Frost Mage Discussion [Cataclysm] - Page 3

Jaypie · 12/18/10, 1:28 PM

I would do something different in the starting rotation.
It´s a good DPS increase if you use your "on use spellpower" trinkets or the orc racial at the beginning so 2 deepfreezes and 2 FFO´s benefit from that 2500~ Bonus Spellpower.

Starting Rotation should look like this :

On youse Trinket / Orc Racial
MI
Freeze
DF
FFO
IV
Coldsnap
DF
FFO
....
IV if it fells off

Is there already some math about Haste vs Mastery if you are below 33% crit ?

Silke · 12/22/10, 1:53 PM

One area that I’m wondering about is the current priority of stats for a Frost Mage. While I see an explanation in the opening post for Mastery, I don’t see where it fits into in terms of value for a Frost Mage).

Would it go something like this?
Hit (to cap)
Crit (to 33.33ish %)
Mastery
Haste

Right now I realize that gear choices are very limited and it’s still difficult to cap Hit but that won’t always be the case so I’m looking for something a bit more long term. So taking that into account, Hit to cap (or as close to cap without sacrificing large amounts of other stats) is the obvious number one priority. After that I’m not as certain where things stand. Crit to about 33.33% seems to vital as this guarantees crits on frozen targets (where a lot of our damage comes into play). But Mastery throws me since I’m not sure how the numbers work out and I’m not sure how important it is for us. Finally Haste I know is one of our lowest priorities as the only spell it really benefits is Frost Bolt.

So does my priority list look right or should it be rearranged with the new arrival of Mastery. Mastery seems fairly powerful for us (compared to some classes) since our major source of damage is on FoF Ice Lances, Deep Freezes and Brain Freezes.

Thanks,

Lhivera · 12/22/10, 2:46 PM

Based on experimentation with SimC, it doesn't take much of an increase in one rating to push the value of another rating up over it. You add (e.g.) Mastery, and everything else becomes more valuable relative to Mastery. When I was playing around with the profiles, I found on a number of occasions that if Haste was higher than Mastery, and i switched one gem or reforge to reduce Mastery and increase Haste, that would be enough to make Mastery worth more than Haste.

Best thing you can do is experiment with your gear in SimC or another tool when you get an upgrade, and see how the numbers play out. I don't think a simple guideline is going to cut it, at least not in T11 content.

Kindig · 12/22/10, 6:46 PM

I've been going over the talent spec outlined in the opening post, and I have a few questions:

In theory, 2 points in Reactive Barrier would help in survivability, however, I have seen that post #13 by Light4 is correct: Ice Barrier will not automatically activate if you have a spell in queue. In practice, this is hardly ever the case, and it does not activate after the current spell queued goes off, which makes these points completely wasted.

I moved those two points around a few times and finally settled on maxing Enduring Winter. I had thought to split the two points between EW and Permafrost, but I decided against it for the following reasons:

1) Each of the first two points in EW gain a 3% reduction in mana cost, but the third jumps to 4%, for a total of 10%. I saw a big difference in mana efficiency when I took the third point, and I have had no problems using Molten Armor in place of Mage Armor and still being mana efficient over time.

2) I have not had any problems with AoE raid damage dropping my Water Elemental, at least not that more points in Permafrost could cure. 1 point here has worked sufficiently to extend the pet's life in all situations it wouldn't die regardless of the Permafrost bonus.

I have not been able to sufficiently test the effect of the 100% proc to mana regen for the raid. It seems to have a cooldown, but I haven't been able to find out how this works, and I haven't seen this answered in previous threads.

Another question I had was about Frostfire Orb. I have tried those points in both FFO and Ice Shards, and come to the conclusion that, as far as I can see, Ice Shards procs FoF and BF at least as much using Blizzard as FFO, and seems to do more damage over a wider area.

The only issue I can see is your ability to react to the procs. Since Blizzard is a channeled spell, you have to wait until the spell ends to gain the most benefit, and that can keep your procs sitting for precious seconds. I've tested it enough to know that using Blizzard in place of FFO is a DPS drop, but I'm wondering if it's acceptable for the utility gain?

Zeldyrr · 12/22/10, 7:55 PM

Originally Posted by Kindig

Another question I had was about Frostfire Orb. I have tried those points in both FFO and Ice Shards, and come to the conclusion that, as far as I can see, Ice Shards procs FoF and BF at least as much using Blizzard as FFO, and seems to do more damage over a wider area.

FFO is not an AOE spell. It hits a single target (fairly hard) and has 15 chances to proc BF and FoF which is another substantial DPS increase. Compared to Blizzard it uses very little mana and doesn't require channeling.

