New Mage with Questions

[nefigah 26]

Hi all,

I just got my Mage to 90, and had a couple questions, if I may:

- Is there any subtlety to the Arcane rotation as listed in the Guide? For example, can it ever be a good idea to cast Arcane Blast at 4 charges? Does it ever make sense to cast AM with less than 4 charges? Should I ever delay AT to fish for 2 stacks of AM?

- Can I safely follow Mastery > Haste > Crit at low gear levels as well? Do I have to worry about mage bomb breakpoints?

- How big of a mistake is it to use the wrong bomb? (I imagine it gets more pronounced as gear increases, but I'm just curious about the magnitude of using NT on single target or whatever.)

- Can ~<500ish ilvl mages solo on Timeless Isle much? Would be nice to try and score some Burdens...

- If I want to try Fire someday, what's a "safe" amount of self-buffed crit to aim for?

Thanks! Sorry for the noobness :)

[Oltier 471]

Hi all,

I just got my Mage to 90, and had a couple questions, if I may:

- Is there any subtlety to the Arcane rotation as listed in the Guide? For example, can it ever be a good idea to cast Arcane Blast at 4 charges? Does it ever make sense to cast AM with less than 4 charges? Should I ever delay AT to fish for 2 stacks of AM?

- Can I safely follow Mastery > Haste > Crit at low gear levels as well? Do I have to worry about mage bomb breakpoints?

- How big of a mistake is it to use the wrong bomb? (I imagine it gets more pronounced as gear increases, but I'm just curious about the magnitude of using NT on single target or whatever.)

- Can ~<500ish ilvl mages solo on Timeless Isle much? Would be nice to try and score some Burdens...

- If I want to try Fire someday, what's a "safe" amount of self-buffed crit to aim for?

Thanks! Sorry for the noobness

Hello nefigah,

 

Congratz on ding!

 

-Ie.: if, for some reason you were very lucky and got lots of AMs, you are on 4 stacks and 100% mana, I would cast another Arcane Blast. It might generate even one more AM, that I can consume the charges with Arcane Barrage and be close to 100% again. Your goal should be to be as close as possible to 100% mana, but never let any mana got to waste.

 

Yes, it does. If you already have 2 stacks of AM, consume 1 as, you can easily waste charges if you don't do so.

You should definitely, but this wouldn't mean too much. I mean you should get AMs aproximately every 2-3 seconds.

 

-Yes, you can. Well. You should reach the 9522 breakpoint, then go for mastery :) But don't gem for haste or anything. You should be able to reach that haste with only reforges.

 

-It's not THAT huge mistake... But still, it doesn't take too much effort to switch a talent, does it?

 

-Yep, it can. Although I wouldn't say arcane mages easily can. Fire with scorch okayish. Frost, definitely. Frost has incredible means of crowd control.

 

-40% is fine.

 

You're welcome, being curious is not being noob ;)

[nefigah 26]

Thank you very much! This helped a lot, and so did going back and reading your leveling guide, which turned me on to Deep Freeze and Ice Ward.

I Frosted around a bit, and it was pretty cool, but I liked keeping track of mana and charges as Arcane, so I played around more with soloing on the Isle. I found that switching out Rune for Incanters Ward helped a lot since movement is required vs. most creatures. Its off-CD regen is pretty decent, and if I take a big hit I can use it defensively.

A Frost question though: How often is Blizzard used?

[Oltier 471]

Not too frequently, to be honest. It forces you to channel the spell, yo it realistically can only be used from max range and only for a few seconds, which makes Flamestrike, Frost bomb cast or NT dotting up everything more beneficial than channelling it. (since mobs will move out of the circle anyway) In raids it is very good, and can even be better than Arcane Explosion if you can finish the whole channeling and it can hit the mobs its full duration.