Kuni's Frost Mage PVE Guide (Cataclysm)

[Bombkirby]

Does anyone else foresee a FFB buff in the near future? They just buffed all of the Fire spells so Fire would preform better DPS, except for one: Frostfire Bolt. And as most people know, Frostfire Bolt can be used as a replacement for Fireball if you glyph correctly. So if they go through with buffing FFB that'd lead to a Frost DPS increase obviously. On the downside I suppose that only increases our dependency on 4p12....

[Deleted]

No, but judging by the fact there are at least 3 extra sockets over what's on T12, I am moderately afraid of the chance Blizz won't compensate for the loss of 4pT12, and by sheer stats alone we'll be forced into T13 while the other two specs out-scale frost again.

We were outscaled with 10% on Frostbolt (one of the weakest Specs in 4.1 with 4pT11). Now, with a lot more haste, we get what we´re not really need - more haste! I´m very disappointed. I find myself raiding more and more with arcane, because of progress reasons. In 10 man raids without a warlock, there is not really an argument for a mage raiding as frost. I hoped for a 5% krit debuff, easier accessible 3% dmg buff in 10 man raids and a 20% chance to proc brain freeze.

And what do we get? More haste and a reduction on a haste cooldown : /

[Ecmelt]

I believe overall t13 will be better and to be honest if the majority of players stick to t12 for any given reason they'll nerf the t12 bonus. They don't like people using old tier. Guess the only question is if we switch 4 t12 with 2xt13 or wait for 4xt13. (As in if the t13 set bonus is worse than t12 which ilvl difference makes it worthy to remove old bonus.) Too early to say that thou.

[Bombkirby]

Well bottom line, if T13 absolutely sucks, we can always beg and plead and hope they notice. And it'd be best to do it ASAP so they have the time to fix what needs to be fixed before the patch goes live.

[Max Rebo]

I feel the same way. It would be nice if the T12 bonus was simply a permanent part of our spec because it makes things flow better. Then make adjustments from there. Sounds "simple" enough to tweak the BF proc rate. Oh, and WTB Blizz/FoF interaction + Blizz mana reduction. :P

I've been growing tired of Arcane, so I raided with Frost last week. It was refreshing. However, since many of the fights require AoE, I inevitably felt the pain of going OOM after seeing some mediocre Blizzard numbers flying around.

It will be interesting to see what happens next on the PTR.

[Kinmaul]

The reason they won't buff the Brain Freeze proc is because of pvp burst damage. They need to buff Blizzard and DF as this will boost Frost dps without making people /cry about shatter combo's in pvp.

[Swizzle]

The reason they won't buff the Brain Freeze proc is because of pvp burst damage. They need to buff Blizzard and DF as this will boost Frost dps without making people /cry about shatter combo's in pvp.

We both know you don't PvP Kinmaul, that's why I didn't give you that trinket from BH way back when. They just need to bake the increased proc rate into a PvE talent that would force a PvP player to give up something vital to pick up.

[Kinmaul]

Hypothetically, if they were to give a talent a +15% increased chance to proc BF where in god's name could they hide so that every PvP'er (even bad ones like me) couldn't take it?

Also I have a glad mount, how many of those do you have?

Ninja Edit:
Ignite could work I guess, but that would make the tool tip massive.

[Swizzle]

Hypothetically, if they were to give a talent a +15% increased chance to proc BF where in god's name could they hide so that every PvP'er (even bad ones like me) couldn't take it?

Also I have a glad mount, how many of those do you have?

S1 Glad from 2s. Well played sir, but I have "of the Four Winds" and "Dragonslayer", so we're even on the titles here, Mr. Light of Dawn.

Well, let's see. Bake it into...Ice Shards, forcing a choice between essential PvP talents and increased BF proc rate.

[Yrrildur]

I read a suggestion from someone a few days ago. He came up with the idea to have Deep Freeze put a debuff on a target if its not stunnable (aka bosses). That debuff can give frost some increased dmg/crit chance or something along those lines. It also will not change anything for pvp.

