[SimC] WoD Fire SimC Disucssion

[satii]

So I recently re-rolled to mage to improve our guilds speed rankings on bosses, so I did what I usually do and spend more time in simc than i do ingame to test stuff and learn the class.
I found some stuff that could be improved, is wrong (or was, hello combustion snapshot).

Default profile 240s 20% var fixed time
Mage_Fire_T18M : 142246 dps

Dragon's Breath (DB)

Right now the apl tells the robomage to DB if we have it glyphed AND:

We are not using Prismatic Crystal.
We are using Prismatic Crystal, and the cooldown remaining is greater than 8seconds.

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actions.active_talents+=/dragons_breath,if=glyph.dragons_breath.enabled&(!talent.prismatic_crystal.enabled|cooldown.prismatic_crystal.remains>8)

The problem here is that the APL delays Prismatic Crystal so it lines up with legendary ring, so dragons breath just sits unused for 30+ seconds.
This is probably because some older apl version didn't delay Prismatic Crystal to legendary ring.


So I made a line that doesn't try to line up with Prismatic Crystal, but legendary ring instead.

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actions.active_talents+=/dragons_breath,if=glyph.dragons_breath.enabled&(legendary_ring.cooldown.remains>10+gcd.max|legendary_ring.cooldown.remains>10&cooldown.cold_snap.remains>60)

After
Mage_Fire_T18M : 142435 dps (+~200)

Pyro Chain

Tbh, I haven't even looked through these lines completely and i trust that they are good, however i did notice that when a fight lasted certain amount of time the robomage wouldn't combustion at the end and the boss dies while pc and combustion are left unused.

So i just added this line below the others. Target time to die 20 just seemed to give pretty good numbers, not sure if it is the most optimal.

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actions.init_combust+=/start_pyro_chain,if=target.time_to_die.remains<20&cooldown.prismatic_crystal.up&buff.pyroblast.up&(buff.heating_up.up^action.fireball.in_flight)

After
Mage_Fire_T18M : 144652 dps (+~2k)

Prismatic Crystal / Target Switching

So, the robomage likes to dump some fireballs and pyros to the crystal after Combustion, BW and DB.
I just thought this can't be good, dump all those tasty pyros to a crystal that is about to expire and lose almost all of the ignite dmg.

So I changed this

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actions+=/call_action_list,name=crystal_sequence,if=talent.prismatic_crystal.enabled&pet.prismatic_crystal.active

In to this. (I believe without this the robomage got stuck in some infinite loop, so yeah)

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actions+=/call_action_list,name=crystal_sequence,if=talent.prismatic_crystal.enabled&pet.prismatic_crystal.remains&(action.blast_wave.charges>0|cooldown.dragons_breath.up)

And right below this in the apl, I added this line. (targets the boss instead of the crystal so it doesn't dump fireballs/pyros to it)

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actions+=/choose_target,if=action.blast_wave.charges=0|prev_gcd.blast_wave&action.blast_wave.charges=0

After
Mage_Fire_T18M : 146490 dps (+~2k)

Also, Prismatic Crystal seems to have a locked 1.5sec GCD in sims, i believe this makes haste overvalued stat in sims when running low amount of haste.

Potion
I noticed the robomage likes to potion on the second combustion at 2 min, when it could save the potion for 4min mark and line it up with berserking for that sweet, sweet value.

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actions.combust_sequence+=/potion,name=draenic_intellect,if=target.time_to_die.remains<140|time>180

Also could add some prepot stuff.

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actions.precombat+=/potion,name=draenic_intellect,if=target.time_to_die.remains>63

This line is so it doesnt waste 4-3 seconds of potion on precast pyro.

[Komma]

All in all a great set of changes from Satii.

The problem here is that the APL delays Prismatic Crystal so it lines up with legendary ring, so dragons breath just sits unused for 30+ seconds.
This is probably because some older apl version didn't delay Prismatic Crystal to legendary ring.

