This week I would like to tell you about an add-on that provides information only; it won’t necessarily improve your DPS, HPS, or even your mood, if you’re in a hurry to reach the next experience level. However, XtoLevel is a simple addon that will provides detail about the kills, quests, dungeons, battlegrounds and experience required to gain a level.

After each kill, quest, dungeon or battleground, the exact number required to level of that particular item is displayed on the screen, and optionally in the default chat window. Hunters can see the number of kills required for their pets to gain a level.

An optional small window displaying details about the kills, quests, dungeons, battlegrounds, experience and time remaining to gain a level is also available.

XtoLevel provides data to LDB front-end addons, such as TitanPanel and Fortress.

All of these display features can be configured via the configuration window, which is accessible by either right-clicking the “average” window or by using slash commands.

You can get XtoLevel from WoWinterface or from Curse.

Music for this week’s segment is from Archive.org and is entitled Hot Mittens by the Bucktown 5.

Download the MP3

No related posts.

This week we’re going to look at leveling guides; specificly, Zygor’s Leveling Guide, and an alternative.

Let me start off by saying that I emphatically do NOT recommend Zygor’s Leveling Guide, and I’m not going to give you a link to the official Zygor site. If you still want it after listening to this segment, you can find it easily enough.

Zygor’s Leveling Guide is an in-game guide; that means it’s an add-on. It also is sold, not supported by voluntary donations. That means it’s in blatant violation of Blizzard’s terms of service for add-on developers.

I quote:

1) Add-ons must be free of charge.
All add-ons must be distributed free of charge. Developers may not create “premium” versions of add-ons with additional for-pay features, charge money to download an add-on, charge for services related to the add-on, or otherwise require some form of monetary compensation to download or access an add-on.

“Zygor” wants $80 (currently discounted to $60) for this add-on package. Frankly, that’s just too much even if it didn’t violate the TOS.

Zygor’s guide is technically beautiful; it has cute little animations to show that it’s doing something, it gives you waypoint arrows, and it does help you find the necessary quests for leveling. That said, however, it takes up as much add-on memory as the free alternatives which I will outline here, and tends to get in the way when you really don’t need it.

Enough said about that; here’s how you can get all the same functions without spending any money (although I do encourage you to donate to the add-on authors who accept donations):

1. Download and install Carbonite from the Carbonite add-on home page.
2. Download and install Lightheaded (see my previous review, Segment 25, for details) from WoWinterface or other sources.
3. Open your favorite Web browser (which I sincerely hope is not Internet Explorer) and go to Jame’s Leveling Guides.

Another option is to go to WoW-pro.com and get the WoW-pro leveling add-on.
You will still need Lightheaded and TomTom also.

In order for any leveling guide to be effective, you really need to start using it as soon as you create a new toon; but the Jame’s guides make it somewhat easier to start in the middle (after making a few levels) than Zygor does (another plus for freeware/donationware add-ons).

In conclusion: You can spend money to violate Blizzard’s terms of service, or you can go with free/donation-supported add-ons to do the same thing. It’s up to you. I know which I choose.

Music for this segment is from Freeplaymusic.com and is entitled “Yarn of the Buccaneer,” by Pierre Langer and Scott P. Schreer.

Download the MP3

General leveling tips:

• Obtain bags as soon as you can. There are many quests that have you gathering items, and you need someplace to carry those items.
• …Members of The Gathering can get bags out of the Guild Vault, or whisper Valkillmoar or Leftbank. The rest of you are on your own.
• If you aren’t using a guide, pick up as many quests as possible when you get to a new zone
• … and complete as many as possible before running back to turn them in.
• Avoid dungeon quests unless you have a regular group with whom you’re leveling together.
• Avoid Sven in Duskwood unless you like traveling a lot and getting very little reward for the effort.
• Make a “bank toon” who will stand around in a capital city and handle auctions and banking for you. The mail system works well and your bank toon can make boatloads of gold from gathering profession items.

No related posts.

Part I: Beginning

Once you get to level 20 some parts of your leveling will become easier, and some will not. The first change that you are going to find is that having the ability to teleport all over the world is absolutely amazing. It’s probably my favorite trait of the class overall. For that matter, it’s my favorite trait of every class in the game.

One change you are going to find with your questing and such is that being able to AoE grind through your quests is going to make them fly by a whole lot faster. Some quests are not impacted by AoE grinding at all, like ones that have you bring back Mr. Mob’s head, or ones where you have to deliver an item from Location A to Location B (though teleporting can help with that), and so on. But a lot of quests involve killing a certain number of specific mobs or collecting a number of items that drop from certain mobs. These are the ones where AoE grinding really shines and where your leveling process starts burning some serious fuel.

Where you level is not especially important, just try to focus questing to some degree in areas that have a lot of mobs grouped together that are melee mobs rather than ranged attackers or spell casters. My first Mage leveled through the 20’s in Hillsbrad Foothills much like my Paladin did. The Mage I am leveling right now did these levels, mostly, in Ashenvale. If you want to follow my path then feel free, but as long as you are questing in an area that is level-appropriate for you then you should be just fine. Just remember to stay away from the caster mobs and ranged attackers as they are the only ones that pose any real threat; at least from an AoE standpoint. If you’re going against mobs 1v1 then by all means just kill everything you see.

Scope
This post is about playing your mage and getting them leveled up to 39. I am going to talk about AoE grinding a bit, but that’s not the focus of this post. That will be in the next post in this series where I discuss the particulars of grinding. If you want to find out about how to AoE with a Frost Mage then you should probably look at that post rather than this one. AoE Grinding: Frost Mage Edition

Here I am going to show you how to spend your talent points, which glyphs you should get, what spells you should cast or avoid, general rotations, etc. So the scope of this post is the mechanics of leveling a mage, not the technique of casting your spells.

Important Spells

Levels 21-30

Counterspell (level 24) This is an excellent spell that should always be somewhere on your screen. I don’t necessarily recommend it be on your primary action bar, but have it somewhere that you can access it. It’s great for PvE (when facing casters), and it’s excellent for PvP. Check the macro section down below for this one.

Conjure Mana Gem (level 28) This spell creates a gem that you carry around in your bags that acts just like a mana potion, restoring amounts of mana that scale with your level. The gems you make early on in the game are always single use, but as you get to end game you will mage gems that have three uses. Creating a gem costs more mana than it returns, so note that it’s something that should be prepared ahead of time.

Ice Block (level 30) This is your first “oh crap” button. It throws a solid block of ice around you for the duration making you immune to, well, everything. The drawback to it is that you’re stuck there until it wears off or you cancel the spell. Use it when you pull too much, when you have Frostbite proc in the middle of a pull that can’t be fixed, when you’re about to die, when you’re covered in DoTs/Poisons/Disease, when you fall off a cliff and can’t find Slow Fall, or when you want to see yourself in a funny little pose since it keeps you exactly as you were when you cast it. If you have the Glyph of Ice Block, use it any time you need to reset your Frost Nova cooldown. And do not feel like you have to wait out its duration. If it’s accomplished what you need it to, feel free cancel the spell early and go back to your business.

Teleport: Darnassus/Thunderbluff (level 30) At level 30 you get access to your faction’s Druid city teleport. I don’t know what the reasoning is for putting these off until level 30, but apparently Blizzard does.

Levels 31-39

Mage Armor (level 34) gives you Resist Magic 5 which isn’t great, but not bad, and also allows you to regenerate 50% of your regular mana regen during combat. A lot of people love this spell and use it in place of Frost Armor. I rarely use it myself, but it’s still a decent spell.

Alliance
Teleport & Portal: Theramore (level 35) Here you are able to both teleport and open portals for your party to travel to Theramore. This portal actually sells pretty frequently for me on my Alliance server as it’s an easier way for people to travel to that portion of the world. Tips for portals vary on every server, so you’ll have to see for yourself how much gold you might be able to make off of it. On my Ally server this portal sells for 3-5g and I see people asking in trade chat for it every other day or so.

Portals: Stormwind, Ironforge, Exodar (level 40) You can now open portals for your party members to be teleported to these major cities. Selling portals is an easy way to make a few gold, but again it varies on each server. My Alliance server still sells all portals and these typically bring in a 10g fee each. You don’t get the portal for Darnassus for a few more level yet, but that one sells for the same.

