Ftoomsh of Aman'Thul is hopping mad that Shamans will be getting Hex in Wrath of the Lich King. Green with envy, she feels that Mages are already being rendered obsolete in PvE. Polymorph as a unique ability should not be added to a pool of skill for more classes to draw from. The original poster jumped to the conclusion that giving this ability to Shamans make Mages completely useless.

Baah, I say. Hex is similar to Polymorph, but is definitely not the same spell. You might even say it doesn't go the whole nine yards. Several of the responding post reminded Ftoomsh that the Hex ability in its current form only lasts ten seconds. On top of that it set to a one-minute cool down while Polymorph has no cooldown but diminishing returns. The frogged character will be in control of their movement, but ill not be able to cast with the debuff. I'd like to add that Hex does appear to lack the healing mechanic of polymorph.

From what I understand Mages shouldn't be counted out just yet. During the Mage discussion at WWI, Blizzard promised an increase in damage for Mages, and the addition of a Frostfire Bolt spell to combat resistances.

This kind of reminds me of the phase when everyone seemed to be getting Mortal Strike. First Hunters were given a healing debuff in their Aimed Shots. Rogues have the option of running Wound Poison on their weapons. Blizzard threatened to give Shaman's Flametongue Weapon a similar debuff, but that change was quickly rescinded.

This leads me to ask two questions: Are Mages becoming obsolete? Should classes have abilities all to themselves?

Tags: class-ability, crowd-control, crowd-control-ability, defining-trait, frog, hex, mortal-strike, polymorph, sheep

Filed under: Mage, Shaman, Analysis / Opinion, Classes, Buffs, Forum Post of the Day