Throne of Thunder Mage Style

[Krazyito 521]

it is adviced NOT to use Frost Orb (if you are frost specced) on the dracari door on horridon as the tanks always move away as they think that is the enemies orb so its a waste of procs

Almost all those adds fixate on a random target anyway. So regardless, the adds are going to move.

[benjam1997 18]

yes, but it is still happening, all the tanks move away from the orbs even though they are friendly

[benjam1997 18]

you just need to be aware as a frost mage not to expect tanks to stay near your prozen orbs as they dont want to take huge damage so i advice to save them or throw it at horridon himself, as when he charges the person he charges should run to the tank so he dosnt move anyway, :)

[Damien 1,514]

When reading some of this, wouldnt using alter time after being swapped be a bad thing? Because that means the person you swapped with will be right where you alter time back to. Which means his add will run to him, and then get a buff for being near each other.

As far as I know, the buff only works between Anima Golems. The tank will be tanking a Massive Anima Golem, so the player's Anima Golem and the tank's Massive Anima Golem getting close to each other should be no problem.

[Vaelkder 6]

On Durumu, as Arcane (I know, I know... I'm just now learning Fire Spec, in order to stay competitive), I glyphed with Arcane Explosion to increase the range for when we ran the maze gauntlet. I was pugging 10-man and YES, we did down him on the fourth try (thanks to 9 astounding people who dragged me along for the ride, even though I was actually holding my own!).

When it came time to stack for the maze part, I quickly switched the keymapping so that Arcane Explosion was actuated by keystroke "1" (normally, that is where my BLINK is, with Arcane Explosion on shift+1). It's an easy switch and can be done on the fly.

As we ran the close-in path which opened up, I was able to keep a bird's-eye view of the path with my mouse while blasting merrily away with Arcane Explosion. It may seem kind of pedestrian to the extremely skilled players out there, but it worked very well for me and I survived both maze phases and was able to keep dealing out damage.

Thanks to everyone who has contributed to all of these great forums, as I'm learning loads!

[Mit213 20]

Since it seems there isn't too much arcane stuff going on in here, I guess I'll give my opinion on what I believe is best for this spec.

Before I say what I use for each specific encounter, I want to just point out that on every encounter I use Blazing Speed (T1) because it makes it so easy to re-position yourself (no GCD makes it amazing especially when you don't have to move very far to put up a new rune, as well as it allowing you to spend much less time dodging encounter mechanics so you can get back to doing damage), and I also won't really mention the T3 talents because I personally don't put them to any use in my raid group.

Disclaimers: I am by no means pro, or in a super hardcore raid group, so I know I'm not the very best player out there, this is just my opinion for talents on each fight. I don't really rank a whole lot (minus lately because I am arcane at the moment, and apparently no one else is playing arcane at all so I get to see all these lovely high rankings that I am 99% sure I wouldn't come close to as fire or frost), so this is another reason to not take stuff I say without questioning it. I would have waited til later when I had more experience with all these fights, but last time I posted this I was told that it would have helped if I posted it a lot sooner, so here it is! I love to use Nether Tempest a bit too much, so I am sure I'm not using the correct talent choice every fight in terms of that, it is kind of an addiction of mine. Also, I have been in and out the past few weeks since MoP started because my computer just decided to explode so I haven't been able to raid a whole lot (like 5-6 nights total, and usually about 1/2 the night when my computer decided to overheat or some other crazy problem), so this is just off the minimal experience I have so far (I haven't experimented with every combination of talents either, just went with whatever I thought would be best).

Unless people feel I am derping and offering bad advice, I'll update this little dealio when I am a bit more experienced in ToT.

Boss: Jin'Rokh

Blazing Speed: This helps you to get out of the waters and stacked quickly as well as lets you reposition yourself quickly when you get focused lightning on you.

T2: I enjoy using Temporal shield because it can protect you from so much damage, as well as doesn't use a GCD. You should use it before a focused lightning hits you, as well as at the start of the lightning storm. Pretty much all of these talents are alright here though.