You definitely want the FFO talent and you want to cast your FFO every minute with an additional orb after a timed cold snap. My raiding time in Cata has so far been limited but I've found it best to use cold snap to get a second FFO when Time Warp is activated. It lets one use all those extra FoF procs as fast as possible (and there is less chance of losing a proc to a double stack).

Blafoorius · 12/25/10, 2:16 AM

Originally Posted by yns88

With an average ilvl of 342, I have 16% hit and 19% crit. Granted, my haste and mastery are quite low, since the little that appears on my gear is all reforged into hit and crit, and I also rely on a trinket for a good deal of my hit rating. I could theoretically glyph for molten armor and drop a percent of crit to reach both hit and crit cap.

Then you have a lot of loot luck. Here is a rough table with the item points per 346 item (note: these values are rounded and approixmated - but you will find two secondary stats with roughly these values on 346 gear:

Slot	Points
head	170
neck	112
shoulder	130
back	112
chest	200
wrist	112
main hand	100
off hand	112
wand	60
hands	130
waist	150
legs	200
feet	150
ring	112
trinket	270

So this gives you roughly 170+112+130+112+200+112+100+112+60+130+130+150+200+150+112+270 = 2250 (2632 with two trinkets and rings) available points from gear. So if you just have crit/hit on gear it is easy to reach the 1742 for hit and ~2000 points for crit. However the moment you get gear with haste and/or mastery (and there is a lot of gear with at least one of these stats out there) you lose 60% of those values.
So for eaxmple haveing feet, wrist, shoulder, waist and trinkets without the desired stats gives you: 2250- (150+112+130+150+270) = 2250 - 812 = 1438

Now you can reforge and save 40% of the stats 812*.4 = 324.8 and 1438+324 = 1762 which would push you just over the hit cap but under the crit cap.

Of course gems and enchants make it easier, but as soon as you have 7-8 pieces of gear without hit *and* crit a secondary stats it gets difficult to reach both caps.

Miim · 01/03/11, 10:08 AM

Something sneaky that actually works pretty well on raid encounters where you have adds that needs to go down fast and have high hp. Works well on for example Magmaw larvas and Maloriak adds. Not so well on Chogall (10) cause the adds have to little HP (the FFB kills the target).

I run a off spec like this: Talent Calculator - World of Warcraft

Use blizzard to fish for FFB and Impact (comes very fast). Use the instant BF (with FoF) and spread the ignite with impact.

Its no where near fire aoe but its something.

Light4 · 01/08/11, 8:36 AM

Since we should reach 100% crit while under FoF, how much paperdoll crit do we need, i.e. which crit buffs are tripled by the shatter talent?
I wonder, because Rawr is optimizing for 33.34% crit total, including all buffs and debuffs. Is that correct, that also crit chances due to debuffs on the target are tripled? Because then, at least for 25Man, reaching the crit softcap is trivial.

On a side note: Is the 1.8% crit chance reduction applied before or after shatter?

Terribad · 01/11/11, 11:16 AM

Deep freeze scales exceptionally well, and due to its cooldown one would assume it is better to line it up with cooldowns and procs. What is the most amount of time I should delay casting a deep freeze after it comes off cooldown while waiting for these common trinkets to proc: Darkmoon Card: Volcano, Theralion's Mirror (1926 mastery), Bell of Enraging, Resonance / stump of time (1926 SP), and Power torrent (500 int)?

Gloinn12 · 01/11/11, 4:10 PM

Frost
•Deep Freeze's base damage has been reduced by 20%, from [ 1447 to 1814 ] to [ 1157 to 1451 ].
•Fingers of Frost now also increases Ice Lance damage by 15%.
•Frost Specialization now also increases the damage of Frostbolt by an additional 15%.

Using Lhivera's ilvl 359 Simcraft output and some rough napkin math for a 5 minute patchwerk style fight:

DF currently hits for ~85000 and is cast about 11 times, so ((85000 -(85000 * .8)) * 11)/ 300s = 623.33 dps loss.
FoF IL currently hits for ~23500 and is cast about 38 times, so (((23500 * 1.15) - 23500) * 38)/ 300s = 446.5 dps gain.
FrB currently hits for ~10500 and is cast about 142 times, so (((10500 * 1.15) - 10500) * 142)/ 300s = 745.5 dps gain.

So 446.5 + 745.5 - 623.33 = ~569 dps gain. These changes should close the gap between frost and fire.

