Arcane Mage Guide: Midnight Season 2 Builds, Rotation, Stats

This Arcane Mage guide covers Midnight Season 2 on patch 12.1.5: which hero tree and build to import, the one loop that drives the spec, the opener and full priority, stats, gems, enchants, tier set and trinkets, and how to play it in Mythic+. Blizzard's October 27 class tuning hotfixes changed Fire (+5% PvE) but left Arcane untouched (Icy Veins hotfix summary), so the numbers below still hold. Build and priority details follow Icy Veins' Arcane Mage guide and Method, cited inline.

Quick summary

• Sunfury is the hero tree for everything. Icy Veins says it does more damage than Spellslinger in raid and Mythic+ "without having to give up anything in return."
• The core loop: build 4 Arcane Charges, stack Arcane Salvo, then fire a big Arcane Barrage. Every Barrage can proc Prismatic Bolt, your hardest-hitting spell (Icy Veins, Method).
• Stats are close together. Icy Veins lists Haste > Crit > Mastery > Versatility, Method lists Haste > Versatility > Crit > Mastery. Both say to sim.
• Top trinkets: Freightrunner's Flask (on-use, Myth-track Great Vault only) and Twisted Horror's Tendril (passive) are S tier on Icy Veins.
• In Mythic+ you kill priority targets, bring Time Warp and Arcane Intellect, and swap utility talents per dungeon.

Know the spec's strengths and weaknesses

Strengths	Weaknesses
Very high priority-target damage, "better than almost any other spec" in M+ (Icy Veins)	One of the few DPS specs that has to manage mana
Great AoE that uses the same priority as single target	Damage is tied to two cooldowns that must stay lined up
Strong magic mitigation with Improved Prismatic Barrier (Method)	Polymorph-style stops let enemies recast right away

Icy Veins puts Arcane at S+ on its October 12 Mythic+ DPS list. Our Mythic+ tier list compares it with the other specs for keys.

Best Arcane Mage build: Sunfury or Spellslinger

Content	Pick	Why	Source
Raid	Sunfury	"Significantly ahead" on single target and cleave	Icy Veins
Mythic+	Sunfury	Slightly ahead on AoE and "much more" single-target damage with its AoE build	Icy Veins
Delves and outdoor	Sunfury Delve build	More mobility and crowd control for very little damage	Icy Veins
You prefer a passive style	Spellslinger	Small passive bonuses and Arcane Splinters. Weaker, but close in AoE	Icy Veins

How Sunfury plays. An Arcane Phoenix fights next to you during Arcane Surge. When Surge ends you get Arcane Soul: Arcane Barrage then grants Clearcasting, generates four Arcane Charges and five Arcane Salvo, and doesn't spend Salvo. In practice you spam hard-hitting Barrages for its duration (Icy Veins).

Icy Veins has import strings for Sunfury Raid, Sunfury Mythic+ and Sunfury Delves on its talent page. Use the in-game import button. The raid build gives up about 1% single-target damage for much more cleave, so Icy Veins recommends it for almost every raid boss. Use the pure single-target build only when there are no extra targets at all.

Set the class tree basics

Method's class-tree advice for 12.1:

1. Put every point you can into Mirror Image and Improved Conjuration. Mirror Image is now a defensive.
2. Take one point in Improved Warding, a new passive defensive.
3. Pick Time Walk over Temporal Realignment in almost every case. Icy Veins treats it as personal preference: Temporal Realignment is a simple passive heal when you drop low, and Time Walk rewards proactive Alter Time use.
4. Pick Spatial Manipulation (extra Shimmer charge) over Reflection.

Understand the apex talent

Prismatic Bolt is Arcane's apex talent (Icy Veins, Method):

1. Rank 1. Arcane Barrage has a 1% chance per Arcane Salvo stack consumed to turn your next Arcane Blast into Prismatic Bolt. It hits your target and nearby enemies and grants 4 Arcane Charges. You can hold the proc for up to a minute.
2. Ranks 2–3. Prismatic Bolt has a 50% or 100% chance to grant Clearcasting, and Arcane Missiles damage rises by 15% or 30%.
3. Rank 4. Another 1% chance per Salvo stack (2% in total) and 15% more Arcane Barrage damage.

Method calls it "by far" Arcane's hardest-hitting ability and says to press it before your next Barrage so you don't overwrite the proc.

Set the Omnium Folio

Icy Veins recommends Rune of Void-Touched Orbs, Rune of Void-Tainted Shell for group play (or Rune of Self-Mending solo), Rune of Lingering, Rune of Critical Power and Rune of Echoes. You can change runes freely. See our Omnium Folio guide.

