The Ultimate Black Mage Resources with Damage Calculator

[LetBloodline]

A question about ending a Single Target Rotation with a Swiftcast Flare.

I have about a 33% chance of getting a crit with my current setting. Would it be worth it to end a rotation betting on that for a Flare? My normal flares hit for only about 1500-2000. Crits will hit above 2200 and sometimes to an awesome 3000.

Would it be worth the chance or will my DPS drop from Tranpose usage?

I do it only if i have convert as well and that means that i also are under Raging strikes

[LetBloodline]

New 'Calculator' Page and 'Spell Rotation' Page are up.

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Gonna pass out for a while before I start updating the dreaded BiS Gear page.. -.-

Those should keep you guys busy until then.

I had downloaded the file as xlsx document and opened with office 2013 and in cell G185 it just say =#RIF! in calculator page so it won't work, a bunch of errors in value and Div 0. Could you try put a direct link to your xlsx file instead to pass trougth drive?

[PuroStrider]

I had downloaded the file as xlsx document and opened with office 2013 and in cell G185 it just say =#RIF! in calculator page so it won't work, a bunch of errors in value and Div 0. Could you try put a direct link to your xlsx file instead to pass trougth drive?

reuploaded as v4.1c

should work now

it probably derp'd when I tried to edit it in real time. Sorry about that

[Uninstall]

Does the Fey Glow DPS account for the 50% up time of the buff?

[Xisin]

Hello Puro,

the fireweaving thing is intriguing...

It makes perfect sense to use thunderclouds in that manner, however with the way I'm reading it, I've either misunderstood this or you merely using off gcd as placeholders, so in order to clarify, is it actually necessary to use the virus, surecast, lethargy etc. or can you simply time it on your own? the .5 seconds things is interesting.

so if you could can you clarify on this further?

are we talking fire 1 (sees firestarter) virus -> firestarter -> fire 1? and if so isnt this simply a fancy way of just waiting for a proc after you see it? (i mean i doubt it since you said dps increase and that would be a loss)

another edit:

How practical is this? I'm not really willing to burn some of those cooldowns for the sake of not missing a proc (raging, swift, quelling, e4e (though useful for when I do want to apply it), apoc (situational) surecast (situational) virus) Though its a nice use for hawkeye outside of pvp. A lot of the advice is good but you most definitely need to know what is going on order to utilize it, I wouldn't burn swift cast if I was a minute before raging strikes for instance.

I love your charts though keep it up, just thought I'd actually contribute.

[Dwill]

Hello Puro,

the fireweaving thing is intriguing...

It makes perfect sense to use thunderclouds in that manner, however with the way I'm reading it, I've either misunderstood this or you merely using off gcd as placeholders, so in order to clarify, is it actually necessary to use the virus, surecast, lethargy etc. or can you simply time it on your own? the .5 seconds things is interesting.

so if you could can you clarify on this further?

are we talking fire 1 (sees firestarter) virus -> firestarter -> fire 1? and if so isnt this simply a fancy way of just waiting for a proc after you see it? (i mean i doubt it since you said dps increase and that would be a loss)

another edit:

How practical is this? I'm not really willing to burn some of those cooldowns for the sake of not missing a proc (raging, swift, quelling, e4e. apoc (situational) surecast (situational) virus) Though its a nice use for hawkeye outside of pvp. A lot of the advice is good but you most definitely need to know what is going on order to utilize it, I wouldn't burn swift cast if I was a minute before raging strikes for instance.

I love your charts though keep it up, just thought I'd actually contribute.

The way I interpreted it is to weave when you can afford to "waste" those cooldowns and that you will not need them in the current encounter. I'm with you on the stance of not wanting to waste those cooldowns for the sake of a Firestarter proc.

[Ceveth]

Let's say you spend T total seconds of a fight in Fire phase; we'll simply neglect Ice phase since it doesn't contribute to Firestarter. It takes you R seconds to respond to a Firestarter proc, including spell projectile travel time, delay putting up the Firestarter buff, and your reaction time. The 40% proc chance of Firestarter means that it will on average proc every 2.5 Fire casts. We know that Fire has 150 potency and Fire III has 220 potency. I will ignore the effects of Astral Fire, since it effects all Fire spells equally.

I'll look at four casting strategies: (1) Spam Fire I and ignore Firestarter (the pre-Firestarter rotation) (2) Spam Fire I, Fire III when you notice a proc (3) Fire I with casting gaps waiting to see the proc, (4) Fire I spam, interrupting the current Fire cast when Firestarter procs to cast Fire III. For the time being, I only consider the average DPS output of each casting strategy during a typical Fire phase, in PPG (Potency Per GCD), so I can ignore spell speed.

(1) is easy: you do 150 potency every GCD with Fire I spam: 150 PPG (potency per GCD).

(2) is more complicated. The proc will occur on average after 2.5 casts of Fire, but delay and reaction time will force an additional Fire cast out before we can respond. If we consume the Firestarter immediately upon completing that Fire cast - before its projectile impacts the target - then the final cast effectively is the first in the *next* sequence of casts trying to trigger a proc. So despite the delayed proc response, there will still be 2.5 Fire casts on average per Firestarter proc; on average 2.5 of every 3.5 GCDs is spent casting Fire and 1 GCD Fire III for an average of

(2.5 * 150 + 220) / 3.5 = 595 / 3.5 = 170 PPG.

Clearly (2) does more PPG than (1), so it's a good idea in general to use Firestarter.

(3) Again, the proc occurs on average every 2.5 casts of Fire. In this case, however, a "cast of Fire" happens every GCD + R seconds to allow time to react to the proc. We spend one GCD casting Fire III for every 2.5 * (GCD + R) seconds of Fire cast-and-wait for an average of

(2.5 * 150 + 220) / (1 + 2.5 * (1 + R/GCD)) = 595 / (3.5 + 2.5 * R/GCD)

PPG, which simplifies to 1190 / (7 + 5 * R/GCD) PPG.

Note that (3) has the same DPS as (2) if and only if R is zero; non-zero response time will always make (3) inferior.

(4) Cast-canceling is especially horrid in this game: I estimate it takes at least half a second to interrupt a cast and get a new cast started. I'll call that interrupt and recast delay I. This strategy will cast one GCD of Fire III after 2.5 GCDs of Fire to trigger the proc, R seconds spent casting Fire before noticing the proc, and I seconds of recast delay. That comes out to

(2.5 * 150 + 220) / (3.5 + (I + R)/GCD) = (5 * 150 + 440) / (7 + 2 * (I + R)/GCD) = 1190 / (7 + 2 * (I + R)/GCD) PPG.

Again, note that (4) can only match the DPS of (2) if I+R is zero; a non-zero time will always make (4) inferior.

We can conclusively state that (2) is better than (3) or (4) for burst DPS over a single Fire phase.

This is math from pre-Fire & Fire III buffs.
The way it reads means any non-zero time checking for a Firestarter proc is a DPS loss.
Any off GCD ability is a minimum .5 seconds.

Unless the buffs substantially changed the way this works I can't see "fire-weaving" by using non-damaging abilities to be a DPS increase in any way.

[LetBloodline]

I like the idea to use thundercloud for fire weaving and the skills you are supposed to use for fireweaving since you will have to cast them anyway but i don't see a costant fireweaving effective

[mayonnegg]

Anyone ever properly looked into cancelling a blizzard 3 to use a firestarter? I'm still not entirely convinced that should come under the "never stop casting" rule.

[Ceveth]

Anyone ever properly looked into cancelling a blizzard 3 to use a firestarter? I'm still not entirely convinced that should come under the "never stop casting" rule.

Literally look up two posts.