It seems there’s another beta build on the test servers and there’s a fairly massive change been slipped in. WoW Insider just reported that downranked spells now cost much more mana than maximum rank, sometimes more than 100 mana more than the highest rank. How is this going to affect you? Over to our panel of experts. Calli, you first.
*yawn* Oh sorry, you wanted a comment? Well I guess that on fights like Morogrim Tidewalker in Serpentshrine Cavern, Mages are going to have use max rank Frost Nova to root the murlocs in place and keep them away from the healers, assuming your raid uses that strategy and doesn’t have a tankadin or a Water Elemental to do it from a safe distance. The increased damage is fairly trivial, so threat shouldn’t be an issue. Can’t see anything to get excited about, personally.
Ow! Put the stick away! Ok, ok.. pvp implications… Well the days of spamming Rank 1 Arcane Explosion to flush Rogues and Kitties out of hiding are well and truly over. Yes, the Rogues are rolling their faces all over their keyboards in utter glee at this one. Rank 1 Frostbolt will probably still be used to get that initial snare off quickly but it’s probably going to be a lot more situational now, and the days of spamming Rank 1 Frostbolt to get that Winter’s Chill debuff up are probably long gone too. Rank 1 Frost Nova in pvp is also dead and buried. Speaking personally, I’m a raiding Fire Mage who’s already paid the pvp penance to get the trinket, so I have no need to either use downranked anything or pvp at all anymore.
Now on the other hand if I was a Frost Mage who did Arenas or Battlegrounds… ouch. Shinano, over to you.