T4: Cold Snap would be good if your healers needed help during this fight, but if not, use Greater Invisibility and just pop it right when you're moving over to wherever during the start of lightning storm and you'll get a good bit of damage reduction from it.

T5: I like Nether Tempest!

T6: Rune of Power is pretty much the only reasonable talent to use here IMO.

Boss: Horridon

Blazing Speed: Just get where you need to be faster. Just use it to run out of stuff/over to where you need to be positioned/whatever, it is just a convenience kind of thing here.

T2: I use Flame Glow because it feels like a majority of the damage I take is from DoTs and I just don't really have to worry about it. Ice Barrier is probably a bit better for this fight in all honesty.

T4: Greater Invisibility removes DoTs from you, I love this talent

T5: I enjoy Nether Tempest!

T6: Rune of Power is what I'd use, but with all the DoTs and raid damage flying around, you could use Incanter's Ward if you wanted to.

Boss: Council

Blazing Speed: Just get where you need to be faster, nothing special about this here, it can get you out of the sand faster or allow you to stack up faster.

T2: I use Flame Glow on this fight but I really believe that Ice Barrier would be a good bit better than it if you don't move out of stuff right away. I usually am not one of the people that stacks for Frostbite, so a lot of the damage that it negates is just the damage from Kazra'Jin returning damage back to me.

T4: Cold Snap is pretty handy for this fight, take off that not empowered debuff twice and gain the respect of your healers after standing in that sand last boss!

T5: For real, I believe Nether Tempest is the best for this fight.

T6: Rune of Power because it isn't too much movement, but Incanter's Ward could work if you just decide to walk over some sand or near the frost debuff every so often (or even hit Kazra'Jin during when he reflects damage).

Boss: Tortos

Blazing Speed: I am all over the fight here so this is amazing for me, I can dodge turtles, get in range to cone of cold for the awesome slow it does, take little time dodging the stalactites so I can start to cast sooner, etc etc etc.

T2: I use Temporal Shield because I couple it with a macro to also cast Incanter's Ward. I feel I get healed by more using this than Ice Barrier during the quake and rockfall.

T4: Cold Snap is great for this fight because in my opinion, this fight has the biggest chance for you to get screwed over twice in quick succession.

T5: I use Nether Tempest because I'm not at all on the bats during this fight, we have our WW monk and our enhancement shaman on the boss and bats the entire fight while us ranged kill the turtles, therefore I like Nether Tempest for the cleave it gives a good portion of the time without missing out on a lot of damage if Living Bomb explodes in a bad place, or if Frost Bomb doesn't explode near another target at all. (I'd suggest you use Frost Bomb if you're ever hitting the bats, I believe you can walk over and shatter them with a Frost Nova right before it explodes)

T6: Incanter's Ward IMO because of all the running around you are probably doing (unless you just sit on the boss and toss out AoE on the bats instead of chasing the turtles around and standing near others for stalactites to drop where your Rune is).

Boss: Megaera

Blazing Speed: Use it to run from the acid thing, as well as to dump the red dot where it needs to go, pretty self explanatory.

T2: I use Temporal Shield during rampages and in between them when an acid thing is about to hit (we don't kill blue one at all).

T4: I love Greater Invisibility for this fight because you can just ignore the acid thingies of doom and just stand there and pop that a second before you get hit ORRRRR you can use them for rampage.

T5: Nether Tempestttttt!

T6: Rune of Power definitely, but if you love your Incanter's Ward that much, damage is pretty common on this fight.

Boss: Ji-Kun - I want to leave a forewarning with this one because of how little experience I have had with it. I have only been here on two attempts, the first of which was a really quick wipe because we derped without a battle rez on hand and just stood in puddles, and the second of which I was carried through to a kill while trying to become fluid with the mechanics (when they downed this last week, my computer was going haywire and such, so it is the first time I had seen it).

Blazing Speed: Use with blink and you won't fall from the push back.

