New Mage Talent Trees Revealed

[MongoJerry]

That is actually incorrect. Well, if you are looking at the untalent version of each spell, they gain equal amounts of damage per second from +damage gear. However, if you improve the cast time of each spell so that Fireball is 3.0 and Frostbolt is 2.5, Frostbolt actually gains more damage per second from damage gear than Fireball.
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The context of the discussion is important. My comment related to the mana efficiency of the spells. Fireball derives more mana efficiency per point of +damage than Icebolt.

But the Winter's Chill talent looks terrible for a Tier 6 talent:

It seems like a skill that's designed for mages who want to play a niche role in raids. Having a few ice mages keep Winter's Chill up would help every ice mage in the raid do damage. It becomes a very powerful spell if you think of it as you granting five or so people an extra 5% crit.

[Warlock]

The context of the discussion is important.  My comments related to the mana efficiency of the spells.  Fireball derives more mana efficiency per point of +damage than Icebolt.

Could you elaborate on this? I haven't played a mage at high level, but using Thott's numbers for level 60 spells Fireball costs 117 mana per second of +damage to Frostbolt's 97. I assume the ratio roughly holds for mana-conserving lower ranks but haven't checked.

Looks a decent review to me, though a little more deep in the Ice tree wouldn't have hurt.

[Bob the Beholder]

As stated by a mage on my guild forums:

After reading over people's evaluation of certain talents, I've come to realize that I have a choice. I can either spend 21 points in arcane essentially for PoM and Improved CS, or actually get the new Combustion and go 20 into Frost. Basically, I want to keep my 30 fire points, and after that, I've got no #$%&ing clue what to do with the rest of the points.

Any other mages feeling the same way? It seems like after these changes, you're either AP/something spec or you put 30/31 points into an elemental tree and have no idea where to spend the other 20.

My response:

That is exactly how I feel, actually.

The only real options now are heavy arcane, or elementalist. I've been playing around with a talent calculator somebody set up with the new info, and here's a spec I've come up with that may be able to compete with AP, in my opinion. (Very unsure about this. Doing without PoM is just something hard to wrap my head around. Although I suppose I've done it before--just not for a long, long time. Also note that if Ice Barrier only has a 30 second cooldown, doesn't get overwritten by PW:S, and I don't have enough points to get PoM anyway, then it's looking pretty nice.)

Heavy frost: http://www.wowhead.com/talent/?RhZVtr00MZVVcuMVot

Much better survivability than fire or arcane. Ice Barrier + Ice Block = yes. Shatter for the crits, Winter's Chill and Arcane Subtlety for the raid DPS. Note that I've skipped over Improved Cone of Cold. It's a lot of mana and three talent points for one spell that you could just replace with a fireblast in your shatter combo, now that Shatter works with fire. Only really worth it if you're hitting several targets, and still perfectly useful for that. Head over to fire for some of the promiment early scorch/fireblast spam talents, such as impact, ignite, incinerate. Flame throwing to bring Scorch and Frostbolt to the same range. And a couple points in Master of the Elements for raid DPS.

But, once again, I am a bit tied to the arcane tree. I've just gotten used to having the option of heavy, instant burst damage. I honestly don't know what I'd do in, for example, WSG, with only slow-cast spells, and the relative inability to hit a button and suddenly become the enemy flag carrier's most dangerous enemy. But, wow, 800 damage shield, every 30 seconds. I can totally tank that flag carrier if he weren't running away very, very fast.

Improved Counterspell, also, is something that would be difficult to do away with. Now that I think about it... how am I going to keep paladins and priests from just dispelling my frost nova, or pretty much anything else from crowd controlling me in some way in mid-frostbolt. "Haha, stupid mage. My fear is faster than your frostbolt, and if you stop casting now, the frost nova will break before you can cast another frostbolt."

I am going to have to do some heavy testing on this. As it is, I am in the process of deciding whether I should slow down playing on my mage and move onto my warlock (who dinged level 57 last night, and equipped the Robe of the Void and Felcloth Gloves I twinked him), or stick with the mage.

The counterspell issue may be workable. I've checked, and dispel and cleanse both are holy spells, so I could work a paladin or priest with scorch to get him to heal, then counterspell and do the frost nova shatter combo. And similar for warlocks and mages--bait them into casting a shadow/arcane spell (fear, sheep, whatever), throw down an ice barrier, and charge in for the kill.

