4P T-21 + 2P T20

[Cames]

So, now that I have it...sims are showing me that Frozen Touch sims slightly higher than Splitting Ice in pure ST encounters or ones that you can not effectively cleave on (like the Fel Dogs). That make sense to everyone?

[Jezrien]

Ofc. SI is a kind of talent you can go anywhere because if you forget it on enounters with 2+ targets (who you can cleave ofc) then it's worse than if you pick SI for pure ST fights. Even though FT is better in terms of getting better logs since 2-3 additional lances usually make FT better in terms of overall damage.

[Xaximbo]

it has a lot of sense disregarding of gear and curren stats. Frozen touch is the ST talent and SI although is not strictly an AoE talent logically has to be slightly worst for pure ST.

Generally speaking you should use Splitting Ice and Arctic Gale this is the best combination for Antorus and any raid or M+ in general, if you want to swap talents on each boss (min maxing for mythic for example) then you should use unstable magic and frozen touch on Gorothi,Sargeras hounds, Imonar, Varimathras and aggramar

On coven and Argus there is a small window frame where splitting ice might be slightly better, rarely happens on coven that you can cleave on both as for Argus during the constellar phase and the orbs in last phase you can cleave so probably SI is best.

[Tenzarin]

just forget frozen touch, it's bad and SI will pull ahead of it on ST now.

[Jezrien]

How it can be bad and behind SI on single target encounters?
Let's say Ice Lance damage is 2m. 5% from SI adds 100k. 2.1m damage.
Let's say you cast 50 lances during the fight. Total Lance damage with SI will be 105m.
Now let's calculate FT numbers. If FT provides you without a SINGLE additional proc you will lose 5m damage from Lances. But if it gives you at least 3 extra lances, you are already ahead of SI.
Ofc due to random nature of the spec you may not notice the difference but I won't be that absolutely sure that FT is bad. Especially when you see every mage has it on ST fights in Antorus.

[nickseng]

2 things:

1. SI also increases the damage of icicles. It's not much, but it probably moves your 3 additional IL threshold higher.
2. How much additonal IL procs will 4% extra chance give you? In your calculations, you said 3 additional IL out of 50 was enough to pull ahead, but I'm not sure 4% additional chance will give you that.

SI does pull ahead on ST on some gear configurations, and especially on t21 4 piece. You can try and guess the values, but simc simulates that over thousands of iteration.

[Jezrien]

I don't think anyone can figure out how many lances proc exactly by FT. But I've killed Garothi both way and with FT I had more Lances: 1 SI fight with 68 lances and 2 FT fights with 75 and 86 lances.
Also t21 doesn't provide for any special item build, so it's pretty much irrelevant to notice 4t21 which can buff FT's lance too btw. I don't think SimC can take such things into account. It calculates procs in a 1 way - for example, you have 25% proc chance - every 4 cast will get you that proc which means you can't get more or less. Without any special iterrations you can get during the fight (like I already said when FT gives you FoF and BF and you cast fb>flurry>FT's lance).
And if you don't like theorycrafting go to warcraftlogs and look for ST bosses and tell me how many mages use SI and how many mages use FT there.

[nickseng]

That's not how simc works at all. You just have to look at the output report and see the FoF Proc count and realize that.

And again, simc goes through thousands of iteration to get the average >> than a couple attempts on a single boss.

And if you don't like theorycrafting go to warcraftlogs and look for ST bosses and tell me how many mages use SI and how many mages use FT there.

It does seem like you're the one who doesn't like theorycrafting to me. And this statement kinda changed from "Especially when you see every mage has it on ST fights in Antorus."

[Tenzarin]

2 things:

1. SI also increases the damage of icicles. It's not much, but it probably moves your 3 additional IL threshold higher.
2. How much additonal IL procs will 4% extra chance give you? In your calculations, you said 3 additional IL out of 50 was enough to pull ahead, but I'm not sure 4% additional chance will give you that.

SI does pull ahead on ST on some gear configurations, and especially on t21 4 piece. You can try and guess the values, but simc simulates that over thousands of iteration.

You are also not counting finger procs getting munched with flurry procs.

[nickseng]

You are also not counting finger procs getting munched with flurry procs.

Those happen whether you take SI or FT, so it shouldn't factor in.

[Jezrien]

That's not how simc works at all. You just have to look at the output report and see the FoF Proc count and realize that.

That is why without changing anything you always have the same result lol...

[Tenzarin]

You are also not counting finger procs getting munched with flurry procs.

Those happen whether you take SI or FT, so it shouldn't factor in.

More finger procs that can happen when you have a flurry proc so it should be counted. A whole 4% more!

[Jezrien]

Your sarcasm is unappreciated. You can find yourself in a situation without procs no matter what talent you choose. I would say that FT is more like to fish your orange logs (like it was with fire spec and haste-mastery build). Nevertheless, as long as I go with FT I got more FoF than with SI. But as I already noticed - I can't tell you exactly where those FoFs came from. And I doubt anyone can and in this case every mage running with FT on ST fights should get your "how to play at the limit" lessons.

[Fonzey]

SI is simming higher for me in all circumstances, but I have considered going FT a couple of times for the "quality of life" benefit for movement heavy, single target encounters.

That said, as far as I know the simcraft APL for frost mage does not take double icelance into equation, and that would further raise the value of SI over FT so for anybody simming "roughly equal" for both options, then SI would pull ahead whilst double icelance is in use.