Good catch. This is why I really hate syncing and retiming things.

Pyro Chain

Tbh, I haven't even looked through these lines completely and i trust that they are good, however i did notice that when a fight lasted certain amount of time the robomage wouldn't combustion at the end and the boss dies while pc and combustion are left unused.

So i just added this line below the others. Target time to die 20 just seemed to give pretty good numbers, not sure if it is the most optimal.

Another good catch. We already do this for Arcane. If you feel like doing another exercise, feel free to mess with things to figure out a good way to do second fireball during pyro chains, but only with PC and only for crit capped (or near crit cap) users.

Prismatic Crystal / Target Switching

So, the robomage likes to dump some fireballs and pyros to the crystal after Combustion, BW and DB.
I just thought this can't be good, dump all those tasty pyros to a crystal that is about to expire and lose almost all of the ignite dmg.

choose_target is the right solution here. I think the correct prevention of infinite loop should be the choose_target within crystal_sequence, instead of the actual invocation of crystal_sequence though. crystal_sequence handles all the actions while PC is up, even if you don't target it.

Also, Prismatic Crystal seems to have a locked 1.5sec GCD in sims, i believe this makes haste overvalued stat in sims when running low amount of haste.

That's odd. Sounds like a bug that needs fixing.

Potion
I noticed the robomage likes to potion on the second combustion at 2 min, when i could save the potion for 4min mark and line it up with berserking for that sweet, sweet value.

The time_to_die value is a little high, and may lead to unexpected results due to burst phases. Otherwise this looks good.

Also could add some prepot stuff.

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actions.precombat+=/potion,name=draenic_intellect,if=target.time_to_die.remains>63

This line is so it doesnt waste 4-3 seconds of potion on precast pyro.

This line would not work outside of fixed_time=1 sims. time_to_die is computed using current DPS and assumption of linear decline of target HP. During precombat, the DPS is zero, therefore time_to_die is infinite.

[Komma]

Also, Prismatic Crystal seems to have a locked 1.5sec GCD in sims, i believe this makes haste overvalued stat in sims when running low amount of haste.

This is now fixed.

[Zelus]

Since the fire profile is updated, it is no longer at the sandman crit cap mark. Does that mean that any gems should be swapped to crit until that mark is reached again?

[DyLemma]

Is the 1.5sec GCD in sims doing it for arcane by accident as well? Curious.

[Komma]

Since the fire profile is updated, it is no longer at the sandman crit cap mark. Does that mean that any gems should be swapped to crit until that mark is reached again?

Uh..I guess? The sample profiles have no gems, so this doesn't apply.

Is the 1.5sec GCD in sims doing it for arcane by accident as well? Curious.

Yes.

[DyLemma]

Since the fire profile is updated, it is no longer at the sandman crit cap mark. Does that mean that any gems should be swapped to crit until that mark is reached again?

Uh..I guess? The sample profiles have no gems, so this doesn't apply.

Is the 1.5sec GCD in sims doing it for arcane by accident as well? Curious.

Yes.

Nice, that being fixed?

[Komma]

Nice, that being fixed?

This is now fixed.

[Norrinir]

I was looking at the changes to fire mages' APL, especially the one about second Fireball on PC (link). Looks like the APL is too eager with those Fireballs, since if you have low haste, the Ignite from the first Fireball+Pyroblast will be almost zero when you finally do Combustion. Normally this wouldn't be a big deal, as long as you manage to unload your Dragon's Breath(s) in time, but if you use Blast Wave, you're losing quite a bit of damage by not being able to BW the crystal.

