When is Fire's AM going to be put on a level playing field?

If the answer to this has been stated elsewhere, don't be irritated, if this can be truthfully answered without trollistic behavior, even better.

As of now Fire's so called "Awesome Mechanic", while fun, isn't awesome at all as far as the numbers it puts out goes. I have been playing with the AM with the dedication of an obssessed maniac and I feel I have developed a natural, and fluid feel to my rotation and still-- DPS'd alongside leaguemates in Lockdown, one Nature, one Sorcery, all same gear level, and got out dps'd by almost 2 mil. Their first two numbers were 55-59, mine was 39. Mind you, I know what I'm doing (just trust me) and have above average stats. Something needs to be done, this is balance in bad form. Just saying. I would put suggestions, videos, what-not, but really, the forum is filled with threads about this already.

From my observations, damage is lost due to cast times, and is not made up for very well by means of DoT's and the inconsistencies of Mass Detonation. Weapon Mastery hits hard- and it does so on a very consistent basis (+360% crit chance & crit magnitude buff as well I believe). Fire AM hitting for 8K (7300 might or so) after a 4-5 second set up and cast (or longer depending on your speed or which cast of MD you're on) is beyond me.

I suggest a mechanic that allows the crit chance and magnitude to scale. If Fiery Weapon were allowed to apply a power interaction with Mass Detonation or Fireburst (but who uses Fireburst???) which would allow each cast of Mass Detonation to raise the critical chance of the MD cast it would help. If the critical chance were ensured on the third cast of MD, it would help in aligning this refreshingly fun, yet unfortunately flawed Awesome Mechanic.

Ty for reading. /wall of text

And yup. Just had to put a suggestion on there...

Do you have both DoTs along with FW up at all times while using the AM? If not, there lies your problem(along with correctly modding and SP speccing)

I think you should have changed the title of this post.
Fire AM is on a level playing field.
The issue is more geared toward Mass Det creating a smaller range of damage and more crit chance.

I use burning determination, flame cascade, fiery weapon, inferno, volcanic calamity, and mass det.
I have no trouble keeping up or leading the scoreboard.
IMO this AM builds SC so fast that it trumps using overheat... and volcanic calamity hits like a truck.

Try this loadout, I have no problem competing with other dps in raids.

Inferno, Fiery Weapon, Burning Determination, Flame Cascade, Mass Det, Fireball Barrage of Volcanic Calamity.

Burning Determination places both Volatility and Thermal Absorption, so don't cast flame cascade and go directly into Mass Det spam. Also, WM only slows you down, spam Mass Det and clip a rifle grenade between casts, u can fit 4-5 Mass Dets in the time before you need to refresh inferno and Fiery Weapon. I have nearly 7500 might, popping my trinket and supply drop, I can crit over 35k with mass det.

The REAL problem with fire are the bugs that still plague the dps side. Thermal Absorption mysteriously drops off for no apparent reason! Flame Cascade sometimes forces your character to jump into the air every time you cast it, also when casting Flame Cascade the character will get frozen into the animation for 30-60seconds unable to use any other powers, trinkets or consumables. Fix these issues and fire would be a great dps power. Right now, fire is just annoying to dps with.

Like I said, I know what I'm doing, you'll have to just trust me on this. So the answer is yes.

And thanks to all of you for your responses. That is the loadout I currently run. I've found a solution or a workaround if you will for burning determinations long cooldown when moving from mob to mob, and it is switching it for absorb heat during sections of alerts/raids with adds, then switching to burning determination on bossfights. I've topped charts before with the am, but against my two leaguemates nature and sorcery, my dps is much lower. Mind you I have enough sp to compete with anybody and have a cr of 111.

Sorry, but you are wrong about fire being on a level playing field. You said yourself the problem lies in mass det, which is the primary power of the am, the big hitter. With it performing the way it is, and with it being the power used for the am's majority, it cripples the am. I agree with you about the range needing to shrink and something being done about criticals. Scaling crit chance. Can't say that enough.

WHAAAAAAA?A?A?!??!?!

Volcanic Calamity? How much damage does yours do? And how do you use it? Maybe I'm using it wrong but it never hits for more than 8k here.

LOL pop supply drop clipped with trinket... then WM into Volcanic Calamity.
you should see 3 dots, usually 15k-20k each

good thing about fire am is being mobile. my mind set with fire is using the AM to build SC quickly and walk back and forth using other peoples supply drops to get the increased stats for big SC damage. I use only 1 point to spec into WM and only use the WM for SC.

hope that helps

I haven't used mass detonation in a long time since WM was released cause no matter how you use it, it just can't keep up with WM.The best I have seen in dps amongst fire is where volatility and WM are both being used.

WM doesn't work with Volcanic Calamity.

I wouldn't include supply drops or Trinkets =P

I've found just hitting my WM does more than the Volcanic Calamity - Plus you deal more dps with a full super charge bar on every attack/spell

maybe theres a reason youre only doing 8k damage then lol

You can only try drowning the horse in the lake for so long before he starts drinking the damn water haha. That's how that saying goes right?

Your sarcasm is not appreciated - as I'm trying to understand why you think the power is stronger than it really is.

Volcanic Calamity does less damage than Spontaneous Combustion.

You quoted 20k damage - which to me sounded quite high so I wanted to understand why that was so. Maybe you knew something that I didn't. Apparently all you know how to do is berate people.

With volatility and fiery weapon buff active it is possible to hit over 20k damage with volcanic calamity but it will have to be a crit.

I didnt intend to come off that way, but when you reply to a post and basically say "or nah" when you asked me what i was doing, it takes from my helpful mood to idgaf.
But ill post a video or screen shots showing Volcanic Calamity.

Volcanic Calamity has 3 dots and hits within that range i described.
And I quoted 15k-20k, but 20k is on the high end. I usually see those numbers in raids when I get group buffs but it adds up to 40-60k.
You could argue that you could do WM+spontaneous combustion in the same amount of time and do more, but I would say... thats the wrong way to look at it.

If you hit the Supercharge the damage keeps running as you continue to add wm/am on top of volcanic calamity damage.
My thought is to cram as much damage as quick as possible in a shorter period of time. and I think this is the best method.

Your sorcery leaguemate wasn't using am so when does sorcery and earths am get on the level?

You'll notice a big difference when using VC with wm. The ring doesn't show as it didn't when weapon mastering into blizzard, but there will be a huge increase. Back when I was fire, and 5200 was the average base might, mine did ticks of 14-15k on 2 targets (with supply drop and fiery weapon up of course). I believe there are 4 ticks, not 3? I can't remember. I can only imagine what number I'd see with 7300 base might Also, a long melee combo tends to make the supercharge hit harder, but kind of hard to hit hard to pull off in raids without getting interrupted. It hits harder with hb range compared to dw range last time i checked.

Volcanic hits harder than Spon, you see 3 hits if the target stays still for it to hit. EAch hit is like atleast 8k