Summary of the latest patch:
In the last patch we saw a buff to LW and a overall aura nerf. This caused LW in combination with TV to be good in dungeons and high aoe raid content. Think of bosses such as Zul, Vectis or from the current tier: High Command, Portal Keeper. The aura nerf is nothing to worry about whilst the LW buff is really good. In my eyes Blizzard seems to be pushing to have GS to be the go to on cleave, RoF on single target and TV on AOE. I'm not sure if they can pull it off completely due to RoF, we might see GS to be the go to for ST and Cleave with TV as AOE / Dungeons.
Intro
With Battle For Azeroth approaching fast and pre-patch just around the corner I thought it would be a good idea to compile a list of changes coming to the Frost Mage rotation. The purpose of this post is to help you quickly get to grips with the coming rotational changes so you're prepared for the new Tier 22 raid, Uldir.
With that being said, let's go over all the changes.
DISCLAIMER
This overview assumes you are familiar with the basics of Frost Mage in Legion.
This overview is subject to change; as tuning and changes are added weekly to the Beta version of Battle for Azeroth, the things listed in this post might change.
This overview is updated for beta patch: 8.0.1.27026
Table of content
-Talents
-Stat priority
-The new rotation
-Conclusion
Talents Blizzard heard our prayers during the Alpha phase of Battle for Azeroth and shuffled around some talents. They also added in new talents to compensate for the lack of Artifact, Legendaries and Relic traits, and they removed some previous underpowered talents.
The Battle for Azeroth talent tree looks like this:
As you can instantly see, new talents have been introduced such as: http://bfa.wowhead.com/spell=278309/chain-reaction, http://bfa.wowhead.com/spell=257537/ebonbolt and http://bfa.wowhead.com/spell=270233/freezing-rain.
Also several talents have been relocated on the tree: http://bfa.wowhead.com/spell=157997/ice-nova is now on the level 15 tier; http://bfa.wowhead.com/spell=205021/ray-of-frost has been moved over to the 110 tier; http://bfa.wowhead.com/spell=157976/unstable-magic and http://www.wowhead.com/spell=112948/frost-bomb have been removed; and much more.
We'll now go over each tier and discuss their usage and their current standings.
Tier 15
http://bfa.wowhead.com/spell=157997/ice-nova is still lacking in its power and considered useless outside of levelling. The real kicker is http://www.wowhead.com/spell=205027/bone-chilling and http://www.wowhead.com/spell=205024/lonely-winter. Whereas on Live you take http://www.wowhead.com/spell=205024/lonely-winter, now it seems the meta has shifted towards http://www.wowhead.com/spell=205027/bone-chilling. This is because the main strength of http://www.wowhead.com/spell=205024/lonely-winter was that it buffed the spells that were already buffed by your artifact. With the removal of the traits in http://bfa.wowhead.com/item=128862/ebonchill, http://www.wowhead.com/spell=205024/lonely-winter's power is greatly reduced. This is why we'll likely be running http://www.wowhead.com/spell=205027/bone-chilling in raids. http://www.wowhead.com/spell=205024/lonely-winter recently got buffed and could become a viable pick when combining with http://bfa.wowhead.com/spell=155149/thermal-void.
Different tier 15 talents compared:
Input: https://pastebin.com/fDULHUqS
Tier 30
The second tier remains fairly unchanged in terms of power and usage. http://bfa.wowhead.com/spell=212653/shimmer will still be your "go to" talent with http://bfa.wowhead.com/spell=108839/ice-floes being encounter specific. http://bfa.wowhead.com/spell=235297/glacial-insulation got buffed from 100% armor to 200%, and because of this I can see this being used in a very specific Mythic progress encounters; outside of this it will likely remain, just as in Legion, under-picked.
Tier 45
This tier remains unchanged.
http://bfa.wowhead.com/spell=1463/incanters-flow is still amazing for Frost. The talent offers the most damage on average and since Frost is not a burst spec, especially in Battle for Azeroth, the talent will always outshine http://bfa.wowhead.com/spell=116011/rune-of-power. http://bfa.wowhead.com/spell=55342/mirror-image on the other hand is usually better at the start of the expansion due to the increased base damage. The talent doesn't scale as much from the caster as the other two talents do; this means that the talent will be more powerful compared to http://bfa.wowhead.com/spell=116011/rune-of-power and http://bfa.wowhead.com/spell=1463/incanters-flow when the caster has less gear or stats. Sadly this is not the case right now, and http://bfa.wowhead.com/spell=1463/incanters-flow's outshines both http://bfa.wowhead.com/spell=116011/rune-of-power and http://bfa.wowhead.com/spell=55342/mirror-image by miles!
