Aoe Mage & Lock builds

Cheers to you all,

With my WPMML team globally approaching 30, and looking at all these vids of AOE farming dungeons with the lock’s lvl30 aoe spell + arcane explosion, I was wondering what builds (mage / lock) those of you running such comps use to maximize output. ideally with the talents to take first since it’s still a long way to 60 where I can get all talent points.

A precision : I’d still like to be able to kill bosses ideally as it’s usually a good source of equipment for the team, so that’d be fine to drop a bit of aoe efficiency to remain fairly versatile. but maybe I am asking too much and being a jack of all trades means what it usually means.

I have quickly scanned through the first forum pages but couldn’t really find them summarized in a post, although, if one exists, feel free to point me to it.

many thanks for your inputs
Nyth

I have 4 mages and 1 priest, but my mages just respecced into deep arcane at 40. If you are primarily using Arcane Explosion for AoE DPS it's a way better spec IMO. Theres lots of talents that give you back mana, or give you more mana. Plus the top talent Arcane Power is a big DPS cooldown that is useful for bosses. I've been farming SM Cathedral, and the boss fight is down to me just spamming Arcane Missiles, and making sure the priest doesn't die to Mograine.

The mages do not need to spec specifically at all to aoe. For a team with a tank like WPMML you need at most Arcane subtlety 2/2 for the mages. From there, you can just about pick any spec you enjoy for leveling and boss killing until around 50+.

The Warlock will be pulling aggro constantly unless you give your tank time to accrue enough threat before starting to aoe. Though, that's not preferable because sitting around doing nothing is not efficient. Hellfire has no threat reduction unless you spec full demo, and it is the highest dps aoe in the game. Going deep destruction imo, syncs best with this comp, you can pick up talents like Intensity and Pyroclasm, while high damage shadowbolts sync nicely with the mages bolts and balls. Just be sure to precast bubble-renew on your lock for every aoe pull, and again during the pull, and keep an eye on their health because you'll be splitting tank duties with the warrior. You can also use void sac when it's off cooldown.

A pally healer would make life so much easier, but most people enjoy the aoe heals with the priest, and some go horde.

Thanks to you both.

playing with the talent calculator for the lock and following Purpleflavor’s advice, I end up with something like this : https://classicdb.ch/?talent#IZfgVzM0oZEx0xbMzx

seems fairly optimized towards hellfire while keeping a good dps with shadow bolt. Just wondering though if Aftermath (eg dazing mobs) really helps during aoe phases.

as for mages, I understand from daviddoran that arcane may become viable at 40, in the meanwhile frost is probably still better. Do you think tweaking my current build (which is mostly frost but includes arcane subtlety) to add improved arcane explosion is worth and would make any significant difference ?

thanks

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Originally Posted by Nyth

Thanks to you both.

playing with the talent calculator for the lock and following Purpleflavor’s advice, I end up with something like this : https://classicdb.ch/?talent#IZfgVzM0oZEx0xbMzx

seems fairly optimized towards hellfire while keeping a good dps with shadow bolt. Just wondering though if Aftermath (eg dazing mobs) really helps during aoe phases.

as for mages, I understand from daviddoran that arcane may become viable at 40, in the meanwhile frost is probably still better. Do you think tweaking my current build (which is mostly frost but includes arcane subtlety) to add improved arcane explosion is worth and would make any significant difference ?

thanks

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Aftermath will help with runners if you have no other solution, or prefer it. You have a lot of options to cover that though. That warlock spec is close to a very common raiding spec for pumping out max damage shadowbolts. Another is MD/ruin for the threat reduction, but i dont see how you could get more than 3 points into MD if you spec pyroclasm, depending on how you feel, maybe going something like https://classicdb.ch/?talent#IZfgVzMx0xZex0xb0z would help with threat. High chance to stun or 20% reduced threat, I'd pick reduced threat for times when you arent aoeing.

