Battle-mage Class concept.

[Teriz]

Overall, the concept isn't terrible. The main issue I have with it is that the niche for battle mages is absorbed by so many other specs that it becomes difficult to carve a niche large enough to justify its existence. Death Knights, Shaman, Paladins, and even Monks have a lot of this covered. Your sister sword ability for example functions almost exactly like dancing rune blade. Also your fire spec functions almost exactly like frost, only with a different element.

Honestly, the greatest ability ever for a Battle Mage concept already exists in the game, and that mechanic is maelstrom weapon. MW is so simple and genius that it simply doesn't make sense to create a Battle Mage class without outright stealing the concept and re-applying it.

The Arcane spec shows promise though. I like the idea behind it, and think you should utilize that as the basis for your concept and expand it from there. However, I don't think you should call it arcane. You should call it something like Aegis, and just say that it utilizes arcane magic. It also needs to evolve away from mages for it to stand up on its own. Perhaps linking it with Dragons or some other type of force within Azeroth? You should also look into Warcraft lore for inspiration. There are many unused units and heroes from the RTS games to pull inspiration from, as well as NPCs in WoW to get some neat spell ideas. Linking your class concept to Warcraft heroes gives your idea an air of credibility.

However, I just don't see this concept working without something like Maelstrom Weapon. If its just Melee with ranged instant spells, it's no different than the other magic/Melee hybrids already in the game.

I do enjoy a challenge though, so maybe I'll do a write up of this concept to see if I could make it different than other classes in the game.

[Silverforte]

I'd much rather see this than demon hunter, to be honest. Everyone asking for a new class is saying 'demon hunter' when I think that it's a tired concept. It's just a hunter with warlock/death knight features, either spell related or aesthetic.

[Gracos]

I'd much rather see this than demon hunter, to be honest. Everyone asking for a new class is saying 'demon hunter' when I think that it's a tired concept. It's just a hunter with warlock/death knight features, either spell related or aesthetic.

You'll probably be glad to know that Demon Hunter is very, very unlikely to happen at this point. Too many of their abilities seem to have gone to Warlocks, and it's thematically too similar to Rogue and Hunter. The only reason I still think they might do it is because of the Burning Legion expansion we all know is coming. It fits in a little too well in regards to that story.

[Notos]

Imo this would work better as a spec for mages rather than a separate class. There's too much thematic redundancy with mages.

[SodiumChloride]

To some extend current Mages are already Battle Mages. They are fully capable of survive frontline combat beside melee classes.

But I too had an idea about armored mages, but as a non-playable class. Magic + high mobility + fast attacks ... kind of like ninjas. Ya ... Been watching YouTube clips of Metal Gear Rising.

[roflwaffle]

They just seem like gimped mages. What do they bring to a group that's unqiue or even necessary?

what do DKs? they just seem like gimped shadow priests. oh wait.

[dangelo37]

Sounds similar to the ORIGINAL concept for warlock: mages that specialize in melee combat. If anyone still remembers, locs had an item they conjured called firestone (among a few others) that enhanced their melee potential. Demon armor gives actual armor and Hp5. It didn't work out so they turned them into full ranged casters.

The biggest reason this MAY work is because these Battle Mages would use plate rather than cloth... but that really would look silly in my opinion. The reason mages wear cloth is to free themselves of the confines of heavy armor so that energy (no matter the source) can more freely move throughout their body. Maybe they could cast some kind of buff or passive that grants reduced damage?

Also, maybe you could take out the 'tank' specialization and just keep it pure dps. Just because it sounds like a tanky class doesn't mean it has to be. When I think of battle mages, I don't tend to think about them throwing themselves in front of the enemy to protect their allies. Warriors, Paladins, Druids... I can visualize them but not the Battle Mage. He seems more like a tanky bruiser that uses arcane power to enhance his own melee attacks.

Just my two cents. I like the idea though. Blizz should add a bunch of new classes to really spice things up.

[Zeglo]

This sounds like enhancement shaman.

[rogoth]

it would have to be added as a 4th spec for mages, however the problem comes with the armour profficiency, with the way the game works atm, there is no exclusions based on spec, so all mage wouldbe able to wear plate regardless of spec choice, which may, or may not be a good thing, not sure, it helps remove the problem of only one spec in the entire game using intellect plate, but another problem that would arise, with the way blizz have set stats out, they would have to change holy paladins to not need spirit, or allow mages to once again benefit from spirit, or turn spirit into a tertiary stat that all healing items have on them outside of teh standard item budget etc, so there are those issues, also, why would a battle mage have to be strictly melee only, there are plenty of battle mages in game as NPC's and in lore, and none of them are melee only characters, in fact most prefer ranged combat, the only way this spec would work, is if it involved redesigning arcane to be a healing spec using arcane energy and the flow of time to undo dmg etc, and have the battle mage spec be for dmg, there a whole load of design problems if blizz did this, but it could work if implemented properly.

[Usagi Senshi]

Enhancement shaman are battle magi and fit the archetype quite well.