Raglu wrote:
Mages are NOT gimped.
Mages are NOT overpowered.
The mage class has been one of the most balanced classes throughout the entire history of WoW, relatively. Mages always been a bit too strong of a counter against warriors, and warlocks have always been a bit too strong of a counter against mages, but otherwise, every fight against/with a mage is a fair fight.
As far as everyone saying that they're gimped, they're simply people who play the class and cry at one or both of two things:
1) They're not overpowered.
2) They're upset that warlocks outdo them in PvE DPS. (Which is a little more legitimate QQ).
If they cry over mana efficiency, they've not spec'd correctly, or geared correctly. If they cry over damage output, they've gotta make sure to use their trinkets during the fireballs of their rotation, not the scorches. If they cry over survivability, they haven't learned how to use Ice Block, Frost Nova, Ice Barrier, and Rank 1 Frostbolt effectively.
The mage could always use some fixins, but many classes could. The mage is not a terribad class in the least. It's simply been dwarfed in the past a bit by the warlock class (a kind of anything we can do, they can do better), but that shouldn't really matter. Playing a mage is radically different from most all other classes, and I think it's loads of fun.
In conclusion, no, mages are not nearly as gimped as the O-Boards say.
Raglu is one of our great-mage-up-and-coming posters who always has a solid post to follow up to.
He pretty much stated what I was going to say, that Mages are not the bottom of the barrel in dps (I do 98% PvE -- raiding/instances), I consistently place in the top-5 if not 3 or even #1 spot depending on the fight compared to locks, rogues, elemental shaman, and another mage. We all fight back and forth depending on the fight mechanics, for a quick-burn fight like Shade of Akama (third boss in Black Temple) I consistently hit around 2.5k-2.8k dps and lead the charts because it is literally 30-40 seconds long, with bloodlust/drumps I would pass 3k dps.
We haven't ever really been overpowered, we have our benefits, with arguably the best crowd control in the game, balanced in 3v3 and 5v5 areans (very under-represented in 2v2) but do fairly well and few groups would turn down a knowledgable mage.