Horde
Teleport & Portal: Stonard (level 35) You are able to both teleport and open portals for your party to travel to Stonard. This portal used to sell almost constantly as it was the shortest way for you to reach Outlands for the first time since it’s just north of the Dark Portal. Now that those portals exist in every major city you might as well forget the fact that this one exists. I do find an occasional request for it from groups that want to run through Sunken Temple on my old Horde server, but for the most part people just don’t need it anymore.

Portals: Orgrimmar, Undercity, Silvermoon (level 40) You can now open portals for your party members to be teleported to these major cities. Selling portals is an easy way to make a few gold, but again it varies on each server. On my Horde server the only portals you ever really see people asking for are Org and TB, with an occasional ask for Undercity as well. The only time you ever see anyone ask for Silvermoon is when there’s a holiday event going on. For my Horde servers you’re lucky if you can get 2g for a port to any of the Horde’s major cities.

Leveling 21-30
Rotation Option 1: Frostbolt, Frostbolt, Frostbolt, Fire Blast
Rotation Option 2: Frostbolt, Frostbolt, Frostbolt, Frostbolt
Rotation Option 3: Frostbolt, Frostbolt, Cone of Cold, Frostbolt
Explanation: This will pretty well be the rotation you use for the rest of the game for single mobs. Basically your life revolves around Frostbolt spamming and throwing out a Fire Blast or Cone of Cold to finish them off.

As you may notice, at this point Fireball is completely gone from my rotations and it will see very little, if any, use throughout the rest of my playing. The only time I go back to Fireball from this point on is when I am fighting a mob that is resistant or immune to Frost damage.

If you feel a need to throw a Frost Nova out there to stop a mob that’s rushing into melee range then feel free to do so. If you like Cone of Cold more than Fire Blast then feel free to use it as well. I generally stick to using Fire Blast as my finishing move, but as you get higher in levels and mobs start having more hit points I begin to use Cone of Cold more frequently for the sake of having more chances to proc Frostbite and freezing the mob in place. Doing this gives you a chance of ending many of your fights without taking a single hit.

Remember that you have your Mana Gem for when you need to restore your mana. Unless you’re in the middle of a horrible pull and already running out of mana then using the Gem by itself should give you enough to finish the fight. If you need more mana than that, then feel free to use a Mana Potion in addition to the gem.

Leveling 31-39
Rotation Option 1: Frostbolt, Frostbolt, Frostbolt, Fire Blast
Rotation Option 2: Frostbolt, Frostbolt, Frostbolt, Frostbolt
Rotation Option 3: Frostbolt, Frostbolt, Cone of Cold, Frostbolt
Explanation: Nothing new here.

You don’t get any new offensive spells in this range, you just get higher ranks of the ones you’ve already got. Refer back to the section above for specifics.

General Tactics

There is one thing in particular that I want to point out right now. As you begin gaining more levels the mobs you are fighting are going to gain more hit points which will require you to cast more spells due to the fight taking longer. The longer a fight lasts, the more likely the mobs are to close in and start attacking you. Do not be afraid to stop casting a spell in order to save yourself. It’s alright to take off running half a second before your Frostbolt goes off. There’s nothing wrong with that; especially if you are close to dying. It’s perfectly acceptable to run away like a little girl, screaming your head off while you wait for Frost Nova’s cooldown to pop so that you can freeze the mob in place and then get back to killing him. There’s also nothing wrong with throwing a Frost Nova the second the mob comes within range and running away all together.

For a Frost Mage a strong offense truly is the best defense you can have. You defend yourself by attacking your enemies and slowing them down or freezing them in place. You don’t have to constantly be on the move and you don’t have to kite every mob that you face, but the abilities that you have give you the time and the opportunity to almost completely control the field.

I’m going to introduce now a tactic I like to call Run Through. It’s most effective when using either Frost Nova or Cone of Cold (or Dragon’s Breath if you’re a Fire Mage). It’s best represented in Rotation Option #3 up above. Assuming that you do not get a Frostbite proc from your Frostbolts, the mob is generally going to arrive near to melee range close to when your second Frostbolt is cast or in the middle of the third. I like to be aggressive on my Frost mage, so I take right to the mob’s face; so if he’s closing in after my second cast I don’t wait for the third cast I just start running into him after the second.

As you get close to the mob cast Cone of Cold and keep right on running through them. You can then cast Blink if you want or just keep on running a ways before turning around and going back to Frostbolts to finish them off. This is going to accomplish a few things 1 you’re going to deal additional damage with an instant cast, 2 you are going to put distance between yourself and the mob, and 3 you have yet another chance to proc Frostbite and freeze the target in place.

By running through a mob to do this you also open up the option of them causing a Frostbite proc from hitting you with a melee attack while you have Frost Armor on which will freeze them in place for you and make your job a whole lot easier. If you remember back in Part I, I mentioned that my hit points are just another resource for me to use, and this is what I mean by that. I’m giving away a few hit points by giving the mob a chance to hit me, but what I’m gaining out of the deal is another chance to proc Frostbite.

AoE Grinding: Frost Mage Edition
Here are your basics of AoE Grinding with a Frost Mage. For more details you will need to refer to the next post in this series which will discuss the details of AoE grinding across all levels.

Generally speaking you want to pull a group of mobs, at least 3, into a central location, Frost Nova to freeze them in place, and then move out of melee range before casting Blizzard. Now, that’s a very generalized version of it, but it’s essentially what it is. There are a lot of tricks that you can use to help you in this, and sometimes you have to sacrifice your cooldowns to make some of them work.

Step 1: Pull The first thing you have to do for any type of AoE grinding is pull the mobs. The easiest way to do this is to jump on your mount and ride around into all of their threat ranges.

Step 2: Corral The second thing you have to do is get them all bunched up together. If you’re still on your mount then ride away, turning a bit here and there to get the mobs next to the others. It’s a bit hard to explain how to do that, but practicing will help you understand. The point is to get all of the mobs close enough to each other, and to you, that a single Frost Nova will catch all of them.

Step 3: Freeze The third thing you have to do is stop them from moving. The best option for this Frost Nova, though at later levels your Water Elemental gets an ability called Freeze which is a ranged Frost Nova that works just as well if not better. Be aware that in this stage you will occasionally miss some of the mobs. It’s good to have items with +Hit on them for doing this, but they aren’t required. You don’t miss very often and even when you do it can still be managed.

Step 4: Distance The fourth thing is putting distance between yourself and the mobs. The traditional way of doing this is to use Blink to teleport yourself a short distance away. However, Blink is not 100% reliable and can often teleport you right into another mob, or group of mobs, if you haven’t been keeping an eye on your surroundings. Personally, I don’t Blink at this point unless the mobs have managed to Daze me which makes you move slower. If I’m not dazed or otherwise rooted in place (nets, webs, etc) then I simply run. I run about 10 yards away and then turn around. Whatever method you choose to use for moving, be sure to turn around and face the mobs when you’re done. The optimum distance is twice the size of your Blizzard’s AoE circle or just slightly further. Going too far means that the mobs will be out of range for Blizzard, while not going far enough means melee mobs will be hitting you in the face while you cast.

Step 5: Blizzard Now it’s time to cast your Blizzard and watch the pretty numbers fly by as they all start to die. You want to position your Blizzard so that all of the mobs (or at least all that you can manage) fall within the area of the damage. You also want the furthest edge of Blizzard’s effect to be as close to you as possible. When a mob is frozen, that freeze breaks after they’ve taken a certain amount of damage, and Blizzard deals a lot of damage. So by keeping the area as close as possible it means that when their freeze breaks they still have to walk through the AoE damage to get to you. Since we also have at least one point in the Improved Blizzard talent (minimum level 20) your Blizzard now has a chill effect that will slow the mobs down. And since we have points in the Frostbite talent, every spell with a chill effect has the ability to freeze the target in place. And every time Blizzard deals damage it chills them, meaning that every time it hits it has a chance to proc Frostbite.

Step 6: Clean Up After you’ve cast your Blizzard you need to decide what’s next. If the mobs are still alive then you have to finish them off. You can do that by either casting another Blizzard if they have a lot of health, or casting Arcane Explosion of Cone of Cold if they just have a little bit of health left. If the mobs are already dead, then your only form of clean up is collecting your loot.

Notes
If you are fighting caster mobs in addition to melee, then pulling them and rounding them up into a single group isn’t going to be as easy. Until level 30 your only real option is to have the caster’s location be where you coral all of the rest of the mobs, or to line of sight the caster and coral everyone there.

