Low DPS for ilvl: Frost Mage

[Okkanai 0]

Getting frustrated with the low dps I seem to be pulling on some fights despite my ilvl. Even when testing dps on a target dummy I'm only able to get around 180-190k sustained single target dps, despite what I believe to be a fairly solid rotation (pretty much following the icyveins rotation.) Ilvl is 553, but I do still have a garbage weapon, trinket, and rings. I do alright on some raid bosses, but for some reason the Garrosh fight seems to give me issues and my dps turns to... not great. Anyway, here's the links:

 

ARMORY

 

TARGET DUMMY DPS LOG (SINGLE TARGET)

 

Let me know if there's any other info I can provide that might be helpful.

 

By the way, I noticed for some reason worldoflogs didn't track my elemental, and gives odd numbers for dps (since it doesn't seem to track when you enter/leave combat.) Recount was showing me my dps during the time in the report as around 190k. 

Edited December 30, 2013 by Okkanai

[Archimage 98]

I see you are clipping your Invoker's Energy, rather use Evocation when the buff wears off to use a extra spell while it is on. You won't be casting damage spells while it is off.

Cooldown usage is correct, rather use Synapse Springs with alter time, and I can't see Potion.

35 Brain Freezes but only 28 casts

46 Fingers of Frost procs but only 29 Ice lance casts, the uptime of Fingers of Frost seems to be high, should be used asap.

 

Did you have all the raid buffs when you practiced vs the dummy?

[Akraen 230]

That's not bad for 553, you know. Especially because you have timeless gear, a useless trinket, and generally poorly itemized items.

 

So I don't think you're doing anything horrible other than the aforementioned missing of BF and FoF procs, try to stay on top of those. Also please keep in mind dummy tests don't really show anything. The biggest challenge to frost that I see is people making good decisions while also dealing with mechanics.

 

Though honestly I just don't think you're that far behind. You're doing about what I was in heroic ToT gear.

[Okkanai 0]

I see you are clipping your Invoker's Energy, rather use Evocation when the buff wears off to use a extra spell while it is on. You won't be casting damage spells while it is off.

Cooldown usage is correct, rather use Synapse Springs with alter time, and I can't see Potion.

35 Brain Freezes but only 28 casts

46 Fingers of Frost procs but only 29 Ice lance casts, the uptime of Fingers of Frost seems to be high, should be used asap.

 

Did you have all the raid buffs when you practiced vs the dummy?

 

The difference between brain freeze/FoF procs and casts confuses me, as I have multiple things set up so that it's virtually impossible for me to miss when I have either one up and I always cast it immediately unless I'm a few seconds away from my icy veins/alter time cds being up. As for synapse springs, the reason I was using it more often than alter time was the difference in the cds (1 min for SS vs. 3 for alter time), but I can certainly try saving it for alter time if it'd make a difference. 

 

I didn't have raid buffs as I was trying to just get a base measurement to compare the results to in the future when any gear/rotation/etc changes. 

[Okkanai 0]

That's not bad for 553, you know. Especially because you have timeless gear, a useless trinket, and generally poorly itemized items.

 

So I don't think you're doing anything horrible other than the aforementioned missing of BF and FoF procs, try to stay on top of those. Also please keep in mind dummy tests don't really show anything. The biggest challenge to frost that I see is people making good decisions while also dealing with mechanics.

 

Though honestly I just don't think you're that far behind. You're doing about what I was in heroic ToT gear.

 

While that is definitely somewhat reassuring, it's still a miserable experience to feel like you're doing far less dps than others (especially other classes) who are in comparable gear. As far as itemization, yeah, I've had crap luck with drops from flex, and only managed to find any groups at all for normal SoO this week for the few I did get. I've had no luck at all finding a decent raiding guild, so I'm kind of stuck going it solo and running with whatever groups I can get in until that changes. Haven't even downed normal Garrosh yet as groups would rather just kick and find a higher ilvl/dps player instead. Good times... 

[Oltier 471]

I'd like to react to some comments:

 

 

I see you are clipping your Invoker's Energy, rather use Evocation when the buff wears off to use a extra spell while it is on. You won't be casting damage spells while it is off.

Cooldown usage is correct, rather use Synapse Springs with alter time, and I can't see Potion.

