When you get to level 80 on your own way, good talents to pick up include the other two ranks of Arcane Mind, because intellect raises DPS for this spec,Don’t despair! There’s still time for you to cultivate a nice, wet, contagious-sounding cough, something that can only be cured by a bit of time off, spent nursing yourself back to health in front of your computer, killing zombified murlocs and getting sea-lions to mate with each other. Not that we don’t want you here, of course. But holy crap, Wrath of the Lich King is awesome. and then we’d go for Ice Floes to lower the cooldown on Frost Nova and Ice Block, Incineration to make Arcane Blast and Fire Blast slightly more useful, and then two points are left over for Improved Counterspell, which should probably have been taken earlier if you intend to do any PvP on the way to 80, apparently an expansion came out, or something? Seriously, what are you doing here, reading this? We’re going to assume that you’re trapped at work or something. 
   As we all know, leveling builds are wholly different animal. While leveling, your main goal is functionality. You still need DPS talents and you still need survivability talents, but while leveling you need a healthy mix of both, including some talents that don’t quite fit into either category. Read the rest of this entry »

What is magic? What does it feel like to harness it? Does the mage have to do a strange ritual or utter incomprehensible words in an ancient language in order to cast her spells? Other fantasy settings often have one or more of these elements together, but as far as I can tell, Warcraft lacks them.

Arcane magic in the World of Warcraft is an ever-present energy field surrounding the whole world. Mages access it by concentrating in the magic energy within themselves, feeling it rush through their body, and directing it as they please. The Mage is the foremost master of magic in the Warcraft universe. Although all the other classes excluding the Warrior and the Rogue use magic of one sort or another with equally wonderful effects, the Mage is the class that’s named after the stuff.

Those spells that require reagents need an extra focusing item with magical properties of its own in order to bring about the desired effect, but for the most part, fireballs, frostbolts and arcane explosions can be created through the mere act of will on the part of a properly educated mind. Read the rest of this entry »

Last week we went over some of the new Wrath factions and the rewards they offer for Mages. If you missed that first part, you can find it here. As quite a few of you pointed out in the comments, the stuff from those factions was a bit…underwhelming. Fear not, fellow Mages, the best is yet to come. This week, we’ll hit the rest of the new expansion’s reputation rewards and highlight those that you’ll want to start grinding for now, if you haven’t already started.

So I assume that you’re all about sick of leftover turkey at this point (at least, those of you who happen to live in America, I guess), and are ready for a heaping helping of something…Magier. Fear not, for Arcane Brilliance is here to serve a steaming pile of Mage directly to you. If you top it with enough gravy, it tastes pretty good.

Knights of the Ebon Blade

Though this faction is made up of rogue Death Knights, they have a couple of surprisingly Mage-friendly reputation rewards for sale. You’ll find their quartermaster in Icecrown, at the Shadow Vault.

Dark Soldier Cape Available at level 78 and honored, this cloak is quite respectable. It has everything you want, and nothing you don’t. Plus, I think it looks cool. Read the rest of this entry »

That about does it for immediately relevant Mage-specific Wrath posts, although there are probably more lurking in our Mage category. They like to cast invisibility.You will be, after you read our riveting Wrath resources on all things Magely. And read quickly - there are just a few short hours left.

 Christian is not best pleased with Deep Freeze. In addition to Penguin, which at least half of you probably have already, once you make your way to Dalaran, and if you have some extra gold, you can learn Polymorph: Black Cat! Too bad Hallow’s End is over.

How long will your gear last? Depends on how good it is, of course, but T6 should get you to Naxx. Mirror Image. Read the rest of this entry »

That could practically read “reduced the mana cost of mages.” Great stuff. Looking at the numbers from the last beta build, the reduction seems to be on the order of 10%, which is quite noticeable when applied to your staple spells.