How Arcane Mage works: charges, Salvo, Barrage

Everything in the priority list serves one loop (Icy Veins):

1. Build Arcane Charges. Each of the 4 charges raises the damage and mana cost of Arcane Blast and Arcane Pulse, and the damage of Arcane Barrage.
2. Stack Arcane Salvo. Arcane Missiles grants it, and Expanded Mind lets Arcane Blast, Prismatic Bolt and Arcane Orb grant it too. The cap is 25 for Sunfury and 20 for Spellslinger. With Intuition, Barrage gets its extra bonus only at max stacks.
3. Fire Arcane Barrage. It resets charges to 0, which resets the mana cost, and hits hard with high Salvo. Each Salvo stack spent is a chance at Prismatic Bolt.

Mana comes from Arcane Surge (it drains your mana, then regenerates you to full during its 15 seconds), passive regeneration boosted by Mastery, and Evocation if talented. Icy Veins notes that entering raid combat resets Arcane Charges to 0, so cast Arcane Orb only after combat starts.

Example. You have 14 Salvo stacks, 4 charges and Arcane Orb ready. Icy Veins says to Barrage now instead of building to 25 with Arcane Blast. Arcane Orb gets your charges back right away, and on average this produces more Prismatic Bolt procs.

Arcane Mage rotation: opener and priority

Opener (Icy Veins)

1. Before the pull, use trinkets or potions that last 15 seconds or longer so they're up for Arcane Surge.
2. Pre-cast Arcane Surge.
3. Use potions, racials or stat trinkets shorter than 15 seconds.
4. Cast Arcane Missiles.
5. Cast Arcane Barrage.
6. Cast Touch of the Magi before Barrage lands.
7. Use Touch of the Magi again 45 seconds later. It has exactly half Arcane Surge's cooldown, so delaying it delays your next Surge.
8. Follow the priority below.

Single-target priority (Icy Veins, condensed)

1. Prismatic Bolt when available. With the 4-piece, top priority at 6+ Cumulative Power stacks.
2. Arcane Barrage at 4 charges and 20 Salvo.
3. Arcane Missiles with Clearcasting and fewer than 15 Salvo.
4. Arcane Missiles with Clearcasting and fewer than 12 Salvo.
5. Arcane Barrage while Arcane Soul is up.
6. Arcane Barrage at 4 charges and 25 Salvo.
7. Arcane Barrage at 4 charges, 12+ Salvo and a Clearcasting proc.
8. Arcane Orb at 0 charges.
9. Presence of Mind when you need to move while casting Arcane Blast.
10. Evocation when out of mana, outside Touch of the Magi and Arcane Surge.
11. Arcane Blast as filler, or Arcane Barrage if you can't afford a Blast.

AoE changes

Icy Veins says single-target and AoE are "practically identical." With more targets:

1. Cast Arcane Pulse over Arcane Blast when it's ready and you don't have 4 charges.
2. Barrage at 12+ Salvo when you have Arcane Orb ready or Clearcasting.
3. Cast Arcane Orb whenever it's available.

Arcane Mage cooldowns

Cooldown	What it does	How to use it	Source
Arcane Surge	90-second cooldown. Drains mana for a big hit, then 35% more spell damage and heavy mana regen for 15 seconds	Use on cooldown, unless Time Warp or an add wave is a few seconds away	Icy Veins
Touch of the Magi	45-second cooldown. Stores 20% of your damage for 12 seconds, then explodes. Grants 4 charges	Use it the moment it's ready so it stays synced with Surge	Icy Veins
Time Warp	30% Haste for the group for 40 seconds, 10-minute lockout shared with Bloodlust	Follow your leader's call. In PUGs, use it right after the pull if enemies stay active for 40 seconds	Icy Veins
Mirror Image	Now a defensive in 12.1	Max its talents and use it for predictable damage	Method

Arcane Mage stat priority, gems and enchants

Stat	Icy Veins	Method
Order	Int > Haste > Crit > Mastery > Vers	Int > Haste > Vers > Crit > Mastery
Note	"All of the secondary stats are very close in value"	Sim for your gear

Icy Veins strongly recommends Raidbots Top Gear over a fixed list, and warns that stacking Haste without Mastery runs you out of mana quickly. Its diminishing-returns table starts the first 10% penalty at 1,380 Mastery or Crit rating, 1,320 Haste and 1,620 Versatility.

