TBC Mage Theorycrafting - Page 8

arch · 10/20/06, 4:36 PM

In Eyonix post about the combat stats he mentions "Spell Haste Rating", anyone got additional info on that? It's completly new to me.

Nork · 10/20/06, 4:42 PM

(edit: Misunderstood your question)

The only existing item I can think of that will have Spell Haste on it is the Mind Quickening Gem. In the expansion, it gives 330 Spell Haste Rating, which works out to a 20.88 casting speed increase.

Jaizha · 10/20/06, 6:05 PM

Originally Posted by Cloudgatherer

Originally Posted by arch

I dont see why people are so upset about the counterspell nerf. Sure, it's a big hit in solo pvp and possibly in some PvE situations, but in group pvp four seconds silence is still four seconds silence to your teammates even though you´re on global cd yourself.

By default, there is no silence component to counterspell. If a mage has the arcane talent for silence on CS, then I'd agree with you, this really isn't that big a "deal" for that mage. However, the general case is that the spell itself does not have a silence effect, it has to be timed properly (easier with a cast bar). In current WoW, if I fire off a counterspell and "miss" the window (quite possible on a 1.5 second cast spell with lag), then I haven't really wasted any time. In the beta/TBC, I can't move to my next spell right away, I have to wait for the GCD and on a "miss" that's a decent amount of time for an enemy caster to get ahead.

That's not even the whole problem, though. I can accept losing a GCD cycle after I attempt to counterspell someone; it's not really worse than hitting fireblast and seeing them resist (annoying though that is). But with counterspell becoming affected by GCD, you have to consider not only the GCD after its use but the one coming from the spell you used immediately before.

Counterspelling quick casts is going to be like trying to catch raindrops in a sieve, and wasting a 30s cooldown for each one you miss. No matter what you do - stick to instants, cancel your cast when they start healing, wand - you have to wait 1.5s to hit that button, else do no damage at all. And 1.5s is a free window for a priest to get off a flash heal, etc.

Maybe in group PvP it won't be such a big issue, I will just have to wait and see. If all else fails I can spec Arcane for the silence component, but it's kind of disappointing that after all Blizzard did to loosen mages' ties to that tree, they are reinforcing them by making the talented counterspell almost essential for PvP.

Evalara · 10/20/06, 6:09 PM

Will this "Spell Haste Rating" scale down in effectiveness with level like crit rating and hit rating? Or will MQG still be a worthwhile item at 70?

• frmorrison · 10/20/06, 6:21 PM

Originally Posted by Evalara

Will this "Spell Haste Rating" scale down in effectiveness with level like crit rating and hit rating? Or will MQG still be a worthwhile item at 70?

Every bonus like haste, weapon skill, spell hit, crit stats will scale down as you level. It takes aboutMQG may be good for making water, but I doubt it would be good at 70 (because the haste will be less than it is now).

Here are the caster scaling:
Spell Critical Strike Rating: 22.1 rating grants 1% spell critical strike chance
Spell Hit Rating: 12.6 rating grants 1% spell hit chance
Haste Rating: 15.8 rating grants 1% haste

• frmorrison · 10/20/06, 6:22 PM

Neth posted a summary of blue responses about Mages:

Here are some questions as posted on the prior thread and their answers:

Q: Will the new talent whereby all spell criticals increase by 50% (2 talent points) will this stack with ignite and ice shards?

A: Yes. 225% Frostbolt crits and Ignite based off 175% Fireball crits.

Q: Will this stack with ice shards? How does this work with Ice lance? With this talent, Arcane power, and ice shards, are my Ice Lance's doing 580% damage on crits?

A: Base damage (Arcane Power adjustments, Ice Lance damage vs. frozen targets etc...) applies before the 225% crit damage bonus (assuming Spell Power + Ice Shards).

Q: Does this mean the developers are happy with frost and fire?

A: There are always issues, varying in priority. We'll let these changes ride and keep playtesting and reading feedback on all trees.

Someone had also suggested the following:

S: I'd like to suggest the following change to Prismatic Cloak Prismatic Cloak
Rank: X/2
Requires 25 points in Arcane Talents
Reduces all damage taken by 2%/4% and the chance your (arcane/all) Magic effects will be dispelled by an additional 15%/30% (if arcane only) 10%/20% (if all).

A: Maybe on adding dispel resistance, but I don't like adding it to this particular talent.

Cloudgatherer · 10/20/06, 6:46 PM

Originally Posted by Jaizha

That's not even the whole problem, though. I can accept losing a GCD cycle after I attempt to counterspell someone; it's not really worse than hitting fireblast and seeing them resist (annoying though that is). But with counterspell becoming affected by GCD, you have to consider not only the GCD after its use but the one coming from the spell you used immediately before.

That's an excellent point. I've gotten quite used to using CS during a global cooldown, it is practically a second nature for me (and probably many other mages as well). In PvP, a fireblast followed by a CS during the GCD is a rather common move for me (extend the spell cast time, counter it).

