Fire Mage DPS Spec, Builds, and Talents — 12.0.5

During Season 1 of Midnight, Fire has had the community largely focus on playing Sunfury, even though both Hero Specs are extremely close in terms of actual damage. (arguably Frostfire actually does more damage on single-target) The primary reason for this is that Sunfury builds run with Scorch, which provides incredible mobility and the ability to do large parts of your DPS while on the move. Due to this, our recommendations are as follows.

• Raid - Frostfire and Sunfury are very close in actual DPS, with Frostfire very slightly ahead in theory. However, in practice, Sunfury tends to win out due to its increased mobility and often preferred playstyle. Generally we recommend playing whichever you enjoy the most, as the differences are very small regardless.
• Mythic+ - Sunfury is ahead a bit in DPS, while also having more mobility, so it is generally the better Mythic+ spec. However, Frostfire is not very far behind, so you can play it as well if you prefer the playstyle.

Generally, both Hero Specs are close in DPS to each other, with the only real difference being sustained AoE DPS, where Sunfury wins out. Due to this, Sunfury is usually preferred as you can then stick to a single Hero Spec in all content, while it also brings more mobility which makes it easier to play than Frostfire. However, Frostfire is very close, especially on single-target where it actually is slightly ahead if played well, so you really can play either based on your personal preference.

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The builds listed above are popular recommendations, covering various different loadouts suited to each style of endgame content. Each Talent Build will have it's own rotation, and can also be manipulated further for specific types of content and to better benefit your group.

Combat Information

Rotations and Mythic+

Want to dive deeper? These guides will teach you how to utilize our Talent Builds in endgame content!

RotationMythic+

Fire has the following Apex Talent:

• Fired Up: Consuming Hot Streak has a chance to grant you a stack of Fired Up, which increases your fire damage. Multiple applications may overlap.
• Fired Up: Gaining Fired Up reduces your Fire Blast cooldown by 2.5 seconds per point, 2 points.
• Fired Up: Combustion greatly increases the chance of getting Fired Up, reducing each time you proc Fired Up. Also causes Fired Up to extend Combustion by 1 second.

The Apex Talent for Fire grants a lot of damage for both Hero Specs, and is virtually always taken. Fired Up is a new proc which grants a large amount of bonus damage whenever it procs, which is just a very nice passive bonus. However, even more impactful is the massive 5 second Fire Blast cooldown reduction when it procs, which happens quite frequently, especially during Combustion.

This Fire Blast cooldown reduction makes it so you barely run out of Fire Blast charges during Combustion, often only running out towards the very end of Combustion. This allows you to chain Pyroblast into Fire Blast for almost the entire duration of Combustion without needing to weave in any other spells.

All these extra Fire Blast charges do cause a bit of a weird luxury "problem", where it relatively devalues Pyroclasm, because hard-casting Pyroblast during Combustion risks overcapping Fire Blast charges, making it difficult to hard-cast during Combustion. Due to this, you often end up having to delay the hard-casts until Combustion is over.

Fire has access to the Sunfury and Frostfire Hero Talent trees.

Frostfire is slightly ahead in most situations, so if seeking maximum DPS, we recommend playing Frostfire. However, both Hero Specs are very close in terms of DPS (a few % difference depending on situation), making it largely a personal preference which one you play.

Sunfury mostly focuses around speeding up your rotation and spawning an Arcane Phoenix alongside you during Combustion, throwing out spells of its own providing damage and some utility. Gameplay wise, Sunfury speeds up your rotation a bit by proving a couple of sources of cooldown reduction on Fire Blast or additional haste, but the main rotational change comes from Memory of Al'ar, which grants you Hyperthermia when Combustion ends. While Hyperthermia is active, you can spam instant-cast Pyroblasts or Flamestrikes, providing another Combustion-like mini-burst after Combustion ends.

Frostfire is entirely focused on augmenting your damage by firing off a bunch of extra Frost spells, like Glacial Spikes and Comet Storm. Gameplay wise, Frostfire replaces your Fireball for Frostfire Bolt, which makes your rotation slightly faster because it has a lower cast time, but otherwise plays the same as Fireball. The main rotational change comes from Frostfire Empowerment, which makes your next Frostfire Bolt a very hard hitting instant-cast spell that also deals AoE damage.

Since Battle for Azeroth, there is the option to enable "War Mode." Enabling War Mode grants the following benefits:

• PvP talents enabled in the outdoor world.
• 10% increase in World Quest rewards at max level.
• 10% more experience gained while leveling.
• Earn Conquest Points, which can reward gear every week.

With the benefits of enabling War Mode for leveling and PvE content, it is recommended enabling the feature to maximize your leveling and rewards at max level. However, doing so will enable PvP combat and the possibility of being attacked by members of the opposite faction while leveling or doing World Quests exists.

In this section, we will rank the War Mode talents for leveling and outdoor content.

1. Glass Cannon gives you a significant damage buff. The reduced health is usually not a problem in open-world content.
2. Ring of Fire puts up a relatively large circle that burns enemies who walk into the outer part of the circle, doing significant damage.
3. Greater Pyroblast is a very hard-hitting spell, especially on high-health enemies, and it will greatly increase your damage against high-health enemies, like world bosses or rares.

Dutchmagoz

Guide Author

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This guide has been written by Dutchmagoz. Dutchmagoz has been playing Mage since 2009 and writing guides and theorycrafting since 2012, with many top 20-100 world kills and rank 1 parses under his belt. He is the owner of the official Mage Discord server Altered Time, where he is involved in Mage Theorycrafting and everything else Mage. You can reach out to him directly for questions or feedback about the guide there.