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All of the latest Mists of Pandaria newsArcane Brilliance: Things I want to see changed, arcane edition
by Christian Belt 
Mar 19th 2011 at 4:00PM
OK, I'm not going to sit here and pretend mages are terrible. I'll leave that to the official forums. The honest truth is that we're a more than capable DPS class, with two currently mediocre specs (one of which is making some substantial strides on the PTR) and one fairly spectacular one. We have one dominant PvP spec, and two others that can kind of hold their own if you don't look too closely at them. In this game, that's pretty much par for the class-balance course.
So I'm not saying the end is nigh, Blizzard is the root of all evil, time to re-roll a death knight, I'm canceling my subscription and buying Rift, or anything else equally ridiculous. And I'm not going to spend a thousand words complaining about stupid things. We have it pretty good, all things considered, and I'm simply not jaded enough yet to ignore that fact.
But the fact remains that the mage class has been pretty damn stagnant for some time now. We've now gone through two straight expansions with no discernible face-lift to speak of, while other classes have undergone some fairly seismic reboots. For the most part, that's not a bad thing. It means we're doing okay, or at least the class design team feels like we are. I tend to agree, but there are still a few nagging problems with our class that I feel need to be addressed. When the status quo has flaws -- even if those flaws are comparatively minor -- then maybe the status quo simply isn't good enough.
So in that spirit, I'm going to list a few things that need to be changed, and provide my own suggestions for how I'd like to see them changed. I'm not going to just throw around patent impossibilities, like what if mages could cast a Pyroblast backwards and have it rez a party member! Whoooooo!
No, these are things I've thought about for some time, and though I know that in the end, this column amounts to nothing more than a glorified wishlist, I'm OK with that. Sometimes wishlists are fun, and I'm interested to see what you all have on your own wishlists.
I'll cover all three specs in the coming weeks. The columns likely won't be concurrent, but I'll try to get them all out in a reasonable amount of time. We'll begin this week with the spec that is lately getting the most attention on the PTR: arcane.
Addressing the arcane problem
Now, don't get me wrong. I'm beyond excited about the straightforward buffs arcane is getting in patch 4.1. Arcane needed some extra numbers in order to compete with fire, and it looks like that's the direction we're moving. A pure DPS class needs at least two competitive PvE specs (though there's absolutely no good reason why we don't have three), and it looks like Blizzard has pegged arcane as our second one.
But the issue most people have with arcane isn't so much the DPS woes it has had of late. The problem, really is that the spec is by and large a one-button spec. The only reason to cast anything other than Arcane Blast in a normal DPS rotation is to avoid running out of mana. Now, I personally find the playstyle to still be a lot of fun. I think it requires a firm awareness of your own limitations, your changing surroundings and current situation, and a keen and alert sense of the best times to use each of your mana return/conservation abilities.
But one button? Really? This can easily be rectified. The key spell is already in place. It just needs to be tweaked.
Arcane Blast Missiles
Is there a reason why Arcane Missiles no longer benefits from the Arcane Blast debuff? It's probably the iconic arcane mage spell. When people think of arcane, they think of those cool gatling gun missiles firing out like they're being expelled from the oversized shoulders of some kind of giant mech fighting off a monstrous phallic metaphor monster that's threatening earth or a chick with blue hair or something. The spell effect is awesome. In the last expansion, it was the secret reason a lot of mages switched to arcane. Now Arcane Missiles has one purpose: resetting your Arcane Blast stack to save mana. And that, I think we can all agree, is pretty lame.
I have some combination of three solutions here. For starters, would it be so bad to just put Arcane Missiles back on the Arcane Blast debuff? Suddenly the spell becomes a useful part of the rotation. Tweak the damage so that using it still isn't anything near the level, damage-wise, of another full power Arcane Blast, preserving the mana-management meta-game. There's nothing less fun, though, than hitting your Arcane Missiles button, watching that awesome spell animation, and knowing that it has done no real damage. You've done the 2011 version of switching to your wand for 5 seconds to trigger your out-of-combat mana regen. It's weak, and stupid.
