Maligne

I don't know what happened to the "or Iceblock: Dicuss thread", so I started a new one.

What does everyone think about the season 2 gear and weapons? Personally I'm getting the Spellblade and wand on day 1, as I'm on a burst team and damage is more important than a couple stat points on the armor. Using a 1 hander also allows for some PVE flexibility (flametounge), and not to mention the fact that everyone and their brother has that big red staff.

After that I think I'll get 2 pieces of the season 2 set to double stack the bonus with the hologogs, then go for the offhand.

The armor bonus is nice but I can't say I wouldn't have rather seen the points used for just about anything else.

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Avelle

I'm not entirely sure what to do about a weapon yet. I may get the Merciless Staff ( I use PVE weapons currently ) but the new staves I've seen introduced in 2.1 are nice too and not out of reach. My team only started doing arena about a month and a half ago so I currently have 2 pieces of Season 2 gear and will have 5k points this Tuesday. I hopped on test and picked up 2 pieces of Season 2 and I will definitely be rocking 2 pieces of Season 1 and Season 2 gear until I can get more resilience. I'm not terribly impressed with the Season 2 stats for Mage but seeing as the damage I seem to take most of the time is melee, I kinda appreciate the armor.

 

Agni

Here's a mage related PVP question, slightly off topic.

I see that some specs have more than 2 points in arcane focus (especially 40/0/21). Is there a reason for this? (other than needing to spend 5 first tier points) As I understand it, the talent gives +spell hit and not +spell penetration. The percent chance to miss a player of equal level is 4%, meaning anything over 2 points is wasted.

Additionally, does anyone have any experience with using arcane blast in arena? It has the same cast time as frost bolt at its slowest and you could even POM into it for a quick ramp-up into burst down.

 

marloz

You're right that you only need 4% hit vs. players but some of us PvE as well That might be the reason you see some PvPers with 3 points in Elemental Precision.

As for the Arcane Blast in Arenas - well, it really depends what brackets you play in. It might be handy in 2v2 or 3v3 but in 5v5 I doubt it's viable due to the sheer mana cost. 5v5 battles can and will sometimes last long, and mana conserving isn't something I think about but you might get problems with AB spam.

And using POM to reduce the casttime of AB is not something I would recommend. POM is there for the extra burst when needed. Another thing worth mentioning is that you tend to move alot in Arenas (atleast I do) and the risk of the AB debuff running out in the meantime is there.

 

Nostrum

Mainly to have a better chance to hit a CS against players with talents like Unbreakable Will and/or Silence resist items.

E: also sheep heartbeat checks of course =)

 

Roywyn

Does spell hit work against silence resist talents?
Also, seeing that all (all? most at least) of those talents have been changed to a silence/interrupt duration decrease does it still have a use? I see some use for it if it eats into those stun/(fear)/snare resistance talents/items.
Sheep heartbreak resists should just be 1% (4% without spell hit) + arcane resistance, or do I miss some poly resist talents?

I tested molten armour and ~23% spell hit gear against a rogue with CloS and it seemed to reduce resists (down to ~70% resists), testing wasn't reliable enough.

So, spell hit vs. resist talents/gear/enchants/gems - does it work or not?

(As for 3/5 Arcane Focus - just consider it a better filler point than 1/5 Arcane Missiles.)

 

marloz

According to Thottbot CloS is -90 chance to hit, so yes; +hit gear will penetrate that ability.

 

Frieza

Weren't heartbeat checks related to resistances?

 

Maligne

I'm pretty sure I've read somewhere on here that there's no way to reduce the effects of the Talisman/silence resist talents.

Also, concerning the season 2 gear:

http://forums.worldofwarcraft.com/th...No=7&sid=1#120

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Carleton

I hope they decide to upgrade the S2 gear =/ The armor is nice i guess, but I think that I might just go for the s1 stuff if they don't since i don't have oodles of points.

 

Maligne

It seems like everyone was going for the staff in season 1, and the spellblade in season 2. I wonder why that is?

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Leto

Possibly because the gladiator's endgame was bad, but the merciless gladiator's endgame is pretty good... so the mh/oh combo is worth the points compared to the staff.

