[Mage-WoD] Mage Beta Discussion

[Avikur]

Yep loving Arcane, ice flows makes it a pleasure to play, gj Blizzard I just hope it's numbers are competitive

[Razhiel]

I'm also really loving Arcane at the moment. I literally don't want them to change a thing.. just make it competitive with the other specs so i can play the crap out of it

[Polarthief]

Bluh, just spent an hour trying to make and get a video up to post on YT since some spells were actually updated recently. It was going to be an entire list showcasting of all the spells that were updated, because many of them seem to miss a chunk of spells. However, not only is my capture software shit, but so is my editing software, and finally I came to render it, and, OH LOOK, BLACK SCREEN FOR 95% OF IT.

So yeah, if I ever get it working properly, I'll post it, but here's some notes on each spell that was in the video I was making (in alphabetical order):

- Amplify Magic looks similar to its old graphic, except it's blue rings instead of red ones.
- Arcane Missiles seems to be 'bigger' and expand out more.
- Arcane Orb (New spell); is more normal sized once more, but it doesn't expand out as it gets away from you as Celestalon mentioned it's supposed to.
- Blast Wave looks roughly the same, with extra polygons thrown in and some smoothness to it.
- (Pet) Freeze and Frost Nova look dramatically different. Freeze effect on the target from these two spells remains unchanged.
- Frost Bomb looks roughly the same, but has a more noticeable bomb on the target.
- Frostbolt looks roughly the same, but shinier/flashier and with more polygons it seems.
- Ice Nova (New spell)
- Icicles are way more pointy and look much better. Unfortunately, their firing animation has been unchanged.
- Incanter's Flow (New spell); has a glowy purple effect on the player at 4 and 5 stacks.
- Inferno Blast without DoTs is just a fiery explosion. With DoTs, it's got a nice new visual to it that's very smooth.
- Nether Tempest is completely different from its previous iteration. It now spits out modified arcane fish that explode upon impact. They seem to scatter randomly and explode when hitting the ground. Don't know if that changes the hitbox or way targets take damage.
- Portals look smoother with extra polygons.
- Prismatic Crystal (New spell)
- Pyroblast now starts small and grows in size and gets more on fire as it flies towards the target, reaching maximum size/fire just before hitting the target. The speed at which it grows/gets lit on fire is much faster the closer you are to the target, but it still starts at minimum size/fire and reaches maximum size/fire just before impact.
- Ring of Frost (target freeze effect) is updated, but I don't believe it's anything new from what we've already seen.
- Supernova got another new iteration rather than just an Arcane Explosion, but it looks even smaller, despite the pretty graphic.
- Unstable Magic (Arcane Blast) is barely noticeable. Small purple sparks explode out of the target.
- Unstable Magic (Frostbolt & Frostfire Bolt) explode out an icy, blue, smoke cloud-like effect. (Forgot to test FFB as Fire)
- Unstable Magic (Fireball) explodes a small fiery explosion.

[nickseng]

- Unstable Magic (Arcane Blast) is barely noticeable. Small purple sparks explode out of the target.
- Unstable Magic (Frostbolt & Frostfire Bolt) explode out an icy, blue, smoke cloud-like effect. (Forgot to test FFB as Fire)
- Unstable Magic (Fireball) explodes a small fiery explosion.

They must've added those recently. I remember having to check the logs to see if they even worked.

[Imnick]

Some illustrative gifs, as I love new spell effects. Some we already knew about, but I hadn't seen the updated portals, ring of frost, or Nether Tempest before.





The new Nether Tempest is very nice, it seems they're getting braver about making spells very flashy now that they have the ability to tone it down for everyone but you.

[Polarthief]

Given that it plays that big "frost pillar" effect every time you start rather than finish casting, and you can then cancel it and cast it again immediately, it would be very annoying to other players otherwise.

I think everything is at max opacity in PvP though as it's intended for that. Raid setting though, it's nice to have all of it "muted" a bit for other people/vice versa.

[Agnhar]

I would really love they change the graphics when you are summoning a portal those summoning rings are just OLD and not flashy.

[Kazuchika]

That new Nether Tempest graphic is amazzzziiiinnng

[Polarthief]

That new Nether Tempest graphic is amazzzziiiinnng

I still wished they would have an arcane fish PER target (e.g., what we have now, but hitting all targets simultaneously). Would be more fun and amazing, especially if they use the newer arcane fish.

