Mage builds
From WoWWiki
 | Talent builds require patch version testing info! Unless the talent build below includes the patch version it was last tested with, the information may be out-of-date due to the many talent changes Blizzard makes over time.
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| Class races: | Dk | Dr | Hu | Ma | Pa | Pr | Ro | Sh | Wl | Wr |
| Quests: | Dk | Dr | Hu | Ma | Pa | Pr | Ro | Sh | Wl | Wr |
| Abilities: | Dk | Dr | Hu | Ma | Pa | Pr | Ro | Sh | Wl | Wr |
| Trainers: | Dk | Dr | Hu | Ma | Pa | Pr | Ro | Sh | Wl | Wr |
| Talents: | Dk | Dr | Hu | Ma | Pa | Pr | Ro | Sh | Wl | Wr |
| Talent builds: | Dk | Dr | Hu | Ma | Pa | Pr | Ro | Sh | Wl | Wr |
| Tactics: | Dk | Dr | Hu | Ma | Pa | Pr | Ro | Sh | Wl | Wr |
| Armor sets: | Dk | Dr | Hu | Ma | Pa | Pr | Ro | Sh | Wl | Wr |
| Starting a: | Dk | Dr | Hu | Ma | Pa | Pr | Ro | Sh | Wl | Wr |
| PvE guide: | Dk | Dr | Hu | Ma | Pa | Pr | Ro | Sh | Wl | Wr |
| PvP guide: | Dk | Dr | Hu | Ma | Pa | Pr | Ro | Sh | Wl | Wr |
| Useful macros: | Dk | Dr | Hu | Ma | Pa | Pr | Ro | Sh | Wl | Wr |
This article is meant to list theorycrafted raiding builds, cookie-cutter PvP specs and other Mage standards/ideas for reference and new player guidance.
For help creating your own build and personalising the ones found here, take a look at our Mage talent analysis.
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PvE
Solo leveling/farming
Leveling as a Frost Mage
Frost is far and wide considered the best Mage leveling tree due to three factors: its mana-efficiency, high survivability and control, and high burst damage.
A basic level 30 leveling build is as follows: Leveling Frost Your very first talent should always be Improved Frostbolt if Frost.
Check the Mage talent analysis to improve upon it when leveling further. Remember to always pick up 1-point talents such as Ice Barrier and Cold Snap when available.
Certain points of interest:
- The Frost Mage's main spell is Frostbolt. It is your opener, your nuke, your chill. Learn to love it. Improved Frostbolt is a must-have to increase mobility when soloing.
- Shatter is a necessary talent for optimal Frost leveling. Used with Frost Nova, you have a very high chance to critically strike your opponents. Fire Blasting mobs who are Frozen is a quick and mobile way to deal burst damage or finish them off.
- Ice Shards increases damage done by Frost spell critical strikes, which is a good boost to Shatter's power. If you want higher raw damage while retaining Frost's control, you can always pick up Piercing Ice.
- Frost Nova is your friend. Frost doesn't do as much damage and Fire and relies on keeping mobs away with chills and such tools, so talents like Arctic Reach and Ice Floes that increase their effectiveness are valuable.
- Elemental Precision is not required, but it helps when soloing mobs of a higher level then yourself. It also reduces downtime slightly.
- Frost Channeling improves mana-efficiency a great deal, making drinking between pulls less necessary.
Leveling as a Fire Mage
The Fire tree lacks the control and survivability of Frost, but has in exchange higher single-target damage and the ability to kill mobs faster one by one. It sacrifices mana-utility for higher power.
A basic Fire leveling build at 30 would be the following: Fire leveling
For further improvement when leveling, see the Mage talent analysis. Your very first talent should always be Improved Fireball if Fire.
Fire relies on critical strikes to maximize its damage, so taking talents such as Critical Mass and Pyromaniac is useful. Burnout and Ignite increase your crit damage by a lot, so it is imperative that you fill them out when possible. Always pick up 1-point talents (Combustion, Dragon's Breath) as soon as they become avaliable.
5-mans and Soloing/Farming
- 0/0/68 +2 Frost 5-mans/Solo build
- High damage on trash due to not having to Scorch, high mana-efficiency allowing for chain-pulling on instances/farming, and high survivability through tools such as Deep Freeze and Ice Barrier. AoE is very good thanks to Improved Blizzard triggering Fingers of Frost, which in turn triggers Shatter. Instance boss encounters are short, favoring the high burst Frost can deliver through cooldown stacking of Water Elemental, Icy Veins and damage trinkets.
Raiding
- The builds listed here come from theorycrafting and are listed in this page.
