October 13th, 2008 by Moche
I finally got around to copying my mage over to the PTR. I went into it with a few builds in mind and once in, the choices were narrowed down significantly.
Frostfire build was rendered null when I found out you have to be level 75 to learn it. /frown
Arcane Blast/Missile Barrage was rendered null when I found out that reports of Arcane Blast’s mana increase being reduced were false or overstated. I don’t want to pay thousands of mana for one spell.
This left the build that I had been avoiding: Missile Mage.
I’m using Presence of Mind constantly to give me a 55% chance to crit (/drool) and opening combat with Slow. I use Arcane Barrage and then start Arcane Missiles, which has a 20% chance (from the Missile Barrage talent) to cast super fast. Frost Nova, repeat. Mana Shield if I need to, as 15% of the damage it absorbs is added to my spell damage for the next few seconds. Most of the mobs I tested this on didn’t even get to the Frost Nova part before they were down. Damage is good. Only one problem: I can’t cast Polymorph or I lose PoM. That’s going to put a chink in my credibility as a valid party member.
Overall, I do love the Missile Mage, though. Even without the beloved polymorph.
Tags: 3.0.2, arcane, patch
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October 9th, 2008 by Moche
So, I’ve found that in an hour I can do 12-13 dailies and get 120-130g. Cool.
In that same hour, I have found that I can make loops around Nagrand mote farming and mining and come up with around 10 Primal Airs and 3 or so stacks of Adamantite Bars and 3 or so stacks of Fel Iron Bars. The next day I have about 300g in my mailbox from all this. Even more cool.
It seems like the second option has the potential to become a business of some sort. But how do businesses work in WoW? I can only assume that I would gather a conglomeration of engineers with flying mounts and have them send me their Primal Airs, and I sell them all on the AH and distribute profit. It makes the most sense to distribute profit by what percentage of total Primals that person sent me. But then the question comes up on why these people could not merely sell the Primals themselves on the AH. Maybe by doing this we could corner the Primal Air market, buying out any that are priced less than ours and reposting them at our price. By combining efforts instead of competing we are all guaranteed profit.
Here, though, we have the problem of members competing with one another. Maybe two spot the same gas cloud and go for it. Well, I could have the person that did not get to the cloud file a joint discovery claim and verify it with the person who did get the cloud and just divvy the profits for that sale between the two people. If need be, we could spread out to farm other Primals if there seems to be too much competition in Nagrand. The only reason I keep naming Primal Airs is because Airs sell for more than any of the other Primals that can be extracted from gas clouds.
Yes, I think this could work. And instead of making a guild out of this, just make a custom channel that can be joined by anyone. It would take some money to start so that I can buy out competition, too. I think this might just work.
Tags: business, engineering
Posted in Uncategorized | 10,885 Comments »
October 8th, 2008 by Moche
I’m not on the Beta. Not on the PTR. I didn’t like the disclaimer that once I submitted the character copy to the PTR that I would not be able to play my account for a day and a half. I had an epic flyer to buy, people. Now that I finally have the jet-propelled roflcopter, I find myself still working to pay back the majority of its cost to a certain wife with certain better funds than a certain mage.
Regardless, the patch scares me just a tad. I’ve attacked the Wrath of the Lich King talent calculator a few dozen times, trying half a dozen builds. I don’t know what I’ll do. The options are:
- Still try to build something like the Icy Veins/Deep Fire build I have now. Downside: It will be tight and I’d have to sacrifice some Fire stuff I love.
- Switch to Arcane and some Fire, using Scorch for its 10% improved crit chance on all spells coupled with Arcane Blasts and (with the Missile Barrage Arcane talent) an occasional super-fast-casting Arcane Missile. Downside: The mana cost of Arcane Blast in the patch started out outrageously high, but Blizzard has made some vague remarks on a few occasions of “reduced mana cost of Arcane Blast”. If it is not too mana-intensive, this sounds nice.
- Go pure Arcane, using Presence of Mind to constantly give an impressive 30% improved crit chance, and use Arcane Barrage and Arcane Missile for damage. Downside: I can’t cast anything that actually has a casting time or Presence of Mind goes bye-bye for three minutes (two with the right talents). That means I can’t polymorph anything. That should go over well with the raid group.
- Go about half and half Fire/Frost and use Frostfire Bolt as primary damage dealer, making sure to hit talents in both trees that jack up the hit, damage, and crit chance of the spell and use Scorch for its crit enhancement. Downside: Something doesn’t feel right about this. I’m being told that the damage is midway between Fireball and Frostbolt and it still has the chill effect of a Frostbolt. If that were the case, Frost mages would have no reason to use Frostbolt ever again since this is the same thing with more damage.
- Go pure Frost. The raid-wide mana regen of the water elemental should go over nicely, and I’ve always admired the usefulness of Frost in PvP and in standard PvE. Downside: It still looks like it’s not going to be as high of damage as Fire, and a good chunk of it looks dependant on your target being frozen in place, which nullifies entirely those aspects when fighting bosses and some other mobs. Plus deep-down I sort of resent frost mages now.
- Go pure Fire. Maybe.
If come patch, Arcane Blast’s mana cost looks reasonable, the outcome will probably be 2. If not, 1 or maybe 4 if what I was told is viable. I sort of wish that for a month after an earth-shaking patch like this that character respecs were 1c like they are on the PTR until people find what they like and don’t like.
Tags: 3.0.2, arcane, fire, frost, patch, WotLK
Posted in Uncategorized | 243 Comments »
October 8th, 2008 by Moche
Hi, I’m Moche. I live in Exodar, Kalimdor and I’m a mage. [/Vern Troyer]
/introduce
Obligatory Forum Sig Thing:
Tags: introduction
Posted in Uncategorized | 86 Comments »