Mage Guide for Midnight - Patch 12.0.1

Mage Guide for Midnight Quick Summary:

• Mages excel at DPS, good mobility, and utility, but have no self-healing and are punishing if you make mistakes during rotations.
• There are no races that are better than the others for Mages when it comes to raids. In Mythic+, Dwarves and Night Elves work the best.
• Best stats for Mages are: Intellect, Haste, Mastery, Crit Strike, Versatility.
• The best professions for Warlock are Alchemy, Tailoring, and Enchanting.
• Consumables that all Mages need are: Silvermoon Health Potion, Thalassian Phoenix Oil, Light’s Potential, Flask of the Magisters.

Releasing your full potential is only possible at higher levels and with good gear, and the best way to reach the highest level is by trying our Midnight Leveling service. A wide array of leveling types is available, so you’ll easily find what you need.

 

 

 

Mage Changes in Midnight

Mage has been slightly rebalanced by removing previously existing spells and adding new ones, as well as making changes to the balancing of existing spells. In this section, I’ll go over changes for each of the specs and try to touch upon the most significant ones, as some of them aren’t that important to mention. Some mage class changes in Midnight are:

• Mirror Image and Greater Invisibility no longer grant damage reduction.
• Shifting Power, Ice Floes, and Mass Barrier were removed.
• All Barrier spells had their GCD reduced by half.

The general changes list isn’t that big, but you’ll see that other changes for each spec are pretty drastic.

Arcane Mage Changes in Midnight

Arcane Mage, aka the most loved child, has been fully redesigned, and the outcome is one of the strongest DPS. It’s one of the strongest specs that deals colossal damage, has great mobility and utility… Honestly, what doesn’t it have? It’s the best Mage specialization in Midnight. It has a pretty low skill ceiling, so you can learn how to play it in a couple of hours.

• Arcane Harmony: Renamed to Arcane Salvo. Otherwise, it’s practically the same.
• Impetus: Arcane Blast now gains 2 Arcane Charges and isn’t random anymore.
• Intuition: Doesn’t give Arcane Charges anymore. Instead, makes your Arcane Barrage deal more damage when reaching max stacks of Arcane Salvo.
• Nether Precision: Has been removed with all the talents and effects that used it.
• Orb Barrage: Now triggered by Arcane Salvo, not Arcane Charges.
• Orb Mastery: When you are under Clearcasting effect, casting Arcane Orb summons 2 additional ones and consumes the effect.
• Overpowered Missiles: Powerful buff to Arcane Missiles based on Clearcasting. Makes Clearcasting has a 25% chance to make Arcane Missiles deal 100% more damage and strike +3 targets for 50% of total damage. Whew.

Plenty of talents were removed, and the newly added talents aren’t all that great for the most part. Even after all these tweaks, Arcane Mage still rips.

Frost Mage Changes in Midnight

This spec is still pretty strong, but seeing what the developers are doing with it makes me wonder if the changes are a sign of something worse to come. What previously was a spec capable of competing with Arcane is now a bit weaker. We’ll see if the downward trend continues in future phases, but for now, this is what we have:

• Glacial Bulwark: Adds additional charge to Ice Block and Ice Barrier
• Mastery: Freeze and Shatter: Makes spells using Freeze and Shatter deal 13% more damage.
• Shatter: Frostbolt and Flurry damage apply the Freezing effect to their targets, stacking up to 20 times. Damage from Ice Lance shatters the enemies and consumes 4 stacks of this effect.
• Summon Water Elemental: Does what it says.
• Winter’s End: Makes the enemies under the Freezing effect explode upon their death.
• Blast Wave, Coldest Snap, Ice Caller, Icy Veins, Mastery: Icicles, Shifting Power, Winter’s Chill: All removed from the game.

Frost Mage still does exceptional single-target damage. His AoE damage is also quite good, and you also have an additional Ice Block charge from Glacial Bulwark, making you tankier than other specs.

Fire Mage Changes in Midnight

The burstiest spec out of the three. While it was also reworked as other specs, they weren’t enough to change the core gameplay that made Fire Mage who he is. Despite that, he’s pretty weak in Raids and is kinda good in M+ dungeons. If you aren’t planning to do raids, this specialization will feel fine. Since our class guides always focus on the Raid side of things, I will not mention Fire Mage in the Builds section. Now let’s check out the changes made to Fire Mage from TWW to Midnight:

• Alter Time: Returns your lost HP when cast a second time or after 10 seconds.
• Burnout: Explodes Ignites when Combustion expires.
• Cinderstorm: Each Pyroblast or Flamestrike has an 8% set chance to summon a storm that deals tons of damage, applies Ignite, and spreads it to 1 nearby target.
• Fired Up: Three new Apex talents with the same name. I’m gonna embed links for each of them here. Fired Up, Fired Up, Fired Up.
• Kindling: Now is just a flat Combustion cd reduction.
• Pyroclasm: No longer a Sun King’s Blessing. Still works almost the same.
• Phoenix Flames and Lit Fuse are removed.

