Managing aggro as a Mage

[Brista]

[*]Open with a low aggro, low damage spell.

OK I'd like to address this point

Firstly, as far as I'm aware, there are no specifically low or high aggro mage spells. There's nothing like Earthshock or Mind Blast that states "this causes additional threat on the target". So low aggro low damage spell is actually a tautology. It's low aggro because it's low damage not both low aggro plus low damage as two separate stackable aspects

And that's where I think this thinking is wrong

Let's for the sake on discussion invent an arbitrary system of hate points - one which approximates how the game handles threat

So first the tank

Second 1 Tank hits mob => 50 hate
Second 2
Second 3 Tank hits mob => +50 hate (100 total)
Second 4
Second 5 Tank sunders => 300 hate + 50 hate for the hit (450 total)
etc

Now the mage's job is to keep below the tank in hate generation

With that in mind consider which of the following is better:

Second 2 low damage spell 100 hate
Second 4 low damage spell 100 hate (200 total)
Second 6 low damage spell 100 hate (300 total)

Second 6 big damage, slow wind up spell 300 hate


Surely the second case is better, since in our two examples the first one would pull aggro in second 2, where the second one doing the same damage by second 6 wouldn't pull aggro

I think in over-simplifying this you're perpetuating a false understanding of threat generation, ie that lots of small spells is better than fewer big spells.

Of course, this doesn't consider crits and with big spells your crits are spikier