As a mage group, 3 or 4, this is what i've found to be optimal.
Arcane is great, cant go wrong leveling arcane, but it really doesnt help with mana until you start gearing up. Those percentages of 10 and 15 only matter when you start stacking on stats in the hundreds. The PoM is amazing, but not enough so to be a priority or outscale some of the other specs. In the 50's and also with pyro does it become a single target beast. For leveling, and especially because we are multiboxing, i find Frost to be absolutely incredible. Ice shards, shatter, frostbite, with 4 stacked mages, you obliterate everything that is vulnerable to frost. Winters chill will insta max stack, Ice barrier is amazing especially when AOEing, you have an oh crap button x2 with ice block, and the control you gain with CC is the best in the game. Tossing a frost nova and/or a Cone of Cold for the freezing and chill effect when AoEing with Arcane Explosion gives you 50% crit against those frozen targets with any spell. So in effect that beats Imp arcane explosion by a lot. Round up mobs, 1xfrost nova, 3-4xAE, 1xfrost nova, 3-4xAE, ect. You're effectively doing 100% crit damage on your first 2 AE's, and that damage means you have to cast less AE's to kill, which effectively saves you mana, which defeats the point of being Arcane spec and it's mana bonuses. You only need to be using Rank 1 Frost nova for the freezing effect, the damage gain is negligible and you'll save 100 mana per cast. You can even get a bit advanced and after you round up the mobs and freeze them all with frost nova, drop flamestrikes which will all have a 50% chance too crit rather than the fire spec imp flamestrikes measly 15%. Frost is amazing solo, but as a boxer it's insane. Even arcane subtlety 2/2 is great for frost, gives a nice bit of damage to cold resit mobs, i think all undead have some cold resist if im not mistaken.

The synergy is crazy, in which Arcane spec really doesnt share. Fire has great synergy, but you dont see it reach it's potential until you're 60 and geared.

Thanks a lot for the tips. Much appreciated!

quick last one. I understand then you do not take sacrifice for an extra 15% fire damage during AOEs (thanks to imp sacrifice). Is it because the 20% threat reduction from MD helps the war keep the aggro during the hellfire / arcane expl phases ?

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Originally Posted by Purpleflavor

Aftermath will help with runners if you have no other solution, or prefer it. You have a lot of options to cover that though. That warlock spec is close to a very common raiding spec for pumping out max damage shadowbolts. Another is MD/ruin for the threat reduction, but i dont see how you could get more than 3 points into MD if you spec pyroclasm, depending on how you feel, maybe going something like https://classicdb.ch/?talent#IZfgVzMx0xZex0xb0z would help with threat. High chance to stun or 20% reduced threat, I'd pick reduced threat for times when you arent aoeing.

As a mage group, 3 or 4, this is what i've found to be optimal.
Arcane is great, cant go wrong leveling arcane, but it really doesnt help with mana until you start gearing up. Those percentages of 10 and 15 only matter when you start stacking on stats in the hundreds. The PoM is amazing, but not enough so to be a priority or outscale some of the other specs. In the 50's and also with pyro does it become a single target beast. For leveling, and especially because we are multiboxing, i find Frost to be absolutely incredible. Ice shards, shatter, frostbite, with 4 stacked mages, you obliterate everything that is vulnerable to frost. Winters chill will insta max stack, Ice barrier is amazing especially when AOEing, you have an oh crap button x2 with ice block, and the control you gain with CC is the best in the game. Tossing a frost nova and/or a Cone of Cold for the freezing and chill effect when AoEing with Arcane Explosion gives you 50% crit against those frozen targets with any spell. So in effect that beats Imp arcane explosion by a lot. Round up mobs, 1xfrost nova, 3-4xAE, 1xfrost nova, 3-4xAE, ect. You're effectively doing 100% crit damage on your first 2 AE's, and that damage means you have to cast less AE's to kill, which effectively saves you mana, which defeats the point of being Arcane spec and it's mana bonuses. You only need to be using Rank 1 Frost nova for the freezing effect, the damage gain is negligible and you'll save 100 mana per cast. You can even get a bit advanced and after you round up the mobs and freeze them all with frost nova, drop flamestrikes which will all have a 50% chance too crit rather than the fire spec imp flamestrikes measly 15%. Frost is amazing solo, but as a boxer it's insane. Even arcane subtlety 2/2 is great for frost, gives a nice bit of damage to cold resit mobs, i think all undead have some cold resist if im not mistaken.

The synergy is crazy, in which Arcane spec really doesnt share. Fire has great synergy, but you dont see it reach it's potential until you're 60 and geared.

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This seems like a great idea, what kind of build would you recommend to take advantage of the frost synergy? Could this take on bosses?

My 4 mages are currently arcane but it sounds like it may be worth switching over.

