A Guide to Mages comment thread

[Skandranon]

Here I submit myself to the slings and arrows of outrageous Lurkers.

[LochnarITB]

One word - Excellent!

This is the best writeup I've seen on the mage. I did quite a bit of surfing on the matter when my little squishy guy was young and this tops everything I found. I can't say that I learned a whole lot new but it did make me reconsider one thing. I had dismissed scorch. I will now have to explore it a little more, especially as I am finding that grouping, at least with fellow Lurkers, is not nearly the horror I thought it would be.

Thanks, Rylea/Skan. I look forward to the additions as you make your way to the level cap.

[Treesh]

I would almost swear the mage that GG and I grouped with last night had read this and took it to heart. That undead mage with us (as Mogoraindyn and MarnTruehorn) used your group tactics outlined to great effect. We were doing the Wailing Caverns with just the three of us. First time any of us in the group had been in the instance. Only wiped a couple of times (almost always because my poor shaman went down first and there went our only healer), but the mage hardly ever pulled aggro off of me or GG's pet. There was a spawn or two that popped up on the mage, but he did the right thing and headed towards us so I was able to earthshock it and hit it with rockbiter to get it off the mage easily enough. Thanks for having the group tactics in there and reminding people that yes, solo and group play are two different animals and should be treated as such.

[Bolty]

Here I submit myself to the slings and arrows of outrageous Lurkers.
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This is really excellent stuff, Skan. Reading over it reminds me of how many changes the mage went through during beta...

...and also of how many nerfings the poor mage has suffered since phase 2.

Frost Nova with 25 second cooldown? Ye gods!

-Bolty

[Skandranon]

This is really excellent stuff, Skan.  Reading over it reminds me of how many changes the mage went through during beta...

...and also of how many nerfings the poor mage has suffered since phase 2.

Frost Nova with 25 second cooldown?  Ye gods!

-Bolty

I've gathered that in the past, mages were some sort of godlike killing machines, necessitating beatings with the nerf stick. Having never played CB, I never experienced that period, and for all the time I've been playing the mage has been anything but a killing machine. The beatings, however, continue. Blizzard doesn't seem to have gotten the message - feeling twice burned, I suppose, on the D1 Sorcerer and LoD Sorceress. Objectively, I'd rank the mage's power level now as either lowest or second-lowest, depending on how well the Druid changes hold up.

Naturally, I'm having a lot of fun with my mage and wouldn't stop playing her for the world, but then again, I have been a member of your Friendly Neighborhood Variant Scum before and am no stranger to having fun with low-power characters.

Anyway, I suspected that Frost Nova's cooldown had been something other than 25 seconds before, just because of Improved Frost Nova. I can't imagine that even the usual Blizzard crack monkeys could have possibly thought a whole 4 seconds off a 25 second cooldown would ever really mean anything.

[MongoJerry]

RULE ONE: THINGS GO WRONG

I had more rules than this, but they all seemed to condense nicely into this. Hence, rule one.

The biggest assumption that a lot of guides make is that things are going to be perfect. They assume that each engagement is going to go according to plan, and that if it doesn’t, you are clearly an inferior player. They also provide little or no advice should things turn south in a hurry.

Hang all that. Things go wrong. You are going to misjudge aggro, or you’re going to pull one too many mobs, or you’re going to get an add from an unexpected direction, or you’re going to get something spawning on your head. Things go wrong. The distinction between an excellent player and one who is merely good is that an excellent player can react to most unexpected situations and still pull out a win.

Rule One also applies to groups. The dream is a perfectly functioning group where you’ve got a pair of tanks, a healer and some other support character. Not all your groups will look like this, and not all groups that do are going to work well. You’re going to get tanks that don’t know how to tank, rogues and other mages who have no idea what an “aggro” is, much less how to handle it, and priests who think they’re offensive spellcasters. You could leave the group every time it’s not perfect, but then you won’t be in many groups. In the majority of cases, you’ll have to deal with it. Things go wrong.

