I've seen a few of us mages still aren't quite sure what specs are good for what and where our powers lay. I know it is nice to stick to what you are used to and changing specs can be a serious drop in performance for a couple of hours (days/weeks/months)

Here is my two cents on what the different specs do for me:


Arcane/Frost:

* Best mana efficiency possible.
* Best threat reduction possible.
* Highest dps (Arcane nuke) if willing to sacrifice range and mana efficiency by going nuts with Arcane Blast (not that viable, but maybe sometimes...) still seems like we are missng a real Arcane dmg spell.
* Good overall dps using Frostbolt nuke with other spells inbetween.
* Good defenses, very good if you take IB over slow, slow can help the group more though.

Frost/Arcane:

* Higher primary nuke damage but with lower crits.
* Best kiting and CC possible.
* Good mana efficiency.
* 10% threat reduction.
* Best defenses possible.

Arcane/Fire:

* Massive crit damage (and ignites).
* Great mana efficiency, rivals frost if scorch is used.
* Average defenses.
* Best threat reduction if specced appropriately.
(note: All Arcane/Whatever specs can do viably high damage with arcane spells at 40% threat reduction to cover themselves when they overnuke their fire/frost)


And the ever renoun 10/48/3
and my personal choice... full Fire with elemental precision:

* Massive burst dps and crowd burst dps.
* Massive sustained dps.
* By far the highest dps for raids.
* Good mana efficiency, bordering on excellent if crit specced. Not as good as a primary-arcane spec though.
* Little defenses.
* DB is sweet as hell, can help alot to turn an angry mob for those few second you need to get away.

If buy some chance that doesnt help you. Then this definately will.

http://www.wowwiki.com/Mage_builds

God Speed

Ulysse

i answer much later,but i still hope that some of the mages see my post.Many mages as Hugo said still dont know what spec to use.There are 3 very good raiding builds:
the first one is 40/21/0.
the advantages are:
-improved counterspell.Very important on fights such as shade of aran and gruul's lair
-30% mana regeneration.Thats very handy on long fights such as NB fight
-15% more int.No need to say why is that important
-presence of mind and arcane power give very good boost of dmg
-25% more bonus dmg from the int.Now i like that first because when i am fully buffed thats like 1200 bonus dmg and around 12k mana
-the improved clearcasting is not only mana efficient,but giving 30% more crit chance is almost always crit.

the next very good build,that is most popular among mages is 10/48/3.This is arguebly the best raiding build for many reasons:
-the 10 points in arcnae three give you clearcasting
-the 3 points in frost gives 3% more hit chance,which is extremely handy
-the lack of more spell dmg is not a problem,because from the fire build you gain 10% more fire dmg
-various of fire based spells like dragon's breath and blast wave help not only in pvp,but also for the aoe part in raids
-when you crit you return 30% of base mana,so if you crit more,you save alot of mana
-much more increased crit chance
-when target is below 20% you do 20% more dmg.Thats so good,because on very hard encounters like in ZA and NB in kara you should nuke the target as fast as you can

the final very good build is 40/0/21
-from the arcane three:
-15% more int
-30% mana regen
-presence of mind and arcane power significantly increase the frost dmg
-25% more dmg from int makes the frost dmg look very good
-50% bonus dmg by crit combined with ice shards is 150% bonus crit dmg.
if you have another frost mage with winter chill,you can even do more dmg then fire mages and your mana will never end.
Well mages i hope i did help you with my post to choose what build to use.All 3 builds are very good for dmg,so dont choose build only for toping the dmg meter,but also build that fits your play style and that you like,my personal choice is 10/48/3,but still i return to 40/21/0 when i am bored from the fire build.i Find both very good.
thats i guess what i can say

I am going to have to say Spank You Very Much....

I Have tried all of those specs and still cant decide which one I am going to go with. I myself liked the 10/48/3 build. But I really liked my Frost also.

Something tells me that tonight I will be respecing back to the fire build though. :p

Tricky decision. I've tried 10/48/3 and currently on the arc/fire one, but may spec back as I miss my crits Do seem to do a bit more damage on arc/fire, but equally overaggro easily!

I use the 10/51/0 and be ferrry pleased with it i love my dps in raids and so on and for the overaggro i use invissible allot. you can see my spec here:

http://www.wow-europe.com/en/info/basic ... 0000000000

Sorry to say it,this build isnt good for raids.Never seen someone with it in raid.The 5 points spend in impact are pointless,also you need 3 in playing in fire,1 in improved fireblast is best,because you can use fireblast every 2 fireballs.Also without points in elemental precision,the spell hit cap is 202,so with 3% less this is bad.We will progress further your dps will slack in raid with so low spell hit.Lets say your build is good in instance,but not in 25 man raid.Pls dont use it