Season of Discovery Arcane Mage DPS Leveling
Welcome to our leveling guide for DPS Arcane Mage. Here, you will learn how to efficiently level your Mage in Classic - Season of Discovery.
Introduction
This guide will aim to provide you with a clear skill and gear path to level 60 as an Arcane Mage in WoW Classic Season of Discovery Phase 4. We will focus on talents, skills to buy and spell rotation, as well as leveling gear and the class specific quests you will find along the way.
Arcane Mage Talents for Leveling in WoW Classic
While it lacks the consistency and safety of Frost, or the high single target damage of Fire, Arcane has great early area effect damage with Arcane Explosion and can level very fast, especially in a group.
If you can get your hands on Regeneration early on, you can also start healing dungeons, making it easier than ever to get into a group as a Mage!
In the short trek to level 60 we recommend the following talents for Arcane Mage leveling.
You can also learn more details about this build and where to AoE grind / what spells to buy on our level-by-level WoW Classic leveling guides listed below.
Leveling Runes for Arcane Mage in WoW Classic
The best runes for leveling an Arcane Mage, considering the earliest level at which you can obtain them efficiently are:
- Gloves — Arcane Blast
- Pants — Living Flame
- Chest — Burnout
- Waist — Missile Barrage
- Feet — Spell Power
- Head — Advanced Warding
- Wrist — Balefire Bolt
- Back — Arcane Barrage
- Ring — Frost Specialization
- Ring — Arcane Specialization
Living Flame deals massive area damage on a short cooldown and is obtainable very early in your journey for all races. Burnout is also both easy and early to acquire and gives a large passive damage benefit.
Arcane Blast is also available relatively early, deals great damage for low Mana cost while at low stacks, and will make your damage much smoother, as it buffs Living Flame and other Arcane spells.
Finally, Missile Barrage, Spell Power, and Balefire Bolt provide large damage increases, rounding up your kit as you approach Level 60.
Make sure to check our Mage Rune Guide, which has all Runes you can obtain and their locations.
Cozy Sleeping Bag
The Cozy Sleeping Bag is a new item in Season of Discovery that you can use to gain extra experience and rested experience, for yourself and any nearby party members, even if they do not have it themselves! It has a lengthy unlock process that will take you all around the world.
- Horde starts at a charred body near 46,74 in the Barrens, and then goes to the charred body at 37,50 in Westfall, while Alliance does the same in opposite order.
- Afterwards, head to 40,52 in Stonetalon Mountains and look for a box next to a tent with a red cross on it. Click the nearby item to turn in the quest and proceed to a pile of dirt nearby at 40,50 for the next part of the quest.
- Head to 49,13 in Loch Modan to turn in the next step at the top of the dam, to a eagle statue. Finish by going up the Thoradin Wall at 87,49 in Hillsbrad Foothills using a nearby cart to climb up the wall. Inside you will find the final turn in spot (bag and note) to receive Cozy Sleeping Bag. Make sure to use it on cooldown to speed up your leveling!
Arcane Mage Macros and Addons
By setting yourself up with an upgraded user interface and macros from the get go, you will make your leveling process much easier. Check out our Mage Macros and Addons guide in the link below for the full list.
Arcane Mage Professions
Learning professions early on is very useful, as you can naturally level them as you go, avoiding extra work at max level. This is especially true for gathering professions, but crafting professions compensate your efforts by giving you extra tools to level with.
We recommend that you learn First Aid as soon as possible for easy self-healing. Skinning, Herbalism, and Mining are great primary professions for a leveling Mage, allowing you to make extra gold, or accumulate materials that you can use to level crafting professions later.
Gear Options for Arcane Mage
While Mages are quite gear independent while leveling, you should still aim to gather items with as much Intellect as possible, making your Mana pool last longer before you have to drink or wait for regeneration.
Spirit is also a useful stat for leveling, as it increases your Health and Mana regeneration rates, but keep in mind you can only regenerate Health outside combat unless you are a Troll, and Mana will not regenerate if you cast a spell in the past 5 seconds, making this stat mostly useful while traveling.
Spell Damage will be very useful at maximum level, but its impact on the spells you will be using while leveling is low, and it has no effect whatsoever on wand damage, which you will be using often to finish enemies off, so do not go out of your way to get it on your gear.
Stamina allows you to live for longer and can be useful in PvP situations, but for the most part, you should aim to kill enemies from a distance, taking little damage in return.
Continuing the Grind with your Level 60 Arcane Mage
Once you grind your way to 60, browse through our Arcane Mage DPS PvE Guide or our Arcane Mage Healer PvE Guide in order to learn all the tricks and tips relative to the current maximum level Mage gameplay.
Enjoy Azeroth!
Changelog
- 10 Jul. 2024: Updated for Phase 4.
- 02 Apr. 2024: Updated talents, runes and explanation text for Phase 4.
- 09 Feb. 2024: Added Cozy Sleeping Bag discovery method.
- 08 Feb. 2024: Updated talents, runes and explanation text for Phase 2.
- 19 Dec. 2023: Clarified that Living Flame post-hotfix can now consume Arcane Blast stacks.
- 15 Dec. 2023: Revamped rune section now that all runes are known.
More Classic Mage Guides
More Season of Discovery Class Guides
Classic Dungeon Guides
Classic Profession Guides
This guide has been written by Seksi, original vanilla player and multi-class player, currently playing on Gehennas Horde. You can find him on the Classic Warrior, Mage and Shaman Discords, as well as the Icy Veins Discord.
- Changes Coming to PvP Layering on Anniversary Classic Realms
- Anniversary Realms to Introduce Dual Spec, Instant Mail, and More
- Mists of Pandaria Classic Reveal Trailer
- WoW Classic Relaunch and Fresh Start LFG Tool, Rules and Realm Sizes Announced
- WoW Classic Roadmap for 2025: Mists of Pandaria Classic, New Endgame Content in SoD, and New Classic Cycle
- New WoW Classic Cycle Begins November 21 with Fresh Vanilla Start and Hardcore Servers!
- Is Mists of Pandaria Classic Coming? New Mount Icons in Patch 11.0.7 Fuel Speculation for Warcraft Direct Announcement
- Molten Core Tuning Detailed, Coming After Weekly Reset