Back in Wrath, I was Blood/Blood - I had a Blood DPS spec and a Blood tank spec, back when that was possible. When Cataclysm came and established Blood firmly as the tanking spec and Frost as a DPS spec, I went with Frost as my DPS spec. (Ironically, when original conceived, Frost was going to be the tanking spec, the notion being that the Death Knight was protecting itself with layers of ice and going with that whole "implacable man" vibe, while Blood made sense as a dps spec that got a bit of self-healing as a flavorful bonus.)
Frost has gone through a few reimaginings over the years, though at its core, it has kept three core abilities: Obliterate, Howling Blast, and Frost Strike.
There was always a difficult balancing act, though, regarding dual-wielding. Death Knights, iconically, were known for their big, two-handed swords, like Frostmourne. But Blizzard wanted to at least allow Death Knights to dual-wield, as some people enjoy that aesthetic.
Thanks in large part to the talent Threat of Thessarian, Frost became the spec that was capable of dual-wielding, but for a while, they wanted to allow those who preferred two-handed weapons the option to do so in a dps spec that didn't require the pet-management of Unholy. Hence, Might of Mograine, a counterpart to Threat of Thessarian, was introduced for those who preferred the two-handed style.
Then came Legion. Legion, with its artifact weapons, needed to make some firm decisions about the sort of weapons that players would use. While Feral and Guardian Druids wound up dual-wielding (despite not being able to do that, generally) for Frost, they decided that making the spec dual-wield only solved a couple problems. Gameplay-wise, they no longer needed to balance the spec for two weapon loadouts. And flavor-wise, it allowed players to wield Frostmourne without having their souls sucked into the sword - the Blades of the Fallen Prince were made from the shards of Frostmourne, but were created in such a way that they no longer drank the souls of anyone who even touched the things.
And so, in Legion and BFA, Frost has been a dual-wield only spec.
I'll be honest, my biggest problem with that is one of aethetics. One-handed weapons just don't look as impressive to me (except perhaps Demon Hunters' massive Warglaives) and for a Death Knight in particular, given the kind of special relationship they develop with their weapons by carving runes into them, it seems kind of cheap in comparison (though I'll grant the sheathed-on-the-back new starting weapons for allied race/Pandaren DKs look pretty good.)
From an aesthetic point of view, I like two-handers, and I also like Frost as a spec that delivers massive, crushing blows rather than a barrage of smaller hits.
So I'm very happy to hear that Frost is going to be allowing two-handers again in Shadowlands.
With that issue solved, let's talk about another issue:
Breath of Sindragosa.
BoS is a talent that really transforms Frost as a spec. For those unfamiliar: it's a 2-minute cooldown ability. You start spraying out a cone of Frost damage that costs a certain amount of Runic Power every time it deals damage (about once a second.) It lasts as long as you have the RP to pay for it, ending when you don't have enough. So, a build that focuses on it will be all about maximizing the uptime of this ability, ensuring that Runic Power generation is as high as possible so that you can get this burst of frost damage.
It's actually a bit like Void Form for a Shadow Priest. But while a SPriest can re-enter Void Form as soon as they build up enough Insanity, DKs with this talent have to wait until the cooldown comes back, and are just doing a more basic rotation while waiting for it to come back.
This means bursts of major damage if you can maintain uptime on your target (Obliterating as often as possible to earn more RP,) but also a chance to have wasted it if you, say, start it off right before a phase in a fight where you have to run away from the boss.
I'm sure there are plenty of people who really like the talent. I don't.
The problem, however, as with a lot of talents, is that there tends to be a cycle in each expansion where Breath of Sindragosa builds become unquestionably the most powerful version of the Frost DK spec. Rather than letting players who like it take it and those who don't to ignore it, it tends to be that at certain gear levels, it's unfeasible, and then at others, it's the only real way to play the spec.
I, for one, have enjoyed a build using Icecap and three stacks of Frostwhelps Indignation (which does a sort of mini-Frostwyrm's Fury and buffs your Pillar of Frost for each target the frostwhelp hits,) which served me decently until I hit higher gear levels, at which point it falls far behind BoS builds.
Now, if the game were designed specifically for me, I'd just say get rid of Breath of Sindragosa and we'd all dance on its grave. But I recognize that, to many, Frost DKs wouldn't be the same without it (they might argue the spec is too boring without it, which I disagree with, given the complexities of playing an Icecap build effectively.)
I don't know how to fix the issue, but I'd love for Breath of Sindragosa to become a truly optional playstyle in Shadowlands.
Of course, given the trickiness of balancing between dual-wielders and two-handers, I'm sure that they'll have a lot on their hands to keep two playstyles within a single spec (among 36) on par with one another.
I don't know that Frost needs a full overhaul like Unholy got in Legion (though I will say I've found Unholy far, far more fun to play since the Legion rework) but I do think there's a question about what, exactly, the fantasy behind Frost is.
To my mind, Frost represents the kind of eternal aspect of the Death Knight. You could imagine someone finding the DK frozen in a glacier after thousands of years, and they're ready to fight right away. Remorseless Winter is a pretty cool aesthetic for them as well, the way that they're surrounded by a biting wind that freezes nearby foes. They're an elemental force on the battlefield. I also love the aesthetic of Frostscythe. Frost feels like it should embody the kind of callous relentlessness of a Death Knight, the grimness of these reapers.
Given that Unholy's damage sources are all divided between many elements - diseases, wounds, ghouls, armies of the dead, and potentially other pets, it becomes something more of a death-of-a-thousand-stings specs. By contrast, I think Frost should be one of cold, bone-shattering blows. Obliterate should hit like a freight train.
Granted, one reason it doesn't these days is that the damage is divided between two weapons. With two-handed Frost coming back, we might start to see massive Obliterate crits once again.
With Shadowlands, I'd really like to see Frost as the sort of Executioner spec for Death Knights - one that maybe needs a buildup - getting your Killing Machine proc, and maybe even building up a debuff via one of the many new runeforging runes - but then taking things out with a felling blow.
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