Mage Builds

[The Kizzy]

I started out full Frost. I solo ALOT, and have just started going into instances. So I decided to try a mix of frost and fire, and didn't like it. I went back to Frost. I think I will spend enough in Arcane to get the instant arcane explosion, but wouldn't it be better to just use the frost spell that freezes them? (Can't think of the name)

[xaoshaen]

Speccing both Frost and Fire is a Very Bad Idea. You wind up with too many overlapping, but not complimentary, talents. Having a kickass Fireball and a kickass Frostbolt means that one is largely wasted as you use both spells for the same purpose and can only use one at a time.

Frost Nova is great, but it's a crowd control spell, not an AE nuke.

With a Frost Build, it's worth pushing it all the way to 31+ points, as Ice Barrier is a terrific talent, and allows you to continue to cast while being beat on: very important for an ice mage as they don't have any talents to counter interruptions from damage and their best AE is channelled. I find myself going with a bare minimum of 18 points in Arcane (Improved Arcane Missiles (5), Arcane Concentration (5), Improved Arcane Explosion (5), Evocation (1), and Improved Counterspell (2)). At least one level of Arcane Subtlety is a good idea, and Arcane Focus is very useful if you spend much time fighting mobs four or more levels above you. If you don't plan on PvPing, you can drop Improved Counterspell, but it's still a nice talent to have when things get laggy.

With a Fire Build, I generally spend 24 points in fire, 27 points in Arcane. The high end Fire talents I want are Critical Mass (3) and Blast Wave (1). This leaves you enough points to get almost all the useful Arcane talents, including Presence of Mind (an essential talent for a Fire Mage). I've been considering reducing Mandor's Arcane Subtlety and Arcane Concentration in favor of permanent mana regen talent (afraid I can't recall the name off the top of my head). Having 45% of your mana regen active while casting could be awfully nice.

Edit: If you plan on soloing, Frost is absolutely the way to go. It doesn't have the burst DPS of Fire, but it's much more efficient and you're much less squishy.

[The Kizzy]

We were doing Uldaman for a hunter last night, and all of the sudden I died, Damn rockmen. Anyway, the healer yells out "SQUISHY, NOOOOOOOOOOOO" I was like WTF? After battle, I asked what that meant, and they told me. It made me giggle.

[Maeya]

My mage has 21 in Arcane for POM and the rest in fire. I love her build but I didn't do the fire part very wisely and ran short before Blast Wave (I know.. I know..).

However I'm considering respeccing to Frost, because as X mentioned, the mages I've talked to say it's really the way to go for soloing. Chatting with a frost mage friend last night, he says that fire soloing burns way more mana than frost soloing, which appears to be true, as I use probably 25-30% of my mana on 55 non-elite mobs, and he uses considerably less. However, he is also a MC geared PVP geared mage with + dmg bonus gear, where I have nothing of the kind. I feel like I have a lot of down time, but at least the water's free.

Also the instance AE is so nice to have. I use it so often I dont' know how I survived without it.

Does anyone know a mage who went purely Arcane? Or was the Arcane branch meant to be a complimentary brach to the other two?

I'm so horrible at choosing talents =( I need an "Idiots Guide to Picking Talent Branches".

[Zanchief]

I always liked Arcane specs most as an outsider(warrior). Good mana to dmg ratio with minimum agro.

Fire was the noob tree IMO. Big spikes of dmg to yank agro off me.

Frost seems popular now days.

But, as I said, I've never played one, just observed from a distance.

[xaoshaen]

It's pretty tough to go pure Arcane, but I experimented with a heavy arcane build complimented by fire. The combination of PoM, Arcane Power, and Pyroblast can put an end to a fight in a hurry. Even if you decided you wanted 51 points of Arcane goodness, I would suggest dumping points into Fire or Frost, as the Arcane damage spells tend to be horribly mana-inefficient. It would behoove you to have a staple offensive spell from another tree buffed by talents.

As a side note, if you wind up using the Fire tree, get Ignite, not Improved Fire Blast in the second tier.

[xaoshaen]

I always liked Arcane specs most as an outsider(warrior). Good mana to dmg ratio with minimum agro.

It's the worst mana:damage tree, but with Arcane Subtlety unskilled mages can blast with impunity without worrying about aggro.

Fire was the noob tree IMO. Big spikes of dmg to yank agro off me.

