MAGE POCKET GUIDE FOR NOOBS

A Guide to Creating and Developing a Mage

Greetings fellow Azerothians! This guide is dedicated for players who are planning to roll a mage. This doesn't mean that I discourage the existing mages to read this guide since I think there is always stuff out there to learn and no one can claim himself to be complete. I will try my best to improve and update this guide after every WoW patch. I have to thank all the mages who helped me writing this guide, mentioning many of your great posts in Mage Forum as well since at least half of this guide is based on your posts. Please feel free to post your comments, corrections to flaws or if there is anything unclear in this guide. Finally I hope you find this guide useful and wish you to have the greatest moments with your mage.

Before I start, you need to realize this is not a 1-70 leveling guide, it's just a guide that will help you in developing a mage, if you need a leveling guide, the best ones are: Joana's 1-70 Horde leveling Guide for horde, and Brian's 1-70 Alliance leveling guide for alliance.

Zahak 60 Mage (EU-Shadowsong)

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Index:

I:   Introduction

II:  Getting Started: Choosing Your Race

III: Mage Talents and Builds

IV:  PvP

V: PvE

VI: Tips

VII: Professions

VIII: Macros, AddOns, Mouse, Keyboard and Key Bindings

IX: Glossary

X: Useful Links

XI: Other sources and links

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Introduction:

What is a mage? The Mage class is primarily a magic damage dealing support class with three separate schools of magic available: Arcane, Fire, and Frost. The three different forms of magic schools available to the Mage make it a very flexible class to deal damage to almost any type of creature in the game. The Mage also has the strongest multiple target area of effect (AoE) damaging spells in the game. Other support functions that a Mage can provide include single target control (Polymorph), and short-term crowd control (Frost Nova, chill effects). The Mage class is also the only class that has the ability to conjure food and drink (to compensate the long downtime of mages) and also teleport; this saves a great deal of cash and time for the mage and his/her group. Mages are always in high demand for groups, raids, and instance dungeon crawls.

Getting Started:

Choosing your race: To me, choosing your race is just how you like your mage to be. Although Racials and Starting Attributes are important, but you shouldn’t roll a race you don’t like because racials don’t make a huge difference generally. The races available to mages are:

Alliance:

Humans: 22 Stamina, 20 Intellect, 21 Spirit

               Perception (active): Activate to increase stealth detection radius by 10 yards - lasts 20 sec - 3 min cooldown - Useful to see rogues, Druids etc.

                 The Human Spirit (passive): Increase Spirit by 5%

                 Diplomacy (passive): 10% bonus to faction point gain - Faster reputation :)

(The other two Human racials don’t have much use for a mage, so I leave mentioning them here)

Gnomes: 21 Stamina, 24 Intellect, 20 Spirit

                Escape Artist (active): Activate to break out of a Root or Snare effect - 1.5 sec cast - 1 min cooldown - More escaping abilities are always nice for a mage, short cooldown as well.

               Expansive Mind (passive): Increase Intelligence by 5%

               Arcane Resistance (passive): All Gnomes get +10 Arcane Resistance

               Technologist (passive): 15 skill bonus to Engineering

Horde:

Trolls: 23 Stamina, 16 Intellect, 21 Spirit

           Berserking (active): Activate when "Wounded" to increase melee and spellcasting speed by 25% - lasts 20 sec - 2 min cooldown

          Regeneration (passive): 10% health regen bonus, 10% active in combat

          Beast Slaying (passive): 5% damage bonus to Beasts

(The is another Troll racial which don’t have much use for a mage, so I left mentioning it here)

Undead: 23 Stamina, 18 Intellect, 25 Spirit

              Will of the Forsaken (a.k.a. WotF) (active): Activate to become immune to fear, sleep, and charm effects - lasts 20 sec - 3 min cooldown - One of the best racials in the game (if not the most useful). Effective mostly in PvP against Warlocks and Priests.

              Cannibalize (active): Increase health regeneration by 200% while consuming a corpse - lasts 15 sec - 3 min cooldown - While mages can summon their own food, Cannibalization can be useful to regenerate health while you are in combat. Also cannibalizing your foes’ corpse after killing them while they are still watching you is really cool :P

             Underwater Breathing (passive): Underwater breath increased by 4x - It may have not much use for a ‘lock, but sure it is a good racial mage-wise.

             Shadow Resistance (passive): All Undead get +10 Shadow Resistance - Nice racial against Warlocks and Priests in PvP.

Fore more info, please refer to: http://www.wow-europe.com/en/info/races/

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Mage Talents:

Basically, you will gain one talent point each time you level up, starting at level 10. So overall, you will have a maximum of 51 talent points (at level 60). Note that you can't redeem your talent points once you spend them unless you'll have to visit a Mage Trainer and pay gold to him/her to unlearn your talents which can be expensive. The first talent reset will cost 1 gold, the second 5 gold, the third 10 gold. Each subsequent talent reset will cost 5 gold more than the previous until the cap of 50g is reached. Most of the mages try a build for levelling up, and once they hit 60, they unlearn their talents and build their talents the way which is the most suitable for their high-end playing style, whether they want to PvP, PvE, or a combination of both.

Mages, like other classes, have 3 talent trees. However each of their talent trees refers to a source of magic: Arcane, Fire and Frost. Arcane is mostly known by mages as a utility tree, Fire is the primary source for dealing damage and Frost is a survivability-based secondary DPS tree.

Note: Information below is based on the topic in the US forums written by Alcaras: http://forums.worldofwarcraft.com/thread.aspx?fn=wow-mage&t=23&p=1&tmp=1#post23  I have changed many parts, deleted some and added other stuff to it to make it more valuable and also up-to-date. This section will be updated after patch 1.11 goes live.

Arcane:

Arcane Subtlety
Reduces the threat generated by your offensive arcane spells by 40%. (3 Talent Points)
Since this talent only applies to arcane spells, it's of limited utility. Most of the time you won't be casting exclusively arcane spells, however, there are a few notable exceptions to this. Higher level instances (e.g. Molten Core) typically have mobs immune to Fire which means that if you're not Frost, then Arcane Missiles is the spell to use. Reducing your threat by 40% will let the warriors hold aggro easier. Another application for this talent is when you're AEing. The threat reduction comes through and makes keeping elites off of you easier. All that said, this is very much a PvE only talent (threat doesn't matter in PvP); however, it can allow you to unleash more DPS in PvE without getting aggro, making you that much more effective in a group.

Arcane Focus
Reduces the chance that the opponent can resist your arcane spells by 10% (5 Talent Points)
This can be useful in both PvP and PvE(?), but I can't say that I've noticed a tremendous difference on high level raid mobs with or without this talent. (Molten Core or Onxyia's level 63 raid elites resisted quite a bit whether or not I had the talent, and there wasn't a statistically significant difference from the data I collected). Also, the Warlock's Curse of Shadow (see http://www.thottbot.com/index.cgi?k=828  ), which also reduces Arcane resist, has far more noticeable effects on Arcane damage. Still, if you're going for 31+ Arcane build, this talent offers a viable place to drop spare points to unlock the deeper tiers. Also, preliminary testing indicates that Arcane Focus may make Polymorph's duration more consistent and longer in PvP.

Improved Arcane Missiles
Gives you a 100% chance to avoid interruption caused by damage while channeling Arcane Missiles. (5 Talent Points)
This allows you to do damage while getting beat on. Note that it only prevents to interruption from damage -- this talent does nothing against Silence, Shield Bash, Pummel, Kick, Earth Shock or any of the other spell-interrupting abilities. It's worth getting no matter what your mage will turn out to be as it has applications across the board. That said, you can safely delay getting this talent if you're interested in pursuing a different tree. Some people feel that it's a coin flip whether want to put 5 into this or 5 in Arcane Focus to get to the next tier, however, having an uninterruptible damage spell is very nice.

Wand Specialization
Increases your damage with Wands by 25%. (5 Talent Points)
Mages don't use wands enough to justify this talent's cost.

Arcane Concentration
Gives you a 10% chance of entering a Clearcasting state after any damage spell hits a target. The Clearcasting state reduces the mana cost of your next damage spell by 100%. (5 Talent Points)
Any time you cast a damage spell -which is most of the time for a mage, you have a chance to proc Clearcasting and get your next damage spell free. Note that the Clearcasting effect fades after about 15 seconds so this talent isn't quite a 10% mana cost reduction because you might proc on your killing spell with no new target in sight (or yourself low on mana). You can also cast low mana cost/high efficiency spells (such as Scorch or Frostbolt) until you get a clearcast and then use a high mana cost spell (such as Arcane Missiles, Flamestrike or Blizzard) thus boosting your net mana efficiency. Very useful talent.
Improved Dampen Magic
Increases the effect of your Dampen Magic spell by 50%. (2 Talent Points)
Dampen Magic itself is a spell with rather limited utility- I only use it when I'm fighting casters without a healer, in other words, when I'm soloing. The talent probably isn't worth investing the points unless for some reason you're fighting a lot of low damage caster mobs. Without the talent dampen magic at its highest rank reduces spell damage by 50 and reduces healing by 100. With the talent it goes to 75 and 150, respectively. Note that for periodic effects, such as Shadow Word: Pain or other DoTs, dampen magic only applies to the total damage not to each period, thus greatly lessening its utility against DoTs.

Improved Arcane Explosion
Reduces the casting time of your Arcane Explosion by 1.5 seconds.  (5 Talent Points)
Astute readers will note that Arcane Explosion's casting time itself only 1.5 seconds which means that 5 points in this talent makes Arcane Explosion in effect instant, allowing you to cast it while moving and making it uninterruptible. This talent is invaluable for AEing (whether solo or grouped) since it means you can always put out damage, even when mobs are beating on you. It might even be called a 'must have' talent, since almost all groups will assume you have it for higher level instances (the Lyceum in Blackrock Depths comes to mind). Improved Arcane Explosion is a wonderful talent that no mage should honestly be without, aside from perhaps some very deep Frost builds that rely on Improved Blizzard to AE, or Elemental builds.

