Arcane Vs. Fire BuildFollow

It truly depends on the length of the fights. Arcane and Arcane/Fire (18/53/0) are very close (1 or 2 % difference). In longer fights Fire or FFB may come out ahead, especially due to less mana usage and the longer the time they have in molten fury range the higher their dps is. On the other hand, in shorter fights arcane takes the cake with having a nice mana dump and fast cooldowns, that with a ton of burst (due to the aforementioned reasons) fights that are patchwerk-style in 3mins or less can sway from one to the other due to good 'ol RNG.

Come Ulduar, it will really depend on what we have going for us in term of if they fix evocation (so that it isn't easily interruptable by any breeze -- there is a LOT of raid damage in Ulduar that will easily interrupt it for us). If they do fix it, arcane should be fine as long as you can sustain a 2minute cycle (for the next evocation). If not FFB/Fireball will probably come ahead.

It is also important to note that Arcane/Fire requires a LOT of hit (you are not getting any hit benefits) so you will need around 14% hit (+ raid buffs of course) to be hit capped. So it really needs a specific set of gear as you should never really gem for hit.

Basically just to add to Anobix's post. I've only tried Arc/Fire for a week, but I can share my thoughts on it.

The cruising DPS rate of the Fireball spec (the rate at which you can comfortably maintain a Rotation without worrying about mana) is quite a bit nicer than Arcane, but is Heavily dependent on a 25-Man setting and great gear in terms of iLevel and stat-stacking options - aka you need to have nearly perfect gear choices available. Once you get to this place, though, with 4 Pieces of T7 and some perfect Hit accompaniment along with around 1800SP raw and Fire will dominate in fights like Loatheb, Sapphiron, Kel'Thuzad, and just about anything else with over 10 Million HP or a 4 minute engage time.

Arcane's "comfortable" rotation is lower DPS but works almost to full effect in any grouping situation. The beauty of Arcane is the throttle. From mana conservative to balls-out AB Spam with CDs popped, you can nearly double your DPS. For fights like OS+ and Malygos, as well as in situations where your Raid as a whole is pumping out so much DPS that bosses fall quickly (say if you're going for Patchwerk 3 Min), the ability to really throttle Arcane to afterburner IS a substantial benefit over Fire. The throttle helps for PVP, questing, Groups, and just about anything else too.

So, I'd say any time you really just need to bust out an enormous amount of DPS before being able to fall back, Arcane has the upper hand. Fire has the consistency and some really nice damage but lacks the critical thinking requirements and the fun that goes with it.

From what I have heard it's like 10-15% lower than Arcane or Fire. FFB is about 5% lower. VERY rough generalizations here. You could still be the highest DPSer in your guild as frost, but out of the theoretical max, you'll be lower than other mages. I seem to remember fire being 6k, arcane 5.9k, FF 5.5k, and frost around 4.8k. Again, very general. It was based on some pie chart from EJ comparing casters. Affliction warlocks using high DPS pets were in the mid 6ks. Kinda scary.

Unless you're progressive-driven, play what you like (but check TGMPE for ideas on why we take talents :-P)

Eventually, you won't have to watch Scorch either. I have been testing life without scorch. I changed my glyph and removed the spell from my hotbars. I still have Living Bomb to watch, but I feel good about leaving scorch behind.

But it could still be a good idea to spec frost if your guild does 10-man runs and you lack any other class providing Replenishment, right?

IMHO the Replenishment argument of how Frost will become more viable than it is now is non-existent. If you look closely at the changes, they can be considered a downgrade to the Frost Mage's utility as opposed to some buff to the tree.

While the actually effect of the Improved Water Elemental is only half a strong (.12%TM as opposed to Replenishment's .25%TM), it does currently stack with other Replenishment effects - of which Anobix has stated many classes do grant. Furthermore, the IWE Talent can be strategically used to last 2 Straight minutes for intense fights, or in fights lasting 5 Minutes can be busted immediately, then again for 2 straight minutes at the end. The control and reliability of this current effect is powerful in its own right.

A synergized 25-Man Raid currently does not go without a Retribution Paladin and a Shadow Priest anyways - it's too much benefit to DPS PAST the Replenishment effect. Really, this then should not be a problem. This means that every 8 seconds, 20 people are getting a 15-second replenishment effect. Theoretically, and of course never perfectly executed, this means that the entire raid should have Replenishment up almost all of the time while engaged with only *2* players. It only takes 1 of these to keep a 10-Man completely replenished the entirety of a fight. The beauty of this is that these classes are support DPS classes (aka not Warlock/Mage/Hunter/Rogue) and that, ontop of being notably strong damage dealers, are intended to bring something extra to the raid - which they do (in multiple ways.)

Now add in Survival Hunters, who not only bring pure DPS, but also bring multiple benefits to the raid. Very few a'raids amass 25 people and have 0 Hunters. So, tell me why we should have another pure DPS class choose fall way behind on his/her primary role and strength, in order to compete - nay make obsolete - these 3 sources of Replenishment. In addition, where Affliction is getting a dumbing-down and a slight Nerf, Destruction Warlocks have the ability to spec into Replenishment as well (similar to Survival's effect.)

It has become relatively obvious that Frost will continue to be neglected as a viable Raid DPS option - at least for 3.1 release - and the Utility she brings is the only plus side. So why, oh why, would changing a controlled Mana Regeneration effect that stacks with current effects into an effect that completely nullifies other classes' benefits (but in actuality provides 0 benefit because the effect will be up nearly 100% of the time anyways) be considered an upgrade to the spec??

(It's not... it's not at all.)

I was specfically referring to 10/25man raids as pve. All specs are viable for leveling, I actually prefer frost as I love the control. Although after the next xpac (god knows when) I may try my hand at leveling arcane.

I leveled from 70 to 80 as arcane and didn't have any problems. I think it works fine for pvp as well with all the fast casting spells.

I don't understand why a person should never gem for hit though? I mean if its not maxed whats wrong with it? I know I would be well below max if it wasn't for gems.

I like to say there two different ways to play PVE. I think frost still king if you just talking about solo pve play (questing)// I would agree that if doing group pve such as raid & instance to level then arcane or fire would be best.

At 80 I would go either frostfire or arcane. both have decent gear leniency. Arcane/Fire (fireball spec) is very gear dependent.