Arcane Multishot Missiles
The other change is less likely, but doubly fun. I'd like to see Arcane Missiles changed to hit multiple targets. The mechanic is already in the game in the form of abilities like Multishot. Arcane Missiles, with its missile salvo appearance, seems like a prime candidate for this kind of ranged AoE. It could hit 2-3 additional targets, doesn't need to do a ton more damage to be worth casting, and would allow mages to have a way to contribute in multi-target fights. Arcane Explosion still has its place when the targets are more numerous, but in 3-4 target fights, Arcane Missiles suddenly becomes a DPS increase whenever it procs.
Arcane Scorch Firestarter Missiles
The last -- and least likely -- suggestion I have involves altering the mechanics of Arcane Missiles to allow it to be cast on the move, like Scorch coupled with Firestarter. Yes, I want Arcane Missiles to become the game's first moving channeled spell.
This addresses one of the major issues with the spec: its lack of mobility. Currently the only spell arcane mages have to cast on the move is Arcane Barrage every four seconds. That's not good enough. With this change, you could also fire off a strafing Arcane Missiles in between Barrages. Not every time, but at least you'd have a chance to see it proc when you're running from spot to spot, desperately watching the seconds tick down on your Barrage cooldown. Would this be overpowered in PvP? Really? Is arcane becoming more mobile going to be a threat to anybody's arena comp? I'm pretty sure the answer to those questions is "duh."
So in my dream world, Arcane Missiles goes from being a mana conservation ability to being a spell that does good damage, hits multiple targets, and can be cast on the move. Perfectly doable.
I guess the upshot of all this is that I miss Arcane Missiles. To me, the single most efficient way to improve the arcane spec is to make Arcane Missiles awesome again. There are a lot of directions the class designers can go here, and frankly I'm not that picky about which direction(s) they choose, as long as the eventual destination is Awesometown.
So that's my arcane mage fan fiction. I want to fire out an unending salvo of machine-gun missiles at multiple warlocks while strafing behind cover. I don't think that's too much to ask. What are your ideas, guys?
Every week, Arcane Brilliance teleports you inside the wonderful world of mages and then hurls a Fireball in your face. Check out our recent Cataclysm 101 guide for new mages or our mage Thanksgiving spectacular. Until next week, keep the mage-train a-rollin'.
Filed under: Mage, Analysis / Opinion, (Mage) Arcane Brilliance
Reader Comments (Page 4 of 5)
Anony Moss Mar 19th 2011 9:08PM
Talked about this on a previous thread. I still think the answer is to allow ABlast to be cast like scorch with 3 or less stacks up. Essentially you could AB3ABar continuously on-the-move or simply ramp up AB stacks till you were settled.
I like the idea of molding Missiles into more of an ae ability. Even if it turned into something like blizzard (targeted AE) for arcane. If it was feasible even to do something like a mob-targeted ae, where the Missiles would mainly hit the target but then 'splash' damage nearby mobs.
The last random thing I think could be fun for arcane AE: allow Arcane Explosion to be cast while invisible without breaking invisibility. (For those worried about the PVP consequences, doing so would reveal the mage's position and allow them to be hit by ae abilities still). Maybe not the best idea, but just thinking outside the box a little.
Kendro Mar 19th 2011 9:12PM
I actually like the moving while channeling arcane missiles idea, it's really cool and fills in a hole that really needed to be filled for high movement fight arcane.
Bronwyn Mar 19th 2011 9:21PM
I'm not really looking forward to it. As usual, frost is going to fall behind and I'm going to be forced to play a spec that I don't know inside and out. Oh well, off to start learning. *sigh*
Pyromelter Mar 21st 2011 3:44PM
I came up with a solution to frost. It's so damn simple, I can't believe I didn't think of this before.
Deep freeze damage. Hear me out. Blizz didn't like the huge number on it's initial hit. I'm okay with that. But you can't buff ice lance or frostbolt any more for pvp purposes, so here is what I propose: Take the deep freeze damage and multiply it by .4 (40%), and then spread that damage by a DoT that will tick 8 times in 16 seconds, and be refresh-able if the player uses a cold snap DF.
This would keep the initial deep freeze damage at it's current level, but not one-shot adds with it. Then, you add the DoT onto it, so you actually buff the overall deep freeze damage, but just have that initial blast at it's currently nerfed level.
Simple, easy.
