As some of you know, I run both this site, and MakeWoWGold.com, where I give free advice and strategies on making gold in the game.

Recently I went back through emails that I had received from MWG members and visitors and conducted a study on which published gold guide they found most helpful.  I decided to do that because with all the feedback I'd gotten I detected a trend and wanted to verify it.  Sure enough, there was one guide that everyone liked the most.  So I did a review of it on MWG.

The long and the short of it is this:  There's a guide called Gold Secrets that members raved about.  It has a fantastic guarantee, and a ton of very useful bonuses.  It is the total package of gold-making guides.  He is even setting up private message forums for folks to share information about.

I try to give out as much information as I can for free on MakeWoWGold.com, but he goes into more detail than I have time to do.  (Between tracking optimal mage strategies and gold-making strategies, I could make a full-time job of it!)  So, I sincerely recommend his guide if you're going to go for one of the published ones out there.

I frequently get asked about the best way for Mages to make gold.

I have compiled a list of several guides below that I can recommend:

World Of Warcraft Gold Secrets

One of the most thorough gold-guides out there. He provides lots of useful bonus products, a private forum, etc. He offers a very good guarantee, so it's worth trying.

World Of Warcraft WoW Valkors Gold Making Guide

A large guide, updated regularly. Lots of lists, and a lot of emphasis on the Burning Crusade.

Warcraft Riches

A new WoW Gold Guide! This guy has compiled a lot of the strategies from many of the other guides...also with a strong guarantee.

Ultimate World of Warcraft Guide

One of the things that I don't care for with this guide is that he has some exploits. Most of the 'hacks/cheats/exploits' that people advertise are old ones that won't work, or can get you banned. In addition to the gold guide (which is really well done, with tons of interactive links), he offers a list of CURRENT exploits that work. Not my thing, but if you're interested, check it out.

WoW Wealth

There are two great things about this guide: 1) it's the most current one on the market and 2) it comes with some really cool Video Tutorials.

Running daily quests is something that all serious WoW players ought to do as a habit. It earns you needed rep, and it is a great way to make gold, especially for folks who have non-gathering professions or classes that don’t kill fast enough to make farming profitable.

The advantage of daily quests is three-fold:

1) completing them earns faction reputation, which usually provides high-level rewards (some are even best-in-slot),

2) they are a consistent way of earning a known amount of gold (and the gold earned is usually at a higher rate for the time invested in it), and

3) they are repeatable (obviously), so you can master the techniques needed to complete the quest quickly, and earn good gold (and rep rewards) over and over.

Technically there is a fourth advantage: many of the quests can be lumped together and done at the same time. This REALLY ups your gold-per-hour rate.

There is a new Daily Quest addon that tells you exactly how to complete each quest. It provides map waypoints to point you in the right direction, and it teaches you how to group the quests so you can run them concurrently.

If you find yourself either needing to farm up some reputation for a reward you’re after, or you just need good, consistent gold at level 80, you need this addon.

It literally puts a waypoint arrow on your screen when you select the dailies for a given zone (or for a given faction), and you simply follow the on-screen instructions. It is as close to automatic gold as you can get without using a bot (and getting kicked out of wow!).

Here’s the Daily Quest Guide/Addon download link.

The theoretical min/max DPS for you does depend on the gear you have. Frostfire specs were optimal at early levels of Naxx gearing, and before Blizz fixed Torment the Weak to work on Thunderclap and other combat slows. At high levels of T7 gear, 57/3/11 arcane theoretically outpaces frostfire, and 18/53/0 deep fire also outpaces frostfire (assuming you can get enough hit rating on gear).

With arcane, it is definitely theoretical... Arcane specs take a lot of planning to play well. You need to know how long a fight is going to be and adjust your spell rotation accordingly to max your damage and ensure good mana longevity so you can last for the entire fight without going OOM. Most mages either can't plan well or don't put the time into it to do it right.

That said, if you do a fair amount of PVP, arcane is probably a better option than frostfire. Cast times are just too long with frostfire to be terribly effective. Arcane has more instants and short-cast burst damage.

Arcane is also very fun to play, but at the same time you need to be very engaged in it. Managing your AB buff stack with procs and stuff is a real challenge. But once you get the hang of it it's fun as h311.

