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Comment by Kyana

As of 2.0.6; "Counterspell no longer triggers the global cooldown."

Comment by 23914

There seems to be a lot of mages that don't fully understand this ability, so allow me to enlighten you. It's a disrupting ability, allowing you to prevent an enemy from casting a school of magic. However, it requires certain parameters to work.
1) Enemy must be a caster
2) enemy must be casting/channeling a spell

It's as simple as that. When you either see a spell-bar or the enemy's hands go all glowy, hit them with counterspell. It's one of the best PVP abilities available and is pretty useful in a PVE environment against powerful enemies.
If you get it specced it'll also silence the enemy for 4 seconds.

Comment by Aikida

It isn't. A warlock with a felhunter out can interrupt without using their GCD

Comment by 78891

Also worth noting in case no one knows. If you spec for improved CS you will NOT retain the original effect. Example: Another mage is casting pyroblast and you CS him mid-cast. Instead of him being unable to use fire for the full 8 seconds he will have full access to all his spells after only 4.

Comment by 155273

can you counterspell a hunter's aimed shot?

Comment by Flameenix

I personally enjoy the fact that it can be casted when you're not facing the target, which makes it very useful as an escape tool as apposed to turning around, and most of all, you interrupt a heal or an incoming attack even when you can't see where the damn caster is!

Definately one of the top mage utilities, and it's fairly sad to see that many mages don't use this until later levels. :(

Comment by Enquillion

Monsters don't believe in spell schools. When you interrupt a monster, you only put that specific spell on cooldown. For example, Counterspell Holy Smite, and the monster might just heal itself the next second. (yes, with a holy spell)

edit: while on the PvE part of this spell, the threat mentioned in the tooltip is abysmally low.

Comment by Flameenix

To spec this into Improved Counterspell , you must spend either 16 or 17 points on the Arcane tree, (16 for 2 second naked silence, 17 for 4 second naked silence).

Comment by Flameenix

I actually read this and tried it in 2 v 2 arena recently, worked a treat to prevent that first charge, it always seems to confuse the warrior because Counterspell isn't much of a visible spell, giving me enough time to start off with a fat-ass shatter combo. :D

So yeah, many uses indeed. :)

(In response to Case, defending counterspell as an ability used against even melee classes.)

Comment by 4966

For mages fighting warrs, it is very useful to counterspell a warr as soon as they are in range, as it enters them into combat and prevents them from charging, giving you that few extra secs to cast or poly them, and starving them of their rage gained from charge.

Comment by Toothun

And mages say they are underpowered ....

Atleast give it a proper cooldown.

Comment by Toothun

This is much better than kick.
Kick requires melee range , gives no silence if PvP specced and only lasts 5 sec.

Edit: Supposed to be a reply to eizei

Comment by 144159

I DON'T CARE IF YOU DOWNRATE THIS COMMENT, BUT THIS SPELL IS TO OVERPOWERED TOGETHER WITH EVERY OTHER SPELLS MAGES GETS IN FROST TREE!

It's not possible as a spellcaster to do anything in pvp when this !@#$'d mage counterspells your first spell, you can't remove the effect with trinkets, and you're as good as dead before the silence runs out.................!@#$ING MAGE SPELLS!

Comment by 222279

As a holy pally my opinion may be skewed, but i can think of a way to rework this spell to make every1(i think) a bit more happy.

When pvping with an enemy mage, i always have to be on the lookout. i know fakecasting works sometimes, but not always. and sometimes u dont have the luxery of faking, and just need to get the heal off or some1 is gonna die.

the biggest issue for me is the spell CD. the CS CD remains greater then any other player caster interrupt. in an arena situation with just about any mage, 8 second of literaly helpless time is fatal. i cant even bubble when i get this.

