Frost raiding DPS in 3.3

[Lunataria]

in case people were lazy and curious, I went onto the PTR and did some preliminary DPS tests on target dummies for both frost raiding and arcane raiding specs.

I found that arcane would pull off arround 5k DPS over 4 minutes
and frost could pull off 4.5k ish DPS over 8 minutes

now, remember the situation: TARGET DUMMIES
meaning no raid buffs, meaning ttw was not going off (even for frost, I had frostbolt glyphed) and it also meant no focus magic, and no use of deep freeze for frost (since dummies can be stunned...)

I will go back on later tonight and do more thorough tests and postmore details if people are interested.

Question time:
Based on these numbers, is it fair to say that Frost may become a viable (not top, but close) raid spec?

EDIT: read my futur posts starting with "UPDATE TO NUMBERS AND INFORMATION" It has updates to numbers and new info.

[Milamber]

now, remember the situation: TARGET DUMMIES
Based on these numbers, is it fair to say that Frost may become a viable (not top, but close) raid spec?

Based on target dummy numbers? -.-

[Loklar]

It's a tough call. Target Dummies aren't exactly that accurate. Though those numbers are a little promising for Frost Enthusiasts.

If those numbers are accurate, then I think we can see Frost doing okay because I susspect Frost has more to gain in a raid environment (mostly from TotW). Really hard to tell though.

[toat]

I see frost maybe being a spec for fights where you need some form of survivablility(sp?) as it gives a fair amount of it compaired to Arcane/Fire. Also maybe if they ever make another fight like GeneralV where mana is limited.

[Loklar]

Did you pick up Shatter?

Because Shatter would boost your DPS on a Dummy but be useless on most bosses.

[YouMadMan]

Did you pick up Shatter?

Because Shatter would boost your DPS on a Dummy but be useless on most bosses.

/facepalm.

Its not useless we have that talent called finger of frost. You should read your tooltips sometime.

[Kultkrieger]

the sloweffect of frostbolt also exists (for tormentstuff) if you have glyphed your frostbolt
it doesnt slow but it counts as sloweffect
(afaik in 3.2)

[toat]

/facepalm.

Its not useless we have that talent called finger of frost. You should read your tooltips sometime.

I think he was refering to Frostbite. As it would boost dps on a dummy while it dosn't work on a boss. Then again if you are speced into it as a PvE Frost "ur doin it rong".

[Lunataria]

I did get chatter, but it will only help on FoF, because no, I didn't get frostbite.
also, I skipped brain freeze, so on the dummy, I prettymuch just FB spammed since deep freeze wouldn't do damage

[smitty]

i hope you were using your ele.

sorry, but these numbers mean nothing to me. you are skipping out on 25k+ damage every 30 seconds...thats 833 dps. i know you addressed this in your OP, but theres no point in testing because the test is miserably invalid.

[Skarrd]

i hope you were using your ele.

sorry, but these numbers mean nothing to me. you are skipping out on 25k+ damage every 30 seconds...thats 833 dps. i know you addressed this in your OP, but theres no point in testing because the test is miserably invalid.

It's more than that. Raid buffs scale differently for different specs (and different classes). Classes and specs are not balanced around 10 mans or heroics. Unbuffed dps is meaningless because of this. If you don't have every buff available to you, your test may not be telling you anything at all.

[Lunataria]

It's more than that. Raid buffs scale differently for different specs (and different classes). Classes and specs are not balanced around 10 mans or heroics. Unbuffed dps is meaningless because of this. If you don't have every buff available to you, your test may not be telling you anything at all.

you raise a lot of points, there is no perfect test.

I'm just trying to present a balanced imperfect test. I'm going back to the PTRs now to do more tests of DPS and try to get better numbers and also try out on bosses.
after I do that, I'll post the spec.s and such.

[Lunataria]

UPDATE TO NUMBERS AND INFORMATION

Frost spec:
http://talent.mmo-champion.com/?mage...YeRa,JIN,10747
NOTE: I used glyph of ETERNAL water, not water elemental, but eternal water isn't on the talent builder.


I decided to run until OOM on a dummy. 18.5 minutes of DPS time
pulled about 4348 DPS
again, no deep freeze, no raid buffs.

this does leave me thinking that yes, it'll be even better for encounters like General Vezax, but won't have much else of a use.
going back on to test out arcane again and get better numbers. I'll report them in a new post.