At level 30 you get an excellent spell called Ice Block. It freezes you in place and makes you immune to everything for its duration. The great thing about being immune to everything is that caster mobs will move into melee range and just start attacking the ice, as will everything else. This gives you a coral method to use when facing casters as well. If you happen to be using the Glyph of Ice Block (level 30) then every time you use Ice Block it resets/removes the cooldown on Frost Nova so that you can immediately cast Frost Nova again. If my pull has gone bad I’ll use Ice Block just to let everyone come to me and start all over again.

Another thing to note about Ice Block is that it gives you a great opportunity to change the direction you’re heading after a Pull. When you go to initiate your Coral you can use Ice Block to do it and then rotate your camera to take a look around the area. Find which direction is clear of mobs so that you know which way you’re running, and have that be the direction you go when you pop out to initiate your Freeze. Playing with an AoE Mage was the reason I turned off the Smart Pivot option in my UI > Camera options. If you’re not familiar with that, it’s what causes your camera to rotate to the direction your character is facing if you rotate the camera with a click-and-drag left click. It allows me to look in any direction, for as long as I want, without having to hold down my mouse button to keep it there. If you aren’t aware, the default settings allow you to hold down both the left and right mouse buttons to run, and when doing that it causes you to run whichever direction the mouse moves. So if you hold down the two mouse buttons coming out of an Ice Block you will run the direction that your camera is facing instead of the direction that your character is facing. When you do it, go ahead and shake the mouse left and right just a hair when you first come out because it’s the movement of the mouse while the right button is down that forces your character to turn that way, but the turn is instant so once the character takes off running the way you want them to you can stop moving the mouse and use whatever method(s) of movement you use normally.

Explanation
Because we’ve combined Frostbite with Improved Blizzard, we have the chance to constantly freeze the mobs in place during your Blizzard. That is why Frostbite is so essential to a good Frost leveling spec even though so many other people claim to hate it. If you find that Frostbite is messing up your pulls then the answer to that is simple, remove your Frost Armor before you pull. If you don’t have Frost Armor up (or Ice Barrier after level 40) then you aren’t going to freeze the mobs in place during a pull because there are not chill effects to make it happen.

I personally keep my Frost Armor spell on all the time, regardless of whether or not it might proc Frostbite and “ruin” my pulls, because I can handle the pulls that other mages apparently feel are dangerous. As I said, if my pull goes a bit bad, then I’ll just Ice Block and let them mobs come to me and then Frost Nova once the Ice Block is over. The duration of Ice Block lasts longer than all of your freezing abilities, so the mobs will break free before your Ice Block wears off. If you use the Glyph of Ice Block then your Frost Nova will already be available when IB wears off so you pop your Frost Nova and then jump right back into the steps above starting at #4-Distance.

If none of those options work because something else comes along and fouls it all up, then welcome to being in a world you don’t control! In this case, put your true mage skills to the test and kick the crap out of them anyway. You’ve got a ton of tools at your disposal to handle the mobs you’re facing, so put them to use. If you need to sheep one, then do it. If you need to Cone of Cold to try to proc Frostbite for Blizzard, then do it. If you need to run around in circles while you wait for Frost Nova to cool down again, then do it. If you want to Arcane Explosion spam hoping to slay them all anyway, then do it. If you took the Glyph of Evocation at 20 as I suggested, then try to run around until Frost Nova is up again, freeze them in place, and then hit your Evocation to restore 60% of your health and mana, and then slay them all.

If the crap hits the fan, then turn the sucker on high and start flinging that crap wherever you can until you’re either the last one standing or you’re all alone in the graveyard. These are the moments that help you grow more confident in your ability to solo content, or that teach you what mistakes not to make again.

I love screwing up an AoE pull with way more mobs than I could take on otherwise and still pull it off without a single Blizzard being cast. I’ve taken out 8 mobs with nothing but Frost Novas, Cones of Cold, and Fire Blasts while running around in circles because my attempts to freeze the mobs kept missing or not freezing. It’s not always easy, but it sure is fun when you come out of it still standing.

Macro Suggestions
There are a few new macros to bring to your attention at this point.

Counterspell: Cancel whatever spell you might be casting and immediately cast Counterspell.
#showtooltip
/stopcasting
/cast Counterspell

Ice Block: Stop whatever you’re doing and cast Ice Block
#showtooltip
/stopcasting
/cast Ice Block

Sometimes a big spell is about to go off and it needs to not happen. If stopping that spell is potentially more important than casting the one you’re on, then make the call and counter the spell. Heals and Mana Burns are the primary target for this unless you’re low on health and need to stop a dps spell from killing you.

Ice Block sometimes has to be cast on the fly simply to save your life rather than to help you in your AoE grinding. When that is the case, don’t bother with trying to get that one last spell off, just throw the barrier up and deal with the situation once it wears off.

Talent Points and Glyphs: Level 21-39

Starting at level 21, this is how I would suggest spending your talent points.
Ice Floes +1 (3/3) Reduces the cooldown of Frost Nova, Cone of Cold, Ice Block, and Icy Veins by 20%.

Piercing Ice 3/3 +2/4/6% damage to all Frost spells.

Shatter 3/3 +17/34/50% critical strike chance against targets who are frozen.

Arctic Reach 2/3 +14/20% range to Frost Bolt, Ice Lance, Deep Freeze, and Blizzard spells and +20% radius to Frost Nova and Cone of Cold spells.

Cold Snap 1/1 Resets the cooldown of all Frost Spells.

Icy Veins 1/1 +20% spell haste and reduces pushback on channeled spells by 100% for 20 seconds.

Frost Channeling 3/3 -4/7/10% Mana cost of all Frost spells and reduces threat generated by Frost spells by 4/7/10%.

Winter’s Chill 3/3 Gives +3 chance to crit with Frostbolt, and a 33/66/100% chance that your Frost spells will increase your chance to crit the target by 1%, stacks up to 5 times.

Cold As Ice 2/2 Reduces the cooldown of your Cold Snap, Ice Barrier, and Summon Water Elemental spells by 10/20%.

Ice Floes is simply there to reduce the time on our cooldowns. Every spell that it effects is useful for AoE grinding as well as leveling in general, so reducing the cooldowns on those is great. Piercing Ice is just a general increase to all of our damage; the more damage you do, the few spells you have to cast. Shatter is going to increase the chance to crit when targets are frozen by 50%. That’s a huge boost to our crit and since every spell you’re going to use has a chance of freezing your target, that means you’ve got a whole lot of potential for landing crits. Shatter is the reason why we want Frostbite.

Arctic Reach helps with the range at which we can cast our spells. That means you can get off more Frostbolts before an enemy can close in on you, and it means you can cast your Blizzards from a greater distance as well. In addition to that it increases the radius of Frost Nova and Cone of Cold. The increased radius is crucial to what you do as a Frost Mage, but it’s also a hard thing to judge because neither of these spells shows you visibly how large their radius is to being with. It’s something you’re going to have to learn on your own and just become aware of. With practice you’ll start picking it up instinctively and you’ll just know when you can catch someone with it and when you can’t.

Cold Snap is easily one of the best talents you ever get. It completely resets all of your Frost spells and makes them available to you again. So you can blow all of your cooldowns, hit Cold Snap, and they’re all right back ready to use again. Icy Veins is a great spell for two reasons: 1 the increase spell haste means all of your Blizzard damage happens in a shorter amount of time (or other spells if you’re fighting single mobs), and 2 removing the effect of pushback means that you get the full bang from your mana-buck from your Blizzard even if you’re getting punched in the face while you do it. I don’t cast it on every Blizzard, but there’s nothing wrong with using it every chance you get. The haste from Icy Veins also works on your Evocation, by the way, so if you need to refill your life/mana in a pinch that’s the way to get it done.

Frost Channeling is last up on the list. The reduced mana here is the primary reason for taking the talent as Blizzard is a huge mana cost spell. The reduced threat is nice when you’re running with groups though it serves no purpose at all when soloing. Winter’s Chill is a stacking debuff on the target that gives you an additional 1-5% chance to crit each time you hit them with a Frost spell. The extra crit chance goes for all spells, not just Frost, but Frost spells are what stacks it from 1-5%. Cold As Ice is strictly to lower the time on your cooldowns.

Glyphs for Leveling
The only glyph slot that is going to open up for you at this level range will open up at level 30.

