[ARCANE] Legion Beta Megathread

[Shangalar]

As promised, here is the first of two megathreads - Arcane. The Fire megathread will be up tomorrow as I'm not sure I'll have time to complete it today. This already took nearly three hours. I've also added my own commentary for Arcane at the bottom so feel free to use it as a basis for a fresh discussion if you want to.

Please don't hesitate to point out if some of the links are wrong or if there's more information you'd like me to add that I might have skipped. Or if you want it to be organized differently or something.

ARCANE overview (updated 13 Feb 2016)

I BASE SPELLS

- Frost Nova, Polymorph, Counterspell, Slow
- Blink, Displacement, Slow Fall
- Ice Barrier, Greater Invisibility, Mage Armor
- Arcane Charge, Arcane Blast, Arcane Barrage, Arcane Missiles, Arcane Explosion, Mastery: Savant
- Evocation, Mana Attunement
- Arcane Power
- Time Warp
- Spellsteal
- Refreshments, Teleports and Portals, Arcane Linguist, Illusion

II TALENTS

Level 15: Arcane Familiar // Presence of Mind // Torrent
Level 30: Shimmer // Cauterize // Ice Block
Level 45: Mirror Image // Rune of Power // Incanter’s Flow
Level 60: Supernova // Charged Up // Words of Power
Level 75: Ice Floes // Ring of Frost // Ice Ward
Level 90: Nether Tempest // Unstable Magic // Erosion
Level 100: Overpowered // Quickening // Arcane Orb

III Artifact Weapon - Aluneth, Greatstaff of the Magna

- Power of Aegwynn
- Mark of Aluneth
- Crackling Energy
- Torrential Barrage
- Blasting Rod
- Aegwynn’s Wrath
- Aegwynn’s Imperative
- Aegwynn’s Ascendance
- Everywhere at Once
- Arcane Purification
- Slow Down
- Aegwynn’s Fury
- Icy Core
- Arcane Rebound
- Ethereal Sensitivity
- Rule of Threes
- Touch of the Magi

IV PvP Talents

Tier 1: Gladiator’s Medallion // Adaptation // Relentless
Tier 2: Train of Thought // Mind Quickness // Initiation
Tier 3: Netherwind Armor // Burning Determination // Prismatic Cloak
Tier 4: Kleptomania // Dense Ice // Temporal Shield
Tier 5: Concentrated Power // Torment the Weak // Time Anomaly
Tier 6: Master of Escape // Rewind Time // Mass Invisibility

V T19 set bonuses

2-set: Your spells have an additional 10% chance to activate Arcane Missiles.
4-set: Casting Arcane Missiles reduces the remaining cooldown on Evocation by 1 sec.




Shang's commentary:

I. Base toolkit: the base spell list includes sort of a "complete" setup for starters - it has a whole dps rotation, sufficient defensive and survival spells, various crowd control abilities and several cute fluff spells.

II. Talents

Level 15 talents offer a variety of abilities - sustain, burst / pvp and an aoe buff. The familiar increases mana and deals some damage and I guess the most important value here will be how much damage it does and how valuable the 10% mana increase will be overall compared with the benefit of having on-demand burst with PoM. Torrent will be valuable on fights with several adds or cleaving, while PoM provides significant burst for specific adds that need to die very quickly. For primarily single target encounters I feel that the Familiar will definitely be the strongest choice.

Level 30 talents focus on survival. The choice is between a weak Blink buff completely unnecessary for Arcane Mages, Cauterize which saves your life passively and Ice Block with two charges. I honestly don't think anything will ever be able to compete with Ice Block on this level and my opinion is still that one charge of Ice Block should be baseline and the other one can be talented for PvP. Shimmer will practically never be used by anyone and has to be changed or removed.

Level 45 talents are strong primarily passive dps buffs. Images still seem the weakest of the set for Arcane, Rune was changed again and now gives an insanely strong damage buff while standing in the rune and seems like the best choice on all encounters it is usable on. Putting aside all the "we have to stand in a small circle" issues that have existed for years, in the current form it looks quite impressive from my perspective. Flow is the same as it was, providing a varying damage increase over time and will still be the choice for mages when Rune is unavailable due to increased movement. I feel like the 50% on Rune will be reduced at some point, but we'll see what happens and the smart mages will do the math to determine the best choice.

