Thinking

.... about moving over to Wordpress.

So many wow bloggers have done that already.

Gonna goof around a bit on wordpress over the weekend, see whats what.

".blogspot" could very well become ".wordpress" in the near future.

More Math!

Today I am going to compare the DPS capacity of an arcane mage with Tier 5 compared to one without.

First off, the set bonus from having two pieces of the Tier 5 magey gear increases the damage dealt by Arcane Blast by 20%.

So let's have a looksie at some math, kk? We're going to do 50/0/11 arcane/IV spec.

(Assuming 550 base Intellect, hit capped, crit rating of 200, and + damage of 1k for each school. Essentially rough approximations of where mages would be at given average Tier 5 content)
For this DPS test, we will use this spell rotation: Arcane Blastx3, Arcane Missiles, and then a frostbolt. Starting the next Arcane Blast timed just so to get the minimum cast time, and ending the spell at the end of the rotation to get minimum mana cost at well.

DPS without Tier 5 set bonus : 919.56.
(If we blow all cooldowns and simply spam Arcane Blast, and mana be damned, we achieve a maximum DPS of 1631.35. We can only keep it up for about 15 seconds, but there ya go)

Now, if we get two pieces of Tier 5

DPS with Tier 5 set bonus: 1008.70
(Again, if we blow all cooldowns and simply spam Arcane Blast, and mana be damned, we can achieve a max DPS of 1957.62. Again, we can only do that for about 15 seconds)

So. If we get two pieces of Tier 5, thats a DPS increase of 9%.

9 Bloody percent. That is incredibly huge.

If the number doesn't seem that big, consider that if you simply spam Arcane Blast, you're looking at a DPS increase of, in essence, 20%. (Math shows 17%, but that is still huge).

Consider that with icy Veins in the game, that a ton of mages will be dumping eleven points into Frost for, essentially, a 3% DPS increase.

Jumping that number by 9% is just absolutely incredible. You simply cannot say no to that.

Or can you?

Comparing Arcane/IV DPS to Fire/IV DPS, considering Tier 5. Let's see what happens.
And for shits and giggles, lets assume you have The Lightning Capacitor.

Arcane/IV DPS: 1068.97

Fire/IV DPS: 1130.15

Wait.... what?

Why is fire still ahead of the game by 5.5%?

Simple. Fire mages have Molten Fury.

/smug

There's Someone From Texas Reading My Blog...

WAS IT YOU, GHOSTKID? WAS IT YOU?!@?!?111


Euripedes' Shopping List:

28 Spellcloth
10 Primal Might
Far Too Much Primal Fire

Essentially, I am looking to complete the Spellfire set and, perhaps, get the Spellstrike set.

Before I go any further, let me say this...

If you are playing a mage, and you intend to do serious Raiding of any sort, you MUST have tailoring!

No ifs. No buts. Just shut up and get the damn profession.

The Spellfire set you get from tailoring is just that bloody awesome. To put it bluntly, you are GIMPING yourself if you don't have it. Same goes if you're raiding frost, get the Frozen Shadoweave set.

Nothing in any heroic or 10-man instance holds a candle to the crafted sets.

You will not see a single drop from Tier 4 that will come close to your crafted set. If I ever catch a mage wearing the Chest Piece from Tier 4 or 5, I will slap them.

And in Tier 5, any and all "upgrades" are questionable. Generally, anything in Tier 5 content that drops will be, at best, a decent side-grade. And also keep in mind that anything you do replace means that the set bonus is broken. Not too bad for Frozen Shadoweave, but it is extremely painful for Spellfire users.

Keep your set together. Only drop Spellfire/Shadoweave when you have a solid upgrade for each piece, that is worth losing the incredible damage and set bonuses for.

Most likely, you will still be wearing these crafted sets right into Tier 6 content, where you will finally be able to find stuff that is actually, clearly, an upgrade.

And if at all possible, search high and low for someone who can make spellstrike. It, too, is an incredibly useful set, and also has an extremely useful set bonus.

You will be farming primals for a long time. Get used to it, the gear from tailoring is spectacular on a million and one levels.

Also, Anathema dropped Void Reaver again. Some more Tier 5 tokens went out (obviously we didn't get any), and yours truly really shined, for once.

For a mage wearing primarily PvP gear, without even a complete spellfire set, being on spam sheep duty, and spending most of the first 2 minutes of the Void Reaver running around, I think I did pretty damn well.

WWS STATS

8th overall in the whole raid for damage done.

My DPS isn't as great as the other mages, but I attribute that solely to Void Reaver forcing me to do pretty much nothing for the first few minutes of the encounter.

It was basically "/cast Arcane Blast. Run away. Run back. Start casting Arcane Blast. Run away. Run back. Run away again. Be forced to run in a circle because he targeted me again while I was running away. Run back. Start casting Arcane Blast. Run away."
And so on.

