Anyone else saddened to see Frost Bomb become 99% worthless?

[Vladamyr]

I confirm it and it's like this from the start (like all bomb).

For me, it's 2 main fails are :
-- not being instant cast (up-time, movement, etc)
-- restricted to 1 target (most fight are multi-dot friendly actually)

So you want it to be a copycat of one of the other bomb spells? Instead why not just bump the damage up enough to be a little ahead of the other 2 on single target. Having a cast time will equate to less uptime on high movement fights and therefore limit it from being the goto choice. That way we actually have difference and individuality in spell selection. I understand that in pvp you can't have it hit that hard (burst rules) but pvp already has individual % tweaks to each bomb just lower it's % until the pvp crowd is happy.

[Deleted]

Oh, on single target FB is only behind LB by 2.7% damage and have the same proc rate for Brain Freeze but a lesser up-time because of the way it work.
But Blizzard in LB rework in 5.3 did buff it to make it better in single target.

It's used only for the burst in PvP, it's why it's pvp's coef is lower than the 2 others.

The only solution is to back LB into Fire and maybe give NT to arcane.

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and having it instant cast won't change it's difference with the 2 others.

[Vladamyr]

Sorry I wasn't referring to just the dps but increasing dpet to be slightly ahead of LB.

[Shiny212]

I want it gone, I want mage back to wotlk/tbc state, I hate mastery magi.

[Mastamage]

You do not in fact have to be facing your target to cast Frost Bomb.

Hmm I've always faced my target. It makes no sense that you don't have to since its a cast.

[Kenbud]

Hmm I've always faced my target. It makes no sense that you don't have to since its a cast.

I think the only reason is because the other two bomb don't have a directional requirement so its just to keep it on par.

[Pyromelter]

Bombs altogether need to go. They frankly were not implemented very well. If we gave fire back Living Bomb baseline, and made it work the way it used to (spread by fire blast, 3 target maximum), they could take out the entire L75 tier and put something more useful in. Arcane had a cool niche where it was the only dps class that had absolutely no DoT damage.

Remember when mages actually used the spell Blizzard for AoE? Maybe I'm being nostalgic, but I really like that spell. It pretty much has no real use anymore. I'd like the devs to do make a return to flamestrike/blizzard for aoe, and there are mechanics in the game for cleaving for both frost and fire, such that bombs/dots aren't what we are concerned about with aoe anymore.

[fearist]

not at all.

[Akraen]

Warlocks are successful this expansion because each spec plays very differently.

Mage specs are very similar, with one of our primary damage sources coming from a spell common to all three specs. Nothing rotational should ever be in a talent tree.

[Deleted]

Warlocks are successful this expansion because each spec plays very differently.

Mage specs are very similar, with one of our primary damage sources coming from a spell common to all three specs. Nothing rotational should ever be in a talent tree.

The thing that i hate the most is the fact that spells that can and should be for one spec only are spread out across all the specs. When i play fire i want to feel like a firemage. Using deep freeze in fire just feels wrong.

[Nightfall]

Bombs altogether need to go. They frankly were not implemented very well. If we gave fire back Living Bomb baseline, and made it work the way it used to (spread by fire blast, 3 target maximum), they could take out the entire L75 tier and put something more useful in. Arcane had a cool niche where it was the only dps class that had absolutely no DoT damage.

Yeah, spreadable LB was the non-multidot choice, kind of like Frost Bomb but without shortcomings. Blizz's stance was that no Fire mage ever took anything but LB, so they removed the best feature of Lv75 talents. Now LB is often the choice anyway, but we've lost spreadable bomb playstyle.

The only way it seems is to remove Lv75 talents and make LB baseline for Fire with an ability to spread it. Not sure about other bombs, won't complain if at least Frost Bomb goes away.

[Deleted]

Yeah, spreadable LB was the non-multidot choice, kind of like Frost Bomb but without shortcomings. Blizz's stance was that no Fire mage ever took anything but LB, so they removed the best feature of Lv75 talents. Now LB is often the choice anyway, but we've lost spreadable bomb playstyle.

The only way it seems is to remove Lv75 talents and make LB baseline for Fire with an ability to spread it. Not sure about other bombs, won't complain if at least Frost Bomb goes away.