Level 60 talents seem like they might be a tougher choice. Supernova is still the strong burst spell as it was before, Charged Up gives Charges on a relatively low cooldown and Words give free Missiles on Evocation. We'll have to see how Words play out if the current for of the 4-set bonus sticks around, but other than that it will once again be up to math to shine the right path.

Level 75 talents are a weird set - there's only one choice for raiding which is Ice Floes and we like to be able to sometimes cast while moving. The other talents are crowd control and will be used in PvP. I haven't decided if this is good or bad yet, but if they want to keep it that way, the choice is clear.

Level 90 talents are again a decent choice based on encounter. Nether Tempest is a decent damage over time ability which plays nice on encounters with multiple targets living the entire duration. Unstable Magic is a weird combination of single target and aoe which I still don't know how to classify, but it will be interesting to compare it's potential with Erosion's. Erosion potentially gives a steady 10% damage buff. I don't know.

Level 100 talents, again, offer various choices based on encounter. Overpowered extends burst, Quickening gives a lot of passive Haste increasing the dynamic of the entire rotation, but since Haste no longer increases mana renegeration it will have to be carefully considered. Arcane Orb is unchanged and will likely be the primary choice for aoe encounters.

3. Weapon

Our weapon gives a lot of abilities and buffs various spells in cool and useful ways. I particularly like the two Missiles buffs, increased chance to proc and casting more Missiles. From the utility buffs, Evocation immunity and the Blink cooldown reduction are both fascinating and I don't particulary care to debate Evocation giving defense and dealing damage and returning mana all at the same time. Sure, it requires a lot of planning, sometimes possibly even a bit of sacrifice, but we'll see how that develops over time. The other DPS increases - Force Bolt and Mark of Aluneth are both cool. I followed the debate about about Mark being semi-unusable and I disagree with the criticism about targets moving out, especially in raiding.

I won't comment on the PvP talents at this time, although I'm excited to actually play PvP with all of them and I am in love with the return of Prismatic Cloak (a big screw you Death Grip!), that was one of my favorite talents in Wrath and Cataclysm. Some others are very cool too, there's a potential to deal massive damage in pvp within 10 seconds when all the talents, pvp talents and weapon abilities are brought together. Arcane also has a lot of escape.

Finally, the current version of the set bonuses is great for the start of the expansion when we have less mana and Blasting will be more taxing. Missiles will have a huge proc chance and we'll be able to burst more often with the Evocation cd reduction. Let's see how it goes in the future, but from the current iteration of everything Arcane seems to be in a very very good place for the start of the expansion. I'm excited.

[Champagne Supernova]

Coming from a mage who has primarily played a Fire mage from BC - WoD, I'm actually tempted to go Arcane this time round. Overall in the current state of the alpha, Arcane has come out with the best changes in my opinion in regards to talents, artifact and general improved game play.

I'm excited to try it out and not be so reliant on Crit percentage to perform well, and as an avid casual BG player, I'm excited that Arcane may work tremendously well in that environment now.

Edit: Is it correct that familiar lasts for 60 mins and is unable to be targeted? That's insane
And how well do you think Nether Tempest will perform with Quickening, assuming cast at 4 charges and before you barrage on single target?
Or does it seem like it's erosion all the way for ST?

And lastly your Mind Quickness link needs fixing.

[Northem]

Thanks for you dedication!! Hopefully with this thread all arcane matters are together and are easy to read.

PS: Incidentally, when the Fire thread is opened tomorrow, the general megathread will be closed? I hope so, because otherwise it would be counterproductive to have dedicated threads plus a general one ...

[Champagne Supernova]

Thanks for you dedication!! Hopefully with this thread all arcane matters are together and are easy to read.

PS: Incidentally, when the Fire thread is opened tomorrow, the general megathread will be closed? I hope so, because otherwise it would be counterproductive to have dedicated threads plus a general one ...

Second the closure of that thread once all 3 specs are playable.

[Shangalar]

Exactly, once all three specs are playable. Not sure if it will be closed, but all spec discussions should be in their own threads at that time, the big thread can be used for speculation, wild unlikely suggestions, random class banter and stuff like that.