I'm curious how blizzard expects mages to stop any spell with a short cast time. Given mages are typically casting frequently (GCD happens alot), do mages need to halt casting in anticipation of a spell to counter (in pve for example)? In pvp, the action is pretty fast, and a GCD will block most opportunities to counter a spell. It isn't as if any semi-intelligent mage (or warlock or priest or other caster) is going to break out a long-cast-time-spell in the middle of a spell duel against another mage, those are typically opening moves, while the rest of the fight typically being short cast (scorch) or instant cast type spells.

The only other counterspell-like effects are kick (rogue), shield bash (warrior) and spell lock (warlock-felhunter). Am I missing other class ones? While kick and shield bash are on the GCD, those classes are also doing white damage during the GCD, and both of those have a 10 second cooldown (roughly). The felhunter has a much longer cooldown, but is not on the GCD (least not on the warlock's GCD). Honestly, I rather wish we did not have spell interruption (+1s, +.8s, etc), that a melee or caster class needed to actually use an ability to halt our spell, instead of just beating on us and doubling (or more) the cast time of most spells. <--- is probably a big reason why many people re-roll out of pure caster classes for pvp, there is just not much to do when someone starts beating on you other than fire off instants (which are limited).

Edit: Forgot Earthshock, which is a hugely powerful PvP spell against cloth casters (damage + counter).

Eej · 10/20/06, 7:17 PM

Originally Posted by Cloudgatherer

The only other counterspell-like effects are kick (rogue), shield bash (warrior) and spell lock (warlock-felhunter). Am I missing other class ones?

Deadly Throw with Rogue Arena gloves.

Saternium · 10/20/06, 7:20 PM

Anyone have thoughts on a leveling spec?

It seems like at the moment any of the 3 trees seems viable for grinding. Deep arcane for soloing elite quests with AP, frost for AE grinding and fire for fast solo grinding.

Anyone in beta have any insights to offer on a spec?

flyinfungi · 10/20/06, 7:22 PM

Imp CS is a big nerf for us. It allowed us before to get off an entire fireball on a caster. Now we can get off only a scorch. The silence is kinda like a 1.5s silence. Imp CS was our BEST anti caster ability. I would be allot more happy with the IMP CS nerf if they increased the silence by 1.5 more seconds.

Noya · 10/20/06, 7:34 PM

We aslo have a lot of ways to control a fight (sheep, nova, blink, coc plus the new stuff like slow and blazing speed). Control then burst will always be better than spamming instants. The GCD on CS won't be such a pain if our damage (please leave spell power as is) scales with the stam buffs. The only major problem I see is shamans and grounding totems.

Vetinari · 10/20/06, 7:54 PM

Nova, the issue with that is that the various methods of control that mages have are only truly effective against warriors and rogues. Mages don't have issues with them now, and will continue to not have issues with them.

Mages struggle much more against casters and healers of all kinds. And the CS nerf is a pretty significant nerf in that regard. (at least, they did when I played one, sometime around 1.2-1.3)

Does anyone have a valid theory WHY it was nerfed? The other spell interrupts are effectively NOT on a global cooldown. (Spell lock is on the felhunter, and rogues/warriors don't chain cast, not to mention that their attacks delay casts enough to give them time to use kick/pummel/shield bash, etc.) It seems somewhat odd to single out mages in this regard.

Xunwael · 10/20/06, 9:23 PM

The official statement is that the only spells that get to not invoke the GCD are those that affect your next spell(s), like Combustion or PoM. Though some speculate that it's because of the introduction of the various 41p talents that warrant this nerf, as they all make it harder for our opponents to cast (Elemental with damage interruption independant of what we're doing, Breath with confusion and Slow with, well... slow).

Personally, though, I like to think that this is all a great conspiracy by everyone in the entire world against me.

Noya · 10/20/06, 9:26 PM

Originally Posted by Vetinari

Nova, the issue with that is that the various methods of control that mages have are only truly effective against warriors and rogues.

Its Noya =)

I didn't mean just rogues/warriors.

Hunters: Blink into range, root them, sheep them, coc/blastwave to keep range.
Casters: Blink into/out of range/los, sheep to reset, impact.
Druids: Constant snares to force shifts.

Not counting the new talents.

The only valid reason I can see to put the GCD on CS is to stop ICS fireball > blastwave > dragons breath > scorch > fireblast type combos.

Xunwael · 10/20/06, 9:34 PM

Those things are near impossible to pull off outside 1v1 encounters, anyway, and blizzard have made it very obvious that they really don't care about those at all. If that were to be their reasoning, then, well, I just don't know what I would have to say to them, had I the chance to do so.

Vetinari · 10/20/06, 11:27 PM

Originally Posted by Xunwael

The official statement is that the only spells that get to not invoke the GCD are those that affect your next spell(s), like Combustion or PoM.

