Let’s talk gear first. Spellpower or Spell Damage of the appropriate element, enough Hit to be capped (four percent against equal-level targets), and Int. Don’t bother with spirit, and don’t dump other stats for stamina, unless you want to PvP a lot while leveling. Evocation and Replenishment are both max-mana based, so Int is your goto stat for regen; Spirit is worthless even with the appropriate talents.

While nothing is as important as being hit capped (an unlucky miss can get you killed), determining the priority of Int or Spellpower is trickier. Generally speaking, if you aren’t killing the mob before it reaches you for the second time post-Nova, you need more damage. If you are, great, stack more Int so your Evocations are bigger and you can go longer without drinking.

Once your gear is in order, you need to think about specs. Frost is amazingly good for stomping mobs singly or in groups…once you have the right talents. Until level thirty, though, it is the gimpest of the specs, so we’ll go arcane at first. Get the five-point talents from the first two rows, then grab Arcane Attunement and Arcane Focus. At this point you can do whatever you like, it doesn’t really matter. At either 29 or 30, head to a trainer and respec to Frost.

http://www.wowhead.com/?talent=#oZZAc0hobu is what you should aim for in your new Frost spec, although if you are killing quickly enough you’ll want to get Icy Floes instead of Frostbite. Not that it matters, since you’ll get whichever one you DON’T start with using your next three points. Then, get Frost Channeling and Winter’s Chill, followed by Ice Barrier and Shattered Barrier, and finally Cold as Ice. Pretty much fill out the tree at this point, grabbing everything below and including Empowered Frostbolt and Fingers of Frost. With the Eternal Water glyph, you can turn your elemental permanent, at which point you’ll be nearly unstoppable.

With spec and gear out of the way, all that’s left to discuss is playing style. AoE requires more skill than I can teach easily, so we’ll stick to single-target pulls, which are preferable now that AoE has been nerfed anyways. Basically, you want to nuke the enemy until they are close to hitting you, then Nova them. After you get some distance, continue nuking until they die. For the first ten or fifteen levels, just use your wand or whatever you just got a rank in as your nuke. And always finish off near-dead enemies with your wand to conserve mana!

The only difference between Frost pulls and Arcane, other than the nuke of preference, is that Arcane can’t nova every fight and will have to tank every other pull. This isn’t a big deal, though, because Arcane is unaffected by pushback. The last thing I want to mention is damage shields such as Ice Barrier and Mana Shield; they are a waste of mana unless you aggro multiple mobs or are fighting a ranged mob.

I hope this is enough to get you started on Mage. I think its obvious I’ve left a lot unsaid, but by the time you need to outgrow this guide, you’ll be much much more comfortable with advanced strategies. Make sure to check out my other WoW guides if you liked this one!

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The first up is of course human. Humans have a few racials worth noting for anyone rolling mage. They get a passive 3% spirit bonus; not great, but still. Every Man for Himself is amazing for PvP, allowing you to equip something other than a PvP trinket. Perception is also great for PvP; busting rogues out of stealth can win fights instantly.

But what about PvE? Every Man for Himself will let you get out of CC and back to DPSing on occasion, but that’s very situational and won’t mean much in the long run. And the 3% Spirit bonus is just laughable. If PvE is all you’re interested in, I’d skip over human.

Next option for potential alliance mages is gnome. Escape Artist is another great PvP racial with limited PvE uses, as is Arcane Resistance…but Expansive Mind is an amazing all-around racial that will impact heavily on both PvE and PvP mages. So gnome is a great all around choice for anyone rolling mage.

Last choice for mage are the infamous blueberries, Draenei. Their HoT racial, Gift of the Naaru, can be handy in PvP and in some situations in PvE; not dying is a great way to improve your DPS. And even if you aren’t in too much risk of dying, taking pressure off overtaxed raid healers can be helpful.

But the thing that is really worth noting on the Draenei racial list is Heroic Presence. This 1% hit bonus is great for PvP and PvE; miss the wrong spell in PvP and you’re dead, and in PvE no stat is a bigger improvement on DPS if you are under the hit cap. Add in their last racial, a 2% passive shadow resistance, and Draenei is another decent mage race.

So all we’ve really concluded is that unless you are rolling a human for PvE, you probably will do alright. But what is the BEST race for mage? For PvP, human is easily the best. The only thing better than one powerful trinket is two, and human can equip two thanks to Every Man for Himself handling all your CC busting needs.

How about for PvE? Well, Heroic Presence doesn’t stack, so if you are goign to be running with other Draenei then it is kinda useless. And Expansive Mind really is a great racial. So gnome is usually going to be the best PvE race for mage.

Hopefully this has answered your questions about which race to roll for Alliance mages. Horde races will be the next thing I write about, so be sure to give that a look if you aren’t sure what faction you are going to play.