Heres my idea: change usage CD of this ability to something like 10 secs, but reduce the CD caused to something like 3 secs.

i think this is good for both me and the mage. for one, if the mage misses, then he wont in such great danger. if i am hit, then i wont be killed 100% of the time. and the biggest reason would be to provide mages a more mainstream interrupt for PvE situations.

I like the sound of that last idea when i think of times on the illidari council where our mage's CS was on CD, and lady whatsherface got a heal off when under gathios' BoP

Comment by 175315

its best to use on paladin, becase he knows only holy, so using this spell makes them totally silenced!

Comment by Norrinir

Also, the silence effect of Improved Counterspell prevents death knights from using AMS, AMZ and few other abilities.

Comment by 206160

counterspell a

priest : shadow - mostly render them useless, esp. if they are shadow in shadow form.
priest : holy / disc : cs heal (or holy spells), and pew pew
mage : not so devastating, as mage have a lot of Nuke/tools from 3 schools
warlock : see him casting immolate? cs Immolate and lock him out of CB, Conf, (backdrafted) Inci... pew pew
dotzers? = mage armor. pew pew.
druid : mostly they use nature spells. cs any and enjoy your pew pew.
shaman : also they use many nature spells. shocks are not that horrifying.
pali : holy have only holy school I guess....

basically, if your cs not on cd, you should win against any casters!
this spell alone make a WHOLE lot of difference.

Comment by Quest

This spell works best on disgruntled female gnome mages try'n to fire their fireball.

Comment by Deforj

Exept a balance druid will use wrath if you CC starfire and use moonfire+starfall if you CC'd wrath.
Also locks will use chaosbolt and shadowbolt if you CC'ed Fire and use Immo+Conflag if you cc'ed shadow.

However, they might just fear you and wait for fire.

Comment by 457442

BOOM, COUNTERSPELL, JIMMY WASNT SPECCED FOR IMPROVE COUNTERSPELL.

Comment by Dr00dboy

Here is a macro you will want to use with counterspell.

/stopcasting
/cast counterspell

Very simple and it helps alot!

Comment by johannhowitzer

I am trying to use a macro to keep casting a different spell with the same button when the button's main spell is countered.

Examples:
/cast Frostbolt
/cast Arcane Missiles

/cast Ice Lance
/cast Fire Blast

These aren't working - when frost school gets countered, the button does nothing. Is there a way I can fix this?

Comment by 265723

Seems to also not be affected by diminishing returns..... got strangulated, then silenced by a priest, then instantly counterspelled after for the full duration.....

is it not supposed to be affected by DR? or is it like a FU button after your silenced for 10 seconds already

Comment by Frogger

Mages in arena are so overpowered with this nonsense. They can sheep your healer. only few sec cooldown, then they can use this with only 24 sec CD! i mean WTF

Comment by dreadblood

Mages in arena are so overpowered with this nonsense. They can sheep your healer. only few sec cooldown, then they can use this with only 24 sec CD! i mean WTF

and I suppose rogues are overpowered with their nearly permanent stuns? or hunters are overpowered with their traps? GET OVER YOURSELF!

Comment by PalaDinka

Traps?It's useless agianst mages(if u have blink).Just blink it over and roll.

Comment by Waterdragon

Will this spell work in BoT on the Twilight-Shifter, or will Spellsteal work better for this?

Comment by Havers

This is one of the mage's strongest spell, its extremely useful in PvP, all casters hate Counterspell

Comment by Thottbot

All I can say is.... my warlock friend is pwned in our next duel.

Comment by Thottbot

dont know about your battle against warlocks. but just sheep a warlock and kill his pet. counter spell you must wait for caster to use ther magic. i think its better to counterspell those damn priest healing flag carriers or healing warriors or whoever. healing priest are the best but the worst in battle. counter spell a preist when there hands glow white > BAH

Comment by Thottbot

This truelly does wreak havok on the opposing caster, i mean, once that 8 seconds is up theyre most likely gonna be dead from mage's unstoppable skills.

