Hello, new to mage and still leveling. Working out where I want things on my bars in terms of priority.
I’m seeing essentially all frost mages take Ice Nova but I’m wondering when you would actually use it?
Shares DR with Frost Nova and Freeze, both of which last considerably longer. So you’d always use Freeze first. Is it mainly a case of not being any better talents to take?
I would use it to root enemies for a time. It helps if you use it and then do an aoe spell which makes enemies take more damage because they wouldn’t be able to move out of the aoe area. Unfortunately the rooting use to be longer.
So essentially only when Freeze is on cooldown? Perhaps I could make it the same button with a cast sequence.
I’m just saying what I do.
As a Frost Mage you can take Cone of Frost and use Ice Nova to AoE generate Freezing stacks and shatter them with Ice Lance. If you play Frostfire and take Comet Storm you can also use combo of Comet Storm → Ice Nova, where Ice Nova would both prevent enemies from leaving area of Comet Storm and triggered Meteor and generate 3 stacks of Freezing for each target that would be shattered by Comet Storm for bonus damage.
Not a single frost mage in the top 50 in blitz take that talent though, hence the question.
While you are leveling it is pretty decent, their builds are mostly optimized for endgame content where its value is low. So you could take and use it on remaining journey to 90 and then switch out.
Point of the question was for at max level where everyone takes Ice Nova but doesn’t take Cone of Frost.
At max level it is still used as a complementation for Freeze as ranged AoE root and a tool to keep enemies in Blizzard / Frozen Orb for longer. It is better to use it first since unlike Freeze it still does some damage and would not diminish following roots.
Freeze lasts 8 seconds. Ice Nova only lasts 2. If you cast Ice Nova first, the followup Freeze only lasts 4 seconds for a total of 6 seconds. Worse than just using Freeze on its own.
Both break on damage, so their actual duration within Blizzard / Frozen Orb would be 1 second and then they break both. So value from Ice Nova in such case is higher (it also does damage) and no - it does not reduce duration of following roots. It received that interaction several expansions ago where it harmed usage of other freeze effects, so now it does not affect them.
Just confirmed ingame, it doesn’t actually DR with Freeze or Frost Nova. Counter to what Google said. Thanks for the info!
Ice nova is amazing to cast on a warrior mid charge. I find pet freeze is better when you want to peel for yourself or when you know there isn’t enough damage to break the root because it lasts longer.
No need to worry about them lasting longer as Ice Nova is off the DR timer
I like using it when someone is running for a pillar to lock a ray on.