AoE Grinding in the New WoW: Leveling Talents 1-18

Yeah yeah, quest rewards provide better XP than anything else while levelling. So what? I've seriously walked through Jame's alliance levelling guide I don't know how many times from 20-30, and I just hate having to go from one spot to another to another and turn quests in chunks at a time.

I like my slow painful grind. I like staying in one place and killing a billion things at once. I like having passers-by stop in their tracks as you perform your elaborate dance. I like making oodles of money from cloths, skins, and greens.

With the change in 3.0.2, we have ourselves a few things that completely change the AoE grinding process. For the better, of course. Three things come to mind:

- The removal of the natural 1% miss rate. As long as you group up with mobs at your level or lower, you will never whiff a Frost Nova on a random mob in that group. You will never ever go "OH SH-" and scramble for the Cold Snap button.

- Reconfiguration of the talent tree. Some good AoE talents come a lot sooner than usual, and some require less points to max out. With this adjustment, you can have a really good baseline talent set-up to grind with as early as level 25. At higher levels, introduction of talents that further increase your snare will result in even more control over your mobs. I'll explain what those talents are later.

- The ability to crit with Blizzard. Holy crap, this is what will make me AoE my way to level 80, with dungeons and instances on the side. Now that Blizzard can crit, you will NEED to put talent points into spells that increase your crit chance and damage.

A combination of the three points above, it is now much easier and smoother to go through the motions of the Blizzard sequence, and your damage capabilities can shoot REAL high.

AoE Levelling Build: 10-27

It was an omen, I suppose, that when the patch hit, the only functional realm that I could access was Wimzig's. He surely has been neglected somewhat with his levelling, but I suppose that in between making acquaintances with Bre's guild, levelling up with Leyola, and my raiding schedule with Bashertin, there wasn't much time.

That's besides the point though. I am now presented with an opportunity to do what I've always wanted to do with Wimzig; AoE grind. I already have a plan set up with his talents as he goes through the motions once again. Here's what I plan on doing.

Lvl:
10-12: 3/3 Ice Floes. Shortened cooldown on your Frost Nova is more important for AoE grinding in the long run than Improved Frostbolt. At these levels, your cast time is pretty short anyways, so it's not such a big deal.

13-14: 2/5 Improved Frostbolt. If you don't like the cast time on your frostbolt, you can switch this with Ice floes, but only take 2 points here, since you're going straight to the second tier at level 15.

15-17: 3/3 Permafrost. At this point, all you should care about is single-mob kiting. This really helps in that regard.

18-20: 3/3 Ice Shards. The crit is pretty good, but you won't see it too much for now. This is just in preparation for when you start grinding it out.

21-23: 3/3 Improved Blizzard. Technically, you could start grinding at this point, but I seriously doubt you have the sufficient Intellect and Stamina to do so, unless you've been buying out "of the Eagle" gear at the AH.

24: 1/3 Piercing Ice. We need one more point to get into shatter, and then BAM! it's paradise city from here on out.

25-27: 3/3 Shatter. Once this talent is maxed, you are essentially good to go with your blizzing with this resulting spec. From here on out, grab all talents that help increase your abilities to AoE grind, including:

- Arctic Reach
- Frost Channeling
- Cold Snap
- Winter's Chill (even more crits!)
- Cold as Ice
- ICE BARRIER (very important!)
- Shattered Barrier (optional. I myself will have to see how this goes, to see how easy it is to control when your barrier pops. Most likely, this will involve waiting a bit for the cooldown before starting the pull.)
- Water Elemental/Improved Water Elemental (Free ranged freezing effect ftw!)
- Chilled to the Bone

In a future edition of this series, I'll flesh this out in more detail, depending on how the grinding goes.

Conclusion

Maybe if I get off my butt and start levelling Wimzig again (in between NaNoWriMo, Leyola, and raiding with Bashertin), I can provide even more information with first-hand experience at the lower levels. My plans for this series of posts regarding AoE in the new WoW will hopefully include:

- 3.0.x grinding pre-Wrath at 70
- levelling build from 28-80
- choice grinding spots, as well as commentary regarding those spots

Wimzig's Whimsy: AoE

((Apologies for not posting the 3.0.x AoE guide. This is probably the next best thing, though!))

