Saturday, April 21, 2012

Need a 4.1 Frost spec pve

i need help i am looking for a pve frost spec and how to reforge also
http://elitistjerks.com/f72/t121704-frost_dps_4_1_way_we_get/

Trying Blood Tanking - at 85?

Hey all!

My guild is trying to put together a second raid group, and we're a little full on melee dps, so I was thinking of maybe trying out for the tanking role. Problem is, I've never tanked on a Death Knight. I love my frosty here, but I was thinking that at the very least I should give DK tanking a shot before trying to beg my way into having a spot for this girl.

However, the fact that I'm already 85 is highly intimidating. I know many people at this level will be wanting to go into pugs (even normal) wanting a tank who knows what s/he is doing. Is it even worth attempting at this level? I already talented my way into the Blood spec, and I'm still kind of looking around for tanking gear that would be appropriate to start out with, but I'm not even sure if the agony of being THAT newbie tank would be worth it or not.

Would it be a better idea to make an alt DK on another server and try out tanking that way? But then, how many levels would I have to level before I have a good feel of lvl 85 tanking? If I have to get all the way to lvl 85, it seems like I should just dive in headfirst with trying this out, right?

Sigh. I don't know. I need some advice. Anybody else ever made the plunge at end game level?
It's not too hard. I recently taught myself how to tank, so here's a little info on how it's been for me. I tank full 359/372 DPS gear, which has probably the same avoidance as entry-level raid gear. Overall, I found it a lot more difficult than my paladin because we have to choose between survivability (death strike) and threat (blood boil, heart strike, etc). Paladins, however, have their mastery 100% of the time even if they're AFK. As a paladin, you'll be mitigating at almost your highest potential even when you're not pressing any buttons. As a DK, if you stop death striking you are dead.

A few tips I have that help me stay alive:
  • Threat does not matter. With DRW and the glyph (which I don't use but you should), you won't be losing aggro unless you just stand there not pressing buttons or your DPS is stupid.

  • Don't waste runes on heart strike. Your threat will be fine, and you'll want to stay alive. Death runes should go to death strike, frost and unholy should go to death strike, and blood should go to rune tap, then I guess heart strike, and then blood tap for more death runes for death strike.

  • Use cooldowns. I'm pretty sure you have more than every other class. "But what about emergencies!!!" you say? If you hit cooldowns, you won't have an emergency. In a heroic, if you're about to pull a big group without enough CC, hit IBF or DRW. If you're still taking heavy damage, hit another CD. You have so many it'd be stupid to not use them, and you'd die without them. VB, DRW, IBF, LB+DC, RD+DP, ERW, AMS, and to a lesser extend BT and RT, should be used on a regular basis. They're there, and if at the end of the fight you haven't pressed them then you've put unnecessary pressure on your healer.

  • Death strike as much as possible. Staying alive is all that matters. It's your job, do it well. Rune strike procs runic empowerment, which gives you more runes, which gives you more death strikes. Blood tap gives you more runes for more death strikes.

  • Put some effort into learning your class. I don't know everything about tanking, and even if I did I'd miss something. Gem and enchant all your gear, prioritizing mastery, etc. Gear isn't everything, but it matters more as a tank than it does for dps. The EJ thread might teach you a few things, but I'm pretty sure it's not as great as the dps ones. I find out just as much from the replies as I do from the original post, so you might want to check out those.


  • I'd definitely recommend learning to tank in regular dungeons, it's pretty simple when you get used to it. Just spamming death strike, as you've probably realized from my post.

    I'd be happy to answer any questions. It should not be hard tanking dungeons or heroics (when/if you have the gear), especially with the +15% healing and hp buff. Death strike double dips into that (if it's relying on the baseline hp portion), and with proper cooldown management and a knowledge of the fights it shouldn't be hard at all.
    Guides can only help but so much. Eventually you need to just go for it and try it out.

    I'd suggest going in normals and/or going with guild mates that will be patient as you learn. It's going to take some time to adjust to it initially, but then it gets significantly easier.

    Britney has given you some sound advice; try it out. Come back and let us know about any other problems after you do and we'll see what we can do.
    lulz tanking r hard.

    4.1 Frost with Unholy Presence?

    Well, after using unholy pre 4.1 and now using frost full time. My question is, do you all spend talent points in improved frost presence? I've heard, go in unholy presence while being spec'd frost. The reason why i'am asking this is because i was doing 2s with a Pally in my guild and he QQ'd and raged that i didn't spend points in improved frost presence and I was in unholy presence.
    No... god no especially not for PvP where Chillbains is a must. IFP is TERRIBLE if you're not in Frost Presence plain and simple.
    You want to be in UH Presence and you don't need Imp Frost Pres.

    ie. Tell the pally he is an idiot.

    And 10 seconds too slow :(
    Also, unless you find that you are being attacked often I would take points out of Blade Barrier and put them into Butchery & Scent of Blood. You don't really need the damage reduction for 2s especially because the other team will generally focus your healer (as that appears to be what you are running).

    Blood boil animation

    Who stole my awesome animation and left me with this crappy new one?

    Bring back my exploding blood sphere please!
    /signed

    no reason to make our blood boil look like the shout everyone else uses, it's not a shout...
    the animation from the last patch was awesome.
    Know the funny thing about the new animation of Blood Boil?

    Hammer of the Righteous does the exact same thing.
    they did it to fix the targeting bug :(
    The 4.0.1 Blood Boil animation was complete overkill. It had to be changed.
    insect swarm is overkill... 4.0.1 bb animation wasn't that bad.
    Just bring back the original animation from the early days
    Who stole my awesome animation and left me with this crappy new one?

    Bring back my exploding blood sphere please!


    yes please.
    I have to agree , this one is just...meh. Call it something else at least like dark wave or something. There doesnt seem to be any BLOOD in blood boil anymore.
    I would also like to add that the common animation and sound effects into certain skills wasn't really necessary.

    Rune Strike and Crusader Strike givin' off a Mangle sound is just terrible.
    seriously, give me a toned down version of the previous animation at the very least
    As cool as the graphic was, it did tend to get a bit annoying after a while due to it's visual obstruction.

    I'm guessing that's why they changed it.
    /signed

    The deathknights have spoken

    I MISS U BLOOD BOIL!
    Signed. /cry

    And why... Why is it yellow? Is boiled blood yellow?
    I felt pretty offended when I saw the shockwave instead of the huge blood sphere. Here's hoping they fix the bug and give it back.
    As cool as the graphic was, it did tend to get a bit annoying after a while due to it's visual obstruction.

    I'm guessing that's why they changed it.


    Visual obstruction? I cast it once every 30 seconds or so and it pops for a split second, and have you seen the aoe/eye candy/seizure-inducing orgy that casters do in ICC?

    Ours is(was) very humble by comparison.
    if blood boil was a "visual obstruction" .. what can ring of frost from mages, be called ?

    just youtube it ..
    Just bring back the original animation from the early days

    DK Rune bug

    No not the good one. I'm talking about the one where none of your spells recognize blood runes because when you switch specs from frost, the blood runes are still Death Runes. It's kinda annoying not being able to use Death Strike in situations.
    Yea this one is driving me nuts, even after I reloadui I still have issues.
    Yea.. I noticed this when I swapped specs for V&T, though if you just watch your runes themselves it's really not a problem.

    pillar of frost / cancel aura question

    Does glyphed pillar work if already under cc?
    bump this, NEED TO KNO!
    Go test it out?
    I'm not sure, I don't use the glyphed pillar. I rarely use the pillar at all.
    Go test it out?
    I'm not sure, I don't use the glyphed pillar. I rarely use the pillar at all.


    You really should use it every chance you get.

    As for the glyph question, I have no idea having never used it before.

    Frost 4.1

    Facerollol
    You do realize that Frost hasn't actually changed all that much right? The only reason anyone is saying anything is because all you FOTM rollers are playing Frost because of Blood of the North.
    its changed a lot more then you think! DKs are king of the hill now and will remain that way for quite some time, if you disagree with me then it shows how low of an iq you have and should just quit plyaing now cause you suck at this game kkthxbai
    we're still quite near the bottom in dps meters in pve lol

    Frost PvP

    I'm a little confused about how/when to Obliterate. I always try to Obliterate when KM is up and only FrS if all my runes are down, but do I Obliterate outside of that? or only on certain situations, like on cloth but not plate.
    Obliterate whenever you wanna hit like a truck? Anytime you have runes for it? Whenever you are in melee range? Its your hardest hitting attack, use it accordingly.
    i typically save obliterates for any armor value less than plate. you should be HBing any plate class and NSing accordingly.

    Getting rep with factions

    Trying to work on getting my reps exhalted. This has probably been asked before but are you able to do the low level quests to get exhalted in Stormwind? Do you get the full rep for that faction by? Just asking as i thought this might be the easiest way in doing so. wasnt sure if it was possible being a level 85.
    I found rep tabards to be faster and they worked while I was already farming for gear.

    Yes, you get the same rep at any level unless they have changed it since 4.0.

    Troll DK Question

    So... Da Voodoo Shuffle:

    http://www.wowhead.com/spell=58943

    Does this stack with On a Pale Horse (for frost pvp ofc)? If it does stack, is it worth it to take some points out of Rime for it since Frost is pretty susceptible to kiting?

    Thanks.
    I don't believe it stacks.

    Regardless, I'm almost certain that most dks take it for movement speed in BGs/world.
    Thanks for the response.

