Patch 3.0.9 - Arcane Changes Again
The notes for Patch 3.0.9 has been released on MMO-Champion.com, and this patch WILL go live this week!
The Arcane Tree has seen quite a few bit of changing in the last couple patches, and for this patch, we will only see changes to the Arcane Tree and Arcane Glyphs. No love (or hate) for the other trees yet. Here is a list of changes:
Mage
- Arcane Power now increases damage and mana cost by 10%, cooldown reduced to 1 minute.
- Arcane Power and Presence of Mind now share a category cooldown. Arcane Power causes a 15 second cooldown. Presence of Mind, once consumed, causes a 1.5 second cooldown.
- Arcane Flows now reduces the cooldown of Presence of Mind, Arcane Power and Invisibility by 15/30%.
- Presence of Mind: The cooldown has been reduced to 2 minutes, (down from 3.)
- Slow: now increases cast time by 30%, down from 60%.
Glyphs
- Glyph of Arcane Missiles: Increases the critical strike damage bonus of Arcane Missiles by 25%. (Old - Increases the range of Arcane Missiles by 5 yards.)
- Glyph of Mana Gem: Increases the mana recieved from using a mana gem by 40%. (Up from 10%)
- Glyph of Arcane Blast: Increases the damage from your Arcane Blast buff by 3%. (Down from 5%)
Undocumented Changes (updated 2/11/09)
- Arcane Barrage: Spell Coefficient reduced [src]
The End of AP + PoM Pyro?
With Arcane Power and Presence of Mind now sharing a category cooldown, you won’t see Arcane Mages in PvP throwing out an instant cast Pyroblast anymore. Or will they? With the new changes, when you activate Arcane Power, it will put a 15 second cooldown on Presence of Mind. The duration of Arcane Power is, 15 seconds.
However if you use the [Glyph of Arcane Power], it will increase the duration by 3 seconds, making Arcane Power last 18 seconds, giving you 3 seconds to bust out a PoM + Pyro. That is assuming that cooldown on PoM doesn’t change to 18 seconds also with the glyph, but we’ll see.
New Arcane Flows Cooldowns
- Arcane Power: 42 seconds
- Presence of Mind: 1 minute 24 seconds
- Invisibility: 2 minutes 6 seconds
Nerfs
- Slow is less effective against other casters, increasing their cast time by 30% instead of 60%.
- [Glyph of Arcane Blast] now increases buff by 3% instead of 5%.
- Evocation is no longer receives a 2 minute reduction on its cooldown by Arcane Flows.
- Less burst damage from Arcane Power
Buffs
- More sustained damage from Arcane Power
- Lower cooldowns on Arcane Power, Invisibility, and Presence of Mind
- [Glyph of Mana Gem] will be 40% instead of 10%.
- [Glyph of Arcane Missiles] has been buffed to increase critical strike damage of Arcane Missiles by 25% instead of increasing range.
This is Blizzard’s answer to nerfing Arcane Mage’s burst damage in PvP, without hurting PvE too much. I think they’ve done a nice job at it. In PvP, I often see Arcane Mages wtfpwn some poor fella within a few seconds. In PvE, I usually see Arcane Mages lighting up the DPS meters at the first half of the fight, then slowly trail off towards the end. We’ll see how these changes goes.
This also gives me a promising look at how Blizzard may be able to make changes to the other two trees in the future. To be able to make changes in PvE without drastically changing PvP and vice versa.
[Image at the top: Forsaken Mage by Xadhoom]
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February 10th, 2009 at 10:21 am
I am PVE arcane. The first thing that came to mind for me was Evocation has gone back to longer cooldown now. When previously, I could afford to do it without mana gem glyph and mage armor glyph, now, I probably need to put mana gem glyph back if I am to remain arcane.
I have noticed definately a huge increase in DPS after I respecced to arcane post 3.0.8, up from FFB build. With this change, will it still make that much of difference in raid? I may go back to FFB for this week’s raid and then decide what I’m going to do with my mage’s build.
Arcane still has some benefits in my opinion. For example, 3% extra hit from talent means that I can get more SP/Haste/Crit from gear. Focus Magic means I can buff others and myself at the same time. However, with arcane power change, it kinds make C/D management more complicated than what it has already been since 3.0.8, on top of watching my mana pool, my mana gem cooldown and my evocation cooldown while running around avoiding certain bosses’ abilities and decursing. I was still able to maintain around 3800-4000 dps. But now, althought mana gem glyph got a buff, gaining around 1.5k more mana per 2 min. It is still a lot less than one extra evo every 2 min.
My main concern is really about mana in PvE. Mana was tight in 3.0.8 but I was able to barely manage it with 2-min C/D evocation. With Evo back to 4-min, I will definately be forced to cast more ABx1 + *spell* than ABx3 +”spell”, which will bring down my overall dps output.
February 10th, 2009 at 11:53 am
Just ran a quick spreadsheet regarding the Arcane Power change. Although minor, the new arcane power change will result in lower dps than previously.
When counting acane power dps second by second, right from the get-go, 3.0.8 is ahead. It won’t be until the end of 3.0.9’s 3rd arcane power buff when the two matches, which is at 102 second. However, at 120, the next 3.0.8 arcane power starts again and jump ahead of 3.0.9. The next time 3.0.9 catches up and matches 3.0.8 is at the end of 6th 3.0.9 arcane power buff, at 228 second. Same thing happens again and the next time 3.0.9 can catch up is at 354 sec, and again at 480 sec.
What happens after 480, however, becomes really interesting because 3.0.9 never ever catches up 3.0.8 again anymore. 3.0.8 arcane power cooldown now lands directly on 3.0.9’s 3rd cooldown and jumps ahead before 3.0.9 can ever catch up.
To make long story short, wIthin 8 minutes, as long as your don’t miss any of the 12 arcane power that you have to hit without any delay in 3.0.9, you will get the same dps output at the end of 3rd, 6th, 9th, and 12th arcane power. If the fight ends before those 4 arcane power buffs, you will have less dps in 3.0.9. Since I don’t have a cpu implanted in my arcane power finger, I am pretty sure that my dps will be lower in 3.0.9 for that 1 second that I know I will miss to hit one of the 12 arcane power while managing other cooldowns and the fight itself.
Once the fight lasts for more than 8 minutes, you will definately output less dps in 3.0.9 than in 3.0.8.
At this point, I consider arcane power a nerf rather than a buff in 3.0.9.
February 10th, 2009 at 6:15 pm
Just found out that Evocation still has 2 min cooldown. It is good news then. That was what I concerned about the most.
February 11th, 2009 at 8:38 am
@ rbn
Yea it looks like the 2 min Evocation was left untouched, so that is some good news for Arcane Mages. Thanks for doing the run down on the comparison of the new Arcane Power changes.
Another nerf which was undocumented was that the Spell Coefficient for Arcane Barrage has been reduced. [src]
Maybe there will be a few changes now to an Arcane Mage’s spell rotation.