If this were brought to PvE, Arcane mage balance- the core design of Arcane as a spec, would basically be fixed. Arcane’s low mobility, low utility relative to fire and frost, low clearcasting procs, and dependency on mana management would be justified if the flip side of that coin is SICK single target arcane blast burn when you’re allowed to plant your feet and start blastin.
Arcane blast shouldn’t be a filler spell that you fish for procs with. Clearcasting should be something you’re glad to get because you can save more mana for more max charge Arcane Blasts, not relieved to get because Arcane Blast sucks and Clearcasting is how you actually do dmg.
You’re so close to resurrecting arcane mage identity, i believe in u blizz 
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It’s not necessarily needed for pve…
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It would be cool if arcane had some kind of niche. Like maybe it would be the single target nuke spec
Currently all they have is some burst, which is fine, but fire does it better and has massive aoe and utility on top. A cheat death, dragons breath, 3 schools, more mobility…
Arcane is just… There
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Im pretty sure the 20% arcane blast buff is mostly just for PoM, like you dont actually sit around casting arcane blast usually in pvp, however, PoM currently is a weak cooldown compared to other classes minor burst CDs.
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Well, arcane actually has more mobility for starters. Arcane can also get a 30sec alter time, and almost immune to stuns with how often blink is up. Arcane does actually counter fire and frost in pvp, and that is because of mana and shields. Arcane can spam spellsteal and doesn’t care if they oom, frost and fire can’t do that, which is why arcane just beats them, they can’t hold onto their shields or their burst, and once the klepto changes comes through, fire and frost will lose their only advantage that gave them a level playing field against fighting an arcane mage. Arcane also has better, and actually useful, invisibility spells.
To me, Arcane plays like a spell thief, Just like all over the place and hard to pin down, assassinating people from invis, which to me feels very different than frost or fire.
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I was referring to PvE
Arcane is just inferior to fire and frost in almost every way. It’s burst is nice, but overshadowed by fire. It’s aoe is outclassed by both fire and frost, and it’s utility very limited when compared to them as well.
It’s very lacking for PvE and honestly nothing special as a spec. It does damage and that’s all
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Sure, Arcane does have some utility, especially in pvp, but at the end of the day you still need to do dmg. And even utility wise…shorter Alter and blinks are fine, but it’s no cauterize. Spending slightly less mana on spell steal spam (which doesn’t matter if you run klepto) is no blink-DB-sheep/ring.
But anyway, this thread is about bringing the 20% buff to arcane blast to PvE. And no, especially in pve, Arcane is not more mobile than frost and fire in pve. You don’t want to run anything but shimmer in m+, and I say this as someone who loves the non-shimmer talents and pure blink. Fire is all instant cast during their extremely valuable cooldown, frost’s main dmg abilities, ice lance and orb, are instant cast, and blizzard can be instant cast.
Arcane is close to being good, like really fun and good and meta-competitive. I ran a couple of our non-push dungeons with Arcane Harmony for the first time last week and did 6.1k overall in an +18 DOS. Considering it was the first time I played that lego and don’t play Arcane that often, it felt pretty good.
But that being said, anyone saying Arcane doesn’t need a 20% buff to arcane blast, or something like that, to actually enter the realm of Legit Spec is… just gonna be a jerk here but it’s 600io 7/10 heroic starter kit commentary. Fire is still the easy pick for pushing m+ because of dmg and utility.
And @Warp- yeah exactly, that’s how I was introduced to Arcane when I started playing in Cata. You were magic artillery. Arcane burn phase was actually a thing that would show up on meters… on any single target fight, not just 1-2 niche boss fights with 10 seconds of extra damage amp custom made to line up with cooldowns. Magic artillery still seems like a fun as hell niche to fill that’s currently vacant, and likewise, Arcane doesn’t fill any dmg profile niche atm.
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I don’t get this mentality. If you want to run shimmer, go for it, there’s nothing wrong with it. But the idea that it’s the only viable talent for m+ makes no sense to me. I never use it and have no issue in mythics. Losing the stun/root break of blink and risking the interruption of evocation is too big a loss for me.
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Not exactly true. I does burst AoE quite well, of course only if you have the Bombardment lego paired with Resonance, but that is only relevant in M+ and even then mostly on Fortified weeks. That’s it though, everything else is lackluster, as you say, and almost laughable when compared to what other specs bring to the table especially in the utility department.
Make Mass Invis a baseline ability for arcane, for Mythic plus this would be huge
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It’s not though. Arcane is performing higher than frost is currently.
Frost is just easier to play.
If you want to see my 6/10 mythic character you should have asked. Brewteaful-Lightbringer
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Sounds about how I remember it being in Cataclysm, my favorite iteration of the spec. I’d be down for that for sure.
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Arcane Blast cannot be buffed in PvE without buffing Arcane Missiles by the same amount, or else there would never be a point to cast Arcane Missiles for anything other than mana reprieve.
Arcane could use minor QoL changes such as Clearcasting duration increase to 20 seconds, and bad-luck protection on Clearcasting procs to make it easier to play, but in its current state, Arcane is an above-average spec.
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I agree, might as well just buff mastery at that point if buffing arcane blast was the answer, and its not.
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All I know is when I play my Arcane mage in Torghast and get the arcane blast stacks and it’s hitting for like 260% more, plus crazy mastery, Arcane feels amazing.
Then I go back into the real world and wonder why I love the spec soo much still…