Well with the news that has been going around on the WoW news sites and blue's posts looks like we will be raiding Icecrown in the next couple weeks. Based on the recent update about how Blizzard will be staggering the releases of wings in Icecrown Citadel we should have plenty of time to be able to farm Emblems of Frost. The new Dungeon System will feature random instances and try to match players based on gear level. You will receive 2 Emblems of Frost by completing a random Heroic each day. There will also be weekly raid quests now that will award an additional 2 Emblems of Frost. With all of the raiding coming up in the final chapter of Lich King I think now is a good time to break down the stats on our Tier 10 vs. Tier 9 sets.
The first thing to mention is the upgrade ascetically. I mean come on the Tier 10 is awesome looking and it has a pair of shoulder that proc ghost stags. Let's take a look at the set pieces and see stat differences between the two sets. I will be comparing Tier 9 ilvl 232 vs. Tier 10 ilvl 251.
Tier 10 - Frost Witch Regalia
Frost Witch Gloves
Frost Witch Hauberk
Frost Witch Helm
Frost Witch Kilt
Frost Witch Shoulderpads
When you total up the stats on the Tier 10 set it looks like this:
5741 Armor
439 Intellect
439 Stamina
223 Haste Rating
143 Hit Rating
422 Critical Strike Rating
669 Spell Power
When you compare the two armor stats here are the differences:
+355 Armor
+107 Intellect
+107 Stamina
-35 Haste Rating
-69 Hit Rating
+233 Critical Strike Rating
+120 Spell Power
The first thing that sticks out to me is the huge gain in Critical Strike Rating. IS this a stealth buff to Elemental Shamans? Some may say crit is the weakest stat of the bunch with which I would agree since we have the ability to force crits with Flame Shock and Lava Burst. But when I thought about the fact I should crit more often in this set with Lightning Bolt, Chain Lightning, and Lightning Overload it has to be a buff to our DPS.
The second thing is the loss of Hit Rating which is a good thing in my opinion since most raiding shamans are way over hit capped. The loss of 35 haste rating is a surprise but with the changes to Elemental Mastery I don't think that it matters.
We gain 120 spell power. When you are able to outfit your shaman with ilvl 251 gear or higher you should have no problem hitting 3k spell power unbuffed. After looking at some of the rings, necks, and cloaks coming in Icecrown shamans shouldn't have a problem bringing in some nice dps numbers. There are some pretty decent upgrades in spell power coming on all of the gear.
With a couple of weeks until Icecrown Citadel it time to really scramble to fill in those last few pieces on the gear your wearing to be ready for 3.3 raiding.