Gems (Icy Veins): with 5 or more sockets, use Powerful Eversong Diamond and one each of Flawless Masterful Peridot, Flawless Quick Garnet and Flawless Quick Lapis, with Flawless Quick Amethyst in the rest. With fewer than 5 sockets, use Indecipherable Eversong Diamond and Flawless Quick Amethyst everywhere else.

Slot	Icy Veins	Method
Weapon	Acuity of the Ren'dorei	Rite of the Hash'ey
Chest	Mark of the Worldsoul	Mark of the Worldsoul
Legs	Arcanoweave Spellthread	Arcanoweave Spellthread
Rings	Eyes of the Eagle	Eyes of the Eagle
Helm	Empowered Blessing of Speed (non-damage)	Rune of Avoidance
Shoulders	Akil'zon's Swiftness (non-damage)	Amirdrassil's Grace
Boots	Farstrider's Hunt (non-damage)	Lynx's Dexterity

Icy Veins says Speed is a solid default in the non-damage slots because you move during instant and channeled spells, and Avoidance is also a good choice. Weapon oil is Thalassian Phoenix Oil for all content.

Consumables (Method): Harandar Celebration food, Flask of the Magisters, Light's Potential, Concentrated Silvermoon Health Potion, Thalassian Phoenix Oil and Void-Touched Augment Rune.

Races (Method): Mechagnome or Pandaren for the highest raid damage, and Dwarf for Mythic+ because Stoneform removes poison, disease, curse, magic and bleed effects and cuts physical damage taken by 10% for 8 seconds.

Arcane Mage tier set, BiS and trinkets

Icy Veins says the Catalyst keeps an item's item level, stats and special bonuses in Season 2, so it doesn't matter which 4 of the 5 tier slots you convert. Getting the 4-piece "in any capacity" matters more than getting it on the right slots. The tier set works like this (Icy Veins):

• 2-piece: Arcane Missiles fires one more wave and deals 5% more damage.
• 4-piece: each Missiles wave raises your next Arcane Blast, Arcane Pulse or Prismatic Bolt by 3%, up to 24% (Cumulative Power).

Tier slot	Source
Head: Venomkeeper's Horrific Cowl	Ula'tek
Shoulders: Ornaments of the Eternal Coil	Twin Fangs
Chest: Primordial Robe of Rites	Altar of Fangs
Hands: Grasps of the Eternal Shadow	Coiled Altar
Legs: Voidweaver's Leggings	Kith'ix

Great Vault picks: always take Jan'thrazet, the Soul Fang on Heroic or higher, since it's the best weapon "by a large margin." Take Freightrunner's Flask when it appears, since it's best in slot and only drops at Myth track from the Vault. Our Great Vault guide explains slots and item levels.

Tier	Trinkets
S	Freightrunner's Flask (best on-use), Twisted Horror's Tendril (best passive), Gebbo's Bottomless Bag (close second passive)
A	Vexhul's Everflowing Gland (single target), Vile Vial of Volatile Venom, Lightspire Core, Wavecaller's Seastone
B	Hex Lord's Dooming Idol, Sapling of the Dawnroot, Mindpiercer's Sigil
C	Fang of Umbral Malignance, Stormbound Emblem of Dazar, Knot of Writhing Serpents
D	Sethraliss' Defiled Relic, Ruby Whelp Shell, Font of Venomous Rage

Pair one on-use trinket for Arcane Surge with one passive trinket. For upgrade tracks and crests, see our Season 2 gearing guide, and for embellishments our crafted gear guide. The tier pieces drop in The Venomous Abyss and The Unbinding of Kith'ix.

Arcane Mage in Mythic+

Your job in keys is to kill high-priority targets fast while doing strong overall damage (Icy Veins).

• Interrupt: Counterspell also locks the school for 7 to 8 seconds. Icy Veins suggests a focus or mouseover macro: /cast [target=mouseover,exists] Counterspell; Counterspell.
• Stops: Supernova or Dragon's Breath (pick one). Supernova is easier because you don't need to be close. Polymorph, Ring of Frost and Mass Polymorph work as last-ditch stops only.
• Dispels: Remove Curse for curse-heavy dungeons and Xal'atath's Bargain: Devour weeks. Spellsteal works as an offensive magic dispel.
• Greater Invisibility drops aggro and can cancel some debuffs.
• Mana: start with water, and Blink or Shimmer ahead after a pack dies to drink for 2 to 3 seconds.