Evocation
While channelling this spell, your mana regeneration is active and increased by 1500%. Lasts 8 seconds.  (1 Talent Point)
Essentially this is a mana-heal on a 10 minute timer. Since it acts on your mana regeneration, you'll want to keep up a decent amount of Spirit before using Evocation. At lower levels (before equipment makes mana pools grow substantially) it'll often be a full mana-heal. At level 60 it can range from 40% to 75%, depending on how much Spirit gear you're wearing. Because it's on a 10 minute timer, it's best to save this ability for when you really need it (e.g. you get an unexpected add right after killing a mob and you only have enough mana for a Polymorph, cast your Polymorph, Evocation, then take out the add, also when someone attacks you in PvP, you Polymorph him/her and begin Evocation). It's also very useful for prolonged boss fights or raid encounters where you won't be able to get out of combat to drink.

Improved Mana Shield
Decreases the mana lost per point of damage taken when Mana Shield is active by 20%. (2 Talent Points)
This makes mana shield more efficient. It might be worth the points, depending on how often you find yourself using Mana Shield. You might also want to pick up the Knight-Lieutenant’s/Blood Guard’s Silk Gloves (PvP reward: http://www.thottbot.com/?i=37762), which have a bonus of +285 absorb on Mana Shield.

Improved Counterspell
Gives your Counterspell a 100% chance to silence the target for 4 seconds. (2 Talent Points)
A very useful talent for PvP against casters, since four seconds can oftentimes be an eternity. Certain classes (priests come to mind) can be completely undone with a well timed Counterspell: Silence: an interrupted heal, no healing for 10 seconds and no casting at all for 4 seconds. You can also cast it before any spells are cast as a blanket silence; this is useful when you're frontloading on a target (presumably sheeped) and want to take away any opportunities they might have for counterplay. Paladin's immunity works through silence at this point in time, so keep that in mind if you find yourself fighting them. Silence complements an Arc/Fire or Fire/Arc build quite nicely. It's still nice to have in a Frost build, but isn't quite as necessary since Frost doesn't frontload as much. Not much use if you want to do PvE only, unless you really like to get some nice aggro!

Arcane Meditation
Allows 15% of your Mana regeneration to continue while casting. (5 Talent Points)
On my level 60 mage, this talent translates to about 10 mana a tick while casting, moderately useful, and it could be more useful if I invested more into Spirit gear. It's also worth considering this talent if you're going to be spamming Frostbolt in Molten Core, combined with Mage Armor, you'll be able to get 45% Mana Regeneration while casting which begins to be somewhat substantial. Recommended for high-end PvE mages.

Presence of Mind
When activated, your next Mage spell with a casting time less than 10 seconds becomes an instant cast spell. (1 Talent Point)
This gem of a talent is on a three minute timer, so be sure to use it often if you have it. I commonly use it with Polymorph (saving your life instantly, stop someone to get a guaranteed “first strike” in PvP), Frostbolt (instant slowing spell FTW!), Flamestrike (a.k.a. Blast Wave version 2.0) and mostly Pyroblast, depending on the situation. Beware not to AE when you have PoM-buffed yourself, since your PoM will be gone! (Don’t know if this is a bug or “working as intended”) Don’t miss this talent.

Arcane Mind
Increases your maximum Mana by 8%. (4 Talent Points)
If you're going for Arcane Power, it's worth putting points into getting more mana (there also aren't that many viable alternative places to put points). 8% of a 6000 mana pool is about 480 mana, not that much but also nothing to sneeze at. Some mages claim as long as they can provide themselves with +Intellect items, this won’t worth spending their talent points on.

Arcane Instability
Increases your spell damage and critical strike chance by 3%. (3 Talent Points)
Since there are only a handful of ways for mages to raise critical strike chance, this talent is a gem, since it raises the crit chance and the damage of all of your spells, no matter what school they are. Required for having Arcane Power -and ToEP/ZHC build ;)

Arcane Power
When activated, your spells deal 35% more damage while costing 35% more mana to cast. This effect lasts 15 seconds. (1 Talent Point)
If you've put at least 30 points in Arcane, be sure to get this talent. Note, however, it is dispellable. Still, it is a 35% increase to damage for 15 seconds, excellent for upping your burst damage especially in PvP. In PvE, since it can produce aggro because of its high bursts, it seems not very reliable if you/your group are not able to manage the aggro.

Fire:

Improved Fireball
Reduces the casting time of your Fireball by 0.5 seconds. (5 Talent Points)
This is a decent DPS upgrade to Fireball. It's more notable at lower levels. In PvP, battles tend to use instants and not casting spells but since it's a requirement for Pyroblast (and thus the AP PoM Pyro insta-combo for Arc/Fire mages), it's worth getting it. It's probably the best place to first put points for mages since it at levels 10-14 it has a greater utility than any of the other first tier talents.

Impact
Gives your fire spells a 10% chance to stun the target for 2 seconds. (5 Talent Points)
Useful in PvE, it truly shines in PvP where a stun will interrupt casting/stop the melee classes and also generally break players' rhythm. It procs off of all fire spells, making it a wise investment. A Flamestrike opener when AEing that stuns several of the mobs/players is very handy. Combusted Blastwave with this talent is absolutely devastating, especially if stacked with other mages. You'll sometimes get lucky with it and proc a stun at the perfect moment (e.g. right before an enemy finishes casting a heal).

Ignite
Your critical strikes from fire damage spells cause the target to burn for an additional 40% of your spell's damage over 4 seconds. (5 Talent Points)
It's 40% more damage to your critical strikes, but since a crit is already 50% more damage, in effect this means Ignites adds 110% damage. A nice way to increase your DPS if you're focused around crits (and since our mana stat, Intellect, is our crit stat as well). A good place to put points. Note that it applies its damage as a DoT and thus can be dispelled.

Improved Fire Blast
Reduces the cooldown of your Fire Blast spell by 1.5 seconds.  (5 Talent Points)
This talent has its uses, but I'm not a fan of cooldown reduction talents personally. It can take your cooldown from 8 seconds to 6.5 seconds, which is noticable (primarily in PvP) but the question then becomes what you have to get up to get those 5 points for this Talent, and I'd rather have Impact or Ignite. Also, it isn't as if you can't cast other things while waiting for Fire Blast's timer (e.g. Instant Arcane Explosion). Still, this talent is personal preference and may work for your particular playing style. The hint here is for the first talent you spend you get 0.5 second cooldown reduction, and 1 second for the rest 4 talents (0.25 second each). I guess the first talent point does really worth spending here, the rest, it’s all your choice.

Flame Throwing
Increases the range of your fire spells by 6 yards. (2 Talent Points)
This lets Fireballs and Pyroblasts have 41 yd range (Flamestrike 36 yards), the longest range in game aside from Marksmanship Hunters. Useful in PvP (especially stand off situations) and those 6 yards can be handy in PvE in terms of getting another spell off or just more reaction time when soloing. Also in instances, the extra reach on Fire Blast is handy for taking our runners.

Incinerate
Increases the critical strike chance of your Fire Blast and Scorch spells by 4%. (2 Talent Points)
Fire Blast is a core PvP spell and Scorch can be a core PvE spell (because of its fast casting time you'll proc more Clearcasts per fight) and thus increasing the chance to crit on both these spells is generally a good thing. Very useful if you are trying a Scorch build (a popular PvE build).

Pyroblast
Hurls an immense fiery boulder that causes 716 to 890 fire damage and an additional 268 damage over 12 seconds. (1 Talent Point)
Don't get Pyroblast unless you get Presence of Mind. With sheep lasting at most 15 seconds in PvP and very often much less, you often will not be able to sheep, back up, and get off a full 6 second Pyroblast cast before your target is unsheeped. It's moderately useful in PvE if you're purely focused on mana efficiency (as an opener especially when soloing), but it truly shines with PoM. Since the additional damage is a DoT, it can be dispelled. If you're a Fire Mage, a Combusted Pyroblast is a thing to be feared and is useful when fighting especially tough mobs, but in all honesty, rarely will you have opportunity to successfully land a 6 second casting time spell in PvP. A critical of an AP PoM Pyroblast (not to mention ZHC/ToEP on an CoE unbuffed mob) is one of the best burst damages in the game and can be cast while chasing a target (Blinking towards a fleeing enemy then unleashing a fiery ball of death is a fun thing to do, and one of the reasons I love my mage ;).

Improved Flamestrike
Increases the critical strike chance of your Flamestrike spell by 15%. (3 Talent Points)
Required for Blast Wave. Useful if you're doing a PoM/Blast Wave build, since you can PoM Flametrike, then follow with a Blast Wave and spam Arcane Explosions. Recommended to AoE mages.

Burning Soul
Gives your fire spells a 65% chance to not lose casting time when you take damage. (3 Talent Points)
A good mage doesn't need this talent, in my opinion, since he/she keeps distance with his/her opponent. If for some reason you're trying to cast while getting hit, Improved Arcane Missiles offers a 100% chance to cast without interruption. In PvP, spell interrupts like Silence/Pummel/Kick aren't prevented with either Burning Soul or Improved Arcane Missiles and thus Burning Soul becomes relegated to casting when a mob is hitting on you and you don't have Arcane Missiles. It can be useful for with Scorch, however if you can often time your Scorches to cast and land between a mob's hits on you and you can almost always Nova and step back or CoC and blink away. I suppose Burning Soul can be useful to a pure Fire mage fighting archer mobs (although I'd recommend 100% uninterruptablity(!) with Arcane Missiles). To summarize, it isn't a bad talent, but just one I find unnecessary for my particular playing style. If it fits your playing style, then by all means take it and enjoy it.