My favorite part of the whole guide. So many priest guides make this same mistake. I might plagerize this section. :D

I can't claim to have read every word, but I gave the guide a long skim and it looked great! One addition I have is that you might want to emphasize Counterspell a little more. After experiencing a shadow spec'd Priest's Silence spell, I can't believe how rarely I see mages using Counterspell. In fact, I ran into several level 60 mages in the beta who didn't even have it hotkeyed. That's nuts! As you say, it's a great way to get a caster mob to come forward and get pummeled. Especially now that Taunt has been *improved* so that one cast of Taunt can get the mob off the mage, Counterspell should be a normal part of a mage's repertoire.

Regarding group dynamics in late game play, I'll give you a preview: Mages are the most powerful AoE casters in the game and that AoE damage becomes critical in so many situations in late game instances. Warlocks can do decently well, but their AoE channeling spells can be more easily interrupted and aren't quite as good. No other classes come close to the AoE damage that mages and to some extent warlocks can deliver.

[Bolty]

I've gathered that in the past, mages were some sort of godlike killing machines, necessitating beatings with the nerf stick.  Having never played CB, I never experienced that period, and for all the time I've been playing the mage has been anything but a killing machine.
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Hmm, how to put it. Imagine the current mage you play now, except that in phase 2...

1) You could turn invisible while not in combat and thus could walk through entire dungeons right to the end. Only a tiny handful of specially-placed monsters in the whole game could see invisibility.
2) Frost Nova's cooldown was 10 seconds. Yep, only 2 seconds higher than its spell effect duration.
3) Pyroblast could easily do 1500-2000 damage a hit at high levels.
4) All overall damage was higher.
5) Enemies almost never resisted your spells, because monster resistance wasn't in yet.
6) No reagents required.
7) Few long-term cooldowns existed on any spells and you could spam them all you like.
8) You could drink in combat.
9) You always regen'ed mana because there was no 5-second-wait-after-casting effect.
10) Channeling spells couldn't be interrupted or have their time bar drained.

Those are just off the top of my head, as soon as I hit "Add Reply" I'll think of more. But you get the idea - mages were GODS when they first got talents, and they've been beaten with the stick hard ever since.

-Bolty

[Skandranon]

I can't claim to have read every word, but I gave the guide a long skim and it looked great!  One addition I have is that you might want to emphasize Counterspell a little more.  After experiencing a shadow spec'd Priest's Silence spell, I can't believe how rarely I see mages using Counterspell.  In fact, I ran into several level 60 mages in the beta who didn't even have it hotkeyed.  That's nuts!  As you say, it's a great way to get a caster mob to come forward and get pummeled.  Especially now that Taunt has been *improved* so that one cast of Taunt can get the mob off the mage, Counterspell should be a normal part of a mage's repertoire.

Absolutely. Perhaps I should emphasize the level 24 barrier a little more. Quite simply, a mage's anti-caster battles are defined by pre-Counterspell and post-Counterspell, which is as massive an impact as any skill could possibly have. I can write that into the Counterspell description.

Regarding group dynamics in late game play, I'll give you a preview:  Mages are the most powerful AoE casters in the game and that AoE damage becomes critical in so many situations in late game instances.  Warlocks can do decently well, but their AoE channeling spells can be more easily interrupted and aren't quite as good.  No other classes come close to the AoE damage that mages and to some extent warlocks can deliver.

I suspected that situations requiring AoE would become more common in the late game, though not to such a large degree. Right now, AoEing is still optional, though with Consecration and the warrior's AoE taunts coming into play to make AoE spellcasting easier, I can see where it becomes more crucial. Should be interesting.

[Skandranon]

1) You could turn invisible while not in combat and thus could walk through entire dungeons right to the end.  Only a tiny handful of specially-placed monsters in the whole game could see invisibility.
2) Frost Nova's cooldown was 10 seconds.  Yep, only 2 seconds higher than its spell effect duration.
3) Pyroblast could easily do 1500-2000 damage a hit at high levels.
4) All overall damage was higher.
5) Enemies almost never resisted your spells, because monster resistance wasn't in yet.
6) No reagents required.
7) Few long-term cooldowns existed on any spells and you could spam them all you like.
8) You could drink in combat.
9) You always regen'ed mana because there was no 5-second-wait-after-casting effect.
10) Channeling spells couldn't be interrupted or have their time bar drained.

