Glacial Spike - Updated

[Xinder]

How are you guys handling the Ice Nine trait when it procs? I find it frustrating when I've been chain casting my frostbolts and I cast my 4th frostbolt, am on to my 5th and I get two icicles and can now GS. I have to then finish my Frostbolt cast that is now irrelevant and then cast GS. It seems like the trait should reward both right after the frostbolt cast finishes if it's going to reward both. Or maybe it should just be redesigned all together to increase the % of the frostbolt's dmg that is converted into the icicle. I dunno. I hate having SOOOOOO many procs around our 1 spell.

[zulgohlan]

just looted 920terror and no way to get it with any gear Combo better next to my 910whisper than with 870arcano.... 40k gap... simc does it calculate correctly atm?

[nickseng]

just looted 920terror and no way to get it with any gear Combo better next to my 910whisper than with 870arcano.... 40k gap... simc does it calculate correctly atm?

It does. High Whisper/Arcano is just that good for GS.

[Lahrast]

also what is maybe not on the radar for some people (me included since yesterday night) mark of the trained soldier (+600 mastery) seems to outscale hidden satyr!

[Tobiee]

Sweet thanks for the heads up. Mastery is simming super high for me for ages. Trying this out asap.

[Xinder]

I didn't even think of the mastery neck enchant. GS sims about the same as TV for me but I have two different gear sets to accomplish that, including two different necks that I use. I had just left them both with mark of the claw but I'll be changing the GS one to mastery to see if I can get GS to sim any higher.

[Finest]

The WoW gods have blessed me. Using an 935 Owl, incredible trinket. Sitting around 70% mastery 19 haste 33% crit 4% vers. My vers is low, but it's working for now. The point is, I've noticed mastery taking a huge successful impact on the GS build. With 4set T20, GS will be unstoppable. Get ready to dry yourselves off gentlemen!

[exeed]

I just saw a log from a chinese GS player who is one of the top logs and in the log itself it looked like he saved every BF procc for shattering GS even tho icicles where only on 1 or 2 stacks. I wonder if its worth doing?

[zambo84]

Hi guys, I have a problem with the simulation craft, I do not understand why it increases the haste instead of mastery / versa..

This is my pg https://worldofwarcraft.com/it-it/chara ... /crossfade" target="_blank

This is the string from Simc ( Pawn: v1: "Crossfade": Class=Mage, Spec=Frost, Intellect=20.18, SpellPower=18.92, CritRating=12.79, HasteRating=21.73, MasteryRating=16.52, Versatility=22.90 )

[Aikha]

Hi guys, I have a problem with the simulation craft, I do not understand why it increases the haste instead of mastery / versa..

This is my pg https://worldofwarcraft.com/it-it/chara ... /crossfade" target="_blank

This is the string from Simc ( Pawn: v1: "Crossfade": Class=Mage, Spec=Frost, Intellect=20.18, SpellPower=18.92, CritRating=12.79, HasteRating=21.73, MasteryRating=16.52, Versatility=22.90 )

I think there's a breakpoint somewhere around 15% haste. Try reaching that amount and it should go down.

[Arandomperson]

How do you guys handle the new 2pc? I was thinking that it varies greatly with haste levels.
with my 26% haste I could theoretically fit in 2 spikes without any flurries but I dont think that is worth it.
So basic protocol: save 5 icicles
if you have flurry then orb spike flurry and then do normal rotation with procs as priority
if you dont have flurry hen you can spike -> orb so that you dont waste orb uptime on casting the spike and pray that it crits.
Dont think it would be reliable enough with only icyveins to go for 2 spikes but it might be, need to test some more, only got my 2set at the end of our raid night 1 hour ago.
With both icyveins and lust I think it's resonable enough to go for 2 spikes while using all procs that you manage to fit in.
Thoughts?

[Eatmymanapie]

Is there an optimal rotation for 2 target cleave, and 4 target cleave? I feel like there are a lot of decision trees to go through with GS, where the AoE Rotation for Thermal Void was much more intuitive.

