Tag: talents

Pure DPS: The One True Class

Posted on by Gazimoff

Every so often I hear this argument crop up: character classes that can only deal damage shouldn’t exist in modern MMOs. Every class should instead be able to switch to tanking or healing, or possibly even both. The idea is that a shortage of any one of the three roles should be resolved by players switching over to fill that demand.

I’ll admit that it is a tempting concept. When I was designing my own MMO I was keen to allow players to pick any direction they wanted to head in. By providing them with freedom for their character, the idea was that you’d end up with an even population of tanks, healers and DPS depending on the demand for those roles. Interestingly, this is the same concept now being used in The Secret World.

I also don’t think it’ll work.

The problem’s a basic one. Very few people actually enjoy healing or tanking. You need a will as tough as iron to handle these roles without being reduced to a wreck when the blame truck rolls into town and tries to work out why we’ve failed to kill the raid boss for the fifth time that evening. For everyone else, pick a DPS class that you know will never ever be asked to tank or heal. Ever.

So what’s the solution? Remove tanking and healing. Everyone plays DPS.

Continue reading “Pure DPS: The One True Class”

Star Wars: The Old Republic – First Impressions

Posted on by Gazimoff

The NDA for Star Wars: The Old Republic has now been lifted and I’m finally free to share my opinions with you. In theory this would mean that I’d be unleashing a huge mega-post containing details of every single nuance about the game. I’m going to resist the urge and scale back a little bit on this, instead focusing on a couple of key areas.

I’m going to go into a bit of detail about my experiences with the two “caster” force classes in the game: the Jedi Consular and Sith Inquisitor, along with the Jedi Sage and Sith Sorcerer advanced classes. I’ll also be talking a little bit about how SWTOR advances the MMO genre and the areas in which it falls back a little.

I’ll be concluding this post with a look about how the game performs on a range of systems. If you’re wondering if your PC will handle SWTOR or whether you should upgrade then feel free to skip ahead to this section.

Continue reading “Star Wars: The Old Republic – First Impressions”

Looking Through The Mists

Posted on by Gazimoff

This weekend has been a firehose of information. Although I’ve never been to a BlizzCon in-person (something I hope to rectify), I’ve been glued to the internet and live streams for information. There’s nothing quite like getting the latest on a games franchise straight from the source.

Like a good meal, it takes a while for me to digest and fully appreciate all the news that emerges. Now that I’m able to sit back and reflect on the dishes presented to us, I feel I’m ready to share my opinions on each delicate morsel that appeared.

There’s a lot to go through, both good and bad. From the changing pace of Azeroth’s story to the abolition of talent trees, from missed opportunities to interesting ideas, I’ll be giving my opinions on all the major topics. Grab yourself a drink, as this may take a while.

Continue reading “Looking Through The Mists”

Comparing Mages: Warcraft Vs. Rift

Posted on by Gazimoff

There’s a common theme among fantasy MMOs. It doesn’t matter what game it is, you can expect to find the same three character classes. There’ll always be a plate wearing warrior type that’s ready to soak up the damage and a cleric or priest (or even minstrel) type that throws out healing.

Then there’s the spellcaster. Mage, warlock or elementalist, there’s always someone throwing around balls of some description. They also tend to have similar mechanics for casting spells and so on. How can a new MMO make itself feel any different?

Continue reading “Comparing Mages: Warcraft Vs. Rift”

Reader Q: From Arcane to Fire

Posted on by Gazimoff

I recently got a reader email asking for some advice with improving their fire spec. I love getting messages like this as it gives me a chance to help someone out and get geeky about my favourite spec at the same time. This particular email was eerily familiar…

We started raiding last evening and had great difficulty controlling the adds. Since then I have been asked to go as fire for the supposedly superior AoE. I’ve spent a little time on the dummies and my DPS is at best unpredictable. I’m guessing this is because I’m not criting enough to proc Hot Streak often enough and therefore having to recast scorch to get the de-buff. Just how much crit do I need and what would be worth reforging?

The first thing is that you’re not alone. I was also struggling with my fire DPS, particularly when compared with Arcane mages. Arcane is great for when you’re learning fights as the simple rotation allows you to focus on positioning and targeting. The great thing is that I found some really simple techniques that allow me to maximise my fire DPS.

Continue reading “Reader Q: From Arcane to Fire”

Mage Stat Priority in 4.0

Posted on by Gazimoff

For many of us, January marks the beginning of Cataclysm raiding. It’s time to start getting those gear upgrades from heroic dungeons, digging out those gems and finishing everything off with a nice coat of enchants. This can be fairly expensive, so it’s worth doing properly rather than wasting money on mistakes.

I’m hearing that the minimum DPS you want to be doing is around 10k sustained while raidbuffed. This isn’t just the burn phase either – you need to be able to provide decent damage output during your recover phase as well. But how do you make sure that the gear you pick is good for you? As an example, there are four cloth headpieces available at iLevel 346, all with the same base stats. Which would be the best for your spec?

