I think it's less likely that mana drain was taken away mainly because of PVP, and more likely that ti was taken away because it's simply one of those abilities that you hardly ever use. I'd bet most locks don't even have it on their bars.

See also: Sentry totem, Aspect of the Monkey, Aspect of the Beast, Amplify and Dampen Magic, Detect Invis, Anesthetic Poison, I could go on.

The point is, yes. Blizzard is simplifying the game by removing spells and abilities that are incredibly situational. As I understand it, you must be an Afflic lock who PVPs and using it against the healer (so no double-DPS teams) in PVP.

That sound like exactly the kind of ability they'd want to remove.

Amplify and dampen Magic were plenty useful. I guess you never fought any bosses that deal mostly physical damage?

Oowxam,

Thanks. I agree that mana draining abilities make the game greater in that they diversify strategy and create different ways to win an arena match. It's very saddening to think that Blizzard might be trying to phase them out of the game (as Mana Burn is the only one left and they've said they will have to take a look at it).

Snuzzle,

Ghostcrawler explicitly says (in the Blue Post I quoted) that Drain Mana is being removed because of PvP concerns.

C. Christian Moore
Contributing Editor
wow.joystiq.com

@ultranator.

Please see the "incredibly situational" part of my comment. I'm not saying they were never useful... heck, even the Soothe was situationally useful (when it would reduce the range at which an enemy would aggro). Didn't mean I used it all the time, didn't mean I never used it. Certainly meant it didn't deserve a space on my main bars next to Hurricane and Regrowth.

I've also been in plenty of dungeons where the mages kept giving out Dampen Magic and/or Amplify Magic to everyone, like it was Arcane Int. Same as druids who just Thorns everyone. Not the intended use of those spells.

So now they're gone, and I'm glad. Drain Mana, another situationally useful spell, is gone. If warlocks are struggling with it gone, it'll either be brought back in a less situational form or they'll be given something new and shiny to replace it.