I was thinking something like 1. orb-> 2. blizzard-> 3. dump fof procs-> 4. use brain freeze proc to shatter frostbolt (or GS if 5 shards)-> 5. GS > Ebonbolt > Frostbolt-> 6. cast blizzard when off cd->rinse repeat from 3 or 4 if procs until next orb.

How high on priority is blizzard? Is it more important to have it up on 2+ target to reduce orb cd, or is it more important to put Ebonbolt on cd? With GS splitting ice, I would guess GS is higher priority than blizzard (considering less than 4 targets).

[reeka]

I have a question, I'm not sure if I'm missing something or experiencing a bug but sometimes I'm stucked on some Icicles after firing GS. I use to run VoTW and for some times I kept getting 3 or 4 icicles after GS (or more like loosing only 2-1 because buff did not disappear for a second) . At some point my rotation looked like :

GS only consumes icicles with damage values stored in them. There are two major areas this can cause issues:

A) You frostbolted an immune target/target dies while FB is in the air. You still receive +1 icicle in the buff/a real icicle however it has no damage (as the target was immune). This icicle will NEVER be consumed by GS and must be dropped through overcapping icicles to remove it.

B) You are under high haste and cast GS before the FB has landed. As the casting requirement of GS is only the self buff (Which is incremented on FB success) you can start GS before the FB lands. In heavy haste scenarios you can finish the cast before the FB has landed (so GS as it is firing will not consume the empty icicle). Once the FB lands that unused icicle will have a value and can be consumed normally on your next GS.

Thank you Zulandia for this post, was an eye opener.
To expand on this, if you want to know how many "empty icicles" you currently have, you can check the number you have on the icicles buff and compare it to the icicles animation on your character head, the difference is the number of the empty icicles you currently have. you can cast GS with one good icicle and 4 empty ones. However, once you get 5 empty icicles, you won't be able to cast GS anymore and must consume at least one of them.

[Tobiee]

I just saw a log from a chinese GS player who is one of the top logs and in the log itself it looked like he saved every BF procc for shattering GS even tho icicles where only on 1 or 2 stacks. I wonder if its worth doing?

Is it possible to try simulate that? I dont know how to edit the simcraft rotation. Does anyone know?

[Ashen]

Hi everyone,

Is Shard still one of the bis legendary if you don't cast it on pull (meaning 2 instead of 3 BL) ?

[Xaximbo]

BiS legs. are the new helm and the shard. If you don't have them, bracers are the close 3rd.

[Xinder]

I totally forgot that if you're going to lust on pull and you're the only one with Shard, you should lust for the group and then someone else lust you in the middle. I've just always had mages in the raid with ring that I forget to be the one to lust when I'm the only mage in the group.

[Acris]

So I've been reading what's going on on the Mage Discord about the new change to Glacial Spike.
I don't really care if it's a buff or a debuff, but I do care about the changes for us. I'm more asking for opinions, not facts, as we won't have them for now.

First, here is the change :
Frost Mage:
Glacial Spike: the stored Icicle damage component no longer benefits from %-damage buffs on the caster.
Glacial Spike damage increased by 50%.

This is to prevent Glacial Spike from "double-dipping" %-damage buffs. That is, since the Icicles have already been buffed by things like Versatility or Incanter's Flow, that portion of Glacial Spike's damage should not benefit again. This matches the behavior of regular Icicles, which do not benefit from those types of buffs.



I have several questions.
-Do you think Clarity of Thought will be king, because Icicles still benefit from crits in FB, and shattering GS will make the 50% buff attractive ?
-Will that affect the opener ? In my opinion, it could be worth it to start with 5FB, then Ebonbolt combo into IV, GS, and start normal rotation. That way, you maximise your GS raw damage, because the 5 first FB wouldn't benefit from Chilled to the Core anyway, due to that change.
-Will that affect stat priority ? I'm seeing Vers go down, but I don't have much more insight.

Thanks in advance boys !
Acris

[willemh]

I have no idea what change you're talking about,there's nothing in the hotfixes and mythic is starting in a few hours, Blizzard won't be making any more changes.

[Nytex]

It was a last minute change, look on mmo champion, top left (Class Tuning).