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Frost Mage Guide — Class Guides · WoW Burning Crusade

Chills, freezes and Frostbolt: the safest mage tree to solo and level with, and the tree of AoE leveling.

A cloth-wearing caster who deals Arcane, Fire and Frost damage from range, controls enemies with Polymorph and frost spells, and conjures food, water and portals. More about the mage

Class
Mage
Roles
Damage
Used for
Raids and dungeons, Player versus player, Leveling
Top talent
Summon Water Elemental
Popular builds
3
Version
WoW Burning Crusade

How to play

Frost in The Burning Crusade gains the Water Elemental, a pet that casts Waterbolt and Freeze, plus Icy Veins, Ice Floes and Empowered Frostbolt. It is the safest mage spec, the best for leveling, and keeps Winter's Chill up for other frost casters in raids.

In raids Frost deals less damage than Fire or Arcane but is mana-efficient and nearly threat-free: cast Frostbolt and use Icy Veins with your Water Elemental out. In arenas, Freeze sets up Shatter crits with Ice Lance and Frostbolt.

For AoE leveling, Blizzard, Frost Nova and Cone of Cold still work as well as ever.

At a glance

Single-target damage
Damage to groups
Survivability
Utility for the group
Solo play and leveling
Ease of play

Rated 1 to 5 against the other specs in WoW Burning Crusade.

Rotation and priorities

  1. 1Ice Armor in the world; Mage Armor or Molten Armor in raids.
  2. 2Summon Water Elemental and keep it attacking.
  3. 3Frostbolt as your main spell.
  4. 4Icy Veins with trinkets and Bloodlust.
  5. 5Ice Lance on frozen targets; your Water Elemental's Freeze sets them up.
  6. 6Ice Barrier, Ice Block and Cold Snap for defence.

Strengths and weaknesses

Strengths

  • The safest mage: slows, roots, Ice Barrier and Ice Block.
  • Water Elemental adds damage and control.
  • Mana-efficient and low threat.

Weaknesses

  • Less raid damage than Fire or Arcane.
  • Water Elemental only lasts 45 seconds.
  • Lower crit damage than Fire.

Stats and gear

Stat priority

Most valuable first. Bars compare each stat with the best one; a cap in the note means the stat drops off once you reach it.

  1. 1

    Spell damagefrost damage counts

  2. 2

    Hitto 16%, less Elemental Precision

  3. 3

    Critical strike

  4. 4

    Spell haste

  5. 5

    Intellect

  6. 6

    Stamina

What to look for

  • Spell damage and hit; frost damage gear counts.
  • Stamina and resilience for arenas.
  • Tailoring's Frozen Shadoweave set is a strong pre-raid choice.

Items worth chasing

  • Icon of the Silver CrescentSpell damage, and more on use.
  • Quagmirran's EyeA spell haste proc.
  • Frozen Shadoweave RobeCrafted robe with shadow and frost damage.

Builds

Each bar splits the build's talent points by tree.

  • Arcane
  • Fire
  • Frost

  • Winter's Chill Elementalist

    DamagePvE
    18/0/43

    Raid Frost: Winter's Chill raises frost crits for the raid, Icy Veins and the Water Elemental add burst, and Arcane talents keep mana up.

    • Cold Snap 1/1
    • Ice Barrier 1/1
    • Arctic Winds 5/5
    • Empowered Frostbolt 5/5
    • Summon Water Elemental 1/1

    Open in the talent calculatorTheorycraftingTalent order by level

  • Shatter Gladiator

    DamagePvP
    17/0/44

    Arena Frost: the Water Elemental's Freeze sets up Shatter crits, Ice Barrier and Cold Snap defend you, and Arcane Fortitude adds armor.

    • Cold Snap 1/1
    • Ice Floes 2/2
    • Ice Barrier 1/1
    • Arctic Winds 3/5
    • Summon Water Elemental 1/1

    Open in the talent calculatorTheorycraftingTalent order by level

  • Frostbolt Wanderer

    DamageLeveling
    11/0/50

    Frost for questing to 70: the Water Elemental and Icy Veins for tough mobs, Empowered Frostbolt and Shatter for big hits and Ice Barrier to avoid downtime.

    • Cold Snap 1/1
    • Ice Barrier 1/1
    • Arctic Winds 5/5
    • Empowered Frostbolt 5/5
    • Summon Water Elemental 1/1

    Open in the talent calculatorTheorycrafting

Key talents

  • Summon Water Elemental · top talent, up to 1

    Summon a Water Elemental to fight for the caster for 45 sec.

  • Arctic Reach · tier 4, up to 2

    Increases the range of your Frostbolt, Ice Lance and Blizzard spells and the radius of your Frost Nova and Cone of Cold spells by 20%.

  • Frost Channeling · tier 4, up to 3

    Reduces the mana cost of your Frost spells by 15% and reduces the threat caused by your Frost spells by 10%.

  • Shatter · tier 4, up to 5

    Increases the critical strike chance of all your spells against frozen targets by 50%.

  • Cold Snap · tier 5, up to 1

    When activated, this spell finishes the cooldown on all Frost spells you recently cast.

  • Ice Floes · tier 6, up to 2

    Reduces the cooldown of your Cone of Cold, Cold Snap, Ice Barrier and Ice Block spells by 20%.

  • Winter's Chill · tier 6, up to 5

    Gives your Frost damage spells a 100% chance to apply the Winter's Chill effect, which increases the chance a Frost spell will critically hit the target by 2% for 15 sec. Stacks up to 5 times.

  • Ice Barrier · tier 7, up to 1

    Instantly shields you, absorbing 454 damage. Lasts 1 min. While the shield holds, spells will not be interrupted.

  • Arctic Winds · tier 7, up to 5

    Increases all Frost damage you cause by 5% and reduces the chance melee and ranged attacks will hit you by 5%.

  • Empowered Frostbolt · tier 8, up to 5

    Your Frostbolt spell gains an additional 10% of your bonus spell damage effects and an additional 5% chance to critically strike.

Frost abilities by level

When each ability arrives: trained abilities at the level a trainer first teaches them, talent abilities (gold frame) at the first level the talent can be taken.

Related

Other mage specs: Arcane, Fire