I know you are a proponent of full conversion to % scalars, so would you see % mana costs as a solution? Then it would be somewhat like rogues/wars, whose abilities you can not downrank, and you would not want to because all ranks just increase damage while costing same percent.

Even though I am a fan of proportional scaling, I have to admit that any kind of scaling spell cost has to be done very carefully, or else you hit people over the head with the futility of mana-oriented stats.

Something I've considered is allowing each spell to have a variable cost at a fixed HP:mana ratio up to a cap, and increasing intellect or mana regen allows this cap to increase. This way there's still some element of choice. That's purely hypothetical, however.

I see what you mean, Int would become highly devalued. I think blizz is actually addressing this w/ the non-ranked spells like blink/poly/slowfall. They are all moving to base mana % costs.

I would think that to keep a bit of balance, base mana would have to increase by a good portion, move all spells to % of base mana, and int adds to the base mana, perhaps reduce the effectiveness of int on mana by a bit, and increase its crit effectiveness.

2.5%, so they need to do double their current DPS at their current gear level to compensate. The italicized part is important. Yes, at level 80, in level 80 gear, with level 80 spell ranks, a Shadow Priest may well be doing high enough DPS to restore as much mana as he currently restores at level 70, in level 70 gear, with level 70 spell ranks. But proportionate to rates of mana consumption, which will also increase greatly at level 80 due to both increased base costs and increased spell haste, it won't be as nearly as much as 5% is at level 70.

And no, it's not really off-topic at all, because raid mana regen is an important concern to Mages. How much we can expect from various sources not only affects the viability of our own various spec options, but the value of some of our own talents. If I'm getting all the mana I need from a Water Elemental, Shadow Priest and Survival Hunter, perhaps Master of Elements becomes superfluous, for example.

It is most definitely not off topic. Deep fire is in need of some help, whether it be another gimmicky form of utility or flat out raw DPS (preferential). If LB can in fact be viably used as a single target DD spell then it will certainly pertain to Mage PvE potential in WotLK.

However if it becomes another Arcane Blast gimmick spec and you need dedicated group matrices, specific mana assistance from utility such as innervates, or are forced to sacrifice other DPS such as damage potions/cooldowns and/or molten armor in order to sustain LB in a rotation, then it may not truly affect DPS potential. These are things we need to know to paint an accurate picture but unfortunately we cannot get a reasonable perspective of the situation at 80 due to the drastic changes in mana regen mechanics, as well as any future changes during beta to mana costs and Armor attributes (hopefully the feedback reaches the devs regarding the need for a mana regen + damage-stat armor).

Until then we can make conjectures on what is the max DPS rotation based on damage ranges/totals.... but just like Arcane Blast the conjectures are null and void when taking a reasonable perspective of mana. The 1,000 mana cost every 12 seconds just screams "mana hog" to me, and I would like to know if it is at all possible to use in PvE single target DPS rotations before praising it for its boost to raid damage.

As an additional note/question to beta testers; Does a crit from the final blast of LB return mana from MoE?

It is kinda interesting that you complain that much about the mana cost for LB, but not nearly so much about the cost of Focus magic, which had an expected duration of about 15s in a 25 man raid.

I answered this upthread but no, it does not. I'm not sure if it's because LB is bugged or not.

To be honest, it seems like mana regen is going to be flying in from all corners of the raid, almost to the point that it could become excessive. Don't forget that even Surv hunters now have their own exceptional regen talent (2% of your total mana back every 8-12 seconds, I would guess,) and with raid-wide auras and totems, there's no real reason a surv hunter couldn't be grouped with a mage.

With, say, 20k mana raid-buffed (which I think is a pretty fair estimation in 80 raid content), a Surv hunter alone will make up 40% of the cost of LB and Focus Magic alone in the time it takes to reapply them. Add that to everything else discussed and I just can't see mana becoming much of a problem, even if Spriests do return less than they used to. Even full AB spam seems reasonable, and that's before evocation and gems.

The only issue being that Hunting Party only works in party and isn't raid-wide (yet or if ever).