Different tier 45 talents compared:
Input: https://pastebin.com/KszkWSBD
Tier 60
Overall, this is one of the most changed tiers.
http://bfa.wowhead.com/spell=205030/frozen-touch has received a buff to also increase your http://bfa.wowhead.com/spell=190447/brain-freeze proc chance by 20%. However, it no longer increases Frozen Orb’s proc chances.
http://bfa.wowhead.com/spell=278309/chain-reaction is a new iteration of the http://bfa.wowhead.com/item=138140/magt ... ed-bracers legendary bracers. The talent works slightly differently to the legendary, as it now only procs on http://bfa.wowhead.com/spell=30455/ice-lances that are affected by your http://bfa.wowhead.com/spell=231582/shatter passive, unbuffed ice lances should no longer work because of this. Next to that change, it now lasts 2 seconds longer but only stacks to 5, down from 6.
http://bfa.wowhead.com/spell=257537/ebonbolt is slightly altered the biggest change is the base cast time which went from 3 seconds to 2,5 seconds, this buff is sizable as the value of casting this spell has been increased greatly. The second change would be that the spell no longer is shadowfrost damage, it now only deals frost damage, this nerf is small and mostly noticed in PvP content where previously if you got frost locked you could still cast Ebonbolt, now this is no longer the case.
With all that being said, http://bfa.wowhead.com/spell=257537/ebonbolt is considered the most viable talent. The amount of http://bfa.wowhead.com/spell=190447/brain-freeze procs gained from http://bfa.wowhead.com/spell=257537/ebonbolt (1 BF per 45 sec) and the fact that it is on-demand makes it stronger than the increase from http://bfa.wowhead.com/spell=205030/frozen-touch (0,75 BF procs per 45 seconds + 0,45 FoFs). The fact that the proc gain is on-demand makes it even better when running http://bfa.wowhead.com/spell=199786/glacial-spike
Different tier 60 talents compared:
Input: https://pastebin.com/kdtD5RkV
Tier 75
This tier is exactly the same as Legion. You will run what you find most useful or swap if a specific encounter needs the utility from one of the three talents.
Tier 90
The tier 90 talents should be a perfect example of single target vs cleave vs AOE.
Sadly, in the current patch, Freezing Rain is heavily underpowered.
Right off the bat, you can spot a new talent: http://bfa.wowhead.com/spell=270233/freezing-rain. This is the old artifact trait and the old talent http://www.wowhead.com/spell=205038/arctic-gale combined! This means that http://bfa.wowhead.com/spell=190356/blizzard is instant cast whilst http://bfa.wowhead.com/spell=84714/frozen-orb is active, and that its damage is increased by 35% during those 12 seconds! One thing to note is that the size of http://bfa.wowhead.com/spell=190356/blizzard is no longer increased.
http://bfa.wowhead.com/spell=56377/splitting-ice is still the main contender in this tier. Its value on both cleave and AOE scenarios is huge, especially when running http://bfa.wowhead.com/spell=199786/glacial-spike. The talent, going in to Battle for Azeroth, remains unchanged.
http://bfa.wowhead.com/spell=153595/comet-storm has skipped down one row from tier 100 to tier 90 and serves as the single target variant of the three. This talent also sees use to as a burst for dungeon packs, this is why you see as we increase the amount of targets the talents sims closer and closer to Splitting Ice The talent remains unchanged going into Battle for Azeroth.
Different tier 90 talents compared:
1 target:
2 targets:
3 targets:
4 targets:
5 targets:
Input: https://pastebin.com/K6dEubKL
Tier 100
Similar to Legion, these talents will define the playstyle or build of your mage;currently the main build seems to be using http://bfa.wowhead.com/spell=199786/glacial-spike.
http://bfa.wowhead.com/spell=155149/thermal-void remains unchanged from live, however its power and value is greatly decreased with the loss of http://bfa.wowhead.com/item=128862/ebonchill, your artifact weapon. You are no longer able to abuse key traits such as http://bfa.wowhead.com/spell=195448/chilled-to-the-core and http://bfa.wowhead.com/spell=195345/frozen-veins, which both contributed greatly to the power of the talent. http://bfa.wowhead.com/spell=12472/icy-veins no longer serves as great an opportunity for burst; it seems to be turning more into a dull haste increase. Because of these reasons, http://bfa.wowhead.com/spell=155149/thermal-void no longer has the power it used to have.
http://bfa.wowhead.com/spell=205021/ray-of-frost has been reworked. Its channel time is halved to 5 seconds and it now generates two http://bfa.wowhead.com/spell=112965/fingers-of-frost over its duration. The buff to the spell is fairly big, but not large enough to make a difference.