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First up for discussion is Undead. Will of the Forsaken is/was possibly the best PvP racial in the game until Patch 3.3, where it will be nerfed to share a 45 second cooldown with PvP trinket effects. This means that the only thing that Undead is best at now is looking cool while they cast. And while this doesn’t effect the use of WotF in PvE, it’s not like WotF is really a big deal for PvE anyways. Skip undead if you want the best.

The second race on the chopping block is blood elf. Blood elf has Arcane Torrent as their noteworthy racial. At low levels, this is great, allowing you to keep fighting by giving you an extra mana regen. And for PvP, an extra silence is great. But for end-game PvE, we have another race that is mostly useless.

Troll is the last race on the Horde mage list, and have always been the least popular. That may change soon though. Da Voodoo Shuffle is a useful talent for PvP, reducing the duration of snares and roots. And Berserking is possibly the best Mage racial in the game. In PvP it is another powerful haste buff, allowing for immense burst. And in PvE it is another cooldown to pop often, providing the best DPS improvement of any racial.

Horde racials are pretty clear-cut once you look at them. Undead is nerfed into ‘mehness’ come 3.3, and was never good for PvE to begin with. Blood elf is decent for leveling and PvP, but lacks PvE oomph. And Troll has a racial that is enormously valuable in both PvP and PvE. So, for the first time in WoW, I can say Troll is the best choice.

I hope you found this guide to the best race for mage on the Horde side handy. Don’t forget that when it comes down to it, racials don’t mean all that much. With Blizzard’s balancing habits, racials are becoming more and more marginalized in the name of fair play. And the top dog can be the weakest race after one patch, if the nerfbat hits.

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A new PTR for patch 3.3 has just been pushed through on the testing servers. Most of the classes have seen some tweaks and changes. At first glance, the biggest winners (not whiners) appear to be mages and shadow priests. Some other big changes include the druid spell Rebirth dropping from a 20 minutes cool down to a 10 minute cool down. Oh and raid leaders, it seems anyone in the party can use raid marks now. Joy! Also, new Achievements have surfaced for Icecrown dungeons. Find out what other adjustments were made after the jump. Continue reading Patch 3.3 PTR build 10571 details Filed under: Patches , News items , Wrath of the Lich King Patch 3.3 PTR build 10571 details originally appeared on WoW.com on Tue, 13 Oct 2009 18:28:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds . Permalink  |  Email this  |  Comments

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Patch 3.3 PTR build 10571 details

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Welcome to another installment of Arcane Brilliance , the weekly mage column that dares to ask the question: how much mage is too much? Then Arcane Brilliance slaps itself in the face, because that’s a stupid question. You can never have too much mage. So, your mage is leveling nicely. You’ve wandered out of the starting area and into the wider zone beyond, done a bunch of quests, learned a rudimentary spell rotation ( Frostbolt –> Fireball –>Fireball–>Fireball–> Conjure Water –>Drink) and now you’ve gone and hit level 10. This is a milestone for a number of reasons: The mage staff quest we talked about two weeks ago . You can now begin doing PvP in an actual battleground against players in your level bracket (as opposed to doing PvP against bored 12-year-olds who think it’s fun to run around the starting areas with their level 80 death knights ganking lowbies). Your first talent point! Let’s discuss the second two of these three things before we move forward. Continue reading Arcane Brilliance: Mage leveling guide, 11-20 Filed under: Mage , Analysis / Opinion , Tips , PvP , Quests , Features , Leveling , Guides , Classes , Talents , Alts , (Mage) Arcane Brilliance , Battlegrounds Arcane Brilliance: Mage leveling guide, 11-20 originally appeared on WoW.com on Sat, 10 Oct 2009 20:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds . Permalink  |  Email this  |  Comments

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Arcane Brilliance: Mage leveling guide, 11-20

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If you’re a fan of Tokyopop’s take on the World of Warcraft — I know I certainly am — then you should be excited to know that the line-up for 2010 has been announced. The first series from Tokyopop was the Sunwell trilogy, written by Richard Knaak and drawn expertly by Kim Jae-Hwan. It dealt with the events of the Sunwell and featured characters prominent in the game such as Kalecgos and Anveena Teague . The second series was called World of Warcraft: Legends , a recently concluded five-volume affair that uniquely told various stories of Azeroth’s lesser-known folks . For 2010, Tokyopop plans to kick off class-based stories starting with the popular Death Knight , featuring Thassarian , the first Death Knight to rejoin the Alliance. According to BlizzPlanet, this full-volume comic written by Dan Jolley and drawn by Rocio Zucchi is slated for December 2010 although they probably mean this coming December, 2009. This will be followed by World of Warcraft: Mage , written by Richard Knaak and drawn by an as-yet-unrevealed artist, which will be available on June 7, 2010. Would Knaak + Mage mean more Rhonin ? I certainly hope not — I think we’ve just about had enough of the super-heroic, time-traveling, ultra-powerful Mage who actually taught Illidan Stormrage how to use magic (don’t ask). Rhonin is kind of like the Chuck Norris of Mages. The most curious of the three volumes is World of Warcraft: Shaman , which is due for a “late 2010″ release. Blizzard works closely with Tokyopop for all its manga, and all the stories are considered canon ( Trag Highmountain even made it into the game). The Shaman book is rumored to be Cataclysm -related, although it’s a good bet that the game’s third expansion will be out by late 2010. There is no official word yet on who will write or draw the comic, but I personally enjoyed Tokyopop Warcraft editor Troy Lewter’s stories in Legends so much that I look forward to him writing a full-volume comic. How about Carlos Olivares for the art? I appreciated his unique, almost whimsical style in Legends. He also draws wonderful Goblins, whom as we all know can roll Shamans in the next expansion. As always, stay tuned to WoW.com as we bring you the latest on Tokyopop’s Warcraft manga. Filed under: Analysis / Opinion , Lore , Comics Tokyopop announces 2010 schedule for Warcraft manga originally appeared on WoW.com on Tue, 06 Oct 2009 19:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds . Read  |  Permalink  |  Email this  |  Comments

