How to Build a Spellcaster on Project Ascension

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* Hero Architect
**So, you like wearing dresses eh?**

## Getting Started

Deciding your archetype, do you want to:

* Intellect Caster
* Spirit Caster
* Snapshot Caster

Well look no further, here's some handy tips on how to build no matter what your goal is.

1. Don't water down the spec by going in too many directions.
2. Keep a goal in what direction you are going

1 If you want to be a caster in Ascension there are quite a few directions you can go but the most popular casters are the ones i listed above.

Lets talk about ***spirit casters first***. So spirit casters are quite gear dependent because the road to big numbers take a lot effort in mythic+ or ascended raiding .

Getting Started: The main focus of this style of spell casting is that you use Fierce Mind (Arcane Mage talent tree) which converts 15% of your spirit into Spell Damage. Then there is also Meditation (Discipline Priest) which converts 15% of your spirit into critical strike rating. There is also Spirit Tab and Improved spirit Tab in the Shadow Priest talent Tree which gives you mana regeneration and critical strike rating. The next thing you do is using the Fierce Mind RE(Random Enchant) to further increase the spell damage gained from Spirit.

Gear: So the gear you want is the Spirit heavy gear so for example the Devout armor from Dungeons or the Healer items in raiding (Mostly Priest sets or Druid Sets). The best place to get the gear for a spirit caster is in Mythic+ since the spirit on the gear there is way higher than in raids but the chances of getting the items you want are quite all over the place since you have to use RNG to be in your favor of course.

The gear from raids are fine but not as good but its easier to get your hands on of course. The tokens (Tier Items) from these raids are what you want but some of the pieces that just drop from a boss with spirit heavy stats on it can be better depending on how much Spell Power they have.

Intellect Casters.

Intellect casters are more to easy play since more builds go around by just having a lot of intellect and spell power. This version of spell casters are more easy to gear up and get starting in Raids or Mythic+

Getting started: So with these style of casters you can pretty much just go into dungeons or PvP to get as much intellect heavy gear as possible and go out on your adventure. There aren't many talents which converts your intellect into Spell Damage but there is one Random Enchant and one Talent which does this job for you which is Lunar Guidance in the Balance Druid Talent Tree (Takes 3% of your intellect and Converts it into Spell Damage).

Gear: So the way of gearing an intellect caster is quite all over the place. You can get it from PvP or Raiding or Mythic+. The best gear for intellect casters are in Mythic+ but raid gear is almost just as good or in some cases even better! You will have an easier time by gearing an intellect caster than a spirit caster will.

***Snapshot Casters:*** So this kind of caster is where you keep a track on all of your self buffs from weapon enchants and talent procs and trinkets and put into 1 ability which in most cases is gonna be a Dot or an Immolate kind of thing. The thing you put into is something you can keep an 100% up time on with talents or Random Enchants. With the refreshing of this keeps the dot hitting hard and you can use a different spell to make zed spell hit harder as well. It's quite complicated going this road but it has a good reward into it. This kind of caster is most seen in the PvE environment since snapshotting in PvP doesn't really work.

Gear: So with the gearing of this kind of caster goes both ways of the Spell caster with either Spirit or Intellect.

## So let's dive into it:

As a caster you will need 17% hit. This means 136 hit rating. -8 rating required for every % hit you gain from talents, RE's, enchants or debuffs on boss.

If you run with someone using Faerie Fire, improved in the Balance Druid talent tree (Imp. FF)... well then you're in luck. Or if **you** are that kind soul. This means you will only need 14% hit, or 112 Rating. If the RE for it is used that's an extra 1% hit chance, dropping you down to 104 rating required. This is doable in ANY tier of gear, and it becomes even easier if we take a look below in the recommended starter talents section and further down under **Hit.**

**A solid start for *most* caster speccs would be to grab these basic talents enhancing your valuable stats (crit, hit, haste and SP).**

*Blessing of the Eternals (BotE),* in the Restoration Shaman talent tree.

*Balance of Power (BoP)*, in the Balance Druid talent tree.

& *Enlightened Judgements (EJ)*, in the Holy Paladin talent tree.

These together gives you 8 (EIGHT!) % hit, which leaves you needing only 72 hit rating from gear*,* and 4% spell crit for only 6 TE.

Further on we have *Mental Quickness (MQ)*, in the Enhancement Shaman talent tree. This is a pretty big deal for any specc utilizing spells with an even remotely good sp scaling. I will go over this in more detail in the **TE** section.

