Spec Viability and Lack of Frost

[Sw1tch]

Making this post for some visibility towards what I am witnessing as an issue within balance. There are currently a number of issues that are making Fire soar above frost in damage within the current Tier:

Fire 4 Piece is significantly stronger than the Frost 4 Piece
The Fire 4 Piece passes Frost in its strong suit: Single Target.
Fire scales better with crit and mastery whereas Frost just scales kinda well with Multistrike.
BRF is itemized heavily towards mastery and crit with little Multistrike in the instance.
I would consider these issues, and there are some that are non-issues but more situational. Nonetheless, they deserve some visibility:

BRF fights are heavily skewed to favor fire because of AoE
Now I recognize it's a bit late for any chances to set bonuses, but scaling could be changed to ensure that Frost isn't entirely surpassed by the next tier and end of the current one. (It already is on many encounters).

In fact, Frost holds none of the top 200 rankings for any encounters on BRF (in any difficulty). AoE encounters are going to fire, and Single Target to arcane. I recognize (and support) specs having strengths. I want fire to be better on AoE encounters, and Arcane on single target. It gives variety to the specializations; however, frost doesn't currently have a spot in progression raiding. Where should frost's strength be? Cleave and mobility? Is that too niche?

On fights like Iron Maidens, Oregorger, and Hans and Franz, frost should be number 1. Cleave and mobility. I hold a number of top 100 rankings in frost for heroic encounters, and the numbers still pale in comparison to those of the other two specs.

For the record, I am not saying that Frost is not viable. That would simply be a lie. But as a progression raider, it would be nice to validate the choice every once in a while.

We face the age old problem of frost's lack of scaling and "jack of all trades master of none" style that isn't conducive to progression raiding. What do you think can be done to give frost a solid "strength" in raid encounters?

[Deleted]

I love frost, I hate fire. Sadly, this is just the case this raid tier, might change the next.

When I looked (2 weeks ago?) I did find some frost mages in the top 100. Guess less people play it nowadays.

[Deleted]

Frost is perfectly good imo, even for progression raids. A lot of people are playing arcane/fire because either

a) they saw the charts on simcraft and just looked at the highest performing spec without putting any thought into it
b) they want to min/max their damage as much as possible and are comfortable with playing 2 specs and 3-4 different talent combinations for the whole raid
c) arcane+fire may not be optimal on some fights, but it shines on more fights than frost alone does
d) they felt like respeccing; i always felt like those two were the "right" raiding specs even though it doesn't really make any sense

I don't think frost needs any kind of particular strength in encounters. The design of one spec being stronger on aoe, one on single target and one being very versatile but still powerful is really good. Frost is a great spec for casuals and alts, but it's strong enough to pull its weight in every encounter as well.

[scwasp]

I think frost is fine as it is. Each mage spec has it's role currently.

Frost is good at lower items lvl and for challenge modes. And I believe it's also the best pvp spec?
Fire is the pve aoe/cleave spec when you have good gear
Arcane is the pve single target spec

It obviously sucks that frost isn't the best spec for pve in current content, if that's the spec you enjoy the most. But really, I don't think any pure dps class has 3 perfectly viable specs for pve.

[Worgslarg]

I think frost is fine as it is. Each mage spec has it's role currently.

Frost is good at lower items lvl and for challenge modes. And I believe it's also the best pvp spec?
Fire is the pve aoe/cleave spec when you have good gear
Arcane is the pve single target spec

It obviously sucks that frost isn't the best spec for pve in current content, if that's the spec you enjoy the most. But really, I don't think any pure dps class has 3 perfectly viable specs for pve.

This.

You're only going to run into difficulty if you're mythic raiding as frost.

I run fire /arcane personally because I love swapping specs for fights, and cannot do that as optimally with frost/fire.

[Deleted]

But really, I don't think any pure dps class has 3 perfectly viable specs for pve.

We do, Frost is just as viable now as it was in Mythic Highmaul, which isn't exactly low item level

[Deleted]

We do, Frost is just as viable now as it was in Mythic Highmaul, which isn't exactly low item level

Question is: what do you call viable?
If you take a look at the logs of BRF, the only thing I see is Frost being near the bottom of the list on many encounters.

looking at the 50th percentile for heroic encounters:
Gruul: Single target : 24.3 vs 29.8k (22% difference)
Orgegorger: heavy movement: 20.6 vs 25.5 (24%)
Hans&Franz: cleave + movement: 26.8 vs 30.9 (15%)
Darmac: AoE: 27,1 vs 43,4 (60%)

(Mythic encounters, for the few logs there are, are looking the exact same : Frost being near bottom.)


The fight on which frost should be shining, Hans& Franz, you see Frost coming close, but still it is 15% behind.

