The Mage, infamously known as the ‘glass cannon’ as they can hit like a cannon but can’t take a hit to save their lives. It’s this ‘glass’ part that’s been why I’ve never leveled a Mage past 44. I’m just not a fan of running from graveyards, often.
Yes, I know, a skilled player can easily stay alive being a cloth wearer. I’ll humbly admit that I haven’t been a skilled player, mainly because I’ve rarely played a Mage. And that, my dear readers, is precisely why I’m taking a Mage along on this adventure. It’s time I figure this class out and I have 100 levels to do so.
First Impressions
I started a female Draenei Mage a few weeks back, and I went with a female toon since I had a hard time seeing the hugeness of the male Draenei character conjuring muffins. That size requires huge axes, not a magic wand. (Yes, I know the image on top of this post is definitely not a short Draenei. We’ll get to that in a minute.)
I have to say, Mages have definitely changed over the years. I still remember (at least I think I do) that Mages used to receive all of the Mage spells. For example, even if I rolled the Fire spec I’d still get Frost Bolt and Arcane Blast, but they wouldn’t be as powerful as if I rolled Frost or Arcane. Fast forward to today and each spec has their unique spells.
I started off with the Frost spec, but flipped back and forth with Fire for the past 25 levels. (Maybe I’ll dual spec Arcane at some point just to give it a try.) I rolled into the Arathi Highlands tossing around fire balls, as I had been the past 10 levels or so, and it was getting a bit tiring. 3.5 seconds is waaay too long for a Pyroblast cast! With a rotation of Pyroblast, Pyroblast, Inferno Blast, it was getting old fast.
But it wasn’t until I had to fight my way up an ogre filled tower that I decided I’ve had enough with Fire. In fact, after the fourth death, I almost gave up on The Mage! Taking on three ogres at once was too much, even after sheeping one of them. Their clubs decimated my cloth-covered body. It was embarrassing to say the least. I could barely make it up the first ramp inside the tower.
On the fourth rez, as I was about to hearth back to a city to hang up The Mage’s robes for good, I decided to re-roll Frost again just for giggles. And that my friends made all the difference. I steam rolled through that tower, and even went after a few more ogres outside just for the fun of it. Wow, was I having fun now. Crowd control for a clothie is key!
Another secret, as I’m sure anyone who has read any of the bajillion articles on the interwebs for how to level a Frost Mage will tell you, is that you need to freeze your targeted mob with your pets Freeze spell. That insta-pops your Ice Lance spell, which hits like a Mack truck! I’m now taking out mobs my level or one higher in 3 shots, easily, without heirlooms. Sad that it took me so many levels to figure this out.
Character Change-up
Leveling 5 to 6 Alliance toons is getting mind-numbing, running the same quests in the same zones over and over again. I even started an Orc Hunter (remember him from this post?) just so I didn’t have to run through the dwarf starting zones once again. Since then I realized I will in fact need at least one Horde character for some higher zones, but I’ll save that for another post.
Well, my Draenei Mage was sitting at 30 getting ready to go through the Hinterlands quests, once again. Hmm, I happened to have a level 45 Mage sitting idle on another server. I could easily skip three whole zones, zones I’ve already completed all of the quests for the Loremaster achievement. Easy peazy decision! Goodbye Draenei Mage, hello Gnome Mage.
The problem though is my Gnome Mage is sitting over on a PvP server with a few level 100 characters, and this is bad for two reasons. Having 100’s around, with their huge bank rolls, is way too tempting for me to borrow a few gold for some gear, or for some mats. One of the original reasons for The Adventure was to bring a couple of toons to 100′ from scratch, without heirlooms or bank rolls, leveling my professions as I went to supply myself with the gear and mats I needed. Sounds odd, but I’d feel guilty leveling the toon on that server! (Yeah, something is definitely wrong with me!)
The second reason the PvP server is bad is because it’s a damn PvP server. Since vanilla I’ve always leveled my toons on PvP servers as it always added an edge to leveling. But I’m trying this with a clothie, without heirlooms. Everyone on this PvP server wears heirlooms, EVERYONE. I ran into an heirloom fitted Horde Warlock in Burning Steppes yesterday, and he owned my arse. After the 3rd death, and the 3rd very long graveyard run, I flew in my 100 Hunter and camped is sorry arse for 30 minutes just to feel better about myself. It was then that I knew I couldn’t keep doing this for The Adventure. It would take too long. So I gave Blizzard $25 and moved The Mage over to the official ‘The Adventure’ realm with the other lowbie Alliance toons. And this is a PvE realm. At least I’ll now be able to enjoy leveling her!
Leave a Reply