Improved Scorch
Your Scorch spells have a 100% chance to cause your target to be vulnerable to Fire damage. This vulnerability increases the Fire damage dealt to your target by 2% and lasts 15 seconds. Stacks up to 5 times. (5 Talent Points)
Probably only useful in PvE, as it is unlikely you will be able to cast 5 scorches on the same target in PvP. I think there are better places to spend your points in Fire for a PvP mage. For a PvE mage (and Scorch builds), it can be a useful talent. Very effective during long boss fights.

Improved Fire Ward
Causes your fire ward to reflect 35% of the damage absorbed back to the caster. (2 Talent Points)
At first glance this seems cool: I can reflect 35% of damage at an enemy mage! But if you look a little deeper... top Rank 5 Fire Ward costs 320 mana and absorbs 585 Fire Damage. This means that at most you'll reflect ~204 Fire Damage, often at the cost of 320 mana. Not the most efficient, there are better places to drop a point in the Fire Tree. Also you should consider that it is only useful against classes with use fire damage (mainly Conflagrate/Fire warlocks and Fire Mages).

Critical Mass
Increases the critical strike chance of your fire spells by 6%. (3 Talent Points)
More critical strikes (therefore more Ignites) on your fire spells. All around damage increase. Useful for a deep Fire Mage.

Blast Wave
A wave of flame radiates outward from the caster, damaging all enemies caught within the blast for 462 to 544 fire damage, and dazing them for 6 seconds. (1 Talent Point)

The daze is essentially a 50% snare. This spell might shine in Battlegrounds, but it's very situational and since it has a 45 second cooldown, you'll pretty much only get to use it once a fight. Still, another instant is always handy and the snare is useful for getting away from melee, even in 1v1 confrontations. Do note however, that if you get Blast Wave, you won't be able to get Arcane Power, therefore an Arcane/Fire Mage can out burst DPS a Fire/Arcane mage. That said, Blast Wave+Combustion is painful.

Fire Power
Increases the damage done by your fire spells by 10%. (5 Talent Points)
More damage, all the time. Required for Combustion.

Combustion
When activated, this spell gives your next fire damage spell a 100% critical strike chance.  (1 Talent Point)
Useful for PvE as an opener with Pyroblast or Flamestrike/Blast Wave and useful in PvP in conjunction with Blast Wave or (to a lesser extent) Fire Blast. Claimed not to be useful  by many because of its long cooldown and the fact that PoM is superior to Combustion.

Frost:

Improved Frostbolt
Reduces the casting time of your Frostbolt spell by 0.5 seconds. (5 Talent Points)
Much like Improved Fireball, a DPS upgrade, letting you get a 2.5 second frostbolt at its highest rank and also allowing for a 1 second Rank 1 Frostbolt which is handy for snaring runners in PvE and PvP.

Permafrost
Increases the duration of your chill effects by 3 seconds. (5 Talent Points)
Typically frost mages will be chain casting Frostbolt, which means they'll always reapply the snare, making Permafrost not really doing anything in that situation. If you take Improved Blizzard further down in Frost tree, Permafrost may not be worth it since the chill is reapplied each wave. However, since Blizzard is resistible, it might be worth it. The first talent point spent might worth it even if you don’t like this talent, since it increases duration of the chill effect by 1 second but the next 4 talent points each increase the chill duration by 0.5 second.


Ice Shards
Increases the critical strike damage bonus of your Frost spells by 100%. (5 Talent Points)
Works similarly to Warlock’s Ruin talent: e.g. An untalented Frostbolt that normally hits for 100 would crit for 150, but with this talent it would crit for 200. A core talent of a Frost build.

Winter's Chill
Increases the power of your chill effects by slowing the target's movement by an additional 10% (3 Talent Points).
An extra 10% snare; shines in combination with a Frostbiting Improved Blizzard to essentially immobilize enemy armies. For 1v1 PvE, not really worth the points since you want the mob to get close to you so you can drop Frost Nova, back up and have a chance to Shatter (especially before you get Frostbite). It's handy when solo AEing as frost. Useful against melees. If you aren't planning to get Improved Blizzard, there are better places for you to spend your talent points.

Improved Frost Nova
Reduces the cooldown of your Frost Nova spell by 4 seconds. (2 Talent Points)
Required for Shatter, useful in its own right since it lets you unleash the Nova+CoC combo more often. Again, useful against melee classes.

Piercing Ice
Increases the damage done by your frost spells by 6%. (3 Talent Points)
Depending on your particular build and playing style, may or may not be useful. Frost is much more about control than damage. Does offer a very slight efficiency bonus. Recommended for a MC/BWL Frost mage.

Cold Snap
When activated, this spell finishes the cooldown on all of your cold spells. (1 Talent Point)
Incredibly useful ability that lets you get off two Frost Novas, or two Cone of Colds right after each other. Also refreshes your Ice Block and Ice Barrier timers. Not to be passed up if you're a Frost Mage.

Improved Blizzard
Adds a chill effect to your Blizzard spell. This effect lowers the target's movement speed to 35% of normal. Lasts 1.5 seconds (4.5 seconds with full Permafrost). (3 Talent Points)
Blizzard is not intended to crit (according to a Blue Blizzard poster), however the chill is reapplied each wave (conceivably this means Frostbite will also have a chance to be reapplied each wave). In many cases, in instances, this movement slowing ability is what you need to make sure enemies take the full 8 second damage when you start pulling aggro away from the tanks.

Arctic Reach
Increases the range of your Frostbolt spell and the radius of your Frost Nova and Cone of Cold spells by 20%. (2 Talent Points)
More range on Frostbolt (to 36 yards) and a wider Cone of Cold and Frost Nova. Debatable, and not as much of a must have as Flame Throwing is for fire, simply because the Frost playstyle is different. Once you get Frostbite, for example, you won't mind mobs hitting you so much since they might freeze themselves by doing so, enabling you to step back and get a Shattered Frostbolt on them. For PvP, however, more range is always good. This talent is also very useful in Molten Core, since you can stand just outside the 30 yard AoE range and nuke at your pleasure.

Frost Channeling
Reduces the mana cost of your frost spells by 15%. (3 Talent Points)
An efficiency upgrade for Frost. You might want to drop these three points in Improved Cone of Cold instead since you can gain mana by +Intellect items on your gear, and also due to the fact that Frostbolts don’t consume your mana like Fireballs, but it is your choice. Many people like Frost Channeling because they often cast Blizzard in MC, and having the mana cost of Blizzard reduced is a very nice thing.

Shatter
Increases the critical strike chance of your frost spells against frozen targets by 50%. (5 Talent Points)
Another core Frost Mage talent. What this talent means is that if you have chance to crit of 5%, then against frozen targets (e.g. Frostbitten or Frost Nova'd targets) you will have a 55% chance to crit. A well-played Frost mage milks Shatter for all its worth. But remember, only on frozen targets, not chilled.

Improved Frost Ward
50% of the damage absorbed by your Frost Ward is added to your mana. (1 Talent Point)
First off, very few enemies will even use Frost magic on you. And secondly, Rank 4 Frost Ward absorbs 430 damage at the cost of 255 mana to cast it initially. That means you'll get back 215 mana, not even as much as you put into the spell. Also keep in mind that there aren't many classes that do frost damage. There are better places to drop a point in the Frost tree to be honest.

Ice Block
You become encased in a block of ice, protecting you from all physical attacks and spells for 10 seconds, but during that time you cannot attack, move, or cast spells. (1 Talent Point)
Required for Ice Barrier, this spell shines when AEing or in group PvP. It cannot be dispelled so essentially you can prolong your life for 10 seconds. If a pull goes bad while AEing or a healer is stunned, you can hit Ice Block and give the time to tanks to get the aggro off you. Probably the most valuable talent in Frost for group PvP, simply because you make yourself unkillable (granted, you can't do anything during those 10 seconds, but you stay alive and continue to pose a threat). Also, you can cancel Ice Block by hitting the button again. Be aware of this and don't spam the button because you might turn it on only to turn it right off afterwards.

Also removes DoTs, makes it very useful against Shadow priests and Warlocks (don't forget Warriors’ Hamstring). Furthermore, it can be used to make your PvP enemies stop hitting you and target someone else.

Improved Cone of Cold
Increases the damage dealt by your Cone of Cold spell by 35%. (3 Talent Points)
A useful upgrade to Cone of Cold. For PvP I'd choose this over Frost Channeling and for PvE I would as well, if I found myself AEing a lot. At 60, this lets your crit Cone of Colds hit for about 1000. A part of the nice “Frost Nova-Cone of Cold combo". Sometimes you can even, Nova, Frostbolt, and Cone of Cold quickly and get both to crit using the Shatter off Frost Nova.

Frostbite
Gives your chill effects a 15% chance to freeze the target for 5 seconds.(5 Talent Points)

A chance to proc a root off of any chill effect (including your Ice Shield!) which you can then Shatter off of. Another core talent of the Frost line. Incredibly fun to have this proc on a melee that attacks you, since they essentially freeze themselves (Frost Armor), allowing you to step back, cast on them, etc. Can be mildly annoying if you're solo PvE AE farming since it'll randomly proc on some mobs but on others, but this talent shines in PvP.

Ice Barrier
Instantly shields you, absorbing 818 damage. Lasts 1 minute. While the shield holds, spells will not be interrupted. (1 Talent Point)
It's on a funky two minute timer, can be overwritten by Power Word: Shield and ever worse, can be dispelled. However, when solo AoEing, it's very useful since it gives you an ability you otherwise wouldn't have available. It'll save your life many times in PvP, but seems it doesn’t scale enough to the damage increase at high-level PvP.