I recommend the Glyph of Ice Block for level 30 which resets your Frost Nova cooldown when you use Ice Block. It’s great for AoE grinding so that you can make sure that your pulls go off as smoothly as possible.

Some people prefer to go with Mage Armor here instead to get mana regeneration during combat, but since I prefer using Frost Armor I don’t personally recommend it. Since I can summon my own water on the fly and have mana gems I don’t really care about regenerating mana during combat. There’s nothing wrong with it, it’s just not my personal play style.

Gearing Up for Spellcasting
Your gear priorities don’t change: stack Spell Power and Intellect, take Stam/Hit/Crit when you can find it, and the other things don’t really matter. Hit becomes increasingly important as you level, so take it when you see it if it’s not going to cost you too much Spell Power or Int.

Again, Tailoring can provide a lot of useful upgrades for you around this level so you might want to check with a Tailor if you aren’t one yourself.

You are still going to be more likely to find a good staff at these levels that a one hander plus an off hand item, but just go with whichever you find that can give you better stats. A lot of the Inscription off-hand items open up during this level range which can give you additional spell power, so if you find a nice off hand go ahead and take it, but you’re still more likely to find a better staff overall.

And as always, keep an eye out for good wands that provide stats. If you find that you are actually using your staff for anything other than killing off mobs that are low on health, then you’re probably doing something wrong; like using Mana Shield for anything other than PvP.

Suggested Instances
I would highly suggest in your twenties that you run through either Deadmines (VC) or Shadowfang Keep (SFK) (both, if you can manage it) for good gear during those levels. You can find a staff, gloves and ring in VC, and excellent robes in SFK that will last you well into your 30’s.

In your thirties, Scarlet Monastery is the place to be. You will get gear from here that will last you into your 50’s. You can get inside the doors of all four sections at level 20 if you have someone run you through, or you can start joining LFG for it at level 28. For a mage you can find shoulders or an off-hand item in SM:Graveyard, a great robe and an excellent staff in SM:Library, and while SM:Armory offers very little, there are a couple of items in SM:Cathedral that can really help you out as well. Primarily SM:GY and SM:Lib are the areas for you to focus on, and both of them can be ran with a group of people around level 30 with little problem. Especially with your AoE skills.

Edit: (10/29/09) Added level listing for spending talent points.
Edit: (10/30/09) Finished Ice Block section near the spell description at the top and added Ice Block information to General Tactics section as well.

Posted in World of Warcraft Tagged: AoE, Frost, Leveling, Mage, Run Through

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In sticking with my normal routine here, I’m going to break the Mage leveling down into smaller blocks rather than lumping them all together. I already have a Mage sitting at level 80 that I have not bothered to play in about eight months, and I am currently leveling another mage on my wife’s Alliance server, Durotan-US.

I posted a while back about grinding rep grinding on my mage and getting Exalted with Darnassus at level 31, but I have not yet covered the process of leveling the character.

If you took the time to look at my post on Motivations Assessments then you’ll see that I’m a mechanics-driven guy. I like to plan out my character before I even bother rolling him. I like to know my spec, my gear, professions, where I’m going to level, instances I want to run, recipes or mats that need to be farmed to make them better or help ease a hard task, or whatever.

Part of that whole process of planning out my characters generally involves taking a look at information on blogs and on forums. I like to get a general idea of what other people are doing in case a change that I missed or had forgotten about has changed how something works or in case I just don’t know how to play the class or build to begin with. For the most part, the information I find there is useful, but there’s one big exception that just really bothers me: Frost Mages.

A lot of what you see on the Frost Mage is actually useful, it just isn’t as useful as it could be. Everywhere you look for information on the Frost Mage and how to level with them using AoE, you find some very key bits of information that people seem to agree with and support, and yet…they’re wrong.

So not only am I going to be covering the leveling process of the mage in this series, but I am going to dispel some of the many myths concerning Frost Mage leveling like talents and rotations that people tell you to avoid which actually slows down your leveling, what spells you shouldn’t use even though they all say you should, and how to realize that even though you may wear cloth armor your ice is even thicker than plate.

Choosing a Race
Mages have a pretty wide variety of races available to use. Alliance has Human, Gnome, and Draenei while Horde has Troll, Undead, and Blood Elf.

Each of the available races has is pros and cons for the class, and in the overall scheme of things you really can’t go wrong with any of them since the “cons” really make very little difference at all. But, since I did just do a whole series on all of the races, I will actually take the time to point out the pros and cons of each in relation to the Mage class in particular.

Human: High starting Intellect (23) for a large mana pool. Diplomacy to help with Reputation grinding throughout the game, and Every Man For Himself to break you out of snares so you don’t get stuck in melee.

Gnome: Very high starting Intellect (27) plus the Expansive Mind racial bonus gives you the largest starting mana pool in the game. As with the humans, Escape Artist allows you to break snares to prevent being stuck in melee.

Draenei: High starting Intellect (24) for a large mana pool. Gift of the Naaru provides a racial heal that you would otherwise lack, and Heroic Presence helps you hit with your spells more often.

Troll: Below-average starting Intellect (19) gives you the smallest mana pool for a mage, but Berserking gives you 10-30% faster casting time when used.

Undead: Above-average starting Intellect (21) gives you a decent starting mana pool. Cannibalize allows you to restore up to 35% of your health over 10 seconds if you have a dead humanoid body near you.

Blood Elf: Very high starting Intellect (27) gives you the second highest starting mana pool in the game. Arcane Torrent allows you to instantly restore 6% of your total mana every 2 minutes.

As the saying goes, play whatever you want to play. From a purely mechanics stand point, Humans and Gnomes are your best bet for Alliance, and Blood Elves and Undead are the top two for Horde. I personally prefer Human and Undead of all the ones listed.

Important Spells
Mages get tons of spells, and I would expect nothing less from a class of that name. Luckily, the majority of them are actually useful.

Going from Left to Right, Top to Bottom we have the following:
Levels 1-12


Fireball, Frostbolt, Fire Blast, Frost Nova, Arcane Intellect, Conjure Water, Polymorph, Arcane Missiles

Fireball is your heavy hitter early on and it’s the only offensive spell you start out with. It’s damage is high throughout the entire game, but it has a longer cast time than Frostbolt. It’s a great spell to use for pulling mobs where its long cast time makes little difference.

Frostbolt will be your bread and butter spell during your entire career as a Frost Mage and will be the spell you cast more than any other. It doesn’t hit as hard as Fireball, but it does have a faster cast speed and it slows enemies down as well.

Fire Blast is a great finishing move, your only instant cast spell with decent damage for a single target until higher levels.

Frost Nova is used to freeze the mobs within its radius in place so that they cannot move. Great for both crowd control, offensive, and defensive purposes. It is also a key part of Frost Mage AoE grinding.

Arcane Intellect is your primary buff spell that you should never be without. Trainable at level 1, and provides you with a bonus to your Intellect which means more mana and more spell crit.

Conjure Water is a big gold saver over time and is how you never have to worry about carrying enough water around with you to restore your mana. Cast it when you first log, while you’re standing around chatting with friends, checking your mail, scanning the auction house, etc. Get a stack or two worth of your water and then go about your business. I never have less than a full stack of water and oftentimes have 2 full stacks though I’ll end up using less than a stack during an extended play period.

Polymorph Your primary crowd control used to turn a single target into a harmless animal for 20 seconds. Use it to even the playing field with how many mobs you’re facing, use it to pull, annoy players of the opposing faction, or use it to run away from combat.

Arcane Missiles A channeled spell that does great damage if you manage to get the full channel time out of it, or a huge waste of mana if you are not able to fully channel it. A potentially deadly spell when used in addition to frost spells.

Levels 12-20

Frostbolt, Fire Blast, Frost Nova, Blizzard, Frost Armor, Evocation, Arcane Explosion, Blink

Nothing new about the first few spells up there.

Blizzard you get at level 20 and it is the key to your AoE grinding. It has a high mana cost, but with its high damage and large radius the cost is well worth it when facing multiple mobs.

Frost Armor you get early on in your playing and though it’s protection does help keep you alive when enemies manage to move within melee range of you, the true beauty of the spell comes when you properly spend your talent points turning it from a purely defensive spell to both offensive and defensive at the same time (more on that in Part II).

