Actually, Pasture is more spot on then you are giving him credit for.

There are many things make no sense when labeling Arcane as the "fun, quirky, utility tree", especially in the context of WoW. Here are just a few:

1. There is no point being the 'utility tree' when almost everyone else has utility far in excess of yours. Far in excess in terms of viability, versatility and usability. Take Slow for example. You can say Slow adds to arcane's 'utility', but in actual fact, its such a commonplace effect that it ends up being pointless, since everyone can slow everyone else, i.e. its not exactly something that you can say stands out for arcane. Not to mention, there are people whose ability to slow is far superior to what arcane can accomplish.

At the end of the day, you can't be 'the utility spec' when everyone already has all the same utility that you have, as well as a theme of their own.

2. Utility has to actually be useful and unique to mean something (i.e. so as to be used as the basis for a "core theme"). If Arcane had a talent that turned conjured food into conjured popsicles, you wouldn't call that utility, you would call that a joke, because it is not useful. If on the other hand, Arcane had a utility that was super awesome, the only way it would remain "super awesome" is if it was unique to Arcane.

Unfortunately, current WoW design has moved away from having a class or spec have something that is "useful and unique" mainly because it would make that class somewhat mandatory. As we all know, this is a big "no-no" in blizzard's eyes.


As a side note, one of the strongest reasons the Wizard in DnD actually worked (at least before they butchered DnD with the 4th ed), was because he was the only one with access to all the unique effects that spells provided. A wizard would be pointless if every other class could have the same impact on the battlefield that he did as well as having something else that made them unique.


So no, while "utility spec" is a good design in a bubble, it just can't work within the confines of the homogenized class design dogma of WoW.

In short, "utility" cannot be arcane's core theme.

All the rose colored memories of TBC Arcane are pretty funny when you consider that the spec's dps was terrible and you could destroy Arcane's numbers just by furiously mashing the Fireball key. The haste part was fun but it didn't actually work in the way you guys think, mostly because the tuning of the dpm/dps trade off was completely terrible. And even full stack AB was barely higher dps than Fireball spam anyway.

So there are abilities out there that provide an instant slow that can be cast on the move, while also being the only spell that slows ranged attacks?

I still don't like the mastery bonus of Arcane being tied to the amount of mana you have unspent. But, I do think mana management can be a fun/interesting mechanic. All you have to do is look at TBC Arcane to see this. Pre-T6 Arcane was fun because it rewarded you for being an absolute mana whore. To me this is what mana management should be.

So I have spent some time collating information from multiple forums (both here and other community sites) regarding the question of what arcane's core theme should be. So far, it looks like there are two main front-runners.

I have tried to distill the ideas behind these two themes. The results are as follows.
(n.b. I have not yet seen an argument which suggests that these themes are mutually exclusive)

The leading ideas of what the Arcane mage should be are:

Idea 1: The Prismatic Mage

Core theme: The prismatic mage is a mage who does not have an intense focus on any one school of magic. Instead, he specializes is using spells from multiple schools to produce synergistic effects. This type of mage specializes in the diversity of magic born out of the use of all spells at his disposal.

Supporting Hypothesis: Many have argued that the initial idea of the Arcane mage was one of a "multischool caster". They believe this goal can still be achieved and may help in solving a lot of the issues plaguing Arcane mages right now (e.g. boring, limited spells. lack of a distinct theme, small spell selection etc). Many proponents of this idea point to the fact that even till now (live), Arcane talents have had support for non-arcane spells (e.g. Missile Barrage working off of non-arcane spells).

Pros:

• Fits well with the arcane "Lore".
• Allows for the possibility of adding gameplay to the Arcane spec without having to introduce many new spells.
• Some precedence exists for successful multischool casting specs (elemental shamans, boomkins).

Cons:

• "Jack of all trades" hasn't worked quite well in the past (though some argue that it is because it hasn't been implemented right).
• It will be hard to create mechanics that provide enough incentive to cast spells from other schools and prevent the "X-bolt does more damage than Y-bolt, so just use X-bolt" problem. N.b. This problem is somewhat stymied in other multi-school casting specs through the use of cooldowns (e.g. Lava burst has a CD). So far, Mages are one of the few classes that don't have cooldowns on their main 'bolt' spells, which, imho, is a positive trait. It is also important to note, that for multischool specs that do not use cooldowns, a separate, unique mechanic is introduced to make the spec work, e.g. eclipse for Boomkins.

Idea 2: The Master of Mana

Core theme: This type of mage specializes in the control of mana (be it his own, his allies' or his enemies', or even all three). The success or failure of this mage depends on his ability to control mana to his advantage. He does this through the use of a diverse set of 'mana management tools'.

