Eventually there will be a Frost thread

[Karrok]

Someone had to do it, sheesh.

Anyone else playing this spec? What have you got to say about your experience so far?

I'm running Lonely Winter and Glacial Spike, well aware that these things sim lower than the other talent choices. But it's refreshingly simple to play without the water elemental (plenty of procs 'n shit already) and I love the animation and giant numbars on GS. It's pretty satisfying to watch those max GS crits go up as my item level increases.

The issues I'm having? Well, I can't aoe for beans without Frozen Orb layered on top of Blizzard, and even then the damage is pretty bad. I might try Comet Storm now that it doesn't split damage (why did it ever?) and see if my burst aoe can be competitive with...well, the tank. Seriously, Blizzard feels pretty weak.

Any ideas on how to improve frost's aoe capabilities? Not even trying to steal fire's niche, just want better-than-garbage damage.

Other than that, been having a blast with frost's mechanics!

[yozone]

Hahaha, I was thining that I'm the only one playing frost mage these days. It will be good to have some thread about Frost mages

[FrostyButt]

I'm going to throw some fake numbers around. Lets assume there are 10,000 mage players in the world.

9,800 are Fire
100 are Arcane
100 are Frost

At least that's what it seems like.

Frost play style isn't horrible. I actually enjoy it more than Fire. Mainly because I really suck ass at playing Fire. As far as my personal experience is on which does more damage. Obviously Fire destroys Frost in terms of burst. But I seem to be able to sustain higher DPS as Frost than I can as Fire. Again, this is most likely because I suck dick at Fire. It could also be because I have been leveling both Frost and Fire weapons. My Frost has second golden trait and my Fire is 3 unlocks (About 80,000 AP) from the second golden trait. Maybe once I get the second golden trait on Fire, my DPS will sky rocket.. The one I am trying to get now is Phoenix Reborn which I think would be a nice DPS boost.

All in all.. I still like Frost over Fire. I guess the main reason I am doing two weapons is because I am hoping Blizzard brings Frost closer to Fire so I can make Frost my main spec. I don't mind Fire being the best spec for damage, but I want to see the specs be brought closer to each other so we have a choice. I mean, we currently have a choice, but no one who raids Mythic is really going to pick Frost or Arcane when Fire is just so good right now.

[Deleted]

I am playing frost now(whole life had fire alt) and feel pretty bad. I am spamming spells on mythicsand bm hunt eating sandwich use barrage and i am always behind him. On pvp its much better (except subt who just eats me). I know i am not best player but doing my best amd still always 100k behind others.844ilvl and i can dream about feral dps. Sry for my low english

[Aurilias]

I'm playing frost; I despise the fire play style. I think once we start unlocking most of our artifact traits (ESPECIALLY the elite ones, I'm looking at you Chilled to the Core) our damage will come more in line. More so on single target than AoE, but still. I think fire at the beginning has more of it's goodies and major capabilities already unlocked. Fire AoE currently makes me look like crap, and it probably always will because AoE is something Fire has always been capable of better than Frost. Right now at 832 iLvl and only having It's Cold Outside unlocked (currently making my way to CTTC), I'm outperforming most fire mages at single target. Their initial burst DPS is high, however over a sustained fight I always come out ahead.

The AoE of other classes at the moment (WW monk, Boomkin, DH) is absolutely insane, I don't know how Blizzard let these classes get away with such freaking insane AoE damage it's unreal. Tank DPS at the moment two-fold to me right now. One, I guess we shouldn't complain that we essentially have a fourth dps in the group, but then on the other hand you're going to get called out by people as a crap DPS because the tank is doing better DPS than you. Which leads to my second point, that tank DPS is way too high right now. Especially on AoE, but even some tanks on single target are pulling crazy numbers. I don't know if that trend will continue being a constant, but we'll see.

[Deleted]

I'm playing frost too.
I refuse to play anything else since Frost was viable on PVE... But its really annoying to have almost the same DPS as the tank (Sometimes even lower...)

And yeah...Let's not talk about AoE.

It's really sad because i love frost gameplay but people (And with reasons) complain on myth since the dmg on frost mages is really bad.
Still gonna keep playing frost.

[Sw1tch]

I love how frost plays, but from the sims it needs a good buffing. AoE is horrendous and single target is still bad. I know from the Q&A they are waiting to do a big balance patch instead of doing minor tweaks now, but it needs a good amount of loving. Balance is in a bad spot right now (as it almost always is at the beginning of expansions due to lack of data). The difference between the top and bottom performing specs is like 40% right now...(Feral and Frost DK)

[Kuni Zyrekai]

Our burst AOE is more or less fine, it's just the whole fact that we have 0 sustained damage since Blizzard is Frostbolt: the AOE. Have a trash pack without CDs? Have fun being dead last. I'd personally like to see the burst be a bit higher due to the amount of setup time required to pull it off (FBomb->Blizzard->RoP->start actually doing damage->reapply FBomb because your target died in 4 seconds), but that's me.