 

Well, now that you know all about talents, better use this Talent Calculator to try some builds yourself before you spend your talent points on your

http://www.wow-europe.com/en/info/basics/talents/mage/talents.html

You can save your templates and show them to other mages (probably in the Mage Forum) or your guildies. Always consider your playing style when specifying you talents rather than what people tell you to spend your talent points on since it is YOU that are eventually playing your mage, thus your build should suit YOU :)

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------PvP:

To start with the mage and its primary role in PvP, I describe mage as the canon of the group. The mage is the class that does more ranged damage than any other class and has powerful AoE and crowd control spells. However mages are a very fragile class. Using their abilities, they should take enemies one by one before they hurt the group. To do this, mage should better get ranged. Other than damage, mage has great Crowd Control (CC) spells and chilling/freezing abilities which become very handy in Battlegrounds (BG's). Suicide AoE runs are also very famous, doing a lot of damage to a crowd of enemies in a short time, but usually ending up with a dead mage. In addition, mages are given escape abilities unlike other MMORPG’s “glass cannons” and therefore, they are not a class to be easily killed. With Blink, Frost Nova and chill/freeze effects, a mage can leave his/her enemy with nothing and run away when he/she feels that he/she can’t overcome the enemy(probably except for hunters where you can’t easily run away from them).

Outdoor PvP:

If you have rolled your mage on a PvP realm, you should be aware that you’ll come across enemies from the other faction in the world when grinding/levelling etc. Gurubashi Arena is another place where you can fight against everyone (including the players from your own and your enemy factions), regardless to your realm type. This type of out-of-the-box-PvP is usually known as Outdoor PvP. You’d better prepare to encounter enemies at any level when you are not in a group.

Duelling (1vs.1 PvP): Duel a lot!

Duelling is a fun way to learn your abilities, spells, knowing other classes' abilities and getting stronger in 1vs.1 PvP. Duelling will make you quicker and more experienced in order to control your enemies better in real PvP situations. However, duelling is not all about fun. What I mean by duelling here means 1vs.1 outdoor PvP: you against an enemy. Mages are not the best 1vs1 PvP class, however, they are not necessarily a "loser". They can’t dish out loads of damage to their enemy in a short time and have escape abilities which make them be able to run away from their foes before they get killed.

Anyway, these are some tips I've gathered from my own experience and from other people's which may become handy fighting versus certain classes:

The first thing you should know is you don’t have to kill your enemy. Whenever you feel like losing, you can easily escape.

Druids:

Druids are of course one of your toughest targets as a mage. First of all, they attack you while they are stealth - like a rogue. So when a druid starts to attack you in stealth mode, the first thing you should do is to Blink away from them. Whenever you notice the presence of a druid, have your Mana Shield up. Frost Nova doesn't work for druids much, because as they shapeshift, the Frost Nova will be gone, sadly. However, Frost Nova-ing is not useless. It will make them shapeshift again and back, giving you the time to cast a Frostbolt, or a Fireball etc.

Mana Shield is a very useful shield against feral druids, but you should use it as rarely as possible, because it takes twice mana as it takes damage. So make sure you don't overuse it, but use it in the appropriate time e.g. when your HP is low but your mana pool is about full.

Druids can go into Bear form, making them as tough as warriors. However, their armor and Health Pool won't quite match the warriors, but still, you should be ready to take a lot of Health Points down.

The other thing is, druids are not useless when they are out of mana, unlike the other casters, thank to their ability to shapeshift: You can easily take down priests for example when they have no mana, but if you think an out-of-mana druid would be as easy kill as priests, you are wrong. However without mana, they can't heal themselves, but they can gain mana while shapeshifted especially if they have a lot of +Spirit.

Counter Spell has a very important role against casters, including druids. Try to Counter Spell them whenever their hands become green- which means they are healing themselves. Casting Arcane Missiles and Arcane Explosion will slow their healing significantly.

Cone of Cold and Frostbolt are very useful to take a feral, shapeshifted druid down, but as I said before, if they go to caster form, all the chill effects i.e. slowing down effects will be removed from them. PoM-Pyroblast can be used as a nice "finisher" here, while druids are very low in HP and are healing themselves, make sure you don’t waste your PoM at the start of the fight.

Oh yeah, droods are tuff!

Hunters:

Hunters are one of the most powerful classes against casters. They have recently got some nice abilities after their revamp, for example they got an extremely powerful ability called Bestial Wrath, with 2 minutes cooldown, which is known as a free Honor Kill against casters by clothies.

Running away from a hunter is not a very good idea and won’t necessarily save your life. As Marksmanship hunters have more range than mages, and have the ability to run faster than normal, plus they have a pet which can chase you forever, not mentioning that they have shots that can slow you down (Concussive Shot). Also, your range is not a pro to hunters because of the reason I just mentioned. So my idea is running away from a hunter ends to a dead mage.

Against hunters you should mainly use your AoE's and instants. Why? Because their pets and shots can slow your spellcasting a lot. Thanks to their "Dead Zone", casters will have the “pro” to them. The Dead Zone (DZ) is the region about 8 yards away from the hunter, where the hunter can't use his/her melee abilities, neither he/she can shoot. Fireblast is a good instant against a hunter, Cone of Cold is another useful one, not only does damage to the hunter and the pet, it slows them down, too. Polymorph is your first defence, maybe the first thing you should do on their pets, however it doesn't work on a "BW"ed pet. Improved Arcane Missiles are very useful when you counter a Beast Mastery hunter, where you can't simply sheep their pet. Therefore even though the pet hits you, you can cast an Improved Arcane Missiles on the hunter but you won't lose any casting time while hitting the hunter, plus, Arcane Missiles itself has a good range. Frost Nova is a powerful spell to stick the hunter in the Dead Zone, making you free to blow spells into their faces or it can be used to trap their pets. When using your Frost Nova, try to position yourself between the hunter and the pet and then freeze them. Improved Arcane Explosion is a good instant AoE which does a nice damage but uses too much mana. Use Arcane Explosion (or other instant cast spells) especially when you are running towards their Dead Zone. The hunter usually tries to go backwards in order to shoot you, and what you have to do is to move towards him and position yourself in his "moving DZ". Fortunately, since you are moving forwards and he is going backwards, your speed is faster than his/her and you can always get yourself in the Dead Zone. The problem arises when the hunter comes towards you to hit you with his axe, instead of trying to keep an efficient distant form you. In that case you should use your slowing spells, preferably Cone of Cold, because it is an instant spell. Then you keep on moving backwards, positioning yourself in their "moving DZ" and spamming instants on him.

Blink is a good way to reach the hunter after he/she goes too far away (e.g. after you finish channelling Arcane Missiles or after being a victim of a Concussive Shot). Mana Shield is a good defending shield against hunter’s physical damage but you will lose too much mana using it, so use it efficiently.

Be careful when using AoE, it unsheeps (the pet) if it hits the sheep.

Mages:

Fighting a mage mostly depends on how your gear/build/luck compare to each other. Open with a Counterspell, sheep as fast as you can, Counter Spell as many times as possible (basically whenever it’s available to you), and finally nuke’em up! Don’t forget to wear your Mage Armor as well as Frost/Fire Shield depending on which type of mage you are fighting to. It is not hard to find out, if the mage casts a Frostbolt against you, he/she sure is a frostie. However, since even Frost mages use Fireblast and Scorch, it won’t be a dumb idea to buff yourself with Fire Shield even without knowing what spec he/she is.

Use instants (like Arcane Explosion) and Arcane Missiles to interrupt his/her casting. If you mainly use your instants, better get close to them to avoid their Fireballs/Frostbolts by passing through them.

Paladins:

Unfortunately I haven't really fought a paladin in PvP since I am a part of the Alliance faction. What I found from duels is fighting versus paladins is very much like fighting warriors, less damage but with healing spells. Basically, you have to rely on the “kiting” strategy. If you are a frost mage, you’ll have a fairly easy time kiting the paladin. Kiting paladins is not as easy as warriors though since they can come out of your Frost Nova and also be immune to your slowing down effects using Blessing of Freedom. Also remember to Counter Spell the paladin when he tries to heal himself. Always open with a Polymorph when they have full HP or have just healed themselves to 90%ish HP (e.g. after they use Lay on Hands) and strike a big nuke. Also as they heal and have a big health pool, you should consider that you may run out of mana before they die. So, make the battle as quick as possible.

I keep this part reserved for further updates when I gain more experience fighting vs. paladins.

Priests:

A good priest can be a nightmare for casters. First of all, they have powerful DoTs, and they can heal themselves, so virtually they have as twice as big Hit Points you can see. Priests you will encounter in Azeroth are usually two types: Holy (main) or Shadow (main) priests, both usually with some talents in Discipline.

Shadow priests are your hardest priest opponents and a good shadow priest can kill you by placing some DoTs on you and casting a bunch of Mind Blasts if your gear lacks Stamina. They can Silence you (so you'll be unable to cast any spell), they can put Magics on you and burn your mana using Mana Burn. Since Magics are not Curses, you won't be able to remove them using "Remove Lesser Curse" - However, Ice Block removes all the DoTs on you, but it’s only available to Frost and Elemental mages. The best way to take a shadow priest down is to first sheep him. He may shield him/her self before you sheep him. If he did so, you can either chain sheep until the shield is gone and then cast a DPS spell like a Fireball or Pyroblast or just attack the shielded priest. If you have Improved Counter Spell, silence the priest immediately after your spell lands the priest. Make sure you Counter Spell them when they hand goes yellowish, which means they are trying to heal themselves. Fighting a shadow priest and having spent your talent points on Improved Counter Spell will help you a lot. Make sure you use it whenever its cooldown is over. One thing you should consider is when they have a purple dusty thing around them, they are in Shadow Form, and they can't heal themselves in that condition. So it is better to finish them while they are in Shadow Form. Shadow Priests are mainly depend on their DoTs, and don't use many channelling spells.