So instead of the current:

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fireball,if=crit_pct_current-1>(1000%13)&prev_gcd.pyroblast&buff.pyroblast.up&buff.heating_up.up&12-pet.prismatic_crystal.remains<action.fireball.execute_time+3*gcd.max

I came up with:

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fireball,if=(!talent.blast_wave.enabled|spell_haste<0.7)&crit_pct_current-1>(1000%13)&prev_gcd.pyroblast&buff.pyroblast.up&buff.heating_up.up&12-pet.prismatic_crystal.remains<action.fireball.execute_time+3*gcd.max

0.7 seems to be the sweet spot for haste (tested with various haste/mastery configurations and for values roughly from 0.9 to 0.6, 0.05 steps). This leads to about 1.5% dps increase on the current mythic profile and up to 4-5% dps increase on profiles with crappy mastery and/or haste (that can hit crit cap with the trinket, of course).

[skiz]

This post from vituscze is interesting. Spell_haste<0.7 should be roughly ~42% haste. Which is have some haste on gear and cast BL. May be worth to use bloodlust as a buff instead.

Another issue that should be affected by that is the Infernoblast before combustion to get a double ignite. But it may need another haste value.A more in detailed post about it is: https://altered-time.com/forum/viewtopi ... =80#p20618" target="_blank

Shortly: ~1k dps gain on 160k profile from:

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actions.combust_sequence+=/inferno_blast,if=(dot.ignite.tick_dmg*(6-dot.ignite.ticks_remain)<crit_damage*mastery_value)|spell_haste<0.7 actions.combust_sequence+=/combustion

Sadly, always casting IB is a little bit behind. Just an ~0.5k dps gain.

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actions.combust_sequence+=/inferno_blast actions.combust_sequence+=/combustion

Furthermore, there is an Issue with amount of targets for both another fireball during PC and double IB spread. Above 4 targets and both should be decent. But this may lead to problems with PC despawning before Combustion and I don't like to debug such things.

Edit: Looks like default profile is not crit capped. Beeing critcapped probably results in always casting IB before combustion beeing the decent choice.

P.S. copy/pasting from "fireball,if=" out of vituscze post sucks. "fireball,if+=/" please.

[satii]

Just speculating here, but spell_haste<0.7 to inferno blast is probably a dps increase because robomage does:
IB
wait gcd
Combustion/IB (on the same global)
If the first IB multistrikes, the multistrike might hit the crystal right after ignite ticks. Multistrike section here.
If we have a high amount of haste, like 42% the pyro chain happens much faster and if IB multistrikes here it will most likely hit the crystal before ignite ticks.

I believe it should do:
IB/Combustion (on the same global)
wait gcd
IB

[skiz]

@satii:
There is a little bit more gated with that spell_haste<0.7. I.e. the amount of time you do have on the Prismatic crystal. With that condition you do make sure that you've enought time to actually build ignite -> do combustion -> use instants.

The gain from double inferno blast is a "bugged" Ignite that is roughly 50% stronger than that one from Prismatic Crystal. The downside of it is actually what happens with your ignite on PC and losing 1 global. The lost global is an issue if you do run coldsnap - but that is very specific. Lets assume it isn't an issue. (I do have ~3 globals instead of 4.)

Ingame I do see the following things:
During BL: Pyroblast hit -> infernoblast hit + Pyroblast Multistrike 1 -> Infernoblast MS1 + Pyro MS2.
On Infernoblast hit my ignite usually jumps down. (~77k ignite -> 73k ignite.) So basically, ingame I do see the "worst" case of ignite refreshes on this situation.
Without Bloodlust, I rarely do get an ignite that gets stronger. Happens sometimes.

As you've mentioned in simcraft I'm just able to run a shitty version of it - with waiting before combustion. Basically, I do not want to wait there. However, even if robomage waits it is an dps increase. So ingame it should be a little bit better. Anyway, arguing about ~1k dps here... And it could definitly need some databackup from ingame / simcraft.

Worth to mention: Range and spellhaste is a huge issue here. Maybe I just stand wrong

[Komma]

Made some changes related to the discussion above. Fixed the DB-ring-sync, late-fight-combustion, and a few other issues. About time, really!