Swap talents for the dungeon

Icy Veins' flexible list, as a checklist before each key:

Need in this dungeon	Talent change
Pack skips	Take Mass Invisibility
Curses on the party	Take Remove Curse, or Improved Remove Curse if a second curse dispeller is in the group
Enemy magic buffs	Take Spellsteal, or Improved Spellsteal for repeat dispels
A mechanic you can Ice Block	Take Ice Cold and the nodes leading to it
Kiting	Take Freezing Cold
Speed runs or stealth skips	Take Incantation of Swiftness, plus Master of Escape

Example. Your group's only other curse dispeller is a Restoration Druid, and it's a Devour week. Icy Veins says Improved Remove Curse helps there, because you can dispel yourself and one other player at once.

Plan your Counterspell rotation with our interrupt coordination guide, and check the current pool in our Season 2 Mythic+ dungeons guide. Our addons guide covers interrupt and cooldown trackers.

Arcane Mage in PvP

Arcane isn't a top PvP pick this season: our PvP tier list has it at D tier, far behind S-tier Fire. On Murlok's October 28 ladders it's 22nd of 27 DPS specs in Solo Shuffle and 3v3, 23rd in 2v2 and 16th in Battleground Blitz, its best bracket. The October 27 PvP tuning cut Fire's PvP damage by 5% and buffed Frostfire burst for Frost, but didn't touch Arcane (Blizzard hotfixes via Icy Veins). If you want to play a Mage in arenas, Fire remains the stronger choice.

Common Arcane Mage mistakes

1. Casting Arcane Orb before the pull. Entering raid combat resets your charges to 0 (Icy Veins).
2. Letting Touch of the Magi drift. It has exactly half Arcane Surge's cooldown, so a late Touch delays your next Surge.
3. Overwriting Prismatic Bolt. Press it before your next Barrage (Method).
4. Stacking Haste with no Mastery. You'll run out of Mana (Icy Veins).
5. Holding Barrage for 25 Salvo every time. With Arcane Orb or Clearcasting ready, Barrage at 12–14 Salvo is often better.

Tips for returning and alt players

• Returning players: Arcane now revolves around Arcane Salvo and Prismatic Bolt. Import Icy Veins' Sunfury string first, then learn the one loop above before the full priority.
• Boosted or catch-up characters: get the 4-piece in any slots first (Icy Veins), then fill empty slots. Stats are close, so item level wins most comparisons.
• Alts: use the Sunfury Mythic+ build for both raid and keys while you learn, and keep the talent-swap checklist handy. Our 12.1.5 catch-up guide is the fastest gear route.
• Planning ahead: the 12.1.7 PTR notes have no Mage tuning so far; see our 12.1.7 Echoes of the Worldcore guide. Other Season 2 spec guides include Arms Warrior and Assassination Rogue.

More Midnight class, dungeon and raid guides are linked from the World of Warcraft hub.

Want a hand with this?

If you would rather not grind this part yourself, World of Warcraft coaching services are listed on FullBoosts. Read Blizzard's End User License Agreement before you buy any service from anyone, FullBoosts included — a marketplace listing isn't publisher permission.

FAQ

Is Arcane Mage good in Midnight Season 2?

Yes. Icy Veins ranks it S+ for Mythic+ on its October 12 list, mainly for priority-target damage, and it's competitive in raid. The October 27 hotfixes didn't change it.

Sunfury or Spellslinger for Arcane Mage?

Sunfury for raid, Mythic+ and Delves. Icy Veins says there's no real reason to play Spellslinger unless you prefer its passive playstyle.

What is the Arcane Mage stat priority in 12.1.5?

Icy Veins lists Intellect > Haste > Crit > Mastery > Versatility, and Method lists Intellect > Haste > Versatility > Crit > Mastery. Both say the secondary stats are close, so sim your own gear.

Is Arcane Mage hard to play?

Moderately. It manages Mana and depends on keeping Arcane Surge and Touch of the Magi synced (Icy Veins). Learn the charge, Salvo and Barrage loop before the full priority.

What are the best Arcane Mage trinkets?

Freightrunner's Flask, Twisted Horror's Tendril and Gebbo's Bottomless Bag are S tier on Icy Veins. Pair one on-use with one passive.

What is the best race for Arcane Mage?

Method suggests Mechagnome or Pandaren for raid damage and Dwarf for Mythic+, because Stoneform clears dangerous debuffs.

Related guides

• WoW Mythic+ tier list
• Midnight Great Vault guide
• Midnight Omnium Folio guide
• Midnight PvP tier list
• Arms Warrior guide
• Best WoW Midnight addons