Magic Weapon

Magic Weapon is a Wizard Tier 6 skill unlocked at level 20, making her weapon magical and increasing damage.

Background

Diablo III Skill [e]
Magic Weapon Active, 5 ranks
Used by:	Wizard
Skill Description:
Imbue your weapon with magical energy granting it increased damage. Damage: X-Y. Duration: 120 seconds.
Skill Details:
Type:	Self buff
Quantity:	25-35 damage
Effect:	Self
School:	Unknown
Arcane Power cost:	10
Cast time:	Instant
Duration:	120 sec
Cooldown:	1.5 sec
Synergies:	None
Requires:	Stone Skin
Prereq of:	N/A

When the need for physical combat arrives, the Wizard is well prepared, fusing her weapon with magical energies, cutting deeper into her foes even when using such a mundane thing as a physical weapon.

Skill Design

This skill is clearly designed to enable a Wizard to play in the Battle-mage style, going melee combat for better or worse. The Wizard isn't really designed for that approach, but by pairing the melee damage with excellent equipment/weapon, and some intelligent spell use, it may be a viable build.

This direction would've been useful in Diablo II, what with all the "unique" builds, including the melee Sorceress. The question is if that kind of diversity will exist in Diablo III, or else this skill seems useless.

Skill Rank Table

• Rank 1: Adds 25-35 damage for 120 seconds.

Synergies

Maxing out the Weapon Master trait is essential for any Wizard using this skill and playing as a Battle-mage.

Blur, a trait that reduces damage taken from melee attacks, would also be helpful.
Note: The current trait list is very out-of-date and will no doubt be overhauled before game release.

Skill Rune Effects

• None known.

Development

Magic Weapon was first shown at BlizzCon 2008, when the Wizard debuted. Back then, it was a Tier V skill in the Conjuring Skill Tree. Together with spells like the VERY similar Weapon Mastery (gone), Damage Resistance (gone) and Spectral Blade (still in), it gave a hint of seeing the Wizard getting the capability of going melee.

Magic Weapon was also shown at BlizzCon 2009, but was unfortunately too high level to try out by the fans. There were, however, still doubts about the viability of a melee build, as Flux elucidated:[1]

One of the odder Wizard skills, seemingly designed for a melee fighting Wizard. We don’t know enough about weapon damage in general to have any idea if this is a big bonus or not. Nor do we know if this damage is boosted by attributes and +magical damage item modifiers. If so it’s possible that some Wizard builds could deal very good weapon damage. On the other hand, there are enough limits on which classes can use which weapons that Wizards might be limited in their melee damage no matter what they tried.

The skill is assumed to still be available in Blizzard's internal game build today.

Previous Versions

See the Wizard skill archive for more details on previous versions of Magic Weapon and other Wizard skills.
Or see Magic Weapon (BlizzCon 2008) for the original version of this skill.

Media

You can find pictures in the Diablo III screenshot and picture gallery:

• Diablo III screenshots and pictures
• Magic Weapon specific gallery contents

References

• BlizzCon 2009 Full Wizard Skill Trees