Is arcane mage trash?

[Nikkaszal]

If it was actually good more people would play it. Like every metric shows it isn't that great.
At the current time there are 15 times more mythic logs as frost than arcane in BoD. For heroic that is factor 13. For mythic+ in season two there are 14 times more frost logs for keys 10 and above and 60 times more for 15 and up.

Not going to touch on M+ because Frost is preferred for obvious reasons (on-demand AoE slows and roots).

Mythic BoD is only on its third reset... hardly compelling statistics.

[Nitros14]

Not going to touch on M+ because Frost is preferred for obvious reasons (on-demand AoE slows and roots).

Mythic BoD is only on its third reset... hardly compelling statistics.

So data from actual progress isn't important, but data from overgeared farming of bosses is.

[Viklad]

As a Mage I dont think arcane is bad right now, i say the only fight its gonna struggle on is rakastan in last phase were you cant stand still, that is arcane big problem, they need to stand still alot, and even if they move slightly like to avoid a orb on rakastan it really hurts them in burst phase as that is one less AB there getting in the AP window.

Another positive is there BIS traits is extremely easy to farm, much easier than frost and fire. there is definitely fights where i will consider going arcane, im already 3/9 M so I think mekkatoque. they also share the share stat priority (pretty much) as frost that makes it not harmful to switch between the 2, while frost/fire needs different stats on its gear.

The biggest downside of Arcane is movement as well as how trinket dependent it is, if you dont have the PVP trink, or Branch if basically not even worth it, PVP especially as it synergies with AP windows, you can marco it in. but with this trinket and a crit trinket Arcane is like flipping a switch, where it is easily capable of pumping 1M dmg into a priority target in its 8 second window and that will definitely have uses,

[Miamii Paradise]

i dont like arcane mage . frost mage has better cc and utility which is better for raids but thats just me

[aoz]

Forget numbers, arcane has been trash all expansion in terms of design. Probably one of the worst specs to come out of the post-Legion trimming, and I regret sticking with it after maining it for 3 expansions.

[davesignal]

If it was actually good more people would play it. Like every metric shows it isn't that great.
At the current time there are 15 times more mythic logs as frost than arcane in BoD. For heroic that is factor 13. For mythic+ in season two there are 14 times more frost logs for keys 10 and above and 60 times more for 15 and up.

Not necessarily true. Arcane requires planning, whereas Frost and Fire are all about reacting. A lot of people don't like planning.`

Frost is better suited to this raid tier than Arcane is-- there's no denying that. But if Arcane was a mindless react-to-procs drinky-bird spec like Frost, it would probably only be two or three times behind Frost, instead of 15.

[DarthMonk79]

Here's always my response to post like this.... DO you enjoy playing the class? If yes, then you're fine. Unless you're in a top end guild fighting toward world first or ranked top 50 who cares if you're dps isn't on par with every other class. DO you have fun playing it, nothing else matters!!! To many people in the game now look at the numbers and not the playstyle or the class itself. Coming up with dps trackers is one of the worst things to ever happen to WoW. It went from having fun and being unique or bringing something to the dungeon/raid that was different to "where's my number's at"....

[Alphatorg]

It's really the same answer as the past tiers: Arcane is dealing fairly/very good single target damage, the most important kind of damage there is. It just gets undervalued by WCL aggregate rankings because it doesn't cleave at all.
With BfD's tuning it's completely irrelevant what you spec on most bosses. That being said Arcane is actually good on Rastakhan and Mekkatorque and there's a top 10 Jaina kill using Arcane as well.

[quite an expert in wow]

Seeing method use arcane on their mythic race, but that's probably for single target burst.

the guy that plays it mostly plays arcane because he is raid leading and it's easy

[TheramoreIsTheBomb]

Arcane is one of the strongest specs in game. Just because it's simple and easy to some doesn't mean it's trash.

[mrgreenthump]

Arcane is one of the strongest specs in game. Just because it's simple and easy to some doesn't mean it's trash.

*One of the strongest single target specs in the game. Sadly there arent many fights that are pure single target in the game anymore.

[lockybalboa]

Fire is even trashier

[TheramoreIsTheBomb]

*One of the strongest single target specs in the game. Sadly there arent many fights that are pure single target in the game anymore.

Then just adapt and stay on the boss or an assigned mob. Method did it with Jaina and several other bosses