Arcane Mage PvP Talents and Builds — Midnight Pre-Patch (12.0)

While the above table provides a generally accurate overview of the viability of talents, some finer points are discussed in the sections that follow, and we recommend you read those for a deeper understanding.

• Temporal Realignment is an amazing defensive passive. When dropped below 25% health, you cast Alter Time and instantly return to 50% health. This is great for preserving Cauterize and preventing you from using Ice Block when teams focus you.
• Dragon's Breath: One of the strongest offensive crowd control abilities in the game; use this to setup crowd control on multiples enemies with Polymorph or Ring of Frost.
• Inspired Intellect, Tome of Rhonin, Charm of Aegwynn, and Charm of Medivh are all small modifiers to stats that help greatly in arena.
• Alter Time, Prismatic Barrier/ Improved Prismatic Barrier, and Mass Invisibility are all great defensives offered in the Mage Tree.

• Arcane Surge: This is your primary burst cooldown as an Arcane Mage. After the cast, you spend all of your Mana and deal damage based on how much was spent. Energized Familiar makes your Arcane Familiar stronger during Arcane Surge.
• Touch of the Magi: This will accumulate 20% of the damage you deal to the target for 12 seconds and then explode for that amount at the end of the duration. With Improved Touch of the Magi, Touch of the Magi will accumulate 25% of the damage you deal to the target.
• Orb Barrage: This talent allows for more Arcane Orbs to be cast, and with each target orb hits, more Arcane Charges are granted.
• Aegwynn's Technique grants you Clearcasting after casting Touch of the Magi. This is great for increasing your damage during your short burst windows.

Chrono Shift causes Arcane Barrage to slow enemies and increases your movement speed. This is another tool you have to slow enemies that might be trying to get to you. This talent makes you very difficult to kill in arena.

Overpowered Barrier increases the absorb of your barriers by 100% and have an additional effect, but last 5 seconds. If Prismatic Barrier is fully absorbed, your next Blink or Shimmer within 15 seconds grants and immunity to damage for 3 seconds. This is an extremely important PvP talent to increase your survivability.

Nether Flux brands your target, increasing the damage they receive from your next targeted spell by 40%. This is an extremely important PvP talent that will help land kills when you have small windows to deal damage.

Ice Wall is a talent that allows you to place a wall of ice in a specific area for 15 seconds with 40% of your maximum health. This wall obstructs the line-of-sight and can be used to block enemies from running away or block a line of sight from a healer to a damage class. This is great for extending crowd control chains on enemy healers when they finally have time to heal.

Master Shepherd is a talent allowing Polymorph to no longer heal enemies, as well as grant Versatility and Speed bonuses. This talent will is great for setting up kills and swaps on enemies, as well as increasing your survivability.