Um...wow. Eesh. I mean...whoa.

Wouldn't mind some higher damage. Or a friendlier Frost Nova cooldown. Other stuff, well...sounds just a little too good.

[Sabra]

I don't know what "the management" has in mind for the eventual direction of the WoW site here at LL. Maybe Skan's work will end up residing in a guides section eventually.

For now, could this be pinned? I've not had the chance to implement even 1% of Skan's advice, but it's already saved my life more than once.

Many thanks!

[MongoJerry]

Minor nit: Druids can remove curses, too. As a priest player, I'd go into a rant about how mages never cast remove curse, but that's just my pet peeve.

More substantive nit: The biggest weakness of the guide is the one you told me before you posted it -- it's so long. Readers, especially those reading internet gaming sites, tend to have short attention spans, and it doesn't take much to lose their interests. I'm not asking you to remove any content. I am asking if perhaps you can say the same things more compactly.

I used to write a fantasy baseball column on the San Francisco Giants for ESPN.com. It wasn't a major thing, but I did have several thousand people reading what I wrote each time I posted something. The problem? ESPN.com had a restrictive formula for us Fantasy Baseball Correspondents as far as what column sections could appear and how long in characters each section could be. I used to hate how I'd have to reduce a 1500-2000 character section that I wrote down to 1000 characters. But you know what happened in the end? The writing got better as I removed phrases and replaced them with a simple word or I removed words like "very," "well," as well as unnecessary helping words. Sometimes I would realize that I didn't need to talk about a piece of information at all, since it was obvious, redundant, or just interfered with the flow of the narrative.

Reading through several sections of your guide, I see many places where sentences could be tightened and information could be conveyed more compactly. To give you full feedback on this would require a full editing job on the guide, and I don't want to do that here. But my advice is that you give yourself a project to shorten things down. I believe you mentioned that the guide was 57 pages in Word. If so, then I suggest that you make a goal for yourself to get it down to 50 pages. A good writer has to learn how to be a little cruel to one's work. It's all a process of seperating the wheat from the chaff or knocking away the quartz to get to the nugget of gold.

As I said before, the guide's great, and I hope you finish it off with late game information. It'll make a terrific addition to the Lurker Lounge. It just needs some polishing that I hope some of which you can do on your own. When you're at a point where you think you're "done," I think I'll have Occhi turn his editor's eye on the guide and see what he comes up with.

[Skandranon]

Minor nit:  Druids can remove curses, too.  As a priest player, I'd go into a rant about how mages never cast remove curse, but that's just my pet peeve.

Didn't know. Druids are not all that common above level 20, and I've always been the curse-remover in any party I've been in. I should probably write something about that.

More substantive nit:  The biggest weakness of the guide is the one you told me before you posted it -- it's so long.  Readers, especially those reading internet gaming sites, tend to have short attention spans, and it doesn't take much to lose their interests.  I'm not asking you to remove any content.  I am asking if perhaps you can say the same things more compactly.

Yes, I'm aware. All I've done is basic proofreading work - RL prevented me from doing an all-up editing job on it, which I have significant experience in doing. What you're reading is essentially a stream-of-consciousness spew of every thought that went through my head while I was playing my mage. (Yes, I have quite the organized consciousness.) Serious editing is definitely in the works, and I think I can cut it down to size. However, there are RL demands on my time, even during the holidays, and so it may be delayed somewhat.

When you're at a point where you think you're "done," I think I'll have Occhi turn his editor's eye on the guide and see what he comes up with.

No offense, but when I'm done (and by that I mean really done), any differences that remain will be merely stylistic, and nothing that I'd care to see "edited" by anyone else.