I’ve put together a handy list for all three mage specs to give you an idea of what gear to look for and what gems and enchants to pick out. This mage stat priority list should help you focus on what’s important while letting you comfortably shard what’s not essential.

Continue reading “Mage Stat Priority in 4.0”

Ratings and Mage 4.0

Posted on by Gazimoff

Back in Wrath, mages were driven by a small number of key stats. Spellpower and Haste Rating were key, with Crit Rating coming a distant third for all specs except Fire. Bringing up the rear were Spirit and Intellect, with the former being useful for Molten Armor and the latter supporting a larger mana pool.

Flip over to 4.0 and the landscape of useful stats has changed. Spellpower and Spirit are largely eliminated, while Mastery has crept in as an elusive new stat. Intellect and Stamina are still present, but they work in new ways and provide new benefits. All this presents a new challenge to players looking to maximise the potential of their gear.

Continue reading “Ratings and Mage 4.0”

The Mage 4.0 Compendium

Posted on by Gazimoff

The game of Warcraft is changing. In the next few weeks the first of a series of patches will be pushed to the live severs. The first of these patches (4.0.1) will bring with it the core changes to all classes, as well as various UI and interface changes.

This guide to the key mage changes is intended to smooth your way into 4.0 and beyond, including making your first steps into Cataclysm. It should also help you with being able to raid during the two months before the expansion is released.

There are however a couple of key things that aren’t covered as part of this guide.

  • This isn’t designed for minmaxers. There’s not been a huge amount of numerical analysis so far on optimal builds and glyphs. As these optimisations come out I’ll ensure the guide is updated.
  • I haven’t included looking at the new racial abilities. I’m not convinced that they’ve been finalised, but I’m not expecting people to swap racials until 85 raiding kicks off.
  • I’m also not covering rotation changes. For the most part things are still the same, although Frost has gone through more significant alterations. Arcane and Fire mages used to Missile Barrage/Hot Streak procs should find things largely unchanged
  • Although there may be some usefulness for PvP mages here, I’m going to focus on PvE for most of this guide.

We’re all learning a lot as we work through the class changes, so don’t be afraid to experiment and try out radical ideas. Share any interesting findings you get with other mages by posting about it on the Mage forums.

Continue reading “The Mage 4.0 Compendium”

Beta Patch – The Pyromaniac’s Impact

Posted on by Gazimoff

Spoiler Alert: Discussion of Mage changes in patch 12759. In this article, I’ll also be focusing on Impact, Pyromaniac and AoE talents and how they’ll work together in a solo, dungeon and raid environment.

A whole slew of mage changes came out in the most recent patch. The main ones were around armour specialisations and talent masteries. Wearing our normal gear (complete cloth armour) nets a handy 5% increase in Intellect. For fire mages, Mastery now gives us a tasty bonus to the DoT component of our spells. Both the specialisation and mastery appear in our spellbook once we’ve learned them from the trainer.

The new teleport bar that I mentioned after the previous patch has now been fleshed out with all teleport spells. The only snag is that only the Dalaran and Shattrath spells work now, meaning that for most mages it’s now a two-hop trip to wherever we want to go. Even so, it’s still better than catching a boat everywhere.

Apparently there are new teleport and portal spells available to the new Tol Barad PVP zone, although I haven’t had a chance to test these yet. There are currently no teleports or portals to Vash’jir, Deepholm or Uldum, although there are static portals at Stormwind and Orgrimmar.

The other big change is that creature damage has been heavily ramped up from level 65 onwards. Level 82 outdoor creatures now do four times as much damage as they used to, which is horrendous news for cloth classes with little to no damage mitigation.

Currently, solo questing involves constant use of mana shield, counterspell and frost nova. And that’s for every single pull, just to stay alive. Going toe to toe with mobs in Deepholm is an excruciating experience – you have to work hard to take down a single mob. If you have anything add to the fight, you’re toast. Don’t forget that Polymorph won’t help you there as almost everything you fight is an elemental of some description.

Continue reading “Beta Patch – The Pyromaniac’s Impact”

Entering Beta: The 80 Fire Mage

Posted on by Gazimoff

Spoiler Alert: Discussion of the latest changes to fire mages in build 12694. Also covering a few general and mage related UI changes and some speculation around what they indicate.

The latest beta realm patch was recently released, bringing with it a range of changes to the Mage fire tree (full notes in the forums). I’d been holding off doing any serious work on my level 80 transfer because these changes were inbound, and it’s definitely been worth the wait. The subtle playstyle changes have livened up the spec, both for PvE and PvP fans alike.

First up, let’s look at the baseline. Comparing my mage to his Wrath counterpart, his health pool has crept up almost 10k hp while his mana pool has remained flat at around 25k. Spellpower, haste, hit and crit percentages are also broadly in line with those in the current live game (although Spellpower is slightly higher in beta). Making the transition should be fairly smooth. The biggest issue will be the wasted spirit statpoints on non-set or filler gear – reforging or replacing may be the best way to deal with these items.

Continue reading “Entering Beta: The 80 Fire Mage”