De-homogenization of Mages, what do you want to see?

[Polarthief]

<snip>

It's more or less that both are incredibly unsatisfying to press mixed with "they both just proc a thing". Yes, the cast time is different and Fireball proccing is based on Crit instead of RNG (practically the same thing), but you can't look at me weird and say "the fuck? They're incredibly different!", because they're really not. Spells should be fun to cast instead of just flinging it, hoping something pops up, and when it doesn't, you continue casting it. This is why I'd love to see a prioirty/cooldown system akin to Ret/Enh. When stuff comes off of cooldown and you pop it, it's fun. Frozen Orb, Novas, Combustion, hell, even fucking Arcane Barrage is fun to press (plus the pretty pixels are a plus but by no means vital). Casting the same spell 5 times in a row is far from fun or satisfying, and again, Fireball and Frostbolt aren't the exact same spells, but in the way they feel, both are very same-y.

Looking at Arcane, it's at least different in that the highest DPS rotation is spamming Arcane Blast (at high mana with cooldowns). ABl is intended to do high damage; it's quick, the damage is immediate, and it feels pretty good to press (especially during AP with high mana), even if there's almost no visual representation, and hell, it has more than just spam it, then do another thing. There's more to the rotation than the set-in-stone proc-filler priority system, even if it's only for ~15 seconds every 1.5 minutes (though I'm still not a huge fan of it, I at least acknowledge it's something different).

[Deleted]

... Fireball and Frostbolt aren't the exact same spells, but in the way they feel, both are very same-y.

Even this is the biggest difference. On paper the difference was clearly stated by komma. But in the feeling Fireball is such a huge fucking sloooooow cast. The casttime difference is not that high but from a point of feel fire is a slow, ill make a coffee/baby/car while casting spell. This alone makes the difference for the spec. Frost ist generally a high pace spec while fire is a slow pace one.

[Obelisk Kai]

Your post is the dictionary definition of a strawman argument. You have no idea what I think yet you made a whole story about what I think (and you assumed wrong obviously). Also, of course I do not think I represent the player base.

Maybe you think you do hence the reason you were offended.

Ahem

I hope Blizzard understands these Suggestion threads have the same people repeating the same ideas and not representing the player base.

Implying the majority are silent. Implying the majority agree with you. And you have the neck to accuse me of speaking on behalf of the player base?

- - - Updated - - -

Even this is the biggest difference. On paper the difference was clearly stated by komma. But in the feeling Fireball is such a huge fucking sloooooow cast. The casttime difference is not that high but from a point of feel fire is a slow, ill make a coffee/baby/car while casting spell. This alone makes the difference for the spec. Frost ist generally a high pace spec while fire is a slow pace one.

Look we are getting bogged down.

What is clearly at the heart of this divide is surface versus depth.

Yes, if we get deep into any of our specs there are substantial differences and we could spend all day debating such minutiae.

What I think Polarthief is getting at though, and which I agree with, is that the essential germ of the idea of fire and frost are the same. Hard casting a filler nuke and reacting to procs with good potential for cleave.

Do other classes have the same system? Yes they do, but those other classes also have substantially different options if they choose to respec.

The class closest to us, Warlocks, suffer from similar issues but I would argue their specs are more distinct from each other and hence less homogenized.

The problem for Mages is we have two such specs on the same class.

Familiarity with those specs has I believe allowed us to see the differences.

I would argue that frost is a beautiful and elegant spec, almost like a snowflake.

I would similarly argue that fire is a monstrous mess.

I believe fire needs to undergo a massive overhaul. And i believe it needs to be moved AWAY from what it is now, no only for it's own sake in the long term but also to provide more design space for frost to flourish even more.

What we suffer from I think is the consequence of the original mistake Blizzard made, granting us three dps specs. I don't think any class needs three dps of the same type (ranged or melee), and that two of any sort should be the maximum. Hunters now have that.

Warlocks, Rogues and Mages will likely have to bear the consequences of that original mistake for a long time to come.