    Any other input before I decide to just bypass the talent?
    I'm pretty sure it stacks, but it won't help much. Snares are reapplied so frequently that it won't make much of a difference. What class do you plan on not being kited by? Mages and many other classes use roots, hunters use roots, permanent snares, and disengage...
    ^

    They stack, but snares in general are spammable, and so they are.
    Well, see, I hardly ever run into an issue with runes being on cd as frost with all the haste we have, so rime isn't very useful to me. So if OaPH stacks with Da Voodoo Shuffle, I'm thinking I might as well just put points into that instead to help with frost's lack of mobility.

    Thoughts?
    still thinking

    How long until...

    ... the changes to frost are reverted or changed again?

    Damage output is pretty nice in raids. I was unholy, made the switch, and won't go back unless something changes. Only thing I am missing is some expertise gear, so I had to reforge for expertise on all of my gear. Not really what I wanted to do, but yea.

    Just wondering who else made the switch and who agrees that it will probably get nerfed a bit?
    It's fine, only possible reason we will get hit with teh nerfbat is PvP hypebole.
    Why would you make this thread...
    ZA/ZG loot has plenty of expertise
    expect ninja hotfix nerfs that will make us crap again. dks doing well at anything is always short lived

    If i were to make a DK

    if i were to make a dk what spec should i choose
    I'd go Blood for leveling. Decent self heals so you can keep a good flow going with little to no downtime. Plus it's the tank spec so if you are in to that sort of thing, you can tank dungeons with insta-queue's. If not, dual spec and grab unholy to DPS them.
    ^
    I have a blood/unholy dual spec for levelling.....Blood is excellent for survivability and Unholy has good utility even at initial levels. I found frost too bursty at lower levels but haven't tried it since 4.1 buffs and with dark succour. Also with frost you dont get your main strike till around lvl69 (HB- the 31st talent point).
    I personally leveled as blood/unholy. Just now am i discovering the wonders of frost.

    Blood has the best survivability and the insta tank ques. Did group quests and such with it. I also used blood, when i first hit 80 and went to cata areas. Those starting mobs do hit hard with the initial gear you go into cata areas so blood shines there.

    Macro Help

    when 4.1 hit alot of my simple macros stopped working, such as these two.

    /cast Raise Dead
    /cast Death Pact

    I would just mash the macro to until my pet was sac'd. but now, it will cast raise dead but wont cast death pact on continued mashing.

    /cast Outbreak
    /cast Icy Touch

    This was my opener macro, and would cast outbreak when it was off cooldown, otherwise it would just cast icy touch. now all it does is cast outbreak when its off cooldown, but wont cast icy touch at all.

    These 2 are just an example, as i have multiple simple macros like these across my characters that have stopped working.

    How do i need to change macros such as these to get them working again?
    /castsequence [reset=60] Raise Dead, Death Pact

    /castsequence [reset=59] Outbreak, Icy Touch

    I don't know if the 2nd macro will actually continue to cast Icy Touch more than once, but if it doesn't, just add more Icy Touch's after the last one.
    ah i see, thank you.

    another question has struck me. does the macro reset 59 seconds after its pressed for the first time, or does it reset 59 seconds after it was last pressed.
    After it was last pressed, apparently.

    Try a smaller number and see how that works for you.

    edit: Alternatively, just use a modifier on the macro to cast one of the spells.
    ok, thanks.

    the way i have my keybinds set, kind of prevents me from using certain modifiers.

    1 2 3 4 5 q e r f
    Alt+1 Alt+2 Alt+3 Alt+4 Alt+5 Alt+q Alt+e Alt+r Alt+f
    Shift+1 Shift+2 Shift+3 Shift+4 Shift+5 Shift+q Shift+e Shift+r Shift+f
    AltShift+1 AltShift+2 AltShift+3 AltShift+4 AltShift+5 AltShift+q AltShift+e AltShift+r AltShift+f
    and CTRL is saved for pet abilities.

    so say i have an alt modifier macro on button 1, and i press alt+1 instead of the game pressing one and using the alt modifier in the macro, it presses my alt+1 key instead.

    but thats a personal issue i have.

    Thank you for the help.
    I ran into the same problem when trying to assign modifiers. The way I worked around this is try to make as many buttons as possible stay in the same spot (Death Grip for example was Shift+3). so I added an alt modifier and made shiftAlt+3 my focus death grip.

    don't forget about g by the way :P Another way to work around this is to just buy a naga :P I'm ordering one here soon

    What VP pieces to get for dw frost?

    After doing my final heroic for the week I'll be at 3080 VP and was wondering what pieces would be best to get?
    Thanks
    Trinket IMO, License to Slay is awesome.
    my first VP purchase was the tier 11 chest because i already had the legs from BH and i felt the 2pc would be the strongest upgrade.

    License to Slay tho is a very powerful trinket and is currently next on my to get list.
    First thing I got was my Tier 11 legs, everyone seemed to think working towards my 4set would be the biggest upgrade possible. Next on my list is going to be the gloves and then the trinket, followed by my chest (already have BoE chest, but saves on a drop)
    Another vote for Licence to Slay, its BiS right now for frost Dk's
    it's like 4th best in slot, but still. definitely the trinket first. only better ones are hurricane for DW and heroic heart of rage/heroic crushing weight.

    DK fastest possible flying?

    Will 310% flying stack w/ pale horse and the guild +10% mount speed bonus? And What %boost will the end result be?
    I think so.
    Nex is correct. Pale horse doesn't stack with other movement buffs, says so in the talent.
    whats the total end result speed though? 330% or 372%?
    100% (walking speed) + 310% (max flight speed) = 410% + 20% (OaPH) = 492%
    392% w/ on a pale horse if you have a 310 mount.
    It's 492%.
    most people don't add in 100% run speed since it's a given. you'll see 392 constantly posted everywhere as it's in terms of how much extra your mount is making you move.
    Press C and look at your "general" stats while flying and it shows your speed
    310%+Pale Horse= 492% which ties them with Paladins for the fastest thing in the skies of Azeroth.
    492% flight speed with on a pale horse. No other speed buff stacks with it.
    495%, just like paladins.

    Stealth nerf

    I don't mind it too much, but I'm absolutely positive that we have received a stealth nerf. Unless somehow my damage just magically dropped 2-3k with extra kings on...
    The only thing that bugs me is that it's not documented so I almost stayed this obsolete spec (no obliterate spec).
    there was no stealth nerf, your just imagining things.
    I really am sure they have, I've been playing this spec exactly the same for the passed week and I randomly take a 2-3k damage dive.
    I was agreeing that it was a bit powerful, and it definitely it toned down perfectly, I just wish it wasn't a secret.

    Or I could just be wrong and randomly my dps dropped exactly 3k for no reason at all and with CDs I have trouble breaking 11k (pvp spec).
    I don't know if it would account for this much, but it could quite possibly be caused by the changes to resilience ...
    You're trying to DPS in Frost Presence aren't you.....
    yep got 1800 in my gear with frost presence.
    Howling blast and frost strike truthfully feel like they are hitting lighter, but I'm probably wrong since I recently specced a little differently.

    Little help

    I dread to ask on the forums, but alas I will anyway. Ignore the reforges and such as I can always rework them, but I am trying to figure out which t11 piece to buy first. With what I have now, which do you think would be best to get first between the ones I can actually buy with valor?
    Get the chest first imo, with a little luck you can always get gloves and legs from BH to drop.

    Death Knight - Class Review

    Greetings, I recently moved to the US from Europe and therefore had to get a new WoW Account on the US realms due to lack of region transfers. After playing a druid and a shaman, for more than 5 years, I have decided I want to reroll.

    I'm sure you will all answer differently, but please refrain from telling me to test out each class before I go on, because as it is, you cant tell much about a class from the first levels.

    Now, on to the questions:

    1) Which spec do you play for PvP and which for PvE?
    2) Do you enjoy playing a dk?
    3) If you have any other class/specs that you enjoy more than playing your dk, which are they?
    1.) Frost for pvp and sometimes pve. I usually tank in pve though as blood obviously. I hate Unholy with a passion ever since I first tried it in the 60s on a random DK I made. I went frost on the next DK I made that I planned on seriously leveling and fell in love with it. but I like RNG sometimes ;)

    2.) I love playing my DK. people will say hero class, yadda yadda but once you get the hang of it you can achieve a high skill cap on a DK and manage cooldowns properly to victory.

    3.) I enjoy my shadow priest only because I was a shadow preist back in the day and I like to solo as ranged sometimes in tb/peninsula/bgs etc. Even pre 4.1 I loved my Frost DK more in arenas than my shadow priest and if you were to compare the ratings on them it'd be clear which one I favored. if i hadnt of been stupid and leveled a mage I'd probably play the mage a little more than the priest relatively verse the DK...but I would still play my DK the most.

    Hero class ftw. get some
    1. Frost/Frost (I used to play Blood when it was DPS, after the change I went permafrost).
    2.It's like sex but sexier.
    3. Ehhhhhhh...My Enh Shammy and Laser Chicken are alright.

    no 2h frost guide?

    can we get somone to make one? i love 2h frost but im a bit lost on the stat priorities :p

    or at the least could somone tell me them (my main being a hpally, for example, im avoiding mastery like the plague and dont know if i should or not)
    You mean like this guide: http://us.battle.net/wow/en/forum/topic/2353275843

    Request a sticky please. You're the second person I've found today looking for this.

    Both Blood Elfs too...wonder if it's a race thing. ;)
    its a i dont go past the first page thing >.> thanks :D
    You have a search bar, use it.

    Am I ready to tank heroics?!?!?!

    Common question on the forums, now let me explain. Just taking one glance at my armor, you will notice that the majority of the equipment is DPS and is reforged for my DPS spec stat weight. I recently took to tanking some 85 reglulars for easy JP to work on my tank offset. The regulars were so faceroll it wasnt even funny, but before I start tanking heroics with my current gear... I wanted to get the community's opinion whether or not I should even attempt the heroics without getting properly geared.
    All I can say is that I hope you never tank for me with that gear. At the very least you need to change your gems, enchant your gear, and reforge with tanking related stats.
    "Shudder"

    No, you need to do some serious work before you can really start tanking, and not just with your gear.