By the way, if you got anytime before or during the battle, wear you Mage Armor to increase the resistance against shadow spells.

Holy priests: Holy priests are excellent healers. They can heal themselves many times, wasting your mana and making you frustrated. Basically if you let the fight take long, you’ll die since they outheal your damage. Try to be quick at doing DPS spells on them, have your Counterspell ready when they heal, and finish with a big DPS spell (like PoM Pyro) before they can heal themselves.

Although Holy Priests are still Priests, but they are not half hard as a Shadow one.

1-Whenever you see a priest healing him/herself, use Counter Spell. If Counter Spell is on cooldown, use Arcane Missiles, interrupting the priest's casting time to heal him/herself. Arcane Explosion can do the same thing too.

2-A priest with no mana is a dead priest.

Rogues:

Against rogues, the first hit is very important i.e. whoever hits first, is most likely to win the battle. A non-stealth rogue riding his mount (usually seen in PvP videos) can be a good HK for a mage. The mages are given an ability to have the first strike: Polymorph. Basically what you should do is to get close to the rogue riding his/her mount, cast polymorph, and you are done if he/she doesn't use his/her Insignia of A/H (a.k.a. PvP Trinket).

When having the rogue sheeped, cast a Fireball or a Pyroblast on the rogue. This will put a DoT on them, so that they won't be able to Vanish and go stealth again. At this point the rogue will come out of the sheep form and probably he will run to you to hit you. So you will freeze him using Frost Nova. Now its your time to get ranged. Go back and cast a chilling (slowing) spell, probably a Frostbolt. The rogue may now have the DoT on him/her gone, and will get stealth again by Vanishing. You have to cast some instant AoE's, such as Blast Wave or Arcane Explosion or even Frost Nova quickly at where he/she had vanished. A little hit on the stealth rogue will make him appear again. As Vanish has a long cooldown, he won't go stealth again, and now its your time to begin nuking the poor rogue. Use abilities which have the chill effect, making the rogue impossible to reach you. If the rogue uses Sprint, you have to use freeze or chill effects to slow them down, Polymorphing would be great if they have full health in this case, oh and don't forget Ice Block or Ice Barrier if you got them.

However, you don't always see a rogue walking around in visible mode. The "pro" of a rogue is stealth:

A rogue will usually gank you when you are busy fighting a mob, while you have 50% HP or less, or while you are sitting peacefully to eat/drink (remember, if a melee class hits you while you are sitting down, they will have a 100% chance to hit a critical strike on you, so ... beware!). This will make the rogue a guaranteed first strike. You have to quickly Blink out when you take the first hit and Polymorph the rogue quickly (that would be a good time to bandage yourself when the rogue is sheeped). If he/she vanishes/blind you before you finish sheeping, cast some instants (Arcane Explosions preferably, better keep you Frost Nova since it has a cooldown). If you got him, then sheep again, if you didn’t, better Mana Shield yourself and be aware that the rogue will strike again, or just get your mount up and run away.

When you feel a rogue is around waiting for you, or at the start of a duel, wear you Frost Armor and Mana Shield as soon as possible before he/she strikes.

Shamans:

Skilled Shamans are almost impossible to kill at levels 1 to 59, but they get easier at 60's.

Shamans have many instant casts, they do damage, they can slow you, they can interrupt your casting etc. They also have some tiny drops called Totems. For those who don’t know, these Totems can throw damage, increase shaman’s resistance against a magical school, heal, regenerate mana, and make the shaman immune to Polymorph. The last totem is very important to be destroyed as soon as possible (it is called Grounding Totem, and it is Blue in colour). Unfortunately using AoE spells on the totems is useless because AoE’s won’t destroy them. To destroy the totems use your wands (make sure you read the Macro section).

Against a shaman, use your instants. A good shaman won’t let you cast many spells and will Earth Shock frequently. Counter Spell (especially their heals) as frequent as possible and try to keep distance from them. Whenver they try to melee, kit’em.

Warlocks:

Warlocks are one of the best 1vs.1 PvP classes in WoW. They are very hard to kill. A good (Soul Link) warlock can beat any class at 60's.

Against a warlock, you better rely on your instants because they have many abilities to stop your casting (e.g. Death Coil, Seduce, Spell Lock, Fear) except when they use Shadowbolt, you’ll possibly have the time to cast a Fireball or Frostbolt. Arcane Explosion is a good spell to interrupt and slow their casting. Don't forget counter spelling the warlock or his/her minion at the right time. Sheeping the warlock isn't a bad idea, but never sheep them when they have their Felhunter out. Staying close to the warlock and spamming AE is a good way to slow their casting time. When you are close to the warlock, you can also avoid their Shadow Bolts by passing through and getting behind them. Having a Decurse macro will save your life from their curses, but you can't do anything about their magics (such as Corruption). Have your Fire Ward up, it can reduce the damage of their Imp's Firebolts and the warlock's fire spells (mainly Immolate).

Against a Soul Link Warlock (you can use Detect Magic on the warlock to see whether he/she is SL or not) with his/her Felhunter out, you basically have no chance to win if your gear is not way better than the warlock. In those situations, just Counterspell the Felhunter, sheep the warlock and Blink and run away. Always bear in mind: When you are unable to kill someone, run away. Fortunately we have many abilities to escape from many classes.

Warriors:

Although warriors are very though against other casters, rogues and hunters, they are one of your easiest target as a mage.

The “pro” of mages against warriors is range, as against other melee classes. Frost mages have a quite easy time with warriors, because of being able to cast Frostbolts in a shorter time, having Cold Snap and you are able to do two CoC’s and Frost Novas in a fight (likely to crit with Shatter). PoM can be very handy here to cast an instant Frostbolt to slow them down. If you got Hamstered by a warrior, kiting gets difficult. Cast an Ice Block to remove the effect.

This doesn’t mean Fire and Arcane mages have a hard time dealing with warriors. Fire mages have a very nice damage output and also Impact (talent) stops the warrior reaching them (10% chance though). Blink does a great job in keeping the range, and is available to every mage. It also removes Stun effects and therefore very handy after they Charge/Intercept you. Frost Armor slows the warrior down if they hit you, but try to avoid the warriors reaching you. Mana shield can be handy when they Charge or Intercept. Since the damage of Charge/Intercept isn’t too much, you won’t lose too much mana. Use Mana Shield when you have too much mana but not too much health. When warriors charge, they do Hamstring straight after. Just remember to Blink out as fast as possible just when they start to charge to avoid getting hamstred. You can usually predict when they want to Intercept you, they keep distance and move away from you.

Group/Mass PvP:

Group/Mass PvP is where the game is balanced around. A mage miArathi Basin is probably the toughest BG in the game for me as a mage. A mage can't defend a resource node on his/her own in many cases. So usually mages should be grouped with a non-mage class in defending a place. Mages are good delayers though: they can interrupt the enemies who are taking the flag with the help of their instants and also Arcane Explosion is a very nice interrupting spell. During this time, when the mage tries to annoy the enemies, he/she calls for more help in that node. This saves the flag uncaptured but you'll die most of the time in these situations (sometimes you hate to do this for the sake of your group).

The basics of the PvP nuking is range. A good mage steps back or even hides behind his/her group and then starts to nuke. When the enemies have targeted your tanks, this is your time to shine and nuke. Try to nuke from different places behind your group, because after two-three spells, you are most likely to be targeted (if not earlier). Trying different targets may save your life since you won't have your enemies’ attention, but isn't a perfect idea. It is better to take your opponents one by one i.e. everyone should better focus on one target and take him out as fast as possible (like strategy games). You should better try to hit those enemies warriors and hunters have already focused on to take them down faster. Hitting the targets which are already fighting reduces the chance of being focused by them as well.

The editted post below is the originally written by Iskander (EU-Argent Down) and contains very good information about the survivability and the role of mage in group PvP:

[quote]With the focus of many complains being PvP survivability in group PvP, I thought I’d put down some of the hints and tricks and general tactics for improving Mage survivability in group PvP.

The two main problems with Mage Survivability are Gear and Playing styles

1)Gear

Get better gear. You need a good balance of +damage, stamina, and intellect. You should aim for a minimum 3.3K HP, and around 5K mana. You should also try to get more stamina than mentioned, as this provides your buffer zone, and determines how long until you have to bail out.

The exact amount of Stamina will more than likely be determined by what amount of +damage you are comfortable with. You need at least 3.3K though. That should be the priority. Once you get that start trying to up the +damage.

You can get away with as little as 5K mana buffed, but when you are happy with the other stats, try and get this up to 6K so that you can use Mana Shield more often, and last longer.
The best gear for PvP is the PvP gear sets, but they take time to obtain.

2)Playstyle

To my mind this is the big problem. All the gear in the world wont support the playing styles I often see in PvP, unless you have a backup healer, which will only happen on really good team, then the gear might provide you with enough survival time for a heal.

So what’s the problem with playing style then?

It’s the gung-ho, charge into the middle, AoE, fire instants, and die. The minute you commit yourself to these tactics early in an encounter you are basically about to die. Sometimes you have to do it, to prevent flag caps, but you should realize that it is a suicide attack more often than not, and really doesn’t allow you to effect the outcome of a fight. You are not a front line assault class, but a long range support, or AoE finisher, and Crowd Controller.

So what playing style better maximizes survivability and the potential for unloading damage?

