WoW Burning Crusade (TBC) Classic – Mage – What Race is Best for Arena?

by Falagar / Game Guides, General Guides / 30 Apr 2021

Mage – What Race is Best for Arena?

Horde

Undead: ★★★

Will of the Forsaken has always been a game-changer in the PvP environment. Not only does it break fear, sleep, and charm effects, it also makes you immune to them for 5 seconds (2m cooldown). This will allow you to use your PvP Insignia for a potentially crucial moment later in the game. You also gain a passive +10 shadow resistance, which is nice against some of our toughest matchups (e.g. warlocks), but not significant. Cannibalize can be used in arena matches, and is beneficial in niche situations.

Troll: ★★

Berserking is a nice option to have, increasing your casting speed by 10-30% for 10 seconds (3m cooldown). This is a great ability to combo with your second Icy Veins after you’ve used your first with Mind Quickening Gem, or you can drop MQG completely and combo it with a damage trinket instead. A downside is the requirement of a large health deficit to achieve the 30% value upon activation, and activating at full health for +10% speed will not often make or break games. Trolls also deal +5% damage to Druid beast forms and Shaman Ghost Wolf in PvP due to Beast Slaying. The increased health regeneration (+10% during combat) is generally negligible in the arena context.

Blood Elf: ★

Arcane Torrent instantly silences all enemies around you within 8 yards for 2 seconds (2m cooldown). This can be impactful in certain moments such as preventing crucial enemy heals landing in arena, however, the short-range requirement can be tough to work with especially against better players that practice good spacing, and the short silence duration is underwhelming. Blood Elves also gain +5 to all resistances which is nice, but not significant.

Alliance

Gnome: ★★★

Escape Artist is an instant ability that removes all movement-impairing effects from your character (1m 45s cooldown). This is an incredibly powerful tool to increase a mage’s already mobile kit, and breaking distance is always a huge benefit. Gnomes also gain +5% intellect from all sources, leading to a larger mana pool and slightly higher crit rate, both of which are very valuable in the arena context. Gnomes passively gain +10 arcane resistance which is generally not significant.

Human: ★★

Perception dramatically increases your stealth detection for 20 seconds (3m cooldown). Using this to find a stealthed rogue before they open you is a large tempo swing in arena games. You can also use this to roam the map and search for druids attempting to avoid you at the beginning of a match, which is a huge benefit in common comps such as Mage/Rogue. If your arena partner(s) are also human though, then the value of your own perception is decreased slightly. The increased spirit (+10%) is a nice benefit especially if you’re playing a longer game with Mage Armor on.

Draenei: ★

Gift of the Naaru is a 1.5-sec cast that applies an HoT to your target, healing them every 3 seconds for 15 seconds (3m cooldown). After scaling, this HoT will be medium-weak in the arena context. Draenei passively increases their own and party’s spell hit chance by 1%, which saves you roughly 13 hit ratings from gear. They also passively gain +10 shadow resistance, which is nice, but not significant.

Falagar

He is the founder and editor of Magic Game World. He loved gaming from the moment he got a PlayStation 1 with Gran Turismo on his 7th birthday.

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