Frost Nerfs Have to be Reverted

Classes Death Knight
1

The new Frost Death Knight nerfs have gone too far. “Obliterate” is a joke even with all the borrowed power of Shadowlands this will leave Frost in a miserable state.

In the Pre-Patch, Frost Dk was already weak, this has exacerbated the problem to beyond a breaking point where Frost DK just sucks regardless of whether you play DW, Breath, 2-h, Obliteration, Frostscythe, it doesn’t matter all of our specs are trash now.

Beyond the damage nerfs why the “Pillar of Frost” changes? We just had four years of “Icecap” making it a 30-second cooldown and now that no one takes that talent 45 seconds is too short? What about the active duration? Why did it need to be shorter? Why do other classes have offensive CDs that last 15 to 25 seconds+ but our 15-second active duration cd is too far?

Blizzard, these nerfs have to be reverted or at least be reduced and it needs to happen ASAP as Frost and 2-hand Frost specifically are borderline unplayable.

If you’re not going to revert the Pillar of Frost changes then you need to tell us why. Otherwise, it will be as it has been interpreted as an unprovoked and unnecessary attack on the Frost DK player base.

If this was done as an attempt to balance the top-end Obliterate damage caused by Soulbind abilities from “Emeni” with the Necrolord and “Pelegos” from the Kyrian then please do not gimp Frost DK’s in the pre-patch by nerfing our core kit. PLEASE just do it right the first time and balance those soulbind abilities that are admittedly quite strong.

If this is to balance talents as some have assumed then I ask you this, no other class in the game has perfect balance between their final row of talents and after this change neither does Frost DK. This has forced the player base to a DW Breath of Sindragosa setup. Some people love that version of Frost Dk and there is nothing wrong with that.

But for some of us Breath of Sindragosa and DW are the VERY REASON we quit playing Frost Dk or quit playing this game altogether in Legion. For people like me who agree with that statement, Brath and DW are the antitheses of Frost Dk they are the destroyers of worlds.

If you continue your path with our spec of forcing players to play a certain way you will be alienating the passionate and oftentimes veteran audience that only wishes for one thing, 2-hand frost DK and for it to be competitive.

So I ask you to please, have mercy on us. We just want to enjoy your game, but you’re damaging the only reason that I and people like me even play it. Frost is our baby too and we just want to enjoy playing it and play it the way that we feel best represents us and for many of us, that means 2-hand Frost and staying as far away from Breath of Sindragosa as possible.

Thank you for reading. - Xodas

240 Likes
2

Honestly having it as a 1min cd syncs better with empower rune weapon as you can macro the 2 together now (no GCD) coupled with a burst spell (I am likely to run the 50% cd on frostwyrm and run it macroed together with erw and pof you do lose a few procs but the damage spike of having both cds active as you cast should still help).

This just opens up other play styles rather than all in on obliterate and haste stacking being our only option for damage

3

Seeing the nerfs just hurt my soul because frost dk wasn’t op at all and now is pretty bad over all. list everything said above is 100% true and needed and if the can’t fully revert it atleast remove the pof cd reduction and base obliterate dmg nerf reverted

43 Likes
4

I am really hoping Blizzard gets rid of these nerfs they just did or at the very least make them smaller. 2h frost was one of the main reasons I came back to the game for Shadowlands after the disaster of an xpac known as BfA. The absolute very least Blizzard could do is come and explain these insane nerfs in detail. None of this makes any sense when even just looking at the raw numbers.

35 Likes
5

Haste in Shadowlands isn’t our main stat as any DK Build, Mastery is. Haste is only for the pre-patch for 2-hand Frost Dk’s since Obliterate doesn’t scale with Mastery yet.

Frostwyrms Fury Lego isn’t even in the top 5 of performers for our spec not to mention Frostwyrms Fury currently hits for even less than a newly nerfed Obliterate on a 3 min cd. CDR isn’t going to fix that.