Perceptive readers will have noticed that I didn't list any haste talents. They are in general... generic.. and gives 2% haste / te - not used for all too many dps builds, however haste is still one of our main stats so I thought I'd mention it...

> These 3 talents: *BotE, BoP* & *EJ* would be baseline for any new caster out there aiming to raid. *MQ* is mentioned more as a side note. MQ is used in plenty, even *most* speccs but imo can still not be called mandatory. (Neither are the hit talents once you have more gear readily available to you).
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## Hit (again)

We've touched on the subject, let's dive deeper and rejoice over our options.

As previously stated: you need 17% increased chance to hit to guarantee your spells to land on boss lvl targets.

This equals to 132 hit rating, from which you can subtract 8 rating for any % increased chance to hit in talents, RE's, enchants or debuffs on the boss. (8 hit rating = 1% spell hit).

You have 2 worthwhile talents to use for this (once again, look above..): *BoP* and *EJ.* These give you a wooping 8% hit. Leaving you at 9% required from hit rating. Let's say you have that RE'd and improved *Faerie Fire* - You now only need 5% from hit rating. But wait! Let's not forget the *Balance of Power* RE, giving you 2% increased chance to hit with your spells! What's this? **THREE PERCENT** from hitcap without any hit rating on our gear!?

**IT GETS BETTER!** Now we take a look at what enchants we have available.. You have the [*Presence of Sight]* ZG Mage Enchant. Appliable to your head & leg armor. Giving 8 hit rating / enchant. We're now down to **ONE PERCENT** hit required from your gear. This is where you could enchant your boots with 5 hit and call it a day but let's face it: **you wan't to be capped**, not miss that big nuke when you need it the most. And furthermore, it would actually be HARD not to pick up some hit on your caster gear.

Here's the thing though, not only would it be hard to not pick up gear with hit on it - you want to **gear for hit** because every 16 hit rating on gear let's you drop a hit talent in favour of one increasing your dps. Now, you'll struggle to find a talent that does more for your dps than 2% hit does if you're not capped - but that's not the point. The point is to **Maximize** your dps, and that means getting the good hit pieces and using the TE to further improve your dmg.

Even so: all these talents and enchants.. RE's and debuffs.. They make it very thankful to swap spec's and try new things. Sure it will take it's tax on dmg spending so many TE into hit if you have none on gear but it does give you more freedom.

AE
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Well, we've gone over some basic TE's let's do the same for AE's.

* *Innervate* (Balance Druid)
* *Feign Death* (Survival Hunter)
* *Inner Fire* (Discipline Priest)
* *Blink* (Arcane Mage)
* *Divine Shield* (Protection Paladin) ***or** Ice Block* (Frost Mage)
* *Curse of Doom* (Affliction Warlock) ***or** Curse of Elements* (Affliction Warlock)
* *Conjure Mana Gem* (Arcane Mage)
* *Berserker Stance* (Fury Warrior)**\***
* *Life Tab*
* *Spellstones (Fire and Spellstone)*

***\*Stances don't stack, so if you're gonna play a moonkin or utilize shadowform you will not benefit from picking up Berserker Stance.***

I'd recommend any caster to pick these up for their AE. Some are dps boosts. Some are defensives utilized to stay alive or mobility used to get where you want quicker thus boost your dps.

* *Curse of Doom/Curse of Elements -* a low time investment for a decent chunk of dmg granted no mechanics stop it from going off - normally stands for atleast 2% of my dmg for 1 GCD every minute - a GCD you might have free due to movement even. HOWEVER, Curse of Elements is a 13% dmg increase for all magic dmg. If no one else is running it... Suck it up, 13% for everyone>2% for you.
* *Berserker Stance* - 3% free crit (affects spells aswell). This is a HUGE boost for 2AE, bear in mind it DOES increase your dmg taken though.
* *Innervate* - speaks for itself, low time investment for high mana yield. Just beware of the threat it builds on new spawns or a recently pulled boss/mob.

* *Conjure Mana Gem* - basically an extra mana pot every minute, 3 uses. Also has a legendary RE coupled with it that increases your haste for 8s upon consuming one.

*Life Tap* is the go-to for mana really, but it's more GCD's spent so if you can get by in a fight using *Innervate, Mana Gems* & a Major Mana Potion (and demonic runes as back up) you will do more dps than if you'd use GCD's tapping for mana.