Wimzig was trapped.

He had expected himself to get into this particular situation. He peered outwards from the mine, and saw a band of kobolds setting up camp in front of the cave's entrance.

A surveying party, he thought to himself.

There were seven, maybe eight of them, from the looks of it, and to simply try to sneak through was an unwise idea for the mage. In moments, the group would start their rounds towards the mine and discover him anyways. There was no getting around the fact that he would have to face the entire group by himself.

In the heat of the moment, Wimzig formulated as precise a plan as he could. Considering his limited arsenal of spells, he re-examined the opposition one last time.

None of the kobolds were armed with ranged weapons, he noticed. If they were going to take him down, it would only be with mining picks. They weren't bright either. Wimzig assumed that they would all chase him in some uniform fashion, eschewing any form of organized pursuit.

With those facts in mind, he settled on a surefire strategy to escape.

Wimzig closed his eyes, sensing the flow of the arcane around him. He concentrated the flow to his outstretched arms, forming circular orbs at each of his palms.

With his specialty in the arts of frost magic, he concentrated on the energy that had formed, and finally imbued the orbs with deep cold. Casting his spell, the energy spread around the tiny gnome, forming a thin protective sphere, laced with ice.

This sudden burst of magic drew the attention of one kobold standing outside, who had noticed a sudden flash of light blue emanating from the nearby mine. He wandered towards the entrance in curiosity.

Wimzig immediately ran out of the mine, zipping by the one who had wandered, immediately grabbing his attention.

"Intruder!" The Kobold initially reacted and began to give chase to the gnome.

Wimzig continued to pump his stubby legs as he shortly reached the remaining group. He ran a full circle through the group, grabbing the attention of the entire band.

"You take no candle!" said one.

"You die now!" said another.

As expected, the entire camp of kobolds, including the one who had initially wandered into the mine were now pursuing the ice-laced gnome. They begun their chase with short-sighted killing intent, but was halted by an unexpected maneuver by their enemy.

Wimzig stopped in place and began to concentrate. He visualized a ring around him, and channeled the surrounding arcane energy throughout the area enclosed by the ring.

Just a bit longer, he thought.

The group of kobolds had closed on him, and began to swing their pickaxes at the gnome, but to no avail. The energy of the icy orb surrounding their target braced the impacts of their makeshift weapons.

"Harder! He die now!" said one.

"He no take candle!" said another.

A few more seconds, and the energy of the orb gave to the repeated impacts from repeated swings. But it was too late. Wimzig cast his second spell. A concentrated blast of arctic energy spread out from him, hitting each kobold. The impacts were not damaging, but managed to freeze each one in place.

Wimzig immediately stepped back in time as his initial barrier spell wore off, and began to concentrate at a spot of land approximately twenty or so yards away from him and the group. He visualized himself standing on that spot, and in an instantaneous blink, he was already there.

The kobolds remained rooted from the knees down, their close-range weapons no longer a threat to the distant gnome. They struggled in place in an attempt to break free, but failed.

Wimzig turned back to the group, and sensed the arcane energy emanating from the open environment. He mentally drew a series of leylines, and channeled the arcane energy into a circle above the group of kobolds. He channeled his spell, imbuing the arcane flow with ice once more.

A torrent formed above the hapless group of kobolds, as they began to be pelted by a violent, yet concentrated blizzard. The sheer impact of the pellets shattered their icy shackles, freeing them. Their sights still set on the source of the cold pain, they forced themselves towards the caster.

Wimzig continued to concentrate on his spell, channelling the remains of the surrounding energy into the storm. The kobolds continued walking towards him, albeit very slowly, as if hampered by the cold. By the time they had reached the mage, they were terribly damaged by the spell, and had but a tiny opportunity to have their last whacks at the gnome.

But Wimzig had anticipated their actions, and immediately cast another quick spell around him. A second short blast shot out from him to the now nearby kobolds, freezing them in place once again.

Estimating the amount of energy he had left remaining, Wimzig elected to strafe away from the group instead of using his instant travel spell. Once he had obtained adequate distance, he began to mentally form another circle above the group.

