Mage casual rotations sustain/non burn

Hi, came back with a mage recently and grinded max aa. I've been going through threads for proper rotations and read everything I possibly could afaik including Sanctus raid rotations. Some people are talking about using rains still for short fights, others not. I do not raid. I have been using rs-many-chaotic-spear, but should I be using rains? Also, what is everyones spell lineup? What is the spell lineup for TBL?

I'm going through older expansiinns for kicks atm, and plan on being in current expansion in the next month or so stuff dies quick.

Ty in advance.

If you are solo/box/duo/group your rotation should be Chaotic- RS- 110 Spear- Chaotic- 105 Spear. Many should only be casted (a) to proc Theft of Essence, and (b) if you have 10 plus pets on a mob, which solo is generally during Host of Elements. Having Many follow RS is a raid thing primarily...

Cool, that's what I needed. Appreciate it will change rotation as per your suggestion.

Until you parse something better use:

RS> Chaotic> Spear > Spear.

Use that as your main rotation. Highly suggest you parse it for yourself. You will get a of BS info on this forum, such as telling you to put spear after RS. Get the parser and a combat dummy and test your own personal play. Two people using the same rotation, but clicking the buttons differently could yield different results.


Because of the randomized nature of Chaotic, the dps it adds isnt always direct or obvious. You can't just look at it on paper and say "it's smaller than spear, so cast spear first". You need to look at parses for fights of all different lengths.

I think you're misunderstanding the aforementioned rotation. It will cast Chaotic twice per rotation, as it weaves in the following way: Chaotic -> RS -> Spear -> Chaotic -> Spear. It should cast Chaotic at least as frequently as your rotation.

The reason Spear follows RS is that RS procs Conjurer's Synergy, which gives a 50% crit focus to your next fire nuke. Spear has 36,056 base damage and a 20% focus AA, which brings its effective base damage up to 43,267. Chaotic only has 26,069 base damage and no focus AA. Focusing the former by 50% is substantially more impactful than focusing the latter. Chaotic certainly has many other benefits, so the ideal rotation maximizes Chaotic casts and allows the highest base damage nuke to benefit from Conjurer's Synergy.

Now in fairness, you can take RS, Chaotic, and both Spears, arrange them in different orders, and get close results. But the above reasoning is why many opt to use the rotation Cicely mentioned.

Yes. If you are not raiding/do not have 10+ pets, Spear after RS, not Chaotic. If you are raiding/do have 10+ pets, volley after RS. They're saying to cast chaotic first because that's what's going to proc twincast and spell refreshes, as well as the fire dd buff, bringing up your overall dps. But chaotic should not be what follows RS in either case. Chaotic > Rs > Spear > Chaotic > Spear is a fine rotation.

Of course all of this is assuming you have synergy maxed, so that your next spell after RS benefits from the synergy...

Depending on what I'm doing, I may want RS first. It's not optimum for dps, but if I'm soloing, I may be using RS to soak up some hits for the pet.

I heard that PMJ uses a magic shock/magic bolt/summoned DD rotation...

No I understood, Im saying over many fights, during which 90%+ of the time you are just blindly spamming a nuke hotkey, the rotation I suggested is best. *Assuming that you are weaving in the appropriate clickys + AAs of course. (i have it all mapped to one key a can hold down)

If you can guarantee that Volley will hit for max hits damage then I would change it up, but I can rarely make this happen in regular groups.

Could you elaborate on that?

Aren't rains hitting for base 60-80k (1-2 targets) vs chaotic 27k, 105 spear 28k? The rain baseline is already 100+% over chaotic/105spear.

Someone mind explaining why rain/rain cannot sub in over the chaotic/105 spear part of the rotation?

Rains function differently than other spells, and as such you can't compare their base damage. First, rains are capped at 40% crit chance. Our passive crit rate is 58%, and First Spire, which has a 20% uptime, puts us at 82% crit chance. If you have other effects available to you (many ADPS abilities, 7th, Glyph of Destruction, etc) you can push your crit chance higher. That really hurts rain damage, especially during burns. Secondly, rains aren't affected by SPA 124 abilities. That means our worn fire/magic foci don't affect them, nor does Heart of Flames, Flames of Power, or Elemental Flames.

That said, rains definitely are viable for sustained damage, and Rain of Knives with Thaumaturge's is viable for burst damage. They also have really solid mana efficiency. They're not quite as easy to implement in a rotation, though, and can complicate certain play-styles. I usually suggest Chaotic -> RS -> Spear -> Spear as a dependable single target rotation, and then have a few situational weaves that include rains. If you're able to rain, replacing the 105 Spear with Rain of Knives makes some sense (although you may have to watch out for the longer recast time depending on your rotation). Chaotic does have low base damage, but it more than makes up for it with its procs (most notably a 10% chance to proc 18s of twincast) for sustained DPS.

Edit: I guess as a third thing, single counter buffs (e.g. Conjurer's Synergy, Chromatic Haze, Beguiler's Synergy, etc.) only focus the first hit of the rain, rather than all three/four waves. When soloing that's only really relevant for Conjurer's Synergy/Flames of Power, but it becomes an increasing disadvantage for rains as you add additional ADPS.

Ah, i forgot about the crit cap! That totally kills it. What about threads of potential? Aura procs? Do they apply once per wave or once per cast?

Threads of Potential applies to each wave. Procs are once per cast.

Seems rains could still be in an optimal rotation when no additional crit chance is in play. Moreso for low AA mages lacking cc and conj synergy. Maybe moreso on broken up fights where 18s twincast procs won't get fully used. Waaay moreso if mana is an issue and there is more than 1 target.

A lot of these situations are more likely to be present for new mages vs the experienced