Supporting Hypothesis: People believe that "mana management" has been (supposedly) part of the Arcane mage's playstyle for a while now. They say that even though the "management" aspect hasn't really shown its face yet, the goal of making the "mana specialist" arcane mage is still a worthwhile task which will produce 'fun' and interactivity in the end.

Pros:

• Fits well with the general impression people have had about arcane for an expansion or so.
• Some core mechanical requirements (i.e. Arcane Blast) are already in place, all that is needed now is to flesh out the rest of this gameplay.
• Blizzard has, to some extent, shown support for this idea with Mana Adept.

Cons:

• Most agree that we (mages) are still undecided on what "mana managment" actually means. Does it mean using mana gem at the right time? Does it mean using some new combination of spells and talent synergies that allow us to control mana in a fine grained way? Does it mean just casting fewer Arcane Blasts? etc
• A very small set of smart posters have provided very compelling arguments showing how 'mana management' is an unrealistic goal, since it exists in an inherent contradiction of the overall design of a mana based dps class.
• Almost everyone agrees that actually creating mana management gamplay would require a lot of work, since in its current state, this kind of gameplay is totally absent from arcane. It may even require the addition of new arcane-spec specific spells, which some people are weary of.

Over the past few days, people have also started gravitating towards Blizzard's description of the Arcane spec in the new talent trees, which states that the arcane mage

"Manipulates arcane energies, playing with the very fabric of time and space."

However, apart from core class spells (e.g. portals, Magelust), few have provided any explanation or hypothesis on how this idea can be expanded upon on a gameplay level. E.g. what does a "time/space warping" caster actually look like in combat? What kind of spells would work in "altering space/time"? etc.

Personal Note
I read a lot of posts in trying to make sense of the community's feel for arcane right now.
What I found most interesting reading a lot of those posts was just how impressively bland the spec looks right now, a feeling which I think is mirrored in a lot of the people trying to play Arcane in beta (especially in PvE).

I mean, there isn't even a talent in the beta tree that expands/modifies/buffs the specs 'iconic' spell, Arcane Barrage. Both the other trees have talents that interact with their iconic spells in some way shape or form, or at least add some synergies to those spells.

Needless to say, I realize there is a vocal minority out there which are of the belief that Arcane, in its current state on the beta, is "fine" and that Arcane blast and mana shield's knockback will provide ample gameplay for the spec to still feel interesting and 'fun' two years into Cataclysm. I implore this vocal minority to seek out the comments of a lot of the arcane mages playing the beta right now. The feedback (arcane = boring) is coming through quite strongly now.

It's very easy to tie in the theme of "time" into gear. Time and haste are strongly linked. A very easy example showing how Tier 10 bonuses can be reworded to fit the Time theme:

2 piece: Your X spells increase your haste rating by Y% of your maximum mana for 5 seconds
4 piece: Your MI spell increases your damage by X% of your haste rating for 30 seconds

If we saw more talents like that in the Arcane tree, haste to Arcane would start to be like crit is to fire. You have some exciting and compelling reasons to want it, aside from the boring 'it makes spells cast faster'.

The mage forums here are generally quite bland lately, but discussion on Arcane is a hot topic: whether it's about the missing Arcane AOE, Arcane theme, Mana Adept - or just general design direction of Arcane. The last page or two of this thread (and even the Cataclysm Beta Forums Mage thread) demonstrates there is some very interesting discussion to be had - I will make a separate thread entitled, "Arcane in Cataclysm"? These threads are common in other class forums.

Edit - Started a thread specifically for Arcane Cataclysm discussion here: http://elitistjerks.com/f75/t104277-...sm_discussion/

I would encourage the posters who contributed excellent discussion on this topic in the last 2 pages, to consolidate their posts and add them to the "Arcane in Cataclysm" thread.

I think this suggestion illustrates that there is some confusion to clear up into what the purpose of the tree is as it stands, so I have a better suggestion.

I think you can tell by the name of talent whether it fits in the tree or not.

You've got Arcane Power, Incanter's Absorption, and to a certain extent, Netherwind Presence and Invocation all suggesting that the arcane mage is trying to spend more mana to get more damage or burst. Then you've got Arcane Concentration, Improved Mana Gem and Arcane Potency suggesting that mage is trying to implement as much mana efficiency as s/he can to gain more damage or burst. In a sense, Netherwind Presence increases the effectiveness of the procs on the efficiency talents, so it really falls into both categories. This method of design works well together because it rewards judicious use of expenditure and efficiency to achieve maximum throughput. To a small extent this also applies to Focus Magic, if your FM target dies mid fight, or for some dire reason you wish to change targets (former happens more than the latter).

