I have been hearing quite a bit on how Fire mage is gaining some steam recently as a viable leveling spec. I am having trouble gathering any information on this though as most things point to Frost primarily for the survivability it gives. Can anybody run me through the advantages with Fire and if or what circumstance it would be viable over Frost?
Fire till 20-26… frost from 20/26-60 for AOE farming.
I should clarify that I would view it from keeping purely ST. But you are definitely right about AoE being more efficient. Albeit with how Classic mechanics will be set up, it probably won’t be as viable as people would like on top of the risks with competition.
I’d be curious too. I just can’t see a situation where fire would be better for leveling. You don’t have enough crit to really benefit from combustion while leveling. And the slows from frost bolt make it so easy to kite a mob without ever taking damage. I also believe fire spells are more mana intensive?
All that being said you also have the capability to aoe farm as frost. Not sure how well that’s really going to end up working out though I have a feeling there aren’t going to be enough mobs to round up and aoe to make it worth it. Especially on a PvP server.
Jokerd was planning on Fire til 22 then respec. Just thought I would plop that down. He may have recently changed that, or may do so before launch.
Fire = Kill it before it reaches you.
Frost = Slow it down so you can kill it before it reaches you, but slower.
IMO level fire, switch to frost for farming and PVE (first 2 tiers).
Ah so that is where the concept is coming from.
When you say level Fire, are you saying from (technically with Elemental Precision) 13 to 60 as fire?
I was going to say there will be too many players to effectively aoe grind. But…just layer hop until you find one with little to no competition and go at it.
Personally I wouldn’t bother with EP until level 32 after you have Blast Wave, but each to his own. Low level mobs resistances are pretty slight.
Not to mention, but the AOE grind method was no-where near as effective in real Vanilla as it was in Private Servers, because many of the mobs used for grinding actually have ranged attacks and would stand back and use them intermittently.
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I remember leveling my mage alt as fire in vanilla. It reached level 35 or something like that before BC.
That was dangerous. Very dangerous. It was basically a race who does more damage - me while being pushed back all the time or mob. Then eating and drinking after each pull.
If you want to be efficient, go frost. If you want to experience danger, go fire.
Alright so this suggests pretty bad downtime for not enough uptime advantage.
Fire is pretty fun with Pyroblast -> fireblast … instant kill one mob. sheep next, and repeat on it.
But once you have enough talent points you can switch to frost for more efficient AOE leveling. I forgot where you switch over, around lvl 30 I think.
Both are fun if you just like different feel of it.
Everything I remember and have read is that frost is the way to go. You will be drinking for days if you roll fire not to mention your control and options for survival are limited in that spec. It may not be a problem early levels, but when you are getting into the 30s you really are slowing yourself down.
It won’t be like that at slightly higher levels. Its Pyroblast + about 2 Fireball casts while being pushed back because mob can easily reach you.
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Really good point. The beta melee leeway of mobs seemed very long.
Mobs shouldn’t have melee leeway =P The game isn’t coded for that as far as I know >.>
Absolutely. I only did fire till 30ish or so, after that I was in full frost when I was leveling. Those were fun levels though.
Oh I agree, but it doesn’t seem like it is something being addressed. The only word from Blizz so far related to melee leeway is “working as intended.” I think that was based on them perceiving it as a PVP check and not mobs. It is definitely a red flag for mages trying to aoe farm considering how beta was functioning.
I think it is people misconceiving a mob’s melee range as well as a player’s personal leeway for being mob leeway. Mob’s don’t have leeway.
Not sure it is simple perception though. Looking at vanilla mage farm videos comparing to how it played out in beta shows a big difference in range that mobs are hitting at. When you had them under chill effects or stuck in novas they weren’t hitting the player from these extreme distances.
Not sure how it was on pservers, since some people seem to be using that as a point of comparison. There is just some suspicious results in mob hit distance.