    The very first question you should ask yourself is whether or not you are serious about Blood tanking and want to be good at it. Blood's priority system is tricky to master and use optimally, and you'll need to devote a fair bit of time to really learning how Blood works.

    If you just wanted a quick queue time and a satchel of exotic mysteries, roll a protection paladin or a warrior, or better yet just stick with Unholy or Frost.

    That said, if you are serious about learning Blood's many tricks and abilities, the very first thing you need to do is read.

    http://elitistjerks.com/f72/t110102-blood_dk_endgame_tanking_4_x/

    That is a more-or-less complete guide to raid tanking in cataclysm, along with the 3rd post on the page. There is very little difference generally between tanking a heroic and tanking Bastion of Twilight, so you'll find much of the knowledge there translates pretty smoothly across different scenarios.

    Once you've read, and practiced a bit with Blood, you should be able to asnwer your own question of whether or not you are ready to tank heroics.

    You'll need to change your gems to use mastery, avoidance and stamina gems, not strength. Reforge for mastery unless you need to reforge for hit/expertise or to balance dodge and parry. Using the very best enchants will provide a small but noticeable difference.

    Your spec definitely isn't the very worst i've ever seen, but it's not optimal. If you aren't going to be tanking raids, you can get away with getting the Crimson Scourge talent for additional AoE threat. I would take one point out of Scent of Blood, both points out of Abomination's Might and put 2 points into Epidemic. Take those points out of unholy command, it's a useless talent, and either get lichborne or dump an extra point into Scent of Blood and get Crimson Scourge.
    Thanks for the advice!
    I have messed around with blood a few times, tanking regs for guildies looking for a fast queue. I am not completely sold on tanking, hence the DPS gear, str gems, lack of enchants, and extremely low avoidance. I love DKs and am familiar with blood and have a basic understanding of priorities and such. Eventually I would like to get a legitimate tank set and I will avoid putting people through the headache of having me tank heroics with my current set. I guess I just got ahead of myself after tanking regulars with no issues at all. Again, thank you for the help

    DK addons and rotation

    Hey all,
     
    I've recently decided to try out a DK and was looking around for some addon help. I currently have a ret paladin and one of the things I'm worried about is rotation. I understand that DKs have a priority system based based on runes and runic power. Are there any addons that could assist with rotation just to get me off the ground? I remember using an addon called clcret and clcinfo to assist me with my rotation when I first started out as ret. For those of you who don't know what the addon was, clcret would show which attack/spell should be hit next based on their priority. The addon was very useful and helped me grasp the priority system. It's been a long time since I've used it but I found it helpful in the beginning and was wondering if there was a similar addon for this class (frost DW to be specific). I have already picked up Runewatch. Any suggestion of mods would be great. Thanks.
    CLC DK should be good to get you going with the priority system. Tried it the other night and it does work on 4.1, and it mostly matched up with what you should be doing.

    http://wow.curse.com/downloads/wow-addons/details/clc-dk.aspx

    I was looking for something to track diseases and remind me to do Horn of Winter. CLC DK was overkill for me, I started playing with Tell Me When instead. Seems to be much more to my liking for tracking diseases and horn of winter.
    My favorite and at this point essential addon for DK to is DocDebugRunes. This addon will show you where you're current runes stand, which diseases you have up on your target and how much time is on them. Shows you stacks on your ghoul if Unholy and shows you your blood shield as well if in Blood spec.

    Can't live without it honestly
    When I checked the other night DocDebugRunes wasn't working on 4.1. Has it been updated now?
    DDR still doesn't work for me. :(
    Yury's Rune Display for Runes.

    I've set up Power Auras to warn me when I don't have both diseases up for either spec, and for when Pillar of Frost is up in Frost spec.

    Blood Shield Tracker for Blood.

    The rest are just raid-frames, DBM, and the like, Omen, MSBT, etc.

    I'm looking for something to display runic power nearer to the bottom center of my screen, but haven't quite found what I want.

    Other then that, the rotation is pretty simple. The WoW UI now tells you when Rime and Killing Machine proc, or Sudden Death and Dark Transformation. Just look up the base priority systems and practice them.
    If you're interested, we started a discussion about recommended addons for DKs over at SoaL:Effective Interfacing, Part II: GUI
    http://sonofalich.com/?p=971

    Any work needed on my Blood spec?

    Besides, you know, getting more Raid epics. I'm mainly wondering if I need any work in terms of gem/reforge/enchant (aside from my legs, unfortunately the Twilight Leg Armor on the AH is 200+ Gold, so I think it may be easier to just go get the mats and make one with a guildee). Anything to be just a little bit more efficient would always be nice.
    Personally I would remove a point from Epidemic and Scent of Blood, put those two points in Endless winter, if you need to interrupt for party/raid.
    Swap out Death Strike glyph for Death Coil. The weak amount of damage the DS glyph provides vs the extra healing you'll get out of Lichborne heals makes it worth while.

    Swap Glyph of Dark Succor for Anti-Magic Shell (the amount you use AMS in raids is massive, or it should be at least).

    Agree with Krisys suggestion on your talent points. Now that they FINALLY have Mind Freeze fixed you might find yourself put on boss interrupt duty a lot more.

    Legs, ring, bracers need to change expertise forged to mastery. Never forge away avoidance unless the piece is parry+dodge combo'd. Helm is an example of this.

    FYI you can forge the Porcelain Crab Dodge -> mastery if you want. I'd be working on your TB tokens for the Mirror of Broken Images as well.

    Update your runeforge to Swordshattering, current gear you should have enough HP for the content you are doing now.

    Legs have an STR gem that can be swapped out.

    Character Audit
    1 unenchanted item
    Jewelcrafting: 3 unused Dragon's Eye
    Still working on JC, so when it's maxed then I will look at using some of the JC only gems. I will look at changing things up to what is suggested otherwise and get that Leg Enchantment made with the cheap mats.
    Good info


    I see you're using the Agi ring.. that's genius and helps equalize dodge/parry rating. I really never thought about it. Would you recommend me replacing one of my rings with it? Probably the Umbriss, but I'll lose out on 40 mastery, I'll still be at 23.50 though.

    Oh damn.. I don't have my cloak on. But my mastery is about 23.80 with it on.
    You can replace your Umbriss Band with it.
    The agility works out to 76 dodge vs the 42 parry that the STR of your current ring provides.

    Then you can reforge the Haste (which I like better than hit anyways) to more dodge. And it's +34 stamina as well.

    Falsen's Ring is already stacked with two good stats so no 40% reforging 'loss' on that one. So I saved for the VP ring.

    Straight comparison(reforged):
    Umbriss - 42 parry, 34 dodge, 168 mastery. (244 total rating)
    Signet - 126 dodge, 127 mastery (253 total rating)

    So net result is 9 extra rating (before DR) points and 34 stamina. Personal I like the haste you get over the hit which is an added bonus.
    Agi ring info


    Good stuff, good stuff. Thanks for the analysis. Will replace tonight :)

    FROST DKS ARE OP

    go ahead if this wasn't already brought up somewhere else people say why frost is op and everyone else can show you why they aren't cause every patch a new spec for dks seem to become op when really your just bad
    love being unholy. We're actually getting some sympathy :p
    zomg and so is almost every other class.
    zomg frost actually gets buffed a bit and its OP? boomkins still rippin 30k dps in HC, we can ALMOST compete now

    edit: 0 pve content cleared on your DK and youre bringing up a topic on frost being op? /facepalm
    edit: look at my gear is it pve and i was bringing it up cause i know they arent dumbass

    Deleted by Kusari
    people were still complaining about unholy and blood being op pre 4.1 so.... i guess now everything is op?
    yea guess so lol even though that would mean they are even and people are just fail against dk
    IMO Blizz just fixed the class. Unholy DKs were just Blizzard's way of taking some of the downsiness out of huntards and spreading it around, because as we all know unholy DKs are just huntards that want to use a melee weapon (and I've been saying that since Wrath release). So now they simply stopped making it so damn easy mode for the special people among us.
    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nCQNqdjGzGM&feature=related


    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y_dBo6YzNRU&NR=1
    Hehe, I love dual wield frost. I hit 58th place on V&T for a few days until I got bumped downward. (Was 97th last time I checked, however I'm probably not on the top 200 world anymore.) As well as I filtered out any other class / spec other then a frost death knight.
    DKZ R A HERO CLASS THERE MENT TO BE OP LOL
    Cry sum moar
    I'm OP??? SWEET!!! Now I can beat anyone in a duel and kill pairs of healers? No....

    so back to the drawing board, i need to be more OP
    Idk about op but critting in bgs for 35k makes me feel very magey

    Priority List

    Hey everyone,

    I’ve been absent for a while and have come back to pick up my DK for PvP purposes. Having never played him at a serious level before, I could use some help. What is the spell priority for Unholy? Yes, I know that Frost is doing well right now but I want something more stable and not likely to be nerfed in the near future.

    I know it’s near impossible to give a rotation for PvP, but in what order should I be using my abilities? Normally it goes something like this: IT->PS->Necrotic Strike spam->Blood Strike->Death Coil.

    Also, where does Festering Strike fit into the equation? And when do I use Scourge Strike over Necrotic Strike and vice versa?

    Like I said, not necessarily a rotation but it’s what I end up doing when I enter a fight. Keep in mind, this is in the context of battlegrounds and not arenas. However, I could use some help there too.