They should just remove nether tempest and give the other two bombs to the specs that they belong to. Arcane mages already have a baseline aoe rotation using arcane barrage splash damage, and the bomb tier just feels hamfisted into the singletarget rotation of the Arcane spec.

Frost bomb has always been a niche talent that is useful in dungeons, questing and challenge modes. They should really just add the slow effect to the new icicles mastery. I don't understand why they nerfed it. in 5.3 frost bomb crits for 300k while in 5.4 it crits for <200k, then they have the audacity to claim that they increased the damage of the bombs. Doesn't even make sense.

[mrgreenthump]

For raiders it's already useless in everything but some certain situations that the damage overcomes the inability to cast it while moving, that said.. as a raider, i've used FB in 5 encounters the whole expansion.. I do not like the cast time on a Bomb, as fire or frost it ain't really that bad, but as arcane, you just can't have a cast time bomb.

So bringing it instant is a start, but still it can't have a buff either when it's such a large AoE contributer(when timed etc). In the end for it to do same damage as LB and NT and be picked by the raiders, it would need to loose the AoE cleave, be instant and do a lot more damage, which again results in all of the bombs feeling the same. But then again feeling the same or feeling different in such a degree that you will never use it, is pretty much the same.

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They should just remove nether tempest and give the other two bombs to the specs that they belong to. Arcane mages already have a baseline aoe rotation using arcane barrage splash damage, and the bomb tier just feels hamfisted into the singletarget rotation of the Arcane spec.

Sure, if they made Arcane Blast(or AM) castable while moving.. You don't seem to know how important having instant cast bomb for arcane is atm in terms of movement dps.

[Polarthief]

It's more challenging to use for no real gain other than not having to multidot.

The inherent problem with it is that it has a fluctuating cooldown and it may come off cooldown when you're mid-cast on something else. This is very clunky and feels wrong compared to the seamless play of LB and NT.

It's also very frustrating when soloing simply because when you stop to cast it/refresh it, the mob(s) are running towards you. As a squishy class that likes to keep distance, frost bomb isn't even good there.

What they should do is increase its damage by Haste (like Living Bomb's explosion) rather than the cooldown. However, they'll also need to give it more BF procs SOMEHOW otherwise it's still vastly inferior.

[Not Againnn]

they should make it castable on like 3 targets but reduce the explosion based on how many targets its on.

so 1 target would be 100% explosion

2 would be 66

3 would be 33.

idk just a thought

[Kenbud]

they should make it castable on like 3 targets but reduce the explosion based on how many targets its on.

so 1 target would be 100% explosion

2 would be 66

3 would be 33.

idk just a thought

Then you would be wasting 2 globals to put out the same amount of damage

[Akraen]

One target is great. But what if the explosion sent ice shards to three targets within 40 yards. Take the cast time off, but still keep a cooldown.

[Erolian]

One target is great. But what if the explosion sent ice shards to three targets within 40 yards. Take the cast time off, but still keep a cooldown.

Isn't that basically just living bomb frost colored without dot ticks? They did ruin the explosions of living bomb though so I guess something has to do it.

If it were up to me I would just turn Frost Bomb into the frost bite spell that frost king malakk or w/e his name is uses. It would also keep us in the cycle of receiving rehashed boss mechanics as spells

[Akraen]

Fine by me. Point is I just want it to not have a cast time or be castable while moving.

[pyrostorm9001]

Time for another crazy suggestion by pyrostorm.

Ok my idea to rework Frost Bomb.

Frost Bomb Level 90
1.2% of base mana 40 yd range
Instant
Requires Mage
Requires level 75
Places a Frost Bomb on the target dealing 0 (ZERO) Frost damage over 12 sec every 1 second. addition ticks with haste
Each time Frost Bomb ticks, a stacking debuff is placed on the target.
When the bomb ends, or the target dies, or dispelled it explodes to deal 3900 [+ 292.32% of Spell power] Frost damage multiplied by the amount of FB ticks, to the target and all other enemies within 10 yards. Limit 1 target
All affected targets are slowed by 70% for 2 sec.

This spell has a 1.0 sec global cooldown.


Yeah I was looking for a way to keep the big OOMF at the end of the bomb, while keeping it usable for certain trinkets as well as mobility.
down sides for pvp early dispel means frig all dmg downside for pve only 1 target.

edit: ticks can proc BF-FFB