Frost Blades

Frost Blades is a cold melee attack skill that strikes with increased range, then has the secondary effect of releasing projectiles from the struck enemies.

Skill functions and interactions

An attack with Frost Blades consists of two parts:

• An initial melee hit with the keywords Cold, Attack, Melee
• A projectile attack with the keywords Cold, Attack, Projectile

When an enemy is hit by this skill, multiple homing projectiles fly out from behind the enemy and target nearby enemies. This skill increases the melee range by an appreciable degree. Unlike Lightning Strike, if the initial attack does not hit an enemy, then no projectiles are released.

The projectiles have the same damage multiplier as the initial melee hit, with the same cold damage conversion. However the initial melee attack scales with melee damage modifiers (such as Melee Physical Damage), whereas the projectiles scale with projectile damage modifiers. Both components scale equally with (unspecified) attack, physical, and cold damage modifiers.

Multistrike uses the increased attack range of this skill when selecting targets to attack. Melee Splash does not release additional projectiles from secondary targets struck by the initial melee splash, nor does it splash the projectiles' damage. Faster Projectiles will increase the speed and effective range of the secondary projectiles. Physical Projectile Attack Damage scales all the damage of the projectiles, but not the initial melee attack: attack speed is NOT reduced since the attack animation itself is melee, rather than projectile.

Note: the tooltip DPS shows only the melee attack component damage and DPS. It does not show damage values for the projectile component. To calculate the projectile component, use the formula at the bottom of this page.

Gem level progression

Level			Damage Effectiveness	Attack Damage	# Projectiles	Range	increased Projectile Speed	Exp.	Total Exp.
1	1	0	110%	110%	N/A	N/A	N/A	0	0
2	2	0	116%	116%	N/A	N/A	N/A	70	70
3	4	16	122%	122%	N/A	N/A	N/A	308	378
4	7	22	128%	128%	N/A	N/A	N/A	1554	1932
5	11	31	134%	134%	N/A	N/A	N/A	6667	8599
6	16	41	140%	140%	N/A	N/A	N/A	26047	34646
7	20	50	146%	146%	N/A	N/A	N/A	49725	84371
8	24	58	152%	152%	N/A	N/A	N/A	95714	180085
9	28	67	158%	158%	N/A	N/A	N/A	169595	349680
10	32	75	164%	164%	N/A	N/A	N/A	283759	633439
11	36	83	171%	171%	N/A	N/A	N/A	453996	1087435
12	40	92	177%	177%	N/A	N/A	N/A	703128	1790563
13	44	100	183%	183%	N/A	N/A	N/A	1061223	2851786
14	48	109	189%	189%	N/A	N/A	N/A	2065870	4917656
15	52	117	195%	195%	N/A	N/A	N/A	2507110	7424766
16	56	125	201%	201%	N/A	N/A	N/A	5798936	13223702
17	60	134	207%	207%	N/A	N/A	N/A	15083919	28307621
18	64	142	213%	213%	N/A	N/A	N/A	27792735	56100356
19	67	148	219%	219%	N/A	N/A	N/A	43869739	99970095
20	70	155	225%	225%	N/A	N/A	N/A	242081556	342051651
21	72	159	231%	231%	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A
22	74	N/A	237%	237%	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A
23	76	N/A	243%	243%	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A
24	78	N/A	249%	249%	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A
25	80	N/A	255%	255%	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A
26	82	N/A	261%	261%	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A
27	84	N/A	267%	267%	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A
28	86	N/A	273%	273%	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A
29	88	N/A	279%	279%	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A
30	90	N/A	286%	286%	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A
31	91	N/A	289%	289%	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A
32	92	N/A	292%	292%	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A
33	93	N/A	295%	295%	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A
34	94	N/A	298%	298%	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A
35	95	N/A	301%	301%	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A
36	96	N/A	304%	304%	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A
37	97	N/A	307%	307%	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A
38	98	N/A	310%	310%	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A
39	99	N/A	313%	313%	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A
40	100	N/A	316%	316%	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A

Projectile Damage Calculation

To calculate the projectile damage (or DPS) given the melee tooltip damage (or DPS) use the following formula:

where:

• IAD = Sum of all % increased attack damage (not including either melee or projectile specific increased damage nor effects from Strength)
• IMD = Sum of all % increased melee damage (including effects from Strength)
• IPD = Sum of all % increased projectile damage (including effects from Strength if Iron Grip is applicable)
• MMD = individual % more/less melee damage modifiers
• MPD = individual % more/less projectile damage modifiers

All % values are expressed as decimal, e.g. 20% = 0.20. Reduced and less damage modifiers are expressed as negative values.

projectile_damage = tooltip_damage * (1.0 + IAD + IPD) / (1.0 + IAD + IMD) * (1.0 + MPD) / (1.0 + MMD)

If there are multiple more/less damage modifiers, then repeat the multiplicative terms (1.0 + MMD) and/or (1.0 + MPD) individually for each source.

