Arcane PvP

[Katave]

Just curious for those Mages that PvP as Arcane. What spec(s) do you roll with? Has anything dramatically changed with 3.2.2? I dropped my Frost PvP spec looking to switch to Arcane. Could use some tips with gear, gems and enchants. (Not doing any Arena - strictly BGs.)

Thanks in advance.

[Deleted]

Whether it's battlegrounds or arena I play as arcane shatter in both. It's a rather viable spec, and fun; it revolves around spamming frostbolt as your main nuke (fingers crossed for that frostbite proc!), using barrage and ice lance depending on the situation, and using frostfire bolt for PoM. The crits are crazy. Off the top of my head I can't think of any spec with a higher crit modifier than the mod for frost spells here - you gain +50% to all spells and +100% to frost spells. With 3/3 incanter's absorption if a warrior charges you and burns your mana shield down you can nova and PoMffb him for ~10k depending on resilience right off the bat. With the arcane potency and shatter talents your PoM/clearcasted spells against frozen targets have a crit chance of over 90%.

Pros:
-The unfortunate spell lock/counterspell to your main nuke (frostbolt) doesn't lock you down that bad; you still have high damage instants outside frost.
-A lot more crits than with the blast/missiles spec, and the delicious almost guaranteed pom+shatter crit.
-Not having to stack arcane blast for superb damage allows you to move around more.
-Good synergy with frost mages and discipline priests (absorption). Try hanging out with them.
-Instant invisibility offers a vanish-like survival tool. A well-aimed blink + Ice Block + /cancelaura Ice Block + Invisibility often allows you to escape a large group of enemies.
-A good counter to frost mages. Winning duels against frost mages often results in comments like "arcane bullshit!", "fag" and "l2p".

Cons:
-As frost you can pretty much wear a couple of pieces of pve gear for haste. As arcane... not that much. In BGs you won't get focused the same way as you would in arena, but it's still a good idea to have over 800 resilience. No ice barrier, no cold snap. Personally I have 850 resilience and I'm aiming for 1000 atm. Kiting melee is harder than with frost but it can be done.
-Less control. Without shattered barrier, elemental and deep freeze you'll have to make the most of your frost nova and use Slow a lot and well.

More about gear:
-Many frost mages gem for just sp. As arcane you might want to gem for sp+stam in blue sockets. Obviously whatever the spec you're a lot more happier running with 100+ spell penetration, so a sp+spen is a good choice for a blue socket as well. Getting a decent amount of penetration without an arena wand or offhand can be a bit tricky, so don't stress it too much.

Anyway that's just some things that came to mind. I'd be happy to answer some questions.

[Katave]

Heh, I was actually wondering if there's a "revised" 57/3/11 spec for PvP. I had it a long time ago, but was curious if it's still viable.

[Jexar]

It really isn't viable anymore, having to stack arcane blast up to 3-4 times before you can really do damage, is near impossible. In arena at least. Arcane mages are generally on-sight kills for any melee, and ranged for that matter. Granted, if you can get 3-4 stacks, your damage would be insane, but getting that is very unlikely.

[Katave]

It really isn't viable anymore, having to stack arcane blast up to 3-4 times before you can really do damage, is near impossible. In arena at least. Arcane mages are generally on-sight kills for any melee, and ranged for that matter. Granted, if you can get 3-4 stacks, your damage would be insane, but getting that is very unlikely.

I have read plenty of posts of Mages being successful with Arcane. Of course this is in Battlegrounds, something I also mentioned I would only be doing for PvP. Unfortunately they didn't have any Arcane PvP specs when I checked their Armory.

[rathok]

IMO frost is a much better BG spec then arcane. Arcane is so fragile that even if someone just throws a little damage your way on the side, that can be life threatening or put you low enough that now your 1-2 shot'able. You can definitely do well as arcane in arenas and alot of that comes from cooldown stacking and proper CC chains. For example, a 3s team with an arcane mage is Elesham/disc/arcane where you can force a trinket on the healer and then gib someone with bloodlust+icy veins+arcane power with a quick spam of 1 second arcane blasts that crit for fucking... 8k+ on pvp targets every single second. That with a 10K+ lava burst from the shaman is going to pretty much guarantee a kill, never mind that the priest can throw out ~5k dmg of her own with a couple quick casts.

SO, for BGs i would definitely not recommend arcane because as soon as anyone looks at you funny your dead and there generally isnt much LOS to use to survive. That coupled with the fact that hard hitting melees are all over the place and for the most part, they are going to eat you alive.

[davidwh2]

well with my mage i only do arcane in bgs as i found frost to be boring...(thats me though)

with a mage especially arcane i learned that you have to keep moving. dont make yourself easy pickens. too me arcane is powerful and mobile.