[Deleted]

Implying the majority are silent. Implying the majority agree with you. And you have the neck to accuse me of speaking on behalf of the player base?

You fell to the same error again. To the perfect example of a strawman argument again. You think others imply something and you believe it.

Stop believing on empty beliefs of implications and assumptions.

> Implying you assumed anything accurate.

[Obelisk Kai]

You fell to the same error again. To the perfect example of a strawman argument again. You think others imply something and you believe it.

Stop believing on empty beliefs of implications and assumptions.

> Implying you assumed anything accurate.

Perhaps you should stop attempting to undermine those disagreeing with you by accusing them of arrogance

And if you don't wish to imply something, choose your words more carefully so as not to leave any confusion.

[Deleted]

Perhaps you should stop attempting to undermine those disagreeing with you by accusing them of arrogance

And if you don't wish to imply something, choose your words more carefully so as not to leave any confusion.

Instead of taunting or threatening me, it might be a good time to start working on your logic. It has faults. When you started accusing me here you did it by putting words in my mouth that I never said or even believed.

Work on that because any other thing is pointless.

Accusing me for imaginary stuff only hurts you.

[KurenaiXIII]

Still think you're smoking something, thinking that Fire and Frost play the same.

There will always be fillers and things that proc. Without it a rotation becomes so mechanical they're diesngaging and disinteresting. Look at Retribution Paladins. Their only proc doesn't affect their gameplay at all. Ret paladins have basically three sequences: When they have Avenging Wrath up, when they don't have Avenging Wrath up, and during their execute phase. It's -boring-. I loved playing Ret paladin but it's become so robotic it literally puts me to sleep while I'm playing.

I could see Fire going to a more Hunter/Elemental Shaman-like playstyle--instead of getting crits to proc, having a bigger spell that comes off cooldown regularly--but you'll still have a need for a filler and I'd hope it'd have something to proc to make the gameplay more dynamic. For me, at least, the resource management aspect of Hunters makes their playstyle more dynamic--something Fire clearly wouldn't have, as Blizzard (rightly) doesn't want to make resources a constriction for casters (except in the case of Arcane, obviously).

[Obelisk Kai]

Still think you're smoking something, thinking that Fire and Frost play the same.

There will always be fillers and things that proc. Without it a rotation becomes so mechanical they're diesngaging and disinteresting. Look at Retribution Paladins. Their only proc doesn't affect their gameplay at all. Ret paladins have basically three sequences: When they have Avenging Wrath up, when they don't have Avenging Wrath up, and during their execute phase. It's -boring-. I loved playing Ret paladin but it's become so robotic it literally puts me to sleep while I'm playing.

I could see Fire going to a more Hunter/Elemental Shaman-like playstyle--instead of getting crits to proc, having a bigger spell that comes off cooldown regularly--but you'll still have a need for a filler and I'd hope it'd have something to proc to make the gameplay more dynamic. For me, at least, the resource management aspect of Hunters makes their playstyle more dynamic--something Fire clearly wouldn't have, as Blizzard (rightly) doesn't want to make resources a constriction for casters (except in the case of Arcane, obviously).

I think we are having a disconnect here,.

I and others are not saying fire and frost play the same. Anyone who has played a Mage knows that the two specs have differences.

What I believe we are saying though is that the two specs come from the same idea and play too similarly (similarly, not exactly ) as a result.

Let's take a look at how they described Hunters recently.

They said they saw Hunters as 'survival is melee with a pet, marksmanship is ranged without a pet and beastmastery is ranged with a pet'

Now imagine they had said 'survival is melee with a pet, marksmanship is ranged with a pet and beastmastery is ranged with a pet'. Basically how they think now in regards to beastmastery and marksmanship.

Yes, they can make those specs play somewhat differently but the same core idea for them is there and no matter how much they try and differentiate them the odds are they would never really be able to break away from the basic format.

I believe that this is the problem with the Mage, that we have three specs with the same design spec.