Properly used, Fire has the highest burst damage of any tree. Fortunately, Fire mages tend to be squishy, so the idiots that can't figure out when to spike their damage through the roof tend to die early and often. I don't bother healing them with my priest, it's easier to just rez them later. A good Fire mage will run on par with a good Frost mage for total damage done, never get hit unless they AE, and be able to drop the big hammer when necessary.

[Zanchief]

Single target Arcane Missiles is worse dmg to mana than fire and frost?

[Jeddas]

Id log in and get speculation from my numerous mage buddys, but I'm 1/3rd through my 72 hour suspension.

-Post to be made.

[Zanchief]

Arcane Missile 1960 dmg for 595 mana = 3.3 Dmg/mana
Pyroblast 1071(with the dot) for 440 mana = 2.44 Dmg/mana
Frostbolt 432.5 for 260 mana = 1.67 Dmg/mana

Am I missing something here?

[xaoshaen]

Arcane Missile 1960 dmg for 595 mana = 3.3 Dmg/mana
Pyroblast 1071(with the dot) for 440 mana = 2.44 Dmg/mana
Frostbolt 432.5 for 260 mana = 1.67 Dmg/mana

Am I missing something here?

Fireball, not Pyroblast is the primary Fire damage spell, and neither Fireball nor Frostbolt will be used at its base stats. Arcane Missiles gains far less from +damage gear than do its counterparts, and doesn't have talents like Frost Channeling, Ignite, Critical Mass, Ice Shards, Frostbite, or shatter to aid it.

Edit: I'm not 100% certain, but I believe the highest rank of Arcane Missiles does just under 1k damage... around 190 DPS for five seconds. Where did you pull your data from?

[Zanchief]

Fireball is even worse with a 1.62 dmg per mana ratio. I don't know the Mage tree (I'll be looking it up in a second) but that is a SUBSTANTIAL difference to make up with talents.

[xaoshaen]

Ok, I used google's lovely cache to pull down data from Thottbot.

Raw, base numbers without factoring talents or +damage gear, which will aid Frost and Fire much more than Arcane, here are the average numbrs:

Fireball: (561->715) + 72 damage, average damage 638+72, for 395 mana, a 1.8:1 damage to mana ratio.

Frostbolt: (429->463) damage, average damage 446, for 260 mana, a 1.7:1 damage to mana ratio.

Arcane Missiles: (960) damage, average damage 960, for 595 mana, a 1.6:1 damage to mana ratio.

Again, including talents and gear will only make the comparison worse for Arcane Missiles.

[Zanchief]

Bah I miscalculated AM dmg~

[xaoshaen]

Bah I miscalculated AM dmg~

No worries, multiplying by five is hard. Almost as hard as remembering to buy crippling poison before we go to Jintha'Alor!

[Zanchief]

...

and I thought a frost mage could handle runners~

[xaoshaen]

...

and I thought a frost mage could handle runners~

Bah, I can't be concerned with actually nuking! I'm far too buy poking fun at our poisonless rogue!

[xaoshaen]

The next thing you know, you'll be wanting me to polymorph adds and conjure sustenance. I didn't sign on for this sort of slavery! How do I get out of this chickenshit outfit?!

[Zanchief]

HAHA

[The Kizzy]

I love it when you are halfway though the instance, and the healer says OOM, so you stop, and then he freaks out because he has no drink. HELLO!!! I asked who need food or drink before we started!! retards.

[Zanchief]

I hate when Warlocks/Mages whine that I pull when they are out of mana. Just drink when I'm fighting moron.

This is directed to someone in perticular although I don't know his name. He called me a noob. I thought that was funny.

[xaoshaen]

I hate when Warlocks/Mages whine that I pull when they are out of mana. Just drink when I'm fighting moron.

This is directed to someone in perticular although I don't know his name. He called me a noob. I thought that was funny.

Or, god forbid, invest in some spirit and a decent wand.

[Tikker]

I love it when you are halfway though the instance, and the healer says OOM, so you stop, and then he freaks out because he has no drink. HELLO!!! I asked who need food or drink before we started!! retards.

we've got a mage in our guild that hands out water/food at the start of an instance, but refuses to summon anymore once the instance starts

maddening

specially once you reach majordomo~

[The Kizzy]

Amen.

I have no problems parking my ass to drink if I am low on mana in themiddle of a fight. Tanks wait for healers mana, not ours.

[Maeya]

I usually summon food and water for myself in Org before setting out on my daily adventure.

About 7 times in 10 I get a tell demanding food or water.

Fine.

So I summon a stack or two and hand it to them. Do I get a thank you? Sometimes.... but more often I get told, "more."


What the fuck.