k my alt is a mage, and i am frost spec'd, the AoE on frost kinda sucks, because i get a group rounded up, freeeze em, and use the arcane blast over and over and they are dead and i have no points in arcane, but the frost spec AoE you need to freeze em walk back and hit it and by time its done they are coming at you anyway, but the arcane one you just get em around ya and hit it over and over and they are dead, why doesnt anybody use arcane? seems the best to me.....But i am only level 24 so if anybody could give me some insite, should i stay frost?

I'm an arcane mage and I think its pretty cool. I have a talent that makes sure that my Arcane Missiles isn't interrupted, one that makes the next mage spell I cast instant, and I have another one where my next spell costs no mana. I think arcane is sweet, but go with what you want.

never used the imp arcane missles unless i go pvp.

Well, Frost Mages are better for survivability and CC in instances, sure Arcane / Fire do more Dmg, but If you pull all of the aggro from the tank, Arcane / Fire = Dead. If a Frost Mage pulls the aggro from tank, he / she can do a number of things to help the group whilst staying alive, FN, IB, etc. As for Frost AoE, Ice Barrier -> Mass Aggro -> Ice Barrier -> Ice Block -> Frost Nova -> Blink -> Summon Water Elemental -> Blizzard / Freeze -> Blizzard -> Cone of Cold, by then they should be dead, if not, hit FN again then another CoC should finish em off.

ONLY Deep arcane mages are very very cool with arcane blast and Arcane misiles


You have to have Enpowered arcane missiles really really good


Go tailoring and make spellfire armor better then cool

I have a 62 fire mage and yes I do pull agro if I crit with a pyroblast but I just stick with my improved fireballs and Im fine and even if I do pull it I can cast that damn I forget the name anyway you encase yourself in ice and boom the monster will leave me alone. You just gotta learn to control your threat and better yet how to use your character. By the time you hit 50 you should be well in tune with the way your guy works. I dont worry much about dying. I can take on a mob of three and do just fine usually only using frost nova once. Mages are great when you know how to use them.

ice block was added as a spell(not a talent) in the last patch they posted before the patch came out

frost is best for pvp..
fire is best for pve..
arcane is used mainly by pvp frost mages to get improved counter spell. and its used by fire mages for clear casting in raids.
arcane as a main spec sucks for pvp. you can do good dmg in pve but fire is still the best way to go. at lvl 20, 30, 40 ect... i dont really know but once you reach 60 i would say dont waste time with arcane. go frost or fire.

Arcane is not best suited for mage?
what about a little in frost

level 48 and am fire.  I went arcane for bg at 39.  Basically spammed arcane blast and was in top three in damage everytime.  fire was never any good in bg because casting time killed me.  Standing still to hit pyroblast or fireball made me a great target for rogues and hunters. 

the way I see it, arcane will give me higher intellect, mana, and damage in bg.  fire will give me more burst, more fire crits, nice fire dot on crits, and more dps in pve.  not sure but it seems like arcane is much more versatile. 

Compare pyroblast with arcane missiles.  Pyroblast will do more damage, but not much more.  If it crits, it will do much more than pyroblast, but otherwise it is pretty close.  If you get it off that is.  If you are interrupted or the enemy gets out of range or he dies or you die or he resists, then you lose and pyro does a big fat zero.  Arc missiles has a crit chance with each missile, a chance to proc clearcasting with each, and if you start channeling the enemy will take damage.  If you have improved arc missiles, damage wont interrupt either.  Seems to me that  arcane missiles beats pyroblast over the long haul.  Maybe you will get a huge pyroblast and it will impress your friends, but in the end arcane missiles is the way to go.

Also compare blast wave with arcane blast or slow.  I think the better is the arcane blast/slow combo.  The main fall back of blast wave is the cool down.  You can get off about 20 arcane blasts in the cool down time of blast wave. 

I am likely to switch back to arcane for the long haul.  This is my level 70 build:

http://www.worldofwarcraft.com/info/classes/mage/talents.html?2050050300230150333124150520031200000000000000000000000000000000000

Until i can get ignite back i will miss the DOT.  I will also miss combustion.  But like I said, this build seems to be better for the long haul. 