* *Divine Shield/Ice Block* - can let you get out of a sticky situation or down right ignore a boss mechanic aswell as just keep yourself safe if healers struggle keeping up. Do note that *Divine Shield* is on the GCD while *Ice Block* aren't.
* *Blink* - same really - ignore boss mechanics or just position yourself quicker to keep on casting at your foes. Also a good survival tool.
* *Inner Fire* - 10sp and some armor for 2ae. The armor is unlikely to help you out if something hits you in a raid but still - the 10sp... well, 10 sp ain't a lot obviously - Free dmg is free though.
* Feign Death: Its really good to have. If you over aggro the Tank you can use this to reset your threat and dont get yourself killed in a raid group or mythic dungeon.
* Fade: *Fade however* also halves stun duration on you if used prior to getting stunned and is a borderline mandatory AE pickup if you're doing AoE encounters or simply do through the roof dps

## Buffs & Companions

One hot topic for casters is the value of weapon enhancements.

If your specc relies on crits you might want to get *Firestones*.

Are you just a machine gun with good base dmg and no mana issues, maybe relying on making the most use of your proccs? Maybe *Spellstones* is your thing, increasing your haste.

Do you scale amazingly well with SP? *Flametongue* provides it in spades.

If you lack AE or TE to improve these you could just aswell pop on Brilliant Wizard Oil on your weapon(s) and get some free stats from that.

As a base for your caster I normally recommend to get the following.

* *Focus Magic* (Arcane Mage)
* *Arcane Power* (Arcane Mage)
* *Power Infusion* (Discipline Priest)
* Any weapon enhancement
* Summon Felguard

> *Felguard* (2AE1TE +2AE for *Drain Soul*) *-* A demonic guardian that deals a decent chunk of dmg and can also be used as a source for additional SP via *Demonic Knowledge (DK)* in the Demonology Warlock tree. By itself it will probably do anywhere between 5-12% of your dmg. A good investment even if you don't use *Drain Soul* for anything but the demon or pick up *DK*.
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> *Focus Magic* (2AE1TE) *-* This is a flat 6% crit when traded/chained in normal raid scenarios.
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> *Arcane Power & Power Infusion* (2AE1TE each) *-* Damage cooldowns are an overall dps increase and I recommend you to have atleast **two** that can be used together, further increasing their value. (Damage % increasing abilities like these don't stack, neither do haste increasing abilities). *Further explained in Cooldown Usage.*
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> *Weapon enhancements* - No matter which you chose/which are best for your specc - you lose dps by not having one.
> These are generic tips, a fire caster might use an *Imp* as a companion for the paths that opens up in TE use, further increasing fire dmg and fire crit - even synergizing with your pet granting it, and it granting you: CRIT! - A shadow caster might want to use a *Succubus* for increased shadow dmg/crit.
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TE
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Basic, dmg increasing TE's not already covered above - and *MQ* in more detail.

Generally speaking for all dps you want to stay clear of talents that give you 1% increases / TE spent, they're considered weak and it's pretty self explanatory when you have talents that offer so much more.

> *Arcane Potency -* This is an added effect to your *Clearcasting*, giving you a 30% (2/2TE) increased chance to crit with your next spell. *Arcane Concentration* is a 10% chance to procc (3/3TE) giving you a measly average of 3% crit for FIVE points spent.. **Don't stop reading**. However the *Spellslinger* legendary RE counts as mage *Clearcasting* and will procc the *Arcane Potency* effect increasing the value significantly (has around a 20% procc rate on average in my specc - decided by ICD aswell ofc). That would put it, without the actual *Arcane Concentration* talent at a 6% crit bonus on average for 2 TE, or 3% / TE if you would. Not every specc will care for this as it requires you to use the *Spellslinger* legendary RE but I feel it's worth mentioning.
> It's also useful for snapshotting with dots that hold their dmg/haste/crit values from application when refreshed via sources utilized in those speccs. (*Everlasting Affliction* & *Pain and Suffering*)
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### **Other damage increasing talents.**

* *Sanctified Retribution* (Retribution Paladin)
* *Swift Retribution* (Retribution Paladin)
* *Arcane Empowerment* (Arcane Mage)

> *Sanctified Retribution* (1AE1TE (with aura 3AE/1TE)) - a 3% dmg increase to anyone affected by one of your auras. - Strong group buff and worthwhile picking up for the raid if no1 else does.
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> *Swift Retribution -* 3% raidwide haste. For 3TE, it's a high price but to min max someone's gotta pay it (not you!)
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> *Arcane Empowerment* - another 3% dmg increase to the raid, however this time for 3TE. Expensive but once again... you gotta do what you gotta do (but not *you*) to flex that dps.
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### **Let's have a quick chat about how you would chose other talents.**

We've already said that 1% increase / TE are weak. You understand that. This is applicable to any % dmg enhances to your used abilities aswell.