[WarcraftMages]

Anyone that has settled into a reliable base rotation for use in the "I. Base toolkit:" of the OP? No need to close a general thread. Even if it's closed, there should be a new one for general and common stuff, e.g. defensives that are common in all specs.

[mindw0rk]

With 100% boost in artifact talents, how much absorb ice shield gives in percentage of mage health?

[Obelisk Kai]

We are all aware of the spec pendulum that has dominated the Mage meta game since at least Ulduar came out, where Fire and Arcane competed for the position of top DPS among Mages. If fire was on top, Arcane Mages were almost guaranteed to get a look and a buff in the next patch and if Arcane began to dominate, Fire would receive some attention.

The end result was that Mages could never settle, not really. We could NOT play the spec we enjoyed, we had to play the spec which came top. My perception is that for the majority of Mages, our time as Arcane was a trial. We LIKED fire with it's colourful graphics, intuitive playstyle and the fact that at the end of most expansions the spec essentially scaled out of control and burned down everything around us. Arcane in contrast was always, despite Blizzard's claim in the class preview a few months back, thematically bland. What drove Arcane from bland to torturous, for me at least, was the introduction of the Mastery.

Mana Adept was never something I enjoyed. No more how often I came back to playing an Arcane Mage, I always deeply resented a spec that punished me for doing my job and spending mana. Coupled with the punishing nature of the rotation that heavily penalised you if you slipped up, is it any wonder that I (and may I dare claim, the majority) of Mages came to despise it?

So we come to Legion, where Arcane Mages may start anew. The replacement of the mastery is the biggest fundamental shift the specialization has undergone in years.
We can now play Arcane safe in the knowledge that we won't have this irritating and nagging sense in the back of our skulls that we are being punished for using our spells. We no longer have to worry about making one Arcane Blast too many and messing up entirely.

So as it starts, for me, Arcane Mages are already on the up. The new mastery, Arcane Savant, still feeds into the class fantasy of mana management but in a way I reckon could feel good rather than bad.

Now,Celestalon said very recently in the Fury Warrior thread the following...

"As we've been saying lately, this is an alpha. And an alpha is the perfect time to experiment with a variety of potential designs, and get feedback on them. So when we make changes and you dislike them, that's not a failure, that's an opportunity for successful use of the testing process. Share your feedback, and do it in a constructive way. We're listening. (And please share your feedback when you do like things as well!)"

We have to believe that it true for us as well as others. We also have to hope that Blizzard is looking for feedback in places that are NOT exclusively the Legion alpha forums. So many good players with valid opinions don't have alpha access yet they have as much right to help Blizzard iterate on the design of our class as those lucky enough to be chosen. We have the downside of being on the outside looking in for the most part, but that doesn't mean our concerns or our observations should be discounted immediately although we have to admit we are disadvantaged by it.

With the level 15 tier my concern is more thematic rather than mechanical (I assume the three talents will ultimately be balanced). I worry Arcane Familiar will be the gateway to making Arcane a second pet spec. Having one pet spec is something I not only tolerate as a Mage, but I actively support. I actually think Lonely Winter is a bad idea because ultimately it will encourage Blizzard NOT to further develop the Water Elemental as Frost's defining trait...they will ALWAYS have to consider players who don't take lonely winter as they iterate further on frost. But two pet options on two different specs for Mages feels wrong to me. At the moment Arcane familiar is as limited a pet as you can get though. From the videos I have seen it appears to be a visual representation of the 10% mana buff but it does occasionally attack. I would suggest it increase the damage of one our rotational spells instead rather than attacking directly itself on pure thematic grounds...however as long as it never receives a pet control bar, is never target-able by our opponents and as long as the damage it does is pretty much a wet noodle (so that a pet doesn't account for a significant proportion of Arcane's damage output) I can live with it.

Once again I reiterate my own strong belief that Mage defensives are currently messed up for the class as a whole, but I'll focus on Arcane in this megathread (which because of the level 30 tier, will focus on parts of the class as a whole).