With this build, though, much fewer quick kills, and no more running off solo to insta-kill a flag carrier in the middle of his own base. But much higher survivability, and failing to blow 20 near-worthless points in a tree just to get the really nice top-end stuff.

[Kharohz]

No one noticed the huge bonus that Blizzard has gotten?

1) Potiental slowing enemy by >85%<

2) Chill last up to 5.5 seconds (Unless of course permafrost increases more than just one second, it did not list more than one in the review)

3) Range was increased by 20% by Arctic Reach (Current patch talent doesn't list blizzard in the description, so I am assuming blizzard currently doesn't benefit from this talent, I could be wrong)


Opinions? Or am I just retarded.

[Arnath]

(As mentioned on the Lurker Lounge front page, which is a hip happening place now...)

If you're trying to figure out your mage talent spec for 1.11, Wowhead has produced an updated mage talent calculator for you to try.&nbsp; Understand that this is an unofficial talent calculator based solely on the information released on IGN's website this morning, so errors are possible.&nbsp; However, the calculator is quite good and worth playing around with.

As an example, one of my guild's frost mages is now considering an ice/fire build.

For more suggestions, see the Lurker Lounge front page.
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Considering some of the new talents, I think that "dark side" build listed on the front page looks very nice (at least on things that can be frozen). You get a huge crit bonus on all spells on frozen mobs, 30% mana back every time you crit, and some massive threat reduction every time you crit. Also, you have a lot of the +crit talents so it happens a lot of the time.

[Warlock]

Blizzard. +crit talents. Elemental Mastery. Lots of targets.

Newly full mana bar?

[Bob the Beholder]

Blizzard. +crit talents. Elemental Mastery. Lots of targets.

Newly full mana bar?
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Blizzard doesn't crit. :)

[Warlock]

Blizzard doesn't crit.&nbsp; :)
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:blush: There goes that plan.

Blastwave perhaps?

[Rinnhart]

:blush: There goes that plan.

Blastwave perhaps?
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Flamestrike. Improved; 65% crit chance against frozen targets. 71% with critical mass.

FN -> FS -> BW -> CoC -> win.

:blink:

[MongoJerry]

Has there been any confirmation that Shatter will indeed improve the crit percentage of all spells? Or could this be another "miscommunication" from IGN?

[castille]

(Warning: rant about Blizz forums ahead)

If I see one more mage post that the "Arcane Subtlety" change is a nerf I'm gonna explode.&nbsp; Are these people complete idiots?

First they spend months upon months complaining about player's resistances slowly raising due to Tier1/Tier2 sets and MC/BWL having a lot of fire resistances in it, then they ignore all the changes that counteract this?

First they spend months detailing how useless Arcane Missiles is endgame, then they complain when their aggro reducing talent affects Frost and Fire?
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OH! I didn't notice the new wording on Arcane Subtlely...

THAT'S where my last 3 points go in my 0/23/28 build..

[MongoJerry]

I've posted a thread on the Blizzard mage forum asking for verification about whether Shatter will indeed work with all spells now rather than just cold spells. All attempts to bump it until it gets answered would be appreciated!

[Pantalaimon]

I've posted a thread on the Blizzard mage forum asking for verification about whether Shatter will indeed work with all spells now rather than just cold spells.  All attempts to bump it until it gets answered would be appreciated!
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Wow I like our boards better :P

Edit: I did find something interesting pointed out on the myriad of threads on the mage board...

(from IGN)

Arcane Concentration
Gives you a 2/4/6/8/10% chance of entering a Clearcasting state after any damage

Old wording was any damage spell I believe... so does this imply wanding, fireball dot ticks, ignite ticks, etc. can proc cc? Somehow I doubt it, but thoughts?

[Rinnhart]

Has there been any confirmation that Shatter will indeed improve the crit percentage of all spells?&nbsp; Or could this be another "miscommunication" from IGN?
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Confirmation.

Also, Master of Elements is insane.

[MongoJerry]

Confirmation.

Also, Master of Elements is insane.
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Yeah, now combine the two with a lot of mobs around. Frost Nova for +50% crit and then aoe to fill your mana bar up.