Now in a new area of the field, he redirected more arcane energy into the lines above the group of kobolds. He cast one final spell, forming another blizzard, this one more violent than before.

The storm pelted relentlessly at the kobolds, once again binded by ice. Unable to defend themselves, they were critically wounded by the miniature blizzard. Simultaneously, the eight corpses collapsed onto each other, making a neat pile.

Exhausted, Wimzig lazily walked towards the pile, taking out a long stick of wax from his pockets. Examining it once more, he concluded that the item he had held was of no value, and was not the relic that he was looking for. He tossed it onto the heap of dead kobolds.

"Fine," he muttered, "you can have your damned candle!"

3.0.2 Blizzard AoE Dummy Test - 3.3k DPS

Essentially, I went to Theramore, and stood in the middle of the 6 dummies near the castle. My rotation was [Frost Nova, Blizzard, Blizzard] x 3, as to simulate an AoE grinding sequence.

See the Recount below. Note that the relevant stats are 18% crit with Molten Armor on and ~1k spell power.



50% crit rate CONFIRMED. Freaking sweet. Kings of AoE? I think so.

Went all out on Curator, but managed to discover that Ghost hit was indeed removed in this patch.



10% miss rate confirms it.

Overall, about the same damage as before; but once I hit cap, that shouldn't be such a problem.

In a way, I'm a little too lazy to gem/gear up some +Hit...Maybe I'll respec arcane for fun. Everyone's into Frost nowadays, and Larísa's gone back to her standby with fire, so maybe Arcane would be a nice chage of pace. I don't know what I'll ever do without Squirtle, being there for me almost half the time.

3.0.2 Frost First Impressions - AoE

So um, blizzard can crit now.

I crit my mobs for almost 1k damage, which occurs 50% of the time btw, thanks to Frost Nova/Shattered Barrier.

Plus Fingers of Frost procs. Which procs essentially every tick of blizzard if you have enough targets in your blizzard.

Even if Fingers of Frost doesn't proc, all mobs still get winter's chill. +10% crit and you still have about half your blizzard left to channel. Assuming you don't proc FoF. Which is often btw.

Oh, have you seen these new glyphs? Like Glyph of Frost Nova, which increases the damage taken by mobs before a Nova breaks? Seems like it's good enough to keep them rooted to take TWO CRITS before breaking.

Oh, what about Glyph of Blink? Farther Blink means extra time to get hit by blizzard. More Procs. More Crits.

Unless Seed of Corruption was a lot more OP than I am led to believe, I have no problem being convinced that Mages are once again kings of AoE.

I'm critting almost 1k, but I think I already said that. And that's only with barely under 1k spell power.

Bah, realm went down. Can't get back in, stuck on loading screen. I think I'll go to bed.



...Well maybe a few more minutes. /swoon.

A tiny detail that I failed to miss...

Not a big deal, but patch notes from the beta regarding the Fire talent, World in Flames:

"World in Flames - Moved to Tier 2, Increases the critical strike chance of your Flamestrike, Blast Wave, Dragon’s Breath, Living Bomb, Blizzard and Arcane Explosion spells by 2/4/6%. "

Let's cut out a few irrelevant words:

"...Increases the critical strike chance of your Flamestrike, Blast Wave, Dragon’s Breath, Living Bomb, Blizzard and Arcane Explosion spells..."

One more cut:

"...Increases the critical strike chance of your...Blizzard...by 2/4/6% "

Wait, but I thought that Blizzard doesn't crit! Does this mean that Blizzard (the company) is looking to make changes to the mechanics of Blizzard (the spell)? They did say that they wanted to increase damage output by mages, particularly in the field of area-effect.

Let's suppose that Blizzard (spell) is programmed to have 0% critical chance, then WiF will increase the chance to 6%. That would mean your blizzard-based dps would increase by 6%, since each critical hit essentially doubles the existing damage assuming the mage has the talents for it, and adds 6 more hits worth of blizzard damage within a span of a hundred blizzard hit occurences.

Then again, it's more likely that critical chance does not apply to blizzard, since talents such as shatter and winter's chill do not affect it. But if that's so, why even bother mentioning the spell in the first place in the changes? Let's hope it's not scratched off due to a typo.

