Shadowlands Mage PvP and Design Issues

Classes Mage
1

General:

  • Baseline Fireblast does no damage.
  • Baseline Frostbolt does no damage and has long cast time.
  • Mirror Images die too quickly.
  • Blink is on GCD. Taking anything but Shimmer makes landing Polymorphs and chasing around pillars hopeless.
  • Lack of a stun spell, aka Deep Freeze.
  • Conjure Refreshment having a 15sec cooldown.
  • Conjured Food having delayed health regen in rated PvP.

Arcane:

  • Arcane Blast damage is too low, spamming Arcane Missiles usually does more for less mana.
  • Clearcasting proc rate is too low and it’s further lowered by mana reduction effects, such as Arcane Power.
  • Mastery: Savant doesn’t affect Frostbolt and Fireblast.
  • Lack of instant damage and awkward openers with Charged Up removed and Touch of the Magi having a cast time.

Talents:

  • Arcane Familiar damage is too low, mana gain is less than Rule of Threes.
  • Master of Time - using /cancelaura alter time macro doesn’t refresh Blink’s cooldown. Also picking this makes landing CC and chasing around pillars really hard with regular Blink on GCD.
  • Slipstream is too weak compared to the other 2 options.
  • Focus Magic is too weak compared to the other 2 options, dispelable.
  • Nether Tempest does no damage, breaks CC.
  • Chrono Shift is too strong compared to the other 2 options. Movement speed bonus on Arcane Barrage should be baselined.
  • Ice Ward is too weak, should reduce the cooldown of Frost Nova too.
  • Reverberate is too weak.
  • Supernova does no damage.
  • Overpowered is nerfed to 33% in PvP, only 13% above regular Arcane Power and only 5% above the static 8% of Enlightened talent.
  • Time Anomaly’s Time Warp proc does nothing in rated PvP, just wasting 1/3rd of the procs.

Frost:

  • Frostbolt does no damage without Deep Shatter and crits. Just delete Deep Shatter and buff baseline Frostbolt damage.
  • Fingers of Frost Ice Lance doing more damage than a Shattered Frostbolt.
  • Cone of Cold doing no damage without the clunky Burst of Cold. Just delete Burst of Cold and buff baseline Cone of Cold damage.
  • Frozen Orb entire damage coming from Fingers of Frost generation, instead of the Orb itself. Also bad pathing, Concentrated Coolness placement should be baseline.
  • Winter’s Chill stacks from Brain Freeze Flurry procs consumed by Fingers of Frosted Ice Lances.
  • Alter Time at lvl 58.

Talents:

  • Lonely Winter takes away both pet’s Freeze and Ice Nova, leaving us with no ranged root.
  • Glacial Insulation is too weak with Blink on GCD.
  • Ice Floes cooldown is too long and it’s inferior to Shimmer due to Blink being on the GCD.
  • Chilled to the Bone damage doesn’t proc if damage breaks your Frost Nova.
  • Ice Form is on GCD.

Fire:

  • Fireball damage is too weak.
  • Scorch damage is too weak.
  • Phoenix Flames damage is too weak and it shouldn’t interact with Heating Up and Hot Streak, unless it’s reverted to guarenteed crit.
  • Flamestrike 20% slow is too low and cast time too long.
  • Dragon’s Breath sometimes breaking to Blazing Barrier’s reflected damage.
  • Alter Time at lvl 58.

Talents:

  • Blazing Soul is too weak with Blink on GCD.
  • Blast Wave damage and knockback is low, also not baseline for some reason.
  • Flame On is too strong and not baseline for some reason.
  • All lvl 45 row talents do no damage.
  • Pyroclasm PvP proc rate should be higher.
  • Meteor not baseline, for some reason.