    Thanks

    Bump
    Bump
    Use outbreak if you can (saves runes)

    Chains of Ice applies the disease, so in PvP is almost always used over Icy touch

    Festering strike is a primary DPS attack, also refreshing hte duration of your diseases and CoI

    Scourge Strike hit decently hard now, and should be used against classes that cannot cast, and
    have minimal self healing

    Regardless (as most classes can heal) you should try to keep the necrotic strike debuff up as much as possible, especially against casters (cast speed reduction)

    Death Strike to heal.

    Except for using Festering Strike for renewing diseases, should I use it for raw damage?
    When you have an extra frost+blood rune and you have no need to renew chains/diseases or pestilence diseases.

    Thursday, April 19, 2012

    Too much dodge?

    Little question for the pro DK tanks out there. I read that you want to keep your dodge and parry ratings near the same. What's the reason for this, and is it possible to have too much dodge?

    Thanks!
    I'm not entirely certain on the specifics but I'm almost sure it has to do with dodge and parry sharing a DR and it being more effective to have 13/13 dodge and parry rather than 17/11 dodge and parry.
    Little question for the pro DK tanks out there. I read that you want to keep your dodge and parry ratings near the same. What's the reason for this, and is it possible to have too much dodge?

    Thanks!


    Dodge and parry are on separate DRs that depend on the ratings. As you get a higher rating, it takes more and more rating to obtain the same 1% dodge/parry. If you have a much higher parry rating than dodge rating, 1 point of parry rating gives you less mitigation than 1 point of dodge rating, so it would be better to reforge out of parry and into dodge. To minimize the DR effect while maximizing mitigation, you want to keep them equal because it minimizes the individual DRs.

    You also need to account for agility in your dodge rating DR, since it contributes without showing up as dodge rating. Raid buffed, you're going to want ~300 more parry rating than dodge rating to account for this. Unbuffed, it sort of just depends.

    edit: as a note, Swordshattering doesn't affect the DR curve because it doesn't give you any ratings.
    Dodge and parry are on separate DRs that depend on the ratings. If you have a much higher parry rating than dodge rating, 1 point of parry rating gives you less mitigation than 1 point of dodge rating, so it would be better to reforge out of parry and into dodge. To minimize the DR effect while maximizing mitigation, you want to keep them equal because it minimizes the individual DRs.

    You also need to account for agility in your dodge rating DR, since it contributes without showing up as dodge rating. Raid buffed, you're going to want ~300 more parry rating than dodge rating to account for this. Unbuffed, it sort of just depends.


    Excellent explanation, thank you.

    Best PvP Talent Tree for Death Knights?

    Also if your able to post what would be the best talent build would be great :)
    bump...
    For what bgs? 2s? 3s? be more specific.

    It's dependent on comp, play style, and scenario.
    I'd say 2H frost, puts out a lot of damage and your large crits can catch people of guard. Or you can get a nice crit to finish them
    For what bgs? 2s? 3s? be more specific.

    It's dependent on comp, play style, and scenario.
    Oh mainly for bgs and 1v1 so 2h frost? That's what I see mostly these days :P
    BG- Frost IMO
    for 1v1 go UH

    Too much haste? Mastery needs <3 too?

    Hey guys!

    I am currently sitting at 2191 haste rating 78.55%(+17.11%), but my mastery is only at 22%, a rating of 563(3.17%). Since haste is multiplicative, or so I've read, at what point would it be a good idea to slow down on the haste and maybe beef up mastery a bit? Or at this point in time with the level of gear currently out do we not have to worry about it yet and just keep getting as much haste as possible? And btw my spec is 2H Frost. Thanks :D
    Pretty sure at this gear level we can't have to much haste. If your gear has haste on it already then reforge the secondary stat to mastery as long as you can stay hit/exp capped but otherwise haste is our best stat. More swings = more procs

    Making a Fraps video, need shiny new UI

    Here's the current abomination:

    http://img809.imageshack.us/f/editedui.jpg/

    I have XPerl downloaded but not running, I have used it briefly in the past. I need to work on the center, getting health, runes, and enemy cast bars all towards the center.

    Also, I want a rune regeneration thing similar to the Blizzard UI one with the rotating circles. That works for me. But not as big and maybe transparent?

    I'm also going to make a (hopefully viral) video so it needs to look purty.

    Malksten

    P.S. Does focusing your UI at the center cause more intense staring? One of the nice things about a poor UI is you have to look all over the screen.

    Loooking all over the screen is a bad thing. Allow me to show you my UI, the UI of gods:
    http://oi52.tinypic.com/5pipvm.jpg
    I also need to do some more reading; is the info in the sticky about not keeping Blood Plague or Scarlet Fever or whatever up true? I pictured a boss doing WAY more damage without that debuff than from one Death Strike per minute.

    My gemming and reforging is probably sub-optimal as well; they're so 2010.


    Loooking all over the screen is a bad thing. Allow me to show you my UI, the UI of gods:
    http://oi52.tinypic.com/5pipvm.jpg
    a thneed is a thing most everyone needs!
    I also need to do some more reading; is the info in the sticky about not keeping Blood Plague or Scarlet Fever or whatever up true? I pictured a boss doing WAY more damage without that debuff than from one Death Strike per minute.

    My gemming and reforging is probably sub-optimal as well; they're so 2010.


    Multiple classes have the 10% damage debuff, and it's FAR easier for someone else in the raid to put up the debuff. It's all situational -- if there's a Paladin, Warrior, or Druid tank then they should be doing it, otherwise you will need to (and if you're tanking something by yourself).
    Loooking all over the screen is a bad thing. Allow me to show you my UI, the UI of gods:
    http://oi52.tinypic.com/5pipvm.jpg

    Counterintuitive.

    frost pvp hand of doom or resilient infection

    45/45

    so which is the better secondary to go down? from an RBG point of view, cant stand arenas...
    HoD imo.
    2's descration 3's hand of doom
    he said he can't stand arenas.

    hand of doom. if you're rolling as frost get it. just....do it. and use it often. if you get good at catching casts you glyph strang and rock the 7 seconds. I personally run the 2 sec glyph because if I'm gonna spec for HoD I might as well make it that much more worth it.
    he said he can't stand arenas.

    hand of doom. if you're rolling as frost get it. just....do it. and use it often. if you get good at catching casts you glyph strang and rock the 7 seconds. I personally run the 2 sec glyph because if I'm gonna spec for HoD I might as well make it that much more worth it.

    AMS glyph, DS glyph, and HC glyph are superior.
    Catching someone mid-cast w/o getting juked can be a hassle and then it feels like a waste - plus you're usually just using it as a blanket over another cc, so there's not going to be a cast to "cast" it on.
    All depends on your preferred play style.

    Desecration offers more movement control, Hand of Doom offers more versus healers and casters.

    Both have their place, and if you hate Arena... I suggest you give them both a good testing to find out what suites you.

    Goodluck!

    PvP guide to gearing/enchanting/gemmingUnholy

    Anybody got one?

    Soloing group quests while leveling

    I'm currently leveling as 2H frost. I wanted to make a blood off spec to solo the group quests. Can anyone point me to a spec to do this? How different is the rotation? If anybody know where I can find this information, I'd appreciate it. Thanks.
    Put points where you think it would most benefit you. Rotation: Spam death strike. And Heart Strike. Heal yourself and junk.

    If you're leveling, none of this really matters.

    If it does matter to you...go check out Elitist Jerks.
    Put points into talents which look like they will increase survivability.

    Its pretty self-explanatory, really.

    The only difference is that you won't have RS as a RP dump until pretty late into wrath, so you'll just spam death coil (or let rp cap like i did, lol)

    So for you its drop dnd, diseases, pestilence, death strike spam, plus heart strike.
    Profit! Nothing can pull off you until cata anyway.

    Also, runic empowerment, lol.

    Other than that, necrotic strike isn't something you'll use much in tanking, dark sim is lol. I can't even remember what we get at 83.. ohyea outbreak..

    Rotate your cooldowns and it'll be fine.

    Frost DW for PvP vicious wep question

    hmmmmm, i want to shift from 2H frost to dual wield for PvP however Im stuck between choosing these two vicious one handers:

    Vicious Gladiator's Hacker
    Binds when picked up
    One-Hand Axe
    841 - 1563 Damage Speed 2.60
    (462.3 damage per second)
    +146 Strength
    +219 Stamina
    Durability 105 / 105
    Requires Level 85
    Item Level 359
    Equip: Increases your critical strike rating by 97 (0.54% @ L85).
    Equip: Increases your resilience rating by 97 (???% @ L85).



    and

    Vicious Gladiator's Slicer
    Binds when picked up
    One-Hand Sword
    961 - 1443 Damage Speed 2.60
    (462.3 damage per second)
    +146 Strength
    +219 Stamina
    Durability 105 / 105
    Requires Level 85
    Item Level 359
    Equip: Increases your critical strike rating by 97 (0.54% @ L85).
    Equip: Increases your resilience rating by 97 (???% @ L85).


    Well the axe has more max damage and lesser min damage than that of the sword. Any pros and cons with this damagewise? (ignore the appearance, the slicer wins hands down, lolz).
    100 dmg difference? People ungeared have over 60k health, 100 min or max damage makes absolutely no change what so ever. Pick one you like the looks of, since you're not a race that as any weapon bonuses. People will tell you dw for pvp anyway is a no-no, because dw's power comes from beating on things, and few people will stand there for you in pvp. :P

    DW v 2H Frost PvP?

    I have had these 1h wpns since January and have not really touched this guy for a few months. My question is whether DW is better for frost PvP or 2H?
    I'm not worrying about PvE so dps isnt the issue, more so about burst and general upkeep(pressure) on an opponent.
    I will have enough conquest to get the 2h next week if I should replace my DW, but if not I can spend the pts on gear. Thanks in advance for your input.
    The straight-forward answer is that 2H performs better.