But still, a 6% damage increase? Not too shabby. But with WiF being a Tier 2 Fire talent, will it be worth it taking? Curse you, Blizzard! October is still miles away!

Dungeon Soloing as a Frost Mage

With so many bodies, it's hard to find the gnome in the middle of it all...

The other day, I was playing around on my alt, a level 17 Dwarf Holy Priest. I was looking to complete a few deadmines quests, so I joined the LFG channel. Lo and behold, I found a 70 mage offering a free run through the instance (he was running his guildmate through, and had extra slots available). I joined up with a bunch of others, expecting that the run wouldn't take more than 10-15 minutes.

Turns out he was fire-specced, and took 30 minutes to complete it.

At the end of the run, I was grateful for his deed, but at the same time, dissatisfied by the duration of the run itself. This was more attributed to the fact that he was a fire mage (and my slight bias favoring frost), and the undisputable fact that frost mages are strictly better for dungeon soloing. Thus I decided to write this post about the nuances of soloing lowbie dungeons to maximum efficiency.

While not as efficient as farming or playing the AH, there is definitely money to be made in running strangers through low-level dungeons. Surprisingly, a lot of people are willing to spend gold on runs through Stockades and/or Deadmines. Whether it be for easy experience, or obtaining certain boss drops, a frost mage can make good money from such jobs. If you're lucky, you'll find multiple people to run you through the dungeon simultaneously for upwards sum of 10-15 gold for a single run-through. In this post, I will outline the general tips to use when running dungeons for your friends, or for making easy money.

Ice Barrier is Your Best Friend

The most important factor that seperates frosties from their fiery counterparts is the liberal use of Ice Barrier. Ice Barrier shields the mage from the multitude of attacks from a large number of mobs while you run through the dungeon grabbing as much aggro as possible. While fire and arcane mages do not have Ice Barrier, they can still use Mana Shield to absorb damage, but the mana-loss as a result of damage may require the expenditure of potions or mana gems, which limits the amount of mobs that the mage can pull without putting his or her own life in danger. Thus, frost is the safer spec for this situation.

The general rule for using Ice Barrier is to constantly recast it when your cooldown expires. With practice, you can get a feel for how many mobs you can collect on a single pull without having to take a significant amount of damage. Before starting your pull, you want to cast IB first, and then wait a small while so that your cooldown can expire sooner without having to worry about taking damage. Also, there's always Mana Shield available if you're still waiting on that Ice Barrier cooldown to reset.

Molten Armor is Your Other Best Friend

Perhaps the most underappreciated buff that mages received in patch 2.4 is the ability of Molten Armor to inflict damage on enemies after they inflict melee damage to a mage with a damage shield on. Combined with Ice Barrier, this buff serves a purpose similar to the combo of bubble+spikes that pallys use for their solo dungeon runs: it increases the mana efficiency of your pull, since you don't have to use as many AoE spells to kill all the mobs at once. On a stocks run, by the time you reach the last mob that you want to pull, the first mob that you pulled may have already lost about 50% of its total HP, depending on your +Spell Damage. ALWAYS have this buff up, along with Arcane Intellect, which increases the amoung of mana available to do your pulls.

Have a Pulling Path Planned Ahead of Time

Having done these dungeons before as a lowbie, you should be familiar with the placements of all the mobs in the dungeon. With that in mind, try to establish a path that allows you to pull as many mobs as possible with the least distance travelled. The more time you spend running and not casting spells, the more damage you're taking, and the sooner your Ice Barrier will expire. Unlike paladins, mages are squishy, and given enough time without a bubble effect, the mage will surely die.

Deep Frost is the Ideal Spec for Soloing Dungeons

Well, this is not absolutely true. Either way, 0/0/61 (all talents except for Frozen Core and Frost Warding) contains all of the important talents that improve your performance in soloing lowbie dungeons. Ice Barrier is an obvious example. Generally, most important talents for soling dungeons are the ones that reduce cooldown on your important ice spells (Frost Nova, Ice Barrier, Ice Block, Cold Snap), as well as Shatter, which allows your arcane explosion to crit at a higher rate after casting frost nova on all of the mobs that you pulled. Talents that are part of the Blizzard/Cone of Cold grinding specs are also useful for higher level dungeons that allow for killing a room full of mobs in the same pull.

