2/47/11 + 1 is easy to type out, but where, exactly, to put those 13 points is troubling.
1) We'll be short 3% hit in Arcane if those 2 points are in the 40% reduced threat. The extra point will close that down to a 1% gap.
2) Is 5/5 Imp Frost Bolt better than 5/5 Shatter? If I'm not respeccing to farm, and for guilds who are eyeballing Al'ar, it's probably more likely to see 8 points spent in the bottom Frost tier than 2/5 Imp Frost Bolt. If not Shatter, what else is more attractive in the 2nd Frost tier to get at 10 points total?
I'm planning on 3/47/11 -- 2/2 subtlety, 1/5 focus, and getting to IV via 5/5 frostbolt, 3/3 Precision, and 2/5 Shatter.
The biggest challenge related to IV as I see it is that it will be almost impossible to get Magic Attunement now (Without sacrificing too much). I guess its "almost" ok for us that have the current content on farm to be slacking on MA, but I want to stress the importance of using Impr. Amplify Magic on MT/MT2 on "new content", especially for mages that havent killed Illidan yet and for Sunwell, as noone else seems to be stressing it.
I continue to be awed by the fact that so many mages are slacking on getting the above talent. Based on WWS numbers the average raiding guild brings aprox 2,2 mages to each raid. Therefore atleast 1 (Or almost 50% of all mages) should have this talent. Yet, I have never seen a mage with the 12/46/3 spec-.- (Which clearly should be the spec of choice for half of us). In any case, when sunwell comes out, I will seriously consider skipping IV and stick to 12/46/3. I will lose out on a 2,8% buff, but I will be able to continue to offer Impr. Amp which in turn will improve healing done on MT/MT2 by a substantial amount (Even more from hots/PwS).
Since this forum usually create the consensus for viable mage specs, you simply cant ignore one of the most important healing buffs in the game when determining viable builds for next patch and current patch.
Locks have the same challenge I guess. Its usually a pain in the ass to get any lock to spec 5/5 Shadow Embrace, as it will influence their ability to pew pew...
I have offered Impr. Amp Magic to our healers/tanks for 3 months now, when I spec fire shortly (After losing the 2p T5 set), I will go for 12/46/3, but for next patch im really not sure. I will prolly start to ignore MA and go for a strictly pew pew spec atleast until Sunwell since we don't seem to have any trouble with current content. I am going to ask the raid leader + healers first how they feel about it though.
Last edited by Andersnordic : 11/23/07 at 11:35 AM.
2/47/11 + 1 is easy to type out, but where, exactly, to put those 13 points is troubling.
1) We'll be short 3% hit in Arcane if those 2 points are in the 40% reduced threat. The extra point will close that down to a 1% gap.
2) Is 5/5 Imp Frost Bolt better than 5/5 Shatter? If I'm not respeccing to farm, and for guilds who are eyeballing Al'ar, it's probably more likely to see 8 points spent in the bottom Frost tier than 2/5 Imp Frost Bolt. If not Shatter, what else is more attractive in the 2nd Frost tier to get at 10 points total?
I'm planning on 3/47/11 -- 2/2 subtlety, 1/5 focus, and getting to IV via 5/5 frostbolt, 3/3 Precision, and 2/5 Shatter.
I think the talent you're freffering to is Ice Shards and not shatter. If I got that correctly, you're wondering whether you can get away with "doable" dps using frostbolt for Al'ar on full fire spec. If this is indeed the case I'd advise imp. Bolt over Ice Shards. While you're on 35+crit for fire your frost crit will be closer to 15% and as such reducing cast time from 3.0 to 2.5 will give a much more pronounced difference than increasing your crit size from 150% to 200% given you're critting less than one-in-seven.
Also, while you are correct about the arcane hit cap, I'm not so adamant that the AoE targets are indeed lvl 73. While I can't claim to have tabbed all of them I do seriously think that morogrim and solarian AoE tarfgets are a mishmash of 71 and 72. The same goes for Polymorph targets on trash. With +13% hit from gear, no points in Arcane Focus should not be a problem.
