2.25 incinerate vs. traditional Sbolt spam

[Dreadnor]

anybody have experience as to which yields out more dps for warlocks? while incinerates dont hit as hard, getting them out at a fast rate might be able to surpass the traditional spam-sbolts-until-out-of-mana-then-life-tap spec. my guild wants us to remain shadow so that improved sbolt gets up there...

[Holmie]

Wise choise by your guild, if there's any increase in dps it will surely be diminished by the lack of ISB.

[TheRabidDeer]

ISB not only benefits a warlocks damage, but also the mana return and damage dealt by shadow priests.

[tidus]

the traditional spam-sbolts-until-out-of-mana-then-life-tap spec.

Nice rotation you got there.

[Cruciel]

anybody have experience as to which yields out more dps for warlocks? while incinerates dont hit as hard, getting them out at a fast rate might be able to surpass the traditional spam-sbolts-until-out-of-mana-then-life-tap spec. my guild wants us to remain shadow so that improved sbolt gets up there...


Mana Cost of Incinerate (Rank2) = 337
Mana Cost of Shadow Bolt (Rank11) = 399

Both of these mana costs are assuming you have 5 points in Cataclysm because it adds around 50 mp/5 depending on which your chain casting, reducing the amount you have to lifetap during a fight and increasing overall damage.

Cast time of Incinerate: 2.25
Cast time of Shadow Bolt: 2.5

Amount of mana used in 225 seconds of Incinerate spam: 33700 mana
Amount of mana used in 225 seconds of Shadow Bolt spam: 35910 mana

Hmmm a decent bit saved, and as stated already you lost your ISB efficiency for yourself and the raid. Oh wait! You have to keep Immolate up to benefit your incinerate.

Immolate Mana Cost: 423
Immolate Cast Time: 2 seconds
Immolate DoT Time: 15 seconds

So Immolate must be cast every 15 seconds, making it actually 13 seconds of incinerate. You could only get 6.6 casts of incinerate off, leaving you with a few choices...

1) Recast Immolate at 13.5 seconds (6 casts)
2) Use the 1.5 seconds to lifetap (most realistic)
3) Cast a 7th Incinerate and not have the Immolate benefit the bonus damage.

Assuming you go with option 2~
You new mana cost per 225 seconds is...
423 (Immolatex1) + 2022 (Incineratex6)= 2445 per 15 seconds
2445 x 15 (15 seconds x 15 reps = 225 seconds)= 36675 mana

Vs the 35910 spent Shadow Bolt spamming.

And this isn't even 4 minutes we're at yet. You've already spent more mana, lost efficiency, and had 22.5 seconds of downtime (in which even if you lifetapped during every 1.5 second break after 6 Incinerates you would still lose 0.5 seconds of complete downtime per 15 seconds.)

And if you recast Immolate early to begin the rotation again trying to get rid of that 0.5 seconds you further ruin your mana efficiency but increase your DPS.

In summary, Fire is less mana efficient than Shadow and requires a spell rotation that induces either down time or even less mana efficiency.

And to bring spell haste to the table, yes it could get rid of the 1.5 seconds of downtime if you had just the right amount. But then again, Shadow Bolt, being a slow cast, would get an even greater amount from spell haste.

[kaib]

Immolate is 2s base cast -0.5s from bane, so your calculation takes a wrong turn there.
I asked myself this question a few times as there's quite a few fire locks out there doing good dps. But the math and WWS does not really support it. If you check http://www.wwsscoreboard.com/topdps.php?class=Warlock , Brutallus is surely a good dps benchmark fight as people pot with everything, get good groups etc. I checked most locks in the top 15 there and it was shadow - fire at about a 4-1 rate. Obviously there are a lot more shadow locks out there, but it seems to me that the dps output is roughly the same. In that case shadow is always the right way to go as it buffs spriest dps and affliction as well, if you have one guy for SE/maled in raid.
Also sbolt scales better with spelldmg + haste, so the more gear you aquire, the more shadow bolt leaves incinerate behind.

[Baldassar]

And to bring spell haste to the table, yes it could get rid of the 1.5 seconds of downtime if you had just the right amount. But then again, Shadow Bolt, being a slow cast, would get an even greater amount from spell haste.


