Hey Kaivax!
Thanks for looking at Arcane in Alpha. Here’s my feedback:
Overall Feedback
These are some fantastic changes. Keep it up Blizzard! I’d love to test this on Alpha, but since I don’t have access these are some of my thoughts regarding what is written so far:
Spellslinger Changes
Below are the changes for Spellslinger.
Controlled Instincts
- Controlled Instincts has been redesigned – For 8 seconds after being struck by an Arcane Orb, 30% of the direct damage dealt by an Arcane Splinter is also dealt to nearby enemies. Damage reduced beyond 5 targets.
- Feedback: Great change! This very clearly differentiates the AoE vs. Single target spell priority. You would still have used Nether Tempest in both situations, but this talent is only useful in AoE where you’ll likely be using Arcane Orb profusely. Great direction!
Splintering Sorcery
- Spellslingers now conjure two Splinters when they consume Nether Precision.
- Nether Precision has been redesigned – Consuming Clearcasting increases the damage of your next 2 Arcane Blasts by 20% or your next 2 Arcane Barrages by 20%.
- Feedback: This may be the best change in this entire list. Arcane Barraging twice to proc 2 Splinters per Barrage (4 during Arcane Surge w/ Augury Abounds talent) is likely going to feel incredible. 1 Splinterstorm per 2 Arcane Barrages in Arcane Surge, 4 Arcane Barrages outside of Arcane Surge. The one thing I would consider is making Nether Precision’s buff to Arcane Barrage only apply to 4 Arcane Charges-consuming Arcane Barrage since otherwise you could simply cast 2 Arcane Barrages without proc’ing Arcane Orb from Orb Barrage in AoE) and it would be worth-it to do that because of the 2 (or 4) Splinters fired. Just a thought.
Splintering Orbs
- Splintering Orbs now conjures two Arcane Splinters when they strike a target with their Arcane Orb.
- Feedback: I think I’m reading this wrong because there’s no way you put 2 Splinters on every target hit with Arcane Orb (4 during Arcane Surge) whenever you Orb. This would do an absolutely abhorrent amount of damage (on 8 targets, 1 Arcane Orb during Arcane Surge would proc 32 Splinters per Orb, and you fire ~6-12 Arcane Orbs per trash pack depending on the number of Orb Barrage procs). I’m not going to comment because that seems like a ridiculously large amount of damage, probably more than initial release of Sunfury. I’ll wait an see how it plays on Alpha (if I get access)
Splinterstorm
- Arcane Splinterstorms now have a 20% chance to grant you Clearcasting (was 100%).
- Feedback: I think this change makes sense given that your Mage Feedback post noted you wanted Clearcasting Arcane Missiles to be stronger, while at the same time given us more Splinterstorm procs via the 2 previous changes above. I’m down for this.
Sunfury Changes
Below are the changes for Sunfury.
Glorious Incandescence
- Glorious Incandescence has been updated:
- Now summons 4 Meteorites (was 8).
- Increased Meteorite’s Fire Blast cooldown reduction by 100%.
- Increased Meteorite’s Arcane Orb cooldown reduction by 100%.
- Meteorite damage increased by 100%.
- The timing between Meteorites dealing damage and their associated spell cooldown reduction effects have been better synchronized.
- Feedback: It seems like you just halved the number of meteorites but doubled all of their effect. I’m gonna guess this was to optimize performance in case there are a lot of mages in a raid fight? It’s a little sad because those meteorites looked pretty cool (like Comet Storm but fire!), but if its a technical limitation then that’s ok.
Arcane Mage Spec Tree Changes
Below are the changes for the Arcane Mage Spec tree.
Energized Familiar and Arcane Familiar Change
- New Talent: Energized Familiar – During Time Warp or other similar effects, your Arcane Familiar fires 4 bolts instead of 1. Damage from your Arcane Familiar has a small chance to grant you up to 2% of your maximum mana.
- Arcane Familiar has been redesigned – Casting Arcane Intelligence also summons you a Familiar that attacks your enemies and increases your maximum mana by 10% for 1 hour. Now passive.
- Feedback: The “Arcane Familiar is now passive” is fantastic. Personally, I think this should apply to Arcane Intellect as well, where party/raid members within 40 yards are just passively affected by Arcane Intellect (without you having to recast it), but that’s just me. The “Energized Familiar” idea is very interesting. I would actually go a little further, maybe by making Arcane Familiar fire its little damage procs faster with more Haste, but reduce the mana gain to 1% to account for the increased procs? Honestly great idea for a talent.
Eureka and Leysight
- New Talent: Eureka – When a spell consumes Clearcasting, its damage is increased by 25%.
- New Talent: Leysight – Nether Precision damage bonus increased to 30%.
- Feedback: Flat damage increase on procs. Sure, why not?
Wizened Wit
- New Talent: Wizened Wit – The cast time of Arcane Blast is reduced by 10%. Choice node with Presence of Mind.
