Kuni's Frost Mage PVE Guide

[Volitar]

How do you guys raid as frost when the only way you can track Icicles is looking over your toons head. It feels gross.

[Akraen]

There. Is. No. Need. To. Track. Icicles.

[Volitar]

Get not FoF procs before you reach 5 icicles, then you are wasting icicles.

So yes there is SOME need to track them.

[Imnick]

no

if you have more than five icicles then it just fires the oldest one automatically
it is impossible to "waste icicles" unless you are using ice lance on a mob that is temporarily immune, in which case you have bigger problems than not tracking icicles
the only advantage to using ice lance to shoot icicles instead of just doing it passively is that it fires five and you get somewhat more burst, and so that they will fire early enough on a nearly dead mob that they actually hit it


There. Is. No. Need. To. Track. Icicles.

[mrgreenthump]

C'mon guys be a bit more respecting to other posters. If someone is wrong, don't make them feel more down. Correct them if they are wrong, explain why and move on. This thread is to help Frost mages in PvE, not to bash people who ask for help.

And you do want to see how many Icicles you have in PvP, but guess that's another thing completely

[Malfecto]

Akraen, why have you dialed back on haste?!

Answer me sir! LOL!

No I'm not a stalker, but I was trying to emulate your weights to push haste higher and now you seemed to have back off that. Is it gear?

[Imnick]

It is hard for me to stay patient with someone who insists on repeating a misconception that has been corrected on a weekly basis in every thread talking about icicles ever since the mastery was introduced

But that's not really an excuse I am sorry

[Akraen]

It's been said many times. I'll give the poster the benefit of the doubt that maybe this guide needs to be updated (I'll write one if Kuni wants, but I bow to him on this sort of thing), and maybe the information is lost in pages upon pages of posts-- but it has been said multiple times how icicles work. However, the way he worded it "how do you guys play frost" sounded to me like a troll who might be out to spread more misinformation.

@Malfecto: Simple: red sockets. The new gear has red socks, and I replaced BotH with the Totem. My haste values will return to awesome once I get the Blood off Garrosh. Fear not, nothing has changed-- haste4life.

[Deleted]

I'd say it's a bit of a miss on Blizzard's part as well. Since the tooltip of the mastery does not state that it will fire the oldest of the 5 when you gain a new one.

[Kalimen]

Hello guys... i have a doubt about my frost mage.. i think i have too much haste... with buff raids im about 47,5%.. but when my metagem procs + bloodlust, etc, i think my haste is a waste... or im wrong ? can anyone help me please ? i have to drop this haste ? what u guys think ? thank you very much.

[Akraen]

Hello guys... i have a doubt about my frost mage.. i think i have too much haste... with buff raids im about 47,5%.. but when my metagem procs + bloodlust, etc, i think my haste is a waste... or im wrong ? can anyone help me please ? i have to drop this haste ? what u guys think ? thank you very much.

Definitely no such thing as too much haste.

When I write my guide I'll explain it in much better detail, but even though you can experiment with haste/mastery ratios, you can follow my lead and go for as much haste as possible.

Yes you'll end up clipping frostbolts when meta gem/hero/unglyphed IV pop, but you gain much more when those aren't up, bomb ticks, RPPM, BF procs, etc.

- - - Updated - - -

Actually, Kuni's guide is updated. Hah, shows how often I look at page 1 of this mega thread.

I think I'll just piggyback and do a more complex thread of my own rather than usurp this perfectly good thread.

[Malfecto]

Thanks for the reply Akraen. That makes sense about the sockets. All those orange gems kinda make me drool for the amount of SP.

I was pushing mastery down some, to MasteryX2 < Int or SP, which dumped everything mainly into haste and left me with whatever couldn't be dumped in mastery and whatever crit I absolutely had to have. I did this because it was the only weight spread I could figure for the last time I looked at your values. You kinda do some manual tweaking too, so its kinda hard to pick out sometimes.

When I do your current gear in the same manner, I see now your values don't change much. I can even exaggerate haste, but that only costs you SP at too great a cost. I guess you are in a pinch with an overabundance of hit and not enough yellow sockets.

As to the Icicles thing, I think it is actually kinda funny. We mages are so anal retentive we want to track everything!

[Akraen]

Yeah, I'm relying on a few things. I need Black Blood to drop hit and gain haste. Then I need different boots for the same purpose.

Hit is a real enemy this tier.

[Kalimen]

Definitely no such thing as too much haste.

When I write my guide I'll explain it in much better detail, but even though you can experiment with haste/mastery ratios, you can follow my lead and go for as much haste as possible.

Yes you'll end up clipping frostbolts when meta gem/hero/unglyphed IV pop, but you gain much more when those aren't up, bomb ticks, RPPM, BF procs, etc.

- - - Updated - - -

Actually, Kuni's guide is updated. Hah, shows how often I look at page 1 of this mega thread.

I think I'll just piggyback and do a more complex thread of my own rather than usurp this perfectly good thread.

Thank u very much for your anwser.

Just another question, i was using mage armor coz i thinked i had too much haste, so, i have to use frost armor ? with frost armor with my equips, gems, reforges, and buff raids i will have close at 60% haste....

thank u again

[Akraen]

Always use frost armor, 7% haste will always be better than 3000 mastery. If you ever wanted to drop haste (which I don't think you should do, but some are finding good results by doing it), drop it via gems or reforges, not with armors because 7% is big.

[Kuni Zyrekai]

Oh, yeah. I went and updated at like 4 AM again and didn't post it was updated. I've been fairly busy, waking up at 5 PM, and waiting a bit to see if there's any post-patch fixes to the spec. But I got bored and did the update anyway.

It's got a couple issues I need to fix but for the most part, accurate.

- - - Updated - - -

Also did you guys know that Flamestrike got a new animation this patch?

[Methusula]

Oh, yeah. I went and updated at like 4 AM again and didn't post it was updated. I've been fairly busy, waking up at 5 PM, and waiting a bit to see if there's any post-patch fixes to the spec. But I got bored and did the update anyway.

It's got a couple issues I need to fix but for the most part, accurate.

- - - Updated - - -

Also did you guys know that Flamestrike got a new animation this patch?

Yeah, it has the same ground effect as the dragon's fire breath on Timeless Isle.

[Deleted]

Sorry for OT, but do you guys have issues with lags? We have really tremendous lags. It was so bad on Nazgrim (game freezed for all every second pull, but chat was still working o_O) Now we are on Malkorok heroic and had some 1%ish wipes, but most of the time we pull the boss and everything is lagging, freezing etc. Forget to use alter time on pull. I push the button and nothing happens, I push the button twice and I reseted it - 2s later. Sometimes I see a bubble spawning an try to walk out, but it was already there for a couple of seconds.

[Kenbud]

Sorry for OT, but do you guys have issues with lags? We have really tremendous lags. It was so bad on Nazgrim (game freezed for all every second pull, but chat was still working o_O) Now we are on Malkorok heroic and had some 1%ish wipes, but most of the time we pull the boss and everything is lagging, freezing etc. Forget to use alter time on pull. I push the button and nothing happens, I push the button twice and I reseted it - 2s later. Sometimes I see a bubble spawning an try to walk out, but it was already there for a couple of seconds.

We have been getting some horrible lag on Malkorok even resorted to not poping lust to help deal. Other bosses have their spikes but Iv just been chalking those up to server lag and the fact I play on a toaster but now I'm curious that you mention it.

[Kuni Zyrekai]

Pete, do me a favour and try and do a pull without Stormlash. I've heard a few reports of it being the culprit.