Mage

Nov 3, 2026WoW: Forever update — November 2, 2026

• Imbue Iceknife’s visual has been changed to better convey that it is a Root and not a Stun.
• Frost Blast: This spell has been removed.
• Arcane
  • Missile Barrage is now correctly consumed at the start of the Mage’s Arcane Missiles channel (was consumed at the end).
  • Missile Barrage has been moved to the 2nd row from the 1st row.
  • Arcane Resilience has been moved to the 1st row from the 2nd row. It now allows up to 3 talent points to be spent for a maximum armor increase of 75% of Intellect.
  • Clearcasting is no longer consumed on Arcane Missiles if Missile Barrage is active at the same time.
  • Fixed an issue where Arcane Missles did not proc Clearcasting.
  • Arcane Focus: This talent has been removed, as it is now combined into the talent Precision in the Frost tree.
  • Arcane Blast: Mana cost increase per stack reduced to 100% from 175%. Percent of Intellect as Spell Damage reduced from 15% to 12% per stack. Duration increased to 18 seconds.
• Fire
  • Fixed an issue where Ignite was not applying to Flamestrike damage past the initial instance.
  • Incineration: This talent now allows spending up to 5 talent points for 10% critical chance on affected spells, up from 3 talent points for 6%.
  • Improved Fireball: Renamed Accelerant. Now also reduces the cast time of Arcane Wrath by up to 0.5 seconds.
  • Critical Mass: This talent has been reverted to a maximum of 3 talent points, instead of 5, for a total of 6% critical strike chance increase, down from 10%.
  • Improved Fire Blast moved to 3rd row from 1st row.
• Frost
  • The Piercing ice talent has been removed.
  • Ice Barrier now increases your Frost Damage dealt by 15% for 1minute when activated and grants an additional 5% Frost Damage while the barrier holds.
  • Frost Warding increases the amount of damage your Ice Barrier and Frost Wards can absorb.
  • Frost Warding no longer has a chance to Reflect spells but instead has a chance to fully negate the damage of the spell without depleting the Frost Ward.
  • Elemental Precision has been renamed Precision and is back to being a 3-point talent, granting 2/4/6% chance to hit with all spells (was 1/2/3/4/5%).
  • Ice Lance now has an 8 second cooldown shared with Fire Blast. Bonsu damage to Frozen targets increased back to 300%.
  • Winter’s Chill: Bonus to Cone of Cold damage increased to 20% per stack.

Oct 16, 2026WoW: Forever update — October 15, 2026

• Frost Blast: This new spell is learned at level 24. It deals damage and slows the target’s movement by 40%. It has a 1.5 second cast time, and is affected by all talents that affect Frostbolt.
• Arcane
  • Fixed an issue where Presence of Mind would not be consumed by spell casts.
  • Fixed an issue where Missile Barrage could reduce the cost and duration of a second Arcane Missiles cast.
  • Missile Barrage: This talent has moved to the first row and become a 2-point talent. It now also grants a chance for Arcane Missiles hits to trigger Missile Barrage.
  • Arcane Blast: Redesigned. This spell is now a 1.5 second cast, and each time it is cast it grants the casting Mage 15% of their Intellect as additional Spell Damage. This effect also increases the cost of Arcane Blast as before and still stacks to 4 times. However, the effect now lasts 15 seconds from when it is first applied, instead of just until the next spell cast. Mana cost unchanged, but damage done and Spell Damage coefficients both reduced 40%.
  • Arcane Wrath: New 16-point gold medal talent. This new spell deals base damage similar to Fireball, with a 3.5 second cast, but also deals damage as if the Mage had additional Spell Power equal to 5% of the Mage’s maximum Mana. 6 second cooldown.
• Fire
  • Heating Up is no longer consumed if the Mage also had Presence of Mind active for the Pyroblast cast. Heating up also always gains an additional charge each time the Mage casts Fire Blast. This does mean Fire Blast critical strikes generate 2 charges.
  • Wake of Fire: Talent reverted back to Improved Fire Blast and no longer grants a bonus when the Mage kills a target. It also now increases the range of Fireblast by 8/15 yards.
  • Critical Mass: Mages can now spend up to 5 points in this talent for 10% total critical strike increase.
  • Fire Power: Redesigned. Now only 3 talent points. Increases damage done by Fire spells by 1/2/3% per the Mage’s Fire effects on the target, up to a maximum increase of 12%. Spells that mix multiple schools of magic do not grant this bonus.
  • Frost Channeling now correctly reduces the Mage’s threat.
  • Fixed an issue where Ice Block was too transparent.
  • Fixed various issues around Clearcasting. Clearingcast now correctly does not roll for every target struck by a spell. Clearcasting no longer has a chance to activate off of Dampen Magic and Amplify Magic. Clearcasting no longer has a chance to be activated by abilities cast when not in combat.
• Frost
  • Fixed an issue preventing Frostbite and Fingers of Frost from activating from your Ice Armor and Frost Armor spells.
  • Ice Lance damage against Frozen targets changed to a 200% increase (Was 300%).
  • Cone of Cold: Movement speed of the first 4 targets hit is decreased by an additional 10% and the slow lasts an additional 3 seconds on those targets.
  • Winter’s Chill: Redesigned. No longer increases critical strike chance. Instead, it causes Cone of Cold to deal 40% increase damage per stack of Winter’s Chill on the target, consumed by next Cone of Cold.
  • Slightly changed the positioning of the spell visual for Cone of Cold.
  • New spell Frost Blast. 1.5 second cast. Deals low frost damage. Slows/chills. Benefits from talents that benefit Frostbolt.
  • Winter’s Chill change to: Gives your Frostbolt, Frost Blast, and Fingers of Frost empowered Ice Lance spells a 20/40/60/80/100% chance to apply Winter’s Chill, increasing the target’s damage taken from your next Cone of Cold by 5% and it gains an additional 7% of your spell damage, stacking up to 5 times.

Oct 8, 2026WoW: Forever update — October 8, 2026

• Fixed an issue where Impact could proc off of Flamestrike’s periodic damage.
• Frostbolt: The base points and points per level of ranks 1-5 of this spell have been adjusted to make the growth rate of ranks 1-6 more consistent, and new ranks always an upgrade.
• Fireball: The base points and points per level of ranks 1-5 of this spell have been adjusted to make the growth rate of ranks 1-6 more consistent, and new ranks always an upgrade.
• Arcane Missiles: The base points and points per level of ranks 1-3 of this spell have been adjusted to make the growth rate of ranks 1-4 more consistent, and new ranks always an upgrade.

Oct 1, 2026WoW: Forever update — October 1, 2026

• All Mage scrolls from comprehension have had an additional balance pass and can no longer be cast while moving.
• Fire
  • Hot Streak has been renamed to Heating Up, since it is no longer dependent on having a ‘streak’.
  • The number of charges of Combustion has returned to 3 (was 4).
  • Improved Scorch’s Fire Vulnerability will not roll a second time to see if it resists.
• Frost
  • Winter’s Chill’s application does not roll to see if it is resisted, since the original spell needed to hit.

Sep 24, 2026WoW: Forever update — September 24, 2026

• Arcane Missiles no longer checks line of sight on each missile, just once at the beginning of the channel. So targets moving out of line of sight during the channel will not prevent the missiles.
• Fire
  • Wake of Fire buff duration has been increased to 30 seconds (was 20 seconds).
  • Hot Streak buff duration has been increased to 20 seconds (was 15 seconds).
  • Ignite no longer double dips on % damage increase modifiers.