I will also miss blazing speed...its just fun.

theres times you cant stop it even with frost but most of the time its due to a group wipe i find anyway, where as a fire mage i was always almost dying
water elemental is great for cc, so is frost nova, cone of cold slows 60% with permafrost, and even your frostbolt slows them 50%, when they are frozen you do a lot of dmg too

perhaps this is just me, but i went deep fire, yet i tended not to die. perhaps it isnt that fire sux, but it just didnt fit ur play style. for example, u can cast a fireball from 46 yards in 3 secs itll hit, n itll either crit n cause some nice DoT or itll just pull the mob on u. by this point, switch to scrotch, much more efficient. if they get close, blast wave, FN, step back, another fireball, then if they get close again give em a dragons breath.

but back to the topic at hand, i agree that arcane is much better for pvp than fire or frost. my build for pvp is 44/11/6. i get the chance to freeze from my ice armor/CoC/FB, with the added bonus of a burst POM pyro, n the bonus kitin addition of slow. arcane power sends ur spells into a new lvl of power. plus, did i forget to mention the increase in mana, crit chance, bonus dmg, resistance, reduction of dmg, n clearcastin.

so yea, arcane FTW

the1realcowboy arcane is not best for pvp.. l2p plz. how is frosts damage too slow?? you can do massive crits with frostbolt icelance combo not to mention your water elemental doing 700 to 1000 damage every 2.5 seconds. arcane just sucks for pvp hence the reason why ive never actually seen an arcane mage in any seriuos pvp situation.

you have 4 frost novas which will give you roughly 8k instant damage with ice lance alone nevermind the 2k cone of cold and fire blast..

Ok Fire sux

but what is best frost or arcane???

Fire is the best pve spec, dot + lots of crits.
Main problem is servabilty sucks so pvp is tough and some people struggle with questing 4 this reason.

ice is maid 4 pvp its mostly about survivability, but they are good 4 aoe, if u practice u can kill 7 mobs easy and not get hit once. Easy 4 questing 4 a combo of those 2 reasons but not as good as fire/arcane at direct dps.

Arcane is 4 endgame
Manna regen while casting + manna free moves works wonders on long boss fights. Most of the spec is 4 boss fights but u gets some nice resistance talents, imp cs and armour etc 4 pvp.

Obviously ice> arcane 4 pvp but its still nice 2 be able 2 do pvp and raid.
One downside 2 arcane is arcane explosion is probably the weakest aoe on the game so u go to get some skill in using all the class aoe in the wrong spec.

Other than that there’s not really anything else 2 say all the specs r good u just have 2 adapt them 2 your play style.

i am a 50 frost mage and i was all the specs...Was arcane from 10-40 then my friend told me to go fire for leveling so i did and leveled to 50 in about a week then went frost for many reasons.First off frost chill effect + icy veins = pwnage cuz when i fight enemys most of the time they r forced to stay still while i pelt them with frostbolts, arcane was cool but i can't use all 3 spells.My friend who recomended me to fire is an arcane mage and used fire and arcane spells, but i like to stick with 1 type of spell and also with my pet my dps. But when i was arcane i mostly cast fire spells and i was always 2nd in pvp but those stinking rogues...

I am a Frost Mage and i like it because i can just freez the target and back up to do more dmg also i can just send my elemental after them "get at lvl 50 for frost mages" and im fine + a water elemental is just sweet while fighting on bosses and stuff because you can just use there frost nova if yours is on cooldown.

The Fire mage is also cool with all the dmg that they do but they cant realy kill the large mobs of Non-Elites unless you have ALOT of health while a frost mage has Ice Barrier to protect them with there Water Elemental and there slowing spells. but if you like to PVE then fire mage is a pretty good choice

The Arcane Mage is also good in PVE altho i donot know mutch about them infact i hardly ever see a Arcane mage around but im a Instance persion.