This part is possibly untrue, all spells with an initial cast time above GCD benefit from spellhaste almost the same, only difference is caused by human reflexes, so it varies from negligible to heavy.

Incinerate gets +10%dmg from the talent and +15% from fire vuln
Shadowbolt gets +10%dmg from shadow vuln and +20% from ISB.

That is the basic difference of the spell, with immolate's bonus dmg trying to cover the better coefficient vs casttime the shadowbolt has.

[jamesrea1]

From practical experience of two Brut kills (heavy heavy DPS fight)

Incinerate locks hold their own with the shadow bolt spammers. First kill the top dps was a fire lock with shadow bolt right behind. Second kill the top dps was a shadow lock with fire just behind him.

Haste > Crit
I noticed a definite drop in dps when I went with Vashj chest w/ crit gems over T6 chest with haste/dmg gems.

It is VERY difficult to get 7 incinerates off to each immolate. As my haste gear improves (2.06 cast time on incinerate atm w/ 202 hit), I may go to a 7:1 ratio, but for now I go 6:1. I usually end up re-immolating just a bit early, but I don't even try for 7 unless I am at max range and can get the immo off before the incin gets to the target. That little piece of time at the end of the incin chain is great for a tap or perhaps a curse refresh, if needed.

We usually run with 2 other Shadow locks in our raid, so ISB uptime is not an issue.

Just my .02.

[kaib]

Overwriting your last immolate tick cannot possibly be right, can it? The last immolate tick is surely worth more dmg then the extra dmg your incin gets from immolate being up.

[Dannkk]

From what I've read, the bonus damage from immolate is calculated when incinerate is finished casting. It doesn't have to be up when incinerate lands, just when you're done casting. It seemed this way when I tried the build, also, but I haven't really tested it myself.

[Searah]

Overwriting your last immolate tick cannot possibly be right, can it? The last immolate tick is surely worth more dmg then the extra dmg your incin gets from immolate being up.

Even so, use this time to lifetap, don't just cheat yourself out of damage because you want to get the dot up sooner.

with a 2.06 sec cast time you should be able to get the full 7 casts in if you practice your button mashing skills. I'm at 2.09 and I was doing fine. It'll be about a half second of downtime between immolates, but that's fine. You can also use that time to lifetap if you really need to. A lot of people like to lifetap early, I'm more of the "wait a little while" group of people, just seems to work out better for me.

The key to ANY Warlock spec is perfection of button mashing and always be casting a spell. With the inclusion of the 1-deep server side queue blizz implemented awhile back this has become even easier.

[Willaise]

I'm trying out fire destro right now.
On Brut, I out dps shadowbolt be a large amount.
With scorch and fire talent, avd damge fire do 15% more than shadow, plus with hast my incs are 2secs, and fire have a higher bass damge than shadow.

I do agree that shadow benefit the raid a bit more, but tbh, when you do see a 11K+ SB, really only happens when you have a highend crit on top of IMPSB.

But now think about all your locks casting @ 2sec, that noncrit for 3.3Kish and still can crit up to 8K, plus it's a lot ezer to manage agro as fire. In the end who does more damage?


PS: don't quote me cause I'm still trying it out and don't really have a nice fire set of gear yet. But personally I still have SB spam better lol, get to be lazy and some fight it does make it ezer on yourself. How ever I do believe fire is better than shadow if you have a mage heavy raid set up.

[MasterLoco]

From what I've read, the bonus damage from immolate is calculated when incinerate is finished casting. It doesn't have to be up when incinerate lands, just when you're done casting. It seemed this way when I tried the build, also, but I haven't really tested it myself.
Spells get calculated the second they leave the caster's hand. For the same reason a warrior can spellreflect a frostbolt & an ice lance with 1 single spell reflect. So yes if the imolate is up the moment the incinerate leaves the caster's hand it'll still count eventhou the imolate is down by the time they incinerate reaches the target.

[Krispin149]

your calculations although thorough, are in my opinion, useless. Don't be offended but you have to be realistic. In most raid boss encounters, you;re not just standing around enough for this to be accurate. The mana efficiency switch needs to be completely reqorked with SP and/or Mana tides in the group make ups.

