A few RL friends and I are thinking about starting a static group to level with, the purpose being to AoE grind instances. Our setup would be prot pally, resto shaman, shadow priest, warlock, and mage. The lock and mage would be AoE, the shadow priest a mana battery, and the shaman and pally healz and tank.
Every other class, except the mage, I have a pretty good idea of how to spec. The mage, on the other hand, has AoE potential in all three trees. For the most part, mana shouldn't be an issue (considering we'll have a resto shaman's mana totems and a shadow priest both providing huge amounts of incoming mana), but even so if certain specs would be uber mana inefficient I would like to avoid them.
That being said, I come here asking for a decent AoE DPS spec. I know frost is usually the AoE grind set, but as there will be a tank absorbing all the damage, the control of frost is not necessary (but it wouldn't hurt, and if there's a lot of AoE DPS there then kudos to frost). So what should the mage spec into?
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For efficiency, nothing will beat a frost AoE spec. A fire AoE spec will give some decent damage. And nothing converts mana to damage faster than an Arcane spec.
As you've said, all three have AoE potential. I would suggest the mage consider whether they want more efficient AoE, greater burst damage, or powerful AoE with such mana drain that they'll drink every other pull at least.
Here are three builds. They're my version of AoE builds that don't care at all about single target DPS. They're obviously incomplete, I stopped em when I had reached that point in a tree where the AoE options stop existing.
Frost:
http://www.wowhead.com/?talent=oZZcAGcsfxsboz
Efficient, decent damage, burst potential, but not very strong for much other than killing things with AoE in a group.
Fire:
http://www.wowhead.com/?talent=oZxg0ubcIoeRk
Much burstier(is that even a word?) due to the cooldown natures of Blastwave and Dragon's Breath; slightly less mana efficient(though you are guaranteed to get MoE mana returns from almost every AoE cast); much better against single targets than the frost one or the arcane one. I didn't take Impact because the stuns could affect the paladin's tanking ability.
Arcane:
http://www.wowhead.com/?talent=oibVc0czxIzi
This build is an extreme example of what arcane is about. Good damage(AoE wise, anyway) at low threat for a lot of mana cost. There really is no faster way to evacuate a mana pool that Arcane Explosion spam. But it'll get the job done. This build is easily the worst of the three at single target damage(with more points into it, it'll be more effective at single target, but it'll still be mana-inefficient).
As you've said, all three have AoE potential. I would suggest the mage consider whether they want more efficient AoE, greater burst damage, or powerful AoE with such mana drain that they'll drink every other pull at least.
Here are three builds. They're my version of AoE builds that don't care at all about single target DPS. They're obviously incomplete, I stopped em when I had reached that point in a tree where the AoE options stop existing.
Frost:
http://www.wowhead.com/?talent=oZZcAGcsfxsboz
Efficient, decent damage, burst potential, but not very strong for much other than killing things with AoE in a group.
Fire:
http://www.wowhead.com/?talent=oZxg0ubcIoeRk
Much burstier(is that even a word?) due to the cooldown natures of Blastwave and Dragon's Breath; slightly less mana efficient(though you are guaranteed to get MoE mana returns from almost every AoE cast); much better against single targets than the frost one or the arcane one. I didn't take Impact because the stuns could affect the paladin's tanking ability.
Arcane:
http://www.wowhead.com/?talent=oibVc0czxIzi
This build is an extreme example of what arcane is about. Good damage(AoE wise, anyway) at low threat for a lot of mana cost. There really is no faster way to evacuate a mana pool that Arcane Explosion spam. But it'll get the job done. This build is easily the worst of the three at single target damage(with more points into it, it'll be more effective at single target, but it'll still be mana-inefficient).
I should mention (forgot to) a bit of single-target damage on boss-fights wouldn't be a bad thing either.
This is the build I came up with. Imp counterspell would allow the paladin to get casters closer to him (especially if the priest goes with silence), and the fire talents would give some single-target DD.
Either that or full frost, skipping only frost warding and frozen core. It would limit him to only frost spells, but hey - they work.
This is the build I came up with. Imp counterspell would allow the paladin to get casters closer to him (especially if the priest goes with silence), and the fire talents would give some single-target DD.
Either that or full frost, skipping only frost warding and frozen core. It would limit him to only frost spells, but hey - they work.
skribs wrote:
This is the build I came up with. Imp counterspell would allow the paladin to get casters closer to him (especially if the priest goes with silence), and the fire talents would give some single-target DD.
Drop Playing with Fire for Blastwave and that could work. Again, though, relying on arcane for any kind of AoE will mean time spent drinking...a fair amount of it.
Quote:
relying on arcane for any kind of AoE will mean time spent drinking...a fair amount of it.
Even with 2 mana batteries?
skribs wrote:
Quote:
relying on arcane for any kind of AoE will mean time spent drinking...a fair amount of it.
Even with 2 mana batteries?
Oh yeah. Arcane Explosion is a horrifying drain on mana. The mage will have plenty of mana while doing single target DPS thanks to 2 mana batteries, but when doing AE spam, he'll be burning the mana faster than they can throw it at him.
skribs wrote:
Quote:
relying on arcane for any kind of AoE will mean time spent drinking...a fair amount of it.
Even with 2 mana batteries?
the mobs would be dropping so fast that there wouldn't be time to get much more than a few ticks in of regen, at least what I am thinking.
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