[LochnarITB]

Yeah, now combine the two with a lot of mobs around.&nbsp; Frost Nova for +50% crit and then aoe to fill your mana bar up.
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It will be interesting to see the first reports when this hits the test realms. I'm hoping that this speculation is only that. It has been hard enough to not spec for arcane power. Now they are going to dangle master elementalist out there and only loons like me will be speccing in anything but arcane power or master elementalist crit machine. :(

[swirly]

only loons like me will be speccing in anything but arcane power or master elementalist crit machine. :(
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I may be a loon, but I'm leaning toward this build currently. I feel that with a build like this I'll be getting use out of all of my talent points.

If I were to go for master of elements I'd feel that alot of points spent on fire talents building up to it are getting wasted. The improved flamestrike might be good for more AOE power, but improving fire blast seems less worthwhile to me. Basically I would be looking at spending 18 points for one possibly two good talents and a whole bunch of weak ones.

Meanwhile if I move those points to arcane I feel that all the talents I put points in are useful. I gain clearcasting, arcane explosions that crit more and get resisted less, and improved counterspells.

Of course I'm typically not much of a raider and so I'm mainly looking at 5-10 man content. When you move into the raiding scene the arcane talents may become less useful and master of elements may gain even more use for its mana savings. I'd also probably move the 3 out of cone of cold for 3 in frost channeling.

I'm unsure if master of elements will be a great deal better than clear casting in raids though. Is 30% mana back from crits better than a 100% free spell 10% of the time? I'm guessing you won't be doing any of the tricks to gain mana from master of elements in a raid because if you are hitting more than one target you probably want to be doing so with blizzard for its range and it not being fire based.

So I'm left feeling like I may stick with the frost/arcane build even for raids. In 5-10 man's the mana you might get back from master of elements probably won't matter that much because the fights are so short anyway. In 20-40 mans you probably won't be able to do that many AOE tricks to gain mana from it. I just feel that when things settle it will be a nice skill that some will play with, but not a real game changer. I could be completely wrong though. My mage experience is limited at best. : )

[Rinnhart]

I may be a loon, but I'm leaning toward this build currently.&nbsp; I feel that with a build like this I'll be getting use out of all of my talent points.

If I were to go for master of elements I'd feel that alot of points spent on fire talents building up to it are getting wasted.&nbsp; The improved flamestrike might be good for more AOE power, but improving fire blast seems less worthwhile to me.&nbsp; Basically I would be looking at spending 18 points for one possibly two good talents and a whole bunch of weak ones.

Meanwhile if I move those points to arcane I feel that all the talents I put points in are useful.&nbsp; I gain clearcasting, arcane explosions that crit more and get resisted less, and improved counterspells.

Of course I'm typically not much of a raider and so I'm mainly looking at 5-10 man content.&nbsp; When you move into the raiding scene the arcane talents may become less useful and master of elements may gain even more use for its mana savings.&nbsp; I'd also probably move the 3 out of cone of cold for 3 in frost channeling.

I'm unsure if master of elements will be a great deal better than clear casting in raids though.&nbsp; Is 30% mana back from crits better than a 100% free spell 10% of the time?&nbsp; I'm guessing you won't be doing any of the tricks to gain mana from master of elements in a raid because if you are hitting more than one target you probably want to be doing so with blizzard for its range and it not being fire based.

So I'm left feeling like I may stick with the frost/arcane build even for raids.&nbsp; In 5-10 man's the mana you might get back from master of elements probably won't matter that much because the fights are so short anyway.&nbsp; In 20-40 mans you probably won't be able to do that many AOE tricks to gain mana from it.&nbsp; I just feel that when things settle it will be a nice skill that some will play with, but not a real game changer.&nbsp; I could be completely wrong though.&nbsp; My mage experience is limited at best. : )
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I'm probably going to go with an Elementalist spec when these come out, do the the SH grind to 60, and switch back to my Arcane/Fire build. There's still a stack of utility in Arcane, though the gap between Arcane Meditation and PoM is annoying.

[Artega]

Evocation has been changed to a trainable ability and Arcane Explosion will now start off as an instant cast spell.[right][snapback]108945[/snapback][/right]

And the Warriors are stabbed in the back yet again.

[lfd]

And the Warriors are stabbed in the back yet again.
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Maybe if warriors weren't so whiney, they'd get more sympathy :)