Evocation is key to reducing your downtime by allowing you to restore 60% of your total mana over a few seconds. It is a channeled spell so should only be used when you are not getting hit (unless you have no mana and need to get whatever you can). When you use the Glyph of Evocation as well you also restore 60% of your total health over the channeled time as well.

Arcane Explosion an instant cast AoE spell that’s great for finishing off mobs that are low on health. The spell is very taxing on your mana and should not be used any more than you need to, but it is a very helpful spell when utilized correctly.

Blink is a ten yard teleport that can save your life, shorten your travel time, or give you an advantage in combat.

Teleports

Alliance (left column): Stormwind, Iron Forge, Exodar
Horde (right column): Orgrimmar, Undercity, Silvermoon

Each of these spells is gained at level 20 for your respective faction, allowing you to teleport yourself to the respective city. At higher levels you will be able to open portals allowing your party members to travel to the chosen city as well.

Leveling 1-6: Starting Zone
Rotation Option 1: Fireball, Frostbolt, Frostbolt, Frostbolt, Frostbolt
Rotation Option 2: Fireball, Frostbolt, Fireball, Fireball, Frostbolt
Rotation Option 3: Fireball, Fireball, Fireball, Fireball, Fireball
Explanation: You start out with just Fireball and Frost Armor, with Arcane Intellect being trainable for 9 copper at level 1 as well. Initially you’ll just Fireball the snot out of everything until it’s dead. Fireball hits harder than Frostbolt, but it also has a higher mana cost and a longer cast time as well. I stick to Rotation 1, personally. But you don’t get Frostbolt until level 4 so for the first few levels you have no option other than #3.

Frost Armor is a decent armor buff for you and it slows mobs down when they hit you. It’s not really necessary to have it on at this low level because nothing has a chance of killing you anyway, but it will save your life later on so you might as well get used to having it on at all times. Arcane Intellect is trainable at level 1, so as soon as you have a few coppers in your belt pouch go grab that for +3 Int, which equates to +45 mana, which at this level is an additional 2 spells worth of mana.

If you know how to kite, then you may want to start practicing your kiting while using Frostbolt. Basically you cast the spell and wait for it to leave your hand, and the second it does so you start moving away from your target. The idea is to use the slowing effect of Frostbolt to constantly keep yourself out of your opponent’s reach. If you’re a kiting veteran you can pretty easily make it all the way through level 6 and out of your starting zone without ever taking a single point of damage.

Leveling 6-12: Surrounding Map
Rotation Option 1: Frostbolt, Frostbolt, Frostbolt, Fire Blast
Rotation Option 2: Fireball, Frostbolt, Frostbolt, Frostbolt
Rotation Option 3: Frostbolt, Arcane Missiles, Fireblast, Wand
Explanation: At level 6 you get Fire Blast, and at level 8 Arcane Missiles. Both of them are often considered to cost more mana than they are worth, though Arcane Missiles is more accepted now than it was in previous patches.

This is the level bracket where you find a lot of different advice on what sort of spells you should be casting. A lot of mages like to keep using Fireball as their pulling spell and then move into Frostbolts, but I personally step away from using Fireball at this level and don’t bother going back unless I’m bored and just want to change things up a bit.

I use Fire Blast from level 6 all the way through level 80, it’s my finishing move, it’s something I use to pull when I’m AoE grinding, it’s constantly on my bar bound to my 4-key and it never leaves. Some people don’t like it, some think it’s mana cost is too high or it’s damage is too low, but regardless of what their opinion is I think it’s a wonderful spell.

Rotation 3 up there is one that I never bothered with before but found to be extremely effective this time around. Arcane Missiles is a channeled spell that shoots out little purple missiles at the chosen mob. It’s an expensive spell, but as long as you get to channel the whole thing then you pretty well get your money’s worth. If you don’t get to use the full channel time then it’s a definite mana drain and not worth the cost. I found though that I was able to use Frostbolt once, follow it up immediately with Arcane Missiles, and by the time the channel was up the mob was either already dead or within a single Fire Blast or one shot from my wand away from dying.

Level 10 is where you get one of your primary spells for the rest of the game, Frost Nova. When you first get it the main benefit that you get from it is just keeping mobs from closing into melee range with you while you back away, but later on it’s going to provide you with the foundation of your AoE grinding as well as significantly increasing both your chance to crit and the amount of damage that you deal when you crit due to the talent points that you invest.

I also want to point out that level 12 is when you can learn Slow Fall. This is one of the best utility spells in the game if you take the time to learn how to make use of it. I get the minor glyph for this spell at level 15 and it never gets changed. It can save your life in both PvE and PvP, it can save you time and effort when you’re traveling, it can screw with other players if you feel so inclined, etc. There are a lot of uses for this spell, and regardless of it being utility rather than dps or defense, it’s one of my favorite spells in the game from any class.

Leveling 12-20: Secondary Zone
Rotation Option 1: Frostbolt, Frostbolt, Frostbolt, Fire Blast
Rotation Option 2: Fireball, Frostbolt, Frostbolt, Frostbolt
Rotation Option 3: Frostbolt, Arcane Missiles, Fireblast, Wand
Explanation: Basically the same as before.

You don’t see a whole lot of changes in what you do or in what spells are available during these levels, so it’s pretty much more of the same thing.

At level 14 you are introduced to Arcane Explosion which is a decent AoE spell that is centered around the caster, but it is also one of the worst mana draining spells you get throughout the entire game. It does go on my primary action bar and it does stay there the entire game, but it only gets used in specific situations. The damage on it is not great, so I tend to use it either to pull multiple mobs at a time or to finish off mobs that are low on health and other spells like Fire Blast are on cooldown. After I start AoE grinding, I often use Arcane Explosion to finish off the group of mobs when their health is low enough that casting a second Blizzard is a waste.

At level 16 your Arcane Missiles reaches Rank 2 and gets a pretty significant boost in damage. I actually used Rotation 3 to kill a lot of mobs at this level just because I did not expect it to be nearly as effective as it was and I was surprised by that compared to when I leveled my previous mage. I pretty well stop using Arcane Missiles at level 20 in all things except pvp.

Find a rotation that works for you during these levels and stick to it. A big part of being a mage involves spamming the same buttons over and over until things die. Adding kiting and other forms of movement into your combat does a lot for keeping the mage an interesting class to play and helping you be ready to react to whatever situation you might find yourself in. Nothing sucks more than plinking off a single mob only to find another mob walk up and agro you from behind. Getting used to being able to move on the fly early on will end up saving your life later in the game. It helps to always be aware of your surroundings.

After you hit level 20 you finally find yourself able to AoE grind effectively and much of your world begins to change as you find out that you go from spamming a couple of keys to kill a single mob turns into casting a handful of spells to kill an entire group of them.

General Tactics
There are a lot of different tactics that you can employ as a Frost Mage. Frost Mages have more potential for crowd control than any other class. Your primary spells slow down your targets and after spending talent points even have the chance of freezing them in place all together. You have Polymorph that allows you to change a target into a harmless animal for a time, and spells such as Blink (level 20) allow you to move around the field faster than your opponents.

Kiting is a great tactic to use for any class that can actually do it, and only a Hunter has the potential to kite mobs better than a Mage. Practice kiting early on and get used to using it.

Prior to level 20 your options for taking on multiple mobs at once are fairly limited, but you do have some options. If you know that you are going to pull multiple mobs whether you want to or not, likely because the mobs are right next to each other, then the best way to take on those mobs is to cast Frostbolt on the target that you want to kill first and as soon as you start casting the spell go ahead and click on the other mob to target him as we get ready to use a crowd control spell on it.

I use the Quartz addon to tell me when I can start casting another spell but if you don’t have access to an addon like that then just start spamming the button for your next cast which will be a crowd control spell. If you have Polymorph already, then that’s the spell to cast on that second mob and as soon as you start casting it you need to retarget the original mob. By doing this you are going to slow down the first mob by hitting them with Frostbolt (if it misses, it misses, just go with the flow), the second mob is going to agro you as soon as your Frostbolt hits/misses that first mob and come running after you. Before he takes more than a couple of steps though he’s going to get hit with your crowd control which essentially takes him out of the fight until the spell wears off which should be more than enough for you to kill the first mob.

After the crowd control hits it’s time to focus fire on the first target and take them out. If you managed to start this type of battle off from a distance, which you should have unless you had no other option, then it’s likely that using this method along with some amount of kiting will allow you to take out both mobs without taking any damage yourself. Another option you can consider in this type of battle is to go ahead and use Frost Nova when the first mob starts to get within range of you. You can then spend a few seconds running away from the first mob and then turning back around to Frostbolt them again before they are able to start moving.

