Frost Mage Patch 9.2 Changes Analysis and Tier Set Thoughts

This page will go over how the changes in Patch 9.2, Eternity's End, will affect Frost Mage. If you are simply interested in what the current changes are for Mages in Patch 9.2 in general, you can instead read our full list of changes to the entire Mage class on our dedicated page below. For an additional list of content coming with Patch 9.2, you can also check out our Patch 9.2 Overview page.

Comet Storm no longer removes Winter's Chill charges per-comet. It simply benefits without consuming. This means that it is a minor gain to hold Comet Storm until Winter's Chill is active. This also means that there are some slight optimizations to how you play around those two charges, to make sure all the comets benefit.

Blizzard and Frozen Orb are both having their damage values lowered, and Blizzard's cooldown reduction effect is being halved. This is an AoE nerf primarily aimed at Mythic+, but it will have a large impact on our cleave. There is a very high chance Blizzard is no longer worth casting on 2-3 targets, although this will have to be backed up by simulations when the final numbers are disclosed.

Frost Mage 2-Piece drops Comet Storm on your current target, same as if you had cast it, delay and all. Given the above change, this means that we will be firing off random Comet Storm casts, and trying to make sure that as much of it is Shattered as possible. What this ends up doing to our rotation is making sure you pay attention to your character's animation, looking for the blue circular aura of it being cast, and adjusting your Shatter combo cast order to make sure the comets hit inside the window.

To do this is about a 3% gain, so it will be worth paying attention to for maximizing DPS. Sadly it does not appear to be able to be tracked other than the animation around your character, so tracking auras will be more inaccurate than usual.

Frost Mage 4-Piece is a passive gain, applied to every target hit by any given comet. This means secondary targets can also be debuffed in close range cleave scenarios.

It should also be noted that the 4p applies to the talented Comet Storm as well, and this actually allows Comet Storm to be the best single-target talent.

9.2 brings the ability to wear a Covenant-specific legendary at the same time as another, once unlocked. This should not disrupt Covenant choice too much, although Necrolord might see some actual play if fights end up having long-lived adds.

Most interactions are going to be irrelevant, but Death's Fathom with Slick Ice has the potential to be extremely powerful on any fight with sustained secondary targets. Under cooldowns, it is possible to obtain well over 100 stacks, making us devastating in cleave and funneled damage scenarios.

Harmonic Echo is also being changed to allow the damage splash to hit the primary target, meaning it will not be useless on single-target.