Other classes use the same system of course, and that has been the great rejoinder throughout this debate. They have fillers and procs or they have a priority system. But those other classes have something we don't, the option to do some completely different. The Paladin's other two specs aren't colour coded and mechanical variations of two handed dps, they are tanking and healing.

Even on classes that have two dps specs, there seems to be a lot more variety. Shamans have elemental and enhancement for example. But even if the differences between those two specs were less pronounced, say as between arms and fury for warriors, the narrowness is excused by that third wildly different spec that gives those class CHOICE.

Hunters now have choice. Yes they are still DPS but they can now make a more substantial choice about the kind of dps they want to be. Ranged or at melee? Pet or no pet?

A lot of Rogues are agitating for something similar, a ranged spec of their own simply to get some choice. Who know they may even get it.

Which leaves Mages and Warlocks, again.

We don't have choice. We will likely never have choice. So the least we deserve is variety.

I accept you feel fire and frost are different. They are.

I and others feel they are still too close. The critical difference is that frost works and fire doesn't.

So with fire in it's current state, isn't the logical thing to do to rebuild it as something as different from frost and arcane as possible?

And IF they want us to fulfill the fantasy of each spec, what is fire's fantasy if not burning people alive.

Everything leads towards burning with fire, and that just screams DOTS.

If we have to maintain three ranged dps specs, have ONE that isn't focused on the filler as the core of the rotation.

Fire should be a dot spec just for the sake of sheer variety, regardless if it could be salvaged in it's current form or not.

[Polarthief]

I believe that this is the problem with the Mage, that we have three specs with the same design spec.

Other classes use the same system of course, and that has been the great rejoinder throughout this debate. They have fillers and procs or they have a priority system. But those other classes have something we don't, the option to do some completely different. The Paladin's other two specs aren't colour coded and mechanical variations of two handed dps, they are tanking and healing.

Sure, that's part of the problem, but if you look at Warlock, they have 3 distinctly different specs. Affliction and Destruction play differently and Demonology, well, that's being changed yet again.

I'm not saying "Fire and Frost ARE the same", but they have very similar elements.

A lot of Rogues are agitating for something similar, a ranged spec of their own simply to get some choice. Who know they may even get it.

They at least were stated in an interview during Gamescon, Hunters we heard plenty about, and Warlocks we've known were getting a Demo change since pre-6.2. Mages have yet to get any information outside of 2/3 of our Artifacts (and one of them [Felo'melorn] looks like ass anyways).

We don't have choice. We will likely never have choice. So the least we deserve is variety. So with fire in it's current state, isn't the logical thing to do to rebuild it as something as different from frost and arcane as possible? Everything leads towards burning with fire, and that just screams DOTS. If we have to maintain three ranged dps specs, have ONE that isn't focused on the filler as the core of the rotation. Fire should be a dot spec just for the sake of sheer variety, regardless if it could be salvaged in it's current form or not.

If it works right, sure. The problem is how exactly do you go about making Fire a more DoT spec? If you just add in more "passive" DoTs (e.g., Living Bomb, Corruption, Shadow Word: Pain, etc), won't it just become a clone of Affliction?

[Obelisk Kai]

Sure, that's part of the problem, but if you look at Warlock, they have 3 distinctly different specs. Affliction and Destruction play differently and Demonology, well, that's being changed yet again.

I'm not saying "Fire and Frost ARE the same", but they have very similar elements.

Indeed, Warlocks are sort of in the same boat as we are. However, what divides our specs and what divides their specs?

For us it is flavour, fire, frost and arcane.

For them it is mechanics, pets, dots and nukes. Their divisions are a lot more tangible than ours, there is more to work with mechanically.

And we don't quite know just HOW demonology will turn out now do we?

Three of the four pures are guaranteed to get some level of attention. Of course, Mages are the ones left out but we are inferring that maybe if the other three are getting something we might get some love to.

