WotLK The Basic's of Frost Mage PvP based Combat

[Krohlee]

Goal of this Guide
This guide is being created because some of the people ive been trying to teach frost mage too seem to be lacking some of the basic knowledge from the class it self, and after having looked into it deeper i found that most of the guides ignore this sort of information. So this guide will focus on giving people information on the basic's of combat (not character setup) such as how to properly kite, or dps without using CDs. There will be a link to the "Introduction to advanced" at the bottom.


Key
1A. Super Basic's
2A. The Donts of Dealing Damage
3A. How to Burst
4A. How to Properly use your CC
5A Basic's of Frost Mage Kiting
6A. Tip's and tricks for Frost Mage Kiting
7A. Other Guide's
8A. Final thoughts



1A. Super Basic's

1Aa. General Terms or ideas
*Tree (aka spell tree): Is a term used to describe the different elemental groups a spell caster has. Example is a Mage has 3 tree's Fire, Frost and arcane. If a person were to interupt a spell from one of these tree's then any spell from said tree will no longer be castable til the end of the interupts duration. It can also describe the "tree's" a player can put talent points into. sometimes these tree's are named the same thing.

*Kite: The act of using CC and your own personal mobility to be able to avoid the target(s) melee or even ranged attacks by staying out of the range of said spells/skills.

*Crowd Control (aka CC): a spell or action that prevents the player from being able to control his character to the degree he would like too. There exists 2 types of CC; "Physical" CC, which are spells/skills that control the person like a stun or polymorph/fear type skill. then theres "Enviromental" CC, which would be the use of a pillar or a sudden gap between the characters that prevents spell casting. Example of this would be a warlock's portal being used to go behind a pillar, or a mage blinking behind a pillar. you can also just walk, jump or skip behind pillars, off cliffs or how ever you choose. this type of CC is generally refered too by its basic name of LOS or Line of Sight. or simply going out of range, but do not be mistaken, LOS is infact a type of CC in its own right.

*Burst: The act of using Damage spells in combination with either offensive cooldowns, or situational bonus's to apply maximum pressure to the team or player.

*Situational Bonus: An act or feat caused by the player or the players partners to control, hurt and or damage the enemy player or team. example's: CCing the enemy players, playing outside of there range so they cannot attack you or use gap closing skills.

*Pressure: A Combination of Burst and Situational bonus's that force the enemy player/team too play alot more serious and generally forces them to use there defensive Cooldowns. This one of the most important aspects of WoW arena.

*Fake Cast (aka "to fake"): The act of casting spell and stopping it at some point to trick the enemy player into using his own interupt skill on you. Doing so lets you free cast for a short period of time.

*Peel: the act of using CC and or LOS as a way to reduce pressure on to yourself or others.

*Cooldown (aka CD): A spell with a set amount of downtime after each use. to be considered a "true" CD though the amount of time usually has to be atleast 1minute or more.


1Ab. Important Frost Mage Terms
Winter's Chill: A talent in the frost tree, that when a target takes frost damage 1 stack of winter's chill is applied. the "main" effect of winter's chill is largely useless, but because it can be stacked up to 5 times it plays a very important role in Frost Mage's CC.

Fingers of Frost (aka FoF): A talent in the frost tree that gives any frost spell that can apply a chill effect a 15% chance to give you 2 charges, each charge will allow the next frost based skill to benefit from the shatter talent.

Brain Freeze: A Talent in the frost tree that allows you to use Fire frost bolt without a cast time once per proc.

Shatter and Shatter combo: Shatter is a talent in the frost tree that applys a 50% chance of critical hit for our spells against any target that is frozen. Shatter Combo, is the act of taking advantage of the shatter talent and when a target is in a frozen state you cast a Frost bolt (max rank) and an ice lance (or a Brain Freeze Fire frost bolt) at the target. which will let both attacks benefit from the shatter talent instead of just one.

Freeze/Frozen: A set of skills the mage has (as well as talent based proc's) that will either hold the target in place or Stun them for a duration, these differ from normal "root" or "stun" effect's because the target is now classified as frozen and your attacks can now benefit from the Shatter talent.