There was about a good 130 seconds where my DPS was about 8.

Ahh, well.

Arcane is working for now, but when 2.3.2 hits, and most importantly, whenn spellfire/spellstrike sets are achieved, I'll be bidding arcane fare well.
Need to get me some action with the Fires of... Fire. /cough

Zen Have a Nap!

Time to Theorycraft!

But I am le tired...

Zen have a nap!

ZEN THEORYCRAFT!




So, I'm going to use this primarly to theeorycraft. This is entirely for myself, and I am studying the effects of crit rating on theoretical DPS numbers given a variety of specs. The specs that shall be tested are as follows:
Arc/Pyro - Deep arcane, and deep enough into fire to get Pyroblast
Arc/IV - Deep arcane, and deep enough into frost to get Icy Veins
Arc Frost - Deep(ish) arcane, and about 21 points into Frost for the awesome crit talents and Icy Veins
Fire - standard 10/48/3 thing
Fire/IV - Deep fire, but with 11 in frost to get Icy Veins
Deep Frost - Water Elemental deep in frost

On with the Theoriorizing!

We shall be making the following assumptions:
Base Intellect of 500.
No buffs at all outside of self buffs. (Arcane Intellect and Molten Armor)
Hit capped in all scenariors.
Base spell damage of 1000 for all schools.
Assuming Fight Duration of 9 minutes (considering raid boss fights, this number is about damn average)

At a crit rating of Zero:
(Produced DPS numbers)
Arc/Pyro = 903.17
Arc/IV = 922.30
Arc Frost = 997.88
Fire = 1044.40
Fire/IV = 1066.21
Deep Frost = 1052.75

HIGHEST DPS = Deep fire with Icy Veins. Deep Frost is beating out Deep Fire at this point.

At a crit rating of 100:
(Produced DPS numbers)
Arc/Pyro = 930.88
Arc/IV = 949.44
Arc Frost = 1036.01
Fire = 1082.90
Fire/IV = 1105.52
Deep Frost = 1086.17

Highest DPS remains Deep fire with Icy Veins. Arcane is getting it's butt kicked.

At a crit rating of 200:
(Produced DPS numbers)
Arc/Pyro = 976.59
Arc/IV = 958.59
Arc Frost = 1074.13
Fire = 1121.70
Fire/IV = 1145.13
Deep Frost = 1119.59

Fire with Icy Veins is still the highest DPS. Deep Fire has overcome frost for DPS.

At a crit rating of 300:
(Produced DPS numbers)
Arc/Pyro = 986.30
Arc/IV = 1003.74
Arc Frost = 1112.26
Fire = 1160.79
Fire/IV = 1185.03
Deep Frost = 1153.00

Let's do another, at 400 crit rating:

At a crit rating of 400:
(Produced DPS numbers)
Arc/Pyro = 1014.01
Arc/IV = 1030.88
Arc Frost = 1150.38
Fire = 1200.17
Fire/IV = 1225.24
Deep Frost = 1186.42

Hmm. No matter what the crit rating is, Fire is always on top. At about 1k spell damage, mind you, which is about where Tier 4/5 ish mages will be.

Let's do something ridiculous, and do 2ooo crit rating, just for fun:

At a crit rating of 2000:
(Produced DPS numbers)
Arc/Pyro = 1388.32
Arc/IV = 1398.61
Arc Frost = 1673.18
Fire = 1767.90
Fire/IV = 1804.83
Deep Frost = 1593.93

Why did I do all this?

Mostly I was out to prove that no matter what you're crit rating was, fire would still be the superior damage dealer. And I was hella right.
Assuming identical gear, and the only variation being the amount of crit rating, which would come out on top? Fire, or Frost?
The numbers speak for themselves. Fire wins.

And Arcane cannot even contend.


CONCLUSION:

No matter what your crit rating is, Fire will STILL be able to output more damage than Frost.

And before you ask, yes, this does take into calculations the Water Elemental, the new Icy Veins, Winter's Chill, all that good stuff.

Fire wins. 'Nuff said.

PoM Pyro For Nubs

In the old days, back when level 70's were still fresh and the majority of us were still getting boned in Hellfire or goofing off in Nagrand, the mage forums were alive with cries and screaming about PoM Pyro.
Specifically, the Arcane Power + Presence of Mind + Pyroblast + Damage Trinket that was causing mages to output incredibly high numbers with a single spell. Especially when the thing crit. (See above picture)
Many, many people called for nerfs, for cooldown to Pyroblast, for anything and everything to lower the damage that mages can output.

Idiots, the lot of them.

The forums have quited down about this issue, but roughly once or twice a day, a new thread pops up complaining about PoM Pyro, complaining about being one shot, on and on and on.