The level 30 talent tier contains one talent, Cauterize, that actually 'FEELS' proportional in terms of what it sets out to achieve. It 'FEELS' like a talent because it is a strong passive option, it has the effect of granting the Mage affected a speed boost that allows them to 'get out of dodge' pretty rapidly and it has a downside in that you burn to death, meaning that it is best chosen when you are grouping with others, preferably someone who will be able to heal.

Shimmer does not feel like a talent. Shimmer, in all brutal honesty, feels like a placeholder put in place while they brainstorm the talent that is going to replace it. We've debated Shimmer long and hard in the general thread and the consensus seems to be that is a mockery, a bad joke. At the moment, for Arcane specifically with all the options it now has to lower the cooldown on Blink, Shimmer is a dead talent. You may as well delete it from the Arcane tree because nobody will take it.
Given the recent iteration on Arcane's Everywhere at Once trait, I feel that even Blizzard must be planning to remove the ability very, very shortly.

Ice Block has also caused a lot of discussions among Mages. None of us are happy that this formerly baseline ability is once again a talent, even if it now has two charges allowing it to be available once every two and a half minutes on average. I find myself agreeing both Shangalar's assessment, that Ice Block with two charges is simply too strong a choice compared to Cauterize. While Cauterize is a passive on a shorter CD than Ice Block (if you use the charges every 150 seconds on average), it comes with the price tag of stressing out your healer in raids (and Blizzard is taking yet another crack at 'stressing healers out' in Legion) and in a battleground would essentially be a death sentence...you'd survive one hit only to very likely die on the next blow. I also find myself agreeing with his proposed solution, of allowing a single charge Ice Block to remain baseline and allowing the second charge to be talented. It is an elegant suggestion and one I hope Blizzard decides to take up.

Baseline, Arcane has both Ice Barrier and Greater Invisibility. While Greater Invisibility being unique to one spec is something I find a bit offensive, I will not lie when I say it is a massive selling point for the Arcane spec. Greater Invisibility is a fun and flexible survival mechanic. If Ice Barrier does end up as strong as Blizzard keeps telling us it is going to be (and Arcane gets the Icy Core trait as well), then baseline Arcane is well served by it's baseline defensives. The final Arcane defensive, Everywhere at once, is thematically appropriate and potentially a lot of fun.
Therefore, in terms of defensives, I find Arcane Mages suffer from the same problems talent wise as Fire and Frost but that factoring in their baseline abilities, Arcane comes out ahead. Still hoping for iteration on the level 30 tier.

The biggest issue for the level 45 tier for me is it's bad design. It's not the fact that Rune will probably edge out Images on virtually every encounters, it is that Rune and Images exist on the same tier at all. Both are cooldowns and ultimately the choice between them will boil down to which is right and which is wrong. From the outside looking in, it seems as if Blizzard is desperate to maintain both abilities and cannot bring themselves to cut either. Talents that affect throughput usually come in three flavours. Active, passive and sustained. The old level 90 talents back in Mists were Invocation (active), Rune of Power (sustained) and Incanter's Ward (passive).
Incanter's Flow is passive. Mirror Images is active. Rune of Power in it's current iteration is sustained, but everyone hates that. Could Mirror Images be reworked into a sustained talent of some sort? Wouldn't it ultimately be a passive?


The level 75 tier seems to be badly designed as well, to the point we are all hoping for improvement. Ice Floes seems to be the sore thumb here, not only is it the default option but it simply doesn't mesh with the CC theme of the other two abilities.
In all honesty, Ice Floes should be removed as a talent because this tier seems destined to be the CC tier. Ice Floes could be straight up removed.
Or it could be made baseline for all Mages. Or it could be made baseline for Frost only...after all, Arcane has Blink on a lower cooldown and Fire can maintain it's rotation by using scorch in place of Fireball. But those are more general ideas.
In terms of what could replace Ice Floes I don't really know. All I can say is that Ice Floes really doesn't belong there as it stands.

I am reserving judgement on the level 65, 90 and 100 tiers. These are options I feel I would actually need to play to be able to determine strong opinions them although I do retain concerns about Words of Power and Quickening.


Regarding our rotation, it's the same as ever although as I stated earlier it will be interesting to try it our unshackled by the old mastery.

