Thinking about boosting mage for BFA..

[huerohueroxxx]

How fun is it atm? 2 much RNG? It's a class that u can become bored easily? btw i'm thinking to boost as fire because from what I understand, he's the most dependent on legendaries, can someone clear these doubts for me?

Thanks

[Realmerc]

fire is literally unplayable without the bracers.. i can tell you that as i just recently boosted a mage.

The playstyle of fire is great, fast and easy to understand. However, gradually, you will feel the lack of ST damage. Without the bracers, you will find yourself spamming pyroblasts with all the heating up procs you have during opener feeling like a big dick, but can't see yourself anywhere in the damage meter...

Even with the bracer, it still doesn't make fire significantly better, first: when the bracer procs, do you have combustion up/rune of power? second: does the empowered pyro crit? if not.. your damage will still be terrible.

arcane is viable and does decent ST and AOE without being too reliant on legos but the rotation is extremely boring.. you'll soon be tired of spamming arcane blast /arcane explosion for majority of the time, imo it's one of the most boring specs in the game atm. (it's fun to play in PVP tho)

frost is probably the spec i'd suggest for you to begin with, it's not hard to play, neither does it rely on legos. Plus the playstyle and damage are both very good. 9/10 spec

[Nynax]

fire is literally unplayable without the bracers.. i can tell you that as i just recently boosted a mage.

The playstyle of fire is great, fast and easy to understand. However, gradually, you will feel the lack of ST damage. Without the bracers, you will find yourself spamming pyroblasts with all the heating up procs you have during opener feeling like a big dick, but can't see yourself anywhere in the damage meter...

Even with the bracer, it still doesn't make fire significantly better, first: when the bracer procs, do you have combustion up/power of rune? second: does the empowered pyro crit? if no.. your damage will still be horrible.

arcane is viable and does decent ST and AOE without being too reliant on legos but the rotation is extremely boring.. you'll soon be tired of spamming arcane blast /arcane explosion for majority of the time. (but it's really fun to play in PVP)

frost is probably the spec i'd suggest to begin with, it's not hard to play, neither does it rely on legos. Plus the playstyle and damage are both very good. 9/10 spec

I'll second this, with a caveat. Don't bother comparing yourself with other mages that have the Shard of Exodar legendary. It's heartbreaking.

[huerohueroxxx]

fire is literally unplayable without the bracers.. i can tell you that as i just recently boosted a mage.

The playstyle of fire is great, fast and easy to understand. However, gradually, you will feel the lack of ST damage. Without the bracers, you will find yourself spamming pyroblasts with all the heating up procs you have during opener feeling like a big dick, but can't see yourself anywhere in the damage meter...

Even with the bracer, it still doesn't make fire significantly better, first: when the bracer procs, do you have combustion up/power of rune? second: does the empowered pyro crit? if no.. your damage will still be horrible.

arcane is viable and does decent ST and AOE without being too reliant on legos but the rotation is extremely boring.. you'll soon be tired of spamming arcane blast /arcane explosion for majority of the time. (but it's really fun to play in PVP)

frost is probably the spec i'd suggest to begin with, it's not hard to play, neither does it rely on legos. Plus the playstyle and damage are both very good. 9/10 spec

Well thanks, im thinking about make it arcane atm, i come from havoc dh but hate the hard rng that it have and the recarge waste fury mechanic

[Nfinitii]

How fun is it atm? 2 much RNG? It's a class that u can become bored easily? btw i'm thinking to boost as fire because from what I understand, he's the most dependent on legendaries, can someone clear these doubts for me?

Thanks

U should just save the boost, u have so much time to bfa u can easily lvl one.

[Realmerc]

well, if you hate RNG.. arcane is your best bet

[Diggster]

Frost playstyle is OK until you get one of those pulls where you just don't get any procs. Then it's depressing :P Same with fire when you have bracers tbf though.

[Ozzyorcborne]

Im thinking about the same but may go the leveling route instead. Would frost still be the spec to use as leveling?

[Fayenoor]

Im thinking about the same but may go the leveling route instead. Would frost still be the spec to use as leveling?

I cannot imagine leveling a mage as one spec from 1-110; play around with all 3 specs as you level; they are all great fun to level with. With BoAs, they are all very powerful for leveling.

Regarding current status of mages - kinda moot from your POV since you are leveling for BFA. Mages have changed so much in the course of Legion that even trying to guess what's going to be FOTM in BFA at this point is kinda futile.