While these numbers are not a disaster, and someone has to be last, you can clearly see that Frost could use some tweaking on Single target (frostbolt or mastery buff perhaps) and large AoE (blizzard buff) to be more in line with its image of being an allaround spec.
Hans & Franz is the only encounter in which Frost is not surpassed by both Arcane and Fire.

[Deleted]

Yeah "viability" needs a hard definition. One of our mages has been experimenting with Frost over the past 2 weeks and while he's absolutely dominating the Frost parses, he's still miles behind everyone else in the raid by quite a bit.

[JIMM-]

frost is a very viable spec at achieving #1 on dps counting from backwards

[LocNess]

I consider something to be viable if it can be used in a raiding environment and not directly hold back a raid from progression. Can Frost accomplish this? Yes. Fire/Arcane are better, and because of that, almost every Mage that is doing progression is playing those specs, therefore Frost is going to have lower parses in general. If it was an even 33% split between all three specs, Frost would still be behind, but it wouldn't be near as much as it is currently portrayed.

If you go Frost, you won't be ruining your raids progression. There are better specs, but Frost isn't super terrible or anything. A good example of a non viable spec on an encounter would be Fire on M Butcher progression in Highmaul. Chances are, you will be the issue when it comes to wiping.

[Polarthief]

Here's the problem with Frost for BRF:

1. Its stats dislike Mastery and Haste is pretty low on its priority. Fire and Arcane both favor Mastery and Haste is pretty good for both. In addition, Multistrike isn't too abundant on BRF gear.

2. Frost's 2P is ludicrously shit. 4P isn't much better, but it's decent. Fire and Arcane have among the best 0P ==> 4P DPS gain out of any other spec in the game.

3. Frost excels on short, infrequent, AoE or constant 2 target cleave. Fights in BRF are either: Single Target (which Arcane beats it at) or frequent adds spawning/consistent 3+ cleave (which Fire beats it at). Frost doesn't really have any fight going for it while both Fire and Arcane have plenty of fights catering to their strengths.


It's not so much that "Frost is weak/bad", it's simply that BRF has gear for Fire/Arcane more than Frost, the tier bonuses are better, and the fights cater more to Fire/Arcane. Is Frost viable? By all means, YES, it's just not going to be breaking meters without a buff, especially now that we're on Week 5 of BRF and a lot of Mages have access to their 4P.

Fun fact: Frost still beats Fire in purely single-target fights, even in full Mythic BiS.

[Magodelagua]

I hate Fire (too much rng and with my nice 200-250 ms in LatAm) and Arcane (boring rotation) ...

Trying to stick with Frost until someone of the pug compare the DPS meter with another mages. This kind of people don't look DMG taken or performance, just DPS chart.

Thanks Blizzard 4 make me feel obligated to play a build i'll never like.

[Notdev]

Frost isn't weak at all. It's still one of the stronger specs overall. However it is so overshadowed by one or both of the other two specs in basically every situation in BrF that the representation is low due. Not only due to pure performance, but the fact that Fire/Arcane both share the same gems/enchants and the gear in BrF is geared towards Fire/Arcane.

I don't know, I'd love for every spec to have its clear niche in every raid, but kinda unrealistic to expect all three specs to be "optimal" on certain fights. A lot of the other pure classes don't have 3 viable specs at all.

Frost is my favorite, the last weak of heroic BrF I went frost and every fight (#3 on WCL All Star Frost mage list last I checked) but I'd hate to have to change between all three specs to get the best results on different fights in the same raid.

- - - Updated - - -

I hate Fire (too much rng and with my nice 200-250 ms in LatAm) and Arcane (boring rotation) ...

Trying to stick with Frost until someone of the pug compare the DPS meter with another mages. This kind of people don't look DMG taken or performance, just DPS chart.

Thanks Blizzard 4 make me feel obligated to play a build i'll never like.

If I was just a "pugger" on my Mage and/or it was still my alt, I'd probably have stayed Frost. Frost is still fairly strong - and the easiest spec to play.

[gallamann]

I m currently playing Frost 8/10 H BRF. What I consistently see in BRF is the specs that can AoE well, dominating on almost very encounter. Talking by 20k+ DPS over what Frost can produce.

Our 2pc is shit, helps single target in a raid tier dominated by multiple targets. A better 2pc would reduce the cooldown on frozen orb by 2 seconds for every ice lance cast while Frozen Orb is out. Or extend frozen orb by 2 seconds for every IL cast while FO is up. Either of those would put more UMPH in our AoE damage.

4pc, I just don't know wtf Blizzard was thinking, again only helpful on Single target. If I am sending my FO into 4+ targets, that already munches FoF charges and on top of that makes both our tier bonuses revolve around FO! 4pc needs to step away from Frozen Orb, instead how about letting us store 3 FoF procs or makes Blizzard not need to be channeled...