Now, I hate to take the standpoint of many other trolls, but I don't really have a choice here.

Y'all are idiots. Seriously, L2play, nub.

You will only ever get hit by incedibly high amounts of damage from PoM Pyro in the following situations:

1) You are an idiot, and do not know how to play or gear for PvP.

2) You have yet to spend enough time gathering resilience, and you are squishy and mine eyes. And when thou art squishy, thou gettest squished.

First off, every class in the game has options to survive / become completely immune to a Pyroblast. You might not always have these options avaliable to you, but then again, the mage is not always able to PoM Pyro you for insane amounts of damage.

Druids have little choice but to take the damage and hope for the best. Bear form can take an incredible beating, and you always have the options of Heal over Time spells. If a druid's reaction time is fast enough (which it will be if your any good at PvP), you will be able to shrug off a Pyro without much, if any, difficulty.
Of course, if you're a Bad Druid, you will get rofl-stomped

Warriors have a load of hitpoints avaliable to them, and most of them will simply raise their eye-brows at Pyroblast. Spell-reflect is also avaliable to be used, and quick warriors can knock up a spellreflect on a PoM Pyro fast retro-actively.

Paladins can bubble, and are usually in the same boat as Warriors HP-wise. No, you will not always have bubble avaliable to you, but you will always be able to heal yourself. And when our Counterspell is on cooldown, there is shit all we can do to stop you. The fact is, you're a Paladin. You can survive a Pyro. Not a problem.

Rogues can CloS. Oh, look, no damage. And don't complain about that being on cooldown. It's 1 bloody minute. You have that sucker ready to go, don't you? I have never, ever fought a rogue (since CloS became trainable, mind you) that was not able to pop CloS while fighting me. And if you're Subtlety spec (I see you little blink-stealing buggers), then you probably won't be killed by Pyro anyways. The laws of gambling and cheat death are in your favor.

Fellow mages can shield themself, Spellsteal Presence of Mind, Arcane Power, whatever, Ice Block themselves, even silence the other mage to prevent a Pyro. There are a lot of options avaliable to cut down on some of the damage, avoid the damage for a while, or completely avoid it.

Warlocks are strange in that some of them can take the damage, some can't. Some will be totally immune to fire damage for a while, some will simply be impossible to get high damage with (Soul Link, dontchaknow?), and some will simply deathcoil/chain fear/pinkhearts you when they see major cooldowns being used. Or spell lock you. Or simply eat your Arcane Power/Presence of Mind. Warlocks quick on the uptake will be like "What is this mage doing? Arcane Power? /sigh... spell lock... deathcoil... hrm, that was fun, wasn't it, mister wasted 3 minute cooldowns?"
Some warlocks simply will not have the reaction speed/spec, and will eat a lot of damage. Which they'll usually shrug off anyway, use a health stone, or fear / drain life you. Whatever they're into, I guess.

Priests are one of the more vulnerable classes to a successful PoM Pyro. They only have one lousy bubble, which even in its buffed form, can be knocked aside rather quickly. Specced into Disc, the priest will be hurting the mage substantially as well, but thats not much of a consolation when you suddenly eat 4k damage. A priest practically has to be disc spec to survive a PoM Pyro, because Pain Suppression / Improved MiniBubble are simply that good. Holy is pretty much boned, as is Shadow. Its certainly survivable, they are just a wee bit more vulnerable than other classes.

Shaman can have a lot of trouble with PoM Pyros. They only have one reliable way to avoid it, and thats Grounding Totem. Which the mage will probably shoot an Ice Lance at. /shrug. Without that, you are naked to the massive damage. At this point, only earth shield and praying Counterspell is on cooldown can save you. Thats no fault of your own, its just you class doesn't do good againt Mages.

Hunters are the worst off class versus a PoM Pyro. They're only defence, Feign Death, is little more than a distraction that might buy a second, or two if the mage is slow on the uptake. The only real defence hunters have is to try and keep the mage locked down as much as possible. Scatter shot, Wyvern Sting, Intimidation, even Arcane Shot and hope it dispells something important.

But even if you don't have the cooldowns ready to go, even if you don't have any real defences against a PoM Pyro, it should not be hard to shrug off the damage if you have any level of decent gear.
You're here to PvP, right? Then pick up some stats that are suitable for the job.

Pyroblast taking too much out of your hitpoints? Get more stamina. Pyroblast critting you for 7k? Grab some resilience, and watch that crit damage steadily fall.
Watch that 7k turn into 4k, assuming it crits at all anymore.

If you get the right gear, and all those shiny 3 minute cooldowns and 21, 31, 11 tier point talents will amount to is hitting for 2-3 thousand damage, and maybe critting for 4000-ish. Assuming it crits at all. And seriously? Thats not very much damage at all.
Literally any PvP spec (besides healers) can easily deal out that much without a lot of effort.