35 Brain Freezes but only 28 casts

46 Fingers of Frost procs but only 29 Ice lance casts, the uptime of Fingers of Frost seems to be high, should be used asap.

 

Did you have all the raid buffs when you practiced vs the dummy?

 

Cooldown usage was not correct. Synapse Spring was used, correctly. However, Alter Time was not. You delayed using that, and Icy Veins for a lot, thus most of your buffs weared off by the time you started using Alter Time.

 

And indeed tehre were lots of FoF and BF charges wasted. Even is you say you used all of them up, the WoL log that you linket states it differently. You can also check it. If you had 2 set bonus, it'd be okay to save up 1 FoF charge but since you don't have, you simply just wasted them. This resulted less Icicle damage as well.

 

 

The difference between brain freeze/FoF procs and casts confuses me, as I have multiple things set up so that it's virtually impossible for me to miss when I have either one up and I always cast it immediately unless I'm a few seconds away from my icy veins/alter time cds being up. As for synapse springs, the reason I was using it more often than alter time was the difference in the cds (1 min for SS vs. 3 for alter time), but I can certainly try saving it for alter time if it'd make a difference. 

 

I didn't have raid buffs as I was trying to just get a base measurement to compare the results to in the future when any gear/rotation/etc changes. 

 

 

Don't wait for IV/AT with your FOF and BF procs. They get wasted meantime. It is awesome if you have those procs before Alter Timing, but the whole purpose of AT is to extend your trinket/DPS CDs. Those are mooore important than 2 FoF procs.

 

With synapse spring, you should use it on CD, BUT every 3 minutes (if possible) use it in conjunction with AT, not like you did in the logs.

 

Overall, with your current gear and without correct usage of CDs and procs, the 190k looks fine to me and you could definitely work on it.

 

(Please, don't take it as an offence, I am just trying to give a light on your mistakes. :) )

[Okkanai 0]

Not offended in the least, I wouldn't have asked for help if I thought I was doing everything perfectly, and I appreciate any suggestions.

 

I'm going to try to create a couple more logs later when I have some time and see if I can sort out whats going on with the procs. I have a weakauras setup going that makes it abundantly clear any time brain freeze/fof is up, and I don't have a habit of just letting them sit there, so I'm really confused as to the log results vs. what I was actually seeing in game. Another thing I'm curious about, I've noticed that despite a relatively low latency most of the time (around 40ms,) quartz cast bars often show a massive amount of red latency area when casting things like FB. Does anyone happen to know why that would be, and/or if it could be having an effect on anything? 

 

Again, thanks to all who replied, I'll try to post again later for some help looking at any new logs I come up with. 

[Oltier 471]

Not offended in the least, I wouldn't have asked for help if I thought I was doing everything perfectly, and I appreciate any suggestions.

 

I'm going to try to create a couple more logs later when I have some time and see if I can sort out whats going on with the procs. I have a weakauras setup going that makes it abundantly clear any time brain freeze/fof is up, and I don't have a habit of just letting them sit there, so I'm really confused as to the log results vs. what I was actually seeing in game. Another thing I'm curious about, I've noticed that despite a relatively low latency most of the time (around 40ms,) quartz cast bars often show a massive amount of red latency area when casting things like FB. Does anyone happen to know why that would be, and/or if it could be having an effect on anything? 

 

Again, thanks to all who replied, I'll try to post again later for some help looking at any new logs I come up with. 

 

In my game, quartz reacts faster to lagspikes, than the actual game. And this could be a reason for waster FFB procs. Ie.: NT ticks every second and you have 1000+ ms, and BF procs twice in a row.. (Very unlikely, but could happen) This means wasted proc already. And if this goes constant... So yes, this could easily be a reason to wasted procs and bad snapshotting...

[Okkanai 0]

This latency thing is really confusing me still, as occasionally when casting FB for instance, quartz will show my latency in the cast bar at as high as 600 or more ms, while my game latency meter shows it solidly at around 40ms. On top of that, running a continual ping to the test ip blizzard provides for my battlegroup never seems to show any high latency there. 

[Blackd 8]

Your Frenzied crystal of rage trinket is pretty much weak on single target despite the fact its 559 warforged. You should switich to kadris totem or yaashar from garosh. Ofc only for single target. Do you refresh your bomb as soon as u get high trinket procs?