target once it expires in order to keep up the [Pyromaniac]
debuff on your target.
You also use your [Combustion]
on your primary target when it becomes available and both the [Pyroblast]
damage over time effect and your [Ignite]
damage over time effect are up on your target.Advanced Mage-Craft
This section will be extensive and contain some math, if you for some reason cannot follow the math, please ask someone you know for help on understanding the equations. However, I shall keep the maths to a minimum and always provide non-math explanations of how a particular mechanic works in human-readable form.
If you really want to get into your mage you may want to consider getting into the maths stuff as well as it allows you insights otherwise unobtainable through sheer experience or “gut feeling”.Issue (1) - The Pyroblast Clipping
As you may have noticed, your [Inferno Blast]
has a 8 seconds cooldown, so, as to get the most out of this cooldown, we’d want to have at least one crit every 8 seconds - statistically.
To achieve this, you need a certain relation between haste and crit which is as follows:
You add the probabilty of a critical effect of your [Fireball]
or [Frostfire Bolt]
up, and you do so for as many times you can squeeze these spells into 8 seconds.
Both spells have a 2.25 seconds cast time, that makes
3.5p chances for a crit to occur within 8 seconds.
You now multiply your effective critical strike chance, which includes every possible buff you can have, and multiply it by that 3.555555555555555, if it’s 100 or higher you have reached the Pyroblast Clipping cap == you will, statistically, score at least one crit within any 8 seconds interval.
We know that haste affects the cast-time of our spells, so, you can use that on the 2.25 seconds base casting time. Luckily you do not need to calculate your casting time as it is shown in your spell’s tooltip taking all active haste effects into account you currently sport.
To check if you’re meeting the cap, use the equation given in the next quote. In this equation you put your values in according to the letters:
c = your effective crit chance in percent (only the number, do not input the percent sign!)
t = your effective casting time for [Fireball]
or [Frostfire Bolt]
depending on which one you want to use. (only the numbers, do not input the seconds word or sign!)
if you want to check on how great a crit-chance or how much haste you need to meet this cap, use your values in one of the next two equations. The first one requires you to put your cast time in and gives you the required critical strike chance as the solution, the seconds requires you to put in your effective critical strike chance and will give you the required cast time as the result.
12.5*t=(the crit you need)
0.08*c=(the cast time you need)
to calculate how much haste you need to match a specific cast time, you first need to understand how haste affects your cast time.
Haste does NOT reduce your cast time by the percentage shown on your character sheet, instead it increases the number of casts you can fit into any one timeframe by that percentage.
An easy way to calculate this is by using this equation:
New Casting Time = Base Casting Time / (1 + (% Spell Haste / 100))
Again, only enter the numbers, not the seconds, percent signs or whatever.Issue (2) - How’s the Secondary Stats Scaling?
First, take these numbers into consideration:
1 Mastery Rating = +0,0025 % Ignite
1 haste Rating = +0,0024 % Haste
1 crit Rating = +0.0017 % Crit
Now, let us discuss what these stats actually do for us:[Mastery]
Mastery increases the percentage of damage from the direct damage components of [Fireball], [Frostfire Bolt], [Scorch], [Inferno Blast] and [Pyroblast] that is used to generate the [Ignite] damage over time effect.
Mastery does NOT affect the damage of [Combustion] directly, nor does it increase the damage over time effect of our [Mage Bomb] or [Pyroblast] in any way, it really only increases ignite overall damage.[Haste]
Haste reduces the cast time of all cast time spells.
Haste reduces the tick intervals for the damage over time effects of [Living Bomb] and [Pyroblast] as well as [Combustion], it also reduces the duration of the damage over time effect of [Pyroblast] while it does not reduce the duration of the other two.
Haste does not reduce the general global cooldown of 1.1 seconds nor does it affect the 1.0 seconds global cooldown triggered by [Inferno Blast].