Comment by Thottbot

When used against a warlock who is casting any shadowspell will shut them down for 10sec.

Asfar as I know, Counterspell is not a magiceffect and can therefore not be removed with the felhunter's devour magic.

Ofc the felhunter is just as a big threat as the warlock itself. (my felhunter killed a mage without me even doing anything, I was polymorphed)

Comment by Thottbot

I've noticed that post 1.11 Improved Counterspell Rank 2 (100% chance to silence target for 4 seconds) is being resisted maybe 10%-15% of the time on normal mobs. Anyone else having this problem?

Comment by Thottbot

Thx AcidTrees, surprised anyone posted in here lol. As for PW:S, it's pretty damn hard to counter an instacast spell ;). And why it isn't holy is beyond my understanding. I'm not noticing an increase in mob CS resists, probably because I maxed the arcane talent that reduces resist chance by 10%, something like that. I tried elemental, but I just like 21/30 arc/frost too much.

Comment by Thottbot

I've run too many 5 man runs in instances to count, and time and again, things have been made better through the a mage using this spell. Whenever the warrior tries to pull a mob that is a caster, of course the caster will sit there and nuke, but when mage throws this down, the mob has no choice but to try and engage in mellee range, making things MUCH nicer.

Comment by Thottbot

Use this against warriors to prevent them from charging you.

Comment by Thottbot

its nice i guess. kinda a long cool but it makes a long silence.

if you want to use this effectively, go to your interface options and switch on the enemy cast bar that will show what spell they are casting and how far throught it they are so you know if you should use it and when.

make a macro too

/cast counterspell
/emote shouts "DENIED!"

Comment by Thottbot

This spell is simply mages' only way to beat healers.

Comment by Thottbot

Doesn't trigger global CD anymore, %^&*!es =D

Comment by Thottbot

Could someone give us some hints for knowing when important spells are being cast from different classes?

For example, someone wrote "counter spell a preist when their hands glow white"

How about other important spells I should watch out to counterspell? Or FAKE casting to watch out for, i.e. Tauren/Druid fake healing with Hearthstone...Thanks!

Comment by Thottbot

The casting bar mod called Quartz not only helps on faster casting because of the latency feature, it also shows you the spell that the enemy is casting, along with their accompanying casting bar.

Try it out. Makes CS so much easier.

Comment by Thottbot

im a mage and when i 1vs1 another mage or lock with felhunter, i have a epic necklace from heroic BF, it reduces silence or interupt effects by 20%. by that time, a mage will cast polymorph on me but, bu i belive when he is casting it, by the time its cast is 1.3, i can silence him back. then i sheep, fireball, fireblast, blink, dragon breathe, scorch, blast wave. by that time he should have 10-20% depending on health and crits. then i melee him o death because he or she is bad.

against a lock its a bit tricky. due to lag it becomes difficult to cs fear so i usually blink upto them and aoe them with w/e usually AE. then i cs and use the same stratedgy like the above paragraph. only exception is tat i dont rush with polymorph cd on the enemy playr considering i might need cs again.

Comment by Thottbot

dont melee him at lvl 70 :D do some arcane explosions or spam ice lance

Comment by Thottbot

I'm an arcane specced mage so far, and I have both points in improved counterspell.
I was dueling a pally friend, and when he was about to die I used counterspell. he wasn't casting any spell at that time so I only used it to SILENCE him... so he wouldn't heal, bubble or anything. I was surprised to see that he bubbled, breaking the silence effect, and healing afterwards.
Can anyone confirm this? I tried against another pally and she broke the silencing effect with her bubble as well.
I think it's a bug since silence should prevent ANY spellcasting

EDIT: I asked a GM for help and he said that pally's bubbles CAN break silence effects.

Comment by Thottbot

Extremely useful. Most classes focus on one school only, so if you cant lock out all their spells with this, they are still going to be specced for one school.

