Frost Mage DPS Rotation, Cooldowns, and Abilities — The War Within Pre-Patch

At its most basic, the premise of Frost Mage is to spam Frostbolt until you gain a proc. Fingers of Frost allows you to cast Ice Lance and gain the benefits of the frozen state. Brain Freeze resets the cooldown of Flurry and Flurry wants you to use a cast time spell, like Frostbolt, going into the Flurry, and then follow up with 2 Ice Lances to consume the 2 remaining Winter's Chill charges.

This Frostbolt > Flurry > Ice Lance > Ice Lance combo is the heart of the spec, and if you have that committed to memory, then the rest is simple. Anything beyond it is simply cooldown and movement management. The priority lists below will showcase where exactly they are to be used optimally, but as long as they are being used at all, your damage should not suffer too severely.

Adding talents to the mix, you gain a few cooldowns and the requirement to keep track of your Mastery: Icicles. All of the spells added by talents still want to take advantage of the idea of the combo above but are used slightly differently each. Comet Storm should follow a Flurry so that it lands as Winter's Chill is still on the target, allowing all comets to Shatter. Likewise, Ray of Frost wants to be cast into the final charge of Winter's Chill to benefit the entire channel. Glacial Spike wants to Shatter as many casts as possible, either replacing the Frostbolt that precedes the Flurry in the combo or one of the spells that would take the place of the following Ice Lances.

On single target, Shifting Power should simply be used whenever all of your talented cooldowns are on cooldown, and you have no procs to go.

Use Fingers of Frost and Brain Freeze as they come: Fingers of Frost, through straight Ice Lance casts, and Brain Freeze, through the primary Frostbolt > Flurry > Ice Lance > Ice Lance combo. Now, there are situations in which you have mentally committed yourself to going into your Frostbolt > Flurry > Ice Lance > Ice Lance, but you proc Fingers of Frost on that Frostbolt. That is unfortunate, but the Flurry is worth more overall. There is a small upside in most builds, though. Wintertide increases the damage of the Ice Lance cast into a "double frozen" scenario like this by 20%. While it is not optimal, it lessens the impact.

For further information on how and why the Frostbolt > Flurry > Ice Lance > Ice Lance combo works, see this section on the FAQ page.

When talented into Glacial Spike, Flurry timing becomes a bit of a game to see if you can land Glacial Spike somewhere within the combo. If, for instance, you finished casting some Ice Lances and are at 4 Icicles, you should instead just Flurry into Glacial Spike, skipping the initial spell in the combo.

Additionally, Comet Storm and Ray of Frost should both be held for Flurry. In the case of Comet Storm, you want to make sure you have enough time for the comets to finish falling within the Winter's Chill window. You could space this out by Flurry, Ice Lance, Comet Storm, Frostbolt, then Ice Lance. The Frostbolt should give you the extra time that you otherwise would not have, and the second Ice Lance will impact before Frostbolt unless you are extremely close to the target.

Ray of Frost, on the other hand, wants to be cast into the second charge of Winter's Chill at most relevant gear levels so as to not waste there being two charges on the target.

Some timing notes:

• 27% Haste lets you Flurry into Comet Storm or Ice Lance into Ray of Frost
• 48% Haste lets you Flurry into Glacial Spike into Ray of Frost
• 52% Haste lets you Flurry into Ice Lance into Comet Storm into Ray of Frost
• 173% Haste lets you Flurry into Comet Storm into Glacial Spike into Ray of Frost

These values are slightly off due to the nature of the travel time of Flurry against debuff duration, so this is an absolute worst-case scenario for each. In practice, the values should be slightly lower, so consider these points so that you will absolutely make the timer.

Obviously, the last one is a bit of an absurdity, but there are common mechanics that grant a Haste buff you could stack with your own buffs.

Ultimately, Frost Mage is primarily about abusing your casts in a way that is suitable to the situation. There are an enormous amount of possibilities, synergies, and overlaps that will provide an advantageous result. It is important, therefore, that you, as a player, think carefully about how you can use your spells in a way that makes sense. Try to avoid using your major abilities haphazardly or without thinking, as this will invariably result in you losing a lot of damage. When your Frozen Orb is about to come off cooldown, for example, start thinking about the ways you are going to cleave with it or if the boss is going to be moved. Check your boss's timers to see how you can line it up for a phase with increased damage dealt or AoE. A lot of this might seem like common sense, but you would be surprised how uncommon that is!