Doubt either get changed, so slapping together a fire set. Think I am there, going to play some old raid content and LFR this weekend as fire to get comfort level down. Hopefully can move to Fire next reset and actually compete with my fellow raiders.

BTW, I am not a big fan of this "oh fire is AoE and Arcane is single target" bullshit, every mage spec should be capable of same damage regardless of target count. Differences already exist in how that damage is delivered, arcane - mana manage, fire - DoT spread, frost - direct casts

[Liandryl]

Question is: what do you call viable?
If you take a look at the logs of BRF, the only thing I see is Frost being near the bottom of the list on many encounters.

looking at the 50th percentile for heroic encounters:
Gruul: Single target : 24.3 vs 29.8k (22% difference)
Orgegorger: heavy movement: 20.6 vs 25.5 (24%)
Hans&Franz: cleave + movement: 26.8 vs 30.9 (15%)
Darmac: AoE: 27,1 vs 43,4 (60%)

(Mythic encounters, for the few logs there are, are looking the exact same : Frost being near bottom.)


The fight on which frost should be shining, Hans& Franz, you see Frost coming close, but still it is 15% behind.

While these numbers are not a disaster, and someone has to be last, you can clearly see that Frost could use some tweaking on Single target (frostbolt or mastery buff perhaps) and large AoE (blizzard buff) to be more in line with its image of being an allaround spec.
Hans & Franz is the only encounter in which Frost is not surpassed by both Arcane and Fire.

It's the same as comparing sub/combat rogue since there is just so many more players playing the top spec that comparing logs isn't as representative even if 50th percentile.
I do agree tho that I can beat frost mage on pretty much any fight as Arcane.

[Xomniuri]

What i hate is the only viable single target spec is arcane.
Do you know how hard it is to raid lead when your playing a spec that needs constant adjustments on the fly.
So i get to either do good single target dps or lead my raid properly

And fire seriously, it's single target dps is trash, the only thing saving it is the fact your can use your arcane gear for it

IMO mages are just broken, your supposed to change your talents depending on the fight not your damn spec
So many raiders as it is have dumped mythic 685 gear for heroic 680 gear, because their previous spec has become trash or their stat priorities have completely changed.

I'm just pissed in general about mages, the only thing that saved WoD mages for me was mirror images and it was already shit with all the cleave fights in BRF and then they nerfed it. Damn rune of power to hell, and the moron that ever suggested it should be fired.

I should of rolled a hunter.

[Deleted]

Frost being as good as Fire/Arcane is something totally different than Frost being viable. Frost lacks the niche power that Arcane and Fire have (ST and AOE/Cleave respectively). That doesn't mean Frost is bad. Also consider during progression, the good mages are not going to play Frost if Fire is going to perform even slightly better. So you are both seeing the good mages playing the other specs and the other specs are better than frost. Better doesn't make a spec non-viable. Anywhere under world 300 guild and go Frost if that floats your boat.

[Deleted]

IMO mages are just broken, your supposed to change your talents depending on the fight not your damn spec

I don't raid lead, but the things you cite as being bad for mages are what i'm enjoying the most about BRF raids. I love optimizing my performance by playing two specs that luckily share the same set of gear (apart maybe trinkets).

Also tbh, raging over RoP is so old. Just go IF if you hate it that much, it's really close on most fights.

[Deleted]

It's the same as comparing sub/combat rogue since there is just so many more players playing the top spec that comparing logs isn't as representative even if 50th percentile.
I do agree tho that I can beat frost mage on pretty much any fight as Arcane.

The comparison was Frost vs top spec on the encounter (which more often than not is not a mage, but that to a side note) and not really Frost vs arcane vs Fire.
The number of logs are imo sufficient enough to make such a comparison.

And yes, even on fights with a lot of movement, Arcane is coming up on top, because of its far superior ST damage.
And as far as I can see, it is only getting worse as gear progresses, because scaling is better on Arcane and on Fire, and their set bonusses are better.
That is why I said that Frost could use some number tweaking (nothing too drastic though)

- - - Updated - - -

Frost being as good as Fire/Arcane is something totally different than Frost being viable. Frost lacks the niche power that Arcane and Fire have (ST and AOE/Cleave respectively). That doesn't mean Frost is bad. Also consider during progression, the good mages are not going to play Frost if Fire is going to perform even slightly better. So you are both seeing the good mages playing the other specs and the other specs are better than frost. Better doesn't make a spec non-viable. Anywhere under world 300 guild and go Frost if that floats your boat.

that is why comparing 50th percentile is not bad. most top mages are in the 90th percentile log, I would hope.

[Deleted]

that is why comparing 50th percentile is not bad. most top mages are in the 90th percentile log, I would hope.

There is a huge disparity between the good mage and the bad mage tho. Frost might not be the best indeed, none will argue but it's still good. Better than good.