It’s a defensive playing style, with an emphasis on defeating attempts to focus fire on the mage.

The biggest killer for a mage in group PvP is getting focused on at the start of the fight, and killed very, very quickly, with no chance to do anything.

Most people when they focus on someone they tend to attack them until, they are dead… only the better players switch targets or pick opportunity targets as they appear. The more damage you have caused to a target, the less likely you are to break focus on that target.

Thus the key for a mage, is to prevent being focused on at the start of a fight, and only starting to unload after the enemy team have picked up other targets, and are attacking them.

This will leave the mage free to pick a target, and get in a few free hits before being noticed. With the large chunks of damage that a mage can produce in one go, this can be very effective in supporting your team… particularly if you take out hunters, or assist warriors/hunters and focus on their targets.

There is nothing more disconcerting than to be fighting a target, taking moderate damage but doing well, and then suddenly a big spike of damage comes in from off your Radar. That is what we should be seeking to do to other players as mages.

So how to avoid being focused on at the start of a fight?

A)Positioning.
Try to start fights behind your group, and only engage after everyone else has started fighting.
Don’t open up ASAP, let people settle on other targets before moving into range. So stay back initially, hide in bushes (can be effective), and move in a few seconds after the fight kicks off. DON’T start fights near the front lines, or Blink in to AoE before the enemy have picked targets. That’s a sure way to get focused on and killed.
The first 5-10 seconds of a group PvP fight are the most critical for targeting purposes, and it is the goal of a mage to make sure they survive these first critical stages of a fight, without being targeted at all if possible.

B)Blink.
This is massive and the main way to break focus. It’s a real killer when it doesn’t work unfortunately.
The minute you notice you are getting targeted and start taking damage, turn around blink and run, until the focus breaks. If they keep following you, keep running, you’ve taken at least one person out of a fight (keep an eye open for a chance to take them out if they are on their own).
Don’t wait to do this until you swallow an Aimed Shot, the minute you start taking even small damage, run. The person targeting you, unless they have caused a lot of damage and thus think they can get an easy kill from you, will be more likely to break off the attack, and pick another target in the core of the fight. Leaving you free to turn back and start nuking again.
Against some melee classes, try to get a Nova out before the blink, but don’t hang around too long.

C)Iceblock.
To me there are two talents that are necessary for a mage these days. Evocation for PvE raiding, and Iceblock of group PvP. (you can make a good argument for Improved AE too and Improved CS, which means most mages are forced into Arcane).
Iceblock is fantastic for breaking focus at the start of a fight, where you got caught up in the melee. Warrior, Rogue and Hunter target you at start of a fight, if blink would take you the wrong way, and there is no time to turn, then Iceblock ASAP. Don’t hesitate. Do it when you have as much health as possible. Then stay in it. At the start of a fight this will force those that were focusing on you to pick other targets. The minute they have done so, break Iceblock (then use Coldsnap to reset the cooldown on it), make some distance and open up on some targets. Ideally use it when you still have plenty of health. As with all focus-breaking, if you are on low health people are more likely to wait out Iceblock for the chance of getting a kill. 

D)Mana Shield.
This is surprisingly effective in group situations. Keep it up at the start of every fight, for those few extra HP to help you react when focused on. When running from an enemy keep it up, particularly vs hunters. It can burn up a lot of mana, but the important thing is to give you time to react. I find it most useful vs. hunters Autoshot, with the big hitters they just blow it away, but it still gives you some precious reaction time.

E) Run early.
The minute you start taking damage, particularly in the early stages of a fight, run/blink/block.
If they cause you too much damage before you run they will follow you, hunting for the kill. So break and run early, and return back the fight the minute they break focus, and stop pursuing you.

So you should be getting the picture. Stay on the periphery of fights, break focus and run the minute someone targets you, keep distance, and unload the big damage spells. Save your instants for when you get caught in 1v1s, have to run in to disrupt attacks, or need to burst a target down quickly (after a Counterspell for instance).

The main classes that can give you problems if you do the above, are Warriors who will follow you with Charge, Intercept etc, thus preventing you from breaking their focus with Blink, and Hunters who will often run after you, and send pets.
Against Warriors the most effective approach is to Nova them, and if you think they will still follow you then sheep them also, then run off, or ignore them for a bit. Most Warriors will break off the attack when Frozen, so Freeze, Trinket out of hamstring and run.
Against Hunters keep your Mana Shield up and run out of range. If they follow you, so be it… get them on their own, blink in (if they are following you they wont have a trap), snare them and try to blast them down with instants. This can be tough though… hunters are the worst enemy to get targeted by. The quicker you start running from them when you see incoming damage the more likely they will be to break off the attack.

With this playing style I tend not to die that often, and be able to really effect battles, by unloading my top damage spells from range, pulling enemy out of the core fight around flags, forcing people to waste time targeting me, and then saving my AoE for when a number of the enemy are on low health and are grouped. Also it is great for either assisting, or taking out enemy support troops and healers (with either damage or CC or both)

It is a fair bit harder to pull this off as a non-frost mage, but the added plus that if you do survive the first bits of a fight, when you start unloading you cause a huge amount of damage.
As a frost mage my feeling is that you can afford to sacrifice more stats for +damage, whereas a fire mage needs to keep their stamina up, and mana, to enhance their survivability.

Mages still suffer a lot at 60 when in blue gear, as it is hard to balance the stats, and blue weapons for melee and hunters can still be hugely effective. When you start to get more epics things become better, particularly the more slots you get … but remember if you aren’t going for a PvP set, stay away from the pre-Tier2 mages sets as a whole. The odd mage set item is worth it to balance some stats such as Int, and sometimes stamina, but generally you will want more +dam.

The above is not to say that mages don’t need a buff in survivability, especially non frost mages, but it can provide a more realistic way of coping until that day happens.

I’m telling you, when you survive long enough to start pumping out your damage at unsuspecting targets, using the longer cast bolts in particular, you will be much more satisfied with your mage.

This is not supposed to cover all situations, but is more a general playstyle philosophy, and there will be many times you will deviate from it, in specific situations.


As an interesting aside, this is why Invisibility would be a huge aid to a mage. Not for nuking out of nowhere, or for aiding in 1v1 PvP, or even as an escape mechanism - but by preventing mages getting focused on at the start of fights in group PvP. That’s a discussion for another time though.

PS (originally by Mustard from EU-Burning Legion): Out of mana? kill yourself (a mage with no mana is like a warrior trying to fight with a fishing pole). A good way to do this is to 'pull' enemies out into the middle of nowhere, on the promise of an easy kill. You were going to die anyway, but you take them out of the action at the same time, and away from their flag, if you're lucky, allowing your teammates to get the advantage.

[/quote]

Alterac Valley: a.k.a. AV:

AV is where the mage shines at its most. In AV, the classes which can deal damage from distance are most favoured. Due to the high population of AV, AoE's work great here. You can do 10k damage every second due to your powerful AoE's, however, not very long lasting. The Frost spells shine here as well: the chill effect reduces the speed of melee classes, making them impossible to come close to your group. Blizzard is very useful in AV too. Channelling Blizzard (along with Warlocks' Rain of Fire) on bridges guarantees that no stealth rogues/druids can pass by. In AV, you don't have a very definate role as you had in the other two Battlegrounds maybe because of AV's high population. You can do the quests inside AV or join your allies in the conflict. Your major responsibilities are dealing damage- whether single target or AoE, crowd control, and conjuring food and water for your team mates.

Here’s a small guide for Alterac Valley, make sure you’ve read it before going to the valley since I think AV is the most complicated Battleground when you first enter it: http://www.wowwiki.com/Alterac_Valley

 

PvE:

Mages are primary magic damage dealers when it comes to PvE. They are also invited to groups for conjuring water, food, crowd controlling and removing curses. Damage, as you know, is the primary thing mages do in groups since they can dish out damage very fast (only rogues can rival mages in dealing fast DPS), however, in long fights, warlocks and hunters (or even warriors) can do much or less the same damage as a mage can do. Mages’ concerns in PvE are aggro management and downtime. The aggro problem can be solved by a balanced line-up of your spells: you shouldn’t cast all those damaging spells at once. Having good tanks in your group is like having gems in your pocket. The downtime problem can be solved by drinking/Evocation talent, Mage Armor, +Spirit/+Intellect items etc. as I will explain in the Itemization section. Our damage, though, can be both AoE or single target. Since mages have a vast number of AoE spells, they can be invited to AoE on trash mobs etc. Just imagine you can do 3000 damage every second…nice isn’t it? :) To AoE in PvE raids:

1-Wear your Frost Armor when AoEing physical attackers: Not only increases your armor, but chills the mobs who attack you for a few seconds. Similarly, wear Mage Armor when AoEing casters to increase the regeneration and resistance to their magic.

2-Get buffed: Buff yourself with Arcane Intellect and get other classes to buff you too, Druids, Priests and Paladins have very nice buffs for you here. You may want to use scrolls (mainly Scroll of Protection) and/or potions or elixirs here as well (e.g. Nature Resistance Potion in Zul’gurub).

3-Get a priest: Ask a priest (or a druid) to put a HoT spell (Healing over time) and a shield on you. Tell a good healer to have an eye on your health while you spam AoE's.

4-Get a tank/rogue: Tell them to pull the aggro of some of the mobs which are attacking you. Inform them before AoEing.

5-Chain AoE: Two Mages are always better than one. Using Frost Nova and Cone of Cold one by one after the effect of each nova/CoC disappears makes the mobs always frozen or chilled, and therefore unable to hit you (if they are melee mobs of course).