Arcane/Fire mages have frost nova too.  And Frostbolt (rank 1) for kiting.  And ice lance for easy 1-2K damage after frost nova.  And cone of cold.  And blizzard (rank 1) for finding stealthers in bg's.  And NOW, Ice block.  And, well, you get the point. 

All this, plus improved counterspell, extra intellect, Spell Power, clearcasting, Arcane Power (extra crit dmg), improved scorch, ignite, 70% chance to resist pushback on fire spells, mana regen while casting (lol, almost never run out of mana if only use scorch), Blastwave, and of course, Presence of Mind and Pyroblast (although that's really pretty insignificant in the overall picture). 

Not to mention an additional 10% chance to crit with scorch (4+6), 3% more crit chance from Arcane Instability, and an additional 3% chance to crit with all spells due to clearcasting (10% * 30%).

If you know how to use ALL of your spells, you will own in PvP, no matter what spec, but as you can probably guess, I have a great time with arcane/fire (33/28, scorch spec), but only when I use the frost spells properly.

I run a 63 arcane mage right now, (jaranna on Ajzol Nerub, www.confrontationguild.com), and i've tried everything but found that Arcane works best for me.

I go into any fight like this.

Before a good fight, make sure presence of mind, and all buffs, including amp magic are active for highest possible damage.

For standard yellow, non leet enemies,

Hit slow, while he's slowly walking towards you hit fire blast and improved fireball, both on instant, by then he's close so then hit frost nova to freeze, then back  up hit arcane missels through once and a fire blast to finish him off.  Usually takes little or no damage on a non leet enemy.

For groups and aoe damage,

if you are solo and your hitting a mob, again make sure all buffs are active and right when you run into the mob, hit arcane power, for boost, use any instant uses on your gear to boost, frost nova, and move back and arcane blast until dead.  Make sure you also have all your mana gems and potions too along with your evocation charged just in case.

Don't pull with slow, though... at least toss a fireball at them and hit slow while it's travelling at them

I run a 63 arcane mage right now, (jaranna on Ajzol Nerub, www.confrontationguild.com), and i've tried everything but found that Arcane works best for me.

I go into any fight like this.

Before a good fight, make sure presence of mind, and all buffs, including amp magic are active for highest possible damage.

For standard yellow, non leet enemies,

Hit slow, while he's slowly walking towards you hit fire blast and improved fireball, both on instant, by then he's close so then hit frost nova to freeze, then back  up hit arcane missels through once and a fire blast to finish him off.  Usually takes little or no damage on a non leet enemy.

For groups and aoe damage,

if you are solo and your hitting a mob, again make sure all buffs are active and right when you run into the mob, hit arcane power, for boost, use any instant uses on your gear to boost, frost nova, and move back and arcane blast until dead.  Make sure you also have all your mana gems and potions too along with your evocation charged just in case.

Ok, I have to add this comment. It's a little off topic, but lately, I've seen a lot of mages questing solo with the Amplify Magic buff active on themselves. I'm not sure if you realize it, but that particular buff increases the damage of spells used AGAINST you, not your spells against targets. The one you want to use is Dampen Magic, if you use either one of them.

Well one of the best resons to go with arcane is u get hella mana and plus if u go a little into fare spec u can get insta cast pyroball =).... improved arcane missles 5/5 rocks too

slow isent that good of a reward for being full arcane but i dont care..... I JUST WHANT MORE MANA!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

ok first of all, SLOW OWNS! it's like having frost for kiting. i can kill lvl 71s without them ever touching me. pyro, fireball, now there at 30 yards so use slow, use another fireball and if there still alive use scorch. if they have crazy health frost nova blink, run to 30-35 yards and repeat just without the pyro. so who needs frost!(i was frost to lvl 65 so no offence to anyone) slow is like frostbolt(with permafrost), it slows them by 50%.

I recently respec'd from deep frost to arc/frost and I must say my frostbolts are doing more damage with more talents in arcane tree.

With "Spell Power" + "Ice shards" my crits do +150% damage instead of the +100% with just plain "Ice shards"

I lost "Winter's Chill"'s +10% crit, but gained:
"Arcane Mind", "Arcane Potency" , "Arcane Stability" which makes up for it.