While leveling, try out all the specs and talents - dont look at some guide which tells you which talents to pick for leveling.

[Swizzle]

Im thinking about the same but may go the leveling route instead. Would frost still be the spec to use as leveling?

Frost is the easiest for leveling if you don't pick Lonely Winter. Pet being able to freeze and take agro for a bit is always handy. Arcane is a bit stationary and has a decent ramp up time, so it comes out as the slowest leveling spec, but you do you.

[Marrilaife]

Regarding current status of mages - kinda moot from your POV since you are leveling for BFA. Mages have changed so much in the course of Legion that even trying to guess what's going to be FOTM in BFA at this point is kinda futile.

Pretty much this, they will have to rebalance all specs with no legendaries / artifact traits in BFA, so there will be probably a few unexpected mega winners / losers of the reshuffle of power. Playstyles heavily affected by legendaries / golden traits will probably feel different, you might get 1 or 2 abilities back in form of talents, but then you have to skip other talents. Not even mentioning things like fire mages going very strong into Legion only to get nerfed after few months. How do you predict that ahead of time?

[Ozzyorcborne]

I cannot imagine leveling a mage as one spec from 1-110; play around with all 3 specs as you level; they are all great fun to level with. With BoAs, they are all very powerful for leveling.

Regarding current status of mages - kinda moot from your POV since you are leveling for BFA. Mages have changed so much in the course of Legion that even trying to guess what's going to be FOTM in BFA at this point is kinda futile.

While leveling, try out all the specs and talents - dont look at some guide which tells you which talents to pick for leveling.

Frost is the easiest for leveling if you don't pick Lonely Winter. Pet being able to freeze and take agro for a bit is always handy. Arcane is a bit stationary and has a decent ramp up time, so it comes out as the slowest leveling spec, but you do you.

Thanks a bunch, both of you. Definitely going to try that.

[Deleted]

well, if you hate RNG.. arcane is your best bet

Sims show the dps of arcane being by far the most reliant on RNG and it's not even close. Fire and frost are fairly close actually. Only difference is you don't feel being unlucky as much playing arcane. You might be lacking AM procs but getting crits or rule of threes procs during your CDs is what decides how well you do. As fire/frost spamming endless frostbolts/fireballs or getting no bracer or whatnot feels really bad, but you can recover from it a lot more easily.

A few words to each spec so you can decide more easily. But all of them are fun in their own way. Which spec you boost doesn't matter in the long run anyway so don't set yourself to a spec too strong if you feel like you don't enjoy it as much.

Arcane: Very bursty, poor mobility, (subjectively) least impressive animations, complex to play, not as rewarding as the other specs, fairly legendary dependant.
Frost: Less but still fairly bursty, RNG procs have a big factor in how it feels like to play, nice animations, easy to learn moderately hard to master, not as legendary dependant.
Fire: Regular predictable burst windows, fairly low RNG if you get your crit rate up, impressive animations, versatile, easy to learn, high mobility, INCREDIBLY realiant on getting the bracer legendary.

This is about the CURRENT state though. Alpha just started so nobody really knows how it is going to play out in legion. There's a lot of issues if not adressed properly that could lead to fairly poor gameplay especially as fire, as frost to some degree and for arcane not as much.

[Kazuchika]

How fun is it atm? 2 much RNG? It's a class that u can become bored easily? btw i'm thinking to boost as fire because from what I understand, he's the most dependent on legendaries, can someone clear these doubts for me?

Thanks

If your definition of fun is 3 dumpster specs where you literally cast the same spell over and over again and sometimes cast another spell then sure

[davesignal]

Arcane doesn't have poor mobility; talent into Slipstream, not Shimmer. You already have Displacement, and being interrupted during Arcane Missiles or Evocation (especially Evocation) is your biggest fear as an arcane mage, so picking Shimmer over Slipstream is a bad idea.

[Deleted]

Arcane doesn't have poor mobility; talent into Slipstream, not Shimmer. You already have Displacement, and being interrupted during Arcane Missiles or Evocation (especially Evocation) is your biggest fear as an arcane mage, so picking Shimmer over Slipstream is a bad idea.

Tried arcane here and there and could not stand it, until I skilled slipstream over shimmer. Shimmer just don't work for arcane.

To OP: Mage is RNG. Frost depends on BF, Fire is bracer procs, don't ask me about arcane. But hard to tell how Azerite gear change your playstyle / rng.