PTR Build 22864 - Arcane adjustments

[Forminasage]

Arcane Blast Blasts the target with energy, dealing [ 165% [ 181.5% of Spell Power ] Arcane damage. Damage increased by 60% per Arcane Charge. Mana cost increased by 100% 125% per Arcane Charge. Generates 1 Arcane Charge Mage - Arcane Spec. 3% of Base Mana. 40 yd range. 2.2 sec cast.

Arcane Explosion Causes an explosion of magic around the caster, dealing [ 1 + 75% of Spell Power ] Arcane damage to all enemies within 10 yards. Damage increased by 60% per Arcane Charge. Mana cost increased by 100% 125% per Arcane Charge. Generates 1 Arcane Charge if any targets are hit. Mage - Arcane Spec. 2% of Base Mana. Instant.

Arcane Missiles Launches five waves of Arcane Missiles at the enemy over 2 sec, causing a total of [ 5 + 190% 209% of Spell Power ] Arcane damage. Damage increased by 60% per Arcane Charge. Each damaging spell cast has a 15% chance to activate Arcane Missiles. Chance doubled for Arcane Blast. Limit 3 charges. Generates 1 Arcane Charge. Mage - Arcane Spec. 40 yd range. 2 sec cast (Channeled).

Can anyone shed any light on whether the increase in mana costs is going to be offset by the increased damage, or is this going to adversely affect us? (Assuming that these changes stick, of course)

[Vagar]

Celestalon just posted this on the mage discord:


As you can see, it's supposed to be a buff. So if someone can prove it is a nerf, tweet at him and it'll most likely be changed.

[Mythlos]

How is this a buff? It's basically going to make managing our mana in Mythic+ all the more difficult and tied to Conjure Refreshment.

It's also going to kill high-Quickening builds.

[Namo]

I don't see where the "significant buff" is, just with the simcraft override, whitout changing the APL:

Before the "buff" with my gear:



After the "buff" with my gear:




I don't see an APL change compensation for that much damage difference, I think Blizzard fucked up their change.



EDIT: Fucked up the mana cost increase, edited my post with the good overide, still a little nerf.

[Causese]

I'm currently testing arcane on ptr and I don't like +25% mana cost increase at all

evocation is on cd at times it used to be off cooldown on live
rune of power during conserve reks all ur mana, you rely on arcane missile proccs to make it "ok"

imo revert it or reduce evocation cd to 1min or we will have to arcane barrage once arcane power runs out
orrr make arcane blast cost more at certain arcane charge stacks, like <AC4 or only at AC4....

[Tyllarin]

Problem is, theyre trying to balance it out around the bracers, which is stupid imo. Most people don't have a legendary, let alone that specific one. Nerf the bracers, not the spec.

[Unreal]

1min evocation cd would probably be way too powerful, especially considering the upcoming nighthold sets. You'd be spending all your time burning mana, resulting in a ridiculous amount of damage.

[Joban]

Problem is, theyre trying to balance it out around the bracers, which is stupid imo. Most people don't have a legendary, let alone that specific one. Nerf the bracers, not the spec.

No, 4 or 5 free arcane blasts over the course of a 6 minute Mythic Nythendra kill last night does not make up for a 25% increase in resource cost.

Is Blizzard serious? I feel like they are trolling arcane mages.

[a0kalittlema0n]

This may FEEL like a nerf, but I see how it is a buff. This puts more emphasis on damage during CDs and less emphasis on burning mana outside of CDs. Also it'll destroy the idea of having to stack quickening up super high then burst, since that won't be nearly sustainable when mana is burning so quickly. It also might make it harder ot keep NT up if reaching 4 stacks constantly it a problem. Not to mention how this might give us more of a reason to stack haste and try a OP build since AM and Blast both have a higher DPET now and the overall necessity of Quickening was dropped a bit.

This is also make Mastery more beneficial since it will increase the damage MORE per charge since the initial damage was bumped up.

This does however hurt our AE spam, putting more emphasis on Abarrage like they have wanted to do for so long.

Buffed damage, obliterated playstyle.

[a0kalittlema0n]

I don't see where the "significant buff" is, just with the simcraft override, whitout changing the APL:

Before the "buff" with my gear:



After the "buff" with my gear:




I don't see an APL change compensation for that much damage difference, I think Blizzard fucked up their change.



EDIT: Fucked up the mana cost increase, edited my post with the good overide, still a little nerf.

Keywords: Without changing the APL

This is going to require a completely new APL to be effective.