The same goes for Mark of Aluneth, which is the big topic of the moment. I don't know if it's requirements are good are bad. Does a spell have to be usable in absolutely every situation? Is Arcane instantly unusable because one brand new ability doesn't behave exactly as we want?

What I will say is this. For the first time in a long time, Arcane may finally NOT be the spec we all dreaded having to play. Blinking like a maniac? Greater Invisibility guaranteed? Cleaving Barrage? Actual (and non punishing) utilisation of our primary resource? Mass slow? The big decision for me on Legion launch day is what legendary I will pick up first. Whilst playing the specs will be the ultimate teacher of what I like and what I don't, I like to think I will be able to know in my heart what my main spec will be over the expansion's first patch and consequently which legendary I will take first.

For the first time since the class preview, Aluneth is definitely in with a shout.

[The Archmage]

Nice work, commendable

I am VERY interested by Legion's take on Arcane Mages. They have been my main spec for as long as i can remember and i love everything about these changes: starting from what is (imho, of course) the most beautiful artifact of all, to the nice and probably well thought effort of giving the spec a much needed possibility to do AoE in a competetive way (really CANNOT wait to see that Arcane Rebound trait in action, expecially when paired with Torrent talent).

Only little downside is the complete lack of visual upgrades, since it was kinda "due" if you ask me, but i can get over it if the spec works.

[Imnick]

There's still hope for visual upgrades, they're not done with the graphics yet and added new spell effects to other already playable specs in the same build that added Arcane mages. Fire didn't have all of its new effects as soon as it became playable.

[Deleted]

Coming from a mage who has primarily played a Fire mage from BC - WoD, I'm actually tempted to go Arcane this time round. Overall in the current state of the alpha, Arcane has come out with the best changes in my opinion in regards to talents, artifact and general improved game play.

I'm excited to try it out and not be so reliant on Crit percentage to perform well, and as an avid casual BG player, I'm excited that Arcane may work tremendously well in that environment now.

Man, you take the words right out of my mouth. Arcane always seemed very appealing to me, since thematically, it is as mage-y as it gets.

Ice Block has also caused a lot of discussions among Mages. None of us are happy that this formerly baseline ability is once again a talent, even if it now has two charges allowing it to be available once every two and a half minutes on average. I find myself agreeing both Shangalar's assessment, that Ice Block with two charges is simply too strong a choice compared to Cauterize. While Cauterize is a passive on a shorter CD than Ice Block (if you use the charges every 150 seconds on average), it comes with the price tag of stressing out your healer in raids (and Blizzard is taking yet another crack at 'stressing healers out' in Legion) and in a battleground would essentially be a death sentence...you'd survive one hit only to very likely die on the next blow. I also find myself agreeing with his proposed solution, of allowing a single charge Ice Block to remain baseline and allowing the second charge to be talented. It is an elegant suggestion and one I hope Blizzard decides to take up.

A talented second Ice block charge strikes me as a bit weak (although I absolutely agree, IB in its current form is way too appealing, comparatively). They should add an additional effect. A small, handy addition, nothing too strong. Perhaps IB could grant a charge/reset the CD of Frost Nova? I think there once was a glyph like this and it would be nice to celebrate the return of our darling Frost Nova after two years of exile.

By the way, I really hope Arcane Blast and Arcane Missiles will be granted a rework. I am far from being the first to voice that, yes, I'm aware. But hey, that animation will enter middle school, soon, and it is about time this plain child entered puberty to flower into a handsome young adult. We'll skip the pimples and akwardness, though.

[Deleted]

Just on the subject of animations, it'd be great to have different shields as part of the now entirely cosmetic glyph system. It's always been weird to me to have Ice Barrier for Arcane And Fire. Would be great to see a Flame Ward for fire, and an Arcane Shield for arcane, just to tie into the specs a little better. Really takes from the whole look of arcane and fire to have a huge barrier of ice around you, especially for fire with all the glorious new effects it has.

As far as the spec goes, I'm really loving the changes so far, especially Rune of Power allowing for more surgical burst methods and not being glued to it for the entire fight. Be interesting to see how it holds up against everything else once the tuning passes start happening, since the Damage arcane has right now on alpha feels a little OTT. Nearly 2 mil arcane blasts with cooldowns running just feels a bit out of whack, along with the 1.2mil barrages.