They at least were stated in an interview during Gamescon, Hunters we heard plenty about, and Warlocks we've known were getting a Demo change since pre-6.2. Mages have yet to get any information outside of 2/3 of our Artifacts (and one of them [Felo'melorn] looks like ass anyways).

We can always hope for more but we must prepare for the likely. I've been around long enough to have memorised the refrain 'Mages are fine'. They don't like tinkering with us. In fact the most attention we have gotten in the past two expansions was inflicting the invocation and bomb tiers on us, forcing us to base our playstyle around them for an entire expansion, then removing them. I was overjoyed they were removed too but in hindsight is it good that our big positive change this expansion was the removal of the last expansion's mistake?

If it works right, sure. The problem is how exactly do you go about making Fire a more DoT spec? If you just add in more "passive" DoTs (e.g., Living Bomb, Corruption, Shadow Word: Pain, etc), won't it just become a clone of Affliction?

To be fair it's been brought up that so many nuking specs work as filler and proc, what is the harm in making another dot spec? They'll jazz it up somehow.

[Polarthief]

Indeed, Warlocks are sort of in the same boat as we are. However, what divides our specs and what divides their specs? For us it is flavour, fire, frost and arcane. For them it is mechanics, pets, dots and nukes. Their divisions are a lot more tangible than ours, there is more to work with mechanically.

That's just such a cop-out though. You can call it Purple, Red, Blue for all I care, and it'd be the exact same thing. Said flavors of Grape, Strawberry, and Blue Raspberry popsicles are a lot different than Candy Bar, Potato Chips, and Piece of Fruit. The popsicles are all popsicles of different flavors while the other 3 are actually different flavors AND different... things, too.

We can always hope for more but we must prepare for the likely. I've been around long enough to have memorised the refrain 'Mages are fine'. They don't like tinkering with us. In fact the most attention we have gotten in the past two expansions was inflicting the invocation and bomb tiers on us, forcing us to base our playstyle around them for an entire expansion, then removing them. I was overjoyed they were removed too but in hindsight is it good that our big positive change this expansion was the removal of the last expansion's mistake?

Almost like they create something annoying just so they can remove part of it. Make a minimal-effort, bogus, thing that most people won't like so you can just remove it and say that you changed the class. It's sad though because Mages were changed plenty back in BC, LK, and even bits of Cata. Why did we suddenly just become "fine"?

To be fair it's been brought up that so many nuking specs work as filler and proc, what is the harm in making another dot spec? They'll jazz it up somehow.

Hopefully. I mean, Affliction and Shadow Priests both have a resource, and Boomkins have their alignment bar. I'd love to see LocNess's "Heat" system be used, but in place of nukes, we'd have more DoTs and less RNG.

[Deleted]

I agree that in general mage specs have not seen any drastic changes in quite a while. It is not a problem, at a glance, but I think the devs really want to delve into the core of the class and it's specializations in detail in Legion and make all three specs distinct. Basically, an evolution of what they have been doing to the mage class for a while (you are only an Arcane mage), but hopefully each spec will get a complete kit for most ingame tasks. It is also worth noting that the new PvP system can give you the basic PvP options and this leave the PvE team more freedom to experiment.

It would be healthy for the class to spruce things up a bit (even if it is one spec), and as many other people here I agree that Fire is the prime candidate for this. It is the spect that is most affected by RNG and that in turn makes it the most frustrating one to play often times. What I fear the most is that the mage class takes a back seat to the other pures in terms of design changes simply because at the glance the three specs invoke different schools of magic, even though the gameplay requires a lot of work.

[Obelisk Kai]

That's just such a cop-out though. You can call it Purple, Red, Blue for all I care, and it'd be the exact same thing. Said flavors of Grape, Strawberry, and Blue Raspberry popsicles are a lot different than Candy Bar, Potato Chips, and Piece of Fruit. The popsicles are all popsicles of different flavors while the other 3 are actually different flavors AND different... things, too.

I wouldn't call it a cop out, more a sad reflection of reality. For Warlocks the idea came first, and then flavour was secondary.