Trust me, I complain plenty about Focus Magic's mana cost as well ... but I assume that Focus Magic's mana cost will be reduced to be more viable (or have a dramatic increase in charges/duration) more so than LB, since the entire intention of Focus Magic is to be a single target DPS boosting debuff, whereas LB functions as a CC/AoE in addition to target damage. The mana cost of LB takes all of its effects into consideration, which could warrant a higher mana cost... while Focus Magic seems like an awfully poor implementation for all cases considering the mana cost.

However I am still hoping for Focus Magic to be reworked entirely and be given a very different mechanic, such as having AM pulses apply a set # of charges rather than a set & forget (for 10-15 seconds) debuff. I could be happy with LB as it is now as long as the mana cost is reduced. I wouldn't be happy with FM in its current form regardless of mana cost.

Note that Survival Hunters, while they can indeed restore Mana, also have the much more rare (even unique?) capability of restoring Rage, Energy and Runic Power. It strikes me as unlikely that Mages will be grouped with Survival Hunters in 25-mans precisely because there are so many other group- and raid-wide mana restoration effects.

Of course not. The system of mana is different than the system of energy because it emphasizes a different effect on playstyle. The rogue energy system is to act as a limiter on DPS through timing. You cannot smash all the buttons for massive damage because you have to wait from some energy to come back in order to use abilities. This emphasizes relatively static DPS throughout entire fights--endurance and preplanning aren't elements on the energy system, only the highest possible damage.

Mana, on the other hand, is a system in which players can choose between fast damage and "efficiency". Based on your knowledge of the length of the fight and the health of the enemy, mana-users have a preset spending limit in which they must use the correct actions in the correct order, or risk draining themselves early of all possible actions, and in the end finding themselves doing lower average DPS (or simply dying in PvP) because they chose to do the highest possible damage rather than working around the inhibitor of mana.

This is a generalization of what rogues have to do with energy, but my point was the the system of energy restricts players by not letting them get all their damage or abilities out immediately. The system of mana allows players to choose to get all their abilities and damage out immediately, but suffer endurance problems as it goes on.

If your argument for Rogues was true Raglu, all Rogue abilities would have an energy requirement. They don't.

As for Mages, Mana is not really something that can be planned around for a DPS class. In which case, the only argument available is that the Mage picked the wrong class for DPS. I'd like to think Blizzard is better than that, but who knows, you may be right. After all, selling the idea that AoE is the Mage moniker is equally moronic on their part.

I'm not too keen on the idea of killing targets because they run out of Mana, that's really the only reason I think the Mana system needs re-working.

Raglu is right regarding energy/rage in that compared to mana-users Rogues/Warriors cannot always use their abilities when available. However that suggests that mana-users should gain an increasing advantage over Rogues/Warriors when they extend their mana longevity. If mana-users do not have the capability to output higher damage with unlimited mana, then there is simply no justification to the mana system (unless of course the mana user offers vast utility which I wouldn't consider mages to have). If I am unable to outpace a regulated damage system using a different system with its regulation removed.... then what is the point of the latter system?

Rogue DPS is monitored, regulated and balanced around the energy available over time... however casting classes continue to be balanced around the idea that they can continue their max-DPS rotations indefinitely & mana is infinite when it clearly is not. If a caster completes a max-DPS rotation that is inferior to a melee's max-DPS rotation, it seems imbalanced to allow the former to go OOM compared to the latter.

The source of the whole mana-limitation seems to come from healers and mana as a PvE skill mechanism; healers managing casts, efficiency and timing to get one specific goal accomplished. The difference lies in how DPS casters' goal is ever-changing; always trying to gain the ability to reach the same goal in less time, aka DPS. So restrictions from mana do not create skill they create a sacrifice of DPS, so if max-DPS rotations ignoring mana costs cannot outpace unrestricted melee DPS then there is nothing to justify a limit on mana.

This is one of the reasons why I've always considered Arcane Blast as a bad omen for Mages; it created the potential for extra mana to in fact be considered extra DPS. Mages became doomed from that point on to be restricted by mana. The problem persisted though where not only is the spam unsustainable... but it remained inferior not only when spammed but even when used purely as a mana-dump as well.