Lastly, you always want at least 1 fire mage in a raid for scorch for optimal raid dps. The personal dps difference between arcane and fire or frostfire will never outweigh the raid dps of 10% crit. This will be easier in 3.1 when the crit debuff is nerfed and warlocks get the 5% crit passively from shadowbolts.

For rotations, you just have to develop a feel for how much mana you can burn given the length of the fight.

Here is a nice table of DPS/DPM tradeoffs for the various rotations.

Generally, the best standard rotation for mana conservation is:
Arc Blast, Arc Blast, Arc Barrage
OR if Missile Barrage procs during that, you change it to
Arc Blast, Arc Blast, Arc Blast, Arc Missiles

Never wait to cast a spell, but when you see MB proc, get that AB3MBAM fired off.

Also, don't change your spell choice based on clearcast or potency. It's not worth messing up the rotation.

When you fire all your cooldowns, you use a burn rotation:
AB spam, when MB procs use AM at a 3 stack of AB

You can get through 20 seconds of AB spam pretty easily. The MB procs will reset the AB buff enough to keep some of your mana. But if you're unlucky with MB procs you can fire a ABarr in the middle to reset the buff if you're worried about mana.

PVP is tough... generally speaking, I run around firing off arc barrage on every cooldown and channeling missiles when missile barrage procs. Depending on the class you can sometimes pop your cooldowns and ramp up AB spam to take someone out.

In BGs, I tend to try to hang back and use a AB-Abarr-AB-Abarr, with arc missiles on MB proc.

A new Dual Spec system has been added to the game, allowing players to maintain more than one talent spec, glyph set, and action bar layout at a time. (Source)

* Max-level players may access this system after visiting their trainer and paying a one-time fee.
* Switching between talent specs requires access to a Lexicon of Power. These Lexicons can be found in any major city, as well as summoned via an item created by scribes.
* Players are unable to switch specs while in combat, or while in Arenas, but may view the second talent spec at any time.
* Choosing to respec your talents will only respec the currently active talent set.

Finally...we can have one spec for Raids and one for PVP! (or farming)

* Frost spec Mages will find Ice Lance to be much more involved in Shatter combos in PvE.
* Improved Water Elemental - this talent has been removed and replaced with a new talent that grants Replenishment (similar to Shadow priests).
* Spirit has been changed to be an attractive attribute for all Mages, regardless of talent spec.
* Survivability in PvP for Fire spec Mages has been improved.

Underwhelming, I know.  No details about the Fire PVP survivability.  No details about how Spirit will be changed.  Removing Improved WE so we get more mana now...

Sounds like they want all PVE'rs to go Arcane.  Just when they have to specs competitive, they can't leave well-enough alone.

Previously, regardless of opinion, or how you tweaked gear, raid buffs, etc., FrostFire was firmly on top.  I'm not talking about any individual person's experience.  I'm not talking "I specced Frost and I beat out all the other mages in my guild."  I'm talking about objective data that proves what the max possible DPS could be done in a real fight scenario.

If you've read this site at all, you know I'm a fan of hard data, and that RAWR is a great source for that.  (Just see my Hit vs. Spell Power vs. Crit vs. Int post for a discussion on using RAWR.)

Pre-3.08, nothing could touch FrostFire if you configured RAWR to mimic any of the end-game fights.

Now, Arcane has made a resurgence.

It's not clearly above a FrostFire spec, nor is it too far below.  Depending on raid configurations and the fight, the two are now close enough in DPS that an end-game mage really does have a choice.  (I guess we always had a choice, but who would want to intentionally choose a spec that didn't do maximum damage?)

The differences between FrostFire and Arcane now have slimmed to the point where player-execution makes the difference.  Reflexes, 'twitchiness', and overall play skill (positioning, proper cooldown-stacking, reactions, etc.) will make or break the optimal DPS.

One thing that Arcane has going for it is it's ability to do burst DPS.  With mana in good supply, Arcane can far out-burst any other spec.

It's taken Blizzard years and years, but they've finally offered us a choice of two specs which can be viable for raiding.  (Now if they'd just fix all the goofy little bugs with the spell named after their company...)