[LochnarITB]

As a priest player, I'd go into a rant about how mages never cast remove curse, but that's just my pet peeve.
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That would be a generalization. Not all mages party that way. As long as my little squishy guy isn't being pounded on, removing curses is second only to sheeping adds in my list of priorities. Silencing a caster is third with dealing damage coming in fourth in the list.

More substantive nit:  The biggest weakness of the guide is the one you told me before you posted it -- it's so long.  Readers, especially those reading internet gaming sites, tend to have short attention spans, and it doesn't take much to lose their interests.  I'm not asking you to remove any content.  I am asking if perhaps you can say the same things more compactly.

While I'm sure that the guide can be cut some, I would suggest that the tool be a scalpel and not a machete. I think the reader that would more likely fit the Lurker model would be the one that would read through a long guide pulling out every bit of info they can. I don't believe that a Lurker Guide™ should be dumbed down to meet some internet lowest common denominator. I would imagine players referring the guide to others would comment, "It's a long read but well worth it."

[Tal]

For now, could this be pinned? I've not had the chance to implement even 1% of Skan's advice, but it's already saved my life more than once.

Many thanks!
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Done m'lady. :)

[Bolty]

Um...wow.  Eesh.  I mean...whoa.

Wouldn't mind some higher damage.  Or a friendlier Frost Nova cooldown.  Other stuff, well...sounds just a little too good.
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Oh yes, they were quite overpowered, no question. But now you'll understand even more why mage-lovers have been complaining heavily for so long. The fall down from that great height has been so steep...

-Bolty

[Bolty]

While I'm sure that the guide can be cut some, I would suggest that the tool be a scalpel and not a machete.  I think the reader that would more likely fit the Lurker model would be the one that would read through a long guide pulling out every bit of info they can.  I don't believe that a Lurker Guide™ should be dumbed down to meet some internet lowest common denominator.  I would imagine players referring the guide to others would comment, "It's a long read but well worth it."
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I'm with Lochnar on this one. Length of guide has never been a real problem at this site - see Sirian's Fire Skills Guide as an example. The LL doesn't cater to the average Internet rules of "keeping interest" that are a staple at commercial sites and basic journalism standards like ESPN or MSN. Let's face it, if you're here it's because you want more than just a character build description - you want to know how the game WORKS. And if an article or guide takes half an hour to read, you'll read it - because if you just wanted a short synapsis, you'd be at some other site!

At the same time, Mongo's right in that if the guide reads like a physics textbook, it could be improved to make it more interesting. But I know when I read a guide, I want to know everything - every little tweak, bug, tactic, and concept. If it takes 10 pages on this site to do it, no problem! Guides can be long AND interesting. I read Skan's original thread from start to finish and was fascinated by all the changes in the class since I last played it.

Never sacrifice depth for an easier read. But then again, putting humor and other tidbits into a guide can make any length a joy to peruse. Ok, see, I'm rambling - not being concise! :)

-Bolty

[MongoJerry]

Yes, I'm aware.  All I've done is basic proofreading work - RL prevented me from doing an all-up editing job on it, which I have significant experience in doing.  What you're reading is essentially a stream-of-consciousness spew of every thought that went through my head while I was playing my mage.  (Yes, I have quite the organized consciousness.)  Serious editing is definitely in the works, and I think I can cut it down to size.

Perfect. That's all I ask. The guide has a feeling of "stream of consciousness" to it. All I'm asking for is another read through to tighten up sentences and paragraphs and to polish your excellent guide. As I mentioned, I would prefer that you do the editing yourself. However, I also recognize that being able to edit one's own work is a skill that many people don't have, so my suggestion of using Occhi's services was made with that in mind. If you can edit your own work (and it's hard to do that -- I grow attached to things I write, too), then that's the best thing to do.

[MongoJerry]

That would be a generalization.  Not all mages party that way.  As long as my little squishy guy isn't being pounded on, removing curses is second only to sheeping adds in my list of priorities.  Silencing a caster is third with dealing damage coming in fourth in the list.