[Mythlos]

This may FEEL like a nerf, but I see how it is a buff. This puts more emphasis on damage during CDs and less emphasis on burning mana outside of CDs. Also it'll destroy the idea of having to stack quickening up super high then burst, since that won't be nearly sustainable when mana is burning so quickly. It also might make it harder ot keep NT up if reaching 4 stacks constantly it a problem. Not to mention how this might give us more of a reason to stack haste and try a OP build since AM and Blast both have a higher DPET now and the overall necessity of Quickening was dropped a bit.

This is also make Mastery more beneficial since it will increase the damage MORE per charge since the initial damage was bumped up.

This does however hurt our AE spam, putting more emphasis on Abarrage like they have wanted to do for so long.

Buffed damage, obliterated playstyle.

Except one of the major selling points of Arcane in Legion was the deconstruction of the burst->conserve cycle in that it allows you to burst more often since you don't want to keep mana up.

Also AE spam was never sustainable. If you didn't want to drop Quickening stacks but had an AOE phase, you'd use Arcane Explosion. If you were in conserve or were doing dungeons, unless there was a burst AOE requirement like imps in CoS, you'd use Arcane Barrage.

[Causese]

here's a comparison for live and ptr arcane mage


I just stopped doing the rotation, knowing how bad it is

i even consider that a good try for arcane ptr. there's times where you have no mana and evo is 13s off cooldown. Never happens on live.

... and here's ptr only with insane proccs doing equal damage to live with avg/low proccs


I'm 100% confident that this is a huge nerf lol

is mystic kilt even a mana gain on ptr?
worried about double burn aswell

[gurudox]

This may FEEL like a nerf, but I see how it is a buff. This puts more emphasis on damage during CDs and less emphasis on burning mana outside of CDs. Also it'll destroy the idea of having to stack quickening up super high then burst, since that won't be nearly sustainable when mana is burning so quickly. It also might make it harder ot keep NT up if reaching 4 stacks constantly it a problem. Not to mention how this might give us more of a reason to stack haste and try a OP build since AM and Blast both have a higher DPET now and the overall necessity of Quickening was dropped a bit.

This is also make Mastery more beneficial since it will increase the damage MORE per charge since the initial damage was bumped up.

This does however hurt our AE spam, putting more emphasis on Abarrage like they have wanted to do for so long.

Buffed damage, obliterated playstyle.

It's possible you're right, but we're going to need some testing and retooling of the APL to find the optimal rotation. As it stands, we're casting ~20% fewer blasts during burn phase because of the resource cost increase, while only gaining 16% damage. I think this is pretty fairly represented in the sims run by Namo.

I don't think the sky is falling, by any means, but on the surface it really does look like these changes are taking into account the spec-specific legendary items, as well as the tier gear that we have yet to acquire. Increasing our mastery even more could make things look a fair amount differently, but puts us in a strange spot right now.

[Tilo]

I'm glad to hear of the stated intent to provide a significant buff to arcane. Based on the evidence the current changes are not providing said buff. So let's communicate and hope they move in the right direction.

Maybe just buff missile damage. And I like the idea that barrage only reduces quickening stacks by a set % instead of completely.

Any changes that increase our mana usage is going to create less positive gameplay, particularly in m+.
Having to drink so much reminds me of the days playing everquest staring at your spell book....

[Ponkster]

I just want them to give us a concrete rotation that doesn't always involve quickening.

Is is so much to ask?

I wonder if the other talents have more worth now we definitely will need a conserve phase.

The moment its viable to untalent quickening im doing it.

[Zyjax]

Celestalon just posted this on the mage discord:


As you can see, it's supposed to be a buff. So if someone can prove it is a nerf, tweet at him and it'll most likely be changed.

Then someone, please, tweet him very fast and show him the obvious information we've got here because that was clearly a nerf. 25% increased mana cost, they must be crazy. Even with the damage buffs the mana cost is a HUGE nerf to Arcane Mages.

I personally look forward to being able to use Words of Power as a viable talent, maybe along with Overpowered. Can't see it happening anytime soon.

[Unreal]

Blizzard doesn't consider simcraft to be accurate enough to serve as evidence and a single case provided by causese isn't hard evidence either, since it requires many more samples. What blizzards going to do is data mine the actual damage output on their servers and make decisions based on that.

[Mythlos]

The point is that they believe it to be a significant buff. Given that these are numerical adjustments, even using the same simulation model, you would expect to see an increase in DPS. The simulation models the basic burst-> conserve which will not change.

