Like they do know its possible to make specs and classes damage comparable without tactical nuking specs that preformed well. My hands getting sore from playing frost mage wack a mole
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They are utterly incapable of balancing the specs and they’ve proven it yet again. Ever since the expansion specific systems were introduced to the game balancing has been a nightmare yet they keep doubling down on it and making things even more needlessly and pointlessly complex. It worked in Legion because artifacts were actually well designed and balanced but it’s been a complete disaster ever since and in SL it’s the worst it’s ever been. I honestly don’t see a way out until they admit that these systems were a terrible idea and move on but that’s unlikely to happen because the people that initially proposed these changes are still in charge and unwilling to admit failure.
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They have had a “nerf mages” button right next to the “make coffee” button at blizz HQ since wrath…
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They kinda did it to themselves. They have 36 specs to balance for three major types of content plus all the SL systems (Soulbinds/Conduits, so many legendaries, now Dom sockets…).
But Fire is fine. It’s not meta anymore but it’s still viable.
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Yeah. I’m not sure why they keep making things harder for themselves when the players have been asking for it to be simplified for a few expansions now. Having so many specs, plus all the stupid and convoluted systems in place is probably why there’s such large dps discrepencies every tier. They could do a much better job of balance and keep more players happy if they just scrapped all the bonus systems and focused on building fun specs and balance baseline spells or talents.
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The nerfs were mostly aimed for M+, which was justified. It’s odd how people think the buffs have killed Fire when Fire is still doing extremely well in M+
Fire is a spec that will always be difficult to balance. Think about it: it’s a bursting caster that is always guaranteed to get its burst off. The buff to ST this week was good though.
Part of me doesn’t mind Fire’s nerfs because:
- It’s still competitive
- It doesn’t eclipse Frost and Arcane completely, which it had been doing since like 8.2 all the way through SL season 1
This is probably the most balanced the mage specs have been since late 8.2/early 8.3
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Because some mages were tired of being whispered “are you fire” to be accepted in pugs ?
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- M+ isn’t the only content. Fire will always perform well in high keys as long as they don’t address the uncapped aoe. Some people don’t want to play the timer game and make the group balance around their spec to aoe nuke down giant packs of things over and over again.
- The changes to kindling are pure “we don’t know what we’re doing so we are gonna break the spec garbage” all of the synergy of the spec is broken. Legendaries don’t line up with combusts doesn’t line up with runes and trinkets are off. Total cluster
- Just needed to have a 3rd cause it’s not ok to have a list of 2 things…
Not a shot to the heart for fire spec but I’m just ruined for my mage this expansion.
All the crap that went down with frost at the start and switching to fire and changing covenants and now frost is probably best single target again but wait maybe not let’s buff fire… I’m over it. Back to the shammy.
If I wanted to gamble I’d play online poker. Probably cost less than remaking all those legendaries too
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The max score a Fire mage has put out in Heroic Domination is better than the max score of the #2 ranking spec. It’s competitive. It beats out Frost or Arcane on some fights, and even on the one fight where its overall position is last (Fatescribe), its best parses beat those of specs ranking higher than it.
It’s balanced, not broken. Broken would be being able to combust every 1 min and having the guarantee that the burst would go off without any hindrance in PvE, ever to the point where the other two specs were absolutely obsolete in progression on anything (raid or any other form of PvE).
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It’s pretty cool that spec doesn’t seem to gate Mages in M+ anymore.
On the other hand, Mages seem less in demand and I’ve been kicked out of multiple groups for not being Venthyr. Weird people assume Mages are Venth when two of the other Covenants are viable depending on spec.
Good point, but over nerfing fire wasn’t the solution. Balancing frost and arcane so they could compete equally was the right move.
TBH, the solution next expansion is to rebuild all 3 specs a new way. Wipe them clean. I miss the days of mage hybrid specs that worked : (
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Have you not figured out that it doesnt matter if it’s a 1% difference. You will be kicked for not playing the best spec and its rather entitled to think you deserve to have a spot when you made a choice to be sub optimal?
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I have to disagree here. I really enjoy the way fire plays. I havent played arcane in forever but I often hear people say it does in fact need a complete rework.
Touch of the magi is my biggest grievance with arcane. If they made it instant and off the gcd arcane would feel so much better. The spell was only added to the game as a more idiot friendly version of prismatic crystal.
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Literally, casting touch of the magi makes arcane feels soo cumbersome. It wouldn’t make it over powered for it to be an instant cast. This is why I’m going frost over arcane.
Hell nerf it by 5% to make up the difference in downtime from the cast if they have any issues
The “funny” thing is I still get those whispers except this time instead of bothering to explain I just hit that X button. 
Flawed player perception is really such a terrible plague on the game. And the worst part is that just like the devs do themselves in by creating all of these needlessly complex systems, the players are the ones doing themselves a disservice by not thinking for themselves and instead letting a cursory Google search do their thinking for them.
That said it’s a bit of a catch 22. Yes, the LFG tool is cancer but without it most people who don’t have the time permitting pre-scheduled group content will have an even harder time getting anything done.
Still though, there is nothing more demoralizing than staring at the LFG interface for 30 minutes getting nothing but rejections and knowing it’s not so much to do with you but rather the fact that there are literally dozens and dozens of similarly geared and experienced people competing for the same slot and that people are making split second decisions based on something they happened to glance at online.
There’s really got to be a better system out there but I am not getting paid the big dev bucks to think of it. 
TotM having a cast time doesn’t make much sense from just a logical standpoint either. I mean you are literally branding your target with a magical sigil. You don’t see farmers waving the brand around before sticking cows and horses with it. Just saying. 
I’m sure there’s a better system, but I’m also sure there’s a better system than democracy. If you ever figure out either, there’s big bucks in it for you.
The thing with arcane that I’ve found is that you need to be ahead of the curve both gear and io wise to avoid these issues. Yes, there is still a negative perception, but if you outpace the average early you will have little problems. Ots why I hit the gravel and got ksm the first week it was realistically available. Most people have gotten the memo that fire is crap now so this isnt nearly as bad as it used to be.
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