I also lost "Empowered frostbolt" but gained "Mind Mastery" which also made up for it. My regular frostbolt hits actually increased in damage I think.

I gained "Arcane Power" as well which works good with "Icy Veins"

I kinda miss the water elemental and have no idea how much damage/mana im missing without that guy+coldsnap.

Ain't missing "Frostbite", "shatter" or my pet's frost nova at all in raids :)

Anyway, I think this is better for raids and you have the option of using arcane blast if you want to as well.
Don't want to go fire cos I think it drains more mana.

This is probably common knowledge for any arcane spec'd mage, but I just thought it was neat that my frostbolt got a nice boost, with more in arcane tree O_O. I was previously reluctant to go arcane because I thought I would have to cast "arcane missiles" and "arcane blast" the whole time which would greatly drain my mana. How wrong I was. Just casting frostbolt works fine(and better than heavy frost spec).

I personally think that Arcane/Frost mages own, and you don't even have to put many talents in Frost to make them do that. With a Arcane/Frost build, you'll end up have a base Crit Chance at like 15-20 percent, and then I forget what Arcane talent but one of them adds 30 percent to your Crit Chance, and with Frost you can get 50 percent Crit chance if the enemy is frozen. 20+30+50= 100 percent! And you get all those talents that add like atleast 150 percent more damage on Crits so, I'd say don't go for just 1 of the 3, go for like 1 big, 1 small.

it etirley depends on what ur planing to do with ur mage frost ide say would be better for a pvp lover ( me :P) its also great for mass grinding fire is good for instances and if u sppec archain fire instant piro is the bomb archain ehhhh ive never rly seen a achain mage but there 100s of combos of specs to chose from but if ur archain ide sugest definatly getting piro :P

Last patch arcane explosion got 50% more damage, using it in pvp will just about always put you at the top of the Dmg chart.
But otherwise I suggest you be a frosty mage so you dont get ganked by rogues. :)

For me Fire is an excellent spec for raiding when all the rest of you party wants is eyebrow singeing raw fire power.

So yes Arcane mages might seem the best but they are not in raids that's for sure.

I'm sure somebody might disagree.

If I PvP'd a lot more I would have a heavy frost build with some arcane obviously to survive longer.

i say when ur lvling start off with fire spec. then when u hit lvl 70 id switch to frost to get the water elemental and other pvp advantages.

You cant say arcane mages are crap, cause t5 gear is for arcane... Arcane is great once you get enough spell damage and mana otherwise your gonna have problems. Fire is good all around, great for pve and pretty decent at pvp. Frost really is only good for pvp it doesnt put out damage in pve like any other spec. But if your like me and dont mind putting 100g a week switching specs than have fun and see what you like.

So would you say frost mage to water elemental then arcane?

I was fire mage till lvl 70, enjoyed that, more dps - more fun. Seeing the majority of mages in my server (Tw. Hammer) beeing frost, i retalented. The difference was fantastic, with water elemental and empowering my frost spells, i had the chance to survive and live longer to kill my opponent.I started enjoying the BG also.I suggest everyone to choose whatever is more convinient and enjoy because mage is a great Class. All 3 kinds have their +,-. And finally i believe mage is one of the most difficult chars to lvling. With my alts (Hunter, Paladin), leveling is much easier. But Mage rulzzzz.

I have played as all three mages, and I have come to love arcane.  I run a 48/13/0 spec, and on single targets I am a DPS god (not bragging, I just mean I do more DPS as arcane than as either fire or frost).  Ice seems the best for multiple targets, fire a balance of multi and single targets, and arcane best for single targets.

ok so i lvled my mage fire all the way to 50 then respeced to ice. Once i hit 70 i went fire so i could do dungeons/ raids.  I found out that mobs lvl 72 or higher have a 26% restitance to fire spells. Then i respec to arcane and my dps has become much better.