Covil Mar 19th 2011 9:54PM
Did you just make a KOS-MOS reference? All is forgiven, even if you are a smelly mage.
inquisitor_eisenhorn777 Mar 19th 2011 10:49PM
It is a Neon Genesis Evangelion reference.
Cifer Mar 19th 2011 10:07PM
On the subject of arcane being a one tree spec, I disagree. Personally, I also use my mana gem and evocation. That being said, 80+% of my damage comes from arcane blast in single target fights and that makes me sad.
The sort of missile salvo idea at multiple mobs I thought was awesome but what if we work this into both an incentive to cast more arcane missiles and a second HUD effect for arcane mages (a conspicuously absent visual). Something along the lines of each time you cast arcane missiles, you get a stacking buff (Some runic thing above your head denotes max stacks akin to fulmination) so that when you fire your next arcane barrage, it fires a salvo of barrages all at once at enemies near the target/the target itself?
The reason I like it: it restores the charging up and storing energy feeling I had back in wrath's arcane as opposed to the draining battery feeling now, provides a ranged aoe and somewhat makes arcane missiles relevant again. It also puts Arcane Barrage into the mix as more than a "oh I am moving the last couple steps I need to after blinking out of the void zone" or a painfully second best option when you cast 6 arcane blasts only to have no arcane missiles proc.
Solanstus Mar 19th 2011 11:12PM
Well, if you look in both the Fire and Frost trees, they have literally screwed AM out the back door. Brain Freeze: no more AM, just instant free Frostfire Bolt...and for fire, a free, instant Pyroblast...both of which do a crapload more damage than AM, and they're both instant...IMO, ABlast needs to replace Abarrage as the frontrunner that you get for speccing Arcane, and AM can proc under some different circumstances than just random procs when you are spamming ABlast and ignoring every other button onscreen...the Ablast spam is the only thing I don't like about Arcane, otherwise it's by far my favorite spec... :/
kingerz Mar 19th 2011 11:21PM
Superb wishlist: all of that woukld be great. You should work for Blizzard. For me, the Mana Adept concept is utterly dumb and that's the real problem. People denigrated Arcane at the end of Wrath as a 2 button spec...now it's just ONE for all intents. We understood that the new design of class and talents in Cat would be that there would be 3 equally viable specs and in exchange, cross-talent builds would be eliminated. This of course meant that we had 3 specs down from six possible ones. Remember, arcane-fire was a spec almost everyone had once, some people liked to be elementalists and I had fun levelling to 70 that way. For some time, hybrid classes and aoe-ing warriors have put arcane mages to shame and that concept is so far from what I once read in the WoW book when I made my mage that I did close one subscription actually and already am not logging in much now. What for, to farm more heroics for things we don't want while we wait for the next expansion? Umm, we did that for a Year waiting for Cat. 4.1 had better be good, basically.
Darkpizza Mar 19th 2011 11:43PM
This is kinda off the topic of the article but one thing i would like to see something done with is mana shield. I mean maybe it's just my Mage, but has anyone else noticed it sucks now? i actually took it off my bar cuz i found myself never using it anymore, and when i did it only gave me a false hope of actually doing something... it pops for me after like 1 hit or maybe 2?, from Cata mobs. i mean i i'm not saying make it equivalent to frost shield but make it actually worth doing something maybe? possible put talents back into the arcane tree to help it or something? back in wrath if i ever got swarmed with mobs or something, i use to be able to hit it as a panic button so i could get away, or even enough time so my friendly meat shield could come and help. anyone else agree with me?
Helston Mar 20th 2011 12:41AM
Unrelated mage question: Why do arcane mages like haste?
As far as I can tell, apart from allowing for more Arcane Missiles ticks and slightly more mobility with faster casts, haste does nothing to improve the dpm (and therefore sustained dps) of arcane mages.
Orrine Mar 20th 2011 1:58AM
I think mages might get to love it in later tiers when mana pool and regeneration will grow.
Norrel Mar 20th 2011 9:06PM
It is a bit confusing because crit works against the mastery bonus while haste is neutral to it. Here are the reasons I think haste is good though. First of all, arcane does higher damage when AB is stacked, so haste lets you stack it faster. Second, haste rating gives you a larger percentage gain of haste than crit rating gives you crit percentage. At least I assume this is true because it was true in BC and in Wrath, but I haven't checked the numbers in Cata. Finally, and this is the real reason I stack haste and mastery and avoid crit... Rawr tells me to.