[Orrin]

That new Nether Tempest graphic is amazzzziiiinnng

It's not, it's purple fog. They went for Diablo Arcane look (purple theme instead of purple and blue), but highlights are too dim, there're not enough sparkles, color changes is purple-into-white instead of purple + white and yellow sparkles/highlights. The result is concentrated fog instead of shimmering energy

[Imnick]

I still wished they would have an arcane fish PER target (e.g., what we have now, but hitting all targets simultaneously). Would be more fun and amazing, especially if they use the newer arcane fish.

I'd definitely like that too, but I suppose considering it's a constant effect with no cooldown maybe they have their reasons for not doing that :P

[Kazuchika]

It's not, it's purple fog. They went for Diablo Arcane look (purple theme instead of purple and blue), but highlights are too dim, there're not enough sparkles, color changes is purple-into-white instead of purple + white and yellow sparkles/highlights. The result is concentrated fog instead of shimmering energy

Oh my bad I thought forums were places to express opinions. My mistake.

[Polarthief]

I'd definitely like that too, but I suppose considering it's a constant effect with no cooldown maybe they have their reasons for not doing that :P

Would it? On single-target, it would only spit out one fish, and graphics are extremely toned down for people who aren't you, so I don't see why they would have to tone that down.

Oh my bad I thought forums were places to express opinions. My mistake.

You thought wrong. Remember this is the Mage forum where we're the most split class community around and people will attack you for your opinions and feelings.

[Orrin]

Oh my bad I thought forums were places to express opinions. My mistake.

We expressed our opinions the same way, where all the scolding comes from? Jumpy much?

[Polarthief]

We expressed our opinions the same way, where all the scolding comes from? Jumpy much?

To be fair, you did kinda spit on his opinion by saying "It's not" rather than just expressing your own opinion without quoting him. There's a difference in saying "It's not awesome---" vs. "I don't think it's that great because---".

But now I'm just arguing about the semantics of words on a Mage thread.

[LocNess]

To be fair, you did kinda spit on his opinion by saying "It's not" rather than just expressing your own opinion without quoting him. There's a difference in saying "It's not awesome---" vs. "I don't think it's that great because---".

But now I'm just arguing about the semantics of words on a Mage thread.

Basically how all forums work world wide.

It is great to have some love put into Spell Effects though. We seriously lacked that in MoP (though Arcane Explosion spam was obnoxious and amazing). Some could look a little better, the Arcane "fog" seems slightly weird to me, however I am not going to complain from the position we are currently at.

[Polarthief]

Basically how all forums work world wide.

It is great to have some love put into Spell Effects though. We seriously lacked that in MoP (though Arcane Explosion spam was obnoxious and amazing). Some could look a little better, the Arcane "fog" seems slightly weird to me, however I am not going to complain from the position we are currently at.

I still want arcane fish spam. I'm at least grateful they kept arcane fish, and even upgraded its graphic to not look like AM.

[Imnick]

Frost Bomb damage went down.
Fireball and Pyroblast damage went up.
Frostfire damage went up... but only to match Fireball (Brain Freeze damage went down to compensate).
There were no mechanical changes, but we get portals!

I guess we weren't really the focus of this pass.

[LocNess]

Frost Bomb damage went down.
Fireball and Pyroblast damage went up.
Frostfire damage went up... but only to match Fireball (Brain Freeze damage went down to compensate).
There were no mechanical changes, but we get portals!

I guess we weren't really the focus of this pass.

I am okay with small-scale changes. Might mean we are relatively on track and set for how we will look for WoD. Fire buffs are always good too.

[Deleted]

There were no mechanical changes.

I'd consider this a mechanical change:

Meteor Calls down a meteor which lands at the target location after 3 sec, dealing [ 1 + 375% of Spell Power ] Fire damage, split evenly between all targets within 8 yards. Also burns the ground, dealing an additional [ 30% of Spell Power ] Fire damage every 1 sec for 8 sec until cancelled to enemies in the area. Mage - LvL 0 Talent. 1% of Base Mana. 40 yd range. Instant. 45 sec cooldown.

Unless it's a data mining screw up of course.