[Baldassar]

What does incinerate get that shadow bolt does not?
115% damage from fire vulnerability
121% (1.10x1.10) damage from Emberstorm
139.15% increased dps


What does shadowbolt get that Incinerate does not?
110% damage from Shadow Vulnerability
0.5/3 = 116.666...% damage from Bane
up to 120% damage from ISB
up to 154% increased dps

Incinerate has a much higher base damage with immolate on the target, and also has the benefit of being able to ignore spellcrit and focus on damage and haste, however shadowbolt under normal conditions does scale better with gear.

On the "isb uptime" issue, keep in mind that SPs consume charges without having the chance to reapply the debuff, hence you should always try to have a good Shadowlock vs SP ratio in the raid, unless you use an unusual lineup, such as moonkin & ele shaman on the locks, in which case 2 shadowlocks should be enough for even 3 SPs (!)

[wadih1]

kind of a verificaiton on what has already been said here, plus a little insight from my own personal experience.
up until the point that i got the gear to go destro, i was affliction, just like any other lock getting geared. obviously, after going through the ropes, getting the T6 and all that jazz from BT and Hyjal, i went 0/21/40. our raids were always Lock heavy. i started to question if fire would make for a better personal dps versus shadow. after a few runs in BT paying very close attention to my damage output in shadow, i then went for the 0/21/40 fire spec. with 2 mages, 3 total warlocks ( mages were fire and the locks were standard 0/21/40) multiple shadowpriests and a boomkin/shaman group, i started to check the difference.
the largest thing i noticed was the fact that aggro was an issue. with the ability to throw out 3 spells, all of which can crit, you have a higher chance of gaining more aggro than with 1 shadowbolt spamming. game mechanic wise, im not sure how that is or isnt supposed to happen, but it was very obvious to me in BT.
secondly, i noticed that mana conservation was much greater. i was able to keep casting longer, which is always good. as long as the mages kept up their buff, the damage at first glance seemed GREAT.
after some wow webstats, and recording combat logs and all that jazz, i found out that my dps was no where near what i thought it was. also, the dps from the rest of the warlocks went down substantially.
after getting used to fire, i went back to shadow, and i sort of rediscovered how much better it was.
i guess the moral of this long story is that fire, although much more fun to play, and slightly more sustainable, does not beat out shadow in the end, unless you have a weird raid setup. if you have very few warlocks, and shadowpriests, and are mage heavy, it might be better, and only for a few fights. with Sunwell not a shadowpriest friendly peice of content due to their inability to break certain DPS restraints, and some new recent changes, fire may have its situational benefits, but overall, i think that most players will see the drop in your DPS and your utility in some situations as too much of a negative point to seriously consider fire spec in the long run.

[Baldassar]

A:...with the ability to throw out 3 spells, all of which can crit... What is the third spell? (other than immolate and incinerate)

If the answer is Conflagrate, i guess the post can safely be ignored since that spell is the biggest dps loss in "simple" fights, which are the only fights where threat can be an issue.

B: If you get a boomking and an elemental shaman, then you have a very high crit chance, if you have a very high crit chance, there's no reason to go fire, since the ISB uptime will be high enough to make Shadowbolting much better.

[Proctology]

Just in general what I have read, Fire lock is a higher personal dps spec, while Shadow lock has good personal dps but not as high as a firelock, but is more raid friendly if you get my meaning. When I get my spell hit capped I am only going shadow because my FSW pieces otherwise I would go firelock and be the only one in my guild.......Just my two cents.

[Nekrabyte]

in my experience it does seem like fire destro does a little bit more damage, and is definitely viable, however it is too reliant on having fire locks, plus you need to use an additional curse.

situationally it is better (like say you have 1-2 shadow priests max, and you have 4 locks) ONE can spec fire and be a raid dps increase

i raided fire for quite some time after 2.4 came out (my guild is 2/6 SWP) and very much enjoyed it. but shadow is still very awesome as well, and is better raid dps if you only have 2-3 locks and 2-3 shadow priests per raid.