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Originally Posted by Nyth

Thanks a lot for the tips. Much appreciated!

quick last one. I understand then you do not take sacrifice for an extra 15% fire damage during AOEs (thanks to imp sacrifice). Is it because the 20% threat reduction from MD helps the war keep the aggro during the hellfire / arcane expl phases ?

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Most people go DS for raiding and squeezing that min/max succi sac shadow damage and the fact that pets die in raids always. I wouldnt bother with the fire damage for aoeing, it already does so much damage that your real issue is threat, casting knockbacks and interruptions, and staying alive. Imps phase shift also ensures it never dies. Also MD succi is 10% all damage so there's that if you want more.

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Originally Posted by KingKrab

This seems like a great idea, what kind of build would you recommend to take advantage of the frost synergy? Could this take on bosses?

My 4 mages are currently arcane but it sounds like it may be worth switching over.

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baseline
https://classicdb.ch/?talent#obZZVAG0o0tVo
and build from there.

For a more Arcane build go
https://classicdb.ch/?talent#oi0VbocZZVAG0oMtVo
I think it was Peregrine who pointed out how good Amplify magic was for your priest and how well it was working for him in another thread.

For a more Frost build go
https://classicdb.ch/?talent#owZZVAGIoftAo
I prefer this one.

For bosses this build is one of the highest dps spec in the game, so it's really just about whether you survive or not. Ice barrier and ice block help a ton with that, more so than any other 4 mage spec. But, Arcane POM pyro spec does so much up front burst damage most bosses will be half dead in your opener, and sometimes offense is the best defense.

I’m running two mages and a lock currently in BRD. What I’m probably going to move to with my lock is soul link with a void walker. You can get massive dmg mitigation since the lock will always be pulling aggro anyways. My mages are deep arcane currently and just using arcane explosion with hellfire. For single target just run curse of elements.

for awhile I was doing ranged AoE but found it’s just more simple to have the team follow my warrior closely.

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Originally Posted by Sisyphus

I’m running two mages and a lock currently in BRD. What I’m probably going to move to with my lock is soul link with a void walker. You can get massive dmg mitigation since the lock will always be pulling aggro anyways. My mages are deep arcane currently and just using arcane explosion with hellfire. For single target just run curse of elements.

for awhile I was doing ranged AoE but found it’s just more simple to have the team follow my warrior closely.

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I am also considering trying to make it to where I can also just follow my Tank and safely AoE from the Warlocks as well.

Like you I initially was leaning toward trying to fit Soul-Link for the extra mitigation but taking the 31 talent in Demonology keeps you from taking the 21 point talent in Destruction for +100% bonus damage from crits.

I am now leaning toward trying to have the +100% damage from crits but also not take aggro by giving my Warlocks -50% threat (-30% from Blessing of Salvation & another -20% from Master Demonologist). If I still have Threat issues I will likely flip that point like you are doing to make the Warlocks more Tanky but I am hoping I won't have to.

Basically running something like this build (flip back and forth between 0/30/21 and /31/20). Still not 100% on the Talents but I am trying to be able to switch between a viable Voidwalker &/or viable Imp and see how much I can get away with by managing Threat.

I’m traveling for work this week and boxing on a laptop, but when I get in I’ll respec and let you know how it goes. IMO at 54 I already do so much damage that I’m not sure I’ll really miss the destruction talents - I am worried about the 70% chance to not be interrupted though. Unfortunately I’m using a warrior and don’t have salv. I don’t think this would be an issue if I was paladin tanking.

So for the shatter build would you round robin the frost nova between all mages casting AE or have mage #1 cast cast frost nova 2 and 3 cast AE. Then #2 cast nova and 1 and 3 AE. Etc.

What spec and rotation are you using on your warriors at SM level 30+? To go with the mages and locks to spellcleave.

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Originally Posted by Skrimshaw

What spec and rotation are you using on your warriors at SM level 30+? To go with the mages and locks to spellcleave.

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You should build towards sweeping strikes in arms with your warriors, then continue on to mortal strike, then go down fury tree.

Rotation should be, charge, sweeping strikes, then DPS, once you hit 36, it should be, charge, sweeping strikes, berserker stance, whirlwind, then whirlwind on cooldown.

Thank you, never played a warrior, got everything else down, and been struggling.

I should have checked the damage meters, not used to a toon you don't have to spam, warrior topping with not much effort.