If this is true, I wonder if other abilities got the same treatment, like taunt, stance changing, etc...

Joink · 10/21/06, 12:03 AM

Originally Posted by Vetinari

Does anyone have a valid theory WHY it was nerfed? The other spell interrupts are effectively NOT on a global cooldown. (Spell lock is on the felhunter, and rogues/warriors don't chain cast, not to mention that their attacks delay casts enough to give them time to use kick/pummel/shield bash, etc.) It seems somewhat odd to single out mages in this regard.

Blizzard wants mages to be hard to play in pvp? /sarcasm

I don't think comparing counter spell to kick/pummel/shield bash is a good comparison as non casters have other drawbacks other than a gcd to worry about. And a warlocks’ spell lock is from a pet so technically the warlocks’ gcd shouldn't be affected.

I do agree that it seems like mages are being singled out here. The direction loot is going in TBC, mages need some cc lov'n not cc nerfs.

arch · 10/21/06, 12:13 AM

Well cc's are getting nerfed inside the arena, polymorph will be even more terrible (yes it is possible) in comparsion to some other cc's.

But after watching the video posted by Dendory on page 2 ( http://files.filefront.com/TBCwmv/;6...nfo.html&sid=1 ) I'm completly sure that we will be all right. At least fire mages, damn those new talents are really awesome... I'm even considering mad builds such as 1/60/0 after watching our new talents in action :)

Xunwael · 10/21/06, 9:59 AM

I don't think Polymorph -> spellsteal spam is a good way to initiate any fight, looking at the mana cost of that spell it's unlikely you'll be able to kill your opponent afterwards. Already, in 9 out of 10 PvP encounters I'd rather use a mana potion than a health potion, can't imagine how it's gonna be like in TBC, but I dubt you'd wanna throw your mana away by using spellsteal alot in PvP.

Honestly, I have to question if it's worth using at all, considering its randomness - it's gonna take less mana to simply do damage to the priest shield than dispelling it, same with HoTs, and considering that you'll prolly have to dispell 3 other buffs before you get to the HoT or shield, it's probably gonna take about the same time as well.

Originally Posted by Vetinari

Originally Posted by Xunwael

The official statement is that the only spells that get to not invoke the GCD are those that affect your next spell(s), like Combustion or PoM.

If this is true, I wonder if other abilities got the same treatment, like taunt, stance changing, etc...

Sorry for not providing a link right away, but the Blizz forums don't seem to like me very much. Anyway, go to this threat on page 3 for the actual post: http://beta.worldofwarcraft.com/thre...20167&pageNo=3

Quotes:

Originally Posted by Nethaera

This is not a bug.

Originally Posted by Nethaera

This is consistent with other spells. Spells that don't have a global cooldown are ones that change the dynamics of your next spell. Example: Presence of Mind, Combustion.

arch · 10/21/06, 12:48 PM

Spellsteal will be useful in 1on1 vs a few classes, but the more people you add the crappier the spell becomes. The problem is that as soon as the people you fight in 1on1 learn about how spellsteal works, they will start overbuffing themselves, mages using mana shield against another mage etc.

I totally see spellsteal being useful against Druids (everything you can steal from a druid is useful except maybe thorns) Priests and stupid mages/warlocks that dont overbuff themselves. It's not going to be worth stealing from a paladin since all you will get is a seal that you dont need and a overpriced BoW or BoM.

But as I said, that's the 1on1 perspective, add more people and the spell becomes close to useless. That's the problem with it.

BeavisNuke · 10/21/06, 2:22 PM

I just looked at the mage trainers on the test server and spellsteal costs 38 mana right now.

Xunwael · 10/21/06, 3:26 PM

Only explanation I can give to that is that you must've looked with a low lvl char, or something? It's 30-something percent of base mana. 36%, I think (blink is 35%, by comparison).

It would be overpowered if it had only token mana cost (even though the time investment itself can be a steep price to pay), but at 36% of base mana it looks only mildly situationally useful to me, though I've yet to actually test it out, maybe I'm wrong.

Nurru · 10/21/06, 4:17 PM

The only class that should be that worried about Spell Steal are druids for the most part. Priests/Warlocks have methods by which to dispel. Who cares about Mage vs Mage, etc.

Druids vs a 41 Arcane mage who can steal Rejuv/Regrowth and increase casting time on Regrowth/Healing Touch by 50% should be quite an opponent for a druid.

BeavisNuke · 10/21/06, 4:25 PM

Originally Posted by Xunwael

Only explanation I can give to that is that you must've looked with a low lvl char, or something? It's 30-something percent of base mana. 36%, I think (blink is 35%, by comparison).

Argh, and I got my hopes up.

Zed · 10/21/06, 4:37 PM

It's nice against Paladins imo it will be funny to steal BoF from a paladin and watch him get an immune message to his stun :D or BoP even.
It will be nice in grp pvp too, another form of purge, spammable on FC in WSG, and sets up a Paladin for a priests Mass Dispel