Empower Rune weapon gets reduced to a 1.48-sec cooldown at level 56 when you get rank 2 which made the 45-second version of Pillar of Frost to match with its cooldown almost perfectly but now you have to technically hold onto Empower Rune Weapon for 13 seconds in Shadowlands while you wait on Pillar of Frost to come off CD.

Macroing those abilities together is a recipe for disaster as you use your abilities at the wrong times and loose massive damage. Also, you would get rolled over in PvP and PvE since Frost DK damage regardless of spec rn revolves around setting up 5 Razorice stacks using Glacial Advance which takes about 45 seconds.

Before this change, you could Pillar of Frost alone and force CDs or do high dmg in PvP and PvE respectively and by the time you had your 5 stacks of Razorice. Pillar would be back up and you could go into a “full burst” where you pop everything and go for a kill.

This nerf affects our core kit and the source of over 40% of our damage. It doesn’t matter what build you run, what legos you wear, we are nerfed.

29 Likes
6

Totally has to be reversed. I’m NOT going to deal with another expansion stopped by the glass ceiling again. I’ve played since Vanilla, main Frost DK since Wrath, look it up Devs. I’ve been die hard since the long ago days of 2 handed frost glory. At one point we were top dogs and the game was fun. You’ve trashed our class since you removed 2 handed and I was so excited to FINALLY get a bit of that power and nostalgia back. Shame on you. Give us what we want, because I can’t deal with another expansion of mediocrity.

37 Likes
7

Obliterate is hitting like a noodle now, [Inexorable Assault] crits hit almost as hard as an obliterate. Every spec in the game has its gimmick for the most part, 2h frost doing big obliterates is its. DK and Ret are the only melee burst spec’s with no mortal strike effect and make up for it with high damage. Paladins have low mobility like DK but still have very high damage, if they nerf DK’s Obliterates and their burst window, what do they have left?

18 Likes
8

The funny thing is that on PTR my frost strike hits harder than obliterate . I assume 2h oblit play style was to far ahead of DW so it needed to take some kind of hit (rember you have to balance for 2 frost playstyles now) but the nerf does seem a bit excessive. Assuming pre-patch is going with the latest changes to the beta, I don’t think frost dks will be very happy this coming Tuesday.

2 Likes
9

I keep seeing people say that the new Frost nerfs are “intra-spec” balance intended to balance Obliteration with BoS.

This ignores a few things. First Obliterate was 40%+ of breath builds dmg too. This nerfed Breath and its consitent damage especially during Breaths long down time. Also Breath and Obliteration serve 2 separate purposes, one is high single target dmg the other is high AoE dmg. You can’t balance a potato and a tomato they are 2 separate entities with two different goals strengths and weaknesses.

If Obliterations AoE potential when paired with Frostscythe is the problem that directly competes in AoE with Breath and is beating it (which it was) then the solution is to nerf Frostscythe not Obliterate so that the Frostscythe build is on par with Breath of Sindragosa.

The “intra-spec” balance argument doesn’t stand up for a second.

17 Likes
10

Blizzard Cant get it right they never will. Ret Paladin, Spriest, Sub Rogue thats the 3 spec they need to nerf not Fdk… We have Poor surviability with Nerf Deathstrike the Only thing we had was dmg and now its gone. GGeasy Go Uh or Blood for Pve Or switch main. Because Blizzard wont get it right.

7 Likes
11

I was excited to main FDK for the first tier, but these are some really sad changes. The least they can do is communicate on them.

Pillar also didn’t need this heavy of a nerf. Increasing both the CD and decreasing the duration is just too massive.

6 Likes
12

To caveat - this is what those classes have come down to - and it’s not even fun to 1v1; you get berated if you decline a duel from them just because you know you will lose no matter what:

ROGUES - will do 30k of a chunk from damage to your health pool in one hit, and if they can’t do that, they DoT you up and then sap you until the next expansion in 2045 drops. They get the kill just from that alone.