[scuac]

I read a suggestion from someone a few days ago. He came up with the idea to have Deep Freeze put a debuff on a target if its not stunnable (aka bosses). That debuff can give frost some increased dmg/crit chance or something along those lines. It also will not change anything for pvp.

Say, like a +5% crit chance on spells against said target? Oh please make it happen! They could limit it to frost, e.g. +5% crit chance on FROST spells against the target with the debuff.

[LoLHellcy]

Hypothetically, if they were to give a talent a +15% increased chance to proc BF where in god's name could they hide so that every PvP'er (even bad ones like me) couldn't take it?

Also I have a glad mount, how many of those do you have?

Ninja Edit:
Ignite could work I guess, but that would make the tool tip massive.

'Give it all'- Increases the proc chance of Brain Freeze by 7/15% while increasing the damage you take from players by 5/10%;

replace blizzard chill; blizzard chill gets backed into specing frost.

Noob Edit: what happens if you Deep Freeze a DK with Iceblood Fortitude active?

[Kuni Zyrekai]

Noob Edit: what happens if you Deep Freeze a DK with Iceblood Fortitude active?

No damage done, if that's what you mean. He's not permanently immune to stuns, so no damage.

Well, let's see. Bake it into...Ice Shards, forcing a choice between essential PvP talents and increased BF proc rate.

Agreed. It has to go into something PVPers won't have the points to take without losing something good. An alternative would be deep freeze generating a buff for... Let's say 2 minutes, that increases BF proc chance when damage is done. 2 minutes would cover add phases quite well, as at your worst, it would put you at 1:30 to down the adds, move, change targets, whatever.

Also I'm intrigued. Frost hasn't been touched yet, neither has shadow. Neither of their MS debuffs got changed today either.

Something's coming.

[Bombkirby]

Something's coming.

Omg omg omg O:

[Lovestar]

Also I'm intrigued. Frost hasn't been touched yet, neither has shadow. Neither of their MS debuffs got changed today either.

Something's coming.

While I would love to be optimistic and assume Frost is getting love, there's a distinct pattern that only the physical-damage classes got their MS buffed. It could be a deliberate decision to penalize caster MS capability in PvP.

[Kuni Zyrekai]

Omg omg omg O:

I laughed.

While I would love to be optimistic and assume Frost is getting love, there's a distinct pattern that only the physical-damage classes got their MS buffed. It could be a deliberate decision to penalize caster MS capability in PvP.

It could be that, but I'm not so sure. A big thing going into this expansion was homogenization of buff power. Things like improved PW:Fort got removed, everything is even except for 6% and 10% spell power. That, in addition to the fact that neither shadow nor frost have had any changes yet while also being the only other MS effect has me intrigued. This patch has shown a lot of underdog specs being buffed.

[Lovestar]

That, in addition to the fact that neither shadow nor frost have had any changes yet while also being the only other MS effect has me intrigued. This patch has shown a lot of underdog specs being buffed.

Demo Lock's Felguard MS was also omitted, which is 3 for 3 casters being left out of the debuff buff (lol). That said, you're right on the second point, so I am still keeping my Frostbolts crossed that something nice will happen. =/

[zito]

In all honesty lets face facts...

... they just forgot...

...like last time..

[Mamut]

Can someone tell me how to aoe as frost? Is just blizzard spam or something more?

[Max Rebo]

Can someone tell me how to aoe as frost? Is just blizzard spam or something more?

While it's not that great unless you have 10+ mobs or something like that (Think scorpion packs in FL), you generally want to cast Flamestrike, Blizzard, and then Pet Freeze while Blizzard is channeling so you get the benefit of a boatload of Shatter crits. After the initial "burst," however, Frost AoE goes down the crapper.

I recall someone suggesting landing Pet Freeze just before Flamestrike hits, but that can be tricky if a whole raid is going nuts with AoE.

After the initial AoE cast sequence, I just repeat FS-->Blizz until most of them are dead. If there are maybe 5 left with a small amount of health, I'll single target them.