Overall, you’re no longer building for constant uptime, and Combustion now feels much more prevalent, as many skills and talents revolve around it.

Mage Pros & Cons

Mage is a full-on DPS in every aspect, without any supporting or, obviously, tanking abilities. It’s pretty squishy and dies very fast. No self-sustain. Resource management can feel very difficult. Some of the specs make you feel like you’re doing a speed typing test. And still, these downsides are minor compared to the insane damage potential the Mage has. Let’s take a look at Mage pros & cons:

Pros	Cons
Big DPS in all specs	No self-healing
Great mobility and utility tools	One wrong move and your whole rotation is borked
Each spec is viable depending on the content you prefer	Not enough variety in gameplay
Fire and Frost Mages offer decent survivability

Mage is for people who enjoy power fantasy, cause when you get going, the battlefield lights up like a Christmas tree. Unfortunately, making mistakes is very punishing and requires near-perfect execution. All the downsides mentioned aren’t constant and can be even subjective, depending on your skill level. My personal opinion is that Mage is super strong, but can be boring to play, as he’s too good. If you learn his gameplay, the game is grass, and you’re a lawn mower.

How to Play Mage in Midnight

Mage is a cooldown-based class, despite Arcane Mage having some resource-management. That means that you have to press as many of your cooldowns as possible while maintaining order and understanding what you’re using at the moment. Below, I will briefly explain the main ideas you should follow to be able to play the class well, or at least on a decent level.

Specialization	How to Play
Arcane Mage	This spec can be complex and frustrating when learning it and the rotation. Remember core principles: burn and restore your mana with Arcane Surge, manage your mana and track your Arcane Charges, and don’t save up your cooldowns. In time, you’ll be able to catch the flow and learn how to play better, and the only way to reach this flow state is to remember what your spells in rotation do.
Frost Mage	If you are a first-time mage player, I recommend trying Frost Mag. He is much more forgiving and has simple gameplay. First of all, use your cooldowns. Play around your procs, as they are very powerful and make up most of the damage you do. Finally, Shatter is your key mechanic. Learning how to play around it is the key to being a good Frost Mage. This spec is more situational in its rotation, so it doesn’t feel like you’re just spamming the same combo.
Fire Mage	Final spec on the list is probably the most standout, as it doesn’t even have a rotation and is more reactionary. Your gameplay is built around spell crits and using Pyroblast afterwards. Combustion is much more prominent in Midnight, as it makes all spells land crits. And once again, spend your cooldowns. All. The. Time.

The key takeaways you should learn from this are that you always have to spend your cooldowns and simultaneously track your resources. It is less stressful on Fire and Frost Mages, though.

 

Best Races for Mage in Midnight

Picking a race for a Mage isn’t that difficult, as they can be anyone they want. While some races offer increased damage, their racial skills' influence is so negligible that you don’t really benefit from it. According to the statistics, it’s about 1% increase. If you are truly into min-maxing, perhaps you consider this 1% to be a day and night difference, but tbh I think it’s better play whoever you like. But if you still really want to know who to play, here are the best races to play as Mage in Midnight:

• Damage: You got Pandaren, Orcs, Void Elves, Trolls, Mechagnomes, and Taurens for Arcane Mage and Fire Mage. Humans and Blood Elves for Frost Mage. I’ll be honest, you’re not going to be using their racials often, buuuut they work decently well as extra filler.
• Mythic+: Now, when it comes to M+ dungeons, we do have clear winners. Night Elves and Dwarves are the best if you are intent on doing keys instead of raids. Stoneform cleans poison, and Shadowmeld helps avoid unnecessary combat or dodging damage.

Ultimately, there’s no big deal about what race to pick when going for Raid or PvP content, as all the benefits are marginal. Just go with the one you like or enjoy roleplaying as. The days when racial abilities were make-or-breaks for classes are long gone, so don’t sweat it.

Best Mage Stat Priority

All Mage’s specs require the same stats, but in a different order of importance. Generally, you always want to sim your character to see what stats he lacks and what stats he needs, but you should always pursue high Intellect. It’s kind of even more important than item level. The best Mage stat priority is:

1. Intellect: Spell Power + damage from abilities.
2. Mastery/Haste: Effectiveness increases with mastery, and cooldown decreases with haste.
3. Crit: A chance for your attacks and heals to have a doubled effect.
4. Versatility: An overall good stat to have, as it lets you deal more damage and take less.