And just for speccing to get PoM Pyro, that mage is squishy as hell. We pay through the nose to get a crap load of damage, and watch it all amount to practically zilch thanks to Resilience.
A single Holy Light spell from a Paladin in any decent amount of healing gear will be able to heal up the entirety of a PoM Pyro.

In conclusion.

Stop whining. Learn to Play. Get some fuggin' resilience. PoM Pyro ain't that great, when you bother to build even a half-assed defence against it.

Ok, No More Roleplay

That was ugly. Really, really ugly.


Awesome things that have happened.

1. We got the Spellfire Belt
2. We finally reachd max skill in wands
3. Reached the Hit cap as arcane
4. Six months after getting it, my epic red gem of +12 spell damage has a home
5. Dinged 30 on an alt
6. Got epic boots!
7. Reached over 20% crit rate unbuffed
8. Hit Honored with the Sha'tari Skyguard
9. 300 Resilience in PvP gear. Woo!
   

I Try To Roleplay

After many months of playing a troll, I wondered what it would be like to roleplay one. Hmm....

"Yo, mon. I am Euripedes, and I am a mage. The forces of the arcane, and the elemental powers of fire and frost are at my control. I can destroy you in a blaze of fire at a whim. I can become immune to anything and everything, including gravity. I can even turn the most potent enemy into a cute wittle piggy.

So why, I ask, is the Darkspear tribe in such a horrible condition? Why is our entire society degraded into a tiny little hovel at the bottom of Durotar? We are trolls! We are strong! Why do we not take action?

*sigh*

I suppose there is something to be said for sacrificing oneself for the greater good. It is no longer about the Tribe, it is about the Horde. We have a Warchief now. We have blood brothers now, outside the tribe.
We are scarred peoples. The trolls used to weild far and widespread power. Our history is one of bloodshed, of betrayal, and death. Our empires were torn to pieces by the elves, by the humans, by even other trolls. We, the Darkspear tribe, have fallen very, very far. But we will have our revenge. Of all the members of the Horde, we are the only ones to not have a land to call our own.
The orcs are even more scarred than we trolls. Their entire race, used, abused, and tossed aside like a ratty rag. Yet they saved us. We owe the orcs a great deal for our continued existence, and it is my pride and honor to fight and die beside them.
The Tauren are an honorable people, and I have a great deal of respect for them. They have solid societal and shamanistic values that have grounded the Horde, at least on Kalimdor.
The Horde of the East is a thing entirely different. The Undead, I can sympathize with. They've died, for Zul's sake, died and continue to fight on. But I do not trust them, and I will never trust their motives.
And the blood elves... traitors to their own kind. The remnants of the high elves, shunned by the Alliance for their dealings with Lady Vashj, among other things. As far as I'm concerned, they are not true members of the Horde, just lost elves with nowhere else to go.
And I cannot stand them! They are self-important, condescending pricks! What gives you damned elves the right to look down on me? What gives you the right to think yourself higher than me? You do realize that the land your precious Silvermoon was Troll land? You do realize that all you pansy ass elves are descended from trolls?
This world, it used to be ours. You, you damn elves, are nothing but the ungrateful bastard children of trolls long dead. And I will suffer your superiority no more.

But I do not hate them. I merely cannot stand them.

But the Alliance.... /spit. Conniving shitheads! The Night Elves have hunted us for centuries. They do not care. They show no mercy. They slaughter us all, given the slightest opportunity.
I hate them so... I will kill them. I will maim the men, rape the women, torture the children. They will scream. They will beg. And I will never show mercy. They will die, humiliated, and in incredible pain. They deserve no better.

And the humans.... *hisssss*. They are even worse. They will suffer even more. They will watch themselves burn, they will watch their loved ones suffer and due in front of them. It is merely justice. They have done the same to trolls, now they will suffer the same fate.
They will not die alone, but surrounded by their friends and famiy. They will watch their cities burn, watch their children fed to our Mounts, watch their wives tortured, watch their husbands ruthlessly maimed and left bleeding in the burning streets to die.

The dwarves and the gnomes are damned for their decision to join the Alliance. They will die and burn with the rest.
The gnomes especially. I HATE GNOMES!! How is it POSSIBLE for a race that annoying to develop? How can they go day to day without killing themselves? They are a cursed people, annoying as hell. They deserve nothing better than death out of spite. Stupid gnomes.

And the Dranei... what the crap are they? A bunch of self-righteous morons who worship "the light". The light? What the hell? You would base your entire civilization off a source of illumination? What is wrong with you?
Just stay out of my way so I don't have to kill you.

Fucktards, the lot of them. Nothing but a bunch of fucktards."

I was banned from the server. Something about breaking the ToS or something... I think it might have been the whole raping elvish women part.