PVE Mage Guide 3.3.5

Well seeing that there had been a large number of threads opened about which spec to use, what gems, enchants and rotations i decided to make this guide to help new mages to better understand mage in PvE. This guide will include Specs/Gear/Rotation/Enchants/Glyphs and other important stuff that there is to know about mages in pve. Lets begin

1. Specs

There are three specs viable in patch 3.3.5, 2 fire specs and 1 arcane.

- Arcane - The reason i didnt pick Arcane Barrage is because it is a huge dps loss if you use it even when moving (You can blink first and then cast your arcane missiles). Can move 2 Ice Shards points to Frost Warding, and trade points between Arcane Stability and Arcane Focus depending on how much hit vs pushback prevention you need. This is a good raid compromise with 3/5 Arcane Stability giving 100% pushback prevention with Imp. Concentration Aura.

This spec is good for short fight and fight where there isnt much movement involved.

Stat priority for Arcane mages goes like this: SP>Haste>Intelect>Crit>Spirit

Rotation for this spec is: Arcane Blast x4 >>Arcane Missiles on Misslie Barrage proc, if you go low on mana lower the stacks of Arcane Blast to suit your needs.

Glyphs for this spec are: Glyph of Arcane Misslies, Glyph of Arcane Blast and Glyph of Molten Armor

Cooldowns: The best time to use Icy Veins is with Trinket proc or trinket on use and together with Mirror Images (if you have 4p t10)

- Fireball/TTW - Considered as the top raiding spec for 3.3.5. I noticed that TTW got fixed so this spec is on par if not better than FFB spec (still needs some testing to be done). Main nuke is Fireball.

Stat priority for Fireball/TTW spec is: Crit>SP>Haste>Spirit>Intelect

- Get around 50-60% crit self buffed then switch to haste and SP. Fireball spec requires more haste than FFB to actualy be effective (800-900 should be sufficient, if you can get more but dont sacrifice too much crit) so keep that in mind.

Rotation for Fire spec is: Scorch every 30 seconds to keep the 5% crit debuff up>>Spam Fireball untill hotstreak procs>>Pyroblast

Glyphs used for this spec are: Glyph of Fireball, Glyph of Living Bomb and Glyph of Molten Armor

Cooldowns: Fire mages dont have any cooldowns exept Combustion. This should be used whenever its off cooldown. Delay the usage of Combustion if the boss is near ~35% and use it when he drops below 35% for better crits and together with 4p t10 bonus. The 4p t10 bonus must ALWAYS be used when the boss is below 35% or with bloodlust up.

- FFB (Frostfire) - This spec is on par with the Fireball/TTW spec above. I made some changes when LB was not triggering Hot Streak and picked Cold Snap. Now when this is fixed i think the dps loss is not noticeable and u can use LB instead.

Only difference between fireball spec and this one is that in this spec your main nuke will be Frostfire Bolt instead of Fireball.

Stat priority is the same as Fireball spec above.

- Very crit dependat spec. You need crit as much as possible. Never gem for Haste...All the haste you need comes from gear.

Rotation for this spec is: Scorch every 30 secs>>Spam FFB untill hotstreak procs>Pyroblast

Glyphs for this spec are: Glyph of Frostfire, Glyph of Molten Armor and Glyph of Scorch/Living Bomb

Cooldowns: Icy Veins and Combustion and maybe Cold snap. Use Icy Veins whenever its Off cooldown, same with Combustion. Use Cold snap to refresh Icy Veins when the boss is ~35% together 4p t10 bonus to sky rocket your dps.

2. Gear

Gearing your mage mostly depends on your spec. If you are fire mage you get gear with more crit on it and if you are arcane you get gear with more haste. Below i will post a list of the BiS items for Fire/TTW, FFB and Arcane mage. Bear in mind that the gear for a specific slot can change depending on stats.

3. Enchants

Head: Arcanum of Burning Mysteries (Kirin Tor)

Shoulders: Greater Inscription of the Storm (Sons of Hodir exalted) or Master's Inscription of the Storm (only for Scribes)

Cloak: Lightweave Embrodiery (only for tailors) or Greated Speed

Chest: Powerfull Stats

Bracers: Superior Spellpower or Fur Lining - Spellpower (only for leatherworkers)

Hands: Exeptional Spellpower or Hyper speed accelerators (only for engineers)

Belt: Socket Bonus

Leggings: Brilliant Spellthread

Boots: Ice Walker

Ring 1/2: Spellpower (only for enchanters)

Main Hand: 63 spellpower or Black Magic

4. Gems

When it comes to gems you gem your mage according to your spec.

For arcane mage: 

Red slots = Runed Cardinal Ruby or Runed Dragon's Eye if you are JC

Yellow slots = Quick King's Amber or Dragon's Eye if you are JC

Blue slots = Purified Dreadstone

For Fire mage:

Red slots = Runed Cardinal Ruby or Potent Ametrine

Yellow slots = Reckless or Potent Ametrine or Smooth King's Amber

Blue slots = Purified Dreadstone

Meta gem = Chaotic Skyflare Diamond ( For both specs ) OR Destructive Skyflare Diamond

5. Stats

45.91 Crit Rating = 1% Crit Chance - Critical is the most valuable stat for Fire/TTW and FFB mages. The more critical you have the more dps you will do, simple as that. But when you get around 48-50% critical, crit begins to lose its value and haste is preffered.

32.79 Haste Rating = 1% Spell Haste - Most important stat for Arcane mages. As arcane mage you need as much haste as possible. 

166.6667 Intellect = 1% Crit Chance - Good stat to focus on as arcane mage since it gives you more mana and crit aswell.

26.232 Hit Rating = 1% Hit Chance - I think geting hit caped goes without saying and it should be priority number one for any mage. The hard cap is 17%. The soft cap varies and depends on your spec and race.

Draenei racial gives 1% Hit rating so you will need 16%.

If you have boomkin or spriest in raid they provide 3% hit rating so that will make 14% (13% if draenei)

As fire mage you will need 11% (10% as draenei) hit and as arcane you will need 8% (7% as draenei) because of precision and arcane focus.

Races and their usefull (for mages) racials

Horde side

Undead - Trinket like racial, good for pvp

Troll - 20% haste for 10 secs every 3 mins, best mage race imo

Blood Elf - Has silence and can restore mana, good for pvp and arcane mage too

Alliance side

Human - More spirit = more crit and trinket like racial, good for pve and pvp too

Gnome - More intelect = more mana/crit and racial that removes snares (doesnt share CD with pvp trinket), best class for mages on ally side imo

Draenei - 1% Hit rating, good if you want to lower the hit cap but i wouldnt roll draenei mage because 99% of the time you will have atleast 1 draenei in your raid.

Constructive Criticsm is always welcome. 

Thank you for reading this i hope it helps you

Source: http://forum.molten-wow.com/showthread.php?t=68496

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