I have that spec currently Andersnordic - and agree that the loss of an extra 120 healing on the main tank of other tanks is a significant loss. I agree that one mage in every raid should have it, because 99% of the times it's completely safe to use on a boss and offers a huge boost to your healers.
We're going to evaluate the DPs numbers when this patch goes live, and the probable result will be that either one of us (i.e. me as the raid leader as I'm always there) will stick with 12 points into arcane, or we will have one deep frost mage and one arcane / frost mage, and the arcane frost mage will pick up that talent on his way down the talent tree.
Maledict, Andersnordic: Granted that Mag Att is indeed a serious boon to learning in particular and given you're passing up the opportunity to gain 2-4% from IV, perhaps the Amp/Damp role is best left to a frostmage? We already know a frostie will have the talents under question already, as well as have a lot more competitive DPS compared to 2.2 frost. As far as I can see it's the perfect compromise: You get to keep your full Play With Fire, Incinerate and BW/DB -and- gain IV, while they simply juggle a few points with 0 impact on their dps and take on the mantle of buffers.
This also ties in perfectly with frost's Ghost Hit issue, where they'll be wearing 10% hit from gear because Ele Pre is granting 6%, meaning the 3rd point on Arcane Focus isn't in fact wasted, as it is on fire spec.
Or if you're extra fruity and don't like Imp Blizz you can take off some points and go for total mana self-sufficiency and claim not only to buff with improved Amp but also to not need SP/Shaman support for sustainability issues.
Yes, I meant ice shards. Surfwatch blocks a patchwork of WoW sites (but not, bizarrely, the official forums -- just every other part of the official site), and I'm just not familiar enough with the tree.
My base crit rate is between 20 and 25%, so I think I'd put that floating point into Shards for 3/5. I'd not thought of the typical Polymorph/Counterspell/AE/Spellsteal targets being sub-73, good catch. If I'm lucky I'll be leeching a Winter's Chill (?) for some extra crit, and the cooldown on Frost Nova has never been a major concern in raiding.
Frost will still benefit from Molten Fury, so I won't be all that bad off on Al'ar with 2/47/12. Maybe these retarded immunity fights will be absent come the next expansion. Al'ar and Hydross are both the 'next' boss in our progression, so some of the elemental adaptability in this build will be handy.
Fire primal farming will be a bit less of a hassle, too.
Ignus has a point, particularly with fully imp blizz, at least 2/3 permafrost and frostbite, popping IV (with it's added 25% to frostbite and faster tic-rate) with Blizz would certainly make Flamestrike a lot more viable for the fire-mages: They can tag all the agro they like, because the mobs won't be moving anywhere. Not only that, bt it'll be easy to coralle them into place and keep them on the Flamestrike DOT.
Ouch, yeah, I hadn't even thought of that. With a tick every 0.83 seconds and a 40% chance to freeze per tick, and a 25% snare on them besides, that's a hell of an aoe CC.
Duodecimal: unless you know something I don't, the spellfire set you're wearing won't work with frost, so convention dictates you'll have to swap to closest compromising blues/kara gear. Given that they're generally substantially down on +dmg, you'll be better off not stacking crit gems on them, hence the comment on the likelihood of reduced crit. Before 2.2 when I was frost I was hovering between 16-18% crit hitcapped, though more is perhaps likely nowadays even with off-gear.
Lhivera: I'm hugely flattered by your quoting me, thanks. Given 3/47/11 are likely to go for Imp Flamestrike nowadays I really think we can work into a warlock-thing where theres one Frostie who (incorporating my previous post) has improved amp/damp and CCs the AOE with massive slow/frostbite while the others Flamestrike spam. Just like locks need one affli to buff tank with imp and to provide malediction-CoS so they can do their 0.21.40 thing.
I would have to say that I don't think Flame strike really is a viable spamming AE, at least not in Hyjal (where the majority of AE occurs I would say). The mobs are simply spread too far apart due to the fight, and the increased crit chance on it won't make up for the lost damage you get because you aren't also hitting the necromancers at the back of the wave etc. Flamestrike looks decent on paper, but is hugely limited by it's area of effect - unlike Blizzard, which is much more encompassing.