Our Mage specs were just the flavor and they've been trying to bolt mechanics on since vanilla. Go back far enough and our 'rotations' were spam fireball or spam frostbolt.

It was an inelegant way of going about things.

Almost like they create something annoying just so they can remove part of it. Make a minimal-effort, bogus, thing that most people won't like so you can just remove it and say that you changed the class. It's sad though because Mages were changed plenty back in BC, LK, and even bits of Cata. Why did we suddenly just become "fine"?

I believe they define fine as being that we work and we are competitive. Which we are. But they've never really done an investigation into the fantasy of each spec as they say they are doing now. I hope for great things. I am prepared for inevitable disappointment.

Hopefully. I mean, Affliction and Shadow Priests both have a resource, and Boomkins have their alignment bar. I'd love to see LocNess's "Heat" system be used, but in place of nukes, we'd have more DoTs and less RNG.

At the moment ANYTHING would be better for fire. However I reckon they will decide fireball is too 'iconic' (it's a clump of badly animated red pixels right now) to tinker too much with so I predict what it will be in the end will be what it is now, a nuke spec with a passive dot component as it's differentiating factor.

[Deleted]

Copy paste Cataclysm's fire to be honest. Most of MoP and especially WoD didn't offer anything new. Just simplification and cumbersome tools.

[stehno]

If would be fine if fire had two dots, channeled fireball sequence (channeling fast fire of fireballs), each dot could proc a spell that momentarly empowers each dot and the channel spell could proc a spell that uses the current power of those dosts and mutiplys it by a percentage to create a powerfull blast and then all over. Or something like that. No passive dot, mastery would increase the percentage of the powerful blast and there could be CD like frosts orb that has a chance to proc those spells as well. Yes that would perhaps make it look like a forst but nor really as frost doesnt deal with dots and lets face it everyone has procs.

[Champagne Supernova]

Copy paste Cataclysm's fire to be honest. Most of MoP and especially WoD didn't offer anything new. Just simplification and cumbersome tools.

That doesn't really put fire in a better position. Especially at entry - mid raid content, We are too dependent on crit and really we're only viable with around 40-50% crit or by having a set bonus like T17. Sure, the 10% increase to crit with each fireball helps, but it's not enough. We'd be better off if they just made living bomb baseline again and have living bomb ticks have a chance to proc an instant critical pyro or something Or bake pyro into the 'New Chaosbolt' with a resource system.

[Deleted]

That doesn't really put fire in a better position. Especially at entry - mid raid content, We are too dependent on crit and really we're only viable with around 40-50% crit or by having a set bonus like T17. Sure, the 10% increase to crit with each fireball helps, but it's not enough. We'd be better off if they just made living bomb baseline again and have living bomb ticks have a chance to proc an instant critical pyro or something Or bake pyro into the 'New Chaosbolt' with a resource system.

Maybe I'm too attached to Alysrazor. That fight was beautiful for us in hard mode(old heroic). Ironically, it was possibly a boss design oversight.

[Tjaeden]

Fire - Frost - Arcane
Instants: Fire Blast - Ice Lance - Arcane Barrage
Cast: Fireball - Frost Bolt - Arcane Blast
Proc: Pyroblast - Frostfire Bolt - Arcane Missiles
CD: Combustion - Icy Veins - Arcane Power
AoE: Flamestrike - Blizzard - Arcane Explosion
Skill Shot: Dragon's Breath - Cone of Cold - Cone of Cold

Are we happy at THIS level?

Or are we really focus on HOW the damage is done?

Fire -> DoTs
Frost -> Instants
Arcane -> Mana Management

[Deleted]

Fire -> DoTs
Frost -> Instants
Arcane -> Mana Management

I would call Arcane's 'long term nuking'. Frost has it but in a short term form. It defines the whole nature of Arcane since it requires to know exactly when to nuke and when not to to not be gimped.

[SherriMayim]

I mean, I love Fire. It was my favorite for BC/WOTLK but now it really needs a rework.. like, increasing the actual spell damage you know?