Even with 1 single instance, if the intent was a significant buff, you would have seen an increase in DPS, not a decrease.

This should be important enough to at least trigger some investigation. Players need to bring this to their attention.

[Tipsey]

Arcane's function is to convert mana into damage. How could it be viewed as a significant buff to increase mana costs by 25% while only increasing damage by 10%? If it was the other way around, sure! As it is, this appears to only really buff rhonin's bracers as they will get more value out of each proc.

To go a different direction, I wonder what would happen if they changed arcane power to lets say a 70% mana cost reduction. Could that make words of power and overpowered a viable option? Or would that literally be overpowered?

[Causese]

here's few logs.

it's basically burn -> conserve -> double burn without legendaries (well I have ring equipped, but only used a single bl)
no buffs pots etcetc

ptr 1: https://www.warcraftlogs.com/reports/hz9LTcktApxPmRKN/" target="_blank
ptr 2: https://www.warcraftlogs.com/reports/rG7nWv2yQ8CH1BqZ/" target="_blank
ptr 3: https://www.warcraftlogs.com/reports/Cr3P4NdgDt7RqvZ9/" target="_blank
ptr 4: https://www.warcraftlogs.com/reports/AdYa97rX2LwB8htZ/" target="_blank
ptr 5: https://www.warcraftlogs.com/reports/NaK4WVhfjFHg2rzc/" target="_blank
ptr 6: https://www.warcraftlogs.com/reports/adYF79PCjgwZA2W3/" target="_blank evo was on cd after 2nd burn for 10+s..
ptr 7: https://www.warcraftlogs.com/reports/NVZJawXHD3by6zc7/" target="_blank good proccs
ptr 8: https://www.warcraftlogs.com/reports/yvXdLbR9hpT8F1Gz/" target="_blank
ptr 9: https://www.warcraftlogs.com/reports/Kg6FjQrDyCmXT7wY/" target="_blank expected this to be a decent try..
ptr 10: https://www.warcraftlogs.com/reports/rag84ZLCQVNMAHb6/" target="_blank evo on cd again after 2nd burn for 10+s
ptr 11: https://www.warcraftlogs.com/reports/7QyV8jgDhfZ6xBdR/" target="_blank evo on cd again after 2nd burn for 10+s
ptr 12: https://www.warcraftlogs.com/reports/j8A4tCbVzGXn2Y69/" target="_blank good proccs
ptr 13: https://www.warcraftlogs.com/reports/aFAhjGZ4dVP7NqDz" target="_blank evo on cd but just for 2s this time, had nothing to cast to make up for it

live 1: https://www.warcraftlogs.com/reports/L8NVgxZn47FdtRk2/" target="_blank
live 2: https://www.warcraftlogs.com/reports/hkTV21pjwAG3P4Bv/" target="_blank
live 3: https://www.warcraftlogs.com/reports/7MFx2YnvG4byWjZm/" target="_blank
live 4: https://www.warcraftlogs.com/reports/1HVWtyP7w6nMZCar/" target="_blank
live 5: https://www.warcraftlogs.com/reports/QXw2hNDPaAMcgFRq/" target="_blank
live 6: https://www.warcraftlogs.com/reports/hBbLTrjCn2qMX4QV/" target="_blank
live 7: https://www.warcraftlogs.com/reports/hxWZN8gjBJzDFtAH/" target="_blank
live 8: https://www.warcraftlogs.com/reports/RqpLGT4Q3jYH8Cc2/" target="_blank somehow managed to lose quickening stacks after 2nd burn (evo)
live 9: https://www.warcraftlogs.com/reports/31m7Frxq9yL2X4zj/" target="_blank
live 10: https://www.warcraftlogs.com/reports/G28XYD4r6hcHwTap/" target="_blank good proccs, fucked up 2 am proccs at the end
live 11: https://www.warcraftlogs.com/reports/rL7zYKyFtGWaqhjg/" target="_blank
live 12: https://www.warcraftlogs.com/reports/gvQfjJK1q8rxLhVF/" target="_blank super weak proccs during RoP after evo. if this was for ptr, evo would've been on a 15s~ cd after 2nd burn
live 13: https://www.warcraftlogs.com/reports/24HTD7wcCkLbA1VP/" target="_blank

i feel like quickening ran out more often on ptr than live. might be tied to world lag (170ms)

I also notice that I get to use more mana during opener on live. I end up at 10% quite often.

please don't let this go live lol. horrible gaming experience