T2: Ice Barrier is the best here IMO because it will let you take less damage while soaking up a puddle for the melee, you will require a bit more overall healing during the quills and for after the puddle soak, but it just feels safer.

T4: Greater Invisibility lets you drop the debuff from soaking puddles, or Cold snap if you just like it more than Greater Invisibility. You could also use Cauterize if you really wanted, but that means you would have died regardless and since there is no super huge nuke that should kill you on this fight, it doesn't really seem necessary (it feels that way with most fights so far in ToT).

T5: Nether Tempest!

T6: Rune of Power definitely.

Boss: Durumu

Blazing Speed: Use to catch up or run through bad areas during the maze portion of the fight, and when you get a flying green blob flying at your face and you need to move.

T2: Ice Barrier is your best bet on this fight I believe, I don't know if you can use Temporal Shield during when you're stunned and being drained, but I couldn't Ice Block so I'm just not sure on this one.

T4: Greater Invisibility or Cauterize for this fight because Ice Block is near useless because you can't just sit in the goop during the maze portion of the fight, which is probably when you'd want to use it if you got all flustered and got lost in it.

T5: Nether Tempest! Frost Bomb would probably be better for killing the red mist mobs quickly, but as I said, I am addicted!

T6: Incanter's Ward is my favorite for this fight, but you could use Rune if you really wanted to.

Boss: Primordius

Blazing Speed: Just reposition yourself quicker with this, not much to it. You can also go pick up other buffs with it, but for the most part I am just an add cleaver on this fight that keeps people supplied with their own buffs as they focus down the boss the majority of the fight so I hardly need it for that.

T2: I'm not really sure here, Ice Barrier is always a safe bet for fights though. (I haven't been able to play around on this fight much at all, it only took a few attempts to get down and such)

T4: Personal preference here, Ice Block the huge nuke ability Primordius gets, Cauterize could be utilized pretty well here for that same reason if you don't notice in time, or Greater Invisibility is always a good one to take because it gives you a lot of freedom to use with its relatively low cooldown.

T5: Nether Tempest 100%, there is no other option that compares whatsoever.

T6: Rune of Power definitely.

Boss: Dark Animus

Blazing Speed: Not really needed, this is a very low movement fight for me, I'll probably trade it out next time I do this fight.

T2: I use Temporal Shield right before I get swapped so I can just heal myself back up, but that is about it. Ice Barrier is probably equal on this fight.

T4: Use whatever here, the same stuff applies as with Primordius but I feel Cauterize will get a bit less use here.

T5: I like Nether Tempest because sometimes the add we are focusing is out of range, so I just do minor damage on all the other adds while I wait for an add that I can get in range of without wrecking some other person in the raid.

T6: Rune of Power definitely.

Extra Tip: If you ever get hit by the interrupt cast by the boss, it might be worth looking into changing your mage bomb into a tree that is different than your spec, no reason to get locked out of frost and not have the choice to cast nether tempest/living bomb, and same goes with fire and arcane being able to still cast frost bomb if they get locked out.

Boss: Iron Qon

Blazing Speed: NECESSARY! You can almost instantly get out of the windstorm thing with this beautiful talent.

T2: I like Ice Barrier for this fight only because when you are taking damage, you're going to want to get healed up really fast, not wait 6 seconds to heal back the damage you took. Temporal Shield would be just fine to take if you wanted to, but I love that talent and I still enjoy Ice Barrier more.

T4: Greater Invisibility will let you take the fire DoT off yourself, and also helps when you're running out of the windstorm if something bad happens.

T5: Nether Tempest!

T6: Rune of Power only IMO.

Boss: Twin Consorts - Haven't downed yet

Blazing Speed:

T2:

T4:

T5:

T6:

Boss: Lei Shen - Haven't downed yet

Blazing Speed:

T2:

T4:

T5:

T6:

Random Tip Dealios:

Using Incanter's Ward and Temporal shield together is a wonderful combination that requires one GCD and lowers how much healing you need by a good amount.

Temporal Shield followed by Greater Invisibility can make a 10 second period of high damage next to nothing for you/your healers to handle without sacrificing damage by sitting in Ice block for 10 seconds.