Rank 1 Frost bolt (aka R1 fb, R1 or Rank 1 fb): is as the name suggestions the first rank of the dps skill frost bolt, but because early skills usually have quicker cast times then the later counter part in full gear an R1 fb can be a .5 or so cast time. this skill isnt used to direct dmg though, its used to apply winter's chill and a lower grade frostbolt snare effect.



2A. The Donts of Dealing Damage
Dont Spam Ice Lance: Unlike in most of the expansions a frost mage's Main source of Damage is his frost bolt. Meaning, even if the target is frozen you do not use ice lance as the primary damage method. if a target is frozen regardless if they have an interrupt or some sort of other skills to stop your attack. you still proceed with frost bolt as your main dmg source So spam away.

Dont let yourself get pressured by the fear of an interrupt or Reflect: If needed you can let the arcane tree or fire tree get interrupted (though i personally would tell you not too if you can help it). but you should be fake casting as best as you can too force an interrupt or reflect skill if the option's are there.

Dont be afraid to CC: Even if the target is 50% health, you can still CC them again to full with polymorph. this is because frost mage burst is fairly high and most classes cannot do much against us without there CDs. Do remember that not every class can be done like this. it depends on how easily they applied pressure too you.

Dont Dps melees in melee range: normally id say dont do it if it could be helped. but being in melee range is just bad, your a mage get some distance. "deadzoning" a warrior might seem like a great idea at first. but remember that our spell casts are long and all it takes for a warrior to charge us is to side step 3 inches to the left or right and you'll get stunned. Only a completely bad warrior falls for deadzoning from a frost mage (some other classes can do it ALOT better then a frost can). Most deadzoning frost mages spam ice lance during the "down time" when they fight warriors. but any self respecting warrior will reflect your frost bolts when he's nova'd Or at the very least can pressure you by not reflecting easily. So keep your distance as best as you can.

3A. How to Burst
There are 2 ways too burst. Burst to force Cooldowns, and burst to kill. ill explain them both below.

Burst For CDs: is the act of applying basic pressure to a team, generally this is done without the use of your own CDs. Simply CCing and kiting can be a dangerous thing. regardless if its 1v1 or 3v3 it applys alot of pressure if you do it properly.

Burst for Kill: This is always done after you've forced enough Cooldowns from the enemy. in arena (and even in most duels )you'd want to get rid of trinkets and basic def CDs like Shield wall or ice block first. at this point though you can use your offensive CDs freely. using pet and viens now is a great idea, but do note just because they have no CDs doesnt mean its time to burst. you also have to CC+kite again because you want to apply MORE pressure not less.

4A. How to Properly use your CC
Suprisingly its not as easy as simply casting polymorph on someone. The key is knowing WHEN to do it, as using a CC skill at the wrong time will not apply any pressure. for instance why would you poly a healer if the warrior is already in shield wall? So her are some things to keep in mind before CCing.

1.Is this Poly/Nova/DF going to apply pressure to the enemy or help Peel you/your team? If the answer to either of those is no, then dont CC. much like how you dont just counter spell every skill a target uses you also do not cast poly every moment you get the chance because of the DR system you have to make it count.

2. Is this Counterspell going to apply pressure to the enemy team or help peel your partners? I made this its own number because this is a very important thing on its own. because it has a fairly long cooldown and misuse of your counterspell will lead to a massive amount of pressure being applied to you while you do near none to them. When interupting you have to take into account there likely hood to fake cast and the importance of the skill there casting. if theyre just casting poly 10 times trying to fake you, you dont really have to interupt yet. you want to wait til they really NEED that poly to interupt doing so applys alot of pressure and can likely force a trinket seconds later. The same could be said with damage. if your fighting another mage why should you interupt the first frost bolt he casts. If you know that cast wont do much to you, then you can wait til you've done some dmg to him and interrupt another spell later on either on him or his partner that will hurt him ALOT more then not being able to cast a frost spell. (generally this is going to be interupting poly or a heal.)