Druid- Boomkin, Tree of Life;Nature lockout is their only spells and its deep trouble for them if you can nuke half decently

Mage- see what school they focus on, CS it. It doesnt prevent them from casting all spells, but all their best beefed up spells will be locked, cutting damage in half.

Paladin- Lock them out during a heal, Holy is the one and only tree for pallys, so lock it out and they become as good as oom for 8 secs. And if you didnt know...a paladin with no mana is a dead paladin.

Priest- For Disc/Holy not that great lock out their heals and they can still bubble. But still nice to stop the flood of heals in av wsg etc.
Shadow is a different story...lock out shadow in Shadowform and they have to either bite the bullet and wait it out, or shift out and cast their relatively weaker heals and then spend a large ammout of mana to get back in to Shadowform...but they have silence too and theyre still a %^&*!.

Shaman- Lock out heals, although they can still Frost/Flame shock you, they cant heal, totem, or cast lightning for 8 sec, huge advantage for you

Warlock- Try to silence during fear SoC or SB to lockout shadow. A warlock who cant dot chain fear and drain life is gonna be in trouble...but the felhunter has a lockout and they are not totally defenseless, can still be a problem.

Warrior- CS has a larger range than charge, use it to bring the Warrior into combat so he cant charge. and 30yds away is right where you want him.

Not a definite "I Win" button, but if you use it with some strategy it can be a serious advantage for the fledgling mage. Dont just blow this on the first spell they cast, wait for the right moment.

/imp CS
/buttsecks
/profit

Comment by Thottbot

"Druid- Boomkin, Tree of Life;Nature lockout is their only spells and its deep trouble for them if you can nuke half decently"

Nope, Starfire and Moonfire are both Arcane schooled spells. Doomkins will still turn you inside-out.

As for Tree Druids, you can't CS their insane HoTs.

<<>>

Comment by Thottbot

if u have silence on CS, u can silence a rogue and they cant stealth as long as silence is on them lol

Comment by Thottbot

Hmm I wonder if you counterspelled a counterspell (if it was possible)

Comment by Thottbot

Counterspelling a counterspell just results in locking out the arcane tree.

Yes you can counter instant cast spells, but you have to counterspell at the exact moment they cast the instant cast, so pretty much it leaves it up to luck for you to counterspell counterspell.

Comment by Allakhazam

This is one of the most critical spells in a Mage's arsenal. Ignore it at your peril.

You know how Creep spellcasters like to sit at range and blast you, forcing you to run to them and possibly draw aggro from their nearby friends? Counterspell them while they're casting, and they'll run to you and try to melee (ineffectively), instead. While your tank buddy will have a very hard time dragging aggro off of you (Counterspell generates a lot of hate, even if you do it when they're not casting), you should be fine.

Comment by Allakhazam

doesn't work on paladin's immune like rogue's kick does. bah

Comment by Allakhazam

Spell works great in PvP vs. other casters. It buys very precious time at the beginning of a duel. I like to use polymorph then nuke then counter then nuke again. Garaunteed frustration for your foe.

Comment by Allakhazam

Im not exactly sure when to cast it. Can i cast it before the made any casts, when they are in the middle of casting or do i have to wait until they have made a cast?

Comment by Kanariya

Causes 300 Threat, even if it does not interrupt a spell. Take caution when using this ability at lower levels while grouped.

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Counterspell

Counterspell

9% of base mana	40 yd range

Instant	24 sec cooldown

Counters the enemy's spellcast, preventing any spell from that school of magic from being cast for 7 sec.

Spell Details

Duration

7 seconds

School

Arcane

Mechanic

Interrupted

Dispel type

n/a

GCD category

n/a

Cost

9% of base mana

Range

40 yards (Long)

Cast time

Instant

Cooldown

24 seconds

GCD

0 seconds

Effect

Interrupt Cast
Value: 1
PVP Multiplier: 1

Flags

Cannot miss
Taps immediately

Counterspell

Buff

Spell Details

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