Mages, don’t worry, you weren’t left out of the love light this patch. Not at all. The number of bug fixes in your section of the patch notes does outweigh the number of substantive changes, but one of the substantive changes is very significant. Let’s start with a bang:

• Reduced the mana cost of Fireball, Frostbolt, Frostfire Bolt, Arcane Blast, Arcane Missiles, and Arcane Explosion.

  Living Bomb, which has been something of a controversial talent, has also been polished a bit:
  And finally, the bug fixes. They may not be glamorous, they may not be exciting, but these rank-and-file patch notes keep the game running smoothly.

• Arcane Potency: crit bonus is now consumed immediately on cast of a spell with travel time, so you can’t get double benefits from combos like Fireball + Fireblast.
• Blast Wave no longer gets double the intended crit bonus from Combustion
• Burnout now consumes extra mana as intended when Living Bomb crits
• Focus Magic now works properly when mages use the ability on each other (kinky)
• Frostfire Bolt (rank 2): periodic damage now benefits from spell power gains
• Master of Elements now works with Living Bomb
• Molten Fury no longer prevents Ice Lance ranks 2 and 3 from dealing triple damage against frozen targets
• Torment of the Weak now works correctly when the mage also has Molten Fury
• Living Bomb: Mana cost reduced to be the same as Arcane Explosion; no longer causes the caster to stand up when the final explosion occurs, and it is now possible for each mage to have a Living Bomb active on a target.

Frost mages, I’m sorry, but there’s a herd of small nerfs (nerflings?) for you in this patch:

• Brain Freeze: Now only works on Frost spells with a chilling effect (was all Frost spells)
• Cold as Ice: No longer reduces the cooldown for Deep Freeze
• Deep Freeze: Now consumes a Fingers of Frost charge when used

No real way to sugar-coat all that, but it doesn’t look too major to me, anyway.

Firestarter
Your Blast Wave and Dragon’s Breath spells have a 50%/100% chance to make your next Flamestrike spell instant cast. Lasts 10 seconds.
Dragon’s Breath
Targets in a cone in front of the caster take 370 to 430 Fire damage and are Disoriented for 5 seconds. Any direct damaging attack will revive targets. Turns off your attack when used.
37% of base mana, Instant cast, 20 seconds cooldown

Living Bomb
The target becomes a Living Bomb, taking 612 Fire damage over 12 seconds. After 12 seconds or when the spell is dispelled, the target explodes dealing 306 Fire damage to all enemies within 10 yards and knocking all targets up in the air. This spell can only affect one target at a time.
37% of base mana, 35 yard range, Instant cast
Burnout
Increases your spell critical damage bonus with all Fire spells by 10%/20%/30%/40%/50% but your spell criticals cost an additional 1%/2%/3%/4%/5% of the spell’s cost.

Hot Streak
Any time you score 3 spell criticals in a row, you have a 33%/66%/100% chance the next spell cast within 10 seconds will gain 100% increased chance to score a critical hit.
Molten Fury
Increases damage of all spells against targets with less than 20% health by 10%/20%.
Blazing Speed
Gives you a 5%/10% chance when hit by a melee or ranged attack to increase your movement speed by 50% and dispel all movement impairing effects. This effect lasts 8 seconds.
Fire Power
Increases the damage done by your Fire spells by 2%/4%/6%/8%/10%.
Playing with Fire
Increases all spell damage caused by 1%/2%/3% and all spell damage taken by 1%/2%/3%.

Fiery Payback
When below 35% health all damage taken is reduced by 10%/20% and your Pyroblast spell’s cast time is reduced by 1.75/3.5 secondss while the cooldown is increased by 2.5/5 secondss.
Empowered Fireball
Increases the damage of your Fireball spell by an amount equal to 5%/10%/15% of your spell power.
Pyromaniac
Increases chance to critically hit and reduces the mana cost of all Fire spells by an additional 1%/2%/3%.
Combustion
When activated, this spell causes each of your Fire damage spell hits to increase your critical strike chance with Fire damage spells by 10%. This effect lasts until you have caused 3 critical strikes with Fire spells.
Instant, 3 minutes cooldown