I wanted to write up a little instructional post for my favorite new addon. I use it to track procs and DoTs that I need to put up, and I've found it instrumental in maximizing my DPS. I'm going to walk through the config screens from how I have it set up, just so that you can see some of the features and dream up your own ways to get value out of it.

Download:
http://wow.curse.com/downloads/wow-addo ... assic.aspx

/powa to bring up the config screen.

On the main config window, hit the New button to create a new aura. It also shows all the auras you have already configured. I have a bunch that I created when I was frost specced, that I've since turned off.

This is the config pane for my Living Bomb. Living Bomb is an instant cast DoT that lasts for 12 seconds, so I cast it a lot during a boss fight. The circular design at the top is the aura that glows below my toon. I have it configured for the DEBUFF, named LIVING BOMB, only if CASTED BY ME (to ignore the bombs casted by other mages), and told the aura to SHOW WHEN NOT ACTIVE, and ONLY IF IN COMBAT, and only if I'm targeting an ENEMY PLAYER. So when I'm targeting a boss, I get this nice visual reminder that it's time to refresh my Living Bomb. I should probably also set it to show ONLY IF IN RAID, since I rarely cast LB while grinding.

I've also customized the animation for this aura. I've set it to be flashing rather than static, and to flash at a slow speed (50%). I also told it to only flash for 8 seconds and then leave me alone (so I can ignore it if I'm mana starved).

Hot Streak was an easy one. A nice big aura around my toon, that shows up for the full duration of the proc to remind me to launch of that instant Pyroblast.
Lastly, I set it to track when improved scorch is absent from the mob. I also have a timer bar that I use to keep it from dropping off, but if I forget and it does drop off this gives me a big visual reminder to get it back on. Though I did set it to only flash for 5 seconds so I can ignore it if I want to.

You can also use it to configure procs in other specs, such as: instant Fireball proc in deep frost, Fingers of Frost, Ice Barrier, Missile Barrage, etc.

If you found this helpful, send Aonghus of Eonar 1g in game.  He'd get a kick outta that.

Judgement of Wisdom
Now restores 2% base mana per proc instead of 1% max mana.
No info on proc rate/cooldown yet.

Torment the Weak
Is now triggered by attack speed slowing as well. It also affects Arcane Blast now.
It should be up all the time on bosses now without casting Slow because the tank has an attack speed slow.

Arcane Overhaul
Arcane Blast debuff is now a buff and lasts 10s. It's stacked by chaining Arcane Blast and removed when casting any other Arcane spell.
It increases damage of your next Arcane spell by 15% and cost of Arcane Blast by 200%. Arcane Missiles get the damage increase for all 5 volleys.
A new glyph increases the damage bonus of the Arcane Blast buff by 5% per stack, up to 15% at 3 stacks.
Arcane Blast is now affected by Torment the Weak as well.

Arcane Playstyles
Early simulations gave the following recommendations:
AB-ABar is your normal DPM cycle.
It might change to AB2/3-ABar when you get haste capped at 33%.
AB*3-ABar is your DPS cycle.
AB spam is your burn cycle, however with a bad mana conversion.
Use MBAM as soon as it procs. Use Molten Armour.

Spec Performance
Without the glyph, it's about 4% behind Fire/Frostfire specs, with more mobility.
Fire with Torment and Frostfire as usual are now neck-to-neck.
Evocation
Cooldown down to 4 minutes, 2 minutes talented with 2/2 Arcane Flows.

Elemental Precision
Is now 3% hit to all spells. No more double-dipping for Frostfire.

Dispel Resistance
Talents now only affect the dispel resistance of buffs and DoTs.
Winter's Chill and Polymorph are not protected by Arcane Subtlety anymore.

Procs items
Many items that procced on spell cast were changed to proc only on damage/healing spells.

Pyromaniac - 10% spirit regen instead of mana cost reduction per point.
Improved Blizzard - down to 20%/40%/50% slowing.
Arcane Flows - added -1/-2 minutes on Evocation.
Slowfall - castable on others now.
Blast Wave - Minor Glyph for -15% mana, no knockback.
Glyph of Arcane Blast - +5% damage on the Arcane Blast buff. Unknown whether it stacks to 15% with 3 stacks.
Illustration of the Dragon Soul - down to 20 SP per stack. About 10% better than Sundial/Embrace now.