Edited March 28, 2013 by Mit213

[Damien 1,514]

On Durumu, as Arcane (I know, I know... I'm just now learning Fire Spec, in order to stay competitive), I glyphed with Arcane Explosion to increase the range for when we ran the maze gauntlet. I was pugging 10-man and YES, we did down him on the fourth try (thanks to 9 astounding people who dragged me along for the ride, even though I was actually holding my own!).

When it came time to stack for the maze part, I quickly switched the keymapping so that Arcane Explosion was actuated by keystroke "1" (normally, that is where my BLINK is, with Arcane Explosion on shift+1). It's an easy switch and can be done on the fly.

As we ran the close-in path which opened up, I was able to keep a bird's-eye view of the path with my mouse while blasting merrily away with Arcane Explosion. It may seem kind of pedestrian to the extremely skilled players out there, but it worked very well for me and I survived both maze phases and was able to keep dealing out damage.

Thanks to everyone who has contributed to all of these great forums, as I'm learning loads!

...

Thank you guys! That gave me a lot of work, but I think I added everything :P

[Vladamyr 169]

Ji-Kun

Talents:

Tier 6 - Incanter's Ward rocks in all specs for this fight. You can use it to soak up Feed Pools and aid in minimizing the damage from Caw and Quills, all the while getting some rocking spell power. Save your cooldowns for a good incanters ward buff and Primal Nutrients. Your dps will be rocking the charts.

[Icecream101 1]

For lei shen, after the first transition phase, time your burst for when the lightning adds pop to spread your combust.

For dark animus, if you are playing frost let your water ele tank it.

[Icecream101 1]

For lei shen, after the first transition phase, time your burst for when the lightning adds pop to spread your combust.

For dark animus, if you are playing frost let your water ele tank it.

I'm sorry. I meant let your water ele tank the small anima robots.

[benjam1997 18]

does anyone know if the bug on magaera is fixed where the frozen orb goes in the wrong directions?

[delat 0]

Hi,

A few comments on the suggested mage build for Tortos. We are just starting on this one and I tried it with most of the site's suggestions on my fire mage.

Blazing Speed Not my cup of tea. You have to move a lot so this comes too infrequently IMO. I went Ice Floes, which is certainly good once you get accustomed to it, but I think I will use the standard Presence of Mind for the next trys.

Temporal Shield Must have ! This is ideal right before Quake Stomp, your healers will love you.

Ice Barrier Why not, but the main advantage is against pushback, so only useful if bats are bothering you (blame your off tank then ).

Bombs: As it seems most efficient to have ranged on turtles and melee on bats, you will want to use Nether Tempest. Living Bomb might be good for some splash damage, I will have to practise the fight a bit more to check that.

After testing Incanter's Ward for a whole night, it's a big NO. The only reliable time to use it is before Quake Stomp, but after this, you have to run a lot to avoid Rockfall, so your nice 15 s, 30 % boost is issentially wasted (btw I ended up last but one dps in these trys, shame ! )

For the next trys, I will go Invocation.

Glyphs: pretty standard, Glyph of Inferno Blast is part of the day-to-day build, so yes.

Hope this helps, and let's hope we will defeat this beast ASAP.

Delat

[benjam1997 18]

well, my tortos kill i used PoM, ice barrier, cauterrise, nether tempm, invoc and RoF

[Oltier 471]

does anyone know if the bug on magaera is fixed where the frozen orb goes in the wrong directions?

It was still bugged for me on Wednesday.

well, my tortos kill i used PoM, ice barrier, cauterrise, nether tempm, invoc and RoF

Temporal shield obviously. Greater invisibility might be a good choice for stomp and rockfall.

Nether tempest if you're on turtles, Frost bomb if you are on bats. And again, obviously invocation. You'll have to move a lot. And because of this, I might be debating againts PoM to Blazing speed for faster repositioning.