Conduits:

  • Artifice of the Archmage(Potency, Arcane) proc chance too low.
  • Controlled Destruction(Potency, Fire) is boring % buff to Pyroblast.
  • Ice Bite(Potency, Frost) is boring % buff to Ice Lance.
  • Unrelenting Cold(Potency, Frost) is boring % buff to Frozen Orb.
  • Incantation of Swiftness(Finesse) too weak compared to the other 3 options.
  • Cryo-Freeze(Endurance) too strong and badly designed, should be reworked.
  • Diverted Energy(Endurance) too strong at higher ranks.

Covenant Abilities:

  • Mirrors of Torment(Venthyr) for Arcane, giving 4% mana per mirror consumed, instead of a Clearcasting proc. Also the 6sec internal cooldown between each mirror consumed, should be removed in PvP.
  • Deathborne(Necrolord) is just awful and feels awful. Has cast time and the bonuses are lame, boring and very uneven for different specs.

Legendaries:

  • Disciplinary Command is weak for Arcane, due to not having Shatter or Combustion + crit chance multipliers.
  • Triune Ward makes your Barriers way too strong, might become mandatory in PvP.
  • Siphon Storm is boring and badly designed, should be reworked.
  • Temporal Warp doesn’t work in rated PvP.
  • Cold Front proc requirement is too high.
  • Freezing Winds is boring and can cause proc munching.
  • Slick Ice should make Icy Veins undispelable.
19 Likes
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And are we gonna talk about the fact that shimmer is 25 sec cd?

6 Likes
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In conclusion modern Mage design is bad. We dont have the amount of CC and kiting abilities what we used to have. And we have no constant damage to back up the loss of really good control.

Also the modern gameplay and skillcap is ridiculously low and we are reduced almost to support Class.

And anybody who disagrees is a troll or a moron. And this comes from Mage that played all specs through Wrath until end of MoP.

10.0 I hope Blizzard gives us Shadow Priest treatment.

7 Likes
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a round of applause to each one that I publish, excellent, blizzard is not you, it is the people you hire, BE AWARE

1 Like
5

It just does not add up that game looks artistically better and better and gameplay gets worse and worse.

2 Likes
6

I have been complaining about this since Deep Freeze, Ice Block heal and counterspell silence were taken away - WoD. (lot of other mages were complaining)

They have not been interested in fixing mage class since then and I seriously doubt they are now.

I think mage is in this weak state on purpose. Dont expect any changes.

EDIT: One stupid thing I have to point out is removing Temporal Shield from Frost and Fire for no reason. Because Arcane now have the advantage of having it and Alter Time too. Yet they did nothing to compsate this, they just took it away. This clearly shows that they did not think or bother about the outcome of these changes. They on purpose nerfed Frost and Fire in PvP. But hey, lot of things are wrong with this class.

2 Likes
7

I think we are weak because Devs dont play PvP anymore. They dont care. They press addons 30 minutes per week, collect loot and log off. I bet people who work with WoW these days dont care about their game. Its just another boring work for them.

2 Likes
8

Leaving my comment to say how much I agree with all your words.
Thanks for highlighting these issues on behalf of the Mages :heart:

2 Likes
9

I made another topic abour Mage control and damage too and getting loads of hate. People still fear us when we were actually good. And we were not even the most op. Ever.

3 Likes
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Arcane lost Displacement for Alter, while Fire and Frost lost Temp Shield.
Tbf, I think Arcane lost the most to get back Alter Time. And to the question why did we even lose these? Idk :man_shrugging:

Issue is that few classes like mage, rogue and hunter have always been the best “noob slayer” classes and in the eyes of the majority of the playerbase, they are always OP in PvP, due to how casual PvP’ers don’t know how to deal with them.

Rogue is generally the melee with most CC and damage avoidance.
While mage and hunter are the only ranged specs who’s survivability relies on kiting and not self healing.
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And then there’s a group of actual PvPers who just think Polymorph is the most overpowered CC in the game and thus mages are the best PvP class.