3. Make sure that when fighting someone with dispells, you apply winter's chill (via rank 1 frost bolt usually) to them first this will make your CC more likely to stick. Do note that how much you have to stack of Winter's chill will depend on the possible dispells coming out, if its a small amount then a single cast or 2 of r1 bolt will be enough, but if your tryin to kill a paladin you may need to stack to 3-5.

4. In duels (and note this is mostly a duel only strat, though it can apply to a few siuations in arena), you can use the silence from Counterspell (that you spec into) to prevent certain casts from various targets. generally this cover silence is used to apply poly to them. most notably in duels vs say a Ret/prot pala or Dk. This technique shouldnt be used vs classes (or comps) that require you to actually interrupt there skills to apply or negate pressure. in arena, this can sometimes be used vs disc's to get a poly on them. IE you might Nova+CS so he cant dispell or CC you which allows you to poly the priest. this instance would be most effective if used vs non mage based disc comps.


5A. Basic's of Frost Mage Kiting
This will just be a list to make it easier to read.
1. Make sure to abuse your CC. even if your just using a R1 bolt, keeping them snared or rooted will do wounders for you.

2. always be mobile if they arnt CCd in some way. (effectively if you arnt bursting you better be moving)

3. even when you are trying to burst them be ready to move at a moments notice

4. Understand that classes mobility, each class can move a lil different and will be effected by your CC differently. so learning these things will help alot. great example of this would be how warriors rogues and hunters are effected by your root freeze effects. skills like charge/intercept, shadowstep and disengage cannot be used while rooted in any form (unless its bugged on that particular server). so the easiest way to prevent one of these ppl from moving is just using ice nova or pet nova. (in the case of rogues though you have to make sure that have no CS or vanish ready or it'll just go to waste)

5. Do not waste blink on just anything, if a rogue opens on you with cheap shot. your first reflex shouldnt be to just blink, you only blink stuns if said stun is pressuring you enough to do so. so even if you get kidney'd if said kidney is doing no dmg dont blink it. you have more wiggle room with its use when the person has no stuns, but you still dont want to waste it on just nothing. dont be lazy walk over there if needed.



6A. Tip's and tricks for Frost Mage Kiting
When kiting as a mage you have to use your CC to your advantage. but simply using nova and running away a lil bit isnt enough, you have to prepare and predict certain things to make sure you can survive or get away from them. So heres a lil list:

1. when you jump and get CC'd your character will usually still move. this is usually true of CC's that hold you in place, so if someone were to nova, stun or sap you right as you jump. youd create some distance. generally this is used vs stuns and is called "jumping the charge" by most. its a great technique to use against warriors as it can make the opening charge useless.

2. stay as close to max range as the current fight will let you. because even if you've nova'd the target now and can get a free shatter off on him. its not going to do much good when he's 3 feet away from your face right after.

3. When doing dmg at range (with no nova or df active) vs a melee or even a caster, continue to move after each cast if you feel they are getting to close. I sometimes will do a single bolt then move and repeat this til they finally reach me (which i prepare for).

4. use addon's too track CDs, this can help you keep track of things like kick, charge/interrupt or shadow step so you know when you can and cannot do certain things.

5. Use an addon to track distance, ive used one for a while and it helpd me alot in the early and mid stages of learning to play frost mage. (I believe the one i used was called "ranged display" or something).

6. Lastly, remember that as a frost mage we are not limited too kiting only melee's, we can kite spellcasters too. so use that too your advantage and move out of range of there skills if needed.


7A. Other Guide's
http://forum.warmane.com/showthread....List-of-Guides (this is just the sticky for mage guides)
http://forum.warmane.com/showthread....Mage-PvP-Guide (this is my other frost mage pvp guide)

8A. Final thoughts
This guide attempts to take all of the basic's of actual frost mage combat and put them into small catagories. but because im writing this so quickly the first draft which i will post. Will have errors, sometimes it could be just gramatical and spelling, or i may of forgotten to mention something. This means the guide may change over time and hopefully will be fairly easy to use for all those who need it.