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Message: <blockquote data-quote="AbdulAlhazred" data-source="post: 5426553" data-attributes="member: 82106">Sorry, but still the point stands, 14 is about the lowest Wisdom you typically see in most Wizards. I'm also picking a pretty mediocre at-will and we're not even counting any of its potential control aspect. That may not be vast, but it exists and I've found numerous situations where a wizard can simply maintain a CoD for more damage, the CoD can deny easy access by minions, other PCs can push monsters through the CoD and add more damage, etc. And as you point out, EVEN WITHOUT any of those considerations CoD is still doing 0.25 DPR more than MM. MM has a few minor advantages too, 20 range and the fact that if you happen to be facing a substantial attack penalty it may be the optimum choices, but those are at least as much 'corner cases' as those where CoD benefits.I've never been in the 'MM is totally useless' camp, but I would not even consider it as a choice for an at-will. I wouldn't even pick it as the 3rd at-will for a human Wizard, though there was a time before some of the nastier at-wills in AP and Dragon (and now the even BETTER Essentials ones) showed up. With something like Arc Lightning (still usually not the best) MM is far outstripped. The real icing on the cake though is the total non-existence of any control effect with MM. You can discount at-will control if you want to, but in fact it IS important because it is always available. In many fights it may be marginal but you can almost always find some melee round where you can drop in an at-will and cause some sort of issue for the enemy. It doesn't have to be much. Control is not always about spectacular effects. Sometimes it is just about preventing a couple minions from causing trouble, denying a monster an OA, or blocking them from using a specific movement path. Dropping a CoD or a Storm Pillar near a fighter for instance can force the enemy into a choice of provoking the fighter, taking damage, or simply not being able to move into position to attack. Given any kind of common situation like a doorway or 10' wide hallway or just a few bits of difficult terrain here or there and the benefits can be quite substantial. When combined with push, pull, slide, prone, etc which even low level allies normally have some of it gets even better. You probably won't WIN fights with at-will control, but in most encounters you can spare your allies a hit, cause the monster to use a less effective tactic, or hasten the demise of an enemy at least once with a good mix of at-will control effects. At worst you force the enemy to change tactics or suffer.Does MM add much to a Mage? Meh, a little bit. You may use it now and then. Probably not every encounter. There may even be that encounter once in a blue moon where it stands out, but you could probably get by with your other at-wills and hardly notice the difference. The main thing you're getting is an RBA with 20 range that at least does SOMETHING. As a modest class feature it is fine, certainly not earth shaking and I would guess it would be hardly missed if it weren't there.</blockquote>

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