The confusion comes from talents like Torment the Weak, which doesn't even sound like it should be in the tree. At best, TtW is a passive flat damage increase that only goes away at a problematic time, such as when target is immune to snare or no one else wants to spare the cast time or GCD to put it on the necessary target. In my experience, in PvE generally the latter situation happens in some kind of DPS race or with dangerous but low HP target that needs to damaged quickly. Recount has shown me that keeping slow up for the 6% from TtW is hardly worth it in these situations, because you lose more than 6% damage from the GCD in rotation period that last as long as slow does. In other words, if the target is not already snared, you probably shouldn't snare it either, because you can already DPS it enough before it can do anything too problematic.

What I'm trying to say here, is that I hate TtW and always have, because its out of place and counterintuitive. In the vast majority of situations, its either a flat damage increase with other people or just wasted points by yourself. It does help with kiting or killing something before it can melee or heal or cause trouble at range (for instance, heroic Saurfang, or soloing a difficult elite). It does help if you cannot avoid blowing GCDs on slow and having to DPS a target down before Slow GCDs are unecessary (you may need to cast more than one, such as on Lich King Val'kyrs). In PvP this situation is more prevalent. But in any case, NV already address the real problem of both situations, which was saving you at least one GCD, while using only 2 points! When you have a decision of whether to use TtW without NV, TtW is oddly an incentive to penalize your DPS- but not a very good one. (Of course this whole time, when I said without NV, I mean that you may or may not have the talent, but that for some reason Arcane Blast is not applying Slow.).

TL;DR version: Torment the Weak should be killed or totally redesigned to reduce confusion of the purpose of Arcane. And even if not, renamed at the very least. What they could do is buff the damage increase (boring, and easy to make overpowered given everything I just said). Or they could mix up the Arcane rotation so that it benefits from the 6% more immediately. That's way harder than just changing TtW.

In PvP, I like the effort to be able to control spellcasting and use of special abilities from Arcane. Torment the Weak could get a less stupid name, and be changed so that when a spell crits it burns some mana, runic power, energy, focus, or rage, and returns to the Mage an appropriately normalized amount mana, whether or not it burns anything (some mobs don't use any kind of power bar). Incredibly useful in PvP, not too hard to balance given there are other mana return on crit, and mana burning/siphoning mechanics for other classes. Fits with the PvE and PvP theme of trading mana for damage and control while getting some back in efficiency. Call it Intrisic Casting, Spell Permeation, Energy Siphon, or something that at least sounds related to magic. (Sorry, I'm really annoyed by the TtW name).

Arcane Tactics is another talent that is a flat damage increase. While useful for the raid, it is boring, and adds nothing to the gameplay of the spec. Again, the crappy naming "Arcane Tactics" gives it away. What the hell are Arcane Tactics? Here is another opportunity for raid utility, and I'm thinking replenishment. Or we can do a replenishment version of damage and healing so that certain spells- perhaps Arcane Barrage- have a chance to cause the player with the lowest percentage of mana gets a damage and healing buff by a significant amount for 10s. We can call it Ley Lines. This could be really fun, very useful in stopping those 1% wipes when your healers or dps are low on mana on a tough fight, can be applied to the mage him/herself, and we can choose the appropriate spells so that the rotation is more dynamic, and increase the chance the caster purposely puts the buff on himself, especially with heavy mana consumption. These are just suggestions, so I'm sure Blizzard can do much better than Arcane Tactics and Torment the Weak (ugh).

edit: suggest arcane barrage specifically to be buffed in last paragraph

I'm not suggesting that arcane be the utility tree in Cataclysm and I'm sure neither is Vontre. It's not just utility. The quirky dps buffs that don't fit anywhere else could also fit in the arcane tree. There's really no unifying theme that categorizes dps buffs like arcane power, netherwind presence, mind mastery and focus magic and all sorts of arcane talents currently, either.

The important thing is that the tree has a fun and competitive spell rotation or prioritization model that uses 3-5 spells or whatever number Blizzard wants. It's theme could be the kitchen sink tree of dps and utility talents that don't belong anywhere else. The missile barrages and the focus magics already fit into that kitchen sink theme.

I am just hoping they haven't achieved this at the cost of end-game mage gameplay. The idea of a replenish is a really really good one, would fit the mastery perfectly. Does anyone here have a high level arcane mage in the beta? I'm curious to see how it plays. Also, correct me if i am wrong, but doesn't the new talent system take Icy Veins from us?

In the new talent system, icy veins is frost only, as it's a third tier talent. I don't think you should be too worried about this though, as blizzard will balance with this in mind. It's just one less line in your cooldowns macro.

@Imlach, is Ignite/Combustion affected by mastery that you have noticed? Also, is Flashburn still present, or has that been scratched out.