It would be a generalization but by far it would not be an over generalization. I'm not kidding on this next part. I got so frustrated with mages not dispelling curses that I started keeping track of how often mages would dispell a curse without being prompted. I would even wait a full 15 seconds after the fight was over before mentioning that they should remove curses on people. Do you know what the ratio was? 50-to-1. That's right, 50 times, a mage would not dispell a curse without prompting. I've frequently seen mages who don't have Remove Curse on any of their hotkey bars. A couple of mages I've seen hadn't bother to buy the spell, because "[They] never needed it." One mage outright refused to cast it on our instance group and said, "I'm not a healer." This is a massive pet peeve of mine.

Another pet peeve is mages who don't have first aid. The example case was in a 40-person raid on Onyxia. The standard tactic is to have a tank try to keep aggro and draw her toward the back wall, so that when she breathes fire, it doesn't hit the rest of the raid. Meanwhile, the dozen or so priests and druids are setup in a healer rotation (with paladins or shamans providing random heals) to heal the main tank. Everyone else slowly and gently does damage. It works pretty well and makes sense.

So, my main focus is healing the raid's tank, right? I'm in a group of four others, and in an emergency (like if Onyxia's eggs hatch and we have whelps flying everywhere), I'll provide some healing to them, but my focus is keeping the raid's tank alive. If the tank dies, we die. It's that simple. Well, the tank got knocked to one side, and Onyxia breathed some fire over a section of the raid before we got things back in order. One of the mages, well out of my healing range I might add, was damaged. And stayed damaged. So damaged that any small flick of fire would kill him. After seeing this for half a minute or so, I yelled, "XXXX, heal yourself!" And he was like "Uh, with what?"

I wanted to reach my hands into the monitor and choke him. First aid is a free profession. It's easy to skill up and everyone can get it. I have bad news for mages. You ain't the main focus of my healing. The party's tank is. There are plenty of times where mages take damage but then manage to get out of it -- via frost nova, sheep, or just having aggro taken back by the party's tank. It would be most helpful to both you and your party's priest if you could give yourself a little in-combat healing when an appropriate moment presents itself. Heck, if a mage is out of mana, a mage with first aid can even heal *other* people while waiting for mana to regen.

[LochnarITB]

Wow! If you have such a loathing for mages, then don't play with them. Again, as a mage player, you've told me I must not know what I'm doing because of my chosen class. In reality, I do exactly what you claim mages don't do. I carry a stack, hotkeyed, of the best bandages I am capable of making. These are applied to myself and others as the situation allows. I also carry a couple stacks of healing potions for instant heals of my own. If the healer in the party is able to heal me, it's appreciated but I do as much as I can to take care of myself. If I do go down, the blame is on myself and not the healer. Apologies are then given for letting the party down and thanks for the res if it comes. At the very least, I would hope that you would remember those whose playing styles do fit your model and go to them when you wish to have a mage in your party.

[Kevin]

Wow!  If you have such a loathing for mages, then don't play with them.  Again, as a mage player, you've told me I must not know what I'm doing because of my chosen class.  In reality, I do exactly what you claim mages don't do.  I carry a stack, hotkeyed, of the best bandages I am capable of making.  These are applied to myself and others as the situation allows.  I also carry a couple stacks of healing potions for instant heals of my own.  If the healer in the party is able to heal me, it's appreciated but I do as much as I can to take care of myself.  If I do go down, the blame is on myself and not the healer.  Apologies are then given for letting the party down and thanks for the res if it comes.  At the very least, I would hope that you would remember those whose playing styles do fit your model and go to them when you wish to have a mage in your party.
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I think you're misinterpreting Mongo's post. I'm taking it as him seeing Skandranon's excellent work as a way to help prevent crap like he has experienced from happening and is asking, albeit in a rather strong way, to emphasize that a mage can and really should do these things to make them a better overall player. You sound like the one in 50 mage from his side. Yes, I realize he was directly responding to you about the generalization he made, but I'm just seeing what I feel as misinterpretations.

I will also echo your sentiments that I have partied with random mages that do know how to play the class, and it is a wonderful thing. I have partied with more who don't know or don't seem to care, and I wish they would read the guide.