I think the ultimate solution is simply to give DPS casters unlimited mana compared to healers who remain restricted... but to regulate the mana gain in some form or another (i.e. GCDs used for lifetap for Warlocks). Casters shouldn't be forced to reduce their DPS in lieu of efficiency/sustainability when already disadvantaged in the DPS department.

Which is why I'd suggest a "Mana" system for casters that is based upon the Rogue's Energy system. It's a self-limiting system in which even though you have access to everything, you cannot spam until the cows come home as a Rogue. You need to mix it up and use all your abilities to be competitive. Mages, and really other casters and Hunters fall behind because of the fact that their ability is limited not by time, but by a seemingly arbitrary "pool" of Mana. What's worse is Mages being given abilities like Evocate and Hunters being given Aspect of the Viper, a basic admittance that Mana management is a problem, but rather than solving it more effectively so that it's a non-issue, you instead have to gimp your DPS, your abilities, or some other aspect of the game to keep up Mana.

I think it's even more obvious now, with Death Knights being given something such as runic power and energy, which is essentially a compromise between giving them Mana outright, because pretty much everyone knows (excepting the Devs) that Mana as a pool is terrible when applied with any amount of practicality.

There's no way in hell that they are changing the fundamental way mana works to be more like rage or energy, so please stop derailing the thread.

Discussing the various ways we will be generating mana, everything from new talents to JOW scaling to pot nerfing is all wonderful. The more data people like Vontre can get, the better we and blizzard will be served.

Posts about your (not you specifically) dream system where mana will be treated like energy, not so much.

I think evocation with no (or sub 5 minute) cooldown would be effective.

No DPS for 8/10 seconds to get a full mana bar, Easily interrupted, and slight cooldown for PvP purposes. In AB Spam situations, it would be quite a hit as you would have to ramp up AB again, and other specs it would take mana completely out of the picture (except that dps loss during evocate).

It would essentially fall in line w/ life tap as a DPS loss/gain, and would help immensely in AoE situations.

Yet there's still a definite problem with melee scaling versus caster scaling.

You're correct in that probably the ideal situation first envisioned by differentiating energy and mana was that mana-users could have a higher DPS than warriors, rogues, and kitties but with low longevity, and would find that more efficient spell choices lead to DPS slightly/mildly lower than those rogues (and kitties and warriors perhaps) over long PvE fights but much longer longevity, leading to higher overall DPS (than using high DPS, low DPM spells) on longer fights.

As it stands, that ideal is simply unrealized as rogues can and often do hold the highest burst damage along with the highest sustained damage. That ideal should have mana-users with the highest burst damage but lower sustained damage than energy-users. Unfortunately, that may have come about due to the design of the rogue class in its other aspects--while the energy system should favor sustained damage over burst damage, the survivability and abilities of the rogue demand high burst damage. The end result was the perspective that energy was an overall "better" system.

Perhaps, in the same way that tankadins are able to consider "front-loading threat" or having "burst threat" with their mana bars compared to red-bar tanks, what some of you are looking for is for the rogue, whose definition as a class is to have high burst, to use the mana system and casters have more energy-like systems so that they can hold sustained damage?

Yes, but with that powerful a talent, it seems like the Surv hunter could become the new spriest of WotLK: 2-3 per raid, stuck in each dps group. This would be especially true if they make VT go raid-wide, as it frees a utility spot in certain groups. I guess it all depends on the potential rDPS numbers hunter TC is churning out for various specs.

The problem with this build is that you're assuming you'll need things quite deep (relatively) into the Arcane tree for PvP. Sure, some of these things help, but are you using them now? The only reason people go into Arcane tree now is for the Silence. So you end up with a 17.0.44 build.

With that same build, and the extra points spent in frost tree, we end up with:

http://talent.mmo-champion.com/?mage...00000000000000

But that's neglecting new talents as well. I realize silence is very much desired, but you don't know how things are going to play out, and thus you end up ignoring other new talents:

http://talent.mmo-champion.com/?mage...00000000000000

Consider arcane PvP builds (which don't work now, but):

http://talent.mmo-champion.com/?mage...53323132510321

And I'm sure there's much yet to be shifted and changed around...