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Tokyopop announces 2010 schedule for Warcraft manga

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I t’s the weekend, and that means it’s time for another edition of Arcane Brilliance , the weekly mage column where the boys are boys, the girls are girls, and the warlocks are smoking husks that only vaguely resemble the humanoid shapes they once assumed. We’re taking a small break this week from our ongoing leveling guide parade. There are some things we need to discuss, you and me. We need to have a talk . Don’t worry! It’s nothing bad! We’re getting a pretty sweet buff, actually. Well, arcane mages are, anyway. We just wanted to discuss it with you, that’s all. Oh, we’re sorry! Did you think Arcane Brilliance was breaking up with you or something? No, we’d never do that! Arcane Brilliance still thinks you’re sexy . See, it’s this whole patch 3.3 thing that’s happening right now. It’s got Arcane Brilliance all hot and bothered. The other columns are too busy to talk to Arcane Brilliance about it. Totem Talk is all excited about “new totems” or some other such nonsense, Lichborne is too busy being overpowered, and Bood Pact … well, you didn’t hear it from me but Blood Pact is written by a warlock . I know! Right here at this otherwise reputable website! Also, Blood Pact smells funny. I think it’s a gland problem. It’s very embarrassing. I shouldn’t be telling you this. And Blood Pact drinks its own pee. Okay. That’s enough. I’m done now. I’ve said too much. Keep this to yourself, all right? Loose lips sink ships and all that. Jump on past the break and we’ll discuss the patch 3.3 changes for mages. Continue reading Arcane Brilliance: Patch 3.3 PTR changes for mages Filed under: Mage , Patches , Analysis / Opinion , Features , Classes , Talents , Buffs , (Mage) Arcane Brilliance Arcane Brilliance: Patch 3.3 PTR changes for mages originally appeared on WoW.com on Sat, 03 Oct 2009 12:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds . Read  |  Permalink  |  Email this  |  Comments

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Arcane Brilliance: Patch 3.3 PTR changes for mages

Mages are not only good for their damage powers, but also for their food and drink, buff and crowd control capabilities. The Mage is casting ranged magic damage dealer. Mages deal huge amounts of damage by casting balls of fire, ice, and mysterious. It works best on mobs that only do melee damage. Ga for a strong monsters, because they easily can be murder you.

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World of Warcraft Mage Guide: Dead

Mages dont deal much damage to the dead. So please make your suite good enough. Fire balls to a 3.5 sec cast, so get the full effect of the damage gear. Mana is not really a concern because you free drinks. Healing and damage canvas cloth. Mages need only damage cloth is heavy on the things that affect the damage (critical strike, spell power, haste, intellect, and Stamina).

World of Warcraft Mage Guide: Mage Power

The ability to attract mobs Mage class as much as they want, they can do great damage area class can not. You might wonder how you can use the Mage ability and this all together to make a serious World of Warcraft hardnut. Their damage scales well with gear. Some classes are terrible with poor gear and get much better gear, while other classes are great with poor gear, but do not much better gear. With Alchemy can create powerful drink that can restore Mana and health, increase damage, among other things. Enchanting Mages, the ability to give themselves strong and enchants Jewelcrafting course they can for their own gems and make their own jewelry.

A level 70 Mage does crazy damage in very small amounts of time. As in, if I lucky, I killed a level 70 mob in about 3-4 button presses. Freeze effects is a bit different in that they end early itself randomly and freeze effects also have a chance to start, when the target takes damage. Fire spells and effects have a higher chance of breaking freeze than other forms of damage. It increases your damage, increases various stats, provides extra coverage, and special spells and abilities. Your talent tree also allows for personalization on a number of areas to better suit your own playing style.

World of Warcraft Mage Guide: Conclusion

Mages use magic cause most if not all of their damage. They can do all kinds of ranged spells, including the production of large amounts of damage on multiple targets, either alone or while in a group or raid. The Clear Casting state reduces the mana cost of your next damage spell by 100%. Then you have the last boss and discovered that the Bubble Lead was the only weapon that could really damage.