Arcane tree first

[Acousticferret]

Just wondering if it's good to go arcane for my first 11 points to get clear casting then go into frost tree?

[flowison]

yep it is

[Lazermon]

I would beeline for clearcasting, and when you have enough points to reach frost channeling, respec and go for that. After that, it's up to you whether you want the mana regen from the arcane tree or the survivability from the frost tree.

[prominer]

tbh i tried both arcane and frost and respec a few times and upon testing i figure lvling with arcane and doin single target is providing more survabillity than frost even with mana shield things are ok the only problem is u need to drink much but u really need that arcane nodes not only frost and not to many only a few particular ones especially if u are gonna try that aoe tactic which require a lot skill and good frost gear if u are newbie on that, the truth is that its not that easy at it may seems unfortunally

[ShaqPack]

Full frost while leveling is by far the best. You'll do way more damage with shatter combos then you will with arcane, plus survivability isn't an issue since mobs will rarely be able to reach you between stronger slows and quicker frost novas. Clear casting is nice, but that 10% chance is not predictable and it just doesn't add up to the advantages that frost gives. Pretty much with either tree it's going to take a good amount of levels before you really notice a big impact, like around lvl 30ish, but with frost it's very hard to actually die to things once you get things like ice block, ice barrier, even cold snap (because of the double frost nova's).

If you're just wanting to try something different, give it a shot, but everyone always ends up coming back to frost.

[Drain]

I don't think Clearcasting is of any real value until the higher levels. You want more points into either Fire or Frost. Frost Channeling btw makes far more sense than Clearcasting if all the spells you cast are Frost. The same can be said about Fire Power, Combustion, and Ice Barrier. Delaying these for 10 levels for Clearcasting, an unpredictable low proc chance, isn't logical to me.

The main problem is that it requires 10 points into Arcane, forcing you to waste 5 here first. If you could obtain it with 5 points instead of 10, not having to get worthless Arcane talents first, then you'd have more options. But even if it was top row, that just means 45+ instead of 50+ in my book. I still wouldn't take it over any of those other talents.