Raiding mages generally want high single target DPS and/or lots of AOE power. Depending on your gear, length of the fight, movement, trash clearing, and interruptions, there's no real "perfect" raiding build. These are the standard builds for each school and how casting works to maximize DPS. Core talents are contained in the builds, extra talent points are available in some cases.
Frost
- (11/10/50) Chilled to the Bone + Ignite + Focus Magic
- This build consists of spamming Frostbolt at all times and using Frostfire Bolt on the second charge of Fingers of Frost, while using the Water Elemental on every cooldown and stacking Icy Veins with damage trinkets. Ignite is taken to boost the Frostfire critical strikes. Focus Magic must be used before the fight on a caster DPSer with high critical strike rate.
- (0/10/53 +8) Deep Frost + Ignite
- This build does slightly less DPS than the one above, and requires that Fireball be cast on every Brain Freeze proc in addition the above playstyle, but the points that remain allow for valuable utility/survivability such as Improved Blizzard and Ice Barrier.
Fire
- (18/51/0 +2) Fireball build
- Theorycraft has shown this to be the top Fire raiding build due to Spell Impact and Focus Magic. Its rotation is highly interactive, consisting of spamming Fireball at all possible times, using Scorch every 30 seconds to maintain the Improved Scorch debuff and casting Pyroblast when Hot Streak happens. Mage Armor should be used, and if the player finds themselves with manageable mana Living Bomb should be kept up on the target. Two points can be put in either Burning Soul or Flame Throwing, or into Dragon's Breath and Blast Wave. If the player has need of any other talents, World in Flames is a good place to remove points from, as its DPS impact is minimal.
- (0/51/18 +2) Frostfire build
- This build is based on Frostfire Bolt, and is classified as Fire rather than elemental for its steep expenditure into the Fire tree, too unbalanced to call Elemental. The rotation in this tree is exactly like the one in the above Fireball build, except replacing Fireball with Frostfire Bolt and using Living Bomb at all times. Frostfire Bolt is highly mana-efficient and has been shown to compete excellently with the Fireball build above in terms of DPS. Although Frostfire Bolt normally hits for less than Fireball, it crits hit much harder due to the number of modifiers and talents which activate on a critical hit: Burnout, Ice Shards and Ignite.
Arcane
- (53/18/0) Arcane Barrage + Ignite + Imp. Scorch
- For optimal single-target DPS performance, alternate Arcane Barrage and Fireball. Scorch five times at the beginning of the fight and once every 5 seconds to keep up the Improved Scorch debuff. If the debuff is already present via a Fire Mage or Frost Mage (Winter's Chill), drop Improved Scorch for Master of Elements. Use Pyroblast on every Presence of Mind cooldown.
PvP
- Note that PvP playstyle is a very personal matter, and these builds exist merely to exemplify and direct new or learning players at solid standard starters.
 | This article or section contains information that is out-of-date. * Please replace the old information with up to date information.
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Battlegrounds
Fire
Fire specialized pvp mages bring fast and powerful burst AoE into play by using Dragons breath, flamestrike, blastwave and another flamestrike all instant cast, raining down damage in just seconds. For single target combat casting living bomb then spamming scorch and occasional instant cast pyroblasts with the full power of the tree for excellent single target damage. Remember, Dragons breath and blastwave also offer the fire mage 2 AE stuns to stop casters from finishing their spells. I highly suggest if you use this spec to have stamina heavy gear, letting the tree do the damage for you.
Arena
Frost
Frost builds have respectable longevity due to their higher control, survivability and mana-efficiency. They also can infict high amounts of damage in short periods of time with their abilities and talents that revolve against Freeze mechanics.
This build is an Arena build, variants of which are employed by Affix of Tichondrius and Faxmonkey of Blackrock, two highly regarded PvP Frost mage players, among others. It relies on the control provided by Deep Freeze and Shattered Barrier, and the burst provided by Fingers of Frost and Brain Freeze. Snares are boosted by Permafrost and Chilled to the Bone.
This build relies on great control and very high burst DPS. Thanks to the Shattered Barrier and Improved Water Elemental abilities you can now pretty much spam Frost Nova and crit your targets with Ice Lance, Frost Bolt and Water Elemental. Icy Veins and Fingers of Frost help you increase your burst DPS. With a few major and minor glyphs you can further improve your efficiency. The points spent in the arcane tree provide you with moderate resistance against all schools of magic, and with the Imp CS ability which is invalubale agaisnt any caster and even the charge of the waror(charge has a shorter range then CS).
Arcane
Arcane builds, with the introduction of Arcane Barrage, gained even greater burst potential than Frost, though they provide less control and survival abilities, if respectable ones (Prismatic Cloak and Slow, for instance).
Fire
See also
- Mage theorycraft, for those interested in the numbers behind the builds.
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