I agree that their non-fire spells need more muscle.

Pfttt, mukkel. Did you even try full-plate battle magician using a fully hasted Runestone Maul? If not you are not living life yet.

Oh yeah! You're not living until you're a full plate magician! MELEE POWER! Nerf it, obv..

I demand let's play vids of the battle mage setup in hell.

Pros - One of the more durable spell casters, and can chain fairly well. Not the worst DPS in the game, that title goes to Shadow Knight.

Cons - Still lacks DPS. Without BiS gear, the DPS would be really low. I think some of the skills could be tweaked up just a little.

I took a SC of the stats/gear I'm using just in case I decide to delete this character later. I tried to squeeze the most DPS possible out of this class, and the stats pretty much validate that. I think this is probably the best gear setup for magician. Yes, that's right 683 Intelligence. I'll post the damage listings for particular skills in a little bit. I think most of Magicians damage on skills with the monster gear I got is sorta lacking compared to other classes with similar gear.

DPS after a chain of 900:




Lava Bolt - level 22 - I think this could be a little stronger? Necro's fireball hits harder than this and hits 3 targets, and casts faster.
Firestorm - level 7 - This is ok for the amount of hits it does.
Frozen Orb - Level 2 - Increase the damage on this please. Only crits for 350ish per tick with the above gear, or 3500-4000 damage total at best.
Elemental fury (Wind) - Level 0. At level 20 the damage doesn't increase at all? Bug?
Armageddon - Level 21 - The damage on this is fine for the amount of hits it does.
Psionic Storm - Level 0. - Damage is decent, but CD is too long IMO.

Since elemental fury doesn't raise the damage any on any of the elemental attacks, and only lowers the CD, I'm probably gonna raise firestorm or frozen orb to 20. I'm worried 30 hits of firestorm will break chains. Also, "up to" is the key word here, so this spell could be stronger on paper than it is in reality. More testing required.

*Another Bug? The "lava bolt revives pet" mod doesn't revive the same elemental you were using. For example, I was using an earth elemental that died, and lava bolt revives a fire elemental. Earth is the best for tanking if you need it. That's problematic if you're chaining tougher mobs. I'm debating taking points out of the pet for this reason alone. Because its not reliable. If I STILL gotta recast an earth elemental pet then I don't need 20 points invested in pets.

Magician is too squishy. Its the reason nobody has gotten to 99 with one yet. I can 5 pull safely in nightmare, but I run into way too many combinations in hell mode that will kill me even with BiS gear. And these aren't even hell nimgall level 120ish mobs, they're level 80ish mobs midway through hell mode. Even 2 champs with the right affixes can kill you in hell mode. Just 2 mobs with vicious or frenzy & chromatic + sanctuary can kill you quite easy. Just one more bad affix like the negative resist one, and you're definitely done. I went from like full to half HP in 2 secs then dead in another 4 even after hitting my "oh shit" buttons.

If lava bolt would revive the same pet that died, instead of reviving fire elemental only, the earth elemental would help you survive those deadly affix combos because they draw more aggro with the roots and have the best HP and defenses. You could then pump elemental fury for the AOE root every 20 secs so the Earth elemental takes a beating for awhile instead of you.

I haven't decided whether I'm gonna continue with mage or not. I was 3/4 the way to 98 and now I've lost that exp because I had the audacity to think I could 3-5 pull in hell mode with a BiS geared mage. Anyone planning to get to 99 should play it safe in hell and just single or 2 pull their way through hell regardless of their gear. Unfortunately, that's a really boring way to play. And unfortunately you about gotta be that safe or risk losing tons of exp pulling the wrong mob affixes. Viable classes should be able to handle at least 3 champs of any affix combo in BiS gear. Magician cannot.

Now don't get me wrong, its still possible to get to level 99 HC with a magician. You'd just have to play super safe and take no risks like multi-pulling in hell, and 5 pull nightmare nimgall to 99. But the same could be said for any class.

Those were my impressions too when I tried Mage - squishy, not enough dps, if you're chaining and get the wrong affixes on champs (chromatic, f u) you're most likely dead.
Btw you're dps is impressive for mage!My Mage has nowhere near it and that's why he's been sitting in Act I Hell (lvl 80ish) for ever ...

With the exact same gear, necromancer could probably do 25k DPS just spamming bone spirit fireball. I could get the cast speed on bone spirit really close to 3x per sec, or around the .34-.38 range. Leech didn't work on spells when I was playing necromancer last, and now that it does I might have better results. Nobody has gotten a necro to 99 yet either, so I might delete my mage and work on necro.