PvE Arcane Mage DPS Guide

Arcane Mage DPS

Stat Priority

Talents & Builds

Pre-Raid & Best In Slot (BiS)

Gems, Enchants, & Consumables

Rotation, Cooldowns, & Abilities

Welcome to the Arcane Mage guide for PVE in World of Warcraft: The Burning Crusade Classic. In this guide we will go over Talents, Rotation, gearing as well as Gemming and Enchanting.

Best Races

Alliance

• Human: With extremely few opportunities for mages to use Perception in PvE content, the only benefit human mages get is from The Human Spirit which increases their spirit by 10%. Diplomacy while being a decent racial has very little use in PvE.
• Gnomes: Due to Expansive Mind, which increases their intellect by 5% and having Escape Artist gives you a massive edge in both PvE and PvP scenarios due to having multiple options outside of roots and slow reduction effects.
• Draenei: Draenei Mages are gifted two beneficial racials. One of those racials being Inspiring Presence, which gives 1% spell hit to everyone in your party, and Gift of the Naaru which is a free Heal over time (HoT) you can use in very dire circumstances. 

Horde

• Undead: Sadly this is the only race that doesn’t directly benefit a mage in PvE content.
• Troll: The only race that has an incredibly powerful racial for mages Berserking which increases your casting speed by either 10-30%. The actual amount depends on your health, with a slightly less useful racial being Beast Slaying which increases your damage against beast targets by 5%.
• Blood Elf: Blood Elves have Mana Tap which can be used to reduce your target’s mana by 30 (stacking up to 3 times) Blood Elves also have Arcane Torrent, which allows them to silence mobs in an AoE fashion and restore mana based on how many stacks of Mana Tap you currently have.

Best Alliance Race: With the exception of not being in the same group, most Draenei will likely be Shamans, which carry Inspiring Presence already. The benefit Mages get from The Human Spirit is nearly equal to the benefit Expansive Mind and Escape Artist. As a result, Gnomes are the best Alliance race to choose for Mages with Humans coming in for a close second.

Best Horde Race: Since Berserking and Icy Veins both increase your spell haste when used individually, Trolls are the best option. As a bonus, Berserking and Icy Veins stack, allowing you to lower your cast time significantly.

Best Professions

For professions there are only two clear cut ones to choose: Tailoring and Enchanting.

• Tailoring provides you with your best in slot set for a vast majority of TBC – the Spellfire Set.
• Enchanting provides you with both 12 spell power to each ring and +4 to all stats later down the line so this powerhouse of a combo is definitive dps increase compared to any of the other professions we have offered to us.