- Feedback: This talent might not work (unless I’m missing something). At 4 Arcane Charges, your Arcane Blast has a cast time of 1.53 secs and procs a GCD of 1.50 seconds. Both are affected by Haste. With a 10% decreased cast time, that Arcane Blast falls to 1.377 seconds, but still procs a 1.50 second GCD. This means that you really can’t use this decreased cast time because you will be GCD locked at 4 Charges for another 0.123 seconds. This essentially turns your 10% cast time reduction into a 1.9% cast time reduction (1.53 → 1.50 because of GCD lock). Maybe you could do something like “Arcane Blast now has a cast time of 1.50 seconds but Arcane charges no longer reduce the cast time” or something like that. Unless I’m missing something, this talent as it currently is might run into some problems.
Arcane Battery, Time Loop and Aether Attunement
- New Talent: Arcane Battery – Each time you consume Clearcasting, gain 1%/2% increased spell damage for 30 seconds, stacking up to four times. 2-point talent.
- New Talent: Time Loop – When you gain a stack of Arcane Battery, you have a small chance to gain another stack of Arcane Battery. This effect can trigger off of itself.
- New Talent: Aether Attunement – While at maximum stacks of Arcane Battery, your next Arcane Missiles consumes Arcane Battery dealing 150% increased damage to your primary target and also fires at up to 4 nearby enemies.
- Feedback: You brought back the S3 Arcane tier set, which was overall well received. This is interesting but I think it suffers from one main problem in AoE, which should be considered given that Aether Attunement (current 4-piece) gives you AoE damage with Arcane Missiles. Currently, there is little reason to use Arcane Missiles in AoE outside of your 4-piece proc (same thing as Aether Attunement), but you can at least spend Clearcasting on Arcane Explosion with Reverberate, which you’ll be using to generate Arcane Charges in AoE. Now that Reverberate has been removed, I think there should be some benefit to having Clearcasting apply to Orb Barrage, where maybe Orb Barrage can consume a Clearcasting proc to guarantee an Arcane Orb is fired when you use Arcane Barrage, and at 4 stacks you would instead use your Clearcasting on Arcane Missiles instead of guaranteeing Orb Barrage’s proc chance. Something to think about perhaps.
Leydrinker
- New Talent: Leydrinker – Every 6 times you consume Nether Precision, your next Arcane Blast echoes, repeating its damage at 50% effectiveness to the primary target and up to two nearby enemies.
- Feedback: This is very interesting, essentially giving you a proc with more cleave. The only bad part of this is that it doesn’t apply to Arcane Barrage (which I saw in the last datamining that it did use to apply to Arcane Barrage; what happened?). I think this would be incredible for the Arcane Harmony build in AoE, since your big Arcane Barrage would cleave even more. I think this talent might not work too well in AoE given it only applies to Arcane Blast. Please think about making this apply to Arcane Barrage again; not doing so would be truly a shame.
Improved Touch of the Magi vs Magi's Spark
- New Talent: Improved Touch of the Magi – Your Touch of the Magi now accumulates 25% of the damage you deal.
- New Talent: Magi’s Spark – Your Touch of the Magi now also conjures a spark, increasing the damage your target receives from your next Arcane Barrage, Arcane Blast, and Arcane Missiles by 25%. Upon receiving damage from all three spells, the spark explodes, dealing Arcane damage to all nearby enemies. Choice node with Improved Touch of the Magi.
- Feedback: I’m fairly confident you’re trying to design Improved TotM to be simpler of the two choices, and Magi’s Spark to be the more complex more slightly more damage version. That’s fine, but there’s an annoying problem with Magi’s Spark: it only buffs a single Arcane Missiles proc and Aether Attunement exists. This means that you will have to hold your Aether Attunement in single target just to proc it during Magi’s Spark, and if you go into your Magi’s Spark window without that proc, you will not be able to get the proc since you need to cast AM to get the 4 stacks of Arcane Battery and your first AM cast will consume the 25% buff. The same exact think applies to Arcane Blast, where it will need Leydrinker to proc in order for it to do 50% more damage with the 25% damage provided by Magi’s Spark. I think the damage buff of both Arcane Missiles and Arcane Blast should be removed to prevent having to go into Magi’s Spark w/ Leydrinker AND Aether Attunement and instead buff the damage of your next Arcane Barrage by 50% (or some increased amount). This would give more viability to the Arcane Harmony build, which is already more complex than the current meta build due to not being able to Barrage freely when OOM (which achieves your goal of having a more complex with slightly more damage than the “easier build” of the Improved TotM talent).
Nether Munitions
- New Talent: Nether Munitions – When Magi’s Spark or Improved Touch of the Magi detonates, it increases the damage all affected targets take from you by 8% for 12 seconds.
