Deep Frost as THE raid specc??

[lurked]

I know some people are already making up some turn offs, without reading this post, only to tell me that Frost is a PvP specc, not PvE, that I'm a dumbass, to learn2play mage, etc...

BUT, I have a few questions in mind.

With the incoming expansion, the the 'AoE-oriented-mages' that blizzard wants us to become, I started to look at mage trees with more and more questions, to know which one would be more viable as a single-target raid specc.


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OBVIOUSLY, deep arcane specc, with a few points in frost/fire trees looks awesome, but I fear it to be mana-INeffective again, and not worth it that much without an decent group setup. It really depends on the end-game mana pool in WotLK.

Fire is also an awesome specc, a great steady dps, with a good rotation and decent mana-efficiency, but no changes that really worth a deep fire specc, except for AoE-oriented fights.
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Thats what brought me to DEEP FROST specc.

Yeah, pvp specc, shatter, I'm noob, blah blah blah... thx.

With a decent build&gear(spell hit capped, 1200+ spell dmg, and 150+ spell haste), a frost mage in TBC can deal some AWESOME dps(I'm always competing with high-end arcane mages for top spot in dmg meters), and will most likely never lack mana, even with a small mana pool. The weak point is the non-crit frostbolts and the 'low' base crit rating, but with talents you still get a +15% on frostbolt crit chances, and when it crits, you get +100% dmg instead of +50%.

My questionings are :
With the new Winter's Grasp talent (Gives your Frost damage spells a 10% chance to apply the Winter's Grasp effect, which increases the chance all attacks will hit the target by 2% and the target is considered Frozen for 5 sec.)

(Assuming raid bosses arent immune, which I think is THE point for this talent)

Winter's Grasp is gonna BOOST frost mage's dps to a sick point, since it make's the target to be considered Frozen you get +50% spell crit on him. So, if you stack spell haste, you'll cast more spells faster without lacking mana, if you cast more spells, Winter's Grasp(and other proccs) will come more often, and so it means a SHIT load more crits.

(Assuming that the target WONT loose the debuff after the first crit)
Here is some fast non-exact maths:

With 150+spell haste(casting 10% faster), frostbolt = 2.25secs.
10% procc for 5secs debuff off a 2.25secs frostbolt = 1x5secs procc over 22.5secs -> 2Frostbolts+1Ice Lance with around 85%/80% crit chances.

Same spell haste, with Icy veins(casting 30% faster), frostbolt = 1.75secs.
10% procc for 5secs debuff off a 1.75secs frostbolt = 1x5secs procc over 17.5secs -> 3Frostbolts+1Ice Lance with around 85%/80% crit chances.

Having Icey Veins twice, and sometimes 3times in a fight, adding bloodlust over all this, frost specc will probably have SICK dps in raids for WotLK, imo.

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So, now is the time to throw your thoughts.

- Will raid bosses be immune to Winter's Graps?

- Will Winter's Grasp get off after a crit?

- Will Deep Frost be THE single-target PvE specc in WotLK?


Yeah, I know, I've only talk about some deep pure speccs, no hybrids at all, but I the main idea I wanted to talk about is there, if you want to bring more talk about any hybrid specc, feel free!  ;D


Edit: Sorry for the broken english in such a long post, english's not my mother language.

[Giggitygoo]

I'm fascinated by mage theorycrafting. I find your idea intriguing. Don't forget that death knights toss up a debuff on mobs if they are spec'd ice, they can apply a debuff that improves frost dmg by up to 20%. On a raid boss, that would make ice mages sexy as hell. It's like having molten fury for almost an entire fight.

However, word is arcane tree is getting some changes implemented (How about fire tree instead?). Looks like Netherwind Presence will now improve haste rating by 2/4/6%, which is actually a pretty nice buff.

(It will make life interesting for my mage in WotLK, since I'm sporting pretty marginal (kara, badge gear) gear, but have 210 spell haste. Another 6% would put me at 19% haste, making my frost bolts 2.03 sec casts.)

What does this mean for the spec you proposed? Likely that having 1 deep frost mage, and one arcane/ice mage in a raid with an Ice Death Knight would make baby pandas cry with their dps.

BUT...