Facing melee mobs is your specialty and where you can really show overwhelming strength because of your many slowing and freezing spells. Caster mobs are slightly harder since they are going to hit you just as much as you hit them, but that’s where a couple of your other spells come into play, primarily Dampen Magic (which lowers the amount of damage you take from spells) and Counterspell (which stops a spell from being cast), though you will have to wait a few levels before these are made available to you.

Macro Suggestions
Because the mage has so many spells that he can use, and all of them have their various uses, I use a lot of macros when playing a mage. Some of them are just for saving space, some are for being able to change from one type of damage to another for when you find thing like elemental that are immune to your main damage type.

As I’ve mentioned in other posts before, I have a standard that I follow when setting up my action bars so that similar spells from each class can be found on the same keys. So when I’m in the habit of playing my mage and then step over to playing my paladin I don’t end up casting the wrong spells just because my fingers want to react a certain way.

The first Mage Macro that I make is a simple one for Fireball:
#showtooltip
/startattack
/cast Fireball

At level 4 I add a similar macro for Frostbolt:
#showtooltip
/startattack
/cast Frostbolt

After I get more levels and decide to remove Fireball from my normal rotation I replace both of those with a single macro instead:
#showtooltip
/startattack
/cast [modifier:alt] Fireball; Frostbolt

The macro above will cast Frostbolt by default, but will change to Fireball if I hold Alt when I cast the spell.

Macros like the one above are time savers and space savers (the third option is anyway). They set your character to attack the target with your melee weapon and then start casting a spell. The benefit of that is that you will attack the mob when they get within melee range when you aren’t casting a spell. It also helps you to target mobs without having to click on them or tab to start off as it will auto-target the nearest mob that is in front of you and within range if you do not already have a target selected.

Talent Points and Glyphs: Level 10-20
This is the talent build that I recommend for leveling with your Frost Mage up to level 20. As you progress higher in your levels a lot of the talents that are only getting some points right now will be capped and some talents that are being skipped now will be filled in. Frost Mages get a lot of use out of their talent tree.

3/3 Frostbite: Gives all of your Frost spells a 5/10/15% chance to freeze the target in place for 5 seconds.

2/3 Ice Flows: Reduces the cooldown of Frost Nova, Cone of Cold, Ice Block, and Icy Veins by 7/14%.

3/3 Ice Shards: Increases the critical hit damage of your Frost spells by 33/66/100%.

2/3 Precision: Reduces the mana cost and improves the hit chance of all spells by 1/2%.

1/3 Improved Blizzard: Adds a chill effect to your Blizzard spell reducing the target’s speed by 25% for 1.5 seconds.

Frostbite is the most controversial of these talent points and the one that most guides tell you to avoid when trying to AoE grind with your Frost Mage. Where they feel that it can ruin their pulls, I’m here to tell you that it’s going to save your life as well as help you kill faster which reduces the mana you have to spend and because of that reduce your downtime. Ice Flows reduces the cooldown of some of your most beneficial spells which also reduces your down time.

Ice Shards is going to double the amount of damage that you deal with your Frost spells when you crit. At this level that’s just a nice little bonus when you manage to crit, but in a few levels you are going to greatly increase your chance to get crits with spells while your target is frozen (which is why Frostbite is especially powerful in AoE grinding). Precision gives you a better chance to hit which is always nice, but it also reduces the mana cost of all of your spells so that you can keep on grinding for longer periods of time. The 3% reduction might not be all that significant, but it’s going to add up over time.

Improved Blizzard is going to add a chill effect when it hits which will make your AoE grinding that much more effect, and it will give Blizzard more chances to proc Frostbite on the target which will freeze them in place, which in turn will give Shatter (the talent that increase crit chance on frozen targets I mentioned above) a chance to proc, which then gives you the benefit of doubled crit damage from Ice Shards.

As I said before, you will be filling out these talent points as you gain more levels, so do not worry too much right now about the fact that you are leaving some of them incomplete.

Glyphs for Leveling
Mages have a decent number of glyphs to choose from, and most of them are actually pretty good. Some of them are crap, which is the case for all classes.

You get both a Major and Minor glyph slot when you hit level 15 with any character. I personally start off with the following Glyphs:

Glyph of Frost Nova [Major] Increases the amount of damage that a target can take before breaking the freeze effect of Frost Nova by 20%.

Glyph of Evocation [Major] Also grants you 60% of your total health over the channeled time of your Evocation spell.

Glyph of Slowfall [Minor] Removes the reagent requirement of the Slowfall spell.

Glyph of Frost Nova is going to help you to some extent prior to level 20. It is not a great glyph that you will use throughout your entire career, but it will help give you better control while leveling. I use this glyph when I hit 15 and I replace it with Evocation when I get to level 20. If you don’t feel like wasting the glyph then you can either wait or use another one in its place, or if you’d like you can use it instead of Evocation.

Glyph of Evocation changes the spell so that you restore 60% of both your health and mana over the channel duration. Being able to restore 60% of both every 3 minutes is huge for reducing your down time and it can be used in the middle of combat just as easily as it can between pulls. You can use it after casting Frost Nova or Polymorph to allow you to regain most of your health and mana in the middle of a big fight, a bad pull, or when an unexpected enemy paths into you in the middle of a fight. I use this glyph at level 20 and keep it there until I get close to level 80.

Another option that is open to you for your Major glyph is the Glyph of Frostbolt which increases the damage of Frostbolt by 5%. The down side of the glyph is that it also removes the chill effect of Frostbolt, which is one of the primary reasons for using it in the first place. I do not suggest the glyph, but if you find that dealing more damage is more important to you than controlling your targets then it is a good replacement when fighting single mobs.

Most of the Mage’s minor glyphs suck pretty bad. Some increase spell durations, some reduce mana costs, and others have no effect on the game (such as the Glyph of Penguin).

I personally pick Slowfall because I use the spell constantly. Slowfall can save you travel time, can save you from a fall that would have otherwise killed you, or it can be used to great benefit in PvP. Taking away the reagent requirement for the spell allows you to cast it whenever you want to for nothing more than its low mana cost. At this level of play I would not consider any other minor glyph to be more valuable.

Gearing Up for Spellcasting
Your primary stat is, was, and forever will be – Spell Power. It’s the bread and butter of everything you do. If your damage sucks then you suck, so stack this whenever you can.

Next in line is going to be Intellect for your mana pool and spell crit. If you don’t have mana then you aren’t going anywhere except to the spirit healer. A tank needs plate armor (or thick fur) to survive, and you need mana. It doesn’t matter how much health you have or how much damage you can deal if you don’t have the mana to put any of your spells to use.

A lot of other things can help you as well, Stamina for health, Hit so that your spells actually do what they are intended to do, Crit to make those spells hit even harder, and so on. That’s where you should be looking after Spell Power and Intellect are covered.

Tailoring is a great source of gear throughout the various levels, especially if you plan on solo questing and solo AoE grinding your way to the top. You can generally find better gear in instances than you can from tailoring when you are starting out, but you can certainly weave that cloth to fill in any gaps you might have.

Whether you use a staff or you go with a one handed weapon and an off hand item is mostly up to you. Use whatever will give you better stats overall and go with it. Typically the low level staffs will be better than other options, but just use whatever you have on hand that provides the most benefit.

Keep a close eye on wands that are available to you and be sure to get one as soon as possible. You can equip the lowest level wand in the game at level 5 and it’s basically a free source of ranged damage. A lot of wands, starting in your teen levels also have other stats on them if you are willing to look around a bit to find them.

Part II: Levels 21-39

Posted in World of Warcraft Tagged: Frost, Leveling, Mage

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[Update: One thing that I didn't mention in this guide is that even though you can train Aquatic Form from your trainer now instead of having to do the quest for it, I STRONGLY suggest that you do the quest anyway. You receive the Aquarius Belt for completing the quest which has some excellent stats on it.

I will add more detail on this in the next post, but for now I am updating this one to include this information at the top so that new or repeat viewers do not miss out on this excellent quest reward.]

Leveling a druid can be a hard thing for a lot of people to do. The leveling gets easier when you hit 20, but getting through those teens is where most people delete their character instead of pushing through it.