If you have 8 dmg sources in your specc and you have the option to improve one of those by 5%, does that make it a worthwhile investment? That would depend on how big part of your dmg it actually is ofc!

It's pretty straight foward in a 1-2 button specc like Elemental Shamans, Holy Casters, Fire Mages and such.

- You will easily discern which talents give you more bang for your buck. (not taking into consideration the fact that you also have to compare those dmg increasing talents with crit increasing ones and so on, and so forth)

A generic 2% Shadow dmg will however probably outwheigh a 3-4 or even 5% increase to an individual ability for a DoT build.

How many of your abilities can crit? What is your Crit modifier? Would you benefit more from 2% haste than 2% dmg or crit in your build? It will always depend on your spec and not be the same for everyone.

Haste is an amazing stat, it lowers GCD's, it increases your dmg by a flat %, it can heighten your procc uptimes, it makes the world seem less grey. But it's a double edged sword because it also drains your mana quicker or in some cases if you play a snapshotted dot caster it can get rid of your dot way to quick before you can reset it.

### Now, I know this isn't what you want to hear but **sometimes you want to spend TE on stuff not increasing your damage!**

I'll give you a few examples here that can help you when the raid struggles to stay alive.

* *Cheat Death/Ardent Defender* (Subtlety Rogue/Protection Paladin)
* *Nether Protection* (Destruction Warlock)
* *Balance of Power* (Balance Druid)
* *Soul Link* (Demonology Warlock)

> *Cheat Death/Ardent Defender* - Both blocks a hit that would otherwise have killed you and has a 120s cooldown, essentially a free pass to fail or just tank a mechanic dealing it's damage in one hit. *Cheat Death* grants you 50% damage reduction for 3s after taking that not-so-killing blow where as *Ardent Defender* reduces damage taken while below 35% hp by 10% **always**(at 3/3). These are both 3TE talents, increasing the likelihood of proccing with each TE. (33% / TE)
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> Nether Protection: Reduces periodic spell damage taken by 2%. Capstone Bonus: The final rank of this talent gives you a 20% chance when being hit a spell or taking periodic spell damage to gain Nether Protection, reducing all damage by that spell school by 10% for 6 sec. This talent has a 4 sec cd
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> Balance of power: Reduces magic damage taken by 2%
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> *Soul Link* (2AE1TE) - Available if using any warlock summon except for *Imp*. This shares the dmg you take with your summoned demon - unimproved it reduces your damage taken by 6% and instead directs that damage to your pet. It can be improved via *Demonic Embrace* in the Demonology Warlock tree for another 2%/TE - On this point I'd also like to mention the talent *Master Demonologist* also in the Demonology Warlock tree, which has a different effect depending on which demon you control, most noticable in this case would be the ones while controlling a *Felhunter* or a *Felguard* (as you wouldn't normally run a *Voidwalker* as dps:
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* Controlling a *Felhunter* gives you a 2% reduction to spell damage taken / TE

* Controlling a *Felguard* Gives you a 1% reduction to damage taken and a 1% increase to damage done / TE.

This is a 5p talent so it can provide a decent additional source for damage reduction if you really ache for it.

## Cooldown Usage

Now we're getting into a bit of gameplay!

Some basic rules of CD usage

* Don't miss out on using them\*
* Don't waste their uptime\*\*
* Use as much as you can at once
* Save for opportune moments\*

\*this is somewhat contradictory but in truth belongs to the 'basics'. So. Having CD's isn't a dps increase if you don't use them right? Correct. However using them at the wrong time will diminish their value greatly. Popping a trinket/racial, *Arcane Power* and *Power Infusion* all to just have to run 15 yards to get out of fire won't do you much good. Or to have them all expire just as the boss enters a weakened state taking more dmg.

\*\*this is partially about planned movement as in the example above, but also about correct order of using your cooldowns. Using 20s duration cooldowns you don't want to spend any of that time refreshing buffs/debuffs that isn't affected by the increases.

Basic CD usage:

* Use as many as you can stack at once. Every CD further increases the value of the other ones. (keep in mind Icy Veins and Power Infusion and Elemental Mastery dont stack!)
* Don't overlap/overwrite CD's.

It's basically about optimizing your time spent casting while CD's are active. And not overwriting CD's is a no-brainer but be careful with that button mashing or you just might accidentally use a *Power Infusion* at the same time as an *Icy Veins* or something.

