Take Heart, My Fellow Frost Addicts!

I admit it. Even after the nerf to Blizzard in patch 3.0.8, and all the shiny new abilities given to the Arcane tree, I still couldn't abandon my Frost spec. Yes, my Blizzards weren't as powerful (25% less powerful, to be exact), and yes, I did have my face melted by a few Arcane mages. But I still had a lot of fun pumping out massive crits in PvE dungeons and questing around Northrend with my trusty pal, Squelch the Water Elemental (Hey, hunters get to name their pets, why can't mages?).

Yes, I knew Frost mages were laughed at. Yes, I knew that overnight the Arcane tree had gone from being the mutant black sheep of the mage family to a brilliant, shining prodigy who brought the best food to the family reunion and stood up Frost and Fire by telling amazing tales of how much better Arcane Blast's grades had gotten in college, and how Arcane Barrage had opened its own chain of super-high-damage retail stores, where warlocks and rogues could go to have their pride demolished, their faces melted, and what was left of their corpses wheeled out on stretchers. I clung to my Ice Lance with its Winter's Chill proc and smiled nicely at the Arcane tree's prideful boasting, and then I went home and cooked up some ice cube soup for my poor little pal Squelch.

Overall, mages right now are in a fantastic position. We have more warlocks than ever screaming that we're overpowered and that we're so much better than they are in PvE (Hey, who needs DoTs when you have AoE?) and in PVP (Burst damage beats DoTs any day, people. And oh, did I mention that Ice Block cancels your fear? Did I? Here, have an Ice Lance to the face.). Our Mirror Image has been touted as one of the game's most over-powered spells ever. And the fact that Evocation's reduced cooldown, not to mention the fact that in the Arcane tree you can get that cooldown cut even finer to two minutes, means that mages no longer go OOM in the midst of raid fights, but that like our mana-recharging companions the shadow priests or the warlocks, we can just keep right on going, like Frostfire Bolt-hurling Energizer bunnies.

But I think my fellow Frost addicts (there have to be some of you still out there, right? Please? Tell me I'm not the only one!) would agree that for now, at least, Frost seems to have become the low spec on the totem pole. The last patch didn't give us any buffs, and nerfed what is for many the staple spell of mage dungeoneering and battleground PvP. The patch wasn't exactly cause for mass mourning of the part of all Frosties everywhere, but it was, well... a little sad.

I won't deny that Frost is for me still the ideal spec for leveling - its power and control are, for solo purposes, virtually undiminished, and there is absolutely nothing which equals the plethora of snares, slows, and crit procs we Frosties have in solo questing. Frost makes leveling the glass cannon mage an absolute joy. It is only when I join groups for dungeons or BGs that I shed a tear of regret for losing my ultra-powerful Blizzards.

But, should you have weathered the 3.0.8 Arcane storm without respec-ing, I have hope for you! In a recent blue post, Ghostcrawler revealed that Frost mechanics are still being examined, but that adding a "Shatter combo vibe" to Frost PvE is something they're considering, the only problem being that so far, it seems the way they would accomplish this would be to buff Ice Lance still further, which would, of course, "unbalance" Frost mages in PvP.

But Ghostcrawler's post does indicate that apart from settling inter-class balance with the new mage buffs, Blizzard is also concerned about balancing intra-class abilities, i.e. they want to make sure that all three trees are viable in their own right.

To say that Blizzard always have a lot on their plate would be an understatement, so don't hold your breath for the new buffs or adjustments to the Frost tree. However, my fellow Frosties, we can rest easier knowing that the changes we've noticed in our class have not gone unheeded by Blizzard, and that, someday, help is on the way, and that hopefully we followers of the icy magics of doom will rise once more to our place of prominence as equal, if not superior dealers of magicky-death to all who cross our path. And hey, we'll always be superior when we can carry around a pocket water elemental, won't we?

It also occurs to me that this column is rather anti-warlocky, which though it is, should not be taken as a slam against all warlocks everywhere. Sure, they ate up our Arcane Brilliance buff, and sure the warlock I ran dungeons with last weekend managed to beat me in every single loot roll, leaving Violet Hold with a lovely new set of blues while I was left standing out in the cold with my ill-fitting assortment of tissue-paper robes covered in random animal skins. But those facts should in no way be construed as indicative of malice toward warlocks in general. I like warlocks! Really! I do. Squelch, stop laughing!