How to fix mages

Holy shit here's some mage QQ!

Here are my top five concerns about mages, and how to fix them.

1. Mana regeneration. Evocation can sometimes be folded into a pretty little swan that we hang in a string in our window to love (glyhped, in PvP or while solo/leveling). Sometimes, it's a white-hot lamp post shoved up our arses (PvE). Make it Innervate style. I know we shouldn't steal mechanics, but Blizzard are homogenizing the classes so much anyway so it's not gonna matter. Let it be instant and self-cast and have it break on any other cast being made, instead of channeled. And hey, remove the cooldown. Every tick we are casting Evocation instead of Fireball is a DPS loss anyway, so people would keep it to a minimum. They are lowering mana costs across the board and upping mana returns (in the Fire tree) but it does not solve the problem, only alleviate the symptoms ever so slightly. We need a tool to manage our mana, not stuff we pop on every cooldown like, to paraphrase a good friend, a tramp on chips. We especially do not want that only. ONLY. Tool to be able to flunk. Huntards may accidently stay too long in AotV and do shite DPS. Warlocks may lifetap and have it kill them. But they will always get the mana, even at the cost of DPS and/or life. The L2P issue is non-existant. A mage that runs out of mana (and we will) is useless and has fallen into a hole that means begging the druids for innervate, bugging the priests about whateverit'scalled and telling shammies to pop their free mana totem when the shamans themselves are at 95% mana. That, or we wait excrutiating seconds while wanding, at least keeping Scorch and Living bomb up at the target. Even 20 seconds spent in this manner is extremely frustrating even if we completely ignore the fact that we'll drop on the meters. It's simply boring to autoattack. FIX. MAGES'. MANA. TOOLS.

2. Threat managment. Make Mirror Images work like Lolcrawler thought they did. Take them off the global cooldown. Have Invisibility keep ticking no matter what (damage, movement etc.) - the three second fade timer I can live with since it is not our oshit button (MI working as intended should be), but a deliberate and planned complete threat dump. Also, make sure that I can still see stuff and keep the boss targeted, so I can insta-break it in raids with a new cast (just like hunters have been able to since, I dunno, forever?), and so that I can navigate solo/leveling/PvP content while under the effect (just like rogues have been able to do sine, I dunno, forever?). Fire has extra issues due to little threat reduction talents and extreme streakyness. Every instant Pyroblast we cast is going to have been preceded by two Fireball crits in a row for the proc by definition, and it will be cast right at the tail of a third fireball, that quite possibly could crit, and the Pyroblast could also very well crit, for a total of metric fucktonne damage in half a second. This will be further adressed below.

3. RNG dependent DPS. This is especially true with the T8 four-piece set. Rogues get Rupture crits. We get another lottery. I like this, but the T8 bonus needs to be a refresh of the proc, not just a non-consumption. The whole Hot streak mechanic fucks with the Haste = More DPS, Crit = More DPM paradigm because we will want to cast those instant Pyros, consuming a buttload of mana (also, Burnout). Right now haste and crit give about the same DPS value for Fire mages, with haste slightly on top, and you can chose to "spec" for garantueed DPS (haste) or potentially higher, potentially lower DPS (crit), or a balance that fits you. How to fix this? I love proc playstyles, but Hot streaks needs to be a lot more consistent (not necessarily more often, mind you). Change it to three crits, consecutive or non-consecutive. This will slightly alleviate the threat spikes too. This means that a series of crit, non-crit, crit, non-crit, crit, non-crit, crit, non-crit, crit, non-crit would yield one Hot streak instead of zero as today, and a series of crit, crit, crit, crit, crit, non-crit, non-crit, non-crit, non-crit, non-crit would yield one Hot streak instead of two as today. Less RNG, and still rewarding to have a high crit percentage. You'd not get them back to back to the same extent anymore, but up the proc chance on 4T8 and that would be solved, at least a little. Alternatively, one could work in a Maelstrom like mechanic, where it lowers the cast time instead, and have a 20% chance to add one charge per Fire spell hit, and 75% chance to add 1 charge on each crit. It's a lot more predictable and won't make the DPS vary so wildly. I can feel in my spine when I'm getting few procs, and when I glance at the DPS meter, I get that confirmed. I don't want to have to do that. You'd still have the fights with many procs and the fights with few ones, but the span would be smaller.

4. AoE DPS and sustainability. This is a big one, and they're experimenting with allowing multiple LB casts. I love this, but it needs a small tweak - it needs to explode when the mob dies. 12 seconds is far too long for any trash to live, and it would add some fun micro managment to trash pulls - imagine having the sparks that the twin mobs in Auriayas patrol path use popped so that a mage's LB would detonate when it's right next to the recipient, for some extra damage. Fun for the whole raid, since you want to pop it late, but not too late... This would give us a fun extra tool.