I agree, my alts easily surpassed my main character mage when it came to leveling, but the power my Fire mage whips out is totally worth it  :)

I was Arcane/Fire for most of my leveling. When I joined my guild I respeced to a deep fire raid build (10/48/3). About a month ago I went full arcane, and I gotta say I LOVE IT.

The damage out put is equal too or greater than what I was doing with fire. With Arcane Missiles I'm normally doing 800 dps per tic. X5 ticks would make a full AM round about 4.5k dps, if none of them crit.

I was getting only a little over 3k with Fireball (3.5 sec. cast) 4k with Pyroblast and that took 6 sec.

Since each AM tick has a chance to crit (about 1.5k on crit) I sometimes do 7.5k damage in 5sec.

Also with Arcane Focus, I only need 76 spell hit to cap instead of 164 like Fire or Frost. That way I can put more focus on Crit Rating and Spell Haste. Giving me a greater chance to crit and/or more DPS per second.

While AE is the weakest of the AoEs I find it the most useful. Flamestrike is ok, but its really only good for a quick burst of damage and the 3 second cast time just isn't worth the wait and the range sucks. Blizzard, which I find to be far better than FS (especially with the range and damage), can be interrupted and really doesn't do enough damage for the mana cost (although I suspect its better for a frost mage). I find myself normally using AE, especially on the Tidewalker fight (and with Arcane Impact the Crit chance increases by 6%).

Normally I'll pull with AB, and then AM the rest of the time and even give a Fireblast near the end (still a very useful spell for the instant damage). Mobs fall very fast, and if I turn on Arcane Power I can beat some 70 elites by myself.

If I run up against a mob that is Arcane resistant I just start spamming Fireballs and Fireblasts at them. I've noticed that even after respecing my Fireballs are still averaging about 3.2k damage. So I really haven't lost that much Fire DPS though respec.

Talents like Arcane Fortitude (Increase Armor by 100% of Intellect), and Arcane Mastery (Increase spell damage by 25% of Intellect) add more usefulness to the Intellect stat than just more mana and crit chance. And, Arcane Mind (Increase your intellect by 15%)gives you even more intellect to help out.

All the other talents are great for helping with damage too (lots of them either increase DPS or increase Crit Damage)

Also, because AM can't be interrupted (thanks to Improved Arcane Missiles), and the short casting time of AB, I'm outputting much more damage in PvP.

There are only two downsides to being an Arcane mage. First is the Mana drain (Arcane spells are expensive even with the right talents), and 2)The range of AM and AB is only 30 yards, 10 less then Fireball, Pyroblast, or Frostbolt. So I've had to stand closer to mobs, which gets a bit risky in raids and 5-mans. Nothing that can't be (and usually is) handled, but sometimes there is a problem with mobs being pulled out of my range so my dps suffers while I try to move closer.

All in all I say that Fire is good for PvE leveling and raiding (but is shit for PvP).

Arcane is great for Endgame Raiding and overall damage output (and is actually a good spec for PvP; I do amazing damage on other players in BGs). You just need the Int and spirit from the elite gear to help with mana regen to really make it work.

Frost owns at PvP because of its Rooting skills and Elemental Pet, and it is good at soloing because of its increased defense and the Pet (although its not optimal for raiding when you need high DPS output).

I have a 30 Fire mage. I also have a bro who plays a fearel druid. we team up to do red quests and stuff like that. while im casting pyro my bro can dps and when it hits i freeze him and he continues. the only thing i have to worry about on my mage is to not do to much damage. Also my fire blast dose the same ifnot more than my fire ball and recharges fast enough to kill.

my combo    pyro/fireblast/fireball

Just thought I would add this:

A smart mage will NEVER pull aggro from the tank, no matter what the spec.  I always Pyro first off in a fight, but I wait for the tank to build aggro first.

Thinking of going 48/0/13.........was frost till 70 and have to say in a bg they see that your a mage I couldnt even get a frostbolt off. The only mages that seememed to own were the ones that blasted arcane blast so i'd assume they specced mostly arcane. Btw this build gear dependant? hit/spell haste seems to be the call. No sense in me making frozen netherweave gear then :)