    The differences are as follows:

    2H: Harder NS hits, More RP generation = More Frost Strikes = More Runic Empowerment Procs = More Resources, Higher base weapon stats.

    DW: Harder hits with damn near every other skill, More melee white hits = more Killing Machine Procs, Room for a 2nd Runeforge/Enchant.

    2H has more resources, DW has more burst.

    2H tends to perform better and is the de-facto choice for most Frost DKs.

    Personally, I prefer DW, it has an irregular feel to it which I love and I perform fine.

    If you want more pressure you'd be better off rolling Unholy as that is the pressure spec.

    But if you insist on Frost, 2H will have more pressure due to increased resources, DW has harder hitting skills but it's uptime is a bit lackluster.
    I promise you - it's far better to go dual wield Blood.
    Cross my heart.
    2h Frost is just...

    Too well rounded, to be quite honest. 2h, for PvP, is a definite must (or at the very least a strong leaning).

    Ask yourself this, first, however: do you wish you had more RP for frost strike, or do you wish you had more burst?

    Therein awaits your answer.
    I promise you - it's far better to go dual wield Blood.
    Cross my heart.


    Die in a fire.
    The straight-forward answer is that 2H performs better.

    The differences are as follows:

    2H: Harder NS hits, More RP generation = More Frost Strikes = More Runic Empowerment Procs = More Resources, Higher base weapon stats.

    DW: Harder hits with damn near every other skill, More melee white hits = more Killing Machine Procs, Room for a 2nd Runeforge/Enchant.

    .


    Totally agree with this, damage wise DW would outperform 2H due to more KM procs and having Razorice as main hand runeforge will add 10% frost damage to your attacks when stacked on the enemy 5 times. Howling blast also takes advantage of this "razorice debuff" and thus does more damage and will be particularly useful if you are being kited.

    2H however has more consistency with runic power and thus has more froststrikes but lesser RNG and minus the 10% razorice debuff. 2H is less conquest heavy that DW too. Personally I like dual wield better due to the burst aspec.
    ahh yeah i think both are very nice .. have my 2h in the bank while uses these zgsweps and i see myself topping bgs like i did with 2 hander .so much pressure in duel wield cause white hits ..faster nec strikes and rune burst ..love to see them run
    Blizz has built frost into more of a 2h necesity for pvp. It takes less points to get the good stuff, and we have enough left over to get reduced dg -and- go deep enough into blood to dig out some goodies as well. DW frost takes too many points, and overall damage is lost because dw is based on the target not moving so you can wail on it, where 2h you wail on hit when you catch up to it or pin it rather than over time.

    1hder drop rate in new heroics?

    Whats the drop rate like? I was thinking of buying 2 of the boe epics from em, but meh, i'm going to be bankrupt soon from boe epix for my hunter so.. do they drop often?

    On another note: the jp shoulders are fugly omg i can't stand them and the boe epic shoulders are too expensive :(

    Can't find a raid on weekends too :(
    dunno about the BoE mace thingie, but i got the sword on the first go :V /luckyduck

    also the one hander tank sword dropped on my second attempt...dunno if you were talking about that o.o; hope nooooot
    any sword would be an upgrade over my current one..

    I think its the 1hder from Ho0 :P
    heroic DM drops a bunch of really good onehanders for frost; i was at one point in time rocking all of them XD...still have smite's reaver on my offhand :3 awesome itemizatiooooon
    I saw 2 in the ZG run last night (mace and something else I think). I already have 359 weapons though so we sharded them =P I just wanted the tanking neck.

    Question about Blood...

    I know blood is not a viable spec for arena, but I like to use it in random BG's. Surviving is fun for me.

    Anyway, my question is this...expertise, is it worth capping? Will a blood PvP benefit from expertise or should I reforge any that I have to a better stat? right now my gear gives me 17 expertise and the cap is 20. ( I think) I am hit capped, my rune regeneration is below 8 seconds, my mastery is at 10.something, and I am gemmed for strength. the only thing i can think of is reforging expertise to haste, should I reforge crit to haste as well?
    Deleted by Tkdpunkk
    You can cap Expertise all day if you like. You'll still hit things like a 5 year old girl in a slap fight. You'll live for a long time running around doing piddle until all your buddies are dead and the other team all murder your face at the same time.
    Generally requires a lot more to expertise cap in PvP than PvE so it's not worth it.
    There's no reason for expertise because it'll only be useful in a small fraction of your fights. Also blood doesn't really have that much survivability anymore because blood shield no longer works in unholy/frost presence.

    Edit:
    http://us.battle.net/wow/en/forum/topic/2325682727

    Looks like he and his partner went frost.
    The blood spec or at least blood combo is dead for Arena.

    I use to win about 60-70% of with a blood DK combo. We were at 1,740 in rating not great, but climbing everyweek since we started recently. This week, we are like 4W-17L since that stupid patch!

    Thank you Blizzard for an other happy customer!
    I am sure everyone is upset that the most boring, annoying two's comp in arena is now dead. We all enjoyed the 30 minute games and will miss them
    The only place blood is nice in is BG's where you carry a flag. It's amazing.

    Edit:
    <a href="http://us.battle.net/wow/en/forum/topic/2325682727">http://us.battle.net/wow/en/forum/topic/2325682727</a>

    Looks like he and his partner went frost.


    Not necessarily. Just means they both logged out in frost spec. They both still sport a pvp blood spec

    How about that Tier12?

    Godzilla vs Mothra was my favorite Godzilla movie.

    Path of Frost Nef Encounter Bug

    My raid started reliable Nef attempts 3 weeks ago, and our first two weeks we experienced a weird problem where Onyxia would randomly turn and shadowflame the raid, even though nobody was close to the tank on threat. I'd been using PoF to negate the initial fall damage, but last night a pug told us that path had been causing weird issues with this encounter. I stopped using it, and we didn't experience the bug at all last night.

    Anyone else seen this? Just thought it would be useful to know, as glyphed path is somewhat useful for the start of the fight.
    Levitate would cause Nef to turn around and punch people to death. Best just not to use that kind of stuff.
    We did have a priest using Lev as well, so maybe it wasn't completely my fault for wiping us 30 seconds into the fight multiple times...
    this is a known issue. as far as i know, it is still bugged to do that. so dont worry about the little fall damage, its too bad it does this crazy thing.
    Any sort of character height alteration mechanic (PoF. Levitate) will cause issues on platform fights. Because the platform you fight on moves up and down it creates glotches when anyone uses those skills. i still get griefed about causing wipes for the first 3 nights of heroic progression...
    Wouldn't PoF break on damage anyways?

    I'm not sure how you're managing to make it to the first flame breath without taking any damage.
    Wouldn't PoF break on damage anyways?

    I'm not sure how you're managing to make it to the first flame breath without taking any damage.

    He's frost/unholy, so he wouldnt be tanking Ony.
    Wouldn't PoF break on damage anyways?

    I'm not sure how you're managing to make it to the first flame breath without taking any damage.

    He's frost/unholy, so he wouldnt be tanking Ony.


    Yeah....I didn't look at the armory >_>

    Why are Warriors posting on this thread?

    I actually wish i had the same DPS as the FOTM arms warrior for PVE when it comes to 2h dps. Are most of them retarded or something?
    Oh look, I can post on my Warrior even though I usually post on my DK here. Whoops.
    Loggin on mah warrior postin in yur forumz

    Rate Me!

    Alright, I think I can handle you guys =)

    Would you guys kind enough to go over my gear, spec, enchants, and such? Is there any gear I should look for? Changes I should make? Anything that will boost dps? Just lookin' for some constructive feedback.


    Thanks in advance!
    To many things wrong to even begin. Go read the Frost guide / EJ for your spec, enchant your stuff, and buy the rest of your glyph's.... Then come back
    4 empty glyph slots
    7 unenchanted items
    3 missing tinkers
    Gemmed wrong
    Glyphed wrong
    Speced wrong
    Geared wrong

    Are you even trying?
    hrm , while yall are rating folks check me out see If ive got anything wrong..
    I don't think going for Blood Tap is worth it at all, your much better off with epidemic to delay needing to Plague Strike. Our death runes are free now after all.

    Try Reforginator or askmrrobot for your reforging. I bet it can get you much closer to your hit/expertise soft caps freeing up points for other goodies. Since your at almost 8.50% hit now.
    Blood Tap is just fine. Get an addon to show your timers on diseases and you're set. Hit PS just as your Blood Plague is running out and you're good. Epidemic is only good if you're not that great at watching your timers or it's a heavy movement fight.

    On movement fights, epidemic may outperform since you might not be in range to get a PS off in time, thus losing some DPS on the boss.

    I didn't bother looking at your Armory, but if the above is right, you've got some research to do.

    Best leveling spec currently?

    I just got back into WoW and was wondering if the smart thing would be to go to unholy for leveling, or stay blood. Thanks,
    idk, i just started my dk and blood seems to be epic, you can tank PvE perfectly. i never go below half health unless im attacked by 2 elites
    Doesn't matter as a dk so long as you have the DS glyph.
    I leveled with frost & it seemed quick for leveling.
    what is a DS glyph anyway deathstrike?

    For questing I found myself a bit squishy as frost against multiple mobs and I got tired of stopping to eat / bandage. My gearset for questing is my dps set + tank 2h'er with blood tree & presence active. Practically invincible & still good damage. Plus it's fun taking on a town-full of mobs at once.

    Your honest thoughts...

    I will have enough VPs for my next teir purchase today. What should I get? Trinket, ring, boots, cloak?
    Your feedback is welcomed.
    Trinket, always trinket. Only other option would be another piece of tier gear to get a set bonus.