On which I could sort of agree back in the days, when we had stuns, silences and bunch of other CC on top of Poly, but now all we have is Poly with some roots and slows sprinkled inbetween.
And I’m sorry, but Polymorph is far less flexible spell than Cyclone and Fear, which imo are arguably even stronger with their flexibility in usage.
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And last, but not least…“BUT MAGE IS ALWAYS GOOD” argument…
Let me say something…EVERY CLASS IS ALWAYS GOOD…because every class has had AT LEAST 1 good spec in every single patch and expansion, it’s just that not every time that spec is a DPS spec and people don’t think that through, that mage HAS ONLY DPS SPECS, if we have 1 viable spec, then we’re always going to be a viable DPS class.
Same goes for rogue, same goes for warlock, same goes for hunter…aka the usual victims of “but your class is always good” stupid argument.

1 Like
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In WoD, right after its awesome launch. Mage forums were filled with feedback from mages about what needs to be done. It was really a good feedback on how to improve the class, lots of it there was.
And yet none of it was even considered.

The same team that made WoD, Legion, BFA and SL is still there. Still doing(not doing) the class design and I just cant see this class getting any better PvP wise, except worse.

I gave up hope on them at that point in WoD where they just pulled the plug - We dont communicate, we dont anwer to anyone and our is the way.

I remember what mage class is suppose to be like. I did get 2400+ RBGs in MoP aka WoW class design peak. I played the hell out of it.

2 Likes
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Also all 3 dps spec classes, more likely to have a spec that is op

13

Mage is supposed to be be squishy target to kill but not defenseless. And so it was like that since the game has started. But you cant have a target that is easy to kill and also being easy to catch. That would make it a worthless class simply because there are classes with better toolkit for PvP.

Mage always was a class hard to master but strong to play against if played correctly. However when prunning happened Mage has became that “squishy” class everyone wanted for years - easy to catch and easy to kill. Thats how squishy should be in many eyes.

On top of that, the team that made pre-WoD WoW is no longer there. The very same team that made MoP class design has been replaced with WoD Legion BFA and SL team and we all know how that team “works”. They had to put up 16 years old game in order to survive. Game that beats retail flat.

So in the end there were 3 things, hate towards mages (mage haters not being able to play that class at high lvl) + prunning + incapable developers, too afraid to take real actions and what we have now are the results.

Im writing all this from years of experience. Iv been here loooooong time and Iv seen lot of things.
When MoP came out, rogue was a trash class. Really bad design something mage is now, just unfinished and poorly designed…talents all that stuff. What they did is, in 5.1 they redisign the class from bottom and from that moment on it was fine.

Today you have class that can stun a target 2x times in a row, have a superior mobility and since its a melee class it has a range interrupt. While on the other hand there is a class that dont have a stun, self heal or means of kiting.

But thats alright, mage is suppose to be like that.

My advise is make what you can make of it, or dont play at all this class or the game at all. Putting any hope into this wow dev team is just a lost cause.

Frost mage got blink and Ice Block that dont heal for PvP, well nothing that heals of that matter. How in the hell is one suppose to play PvP with that nowdays… Temporal Shield was simply taken away and Alter si higher lvl spell + for Frost/Fire mages is does not reset Blink CD.

Im afraid as long as Ion remains Lead game designer, the game will never get a chance to be better. Its his 4th expansion and its still the same.

1 Like
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I also agree with you guys. Mages are so weak right now and Blizzard still nerfes them. It is beyond my comprehension. The only class without stuns and any form of heal. Blizzard truly does not care about PvP and since activion not even about their own players. They only see us as customers who they sell their product to. It is nothing more.

16

I think with time, with all the “Mages are the golden children of class developers” and whatnot, every single specialization got diluted and sapped of uniqueness. I stick to Arcane vehemently, but whenever I play alternate characters such as Druids, Priests or even Death Knights, I come to realise how lacking the Mage toolkit has become. The unpruning did such little good to Mage - Mana Gem? Why? It could have been anything, and yet Blizzard still remains in this weird world where Mana matters most to Arcane Mages. Sure, it does - but when Arcane Power is conserving our Mana, it is in no way buffing our Missiles. Clearcasting is massively detached from the entire specialization.