My wish for arcane is that we get a new graphic for Arcane Blast.
Cifer Mar 21st 2011 12:46AM
As an Arcane mage, I too was wondering why it was that haste was the preferred stat to reforge/gem into as it is the only secondary stat that does not improve Mage's damage per mana. I tried stacking haste, crit and mastery all independently of each other and while in perfect theory, mastery tends to win out (I calculated out that at above 93% mana, 1 point of mastery rating becomes more dps than 1 point of haste rating) and crit falls out of favor because it scales so slowly with respect to haste or adept, haste tends to win out because it contributes the most to our dps in burn phases. Also, looking at the ratings, 1% haste is way easier to get than 1% crit.
Citizenpete Mar 20th 2011 12:48AM
Well with the latest Arcane buffs, it`s clear Blizzard is done with the frostspecc in PvE. I`m a Frost Mage and im really sad about this but im happy for my Arcane fellas, they´ve really needed a buff.
trvcht Mar 20th 2011 1:46AM
You know what my problem is with arcane on live? With halfway decent gear I can sit there in ABSpam mode for a full minute. The fun part of arcane phases for me was the ability to burn my mana from 100% to 0 in a matter of seconds if the burst is needed. The PTR buff for arcane is the first one that moves in the right direction for an arcane that cares about mana, whereas the previous buffs just made arcane monotonous again by making ABSpam go on for too long - heck, with full raid buffs and a good chain of spellstolen remedies from Maloriak you can run a burn phase for over a minute - and that's not making mana matter.
Soverss Mar 20th 2011 2:54AM
I think the root of the problem is our mastery. Lets face it, it sucks when compared to most others. It is more of a handycap in nearly every boss fight (I am mainly reffering to raiding content). There are not many of us Arcane that can play the mana game well, though it does make me feel special that I'm sticking with it and competing on the DPS charts. I believe that if the Mastery were changed, than other much needed changes would fall into place. Hell, they could even go back to the rotation that Blizzard originaly wanted for cata; Arcane Blastx4, Arcane Barrage to proc Missle barrage, anf then Arcane Missles. atleast it wouldn't be a one button rotation that way.
Pyromelter Mar 20th 2011 6:14AM
"Arcane Scorch Firestarter Missiles
The last -- and least likely -- suggestion I have involves altering the mechanics of Arcane Missiles to allow it to be cast on the move, like Scorch coupled with Firestarter"...
Ahoy Archmage, let me humbly submit a different suggestion:
Arcanofrostbolt
2.5 second cast
Similar to arcane missiles, this cast will clear arcane blast stacks, however will hit for 40% less damage than what arcane missiles would hit for. Also, this spell becomes instant with the Missile Barrage buff. This spell has a similar slowing effect to the Slow talent. Finally, casting this spell would also give the mage a chance to proc Missile Barrage.
This would do a couple of things. First, it would be totally awesome looking, and I fully admit that the inspiration for this was the picture above. I know those are arcane missiles, but I just think an arcanofrostbolt would be really awesome looking and useful. Second, it would give arcane mages a button to press on the run, and it would also introduce a bit more RNG, because if the mage is running, he might get lucky and get a couple of MB procs in a row to continue casting this. Third, this would give the mage another option in pvp. Since this would do less damage than missiles, but it would do more upfront damage, a mage trying to finish someone off might choose to use this spell instead of AM.
It would also punish poor usage of it, as hardcasting this spell would be a waste of time and mana, but would give arcane mages another button to press, as well as something to cast while on the run.
Pyromelter Mar 20th 2011 6:15AM
Either that or just copy the arcane/frost beam from magicka, and have the mage spin around the room cutting people down with your lazer beams of arcanofrost death.
Kata Mar 20th 2011 8:38AM
Theres another problem not mentioned besides the mobility issue (that i think it could be solved with the "scorched-AMissiles" idea. That is the AoE.
I'ld still like to se Arcane explosion castable in the distance, with a konck out effect or something like that.
Also Arcane orb would be awesome :D