An Example Pull

Before you start off the dungeon, be sure that you have enough food and drink to last you the duration of the run, as well as having the self-buffs mentioned above. Using enchanting oils and alchemy elixirs are not important, as AoE damage is not significantly boosted by them.
First off, put up your Ice Barrier, and wait a small while for your mana to regen and for your cooldown to return, or at least come close to it. Then run your path.

Unlike paladins, bears, and other multi-mob soloers, you have the advantage of using rank 1 Arcane Explosion to pull a number of mobs around you without actually having to run into them directly. Use this only to pull new mobs, not to damage the ones already on you. This method shortens the time you need to pull all the mobs within an area, and lets you maximize the duration of your Ice Barrier.

If there is a sizeable distance between groups of mobs (such as Stockades, when you have to run in between rooms), use Blink to get to the next area faster.

When you reach your limit of mobs pulled, it is optional to use Ice Block to let all the mobs gather around you, but not necessary. If you're in a dungeon that has ranged mobs or casters (eg. Defias Wizards, Scarlet Evokers), you will want to finish your path around a corner, and then ice block allow time for the LOS pull the ranged mobs closer to you. Then, depending on the level/design of the dungeon, cancel your Ice Block, and then do either of the following:

- Frost Nova the mobs in place, and repeatedly use your highest ranked Arcane Explosion until they die, or

- Frost Nova, Blink away, cast blizzard repeatedly until they reach you, then Frost Nova, Blink, and repeat until they die.

The former option is the easiest and simplest method to use in dungeons such as Deadmines, Stockades, Wailing Caverns, and Blackfathom Deeps. Higher Level instances such as Scarlet Monastery might require your more damaging AoE spells such as Blizzard and Cone of Cold.

Soloing Bosses

Pretty much all the bosses up to Scarlet Monastery do not require any detailed strategy. You can simply put up a shield and frostbolt the boss a few times before he dies. In general, bosses that come with adds (Greenskin, Houndmaster in SM) require that the adds should be downed first with Arcane Explosion before the boss himself. To help kill the boss faster, feel free to summon your water elemental for MASSIVE DAMAGE.

In higher level instances, bosses might deal a significantly high amount of damage such that the boss will have to be kited.

Getting your Rewards

Some of the most useful features of soloing dungeons is the fact that you get all the loot to yourself. In a single run, the cash you get in total from all the mobs that you have demolished is considerable, but not on the same level as farming for motes, minerals, or leather. You can get some green world drops from Deadmines and Stockades, and sell them on AH for 2-3g buyouts. Even the Blackened Defias Belt can go relatively high if they ever drop off of Captain Greenskin.
Because of the loot described above, it's quite fair to charge a reasonable amount to run lowbies through dungeons in a way that they can keep all the greens. They'll pay 5-6g for a run, but in the end, may get up to 7-8g worth of drops.

If by chance you happen to be an enchanter, you need to look at your server's economy to determine if disenchanting your loot is more profitable than selling the greens themselves.

You Don't Even Have to Pull the Whole Dungeon!

If you're not in a party, you may elect to go straight to the bosses and kill them for disenchants or vender blues. While each dungeon may vary, you can sidestep through a few groups without having to actively engage in combat with them. This is simply due to the fact that the level difference between you and the mob results in a very low aggro radius, or minimum distance from a mob that a player can stand without drawing aggro. Depending on the dungeon, you can even blink through a group of mobs that is impossible to walk through without drawing aggro (ie, the halls in SM Library and Armory). With proper timing and positioning, you can kill Arcanist Doan within 4 to 5 minutes from stepping into the Library!

In Conclusion...

Soloing dungeons can be rewarding, whether it be by farming your alt's Defias Leather set or Scarlet Mail sets, or disenchanting boss blues for your Fiery Weapon mats, or charging runs to lowbie alts. The rewards may not be as rich as farming motes from outland, but at least you have the pleasure of absolutely destroying those pesky Defias or Scarlet Crusaders, en-masse.

Stay tuned later tonight for pictures to accompany the text above, as I'm posting this from the office.