Derivation

tooltip_damage_melee = base_damage * (1.0 + IAD + IMD) * (1.0 + MMD) (1) tooltip_damage_projectile = base_damage * (1.0 + IAD + IPD) * (1.0 + MPD) (2) Divide (2) with (1) to eliminate base_damage tooltip_damage_projectile / tooltip_damage_melee = (1.0 + IAD + IPD)/(1.0 + IAD + IMD) * (1.0 + MPD) / (1.0 + MMD) (3) In order to be accurate, IAD, IMD, and IPD must be calculated correctly, including any effects from Strength and Iron Grip if applicable. Note also that (3) is valid only individually for the physical or cold portions of the damage. In the presence of cold or elemental damage modifiers such as Fangs of Frost, Hatred or , then the physical and cold components must be calculated separately and then added together to determine the total damage amount, and multiplied by attack speed for total DPS.

Example

Tooltip_damage = [10, 20]  % increased physical damage from passives = 20%  % increased melee physical damage from passives = 60%  % increased melee physical damage from 90 Strength = 18% (Iron Grip is not taken)  % increased projectile damage from passives = 40% 30% more melee damage (from level 1 Melee Physical Damage) 30% more melee damage (from level 1 Melee Damage on Full Life) 35% more projectile damage (from level 6 Physical Projectile Attack Damage) 25% less projectile damage (from level 1 Lesser Multiple Projectiles) IAD = 0.2 IMD = 0.6 + 0.18 = 0.78 IPD = 0.4 MPD_1 = 1.35 (35% more) MPD_2 = 0.75 (25% less) MMD_1 = 1.3 (30% more) MMD_2 = 1.3 (30% more) projectile_damage = tooltip_damage * (1.0 + IAD + IPD) / (1.0 + IAD + IMD) * (MPD_1 * MPD_2) / (MMD_1 * MMD_2) = [10, 20] * (1.0 + 0.2 + 0.4) / (1.0 + 0.2 + 0.78) * (1.35 * 0.75)/(1.3 * 1.3) = [10, 20] * (1.6) / (1.98) * (1.0125) / (1.69) = [10, 20] * (0.4841) = [4.8, 9.6]

Threshold Jewel

The following threshold jewels augment the skill gem:

Item	Radius	Stats

Related helmet enchantments

The following helmet enchantments affect Frost Blades.

Note that helmet enchantments are no longer obtainable since version 3.23.0 and can only be obtained in permanent leagues as already enchanted items from before this patch.

Name		Labyrinth	Stats	Spawn Weighting
Enchantment Frost Blades Damage 1	66	Merciless Labyrinth	25% increased Frost Blades Damage	helmet 100
Enchantment Frost Blades Damage 2	75	Eternal Labyrinth	40% increased Frost Blades Damage	helmet 100
Enchantment Frost Blades Projectile Speed 1	66	Merciless Labyrinth	20% increased Frost Blades Projectile Speed	helmet 100
Enchantment Frost Blades Projectile Speed 2	75	Eternal Labyrinth	30% increased Frost Blades Projectile Speed	helmet 100

Version history

Version	Changes
2.6.0	Physical to Cold conversion increase to 60% (up from 40%).
2.4.0	15% more damage at gem level 20.
2.1.0	Attack skills that have their damage based on the wielded weapon have their mana costs fixed in place from level 1 onwards. Frost Blades has been improved from 2 additional projectiles at all levels to 4 additional projectiles at level 1 and 7 additional projectiles at level 20. It has also been increased from +14 weapon range at all levels to +18 weapon range at level 1 and +21 weapon range at level 20. It now gains 1% projectile speed per level after the first (19% at Level 20) and its base projectile speed has been increased by 25%.
2.0.0	Introduced to the game.