1. Pre-cast Frostbolt at 2 seconds on the countdown.
2. Cast Flurry to start the cooldown and to Shatter the prior Frostbolt.
3. Frostbolt should land, and the boss encounter should have begun at this point.
4. Activate Icy Veins and Time Warp if popping on pull.
5. Cast Comet Storm.
6. Cast Ice Lance to consume the first stack of Winter's Chill.
7. Cast Ray of Frost.
8. Cast Ice Lance to use one of your two Fingers of Frost from Ray of Frost.
9. Cast Flurry.
10. Cast Glacial Spike.
11. Cast Frozen Orb.
12. Cast Shifting Power.
13. Cast Ice Lance to consume the second Fingers of Frost from Ray of Frost before Frozen Orb impacts and grants the first proc from it.
14. Follow your normal priority, as indicated below.

1. Cast Icy Veins.
2. Cast Time Warp if Icy Veins is up. Pair the second use with your second Icy Veins.
3. Cast Comet Storm if Winter's Chill is on the target.
4. Cast Flurry have just cast Frostbolt, or another spell that will benefit from Winter's Chill.
5. Cast Flurry have just cast Frostbolt, or another spell that will benefit from Winter's Chill, or you have 4 Icicles before casting it, to follow it with Glacial Spike.
6. Cast Ray of Frost if one stack of Winter's Chill is on the target.
7. Cast Glacial Spike if Winter's Chill is on the target or will be if you are following Glacial Spike with Flurry.
8. Cast Frozen Orb if Ray of Frost is on cooldown.
9. Cast Frozen Orb.
10. Cast Blizzard if there are 2 or more targets that will get hit by it.
11. Shifting Power when Ray of Frost, Comet Storm, and Frozen Orb are on cooldown for at least 10 seconds longer.
12. Glacial Spike if you are at 5 Icicles, regardless of whether you have Flurry or not.
13. Cast Ice Lance whenever there are charges of Winter's Chill on the target that is not otherwise prioritized.
14. Cast Ice Lance if you have Fingers of Frost.
15. Cast Frostbolt.

This boils down to Shatter your big cooldowns like Ray of Frost and Comet Storm, and play around your Mastery: Icicles and Flurry to land Glacial Spike inside Winter's Chill. This means that you can have situations where you are at 3 Icicles, throwing Flurry > Ice Lance > Glacial Spike. Likewise Glacial Spike > Flurry > Ice Lance > Ice Lance is valid, as is Frostbolt > Flurry > Glacial Spike > Ice Lance. Just do what you can to hit 5 Icicles, and fire Glacial Spike into Winter's Chill.

1. Icy Veins
2. Cast Frozen Orb
3. Cast Blizzard
4. Cast Frostbolt until you have 12 stacks of Death's Chill.
5. Cast Comet Storm.
6. Cast Cone of Cold.
7. Cast Comet Storm again.
8. Cast Frozen Orb again.
9. Cast Blizzard again.
10. Cast Shifting Power.
11. Follow your normal priority, as indicated below.

This priority list describes the optimal AoE rotation for Frost Mage. If it looks similar to the above section, that is because most of your AoE damage is tied up in cooldowns, and you simply drop to single target between them. If you have the burst order down right, you can simply hit things as they light up, right up until Cone of Cold is coming off cooldown again.

1. Icy Veins
2. Cast Frozen Orb
3. Cast Blizzard
4. Cast Frostbolt until you have 12 stacks of Death's Chill.
5. Cast Comet Storm.
6. Cast Cone of Cold.
7. Cast Ice Nova, if the targets can be frozen, and you just cast Glacial Spike.
8. Cast Shifting Power.
9. Cast Glacial Spike. Try to combo it into either Ice Nova or Frost Nova if the targets can be frozen, especially if you have your 2pT31 set bonus.
10. Cast Flurry if available.
11. Cast Ice Lance if you have Fingers of Frost available.
12. Cast Arcane Explosion if there are 7 or more targets, and you are above 30% Mana.
13. Cast Frostbolt.