    Deathrunes hate me

    So its like this. when all my runes turn into deathrunes i get a "Not enough runes" error message..........that's strange...i thought deathrunes could be used as blood,frost or Uh WTFHBRO so its like how do i fix that or am i one of 80 billion death knights that cant use deathrunes for anything......


    Four out of Five voices in my head agree.

    hmm, i'll give it a try thx
    thanks, i was wondering if this was a bug or not during instance runs.
    Ya, i got something similar when i changed from frost to blood, both blood runes stayed as death runes. plus with death strike i had only death runes, quite nice but only happened once.

    best dps?

    Im a blood dk atm but i want a dps class because all my other toons are dps. Tanking's fun but i shouldnt have started tanking with a DK. Ive heard UH UH UH! and FROST FROST FROST! so which is better?

    p.s. burst dmg seems alot better since there is ATON of diseases
    Frost is better by a huge margin.
    If you're all about burst damage, 2H frost is the way to go.
    isnt UH using pets like ghouls and such?
    Frost is the best DPS spec since 4.1 came out.

    Help with Stats

    hey people just wondering if anyone could help me with my stats, i think i should be pulling much higher numbers than i currently am. Thanks =D
    3% hit? that'd do it.
    Character Audit
    3 empty glyph slots
    7 unenchanted items

    The points in Morbidity are also wasted.
    Missing all 3 Major Glyphs, Unenchanted items, a ilvl346 cloak itemized for PvE may give better results if you can get your hands on one, spec isn't too bad, not sure why the morbidity as much, but that's a personal choice and minor.
    yeah i was gonna have my guild enchanter throw some enchants on me today hopefully. what should i put the 2 extra points into?
    HIT.
    CAP.

    find it.

    8%.

    Hit > Exp.
    should i do 5% or 8% cause ive heard people do both
    le sigh. l2readyourtalents.

    Nerves of Cold Steel

    Increases your chance to hit with one-handed melee weapons by 3% and increases the damage done by your off-hand weapon by 25%.

    5% + 3% is 8%. imma do you a favor. dont go anywhere. brb.
    http://wowreforge.com/US/Demon%20Soul/Lvingdeadgrl

    enter the following stat weights:
    Hit 1.76
    Expertise 1.18
    Haste 1.23
    Mastery 1.11
    Crit 1.07

    click 'optimize'

    this will get you at hit and exp cap, and get your crap together for you.

    enjoy.
    awesome, thank you very much, ill try this out and let you guys know how it goes =D

    Maybe it's my rotation

    I feel like I'm sucking so much as a DK. I hate when I get out DPS'd by a warrior with !#*@tier gear than me. My iLvl is 356 and I'm almost full T11 working on my BIS DW Frost gear. Feel free it inspect my gear and reforging. Shouldn't I be pulling more than 11-14k DPS single target?
    You're doing something wrong. Unholy with 100% pvp gear and pve hit cap is pulling roughly 19k.

    (On the other side my warrior with identical pvp gear is doing 21k :)

    Depend's on fight most of the time.
    I'd recommend 2h frost. It's way easier. I played DW Frost for a bit and couldn't stand how sluggish and out of control my abilities were. 2h you have a lot more control. I call it faceroll but other people get mad. Works good for me /shrug

    And I recommend not getting Glyph of Pillar of Frost
    @Finalrequiem I'm playing frost
    @Britneyfears Doesn't my proc rate go down if I'm 2h'ing?
    @Draugr I just need 4 more pieces
    I'm pulling 15k single target and I'm 10 ilvls under you...not sure what I can say outside of asking about your rotation;
    I love dw frost, yea I pull like 19k-22k on single target not much moving. Moving I'm down to 16-18k. Heart of solace won't drop for me tho.
    I used askmrrobot.com to reforge my gear unless you guys got a better site?

    1-=
    Frost Strike, Icy Touch, Plague Strike, Pestilence, Obliterate, Blood Strike, Howling Blast, Horn of Winter, Icebound Fortitude Impatience of youth trinket, anti magic shell and raise ally
    Have they updated to show DW haste>other seceondary stats (except hit/exp to cap)?

    And I don't understand your second statment. Blood strike should never ever never ever ever ever EVER be used now.


    DOn't need to Icy touch also. Outbreak, and HB procs will take care of Frost Fever, and you just have to PS twice or once (depends if you go an IBT spec or Epidemic spec).
    Deleted by Zerôshik
    Have they updated to show DW haste>other seceondary stats (except hit/exp to cap)?

    And I don't understand your second statment. Blood strike should never ever never ever ever ever EVER be used now.



    I've only been playing since august and sadly I still don't fully understand my DK. I'm not sure about stat priorities I've tried EJ but the stuff on there just confuses me.

    Whats your rotation? Along with any addons you use? How do you go about reforging your gear?
    Whats your rotation? Along with any addons you use? How do you go about reforging your gear?


    Addons I just use Shadowed Unit frames, Dominos for bars, I mean nothing really specific to DK's (i use about 75 addons but besides Blood Shield Tracker non are DK specific, and I use alot of built in Blizz things for procs/SCT).

    Reforging i go hit to cap, exp to cap, reforge crit first to haste, then mastery to haste. Put all STR gems in you slots (unless it's a 1 gem or 2 gem with 1 red and the bonus is 20 str, then do like 20 str/20hit or w/e). If your DW, razorice on MH, fallen crusader OH, 2h Fallen crusader.

    Priority (single target):
    Diseases
    Oblit (Esp use this on KM procs)
    Frost Strike (esp if RP capped or very near cap)
    Rime Procs
    Horn of Winter if all Runes are down and no RP for FS

    Also, if you are eng or have an on use STR trinket:
    /use 10 (this is glvoes I believe for eng)
    /cast Pillar of Frost

    then burst.

    Also, I use the gun/big daddy's with Eng, that I put into rotation with no RP/Runes up.

    You bring 10% attackspeed to a group. Nothing a warrior can give you as a buff will even come close to the damage increase you'll give him just for being near what he's whacking on. Some classes do the buffing, some classes take the buffing. You're comparing apples and oranges.


    I've only been playing since august and sadly I still don't fully understand my DK. I'm not sure about stat priorities I've tried EJ but the stuff on there just confuses me.


    I jsut headed to askmrrobot, and looked at stat weights for Frost DW DK's, looks like they have made haste highest secondary stat except hit, they do have it over expertise, but not sure I agree with that personally, but Math prolly proves me wrong i'm sure. I might try then what they recommend when I can log into wow and log out in my dps gear.

    Also your like me have the BH trinket. Been running Lost City to try and get Heart of Solace, which with the haste and STR proc > BH trinket.

    Your hit is way low, you need to be near 8%, little over or under is fine. Expertise cap is 26,

    Also you running in unholy pres, if so Imp Frost Pres is useless. Also, if you have a hard time PS'ing right when BP is dropping off, you might want to try epidemic. Becuase, BP is up 21 seconds, Outbreak is 1 min CD, so you Outbreak, PS at 20, PS at 40, Outbreak, it's a tight timer, whereas Imp Empidemic gives you a bit of breather to only PS once, then outbreak, plus you have like 3 second coushin.
    Is ther a site specifically for dk's other than this? Where can I find th caps at and is there a better way to reforge?
    You have a tanking cloak, drop that. And I guess armory doesn't show the 3% you get from Talents for DW. So your at 7.25% you want to be closer then that, you want to try to be like 7.85-8.15 but closer to 8 is better. You can try askmrrobot and see what it says.
    It's going to be a while until I get the vp to get a new cloak
    But thanks alot for the info I'll reread it later on any other tips please let me know and if it's possible a screenshot of your UI
    There is a cloak dps in za. And yea i can post a UI, most people say I have too much going on. I also use an 8 button mouse. TBH I recommend this for any dps class. I can bind my bombs, gun, gloves/pillar, PS allto my mouse. So my finger only worry about strafing, Oblit/Frost Strike, Outbreak mainly.
    You said you can bind guns and bombs? As a DK? And I don't have a gaming mouse I want to get a Naga eventually but I'll stick to my laptop keys. Also I'm not too experienced with keybindings.

    Runeforging Question

    I normally play DW frost, and have for some time. I got a greed roll on a decent 2h weapon from heroics, and was going to try out 2H for a while. So, with a 2H weapon, do you runeforge Razorice or Fallen Crusader?

    Also, any advice on gear, enchants, etc. would be welcome. I am beginning to run heroics with people in my guild so I can learn the fights before I use the random dungeon finder. I don't want to be the guy who wipes a group because there was something I didn't know or ask about, as I realize that people are invested in runs as much as I am, and everyone's time is valuable. If you would, please let me know where I need to make adjustments. Thanks in advance!
    EJ states to forge it to Fallen Crusader, as strength has more of a stat weight than frost vulnerability. That said, I say it's a matter of preference, and in some situations, Razorice can be good, and I think if you have a frost mage, they benefit from the debuff. Don't quote me on that though.

    But for the most part, FC runeforge is currently the way to go.
    For 2H frost you want to go Fallen Crusader.

    Your spec will obviously need to change if you go 2h. You need Might of the Frozen Wastes instead of Threat of Thassarian. Also, what presence do you DPS in? It should be Unholy, and I find it odd you didn't pick Improved Frost Presence as it benefits Unholy Presence as well. I would get rid of Icy Reach and put those points in Imp Frost Presence. I also took one point from RPM and put two points into Endless Winter for the free Mind Freeze. Kind of personal preference, but an extra 10 RP doesn't matter much in the grand scheme of things as you'll rarely be RP capped if you're doing it right.