[Kuni Zyrekai]

Nearly 2 mil arcane blasts with cooldowns running just feels a bit out of whack, along with the 1.2mil barrages.

Stop hitting lowbie dummies.

[Deleted]

Just on the subject of animations, it'd be great to have different shields as part of the now entirely cosmetic glyph system. It's always been weird to me to have Ice Barrier for Arcane And Fire. Would be great to see a Flame Ward for fire, and an Arcane Shield for arcane, just to tie into the specs a little better. Really takes from the whole look of arcane and fire to have a huge barrier of ice around you, especially for fire with all the glorious new effects it has.

Arcane Shield? Mana Shield!
I'd appreciate it, now that Ice Barrier becomes baseline. On the other hand, if IB would become spec appropriate, they would probably also be counted towards their respective spell school. For fire and arcane that would be a minor hindrance in PvP. I'd still take glyph. I'd be a bit annoyed when doing so, though.

[Deleted]

I checked out Touch of the Magi a bit. Of course subject to change.

It procs very often like every 25-30s.
Damage from pets like Arcane Familiar or Mirror Images does not count.
Only damage dealt to the debuffed target counts (e.g. SN aoe to other targets does not).
The debuff "Touch of the Magi Accumulator" only lasts for 12s and detonates for 20% damage dealt. (10k AB --> 2k explosion)
The explosion damage itself is affected by RoP and IF. (10k AB * 1.5 (RoP) = 15k AB ---> 3k * 1.5 (RoP) explosion, double dip?)
Erosion does not increase the explosion damage again. (10k AB * 1.1 (10x Erosion) = 11k AB ---> 2,2k explosion)
Force Bolt does not count.
Mark of Aluneth counts, even the stacking debuff for the explosion.
The explosion may crit.

[Deleted]

Stop hitting lowbie dummies.

This was Violet Hold at 110.

For the record the accompanying classes were a Prot Pala, Enhancement Shaman, Holy Priest, BM hunter. No idea if there's any potentially buggy interactions between debuffs causing things to hit harder, but the damage aross all spells was stupid. Missiles ticking non crit for 277k, 1.2mil barrages. Hell even Mark of Aluneth detonation was doing the biggest part of a million damage.

- - - Updated - - -

Arcane Shield? Mana Shield!
I'd appreciate it, now that Ice Barrier becomes baseline. On the other hand, if IB would become spec appropriate, they would probably also be counted towards their respective spell school. For fire and arcane that would be a minor hindrance in PvP. I'd still take glyph. I'd be a bit annoyed when doing so, though.

Deliberately didn't mention mana shield to avoid people suggesting it would drain our mana etc, but that's exactly what i was thinking of at the time. The whole lockout thing could be avoided by just not changing the school type anyway. Glyph would only be a visual difference.

[Northem]

I checked out Touch of the Magi a bit. Of course subject to change.

It procs very often like every 25-30s.
Damage from pets like Arcane Familiar or Mirror Images does not count.
Only damage dealt to the debuffed target counts (e.g. SN aoe to other targets does not).
The debuff "Touch of the Magi Accumulator" only lasts for 12s and detonates for 20% damage dealt. (10k AB --> 2k explosion)
The explosion damage itself is affected by RoP and IF. (10k AB * 1.5 (RoP) = 15k AB ---> 3k * 1.5 (RoP) explosion, double dip?)
Erosion does not increase the explosion damage again. (10k AB * 1.1 (10x Erosion) = 11k AB ---> 2,2k explosion)
Force Bolt does not count.
Mark of Aluneth counts, even the stacking debuff for the explosion.
The explosion may crit.

I'll insist, [Touch of the Magi] should be an active ability, or is it that nobody of you remember the headaches caused by the randomness of [Prophecy of Fear]? Please, let's try to learn from past mistakes ...

And speaking of learning from past experiences, [Mark of Aluneth] is simply another [Rune of Power] but in this case for our enemies instead of for us...

Yes, [Mark of Aluneth] must disappear immediately for good! Unless you want to suffer its problems for two expansions, as happened (and will happen during Legion up to a point) with [Rune of Power] ...