On that topic, L90 has no choice behind it. You take FBomb, or you're bad. Both in terms of sustained damage output differences and in terms of burst potential. AG needs an absolutely stupid modifier on it to make it worthwhile, and UM I don't think can ever compete at percentages Blizzard is likely to put on it.

Chain Reaction feels more like a punishment than a buff, especially in an AOE situation. It also actively works against busy talent selections. I'd like to see this reduced to 8-10%/stack, but allowed to proc off of anything that isn't Ice Lance.

GS needs to be made not DPS negative, plain and simple. Trap talents are bad. Talents made traps by traits are even worse.

Ray might need a bit of a buff, but with the proposed Chain Reaction change it might also be fine.

[Sw1tch]

Our burst AOE is more or less fine, it's just the whole fact that we have 0 sustained damage since Blizzard is Frostbolt: the AOE. Have a trash pack without CDs? Have fun being dead last. I'd personally like to see the burst be a bit higher due to the amount of setup time required to pull it off (FBomb->Blizzard->RoP->start actually doing damage->reapply FBomb because your target died in 4 seconds), but that's me.

On that topic, L90 has no choice behind it. You take FBomb, or you're bad. Both in terms of sustained damage output differences and in terms of burst potential. AG needs an absolutely stupid modifier on it to make it worthwhile, and UM I don't think can ever compete at percentages Blizzard is likely to put on it.

Chain Reaction feels more like a punishment than a buff, especially in an AOE situation. It also actively works against busy talent selections. I'd like to see this reduced to 8-10%/stack, but allowed to proc off of anything that isn't Ice Lance.

GS needs to be made not DPS negative, plain and simple. Trap talents are bad. Talents made traps by traits are even worse.

Ray might need a bit of a buff, but with the proposed Chain Reaction change it might also be fine.

Agreed on all points here. You can't really make any kind of rotation off chain reaction because in most raid situations you're casting Ice Lance before frostbolt even hits (following Frostbolt casts of course). I'd like to see the % get decreased, but the duration go up so you can get some benefit from it.

What are your thoughts on Lonely Winter? Do you think it could ever be viable with how much Ebonchill benefits Frozen Touch and Thermal Void?

[Kuni Zyrekai]

What are your thoughts on Lonely Winter?

Bad talent should stay dead? There's two things with it.

The first is I'm of the belief that complexity within a single spec should be rewarded; RoP should do more than MI should do more than IF. LW's the only thing that actually removes baseline complexity, and therefore should be punished. Which it is. Now, it shouldn't be by as much as it is currently, but I believe that's an artifact being compounded by Chain Reaction and the lack of a real good L100 talent to go along with it; TV is hurt by the lack of ICO/WJ FoF generation, and GS again being a trap talent after getting CR.

Secondly, you have to be VERY careful about damage modifier talents, they scale out of control very easily. The Marksman Lone Wolf effect is very strong here, and before Lonely Winter got nerfed by just a small amount during beta, it was the go-to talent. If Lonely Winter ever becomes the go-to, that's a failing of design and needs to be rectified. Nerfing CR's stack damage indirectly helps LW in that you're missing less damage on those missing FoFs. They have to be careful, or just nerf LW further if a CR reduction causes LW to overtake BC/Ray.

[Deleted]

Whats the chain reaction change?

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with the proposed Chain Reaction change it might also be fine.

Whats the chain reaction change?

[Nefarious Tea]

Bad talent should stay dead? There's two things with it.

The first is I'm of the belief that complexity within a single spec should be rewarded; RoP should do more than MI should do more than IF. LW's the only thing that actually removes baseline complexity, and therefore should be punished. Which it is. Now, it shouldn't be by as much as it is currently, but I believe that's an artifact being compounded by Chain Reaction and the lack of a real good L100 talent to go along with it; TV is hurt by the lack of ICO/WJ FoF generation, and GS again being a trap talent after getting CR.

Secondly, you have to be VERY careful about damage modifier talents, they scale out of control very easily. The Marksman Lone Wolf effect is very strong here, and before Lonely Winter got nerfed by just a small amount during beta, it was the go-to talent. If Lonely Winter ever becomes the go-to, that's a failing of design and needs to be rectified. Nerfing CR's stack damage indirectly helps LW in that you're missing less damage on those missing FoFs. They have to be careful, or just nerf LW further if a CR reduction causes LW to overtake BC/Ray.

I completely ignore water jet, even though I take the Ice Bea- I mean Ray of Frost - talent. I don't like having a stupid water elemental. It's not even an ice elemental. Then again, I only play Frost in PvP >.>

[Kuni Zyrekai]

Whats the chain reaction change?