- Feedback: At first glance this is cool idea but I think you can create something better here. Extra damage after your cooldowns doesn’t really fit the Arcane playstyle of burstiness, and I think you can apply a similar damage increase without making it into a buff. For example, consider the following change to that talent: When Magi’s Spark or Improved Touch of the Magi detonates, you gain 4 Arcane Charges and your next 3 Arcane Barrages also generate 4 Arcane Charges." This would allow your TotM windows to end with 3 neat Arcane Barrages, providing more damage in AoE while also providing some benefit in single target in the form of free Barrages (and the mana that they give w/ the Mana Adept talent).
Arcane Missiles changes
- Arcane Missiles has been redesigned – Can now only be cast when you have Clearcasting. The wording of talents that are associated with Arcane Missiles have been updated to reflect this change.
- Feedback: Fantastic changes. The only I’d like to now be considered given that you’ve solidified Arcane Missiles as having 8 missiles at all times is to make Arcane Harmony max cap at some multiple of 8. I don’t care how much, 8, 16,24, 32, 64; you choose Blizzard, but please make it some multiple of 8 instead of the current 20.
Nether Precision
- Nether Precision has been redesigned – Consuming Clearcasting increases the damage of your next 2 Arcane Blasts by 20% or your next 2 Arcane Barrages by 20%.
- Feedback: Fantastic changes. Works phenomenally with Spellslinger. Banger of a change.
Illuminated Thoughts
- Illuminated Thoughts has been redesigned – Clearcasting has a 5% increased chance to trigger and spells that consume Clearcasting deal 5% more damage.
- Feedback: Why not? I think this is better than the current Illuminated Thoughts given that damage increase to Arcane Missiles.
Concentration
- Concentration has been redesigned – Casting Arcane Blast has a small chance to make your next cast of Arcane Blast free.
- Feedback: Be careful here: not spending mana is a gift and a curse. If you don’t spend mana, you don’t generate Clearcasting procs. You could make this talent simply refund a bunch of mana when it procs instead of the current effect, which would address this issue.
Improved Prismatic Barrier
- Improved Prismatic Barrier is now baseline.
- Feedback: Great changes, makes our barrier significantly better.
Missing/Removed Things/Additional thoughts
Below are some of my thoughts for some of the things that were either removed or left unchanged, or just some additional thoughts
Siphon Storm
- Suggestion: I know for a fact that you guys are looking at this talent because I see the datamined “Technique of the Magistrix” talent on WoWhead. I beg of you to consider my suggestion of removing the damage amp from Siphon Storm and instead making it remove Evocation’s cooldown. I’ve actually played high-Haste Arcane in S1 of Shadowlands (as Night Fae), and in AoE (where you don’t run OOM), it really feels good to play. Here is the video where I talked about this (with math n such):
https://youtu.be/XphxxFVWiW8?si=XNiEwr4LDsYmPfor&t=725
Radiant Spark and Arcane Harmony
- Suggestion: The removal of Radiant Spark is overall a good move, but I do feel sad that now that this playstyle is gone since it severely weakens the Arcane Harmony build. Furthermore Arcane Harmony is still stacking up to 20 stacks. I made a couple of suggestions to address this, see here:
https://youtu.be/XphxxFVWiW8?si=2p9AlukkM9NeYGDT&t=1118
Rule of Threes
- Suggestion: I do wish this talent either had some iteration done or was removed. I don’t know that it currently fits well with the current tree setup. I discussed an idea previously here:
https://youtu.be/XphxxFVWiW8?si=XlLBF68H8ysv5x8K&t=1273
Nether Tempest, Mana Gem, Cascading Power
- Suggestion: In the trash where it belongs.
Orb Barrage, Reverberate and RNG
- Suggestion: As discussed in the Aether Attunement section of the post (in the Arcane Mage Spec Tree changes section), there is almost no purpose in consuming CC in AoE outside of the 4th stack of Arcane Battery (which procs Aether Attunement) given the loss of Reverberate. I think one way to address this and to reduce the RNG nature of Orb Barrage is to make Orb Barrage consume Clearcasting procs and be guaranteed to proc when that happens. This also gives the new Eureka talent a little bit more coolness in AoE. One thought if you do implement this: you might also want to create a talent that allows you to consume both procs of Nether Precision w/ a single Arcane Barrage so as to not overcap on Nether Precision resources if, say, you have multiple CC procs and you sequentially spend them on guaranteed Orb Barrage procs.
Crackling Energy, Improved Arcane Missiles, Chrono-Shift and Supernova
- Suggestion: I really wish you would remove Crackling Energy and Improved Arcane Missiles. They continue to be expensive madatory point dumps that bring nothing other than bigger numbers to our core abilities. I think you could easily remove them and put Chrono-Shift and Supernova in their place to allow these lesser picked talents to see more use (with the exception of Supernova in ST w/ Spellslinger’s Unerring Proficiency)
