Focus Magic: Q&A

For this episode of Focus Magic, OMF took questions from the audience. He didn't get many, but the few he did were pretty good!!

Intro

Salutations and welcome, my fellow guildmates. Welcome to that fabulous place that lies somewhere between the dreams of the fallen warrior and a hot dog stand somewhere in upstate New York, Focus Magic. As per normal, I am your host with the most, spending time in Wintergrasp as a ghost, Dahkar. Or as most of you call me, OLD MAN FRANKS. Well actually, most of you call me OMF, but you get the point.

This time around, it's your questions, but not your answers. It's my answers. We'll run the gauntlet of anything and everything you might be curious about. So let's get it started, shall we?

Question from GFitz

First question comes from G Fitz. He asks the following....

"What armor spell do you use and when and why? Frost Armor, Molten Armor, or Mage Armor? I understand the differences, but any advice on how to use them the most effectively?"

Good question. It depends entirely on what you're doing and what your spec is. Frost Armor is excellent for solo leveling in the frost spec. It gives you some armor, but the real added benefit is the chill effect when someone strikes you in melee. If you've got frostbite, there's a chance that it will proc as well. It also sees use in PvP for that very same reason, but melee classes in PvP tend to hit a lot harder and a lot faster than mobs do, so I think there's a better choice. More on that in a second. Mage Armor gives you magic resistance and allows an additional 30% of your mana to continue regenerating while you cast spells. Basically, if you've got a LOT of MP5, this can help allow more of it to continue to work while you're casting spells, which ordinarilly does not work. I recommend this armor for a very specific purpose: PvE if you find yourself running out of mana. In groups it will help you stay in the fight longer, especially if you're Arcane, which tends to burn through mana fast. It won't help much, but it will help. Finally there's Molten Armor. Glorious Molten armor. This armor damages melee mobs when they attack you (though not for much) but the other effect it has is 3% crit chance, for ALL spells (not just fire). Heck yes. Add in the Glyph of Molten armor, and it's another 2%, so you get 5% total extra crit chance when this armor is up. More crits are something we all need, so once you get this, it should almost always be your default armor of choice, because it's the only one that directly benefits your damage.

Question from Imeagle

Next up, Imeagle asks the following

"My question is about attributes for a mage. I know mages need intellect but what else should I be looking for while deciding on gear and/or enchants while leveling? Thanks!"

Excellent question. Early on while you're leveling, look for Intellect first, and then Stamina. Those will help you survive and keep you in the fight. Spirit is also a decent choice, but don't make it a priority over Intellect or Stamina In instances is where you'll start seeing gear with stats like Spellpower and crit strike rating. You'll want to start picking these up as you get them. Prioritize these stats higher, they will contribute more to your ability to kill things faster than Stam and Int alone. When you get to Outland, spellpower/crit gear will become more widely available, so you'll be able to start building up those to big numbers You don't need to focus on spell hit so much when leveling, because it's not necessary and you won't see it much anyway. but if you see some gear that's got it, pick it up too. It'll lessen the chances you see the dreaded "resist" on a mob, and it usually has other stats we mages need anyway.

Question from Dills

Here's a question from Dills. He loves me, by the way.

"When if ever should I use the mana shield?"

You shouldn't. You really really shouldn't. If you have this spell up in combat, every smack of a mob will drain away your most precious resource that you need to kill things: your mana. And it's not even a 1 for 1 trade. You lose greater than 1 point of mana per point of damage. This really is one of the more worthless spells in the game. Please don't ever use it. You just make yourself die faster.

Question from Pyrodeath

Next up, Pyrodeath. Love the name.

"Hey OMF, Pyrodeath here... I've talked to you before about my mage and would like to pick your brain once again...I am trying to figure out my Hit rating... I have both Arcane Focus and Precision... so is this correct...? 6% or 289 hit rating? I am currently at 352... Is this overkill? Should I start switching up gems and gear for spell power and get my hit rating down closer to 289? "

Yeah, Pyrodeath, it really is. 289 hit rating is equivalent to around 11% chance to hit. With your 6% hit from talents, that'll put you at 17%, which is the cap needed to always hit everything, including raid bosses. Pull out some of those hit gems and replace them with red gems which offer spellpower increases, or orange ones which offer Haste and Spellpower increases. Haste does more for Arcane than crit does, but red spellpower gems are probably your best bet unless you need to meet the meta gem requirement in your helm.

Question from Omali

Here's a question from omali...

"In instances how can other people make your life easier?"

Omali, a lot of it depends on who you're running with. The usual stuff of "Tank must keep aggro, healer must keep everyone alive, everyone must buff everybody, don't break crowd control" doesn't need to be restated. Anything more specific than that depends on what classes are filling which roles in your group. For example, you can ask shamans for Wrath of Air, Flametongue, and Mana Spring totems, those will benefit you by increasing your spell haste, spellpower, and mana regen. But if there's, say, a rogue and a retadin sharing DPS duties with you, it might benefit the group more to get Strength of Earth and Windfury totems instead. So the best you can do is make other's lives easier to the best of your ability. Buff everyone, pass out food and water, keep your designated mob sheeped, and DPS targets down in the right order. Don't be afraid to take marking duties over either. You know better than anyone the limitations of Polymorph!

Outtro

That's it for this week folks. In our next episode, we'll go over what patch 3.1 is going to do to us and do for us. Until next time, this is Dahkar, aka Old Man Franks, reminding you: Help control the gnome population, roll a troll today!