Flamestrike needs to be frontloaded enough that it's worth casting on trash, without skipping the DoT entirely, it can be of use when we AoE trash close to bosses due to Ignite. And Jesus, give it a larger reticle. Five yards is pathetic. Keep the cast time, but make it worthwhile - it's a FLAME STRIKE damnit, not "Ow, the ground is hot".

Now, Blizzard on the other hand, should recieve a fade mechanic. Keep the reticle size, but have it stop using mana when you stop casting it, and keep doing nerfed damage for a while. This way you could keep a big one up via channeling, or spam a lot of small ones at a lower mana cost to cover larger areas. The overall DPS should be balanced so that each reticle needs four or five targets for it to be worthwhile to do the "instant" Blizzard (where you'd just start casting it and let the "fade" mechanic do the rest, practically turning it into an ice version of old Flame strike), and two targets for a full channel to pay off, and maybe three or four for a balanced, half one. Needs smart usage, and can yield nice results. Different new tools for different situations, built into the same old spells.

Overall, mana costs need to be reduced, but not too much - remember we fixed Evocation :). Fix the bloat in the Fire tree so that Fire mages can pick up Dragon's breath and Blastwave. Fix the bloat in the Arcane tree and give Arcane a targeted AoE too. I'd like the concept of a magic reducing zone, but DK's have that one covered, and the slowing of attack time is covered by hurricane, and lowering cast times feels a bit unimaginative. A targeted vulnerability-style AoE debuff that applies a DoT to the stuff it hits? This would further the notion of Arcane as the utility tree - stick up... "ARCANE NEEDLE STORM" and then go to town with your normal AoE rotation on weakened mobs. Have Arcane have talents that make it good enough to be their best AoE choice so that each spec actually uses the spells from it's main tree.

I want to AoE, and I want to contribute, but I am very reluctant because what tools I have are very blunt for the job - they cost too much and have a very low risk/reward ratio.

5. Quality of life issues. Amp/Damp magic needs to be castable on a raid in one go. Slow fall needs to be castable on a raid in one go (with same mana cost per target in range - quite possibly make the range akin to Arcane Explosion's but apply Slow fall to all within, and keep the targeted version at the current 30-something yards depending on talents). Improved Scorch needs to be a one point talent that makes your Scorches apply "MAGIC VULNERABILITY", a shared debuff that locks speced into ISB and mages speced into Arcane and Frost can apply and refresh that is -shared- and always at 5%. The 3% extra ego crit that was stuck on there can be smacked onto some other talent to not nerf Fireball crit rates or removed if that's the price to pay for better debuff application. Mages should be allowed to keep mage food during logouts, other classes not. None of this will break the game, but will make us feel more awesome. And that's really what it's all about. Multitarget Slow falls, if ONLY EVER GOOD ON ONE FIGHT (to alleviate fall damage during Malygos vortices), would make me feel so damn cool. A raid leader going "GATHER UP FOR SLOW FALL" would make me all tingly inside, instead of having to waste precious global cooldowns that could have been spent fireballin'. I can probably think up a couple more if I get the chance, but the problem is that we have so many small problems it's turned into a really big one.

My last point is the PvP/PvE discrepancy. We want four viable PvE specs instead of one if I'm being harsh, three if I'm being kind, and two if I'm being reasonable, and four viable PvP specs instead of two. Fixing Fire PvP and Frost PvE requires entire posts though, so I won't cover that here but instead mention it as a quality of life issue. I want to be able to PvP as Fire, and I sure as hell would want to be able to PvE as Frost. FOR FUN. Not because some arbitrary mechanics require me to be pigeonholed. Hell, kill that stupid Frostfire spec anyway, if that's what it takes to fix Fire PvP and Frost PvE. It's not a interesting hybrid elemental build, it's just a Fire mage with more mana and a differently colored ball of hurt. Three PvE specs and three PvP ones is plenty.

In conclusion, I don't really mind that raid leaders don't need to bring more than one mage. I wan't the old DPS vs. Utility classes back. But, if Blizzard is hell bent on keeping hybrids' DPS on par with pures' DPS, then I -do- want utility above and beyond 5% extra spell crit on stuff I Scorch. The choice shouldn't be "Hmm, do I get 3.5k DPS and 5% extra spell crit, or 3.5k DPS and 13% extra spell damage, or do I stack for melee buffs instead" but rather "Hmm, do I take a 3k DPS that brings 13% spell damage and 5% spell crit, or do I bring a 5k DPS". Numbers are made up, and should be read as balanced, assuming 5% crit is worth the same as 13% spell damage etc, but I hope it serves to illustrate my point a bit.