6-Better use your casting time-required spells (e.g. Flamestrike, Blizzard) first. Use your spells which have cooldowns (e.g Blast Wave, Cone of Cold) earlier in the fight to be able to use them twice or even three times in an AoE run: The earlier you use them, the sooner their cooldown will be over.

7-Know your spells: Ice Block works great as a defensive spell while AoEing. Blast Wave dazes your targets, Cone of Cold and (Improved) Blizzard reduce their speed, Frost Nova traps them, Flamestrike puts DoTs on them etc.

 

Other than damage, polymorphing is probably our great crowd control spell, make sure you’ve warned your group before polymorphing (see the Macro List below). Here you go with this nice article about polymorphing: http://www.laggaming.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=389&Itemid=82

Solo PvE for levelling up and grinding is very easy. You will definitely find a great kiting spell/AoE combo after you reach level 15ish. You’ll lose mana too fast though, so have your conjured water and food always in your bags. Have a look at: http://www.mindimaging.com/wow/mage.html to see where the best place is to level up your mage.

Itemization:

Stats Explained:

Intellect: Intellect increases your mana pool, making you able to cast more spells in long fights. Each Intellect increases you mana by 15. It also increases your chance to hit a critical strike. At level 60, 59.5 Intelligence increases your crit chance by 1% (Note that there is no base crit-chance)

Stamina: Increases your health points (HP). Each Stamina increases your HP by 10.

Spirit: Spirit increases the rate of your Health and Mana Regeneration, no matter you are in or out of combat. However health will not regenerate in combat. Also mana will not regenerate after casting a spell for 5 seconds, by default.

The mathematic formula for how much regeneration you’ll get by Spirit is: 13 + (spirit / 4) mana per tick (what is a tick? see http://www.wowwiki.com/Tick )

For more information please visit: http://www.wowwiki.com/Spirit

Strength & Agility: Strength increases your attack power and therefore the damage of your staff or dagger depending on which one you have in your hand. However, as mages don’t generally use staves/daggers/swords for doing damage (expect they are out of mana, but wands are still superior to staves/daggers/swords in terms of damage), Strength is not an important stat for a mage. Agility on the other hand increases the damage of your wand and also your armor and your chance to dodge physical attacks. As you see, like Strength, Agility hasn’t got much use for mages, but I would prefer it to Strength.

+Damage (items which increase damage done by spells and healing up to x)

This Spell Damage Calculator shows how much DPS increase you will get for each of your spells.

http://www.academiaarsarcana.de/spelldamage/Spellpower_US.htm

Other Stats: Resistance, Mana Regeneration, Hit or Crit chance increase etc.

You can also enchant your items if you are an enchanter or ask an enchanter to enchant your gear. High-end enchants have a very wide range, from enchants which boost your damage to health/mana boosts. Very useful and powerful, but they can be very expensive, too.

You should consider +Damage items only add to the total damage of your spells. This means, for an AoE spell for example, they add to your AoE's overall damage, not single hits of your AoE spell.

PvP Gear:

Stamina: Because of the lack of survivability of the mage class, Stamina rich items are the prior items you should look for your PvP gear. Stamina makes you survive longer in the battles. Try to have at least 3000 HP unbuffed when equipped for your PvP gear.

+Damage: +Damage items are very useful especially if you are more into solo PvP, although it is useful in solo PvP as well. Aim for a minimum of 200-300 +damage on your gear.

Intellect: Intellect makes your Mana Pool larger and also increases your chance to “crit”. Useful if you are an AoE mage and don't want to run out of mana fast. Aim for at least 5000 Mana unbuffed.

PvE Gear:

Intellect/+Damage combination: As Intellect increase your mana, you’ll be able to cast more spells in during long fights (e.g. Boss fights, etc.) so your downtime decreases and you need to drink less frequently. +Damage items on the other hand increase your average damage and therefore your overall damage. I would personally go for a combination of Intellect and +Damage for my PvE gear. Beware of the aggro though ;)

Spirit + Mana Regeneration: Spirit items make you regenerate health and mana. Mana regeneration is well important in long fights and that is where Spirit can help a mage regenerate mana. While Mage Armor gives your 30% Mana Regeneration while casting, Spirit items boost this rate significantly. Spirit also increases the rate of Mana Regeneration through Evocation and Arcane Meditation (both require talents). +Mana Regeneration items make your regenerate mana while you are casting even if you are in combat and you haven't got your Mage Armor on. +Crit chance is also nice if you can manage the aggro properly.

If you are an AoE mage in your group, +Damage items won't really help you to increase your AoE's damage significantly. You better get more +Stamina (to survive longer) and +Intellect (to cast more AoE's).

 

Staff or Dagger+Off-hand? This question is asked from me many times, even by myself. To be honest it is all your choice. You should look at the stats they provide you with and see which one works better for your playing style. The hard decision is when you have a good staff and a much better dagger (or off-hand) but you don’t have a good off-hand (or dagger) to combine it with. In those situations, you better keep them both. Doesn’t make a genius: use the staff for a while until you get a good off-hand and then you can equip the Dagger+Off-hand combination and rule Azeroth.

 

Tips:

Spells:

Arcane Missiles: Has a long range which can be used for hitting fleeing targets. Arcane Missiles turns with respect to your target automatically. I frequently use it to slow down my enemy’s casting.

AP PoM Pyroblast: I usually use it as a "finisher". Don't lose your (AP) PoM (Pyroblast) at the start of the battle especially against healer classes since they heal themselves and become back to normal. I rarely used my AP PoM Pyroblast when I was Arcane/Fire because I always wanted to keep it for special occasions (blowing the last hit on the flag carrier for example in WSG), so don't lose it for nothing.

Ice Block: A spell with tens of uses, from breaking PvP/PvE focus to removing DoTs, Fear, Hamstring etc. Note that there's about a 1 second casting animation lag' between hitting the button and actually getting Ice Blocked, so don't wait too late to hit it. I play with about 50 ms latency (ping) and have seen the Ice Block animation go up and found myself dead anyway because of latency, so keep that in mind.

Frost Armor: Use it against melee classes , hunter pets etc. For PvE, always have it buffed on yourself.

Polymorph: Know that you can cast polymorph regardless to where your face is pointing to i.e. you can sheep a target while your target is behind you. This works extremely useful after Blinking, when you are most likely to be back-to-back to your target.

Frostnova: Remember it deals a little damage to your target as well as freezing them, therefore using Frost Nova would de-sheep the polymorphed targets.

Scorch: Scorch is a good “finisher” because of its short casting time when you have your instants on cooldown and you don't want lose too much mana. Also scorch is a mana-efficient spell in high-level PvE if you have Arcane Concentration as a talent. Statically you'll enter a Clearcasting state after casting 10 Scorches when you can then cast a mana-eating spell. This tactic is good during long fights in dungeons and you won't lose too much mana, therefore your damage output will be more stable than a Fireball spammer and you'll get less aggro.

Except for at the start of the BG, don’t buff yourself with Arcane Intellect, it costs too much mana.

Have your Rank 1 spells out: Rank 1 Fireball (Fireball's DoT on rogues make them unable to vanish, remember?), Rank 1 Frostbolt (chill effect) on your screen and/or key bindings. Rank 1 spells have less casting time than higher ranks but do the same job (DoTing and chilling), of course with less damage and mana cost.

A full list of spells available to mages, from level 1 to 60: http://www.thottbot.com/?c=Mage

Profession:

Note: Don't know about professions?

Tailoring/Enchanting: This combo will help you a lot in having up-to-date gear while levelling up, up to level mid-60's. The cloth needed for making stuff by Tailoring are dropped by monsters you kill during your levelling process. Although you won't necessary be able to make very up-to-date gear for yourself because you tailoring skill is usually a bit behind your actual level (e.g. your level is 32, but the gear you can make by your tailoring skill are level 30). However, Tailoring is very vital for Enchanting, as you can simply disenchant the stuff you make by tailoring and use the enchantments to enchant your gear, or simply sell enchants/enchantments. You can also sell the stuff you make by Tailoring on AH, but don't expect a huge profit out of them.

Enchanting can be a very expensive profession, especially when you are leveling up your enchanting skill. This is because you have to disenchant (DE) the disenchantable items you get from drops or tailored by yourself which could have been be sold on AH for money. But don't look at Enchanting as a worthless profession. People always want to buy enchants on their items to make them powerful, and they sure pay loads of golds to enchanters for doing this, especially if you know a rare formula at higher levels. Also, selling enchantments on AH is a very profitable business.

For more information please visit: Tailoring: http://www.thottbot.com/?t=Tailoring and Enchanting: http://www.thottbot.com/?t=Enchanting

Mining/Engineering: This is my PvP favourite. Being an Engineer, you can make bombs which can stun your target for several seconds or they can cause AoE damage to your enemies. You can also make loads of trinkets which help you during the combat a lot. For more information about Engineering, visit: http://www.thottbot.com/?t=Engineering

Remember, it is highly recommended to have Mining as your other profession, which can provide the materials you need to make engineering products, also you can sell you spare metal bars on AH and make a huge profit out of it.

Note: If you are an Engineer, you can buy potions from Auction House (AH) -they can be expensive though, or have a guildie to make them for you. (You can get mana/healing potions them from random mob drops or NPC stores such as the one for Knights/Bloodguards in Stormwind/Ogrimmar), but an Alchemist for example, can't use Engineering since Engineering products are limited to Engineers only.

 

Herbalism/Alchemy: This combo rocks for both PvP and PvE. While Engineering's use is mainly for PvP, Alchemy will work great for you in both PvP and PvE. Being an Alchemist, you'll be able to make yourself potions which can buff you with stats, resistance, instantly heal/restore mana, etc. Make sure you have Herbalism as your other profession. The pro of Alchemy to Engineering is you can sell potions on AH and make loads of gold, but as using Engineering products are limited to Engineers only, you won't make too much money from Engineering.