I'd like to see this reduced to 8-10%/stack, but allowed to proc off of anything that isn't Ice Lance.

This proposed change, not anything from Blizz.

[Sw1tch]

Bad talent should stay dead? There's two things with it.

The first is I'm of the belief that complexity within a single spec should be rewarded; RoP should do more than MI should do more than IF. LW's the only thing that actually removes baseline complexity, and therefore should be punished. Which it is. Now, it shouldn't be by as much as it is currently, but I believe that's an artifact being compounded by Chain Reaction and the lack of a real good L100 talent to go along with it; TV is hurt by the lack of ICO/WJ FoF generation, and GS again being a trap talent after getting CR.

Secondly, you have to be VERY careful about damage modifier talents, they scale out of control very easily. The Marksman Lone Wolf effect is very strong here, and before Lonely Winter got nerfed by just a small amount during beta, it was the go-to talent. If Lonely Winter ever becomes the go-to, that's a failing of design and needs to be rectified. Nerfing CR's stack damage indirectly helps LW in that you're missing less damage on those missing FoFs. They have to be careful, or just nerf LW further if a CR reduction causes LW to overtake BC/Ray.

Good point. When it comes to raw number output, achieving efficient complexity should always give the biggest result. I will say though, with RoP/Ray of Frost/Frost bomb/Water jet/FoF/BF/GS/etc. It becomes less of a game and more of a click the right things at the right time. There should be a line where QoL and raw damage output can meet without sacrificing too much on either side.

The only reason I'm a fan of GS is because I use to love Deep Freeze when it did damage. Something about a really hard hitting spell is just satisfying.

If it were up to me, RoP would be a two minute CD with 1 charge and do double damage. It's annoying to manage right now and takes away from the QoL of the spec IMO. Maybe it wont feel this way in a dedicated boss fight that lasts 5-10 minutes, but at least for regular content and dungeons it feels annoying to use.

[Kuni Zyrekai]

If it were up to me, RoP would be a two minute CD with 1 charge and do double damage. It's annoying to manage right now and takes away from the QoL of the spec IMO. Maybe it wont feel this way in a dedicated boss fight that lasts 5-10 minutes, but at least for regular content and dungeons it feels annoying to use.

I actually quite like RoP. The flexibility of the charge system combined with a short cooldown means you can pop it on trash packs without issue, and is quite frankly the only way to get decent burst AOE out of this spec at the moment.

[sponge5307]

Off topic boosts a mage to lvl 100 and pick frost (big mistake). Leveling seems very difficult when I compare it to other class. Seems I don't do enough damage so when mobs are near they still have town of hp.

Any suggestions I should try to level faster?

[pkm]

I actually quite like RoP. The flexibility of the charge system combined with a short cooldown means you can pop it on trash packs without issue, and is quite frankly the only way to get decent burst AOE out of this spec at the moment.

RoP is pretty much the only talent all 3 specs should be using anyway. It's just too far ahead in the sims. Even on fights with heavy movement, you can still find times to stand still for ten seconds.

Regardless, it's not the only problem with Frost. As usual it suffers greatly from real poor scaling. Although there might be a point in the expansion where frost might be competitive with Ray of frost builds if haste reaches that point.

[gunner_recall]

It ain't easy bein freezy, boys. It's a fire Mage world.


I opted for RoF since it works really well with RoP. I still hate RoP and I feel dirty every time I use it but I have to admit, it works pretty well with frost and its long cool down high damage spells. I've been using one for RoF at the beginning of the pull and then another one with Ebonbolf+glacial spike and ice lances.

My only thing is, I feel like I'm losing out on damage from the icicles not launching and benefiting from black ice. Thermal void seems like a waste in dungeons, though, since bosses are dying so fast. Maybe once raids open up...

[Kuni Zyrekai]

RoP is pretty much the only talent all 3 specs should be using anyway. It's just too far ahead in the sims. Even on fights with heavy movement, you can still find times to stand still for ten seconds.

Being the frost thread and all, I guess I should point out that the standard BC/TV raid setup has less than 0.6% loss from using IF over RoP.

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My only thing is, I feel like I'm losing out on damage from the icicles not launching and benefiting from black ice. Thermal void seems like a waste in dungeons, though, since bosses are dying so fast. Maybe once raids open up...

GS works with BI, has for a long time. I prefer CmS for the sweet AOE damage in dungeons though.

[gunner_recall]

GS works with BI, has for a long time. I prefer CmS for the sweet AOE damage in dungeons though.

See, I couldn't tell if it worked with black ice or not. I knew it worked with splitting ice(or at least it looks like it does), so I kind of figured it did but...yeah.

Yeah, I've been using comet storm a lot in dungeons lately. I figured AoE was probably more important since Legion dungeons are just lousy with trash.