Why Change Leveling?
At BlizzCon 2019, WoW developers identified three key areas needing improvement, based on observations of leveling up through and including Battle for Azeroth:
- Time: leveling takes too long
- Satisfaction: too many levels = not every level is rewarding
- Consistency: too many storylines and not enough time to explore them all before leveling out of an area or expansion
Fifteen years and eight expansions can overwhelm and confuse new players. The traditional "newbie" zones don't adequately prepare brand-new players to the wide variety of concepts even a beginning player needs to know to progress through World of Warcraft. The challenge is how to balance the requirements for new players with the needs of experienced players who want to level up alts for the endgame.
This process started with the introduction of scaling words introduced with the Battle for Azeroth expansion, allowing leveling players greater choice in where to level instead of being stuck in narrow-band zones that would go grey before they could even begin to explore the area's storyline. Shadowlands will take that scaling one giant step farther.
The first ability all level 1 Mages receive is
Frostbolt, a nice pulling spell since it not only does damage, but also slows the target by 50% for 8 seconds.
- At level 2, you learn Fire Blast, an instant-cast blast of fire to the face! Best used after Frostbolt, since your target will be super annoyed after this.
- At level 3, you learn Frost Nova, an AoE spell that does frost damage and freezes them in place. Used with great effect when combined with the next available spell, Blink, for putting in distance after they're all stuck to the ground.
- At level 4, you learn Blink, which teleports you forward 20 yds or until reaching an obstacle, and frees you from all stuns and bonds. Make sure there is space in front of you that doesn't go into new enemies, into an obstacle, or off a cliff. Can sometimes trip on stairs or small rises in geography. Part 2 of the popular "frost nova and blink" mage kiting method.
- At level 5, you learn Conjure Refreshment, which lets you conjure mana food for you and your allies. If casting when you're not in a group, you'll just get a stack for yourself. In a group, it conjures a table, so group members can help themselves!
- At level 6, you learn Arcane Explosion, causing an explosion that deals reduced damage to all enemies in 10 yards. Not incredibly powerful, but very good for getting rid of large numbers of little swarming mobs
- At level 7, you learn Counterspell, which interrupt's an enemy's spell casting and prevents them from casting another spell from that school of magic for 6 sec.
- At level 8, you learn Arcane Intellect, an intellect buff that increases Intellect by 5% for 1 hour. Works for yourself and your entire party or raid.
- At level 9, you learn, Slow Fall, which slows falling speed for 30 seconds. Can keep you or your friends from splatting on the ground.
- At level 10, you learn Polymorph, which changes enemy beasts, humanoids, and critters into a sheep, which wanders around for 1 minute. Damage breaks this effect. Players who go through Exile's Reach will learn this a bit sooner through a special class quest. Popularly referred to as "sheeping", even though you can learn to Polymorph into many other forms, including cat, turtle, rabbit, etc,
At level 10, you will have to choose a specialization. You can choose a specialization by pressing N, then selecting one specialization and click on Activate. You will then start learning spells that define the specialization you chose.
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