As mentioned earlier, http://bfa.wowhead.com/spell=199786/glacial-spike will likely be the way to go in the BfA in raid content, seeing as it was already very close to http://bfa.wowhead.com/spell=155149/thermal-void on live and with the big, indirect, nerfs to Icy Veins it now has its time to shine. The only actual change to the talent would be the way http://bfa.wowhead.com/spell=205473/icicles damage is calculated. Please do check out the section about the mastery rework for that.
In dungeon content or heavy aoe we will see mages use a different builds, these builds are going to be dependant on the dungeon, the affixes and the party comp's.
The three different builds compared to each other:
1 target:
2 targets:
5 targets:
Input: https://pastebin.com/BB6AQEEr
Stat priority The talents are not the only things that changed with Frost Mages. The most important change is to mastery, making ita viable stat again!
On live a percentage damage done by Frostbolt is stored into an http://bfa.wowhead.com/spell=205473/ici ... frozen-orb! This means in both single target and AOE encounters, mastery will have value again.
Legion mastery: http://wowhead.com/spell=76613/mastery-icicles
Battle for Azeroth mastery: http://bfa.wowhead.com/spell=76613/mastery-icicles
One important thing is that your mastery is a percentage of your total intellect. This means that if you have more gear, your mastery will be stronger and therefore have more value.
Because the amount of intellect we have on our gear will drop, due to it being a new expansion, the value of our main stat will increase drastically. This means we’ll likely go intellect > secondary stats, as long as these stats remain somewhat balanced.
Generally this will be your stat priority:
Critical strike (to 33,34%) > Haste > Mastery = Versatility > Critical strike (after 33,34%)
Disclaimer
Do not blindly follow the stat priority. Simulationcraft and Raidbots will support Battle for Azeroth when the prepatch hits. Sim your own character! Use topgear to find your best gear setup and use stat weights to get a rough guess what gear to fish for next!
If you have trouble simming, read the following guide:
viewtopic.php?f=2&t=4973
Glacial Spike build:
Input: https://pastebin.com/4t5VvQ0m
The new rotation We'll likely be running http://bfa.wowhead.com/spell=199786/glacial-spike as our main build for the pre-patch and Uldir.
http://bfa.wowhead.com/spell=199786/glacial-spike is very similair to Legion's rotation; in Legion you started holding your http://bfa.wowhead.com/spell=190447/brain-freeze procs at 3 http://bfa.wowhead.com/spell=205473/icicles, in Battle for Azeroth you keep up with the trend of holding your http://bfa.wowhead.com/spell=190447/brain-freeze but do so at 4 stacks of http://bfa.wowhead.com/spell=205473/icicles. In the optimal talent build you also run http://bfa.wowhead.com/spell=257537/ebonbolt, butyou do not cast it on cooldown like in Legion. You must always save Ebonbolt for that one moment where you havehttp://bfa.wowhead.com/spell=199786/glacial-spike ready but no brain freeze. You would cast in the following sequence: http://bfa.wowhead.com/spell=257537/ebonbolt>http://bfa.wowhead.com/spell=199786/glacial-spike > http://bfa.wowhead.com/spell=44614/flurry> http://bfa.wowhead.com/spell=30455/ice-lance
One last thing to keep in mind is that in Legion you used http://bfa.wowhead.com/spell=199786/glacial-spike regardless of whether you had a http://bfa.wowhead.com/spell=190447/brain-freeze or not. In Battle for Azeroth this has proven to be a dps loss, we'll now be casting Frostbolt until we get http://bfa.wowhead.com/spell=190447/brain-freeze even if we have http://bfa.wowhead.com/spell=199786/glacial-spike ready.
If you wish to more indepthly view the rotation you can always read: https://github.com/simulationcraft/simc ... Frost.simc
Conclusion Frost has undergone a few minor changes, the talents have shuffled around, the mastery was reworked and we will now go by a new build; http://bfa.wowhead.com/spell=199786/glacial-spike in Raids and both http://bfa.wowhead.com/spell=199786/glacial-spike and http://bfa.wowhead.com/spell=155149/thermal-void.
The stat priority remains similar to Legion, with mastery becoming viable at normal raid levels of gear. The recommended talents are:
Single target:
Cleave / AOE:
Heavy AOE (EG Zul, Mythic Zekvoz):
Talents for dungeon's will vary heavily from instance to instance, from affix to affix and even from party composition to composition. The following talents are going to be "go to" in most cases regardless:
I hope this quick overview of the most important changes to Frost helped you out.If you still have questions or you feel the need to discuss the changes, come join us in the Mage class Discord: here
Special thanks to Malon and Glynny for helping out in each way they did.