Deep ice seems likely to have problems in Northrend. Why? ICE IMMUNE/RESISTANT MOBS. That's why we're getting Frostfire bolt. I'm not sure how Naxx and the other raids will be, but generally, I think ice will struggle in Northrend 5mans...

[Omatre]

Frost will excel with 2 frost mages, the combination can guarantee almost 100% uptime on the "frozen" aspect then really.

The raid boss issue has always been what hurt frost, since a large chunk of the DPS came from Shatter.

Frankly I love Arcane, mana inefficiency is something that can be overcame with a proper cycle and playstyle and still keep up with DPS, and when you finally bump over that threshhold, its skys the limit pretty much.

Its all too speculative at this point IMO, it all has a long way to go, beta testers are going to influence the direction if enough whining is put into place (and lets face it, thats how things get changed, the more gamer tears the more changes). It seems Blizzard decided to start out and say "Ok here's the entire pie, eat it all up". By the time Wrath is released you'll see:

Patch 3.0.0.1 Guess what, Pie is a lie, here's your nerfbat to the skull.

[siempel]

Just think about this... the more mages with winter's grasp, the higher the uptime of the debuff. So... if you were to get enough mages with this talent (either PVE frost mages or frostfire elementalists) then you could theoretically have a constant +50% crit chance against raid bosses. Add this to winter's chill and empowered frostbolt, and that's a 65% chance to crit with frostbolt before gear!

Too good to be true? Probably... something will be changed.

[elidion]

A few months back I did some mage theory crafting for my wife, I made this big fancy excel spreadsheet that calculated in crit bonuses, crit rating, spell hit rating, spell damage, damage bonuses, haste, ect ect, you get the picture...and with a certain arcane/frost build, I found it to be the most mana efficient build in the game via frost bolt.

I will have to modify it now with wotlk but I think it will still be a viable raiding spec.

Another thing to consider is the the Frost Death Knight synergy...Frost DK is the tanking spec, winters chill 15% frost damage debuffs on the mob will help, you have shatter, the DK has howling blast that does extra damage against frozen targets, Both mage and DK have abilities to freeze targets...I think the synergy between the two classes will be great.

[lurked]

Yeah, I kinda like the idea of 2-3mages with Winter's Grasp + a death knight, in a raid.. That would be kinda insane.

I'm also affraid about the number of bosses immune to frost, but I dont think they'll release an expansion that make a specc of a class, unusable in raids.

I know there's still a lot of things that'll change from beta, but if it goes out the way I think, Frost specc will be awesome.

[greenmasheen]

think about it, how often will a death knight be tanking though?

from what i understand it will be situational tanking and arcane looks like it will be the main raiding spec for mages.

[elidion]

There isn't a much, if anything that is immune to frost yet that I've seen. Blizzard is making Frost DK the tanking spec, if everything was immune to frost it would make them pretty worthless. Just because it's northrend, not everything is snow and Ice, you can see that from the screenshots even. But even in there is a raid or instance made entirely of ice, I doubt they will be all immune, some resistance perhaps...maybe 1 boss that's immune like sapphiron in Nax or Kelthuzad...but I don't think they will gimp the new tanking class they just created.

[elidion]

think about it, how often will a death knight be tanking though?

from what i understand it will be situational tanking and arcane looks like it will be the main raiding spec for mages.

Blizzard has said they are making them a viable tank for both raiding and 5 mans...not situational...all tanks are getting buffed to be less situational and be able to a little bit of everything now. Warriors are getting TBS and AoE tanking, Pallys are getting TPS and mitigation, Druids are losing Crushing blows...Of course a Pally will still be a "little" better than say a warrior at AoE tanking, but they are trying to level the playing field more so that any tank can work and you don't have to get a specailized tank to run certain instances. Yeah DK has a little Anti-Magic ability...but it's really no more different than a priest Power Word: Shield that absorbs a certain amount and then you have to wait for cooldown.

I don't think there will be much in the way of frost...I may be wrong, but I havn't seen it yet.

[Cicelice]

If you think about it, the best group then would be a warlock for CoE a Death Knight tanking, one of each healer and then some shaman for group buffs/heroism, and a bunch of frost mages for optimal damage.

Think about it, would Blizz really allow a gimmick team like that?

