Fire Mage Playstyle and Rotation Guide

General Rotation:

Basically, the idea is to farm Sun King’s Blessing in the opener, since the boss will be in Firestarter range, so it means Fireball and Pyroblast will always crit.

We want to farm Sun king’s Blessing stacks as long as the boss is in Firestarter range with Fireball and Pyroblast. This way we can also farm Pyroclasm Procs, and once we reach 8 stacks of Sun King’s Blessing we hard-cast our Pyroblast and halfway through activating Sun King’s Blessing we press Combustion to benefit from extended Combustion from Sun King’s Blessing and our own Combustion.

Opener with 10.2 Tier Set Bonus

1. Pyroblast at 3 Seconds before the pull.
2. Press Ice Nova, Potion, Bloodlust and Immediately Fireball
3. Halfway through that fireball cast activate Combustion and press double Fireblast to reach Double Pyroblast sequence, that pyroblast will generate another pyroblast and we can continue chaining pyroblast during combustion
4. Once you are out of fireblast charges continue to chains hotstreaks via phoenix flames 
5. You should be at 8 stacks of Sun King’s blessing you can hardcast pyroblast and enter Sun Kings Blessing Window (cast shifting power if you are at low charges of Fireblast or Phoenix flames before)
6. Continue to fill with fireball, don’t overcap on fireblast charges
7. Save at least 2 fireblast charges before entering combustion window
8. If for whatever reason you have nothing to press inside combustion or Sun King’s Blessing fill with Scorch.

Opener 

1. Pyroblast 3 seconds before the pull (depending on how far you are from the boss)
2. Cast Fireball. Halfway through the fireball you want to cast Fire Blast since the boss is at Firestarter range and you will gain a hot streak chain
3. Continue to build your Sun king’s Blessing stacks as long as the boss is in Firestarter range
4. You want to be aggressive with Fire Blast within the Firestarter window, since you want to reach SKB stacks as fast as possible
5. Continue to Pryoblast and Fire Blast until you are at 8 stacks of Sun king’s Blessing and you are ready to enter your Combustion window
6. Use potion and trinkets and any racials you have, hard cast pryoblast and just before the pyroblast cast goes off, you want to press your Combustion so you benefit from Sun king’s Blessing and a longer Combustion window
7. After your Combustion window, you want to cast Shifting Power. At this point you should be at 7 or 8 stacks of Sun king’s Blessing
8. If SKB is ready, start hard casting pyroblast to enter the SKB Window once again
9. Fill with fireball and don’t over cap on Fire Blast or Pyroclasm Procs

Important Note

During PI or when you are affected by Double Bloodlust, you are allowed to cast Fireball and chain it with fire blast to chain hot streaks and heating up procs during combustion.

The reason behind it is that scorch has very short cast time and you won’t be able to maintain and chain hot streaks / heating up procs during double bloodlust.

Ignite vs Flamestrike AoE

Generally speaking, the ignite gameplay hasn’t changed at all, and it’s still viable and strong, just a tiny bit weaker with Ignite's multiple nerfs.

You can still ignite on 8+ targets if there are priority targets, especially in M+, that need to be focused (like enforcer in the first pull on Freehold).

When it comes to flamestrike, the rotation hasn’t changed. You just replace pyroblast with flamestrike on 8+ Targets as your Hot streak spender, since flamestrike contributes towards the Hot Streak system.

Flamestrike AoE Rotation and Sequence:

1. Cast phoenix flames (to apply 2p debuff on AoE Targets)
2. Cast flamestrike, and halfway through Flamestrike activate combustion
3. Cast flamestrike again from another hot streak from previous Flamestrike in combustion
4. fire blast
5. phoenix flames
6. Meteor (inside combustion to benefit from combustion)
7. flamestrike
8. Fire blast
9. Dump any remaining fire blast charges you have into flamestrike
10. Dump any free phoenix flames charges refunds from Fire 4p tier set
11. Shifting power if you are out of Fire blast charges
12. Flamestrike
13. Scorch to fish for Hot Streak for the last Flamestrike
14. Your Sun king’s blessing should be ready, hard-cast flamestrike
15. Repeat step 3 onwards

Fire Mage Opener in 10.1.5 with Double Bloodlust

Here is a visual representation of how the new opener is supposed to be played with double bloodlust on pull:

Playstyle

In general, your playstyle and especially cooldown use should be molded on a fight-by-fight basis. This has historically been one of the best strengths of Mage in cutting-edge content. Our CD timing is variable, and the damage we do in short bursts can overcome difficult parts of an encounter. In general, do your best to time your combustion and rune usage to increased boss damage windows, add spawn or just some point in the fight that allows you to stand in place for 12 seconds at a time.

Get used to stutter stepping between your GCDs. You want to only use your blink charges for large movements. If you only have to move 10 yards and you have a few seconds to get there do it by stutter stepping in your rotational down time.

Lastly, Mage is one of the tankiest DPS classes in the game, but nearly all of our defensives are proactive buttons and not reactive. Blazing Barrier, Alter Time, Mirror Images, and Ice Block all do no good if you haven’t pressed them before a damage event happens. Get used to studying damage patterns of encounters and knowing ahead of time when you are about to take a big hit. Your healers will be able to feel the difference if you are playing well defensively, and they will thank you for it.