Cryosa · 01/11/11, 4:28 PM

Originally Posted by Gloinn12

Using Lhivera's ilvl 359 Simcraft output and some rough napkin math for a 5 minute patchwerk style fight:

DF currently hits for ~85000 and is cast about 11 times, so ((85000 -(85000 * .8)) * 11)/ 300s = 623.33 dps loss.
FoF IL currently hits for ~23500 and is cast about 38 times, so (((23500 * 1.15) - 23500) * 38)/ 300s = 446.5 dps gain.
FrB currently hits for ~10500 and is cast about 142 times, so (((10500 * 1.15) - 10500) * 142)/ 300s = 745.5 dps gain.

So 446.5 + 745.5 - 623.33 = ~569 dps gain. These changes should close the gap between frost and fire.

In the latest patch notes on mmo-champion it says the following:

Frost Specialization now also increases the damage of Frostbolt by an additional 15%. However, if will decrease your Frostburn mastery by 6.

I don't have any math to back it up, but that last bit seems like a nerf, since it pretty much halves my mastery (from 12 or 13 to 6 or 7).

Sinless · 01/11/11, 4:47 PM

Originally Posted by Gloinn12

Using Lhivera's ilvl 359 Simcraft output and some rough napkin math for a 5 minute patchwerk style fight:

DF currently hits for ~85000 and is cast about 11 times, so ((85000 -(85000 * .8)) * 11)/ 300s = 623.33 dps loss.
FoF IL currently hits for ~23500 and is cast about 38 times, so (((23500 * 1.15) - 23500) * 38)/ 300s = 446.5 dps gain.
FrB currently hits for ~10500 and is cast about 142 times, so (((10500 * 1.15) - 10500) * 142)/ 300s = 745.5 dps gain.

So 446.5 + 745.5 - 623.33 = ~569 dps gain. These changes should close the gap between frost and fire.

True but it would close the gap with 4.0.1 fire, remember that fire DPS is also getting buffed in 4.0.6 with a slight buff to mastery and a significant reduction in mana costs of FB and LB.

takolin · 01/11/11, 5:15 PM

Originally Posted by Gloinn12

Looks like they updated the patch notes since I left work, but i think that the decrease of the mastery will only apply directly to frostbolt's damage to frozen targets. This will be a PvE buff, but while not being overpowered in PvP. This is just speculation at this point until we get some data from the PTR.

There has been a bluepost to clarify the changes and it boils down to something that shouldn't affect PvE a lot because the mastery nerf gets countered by the fact that a FoF IL doesn't lose damage when compared to live.

We did buff Frost Bolt. And we did buff Ice Lance when Fingers of Frost is up. However, we've decreased all Frost damage to Frozen targets by about 15% from previous values. The net result is intended to be that Frost Bolt is a little better against non-Frozen targets, and about the same versus Frozen targets. Ice Lance with FoF is still good, but Ice lance damage against Frozen targets is down a bit.

The intent isn't to nerf PvE frost at all, but instead reward Frost Bolt use in PvP a bit more, and reduce the damage and effectiveness of Ice Lance in PvP.

The important take away here is that datamined changes from pre-release builds and tests are not accurate ways for you to get information on intended game adjustments. Take it with a grain of salt, and approach it with a giant cup of curiosity.

Source

Naqaj · 01/11/11, 5:25 PM

Originally Posted by Gloinn12

DF currently hits for ~85000 and is cast about 11 times, so ((85000 -(85000 * .8)) * 11)/ 300s = 623.33 dps loss.

If I read this correctly you reduced DF total damage by 20%. The patchnote reads reduced base damage.

DrRumpus · 01/11/11, 7:16 PM

Some thoughts about the upcoming changes:

- As Frostbolt damage increases by 15%, Glyph of Frostbolt will also award more dps.
- As Deep Freeze base damage is decrease by 20% and effected by 15% less damage from mastery, Glyph of Deep Freeze will also award less dps.
- Ice Lance damage stays about the same.
100*((105+x)/(120+x))*1.15 should be the formular where x is the additional mastery from your character. E.g. with 5 additional mastery IL will do 1,2% more damage now. Correct me if I'm wrong
- Frostfire Bolt is also effected by 15% less damage from mastery. (Glyph of Frostfire Bolt awards slightly less dps.)
- Thus Ignite will also be effected
- Frost_Frostfire is no longer a reasonable build for PvE.

Overall I'm pretty sure this patch is a nerf to Frost even if it wasn't intended.

Edit:
Blizzard + Petnova will also have it's damage decreased until the nova breaks. I've used this regularly on Magmaw, Cho'Gall and sometimes with Maloriak and Halfus.