[Ceosir]

How about the same idea but with Frostfire bolt instead ( as it's proven(?) that it works with both frost and fire talent )
and get ignite fire power, critical mass, combustion and all the core damage increasing in fire tree and get everything else in frost tree up to winter's grasp. AKA this Talent spec - http://wotlk.wowhead.com/?talent=oZV...eoZbAMcocxoVVM

[siempel]

This means that Frostfire elementalists and PVE frost specs will synergize well together as they will all assist in maintaining winter's grasp uptime!

Finally something that allows multiple mage-specs to co-exist!

Bye bye pve fire mages?

[andomin]

I think my guild will have 3 elementalist mages per raid. The spec below will probably be one of the best raiding specs out there for a mage in the expansion. I'll be the first to say it.

http://www.worldofwarcraft.com/info/...01025120201000

[thunderstruk]

it's not yet proven that ffb will gain benefits from both trees. and it's most likely to be only one (the spell typo say it... fire school and only ice if there is some resistance...)

if someone with the beta can tell if ffb proc with both ice and fire debuff.

[auren]

You will probably want to stack Frost Mages for a more constant Winter's Grasp debuff. And therefore it should make it the stronger spec then fire or arcane.

Kalgan said that Winter's Grasp can affect bosses, so Shatter will become a PvE talent as well.

It isn't confirmed that Winter's Grasp will last 5 secs without breaking. So you may be getting your hopes up.

Some patch ago like 2.1, Freezing effects now break easier due to spell critical strikes (might be 2.2).


Plus you don't understand Spell Haste and your calculations are wrong. The Spell Haste percent works as an increase in casting speed, NOT casting time reduction.

Example: IV is 20% haste, but only a 16.66% cast time reduction.

[ant1pathy]

It will hinge entirely upon the consumption of the debuff on a crit. If it stays the entire 5% regardless of what hits, then we're golden. If it "breaks" early based on what hits it (like a standard Frozen debuff) then we're screwed.

And since raids now, if they're trying to min/max, will bring as many Warlocks as possible to maximize ISB uptime, I fail to see how multiple frost Mages synergizing will be any different. If you're min/maxing at the expense of everyone in the guild, then you will want to stack the class with the best synergistic effects in as many slots as possible.

[CorvusER]

I dont know about the rest of you mages out there that know how to play ur class, but im tired of re re's out there who dont. If people would learn how to play this class they would know how to maximize their dps with a spec that makes sense. These fire/frost specs make my head hurt. Yes there will be mobs in Northrend that will be immune to ice spells...but blizz said way back when they were first talkin about instance and raid bosses that none of them would be immune to any type of spells and that very few mobs would be frost immune. Plus, speccing fire/frost is a dps killer. No one is gonna maximize their dps with that retarded spec. So the spec I'll be rockin in WOTLK will be

http://www.worldofwarcraft.com/info/...01005000000000

For Arc/Frost Mages this spec is gonna maximize your dps to the fullest. At 80 with all the badge gear that my mage has i will have a 45% chance to crit once winter's chill is put on the raid boss. I will not be out dps'ed by any fire mages...mainly cause i dont now... Only maybe a 2/5 tier full arc spec mage might out dps me. And as with this spec...i dont need to gear for alot of haste...mainly because of icey veins and my racial (troll).

[Rambobarbq]

so far what i think is about arcane and frost fire is dead for me in wotlk and only a joke.

[Bucketojoy]

http://www.worldofwarcraft.com/info/...01325155001350

I'm glad I'm finally seeing another raid frost mage.

It's too bad you went for pom instead of the elemental... a ton more DPS, believe it or not.

[seasonfour]

It seems Blizzard decided to start out and say "Ok here's the entire pie, eat it all up". By the time Wrath is released you'll see:

Patch 3.0.0.1 Guess what, Pie is a lie, here's your nerfbat to the skull.

HAHAHHA guess what?! pie is a lie :P

made me lol irl.
anyway, i see the OP's spec to be pretty decent overall, but the one problem as before mentioned would be if lots of bosses were immune/resistant to frost dmg spells. otherwise I can see winter's grasp being rediculously overpowered in PvE dps (although critting out your ass would have to start well into the fight or you're gonna be a dead mage :P )