Rogue at heart.

 

◊ Vontre

What the fuck I didn't post that!!

www.magegraf.com

Raiding is full of challenge. Sometimes there is fire. You have to not be in the fire.

"We agree with Communism." - Greg Street 2009

 

Leto

Seeing things?

Rogue at heart.

 

heemo

i also went with the spellblade, though i'm going to forego getting the offhand in favor of picking up two pieces of armor for the double resil. bonus using talisman of nightbane in the meantime. as far as the spellblade vs. staff debate is concerned, it's pretty much a no-brainer since about the only thing you lose is a few hit and a good amount of crit - which i've found is much less valuable than +dmg per item point, especially against high resilience opponents. what you gain is a lot of +dmg and resilience, so it's a worthy tradeoff, even if it costs you more arena points in the long run.

my main focus is 2v2 which i do with a shadow priest so i virtually never get focus-fired first. my thinking is upping my damage output is much more valuable than upping my survivability since the latter only comes in to play after my partner is dead. i do 5v5 as well, though i play that much less lately, but i will eventually have a set for each, one putting me around 10k hp, 450 resil, 850 dmg for 5v5, one with about 9k hp, 300 resil, 950 dmg (and the two piece tier 4 bonus) for 2v2 and 3v3.

edit: oh, also on the +hit/arcane focus - aside from boss dps (assuming you even use arcane spells on them), i don't see any reason to spend points in those talents when you've already hit the 4% cap. as was mentioned, the talents that used to increase resistance to silence/interrupt effects have all been changed to reduce durations instead. since i see most of the arcane tree up to 15 points as a pretty big waste - now more than ever - i've given up 17-0-44 for a full 61 point frost build and am loving it. the only time i really miss having imp CS is against other mages (particularly AP mages) and resto druids.

 

Maligne

My spreadsheet says you did, and it's 98% right. Most of the time.

Inform your dealers and whores of my credit, and pour me a goddamned drink!

 

Northerner

I am very amused.

 

Faerun

Well, not to revive a dead thread, but my mage is hopefully going to finish 65-70 this weekend so I can start arena'ing with him and I was looking at an elemental build. I played a mage pre-BC and always wanted to try elemental, but it didn't really seem viable back then. However, with 10 additional talents, I really want to try it, so here's what I've come up with:
http://www.wowhead.com/?talent=kZEgRz00cReRbVbrho0xo
Fire will obviously be my main damaging spells, so I picked up some of the imp snare/freezing frost talents- I don't plan on shooting many frostbolts other than rank 1 now & then. Any input would be great, thanks

 

MeCh

You will rarely have time to shoot fireballs.

If you have any points in fire, 3 points in imp fireblast, or don't go fire at all.

 

DecimusGarona

A build something like this would be better if you want to PvP as elemental.

http://www.wowhead.com/?talent=kZVgGzf0cReRZVoGho0xo

Only a few points have been shifted, mostly to focus on scorch over fireball.

 

Faerun

Thx a ton. I'm excited!!

 

Lodi

re: don't go fire at all w/o imp fireblast

What about 0/7/54 (impact proc for molten armor plus range for fireblast)? Would 0/10/51 be better?

re: 61 frost

Does anyone use imp blizzard at all for the improved snare effect? Assuming rank 1 works fine as the damage is laughable at any rank and mana matters.

 

Maligne

Re: Elementalist: This build is kind of a tightrope walk between doing damage and using mana. You really have to be careful with maxed improved fireblast and cone of cold because they drain mana pretty quickly. Also if you're going to use fire for most of your damage, try and get as many points as possible in firepower. I always preferred a 0/38/23 variant, because molten fury is pretty incredible.

Lately though I've been loving arcane/fire. Spamming improved mana shield better than iceblock? Discuss.

Inform your dealers and whores of my credit, and pour me a goddamned drink!

 

Avelle

no. :P

 

tha_bishop

Improved or not it still drains alot of mana and the best thing about iceblock imo is that it removes MS and wound poison. Arcane fire can be a real pain in arena at times