MAKE ARCANE GOOD
So a few things about the arcane tree. It's a mess but I see some weird things we might be able to do with it. Supernova knocks all targets up? Will this be interrupting things? That's a 25 second pseudo aoe interrupt. Brings some utility to arcane. Then there's also some weird things we might be able to do with cancell cast macros to consume clearcasts in our burst windows when you play a spark build, in order to increase blast dmg by 20%. Arcane power is now on a baseline 1.5 min cd making it so you can do a big ramp and a small ramp on any build you choose.The arcane orb build looks real interesting as in aoe or single target you'll be sending upwards of 4+ orbs out during a burst window with other ones going out at random times too. Gives a potential non evocation build if you're careful with mana. I.e. You can stay in Enlightened window permanently.
For Fire having to get Conflagration (which is meh by itself) in order to get a better blazing barrier is gonna cause problems,especially in PvP. Also I don't see any reason having BOTH Pyroclasm AND SKB. Also if you have one cast of ROP and one does not automatically drop with CDs (except Icy Veins it seems? ) doesn't make much sense for Fire and Arcane. It's actually better if it just becomes a passive on CDs,as there's not really a choice in the matter. Requiring Shatter or Cone of cold in order to decurse in the general mage tree feels weird. Also I see nothing new. For Arcane everything seems a mess.
After watching the icicles talents, I can only hope for the Glacial Spike build to be viable at least again.
I'm liking arcane more and more the more I look at it. They fixed the problem of arcane power reducing clearcast proc rate. And you can get an all burst all the time build from what I can see. 1 min evo? You'll just be blasting 24/7. Arcane Power now doing what looks to be a kamehameha worth of dmg into a magi seems fun as well. Reverse burst setup? Spark first get 3 stacks ---> Magi ---> Power ---> Barrage proceed to blasting the target with missiles.
I am disappointed with mage talents. Mage was my first character in WoW when i started in 2008. Stopped playing mage in BfA. At least my other favorite classes receive good changes. Rogue gets Acrobatic strikes and Leeching poison for every spec and warrior datamines look promising, so it will be one of these for Dragonflight.
wildfire talent is confusing. 4% crit strike with combust, does that mean 4% crit strike damage or chance? cuz if its 4% crit chance makes no sense with combust since combust gives 100% crit chance anyway
My only question is...where is the counterspell? đŸ˜‚
I've been playing mage since Wrath and the specs has hardly changed since Cata. I like arcane surge and the random buff talent, nice spells. But those are the only really new things. they seem to just pack in old cov and lego ability and not considered gameplay. A dragonflight mage will still be playing the same WOD mage and thats just bad. my opinion is i think blizzard does not want to mess with a "working" class, but the class has been boring and the same for many xpaks. the base talents feel terrible, having to spend point and mages spells like counterspell seems wrong as its the Only interrupt we have. no idea why shatter is in there too, not much use for fire or arcane. will likely be a skipped point for them. Arcane just feels forgotten. its like Blizz doesn't know what to do with the mage.
Invisibility should be a baseline ability. Looking at talents you can end up with a completely useless talent by having greater invisibility and invisibility, then greater invisibility is superior in every way. Replacing invisibility, I'd look at some extra utility, like an offensive dispel that doesn't require insane mana (21% vs ~2% for a Priest's dispel). Or adding a defensive dispel. Master of magic and all.Icy Veins has a crazy amount of talents that affect it. it's also crazy that thermal void is one point for +10 seconds and an extra second of Icy Veins for each crit, but you also in the same tier have 2 talent points for +3 seconds ("Improved Icy Veins"), which is awful in comparison.A decent start, but definitely some improvements needed. It feels like too much essential stuff is in the center of the tree.Also no return for Frostfire Bolt or Deep Freeze?
Blizzard are clowns. The end
Love Fire, got ideas flowing for Arcane, Frost is meh. RoPs extra (and non-gcd) cast on burst is awesome, but I liked long-forgotten static RoP more, and Incanter's flow does not look like an option in any case... I was hoping for Arcane Crystal, tbh.As a feel of specs, I hate "new" Frostbolt visual (changed in Legion?) and I hate Flurry - Frostfire bolt was amazing. Why so many abilities became less impactful? Take warrior's Execute and paladin's Templar's verdict - they had an "impactful" feel in them, and now a joke.
Same old, boring. Everything about this new expansion has seemed negative so far, except the theme.
I feel like there will be many changes to the class tree by the time DF is launched. I am not sure about the spec tree.
Watch Incanter's Flow be a dead talent AGAIN for the entire expansion, trash dev team.