Moreover, my perfect solution consists of removing [Mark of Aluneth] and replace it with an active version of [Touch of the Magi]. This way, [Touch of the Magi] would be our new active "special power" from the Arcane artifact.

[Deleted]

I'll insist, [Touch of the Magi] should be an active ability, or is it that nobody of you remember the headaches caused by the randomness of [Prophecy of Fear]? Please, let's try to learn from past mistakes ...

And speaking of learning from past experiences, [Mark of Aluneth] is simply another [Rune of Power] but in this case for our enemies instead of for us...

Yes, [Mark of Aluneth] must disappear immediately for good! Unless you want to suffer its problems for two expansions, as happened (and will happen during Legion up to a point) with [Rune of Power] ...

Moreover, my perfect solution consists of removing [Mark of Aluneth] and replace it with an active version of [Touch of the Magi]. This way, [Touch of the Magi] would be our new active "special power" from the Arcane artifact.

I don't mind Mark of Aluneth. It isn't overly exciting, to be sure. Your suggestion makes sense to me, though, as Touch of the Magi is the more interesting concept and its usefulness would be heavily restricted by RNG. (Especially in PvP! "RNG burst" is an oxymoron)

[Deleted]

I'll insist, [Touch of the Magi] should be an active ability, or is it that nobody of you remember the headaches caused by the randomness of [Prophecy of Fear]? Please, let's try to learn from past mistakes ...

And speaking of learning from past experiences, [Mark of Aluneth] is simply another [Rune of Power] but in this case for our enemies instead of for us...

Yes, [Mark of Aluneth] must disappear immediately for good! Unless you want to suffer its problems for two expansions, as happened (and will happen during Legion up to a point) with [Rune of Power] ...

Moreover, my perfect solution consists of removing [Mark of Aluneth] and replace it with an active version of [Touch of the Magi]. This way, [Touch of the Magi] would be our new active "special power" from the Arcane artifact.

Just make Mark of Aluneth an 8 second debuff that works the same and it's fine.

[Northem]

Just make Mark of Aluneth an 8 second debuff that works the same and it's fine.

That would be the easiest and most logical solution, as I already mentioned.

- - - Updated - - -

I don't mind Mark of Aluneth. It isn't overly exciting, to be sure. Your suggestion makes sense to me, though, as Touch of the Magi is the more interesting concept and its usefulness would be heavily restricted by RNG. (Especially in PvP! "RNG burst" is an oxymoron)

Exactly, RNG is annoying, and the worst of that is that Arcane Mages are getting dozens of random effects! We are not Fire Mages for the love of God!

For that reason I proposed these changes in order to try to reduce the overwhelming amount of RNG effects we have.

- - - Updated - - -

Just on the subject of animations, it'd be great to have different shields as part of the now entirely cosmetic glyph system. It's always been weird to me to have Ice Barrier for Arcane And Fire. Would be great to see a Flame Ward for fire, and an Arcane Shield for arcane, just to tie into the specs a little better. Really takes from the whole look of arcane and fire to have a huge barrier of ice around you, especially for fire with all the glorious new effects it has.

Apparently we are very few who, as Arcane or Fire Mages, are not comfortable using frost spells ...

In fact, is so much my conviction for not using non-arcane spells, that from the beginning I choose [Evanesce] and [Supernova] simply for the purpose of getting rid of [Ice Block] and [Frost Nova] respectively ...

Assuming that I am a pure arcanist, why the hell I have to resort to using frost spells?

So yes, I am glad that [Ice Block] returns to be a talent (and thus avoidable) and the same time I'm deeply pissed due to that, despite being an Arcane Mage, [Ice Barrier] has to be our main defense spell and [Frost Nova] has to be our main AoE CC spell.

And I know that, as I said before, most people do not share this view at all ... but I had to say it.

On the other hand, I won't be satisfied simply by changing the names and colors of the graphical effects of [Ice Barrier] or [Ice Block] for instance ... I aspire to something more ...

For example, in the field of defense, some time ago Polarthief gave the key by suggesting that each specialization should deal with the damage taken in a completely different way. That's what I aspire to!

However, I know, having true defense alternatives for each spec would cost us a raid tier, so anyway... it doesn't matter...