4.0.1 Fire Mage

Fire = Fun!?

So patch 4.0.1 came out yesterday. First thing I did was log on the Mage and look at all the goodies. Fire, Arcane or Frost. Before 4.0.1 I was Frost for PVP and Arcane for PVE. Now that 4.0.1 has come out the game has changed. Smaller talent tree's, bigger mana pools, bigger health pools.

So I went Fire since I keep hearing so many good things about it. But I honestly don't have much crit gear. Haste stacked due to Arcane and Frost pre 4.0.1. Have no fear. I pulled over 14k dps in ICC 10 with only 33% crit and 28% haste. Now if I was above 50% crit like I'm supposed to be, I'm sure I would have put out more dps.

Lets first talk about fire in Battle Grounds. 14k crit instant cast Pyroblast's, Fireblast procs left and right and Living Bomb turning people into suicide bombers and Dragon's Breath to make them all walk in circles. Also the change to Flamestrike and Blast Wave.

• Flamestrike is now an instant cast always. Doesn't do a lot of damage but puts a nice circle of dot for your enemy to dwell in. 
• Blast Wave no longer blows the enemy units back. Now an area of affect spell like Flamestrike and instead of blowing people back it slows them by 70% for 3 sec or so. 

Running around using Scorch to get Pyroblast proc. Just sexy.

Yes fire is still lacking in survivability some might say. Although you have more than enough slowing/stunning/silencing spells to keep any healer down, the dps at a distance (if you want them at a distance ;-) ) and with the right procs up you won't even need them.

I personally don't stop running around in circles if I'm being targeted by a melee, trying to confuse and slow them to death. Of course if there is another caster or hunter I stand on their face trying to avoid any casts or incoming damage.

Now for raiding. The rotation is quite simple, start with Scorch for the 5% crit buff, keep Living Bomb on the target at all times. Fireblast every time its up and whenever it procs, Pyroblast every time it procs. Use Fireball as the filler. I haven't tried putting some Flamestrikes on a boss to see what it would do to my dps. But this rotation gets me over 14k with a single target. Good old PVE, doesn't like to be hard ;-)

If you guys have any specific questions about fire let me know. I'll be posting the different strats I use for specific classes, I don't expect them to defer much, but you never know.

My Mage.
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Fire Spec of Choice