    For gems go all strength, you don't need any of the socket bonuses you have on any gear and the pure strength gem outweighs those bonuses by a wide margin. Otherwise it looks good. Make sure you're hit capped/expertise capped and you'll be just fine.
    Thanks for the info. I respeced my off to be 2H, so I an switch back and forth until I get decide if I like one more than the other. I have other characters I tank with, so tanking as a DK doesn't really interest me at this point in time. The reason I left 2 points in IR for my DW spec, is that there are fights where I have found that that extra 10 yards allows me to AoE from a distance without being in the fire so to speak. Person preference on my part. I figure if I can still deal damage without taking any or as much, then my healers stay happy.

    Since 4.1, I reforged for haste when I can, mastery when I can't. I run in UH presence for both 2h and DW. The gems, I know, but there are not alot of the +40 str gems for sale on my server lately. They go quick, for upwards of 300g per. I will replace them when more become available.

    I appreciate the advice.

    A question about DPS and My gear

    So I have two sets of gear, one for PVP and one for PVE, as well as individual specs for each set of gear ( I do not yet own a PVP weapon however, only 346 heroic weapon)

    Today I got curious and switched to my PVE spec, and supplimented my PVP gear with PVE gear to fill in the caps (hit, exp) and went to do my rotation on a target dummy. I came out with 12k dps

    then I put on every piece of PVE(Almost all 346, couple 359) gear I own and did the same thing, and I came out with 12k dps.

    Whats going on here?
    Is my PVE set just terribly itemized?
    Or Does the strength bonuses from the high ilvl of the pvp gear making up for some of the secondary stat loss?
    DPS on a target dummy doesn't mean anything. The lack of raid buffs and debuffs, as well as the fact that patience limits your ability to whack the dummy for a statistically significant amount of time means any claims based on target dummy testing are worthless.
    Thats why I didn't want to go ahead and do this in a PVE environment, it just striked me as a little odd

    Need a macro expert

    With the new DK B-rez making some unhappy for rezzing (targets coming back with 20% only to die again because the healers weren't paying attention), I'm looking for anyone that knows how to work macros to help me out with something along the lines of:

    *target dead player*
    /y Rezzing *dead player's name*-heal em up
    /cast Raise Ally

    Maybe throw in an option for using a potion/bandage on them or something (if it's possible/logical--never tried using potions on someone else, but I know that bandages work).

    Thanks in advance. <3
    Are you targeting the dead person first and then using the macro?
    /cast [target=mouseover] Raise Ally
    /y Rezzing %t - heal em up
    Most likely. I tend to stay away from using mouseover commands with important stuff, considering I'm usually on the move in the middle of a fight.
    /cast [target=mouseover] Raise Ally
    /y Rezzing %t - heal em up


    Cool! So considering I posted that I don't use mouseover commands right as you posted that, would I just delete the "=mouseover" portion and leave it as /cast [Target] Raise Ally?
    /y Rezzing %t - heal em up
    /castsequence reset=10 Raise Dead, Dense Embersilk Bandage

    You can't make it automatically bandage them for 2 reasons:

    1. They have to accept the rez first.
    2. Raise Dead uses the GCD.
    Don't even need the Target modifier if there's no special parameters.
    Ahhh that makes sense. Just wondered if there was anything I could possibly do in the way of "preventative" healing in case the heals aren't paying attention (sadly happens more than I care to admit...). Thanks all. <3
    Woops, made a typo in my macro.

    Fixed, now.
    /use [@target,help,dead]Raise Ally;[@target,help,nodead]Name of bandage here

    Cheers.
    addon

    RSA - Raeli's Spell Announcer
    http://wow.curse.com/downloads/wow-addons/details/rsa.aspx

    you can configure it to send different chat messages to different channels when you perform an ability

    you just set it to yell or raid and or whisper and bam.

    4.1 for DKs

    http://i53.tinypic.com/2nq7juq.jpg
    Your watch is missing a few hours.

    Is unholy PvP dead?

    Since the release of 4.1 I've been playing desecration frost spec and recently opened my unholy spec back again for 2's. I found that even with ghoul and better diseases it neither seems to have better control than frost or the amount of pressure and really the only pros to unholy that I can see for the time being is DA, perma ghoul, and gargoyle. My rotation I use for Unholy would be Outbreak>CoI> D&D> FS> Death coil dump>necrotic when it comes up> FS. and then gargoyle and dark transformation when available. If anyone could point out what I'm doing wrong or affirm Frost has just become the most viable PvP spec for a dk for the time being would be very appreciated

    pvp blood spec

    I was asked by my guild to get a blood spec to carry flags on rbg's, i'm looking for a good spec and a guide. I tried to search but i had no luck through the gazzilion posts out there.


    Blood makes for an excellent FC, or excellent node defense.

    In Arena, it's quite a bit more limited. Your best chance of success in Arena is to pair off with another prot spec.

    Or roll Frost and enjoy the power we currently possess.

    Edit: Because without support, in Arena, you will be kited/CCed and ignored.
    Blood is easier to kill. For flag carrying you'd be better off going frost or using a different class.
    yeah i know, i'm only playing blood when doing rated bg's so i can carry the flags.
    I doubt it's good for flag carrying anymore. Blood shield was nerfed, and so were flag carriers. You'll get destroyed and will have no way to get away.

    Blood Plague

    Is it necessary to keep it up outside of Outbreak as Frost? or should Death/Unholy be used for Obliterates and Necrotics?
    Deleted by Derpenstein
    if you're going to use obliterate at all, the modifier on having both diseases up is significant.

    Since you mention necrotic strike, I assume you're talking about pvp. Read the other recent thread about no longer using obliterate. I think it is possible to rely on howling blast, necrotic strike, and frost strike and be successful in pvp.

    In PvE however, not at all. And again, if you're going to use obliterate at all, pvp or pve, you really need to have both diseases up.
    It is just 1 UH rune every 30 seconds. For 12.5% stronger obliterates for that whole time (which is quite a few obliterates in 30 seconds) It's too much of a DPS loss to not use it. You are going to have to face the fact that you are going to be using runes on things other than obliterate. Always keep diseases up and use pillar of frost every time it's off CD.

    looking to get into tanking

    so hows dk tanking?

    ive been pvp since 85 but im wanting to start tanking but i only have about 7 pieces of tank gear atm the rest is pvp gear would that be enough tos tart tanking reg dungeons to finish gearing up?

    what should i do? i did all the q's in the 84-85 areas so im really locked to JP gear and dungeon drops, i just dotn know if i have what it takes yet

    Wednesday, April 18, 2012

    DK tanking help.

    Hey guys I'm going to start tanking on this DK's and get him up to 85 but I was wondering if someone could give me some starting tips and rotations and things that I should know. I have researched myself and looked at sources but I find a few of them confusing and was wondering If I could get some clarification please.

    I'm not new to tanking as I had a prot pally and warrior but I just find DK's so foreign.
    You don't really need to do anything specific pre-80.

    Death Strike when you need the healing, Heart Strike otherwise. Put up diseases if the mobs are actually going to live for a bit. DnD for AoE threat. Use cooldowns often, even on trash mobs.

    When you hit 85, you'll be using Death Strike far more often than Heart Strike because you'll need that extra healing and mastery.

    When you plan to tank raids, I'd advise reading this, as it becomes quite relevant:

    http://us.battle.net/wow/en/forum/topic/2416208246

    Am I doing this right?

    Ok I have not really played my DK mostly back in the days of ToC days but Now I have hit 85 ~2 Days ago. I did BH 10 Man last night and am pulling 16-17k DPS. Now my question is Is my unholy spec and my dps actually a bad or a "normal" thing. They have changed DKs alot so I am out of the game but if anyone can comment or say something on my gear or spec or any CONSTRUCTIVE criticism please let me know. (also I know I am not hit caped by like 1%)
    16k to 17k is a good average to have dont worry u are doing fine
    awesome thanks very much.

    Dear Blizzard - Please Fix the Rune Bug

    Blizzard,

    I am not writing this because I want to lash out but I feel that more needs to be said. I have sent reports to GM's and I have viewed the bug forums and hotfix lists. I have been playing this game since vanilla and while there have been some bugs that have annoyed me but this is the first time I've found one that made for a truly terrible game experience.

    It is most notable when I'm tanking, which is my preferred spec and role. My runes do not regenerate correctly and do not display correctly either. Tanking has become a huge, tedious game of whack-a-mole trying to hit my abilities and hope that I have the right kind of rune off cooldown because they don't refresh or display correctly. For a class that requires you to monitor the status of your runes at every moment to prioritize and plan your next move, this makes it almost impossible to tank effectively.

    So please Blizzard - let me sleep soundly tonight knowing that this is being resolved. It does not do you, or those of us who play as death knights, well to have the class crippled like this.

    DK Pet Macro [Bug]

    #showtooltip Gnaw
    /cast Gnaw
    /cast Leap
    /petattack

    It won't Leap unless you Gnaw first, and vice versa. I was dueling a warrior spamming this macro for a stun and I realized my pet wouldn't Gnaw unless I Leaped first. So I changed the macro, but now I can't Leap unless I Gnaw first.
    I noticed this too. I had to dissolve this macro and simply create a key for leap and a key for gnaw. Unfortunate.
    Ya i just tried this and i am not too pleased with how Blizzard bugged this type of macro so leap and gnaw can't work as one button. I got enough buttons and macro's to worry about. I don't need another button to click where there isn't any room on the keyboard or wow mouse.

    Frost PvP Help

    Hey everyone I need some frost PvP help. I have been Unholy ever since I started my DK. So basically I have no idea how to play a frost DK.
    Do we just dot them up and spam obliterate and frost strike when we are capped with runic power?
    I spammed necrotic strike as an unholy DK. As a frost DK do we still do that or save the unholy rune for obliterate?
    Attribute priority
    Hit Cap > Spell Pen > STR > Crit > Mastery> Haste?