PALADINS - are able to heal endlessly, with no remorse, and I understand that is the class fantasy. But to have infinite bubbles to avoid damage, ability to heal on a whim, and have high mobility is just insane. Let alone their damage output next to all of those tooltips.

SPRIESTS - will DoT you up, heal themselves, take no damage at all, and even mind control you for the whole duration of a fight. Where is the fun in that having someone else control your character during a duel while you watch your health wither from their DoTs?

Yet, FDK, has no mobility, barely any self sustain, A GUARANTEED BURST WINDOW FOR OTHERS TO SHUTDOWN, barely any utility such as a 20% baseline damage reduction that YOU have to stand in and get nuked on for it to have any benefit from casters that are far away and you can’t deal damage back to.

Do I think that a 25k Obliterate proc is overdone for classes that don’t have but 25,001 health? Absolutely. But having obliterate hit for 500 damage otherwise is absurd while we have nothing else to show for the class or might even had dead windows in the spec to do anything.

It’s not about balance at this point (okay maybe somewhat) it’s coming back down to playability of utility spells, while we get nerfed for BOTH damage and utility.

To be honest, this company hasn’t got a 4king clue about what they are doing right now and it shows via delaying the expansion.

Don’t get me wrong I can’t code for $h!t or balance things for the longevity of a game, but normally when it’s your job - you’re supposed to be somewhat efficient at it. Hence why I am paying for a monthly service.

Looks like Blizzard/Activision cleaned house and they have all new people still learning. Unacceptable.

Let frost be the slow @$$ glass cannon that it was designed to be. Blizzard wanted the spec to be RNG based with procs, let it stay that way, but also let it 4king RNG people when it decides. If you get hit for 100k once in a blue moon? Not sorry.

22 Likes
13

If these changes are kept we will need a ~10% overall damage increase to offset the losses. I would like the spec to be less reliant on obliterate for damage, but after these changes we have no damage at all.

1 Like
14

Blizz, you made me do it. You made me do something I hardly ever do and absolutely hate to do, and look at my post number and achievements…i’ve been here since month 3, vanilla. You made me come here and complain. I hate whiners myself, but this is justified. I loved playing Frost DK on the beta and I had plans to run about 5-10 m=/day for 3-4 weeks as a tank to get fast dungeons so I could gear up my FDK, one of my top 3 classes and I was planning to main for SL. I didn’t like the bos build, it just didn’t feel natural, but it would have been much funnier if we could have used it by turning around and blowing it out our asses (just a joke blizz, just inserting some humor here, no offense, just a joke), oh well. I cannot add any more to what was said above, but as fun as FDK is, getting destroyed by every other class in arena is not. I had such big plans for arenas this pac, but they are gone now. RIP. Praying you will at least make the class competitive. Xodas, thanks for all the hard work you do. I so respect you. You are an honorable gamer who knows his class.

27 Likes
15

You could just play unholy

16

You could just level to 120, since you are 111.

Same concept right? Speak on sh!t you can understand for the current issues for max level.

4 Likes
17

I have a max level dk but okay lmao

18

Blizz needs to differentiate between a talent over performing and an ability. The pillar nerf didn’t need to happen; if obliteration was the main issue why not change it, how? simple let’s look at the tooltip:

While Pillar of Frost is active, you next X Frost Strike , Glacial Advance and Howling Blast will grant Killing Machine and have a 30% chance to generate a Rune.

*where X is a number, 4/5/6 whatever works

or how about change how KM rank 2 affects obliterate perhaps reduce the % of phys damage that get’s converted into frost

3 Likes
19

I’m glad I joined the discord it’s pretty sad in the WoW forums.

5 Likes
20

I wholeheartedly agree with everything said here. I’ve played UH DK out of necessity for PVE/PVP on my main dk and was really looking forward to having frost be viable all around. Seeing this significant nerf is disappointing. They need to scrap it or reduce it.

3 Likes