Edited April 19, 2013 by Oltier

[benjam1997 18]

never take blazing speed, its a load of garbage, PoM is for an instant cast while moving to keep your Frostbolt debuff on the target to keep it at three stacks, as why need blazing speed when the room is so small you can just Blink to the location? a waste of talent to be honest

[Tpesa 4]

Greetings fellow mages!

I have few tips but I warn that I have only done 11/12 as normal so I don't know if these helps in heroic modes.

Currently, I play as fire but these few tips does not matter in which spec you play. So here we go:

Ji-Kun

If you decide to go and get the wings buff, try time your flying so that you catch the damage buff AND that the boss casts down draft. When down draft starts and just before your flying buff wears off, be just few pixels above the ground so that you don't touch it. I have noticed that when you do this, down draft WON'T affect you as long as you don't move. Intended or not.

Iron Qon

This tip is for you who struggles in windstorm phase. So if you don't like to dodge the tornados, do this:

- Just before the boss flies to cast the windstorm, be sure that you are in the safe zone before anything. Then cast alter time.

- If you casted alter time before the windstorm catches you and pulls to middle, either let the alter time expire or press it again to stop it.

- Tadaa, you are at the safe zone and you don't have run and dodge the tornados.

[benjam1997 18]

if you do the alter time for Iron Qon, then you wont be able to use it for dps burst with your procs which you need to prevent wipes from the ground smash and other things, the tornados are easy, just move and stop then go after a tornado passes or you see none are coming, easy mode, right?

[Tpesa 4]

Yeh, that's true. But there's no benefit of dead dps and I think that you will have your alter time up again when the last phase starts anyway. I did not pay attention to if you could damage Iron Qon while he is flying up when windstorm is on. Because if he takes damage while windstorm, you have few seconds to actually just sit and do the damage to him. But yeah, you should be able to avoid the tornados without using the alter time.

[benjam1997 18]

yes, but i mean that if you use your alter time then. it goes to a 3 min CD, whereas if you just run through the storm as it is not hard, you can proc up then use alter time then for the dps, then have it again for the last phase for more dps, as if you have a priest in the team they can easily leap of faith you to the safe zone if you struggle.

[Vladamyr 169]

never take blazing speed, its a load of garbage, PoM is for an instant cast while moving to keep your Frostbolt debuff on the target to keep it at three stacks, as why need blazing speed when the room is so small you can just Blink to the location? a waste of talent to be honest

I'll take the added survivability over a very minor dps increase all day.

[Oltier 471]

Well said Vladamyr.

Tpesa, as a mage you ahve the option of Blinking out (with glyph of Blink, since you will not really need any other on that fight, but 2), then Blazing speed and you're out with no problem :)

[benjam1997 18]

is this just happening to me or everyone, on the Magaera fight were ever its LFR, normal or HC, when i cast Frozen Orb, it always goes either behind me or sidewides whereas it is meant to travel in a straight pasth in front of you, is blizzard intending to fox this or is it intended just to piss us mages off, :P

[Vladamyr 169]

is this just happening to me or everyone, on the Magaera fight were ever its LFR, normal or HC, when i cast Frozen Orb, it always goes either behind me or sidewides whereas it is meant to travel in a straight pasth in front of you, is blizzard intending to fox this or is it intended just to piss us mages off,

Yeah, seeing this too when I cast at range, so what I've been doing is casting it during rampage. It's not really ideal but at least i'm getting some procs this way.

[benjam1997 18]

that is what i do but was hoping blizz would fix it so we can use it when needed instead of being forced to use it there and then, you know, :P

[Oltier 471]

Does Greater Invisibility remove the Ionization debuff on Jin'rokh?

My theory is, since the Ionization CD is the same as the greater invisibility is, when I get Ionization I move out of the water press greater invisibility, get dispelled by it, also benefiting from the 90% damage reduction. I did not have a chance to try it yet, but if you had please share your experience.

OR, I'll have to pop it before I get dispelled by a healer? :3

If this is the case do you think using cold snap, to mitigate the application of the debuff is a better idea?

Edited May 2, 2013 by Oltier