Buffs that last a bit longer

[VydarrTyr]

Along those same lines, I would like Skull Sunder to do 1 million points of damage, and make the mob explode. Or at least get shot into outer space.

The reason buffs only last 5 minutes is to make you recast. When you're doing difficult fights that last longer than 5 minutes -- like NMs -- the mage has to pay attention to when the buffs wear off and re-buff mid-fight. If you make the buffs last 30 minutes, mages will never have to worry about re-buffing mid-fight. They'll just be spamming heal and occasionally throwing up DoTs. This at least forces them to pay attention.

There's also an element of strategy to it. Casting buffs generates hate, which threatens to pull aggro away from your tanks. Making it so mages don't have to re-buff mid-fight takes that element of strategy away. And one of the big complaints posted all over the boards is that people think the fights don't have enough strategy.

That's also why I think this is a bad idea:

Buffs like stoneskin would auto-refresh on all players every 3 minutes or so.

If they auto-refresh in the middle of a fight, then that could potentially auto-grab aggro. Which you don't want.

Not wanting to perform the same tedious task every five minutes ≠ laziness.

It's not like they're asking you to balance your checkbook. It's two button presses every five minutes. It takes like 15 seconds, max, to cast all the buffs. I don't think it's too big a deal.