This brings us to the next points:

**MORE CD's!**

Having *Arcane Power* and *Power Infusion* is pretty standard, you will have them up every 2 minutes to use together, also combined with racials or trinkets that hold a similar CD.

What's to say you won't run 2 trinkets? (or simply one on-use trinket and your racial) Why not Combine the next trinket/racial use with say... *Icy Veins* (Frost Mage)or *Elemental Mastery* (Elemental Shaman).

I advice most ppl to macro abilities with the same cooldown together to ensure you keep them used together. However there are trinkets with longer cooldowns but greater effect that could be used together with others on lower cooldown to increase their value. It boils down to fight lengths in many of these scenarios. Being able to get 330 haste from a trinket instead of 175sp, or 200 haste will ofc boost your *Arcane Power* value more, but if it offsets your cooldown use it might end up giving less overall dps by not being able to use your cooldowns in tandem for the next time they (well, some of them) are ready.

Practice makes perfect. Make sure you macro those CD's as you feel comfortable using them - one button press or a double tap is quicker than pressing 3-4 - I don't care how quick or good at fingering you think you are.

## RE's

Here we go again, it's individual from specc to specc, player to player - yaddayadda.

There are however some that most speccs will utilize and I'll list them below (some might not be for every player, but I don't really know any specc that wouldn't run them)

* Balance of Power - 2% hit into spells
* Precision-2% hit to all spells and attacks
* Fierce Mind (3% spirit into Spell Damage)
* Lunar Guidance (3% Intellect into Spell Damage)

As a caster in general you'll be looking for RE's that does any of the following.

* Increases your damage, haste, chance to crit or hit in general.
* Increases the damage or critical strike chance of your main abilities.
* Enhances synergies.

These are what will have a direct effect on your output but you can also look for utility RE's, some examples to follow.

* Reduced mana costs.
* Reduced damage taken.

These are obviously highly circumstantial and will in any normal scenario not really be used as more than a filler RE. (A filler RE is a second tier RE, one that doesn't increase your dmg as much as the *good* ones available to you). Out of these the reduced mana cost is the one that tends to have a direct impact on your dmg done as it will reduce GCD's spent on getting mana back via *Life Tap* or simply let's you go longer before running out of mana.

Some bossfights will have heavy AoE dmg going out and reducing this will help the raid as a whole to survive by lowering the healing requirements. Stay alive - do more damage.

We can make a long list of RE's that are useful in one way or another but I will keep this short, just to point out that damage isn't always the only goal you have.

## ABC - Always Be Casting

This is the law for casters. A melee can sit and wait on a cd whilst auto attacking or pooling resources for abilities. A caster however should ALWAYS be channeling a spell or you're missing out on dmg. If you have to move, refresh a debuff/buff/totem, but beware to not be on the GCD when you stop moving to not disrupt your **ABC**. It's as if a rogue or warrior would sit at 100/100 Rage or Energy and not use their abilities.

That's it really, this entails planned movement ahead of mechanics or boss movement so that you can refresh or apply instants while moving without overlapping them or to keep range for adds spawning or boss to not get that oh so infuriating 'out of range' just as you're finishing your cast.

## Consumables

As the title says: What can we *consume* to boost our damage

Keep in mind there is no vendor for these flasks/food. You get this from the Action House or self crafting this! (There are all the flasks in the game at the moment for the seasonal server so here is a mix of caster/melee/tank/heal flasks)

These imagies where from a test food vendor i only wanted to show you the names

There are 3 kinds of rarity when it comes to food/flasks. There is Common/Rare/Epic. The Common and Rare ones are quite cheap but the Epics ones are quite expensive but the power boost from getting the epics are worth the money.

***The Flasks you want as a Int/Snapshotter caster is***

**Flasks:** Shattering Thunder,Kirin Tor

**Food:** Winter Wonton

***Spirit Caster/Snapshot***

**Flasks:** Manifesting Power

**Food:** Jurassic Soup

## Gearing

Again, statwheights varies depending on specc... Some want more crit, some want more sp. Some value haste (limited in supply), some value TE's more so that they want more hit on gear than others.

MOSTLY you'll want as much hit as humanly possible to come from your gear as the TE normally boosts your dmg more than swapping 2 items with hit for 2 items without hit but more SP. The trade off is rarely worth it.

As we have a transmog system in place on Ascension you don't have to worry about looks of what you EQ either! ;)

**This is what you want!**

> Author: Seagull
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