Similar to the priest, this is the third time I have tried to level a druid. The first one was deleted at level 12, the second I got up to level 24 and though I did not delete the character I never bothered playing it again either. The mistake that most people make, myself included until now, when leveling their druid through their teens is switching over to Bear Form at level 10. To be as honest as I can here, Bear Form sucks. It does get better, but when you get it it sucks. You will have much more success sticking to spell casting than you will being a bear during your teens.

Important Spells
If you’re just getting started with a druid, take note of these icons and remember them. These are the primary spells that are going to get you to level 20. There are three others worth mentioning as well, but these are the icons to remember.

The two on top are your buff spells (Mark of the Wild, Thorns), the two in the middle are your damage spells (Wrath, Moonfire), and the two on the bottom are your utility spells (Rejuvenation, Entangling Roots). I will be discussing these spells in depth down below. These aren’t the only spells you will use, as you do/will have two more healing spells as well as a resurrection spell, and another buff/utility spell (Nature’s Grasp, mentioned below). But those six spells are most of what you will be casting.

Leveling 1-6: Starting Zone

Rotation Option 1: Wrath, Wrath, Attack/Wrath
Rotation Option 2: Wrath, Moonfire, Wrath/Attack
Explanation: At this level Moonfire is a huge mana-sink and most mobs will be dead long before its full damage can take place. I suggest you save your mana and your time and stick with option 1. If you do cast Moonfire, then make sure you cast it either to pull or immediately after you pull to get the most out of its use.

As with all classes that I level, I prefer to go and grind mobs as soon as I log in with the character until I reach level 2. I don’t accept quests or do anything else, I just go kill things until I gain a level. There are a couple of reasons why I do this. First, the trash that drops from those first 8-10 mobs that you need to kill to reach level 2 will sell for enough to pay for your first ability and give you some spare copper as well. All characters have a spell that they can train at level 1, they just don’t start with the cash to do it with. Second, this helps you to reach level 6 by the time you finish your starting zone to help maximize your experience gained from turning in quests.

During your first six levels there are not a whole lot of options open to you. You start out with only Wrath and your Auto-Attack for damage, and that’s pretty much what you will be using for most of your leveling. You do get Moonfire at level 1 if you can pay for the training, but it’s high mana cost is significantly higher than Wrath so try to focus on Wrath so that you can minimize your downtime.

You also start off with one of your buff spells, Mark of the Wild. The main reason I prefer to use it is because of the bonus it gives to your stats. The armor bonus doesn’t matter much to me, but I do enjoy more health/mana.

Most mobs will die with just a couple of Wrath casts plus an attack or two. Some mobs might take three Wraths to take down instead, and that’s fine too. In early levels I tend to rotate between killing a mob with Wrath x3, then killing another 1-2 mobs by doing Wrath x2 followed by attacks, and then repeating that cycle. Since the chances of you dying in your starting area are fairly small, I use my health as another resource while leveling. I don’t mind letting something beat on me for a few seconds for the sake of conserving mana for the next fight. When both my health and my mana are low, that’s when I sit down to eat and drink.

When you get to the quests in your starting zone that has you facing mobs that are hostile (Red bars instead of Yellow), then you can go ahead and add Moonfire into your rotation if you’d like. Personally, I try to only use it in my starting zones when a mob with low health runs away from me or when I know that killing that mob is going to give me a level. Because Moonfire is an instant cast that does deal some damage right away, I do use it when my health gets dangerously low and I need to finish the mob off quickly. That way I don’t have to die, and the mob goes down faster so I can eat/drink sooner.

At level 4 you receive your first Heal over Time (HoT) spell, Rejuvenation. This is my preferred method of keeping my health up while leveling. A lot of people suggest casting it on yourself right before you start combat, I personally just use it whenever I feel a need to do so. Since casting spells is going to be your fastest method of killing mobs right now I would at least wait to cast it until after a mob has already started to attack you in melee. Generally, I cast it after I kill my current target or on my way to my next target. If I start to drop below 50% health while fighting mobs I will cast it then as well, but that doesn’t happen very often in the starting area.

Leveling 6-12: Surrounding Map

Rotation Option 1: Wrath, Entangling Roots, Wrath, Attack/Wrath
Rotation Option 2: Wrath, Moonfire, Entangling Roots, Wrath/Attack
Explanation: You don’t get Entangling Roots until level 8, but when you do you start to get a lot more control over combat.

At level 6 you get your second buff spell, Thorns. This spell is going to deal damage to every mob that attacks you. It’s basically free damage for the price of getting beat up. And since you’re going to get beat on anyway, you might as well get paid for it with the blood of your enemies. Thorns only lasts for 10 minutes, and I honestly forget to refresh the thing all the time. It’s damage isn’t great, but every little bit helps.

Until level 8 you will play just like you did from levels 1-6, sticking to Wrath as your primary source of damage.

At level 8 you get one of your key spells, Entangling Roots. It’s both an offensive spell and a defensive spell all wrapped up into one. The damage it deals isn’t significant, but it is there as a nice little added bonus. The reason for using this spell though is that it snares the target and prevents them from moving. So you can pull the target with Wrath, snare them with ER, and then Wrath them 1-2 more times to finish them off.

I still hold back on casting Moonfire at this stage because of its mana cost, but if you do decide that you enjoy using it, try to cast it before Entangling Roots. ER breaks after its duration has expired, or after the target has taken a certain amount of damage. Since Moonfire does damage when it hits, it’s better for that initial damage to happen before ER rather than after so that your roots don’t break early.

At level 10 you get one of those spells I mentioned up at the top that I did not include in the picture. The spell is called Nature’s Grasp, and what it does is it casts Entangling Roots for you on the first mob that hits you after you’ve cast it. The spell lasts for 45 seconds and has a 1 minute cooldown on it. The best thing about the spell though is that it has no mana cost. It’s great for use as crowd control in case a hostile mob comes up behind you while you’re fighting another one, or even as just a part of your regular fighting methods. Cast this, Wrath the target twice, and when they hit you they’re stuck. Then you just run away a few steps and turn around to throw another Wrath in their face. It’s an excellent spell, and I use it frequently.

Nature’s Grasp is also a great tool to use when facing fast-moving mobs, like Raptors, who can close into melee range faster than you can get off your second Wrath. Those are the mobs that I usually use Moonfire against as well to help me take them out sooner.

Leveling 12-20: Secondary Zone

Rotation Option 1: Wrath, Moonfire, Entangling Roots, Wrath, Wrath, Attack
Rotation Option 2: Nature’s Grasp, Wrath, Moonfire, Wrath, Entangling Roots, Wrath
Explanation: By now you should have a good enough mana pool that you can throw Moonfire into the mix. Entangling Roots should be part of your rotation now to save yourself from spending mana on healing spells as much, and saves you from having to look for Stamina on your gear as much.

Since I prefer playing Horde, the Barrens is the location of choice for leveling during your teens. Now, most of my toons I prefer to level up elsewhere, but some of your druid quests actually require you to be in the Barrens to do them, so I’d rather just stick to one place.

Barrens is an excellent zone for professions such as Skinning and Herbalism, and it’s pretty decent for leveling your Mining as well. The main reason to level here though, other than the druid quests, is that there are so many quests in the zone and they are all pretty well bundled up in the same areas so that you can easily do several of them at once.

You don’t really get any new spells in these levels to help you go any faster, but you do get more mana which allows you to be a bit more controlling in how combat plays out. Start off with Wrath, hit them with Moonfire, and then Entangling Roots to keep them in place. Entangling Roots will deal damage to them while it holds and Moonfire will continue to tick away their health as well. If the mob has closed in enough to hit you with melee attacks, then back up right after you root them, otherwise I suggest you just stay where you are and throw another Wrath at them. If they still have a lot of hit points left, then continue Wraths until they drop into melee range and then pummel them to finish them off.

If you have plenty of mana to spare and don’t mind a little extra downtime, then you can also go with a full Root ‘n Nuke style of switching between damaging spells and snares. I would suggest using Nature’s Grasp first since it does not have a mana cost, and then pulling with Wrath. As soon as Wrath is cast follow it up with a Moonfire. You have two options at that point, you can either run directly into the mob to get them to attack and trigger your Nature’s Grasp, or you can stay where you are and let them come to you while you nuke them with another Wrath. I generally run to the mob to get NG to proc and keep on running “through” the mob and turning around on the other side to hit them with another Wrath. Once they are snared follow with another Wrath and then cast Entangling Roots on them to root them again. Go back to either casting more Wrath nukes, refreshing your Moonfire, or just letting the damage ticks from ER and Moonfire kill them off for you.