Note that this is a general list. If you really just want to play the game instead of worrying about stat building too much, it’ll do. If you want to further push your Mage, this is the order of importance for each spec:

• Arcane Mage: Intellect > Mastery > Haste > Crit > Versatility
• Frost Mage: Intellect > Mastery > Crit > Haste > Versatility
• Fire Mage: Intellect > Haste > Mastery > Versatility > Crit

The stats work practically the same on all Mages. As an example, for Arcane, Haste makes you spend more mana with Arcane Pulse. On Frost Mage, Crit works really well with Shatter talents. With Fire Mage, I wouldn’t say that the stats influence some specific skills too much.

Best Builds for Mage in Midnight

Let’s talk about the most important part - the builds. I’ll provide two builds here, as they work best for raids. I’ll also briefly explain how you want to play them. The builds I’ll cover are:

• Arcane Spellslinger Mage
• Frost Spellslinger Mage

Arcane Mage is the strongest out of the two, as it can deal great AoE and Single Target damage, as well as priority, while providing utility to the raid. Frost is a good Single Target build that has a focus on Shatter.

Best Arcane Mage Build in Midnight

The core loop you’ll follow here is stacking Arcane Salvo to build up to a huge Arcane Barrage. You mainly spend Clearcasting procs on Arcane Orb, as it allows you to proc multiple of them. Your goal is to build 20 Arcane Salvo stacks with Arcane Blast, Splinters, and Orbs, and then Arcane Barrage when you hit 20. Your cooldowns are structured around Arcane Surge and Touch of the Magi for Bigburn, mixed with filler between Surge windows. You need to time your big bursts well, as not having a cooldown for the priority enemy can fail the encounter.

Best Frost Mage Build in Midnight

The Frost Mage rotation is centered around Ray of Frost. It’s a dangerous cooldown, as it leaves you open for interrupts. The base loop is Frostbolt, used as a filler to build Freezing stacks and then converting these procs into damage. Use your Ice Lance during Fingers of Frost, as Lance will act like you have full Freezing. Brain Freeze resets Flurry, so you can continue building procs efficiently. Basically, your loop is Frostbolt until proc breakpoint, the Ice Lance during Fingers, Flurry on Brain Freeze, and then try to line up your hardest hits during the Ray of Frost damage window. Try to always attack grouped-up enemies if possible, as your cleave is hard to land if the targets are distanced from each other.

 

 

Mage Best in Slot Gear in TBC Classic Anniversary

This section is under construction. As soon as we find out the BiS gear for Mage, we’ll update this article. For now, please continue.

Best Mage Professions

As with every other class, professions now bring minimal use in Midnight. Mages can choose any profession according to what they like most. Still, some of the best Mage professions are:

• Alchemy
• Tailoring
• Enchanting

Rated in order of importance. While BiS Gear is pending, you may upgrade your Tailoring, as many gear pieces from it can be great alternatives. As all classes that depend on resource management, you can master Alchemy to craft consumables. This is especially relevant on Arcane Mage. Finally, to increase your spell power, you may settle for Enchanting, so you don’t go broke fishing for the perfect roll on the Auction.

Best Consumables for Mage

Mages, despite being DPS, benefit from consumables probably more than other DPS classes. I’m not even talking about typical stat boost consumables. It’s probably the only class that needs healing potions during the encounters, as they have no self-healing whatsoever. Let’s go over the best consumables for Mages:

• Silvermoon Health Potion: The one every mage needs. Restores a lot of health, depending on the item’s level.
• Thalassian Phoenix Oil: One of the best oils for DPS. It increases your Critical Strike and Haste for 2 hours.
• Light’s Potential: Increases your primary stat for 30 seconds. Pop before your big cooldown window.
• Flask of the Magisters: Increases Mastery for 1 hour. Generic damage boost that works the best for Frost and Arcane Mages.

There are more possible options for Mages, such as Flask of Thalassian Resistance to boost your Versatility, and Flask of the Blood Knights, but they’re more situational and won’t fit every Mage. I recommend simming your character to understand what stats you’re lacking and moving on from there. These potions can work as good mitigators to bring your DPS to adequate levels, not only as boosts.

Read our other WoW Midnight guides:

• Warrior Guide
• Hunter Guide
• Warlock Guide
• Evoker Guide
• Demon Hunter Guide

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