Having said that, both Mining and Herbalism (gathering professions in a larger scale) are very good for making money. There is always a high demand of metal bars/ores, herbs and skins in AH, so you can sell your extra raw materials on AH and make a good amount of gold by them.

To see what alchemy products you can make, have a look at: http://www.thottbot.com/?t=Alchemy

Make sure you learn and develop Herbalism and Fishing skills along with Alchemy since these two professions provide you with the raw material you’ll need to make potions.

Link: Handy Herbalism guide: http://forums-en.wow-europe.com/thread.aspx?fn=wow-tradeskills-en&t=39004&p=1&tmp=1#post39004

Mining/Leatherworking or Herbalism: Haven't got the money to buy an Epic mount? This combo will be the right choice for you. Mining and Leatherworking is a famous combo for making gold on AH. Leatherworking is a very easy profession since you just have to skin the animals you kill (most of them can be an objective of you quests too) when you're exploring the world. You get experience (XP) when killing those animals, so as you see, it is a great profession which helps you level up and make money fast at the same time. Mining and Herbalism can be a bit harder though, and you won't get XP for picking a herb, you know ;)

Macros:
Here is a compiled list of all the useful and awesome Mage macros. (originally posted by Beau in US Forums) I will update this section asap.

Sheeping Macro:
---
/script if UnitSex("target")==1 then g="F " else g="M " end;s="Poly "..g..UnitLevel("target").." %T";a=0;if GetPartyMember(1) then c="party" a=1 if GetNumRaidMembers()>0 then c="raid" end;end;if a>0 then SendChatMessage(s,c) end;
/cast Polymorph(Rank X)
---
Description: Informs your party (or raid) of the sex, level and name of your target and than casts Polymorph. If you aren’t in a raid or party, you simply cast Polymorph.

Example:
/script if UnitSex("target")==1 then g="F " else g="M " end;s="Poly "..g..UnitLevel("target").." %T";a=0;if GetPartyMember(1) then c="party" a=1 if GetNumRaidMembers()>0 then c="raid" end;end;if a>0 then SendChatMessage(s,c) end;
/cast Polymorph(Rank 4)


De-curse:
---
/target [your characters name]
/cast Remove Lesser Curse
/script TargetLastEnemy();
---
Description: Removes one curse from you.

Example:
/target Zahak
/cast Remove Lesser Curse
/script TargetLastEnemy();


Anti-totem:
---
/target Earthbind Totem
/target Searing Totem
/target Magma Totem
/target Mana Spring Totem
/target Grounding Totem
/target Healing Stream Totem
/cast Shoot
/script TargetLastEnemy();
---
Description: Shoots the last totem on the list above, that is in range.

Insta-Counterspell:

/script SpellStopCasting();
/cast Counterspell
---
Description: Stops casting any spell currently being cast, and casts Counterspell at your target.

Multi-water:

/stand
/script if (UnitMana("player")>[Mana cost for your Conjure Water spell]) then CastSpellByName("Conjure Water(Rank X)") else UseContainerItem(0, 1); end;
---
Description: When you have more mana than it costs to cast your Conjure Water spell, it casts it. But if you have less mana than you need, you use the first item in your backpack; usually the water you just conjured (or you could put a mana potion in the first spot, for a faster pace).

Example:
/stand
/script if (UnitMana("player")>780) then CastSpellByName("Conjure Water(Rank 7)") else UseContainerItem(0, 1); end;


Hybrid Assist:

/script ClearTarget();
/assist Character
---
Description: Clears your current target and targets the same target as the character you have inputed above.

Example:
/script ClearTarget();
/assist Keyleigh


Self-bandage:

/script SpellStopCasting();
/s Bandaging, don't heal me!
/target [your characters name]
/script UseContainerItem (X1, X2);
---
Description: Stops whatever you are doing, announces that you are bandaging yourself and promptly bandages you.
Note: X1 represents the bag number, from right to left; 0-4. X2 represents the space number inside the bag (X1), from left to right.

Example:
/script SpellStopCasting();
/s Bandaging, don't heal me!
/target Joe
/script UseContainerItem (0, 1);


Shut up: (I prefer not to use this macro to be honest, but as it’s very famous, here you go)

/say No, I don't have time to make you free stacks of water, unless you want to pay me XG per stack.
/script CancelTrade()
---
Description: You simply say the above and than automaticly cancel the trade.

Example:
/say No, I don't have time to make you free stacks of water, unless you want to pay me 5G per stack.
/script CancelTrade()


Detect Clearcasting (this one can be a bit hard to make, make sure you look at the example):


/script local q; local t;for i=0,15,1 do t=GetPlayerBuffTexture(i); if (t and string.find(t, "ManaBurn")) then q=1; break; end; end; if(q ~= nil) then CastSpellByName("Arcane Missiles(Rank X)") else CastSpellByName("[Spell you use often](Rank X)"); end;
---
Description: Use as a normal spell key-binding, except if you gain Clearcasting before you cast it it will cast Arcane Missles instead.

Example:
/script local q; local t;for i=0,15,1 do t=GetPlayerBuffTexture(i); if (t and string.find(t, "ManaBurn")) then q=1; break; end; end; if(q ~= nil) then CastSpellByName("Arcane Missiles(Rank 7)") else CastSpellByName("Scorch(Rank 7)"); end;

PoM Pyro:

/Cast Presence of mind
/script SpellStopCasting()
/cast Pyroblast(rank X)

You can replace Pyroblast(rank X) with Frostbolt(rank x) or Fireball(rankx)

Replace the “X” with the rank of your spell e.g. Pyroblast(rank 2)

 

ToEP+ZHC+AP: (won’t work after patch 10 goes live, shame!)

script UseInventoryItem(GetInventorySlotInfo("Trinket0Slot"));

/script SpellStopCasting();

/script UseInventoryItem(GetInventorySlotInfo("Trinket1Slot"));

/script SpellStopCasting();

/cast Arcane Power

/script SpellStopCasting();

/cast Presence of Mind

/script SpellStopCasting();

Mage-specific AddOns/UI's:

AutoMageBuff: http://www.curse-gaming.com/mod.php?addid=1605

NovaWatch: http://www.curse-gaming.com/mod.php?addid=1626

SheepWatch: http://www.curse-gaming.com/mod.php?addid=1176

Flexbar: http://www.curse-gaming.com/mod.php?addid=42

PvP Videos:

Dunst: An example of a good Frost/Arcane mage, using engineering. http://www.warcraftmovies.com/viewauthor.php?id=3621

Glass Canon: Arcane/Fire mage kicks butt. http://www.warcraftmovies.com/viewauthor.php?id=676

Sorrow Hill (Fire Mage): http://www.warcraftmovies.com/viewauthor.php?id=180

Elemantalist Mage: Quickest mage I've ever seen shows the power of elements. http://www.warcraftmovies.com/viewauthor.php?id=1866 and http://www.warcraftmovies.com/viewauthor.php?id=1910

Francis: The first PvP movie ever made by a mage http://www.warcraftmovies.com/movieview.php?id=1880

AoE Mage: http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-1907207545625518982&q=aoe and http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=8408964958085544819&q=alterac

How to get rank 14: A funny PvP video made by a creative mage! http://www.warcraftmovies.com/movieview.php?id=1746

Mouse, Keyboard and Key Bindings:

Logitech® G15 Gaming Keyboard http://www.logitech.com/index.cfm/products/details/GB/EN,CRID=2288,CONTENTID=10717

Belkin Nostromo™ SpeedPad n52 http://catalog.belkin.com/IWCatProductPage.process?Product_Id=157024

Mouse Tip: It is better to turn around using right mouse button. This works much faster than using the Arrow Keys on your keyboard. Hold the right mouse button and move your mouse to rotate. Very useful, PvPwise.

Use key bindings/macros: Macros and Key Bindings will help you react much faster than normal mouse-clicking.

Glossary:

AB: Arathi Basin

AE: Arcane Explosion http://www.thottbot.com/?sp=22460

AH: Auction House

AoE: Area of Effect

AP: Arcane Power http://www.thottbot.com/?sp=12042

ASAP: As soon as possible

AV: Alterac Valley

BG: Battleground

BW: Bestial Wrath http://www.thottbot.com/?sp=19574

BWL: Blackwing Liar http://www.wowwiki.com/Blackwing_Lair

CC: Crowd Control

CD: Cooldown

CoC: Cone of Cold http://www.thottbot.com/?sp=10161

CoE: Curse of Elements http://www.thottbot.com/?sp=11722

CoS: Curse of Shadow http://www.thottbot.com/?sp=17937

Crit: Critical stike

CS: Counterspell http://www.thottbot.com/?sp=20788

DE: Disenchant

DoT: Damage over time

DPS: Damage per second

DZ: Dead Zone

FN: Frost Nova http://www.thottbot.com/?sp=10230

HP: Hit Points

Imba: Imbalanced

MC: Molten Core http://www.wowwiki.com/Molten_Core

PoM: Presence of Mind http://www.thottbot.com/?sp=12043

PvE: Player vs. Environment

PvP: Player vs. Player

Regen: Regeneration

SL: Soul Link http://www.thottbot.com/?sp=19028

ToEP: Talisman of Ephemeral Power http://www.thottbot.com/?i=39255

WSG: Warsong Gulch

XP: Experience

ZHC: Zandalarian Hero Charm http://www.thottbot.com/?i=51326

 

Other sources and links:

Pre Epic/ Blue items: Farmable

WoW Wiki

Tazdingo's Comprehensive AoE guide

World of War.net

WoW US Unofficial Guides

Brady Games: World of Warcraft Official Strategy Guide

World of Warcraft: Official Game Manual