When doing Root ‘n Nuke you have to judge for yourself how many times you need to root and how many times you need to nuke. The only time I have ever needed to root more than twice was when one of them missed. Most of the time I don’t actually need to root a second time and instead will just nuke them again to bring them down. Very few mobs here should take more than 3 Wrath spells and a Moonfire to bring them down, and what extra damage does need to be dealt can usually be covered pretty easy with regular attacks.

Another method of using the Root ‘n Nuke is to just switch off between Wrath and Entangling Roots. You can generally get off two Wrath’s per ER unless you happen to Crit with one. If you use this method then pull the mob using Entangling Roots itself, follow it with a Wrath or two, then reapply ER. Repeat as needed until the mobs are dead. You can throw in a Moonfire to increase the damage they take over time which will allow you to conserve mana a bit by not having to cast Wrath so often.

Play around with the Rooting and Damaging spells that you have until you find a rotation that works for you.

Another bonus to leveling in this area is that it is going to be easier for you to find groups going into Wailing Caverns. The Embrace of the Viper set, frequently referred to as the “Fang” set, is found in WC and it is excellent for getting you geared up and ready to switch over to Cat Form dps at level 20.

With a combination of questing and running through the WC instance, you should easily be able to hit level 20 in the Barrens. My druid is actually sitting at level 25 right now and he still has almost 20 quests that he can do in the zone. I’m not going to keep him there that long, but I mention it to give you an idea of how much experience there is to gain here.

Macro Suggestion
There is really only one Macro that I find helpful at this early level with the Druid, and it’s a very simple one.

#showtooltip Wrath
/startattack
/cast Wrath

It’s a very simple macro, but I use a variation of it on almost every class. This macro makes your character start attacking the target with it’s melee weapon, and then casts Wrath on the target.

This macro does two things:

• First, if you have no target selected then it will select the nearest target in front of you (assuming they are within 40 yards or so) and have your character attack them with your weapon. If you’re not within range to actually hit them with your weapon then your character still stands ready to attack if they do end up closing in to melee range (which they will).
• Second, this macro causes your character to cast Wrath on your target (if possible).

So the main reason to use this macro is really to save yourself the hassle of targeting a mob and then casting a spell. Instead it combines it into a single button. The side benefit of using this though is that since you are playing as a ranged caster, and your roots are going to occasionally break or miss in the first place, you will end up in melee at times. Since the /startattack line is in the macro you will start to hit the mob with your melee weapon as soon as they are in range without having to press any other buttons or take any other actions.

So it serves as a bit of a time saver, and provides a bit of convenience as well.

Talent Points and Glyphs: Level 10-19

You have a little wiggle room in the talent trees, so you can go with anything you feel comfortable with. I chose to go with the build below and I had no trouble at all while I was leveling or while I was running instances as both dps and heals.

I suggest spending these points from top to bottom, left to right.

Glyphs
Glyph of Wrath is really the only major glyph that I see you getting a whole lot of use out of while casting your way through your teens. If you really feel like being a bear then you can go with a different glyph, but I strongly suggest that you stay away from bear and it’s associated glyphs for now.

Glyph of Thorns is going to increase the duration of the spell by 50 minutes, so that it lasts for a full hour instead of just 10 minutes. This is really only a glyph of convenience, but it does help with your damage while things are attacking you so I include it in the guide here.

Personally, I don’t really care about Thorns at this level, I care more about moving around the world quickly. I do that with a druid by using the Glyph of Aquatic Form instead. You get Aquatic Form at level 16 which allows you to breath underwater and also increases your swimming speed by 50%. Normal Swim Speed is 66% of your regular running speed, and Aquatic Form by itself increases that number by 50%, so it becomes 99% by calculation though addons that monitor speed show it to be 100%. The Glyph increases your speed by another 50% (of the base 66%) which would put you at 132% speed, but again those addons actually show you to be at 135% speed in water. So you actually move faster in Aquatic Form than you do when you’re running on land.

So which minor glyph you choose is up to you. Thorns will help you in combat more, but Aquatic Form will help you in transportation more. I personally like to move fast so I go with AF instead of Thorns.

Gearing Up for Spellcasting

When you are looking for gear to help while you’re casting your spells, you want to focus heavily on Spell Power (SP). There is a lot of SP to be found in Tailoring gear, so if you have access to a tailor then you might want to hit them up for some SP gear. It’s also nice to increase your mana pool by getting gear with Intelligence on it, and it never hurts to have a nice health pool from Stamina gear either. At this level I would go for Spell Power above all else, followed by Intelligence, and then whatever you happen to find for the rest. Since Wrath deals Nature Damage, you might want to look for a weapon that adds decent Nature Damage since finding a straight +SP weapon might be hard. Preferably a one-handed weapon such as a mace or dagger, since one of your druid quests in the Barrens is going to reward you with an off-hand item that gives you a very nice mana regeneration.

Level 20: Time for a Respec

When you reach level 20, it’s time to drop that precious gold coin you’ve been working towards for so long and switch over to a feral spec. There are a lot of different ways you can spec, and you can find quite a variety of advice across different forums and blogs. Feel free to look at other suggestions from other sites, but this is the build that I suggest switching to at level 20.

Gearing Up for Feral

The primary stat you should be looking for as Cat DPS is Agility. You do get more Attack Power (AP) from Strength than you do Agility, but Agility is also going to provide you with Crit and help with your Avoidance as well. Stack Agility above all else. Anything that increases your Hit Rating is also going to be good for you since missing is going to make you suck. Strength will help you deal more damage, Stamina gives you more hit points which is nice since you will now be in melee constantly, and so on.

Having a Leatherworker is going to give you the most benefit in the land of Agility stacking, so I suggest heading there for your starting gear. Most of the Fang armor will be better for you than what a Leatherworker can make for your level, but it’s not always easy to get your hands on the full set since the gloves are the only piece that does not bind when you pick it up. My Shaman picked up the entire set with only two runs through WC, but my Druid has been through WC five times now and only has two pieces, one of which are the gloves.

If you look at the Glyphs included in the Feral spec above, you will see that I left Glyph of Thorns as the minor glyph and replaced Glyph of Wrath with Glyph of Rip. You aren’t going to be using Wrath anymore since you now claw everyone’s face off, but Thorns will become more useful with how much time you spend in melee. Glyph of Rip is going to extend the duration of your Rip which is your primary Finishing Move when you start out as a Cat.

Again, I personally stick with Glyph of Aquatic Form as my minor glyph regardless of how much Thorns can help. The only benefit you get from Glyph of Thorns is extra time on it, but since you aren’t using your mana for anything else besides an occasional heal it’s not a big deal to just recast it as needed. Extra movement speed is always a good thing though, so I like making my flippers move faster. Once again the choice is yours, either having Thorns up more consistently to help with damage, or move faster when swimming.

Posted in World of Warcraft Tagged: Druid, Glyph, Leveling, Macro

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If you’re like me, you look for every advantage in the leveling game.  I pick and choose my quests based on efficiency and difficulty.  If I know it’s going to be a tough quest, where I may die in the process, I’ll move on to something that yields the same XP with fewer chances of downtime.  I move from area to area quicker than you should, in order to always be on the cutting edge of XP gains from killing mobs and completing quests.  It’s the little things that add up to get you to the level cap quicker than ever.

I’ve found my next avenue to speed up the leveling game.  With the introduction of Wrath of the Lich King, a number of heirloom items were introduced to assist those leveling their alts.  By gaining tokens from Wintergrasp, and Emblem of Heroism, you can exchange them for gear that levels as you level.  In addition, it provides +10% XP per mob kill or quest turn-in.  Epic.

I choose the cloth shoulders, Exquisite Sunderseer Mantle, since the alt I’m working on is a clothie.  Not only that, but anyone can wear cloth.  So when Jaltar is working to level 90 with the next expansion, he can benefit from these shoulders as well.

Being account bound, you can mail these shoulders around to your characters as you wish.  I’ll be able to use these on all of my alts, to assist them in the leveling process.  I’ll definitely check in once I’m able to utilize them and see a real effect.

What are some of your habits in speeding up the leveling process for your alts?

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