Also, unless I'm missing something, I don't see how it's actually possible for a frost mage pick up both Magic Attunement *and* get permafrost / improved blizzard / frostbite. I'm missing two talent points in order to get frostbite up to 15%.
Flamestrikes AOE in Hyjal rocks if your tanks and raid knows how to bunch up the mobs. If they aren't.. speak up, they're only hurting the rest of the raid by making the waves go slower.
I can confirm that
ColdSnap has 8 min CD
Icy Veins costs 65 Mana untalented, 3 min CD and not affected by Ice Floes.
Cold Snap reset it as expected
It affects fireball and arcane blast as the tooltip suggests
It is lagging to much to clarify haste vs casttime reduction argument.
Shouldnt you be able to see by the tooltip? As far as I know the tooltip updates the cast time directly influenced by haste effects, even non-permanent ones like PoM and Heroism/Bloodlust
I can confirm that
ColdSnap has 8 min CD
Icy Veins costs 65 Mana untalented, 3 min CD and not affected by Ice Floes.
Cold Snap reset it as expected
It affects fireball and arcane blast as the tooltip suggests
It is lagging to much to clarify haste vs casttime reduction argument.
I'm pretty sure it is being calculated as haste. Just got on the PTR myself and when you activate Icy Veins Fireball is reduced to 2.5s and Frostbolt to 2.08s. That's 20% haste, not 20% cast reduction.
Well PTR's been reverted to 2.3.0, so for the people who were on: What exactly has changed in the frost tree? Is frostbite the pre-req to Icy? Odiodin's post infers that it's 20% haste and not reduction, so that's covered, and macbeet covers the other questions
Well PTR's been reverted to 2.3.0, so for the people who were on: What exactly has changed in the frost tree? Is frostbite the pre-req to Icy? Odiodin's post infers that it's 20% haste and not reduction, so that's covered, and macbeet covers the other questions
Icy Veins was in the 11 point position, and Cold Snap (8min) was at the 21 point spot. Neither of them had prerequisites, and the tree was otherwise the same.
I was wondering the same thing about 33/00/28 and Icy Veins. With 3/5 Winter's Chill you don't have to rely on another deep frost mage in the group. Actually tried it on live tonight and was a fairly nice dps increase for me.
I would have to say that I don't think Flame strike really is a viable spamming AE, at least not in Hyjal (where the majority of AE occurs I would say). The mobs are simply spread too far apart due to the fight, and the increased crit chance on it won't make up for the lost damage you get because you aren't also hitting the necromancers at the back of the wave etc. Flamestrike looks decent on paper, but is hugely limited by it's area of effect - unlike Blizzard, which is much more encompassing.
In my guild we mages pretty much exclusively use Flamestrike in Hyjal and it works like a champ. Trash has never been a problem for us. We all dropped DB, BW and Pyro and got 3/3 Imp FS.
Hunter frost traps are plenty to keep the mobs slow enough that warriors can get them back before they get too far.
I've been singing the praises of Flamestrike on here for a while, though. Don't mean to come off as a zealot about it, just hate to see people saying it can't work.
Last edited by ebbv : 11/24/07 at 12:40 AM.
Reason: Elaboration
In my guild we mages pretty much exclusively use Flamestrike in Hyjal and it works like a champ. Trash has never been a problem for us. We all dropped DB, BW and Pyro and got 3/3 Imp FS.
Hunter frost traps are plenty to keep the mobs slow enough that warriors can get them back before they get too far.
I've been singing the praises of Flamestrike on here for a while, though. Don't mean to come off as a zealot about it, just hate to see people saying it can't work.
The wonderful, wonderful thing about flamestrike is you are at range from the mob. Sure you've got 40% threat reduction with arcane, but so often when using arcane explosion you are standing in melee range or close to it of the mobs and so lose the ranged threat buffer. In Hyjal with mobs that can very quickly kill a clothie this is a big deal.
Also has anyone noticed lately that with large groups of mobs that flamestrike with MoE sometimes returns more than one lot of mana? I've been getting up to 3 returns per flamestrike. Not sure if this is lag related (playing from New Zealand).
11/23/07, 10:47 AM
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