It all sucks. Only Fire ends up feeling like a more powerful specialization with its hard-hitting fireballs and wondrous animations. There has undoubtedly been a decline.

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Played mage from day 1 launch USA side. Move to EU side with friends years later.

They have gutted mages to the degree they are a joke.

I do honestly want to punch the current devs in the face because its blatantly obvious when you join a bg and literally 90% of the opposing team are all stealth or melee class’s.

I mean come on, they gave paladins a spam ranged slow / nuke and ability to ignore most cc and bubble heal.

Its pretty freaking sad and broken that melee get to do more damage than us at range.

18

I agree with everything except a few points.

Fire blast’s damage (fire) is actually really strong, critting for 2k+ without a GCD and 3 charges, making it one of the strongest damaging spells in the game since its the only spell that functions in such a manner.

Blazing Soul is strong, perhaps even the strongest option for fire. I find Shimmer to be completely useless ever since its CD got increased to 20sec, not to mention now that its 25sec. Too many stuns in the meta atm, you can’t really go without blink unless you are playing arenas with a healer. Blast Wave is nice, but its underwhelming compared to the other two options. No idea why Blast Wave wasn’t made baseline considering the lack of slows for fire.

Scorch damage is weak without Searing Touch. Once Searing Touch becomes activated scorch’s damage is actually really strong. This is what scorch’s damage should be like 100% of the time.

One thing I’d like to add is that Dragon’s Breath breaks on Living Bomb tic damage (and possibly Meteor ground damage and Flame Patch damage but I havent tested those out).

The lvl 45 row for fire mages is almost completely useless for both pvp and pve. In PvE you pick Flame Patch and nothing else. For PvP you don’t even want to pick any one of those options since they break CC.

1 Like
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My dudes. Many people tried to talk some sense to them since WoD prunning and there was no answer. Not even attempt to fix anything really.

Mage class is broken and there is a big flaw in the class design. Just look at DH, superior mobility but still it has a range interrupt that does not need. Yet it only makes the class stupid, boring and not challenging to play.

I said it once and Ill say it. This class design has been a thing since Ion took over and it got only worse.

WoD, Legion, BFA now SL and try to predict how next expansion is going look like. Exactly like those before or worse.

1 Like
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The thing is, mage overall class design is good, with frost’s FoF and BF procs having little synergy being the main issue.

The problem is other classes’ design is overtuned like crazy with little regard for how it would affect casters. Blizzard are buffing melee mobility because of the ever increasing amount of movement mechanics in PvE, which strongly impacts the PvP scene for the worst. Melee have become more and more mobile with every expansion, the latest two classes being added - Monk and DH, having some of the highest mobility in the game. This, coupled with the fact we’ve never had a new caster class, greatly impacts the balance between melee and casters.

What boggles my mind is why blizzard decided to get rid of Blazing Speed back in Legion considering how much mobility every melee has. In early MoP mages had the same issue regarding melee until Blazing Speed was buffed and it allowed mages to kite just fine throughout WoD until it was removed in Legion. Hell, I would pick Blazing Speed over Shimmer with 15sec CD any time.

1 Like
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Was mostly talking about Fireblast for arcane and frost.

The idea of the base design is good, but talents and a crap ton of little anti synergies, is where it all falls flat on its face.

  1. FoF and BF
  2. Arcane Power and Clearcasting
  3. Hot Streak and Phoenix Flames
  4. Arcane mastery increasing only arcane damage, even though we got fireblast/frostbolt
  5. Arcane familliar and Nether Tempest constantly breaking Polies
  6. DB breaking on Pyro dot damage and Blazing Barrier reflect damage
    And so on.
1 Like