[Milamber]

Target Dummy numbers = almost worthless numbers

[Lunataria]

UPDATE TO NUMBERS AND INFORMATION part 2

Just tested arcane, with the standard arcane raiding build that is out right now, so I don't feel compelled to post it.
Rather than my original post, where I stacked arcane blast to 4 no matter what, this time I did a more mana conservative rotation of simply using arcane missiles whenever missile barrage proc'd.
I was able to pull off 4565 DPS over about 13minutes before going OOM
there was some downtime in there due to bad CD timing, but it was minor, but worth noting

Target Dummy numbers = almost worthless numbers

I would agree that target dummy numbers are worthless, but they can be useful when you compare them to other dummy numbers. again, I'm not giving estimates to what actual DPS numbers in 3.3, but I am just putting the info out there to give an idea of what the DPS will be relative to a currently known DPS spec.

so basically, I am working percentages here. runing the numbers (4348/4565=95%) we'll be able to see that frost will likely do 95% of the DPS the arcane currently does, and that it will DPS for(1110sec/780=1142%) 1.4 times longer than arcane does.

that's my theory. take of it what you will. going to test on 25man bosses some time this week to get you closer to "real" numbers.

[Karaghan]

Hes trying to show you some kind of picture of new changes. Dont blame him for that. I bet some people will find it usefull and interesting. If you dont just move along i guess.

[op3l]

I don't have a mage but seems to me that Frost raiding would be much like ele shaman raiding. Stand still and nuke, or move and suffer massive loss in DPS due to lack of dots?

Not relevant to discussion i'm sure, but just throwing that out there.

[Tiga]

Unfortunately the only good place to test deep freeze is on Dr. Boom in Netherstorm. As Dr. Boom is much lower level, there's some slight crit inflation, but it's not much. You would need another mage spamming slow to get TTW. Arcane benefits slightly more from TTW than frost.

There's still one big piece of the frost puzzle missing and it's pet scaling with haste and crit. We don't know how much those are going to increase water elemental DPS, but it will affect the bottom line. We also don't know if deep freeze is going to shatter or not (currently it's not shattering on the PTR).

I think it's interesting to look at the burst cooldowns of different specs:

Fire/TTW: Combustion
Frostfire: IV, Combustion
Frost: IV, Cold Snap, Deep Freeze (not entirely reliable) (Summon Water Elemental ceases to be a DPS cooldown)
Arcane: AP, IV, PoM, higher mana cost cycles

I think arcane still wins in terms of available DPS cooldowns. Lack of burst cooldowns is actually one of the major concerns that warlocks and shadow priests seem to have at the moment (and I guess it still applies to Fire/TTW too).

The value of a spec isn't just its average DPS on Patchwerk...some other factors to consider (loosely ordered by how important I find them):

- Burst cooldowns
- Mobility (frost is actually pretty good here, if you have brain freeze talented)
- Defenses: chance to survive an encounter (frost is strong, fire is weak)
- Ramp up time and damage on untanked adds (TTW is a mage weakness here)
- Threat management (arcane and frost are better than fire)
- Raid buffs (arcane is getting a bit more love in 3.3)
- "Cleave" DPS (one main target + splash damage on nearby adds - fire is strongest by far)
- AOE DPS

[afkalmighty]

Target Dummy numbers = almost worthless numbers

'almost' not 'completly'

The OP never claimed his tests to be a accurate measure nor as evidence.

He's simply trying to be helpful, which it is especially for people like me who don't have access to PTR at all and these numbers, as inacurate as they are, are the best grasp of the changes I can get.

It's just a game, try being less negative. As if there isn't enough of it in RL

[Milamber]

'almost' not 'completly'
The OP never claimed his tests to be a accurate measure nor as evidence.
He's simply trying to be helpful, which it is especially for people like me who don't have access to PTR at all and these numbers, as inacurate as they are, are the best grasp of the changes I can get.
It's just a game, try being less negative. As if there isn't enough of it in RL

He asked "is it fair to say that Frost may become a viable raid spec based on target dummy numbers?" whos gonna respond positive to that huh?