    You dont need crit as frost.You get free crits all the time.Mastery over crit.As frost you should be in unholy pres most of the time + all the haste from your tree.No haste on gear all mastery for burst.
    Hey everyone I need some frost PvP help. I have been Unholy ever since I started my DK. So basically I have no idea how to play a frost DK.
    Do we just dot them up and spam obliterate and frost strike when we are capped with runic power?
    I spammed necrotic strike as an unholy DK. As a frost DK do we still do that or save the unholy rune for obliterate?
    Attribute priority
    Hit Cap > Spell Pen > STR > Crit > Mastery> Haste?


    You need help on playing a frost dk in pvp? dun know if srs...?
    I have yet to find a post on Frost PVP with good information. Maybe someone might have a good site somewhere out there.
    Spam obliterate, you can't wrong with that.

    Ghoul Pet bar is grayed out

    So, I respeced into unholy and the Ghoul pet bar is grayed out and everything I've tried has failed. Deleting good old 3 folders bliz always tell you to delete didnt work. Took off all addons and still didnt work. Even deleting and reinstalling WoW all together didnt work.

    The funny thing is when I log on to my hunter and mage, which are on the same server, I can use those pet bars just find. It only happens on my DK.

    Any ideas?


    queue up for a BG and die.
    that's one solution i've seen mentioned, but i've never had the problem, so can't say if it works.

    queue up for a BG and die.
    that's one solution i've seen mentioned, but i've never had the problem, so can't say if it works.

    this worked for me when i switched to unholy while leveling
    it seems using death pact works too
    build up some RP on a training dummy and sack the little bugger :D

    Edit: wow did not see how old this was... goes to show blizz repeats their mistakes

    Frost - 2H or DW for PVP?

    I noticed dual wielding has like a 20% miss chance for white attacks, is that a big deal? I play with the Swordshattering rune because I can't stand being disarmed for 8 seconds, being able to death strike while my healer is CC'd has saved my life countless times. With DW I could have the disarm rune and the fallen crusader rune, I imagine the 15% strength buff is pretty powerful. Also, I think I remember Killing Machine only works with one of your weapons, is that still true? Dual wielding would also require 3 talent points taken from some other useful talent.

    I need help deciding which weapon type is better.
    Also, which rune would be best paired with disarm on the other weapon?

    And if I wanted to use two dps runes which would be best?

    Would Cinderglacier or Razorice be better than Fallen Crusader?
    I am also very interested in the answer to this. I want to be effective in Frost PvP, but I also like variety. If I 2h blood, I'd prefer to dual frost. But effectiveness comes first.
    Basically, I'd like to know:

    2H or DW
    Presence to use for above
    What runes to use on the weapon(s)

    I've been reading it's still 2H + Unholy Pres + Fallen Crusader, but a lot of those posts are 4.0.6.
    I DW in RBGs and don't notice much of a difference except I don't generate as much runic power, which can be a problem.
    What you have read still remains true with 2H+unholy pres+fallen crusader. DW will have high damage white hits...but 2H pans out to be better for pressure and overall damage in a pvp setting due to greater runic regen. Also, more talents are left free with a 2H setup in order to go for 1 min strangulate cooldowns (for ticking healers off) OR desecration (for ticking EVERYONE off). Whereas the 1H spec pretty much requires 6 points in the frost tree that 2H does not.

    I am not the expert on DW frost but have been playing frost 2H in pvp since before it was cool. Right now the obliterate crits are off the charts and fun to watch.
    Disarm really sucks for 2H frost...but that is a good time to use chains and kite if you did not prepare beforehand with a swap to a swordshattering wep.

    4 piece bonus (dps)

    i have yet to acquire 4 tier pieces... can anyone give me a estimate on how much dps increase it is ? also should i drop 2 372 items to acquire it?
    I was wondering this as well, was it worth to drop my HM Pauldrons of the Great Ettin to get my 4pc with t11 shoulders.
    If it was only ONE piece of HM gear I would say it's worth a shot, but the stat increase of the 372 pieces may outweigh the 4 piece tier bonus. I'm at work right now and don't have EJ open, but I think it MIGHT show what the percentage of each tier bonus.
    It's good, I think it amounts to a 1-2% dps increase alone. OP, I don't think it would be worth it to drop two pieces of 372 gear just for the 4 set.
    One more thing, I recently acquired quite a few new pieces of gear (HM Chest, Gloves, Legs) and also Battleplate of Ancient Kings So I was wondering if with my new gear if that chest and Pauldrons of the Great Ettin are still outwayed by 4pc DPS.

    Trying to find a trustworthy resource.

    I wanted to check and see if I was doing anything wrong, so I went to the tank sticky in this section..and I saw Hand of Doom recommended for the 5 man spec, when in the past I was told this was a PvP talent that was largely useless for tanking.

    Everywhere I go, I see different information and very few "conclusive" topics about DK tanking.


    I'm not getting into raids anytime soon, but I don't want to optimize purely for 5 mans, as I'm considering raiding and would rather be "raid ready" gear-wise.


    I thought I would just go to EJ, but their guide states that I should not reforge for mastery if I need to reforge for hit and expertise, which I find every other forum stating that threat should not be reforged for and everything should go to either mastery or avoidance(or both).


    How do you guys approach this? Do you just take everything from the EJ thread? From this forum? From MMO-Champ guide? From Pwnwear.com?

    All of these sites just give contradicting information, should I assume that the various specs are all okay and that there is no cookie cutter?

    I mean look at my spec, it's meant for aoe tanking, but supposedly having 2/2 crimson scourge is actually bad due to blood barrier issues.

    I reforged according to MMO-champ, which like nearly every other guide, states that going BOTH avoidance and mastery is not okay, but going for one is.

    Yet the reforging recommendations are as such


    Item has Avoidance and threat: Reforge threat to mastery
    Item has 2 avoidance stats: Reforge higher-rating one to mastery
    Item has Avoidance+Mastery: Reforge avoidance to the one with lower rating if possible.

    The problem occurs when I went to mrrobot and I realized that I can gain way, way more mastery by reforging the avoidance into mastery on a avoidance+threat item.


    Again, I do mosty 5 mans, but would like to stay raid-ready at least.

    For this, I can spec and glyph according to 5 mans and switch when it's raid time because that's easy, but I would like to keep all gear optimized for raids(shouldn't really be different actually.)

    What is the right route to go in regards to Hand of Doom, Crimson Scourge, and this whole Reforging thing?

    Are threat stats so useless that I should reforge them to mastery even if I can get more mastery by reforging the avoidance? Doesn't that contradict the idea of not going for both mastery and avoidance?


    Glyph of Resilient Grip

    Anyone else having situations where it doesnt do its job?
    For example, Tank in Tol Barad. I was just running around farming herbs when I accidentally pulled him so I ran up on top of that rock in front of where Captain P. Harris is on the sunken ship. While up there I still had aggro but obviously he cant leave the water. So I tried death gripping him up and it said Immune. Then I remembered how if you're on the rock, he will be immune to all attacks after the initial attack. So I figured he might be immune due to that. But when I went in the water and tried to death grip him, it still said immune and the cd did not reset. I tried it multiple times on tank and it never resets because hes immune.
    had similar issues with that, but i believe death grip also makes the target focus on just you for 2-3 seconds. I think the Immune comes from that part.

    i could be horribly wrong tho.
    It does cause high threat. In the spell tooltip it says "forcing the enemy to attack the death knight for 3sec." which is where the threat comes from. I just dont like how the glyph says it will reset the cd if the target is immune and it actually doesnt reset it on certain mobs. It should be all mobs.

    So I Tried Frost (4.1)

    Al-tho critting under geared clothies for 50k Obliverates is fun, I find this spec to be interesting to say the least. Any word on arenas above 2500 playing this spec? I find that reforging mastery, spamming necrostrike, HB, and froststrike dump is actually pretty good. Not including the 1 min CD on Strangulate, its very nice for chopping healers. When i'm being focused it's difficult to keep up tho. If I need to go defensive its fairly easy with succor because of those death runes.. I can get in 1 extra death strike with blood tap easily. I don't like not having a pet stun, but I can deal I guess. Since they nerfed the macros and I have to bind leap and gnaw its really annoying. I wanna hear everyone else's thoughts...
    I switched to Frost after the buff and saw marked improvement, could just be that I'm bad and Frost is easier to play but meh.

    BTW, if you like NS/FS spec you should look into an oblitless spec.

    ZG neck vs 359 choices

    Since the ZG leg discussion turned out so amusing, figured this one should too

    Amulet of Protection = Ironstar Amulet & Rage of Ages

    The str/stam difference is negligible (10/16 points) and the total dodge/mastery you get on the other two is really hurt by having to reforge for mastery/dodge. The heavy amount of dodge becomes a lot less attractive if you are a mastery DK since you will only get a forged amount from it.

    Just pondering, sure seems like a neck and neck race between them (hah I made a punny!)
    Perhaps you could get lucky and get a 359 Necklace from Al'Akir that gives Dodge & Mastery to act as a direct upgrade from the Amulet of Protection.
    While that would be awesome, the odds of seeing that item are so slim that I wouldn't really consider them when planning to gear or raiding.

    I actually deffered the Ironstar to our other tank so he could upgrade his blue. Just pondering if I should even bother grabbing either of the BWD drops at all (maybe if it's just going to be sharded? lol)

    Just a few tank questions

    Ok yes I know there's about 100 of these im sorry. Main question is i feel like its hard for a healer to keep me alive and im now at 154k unbuffed. I'm not sure if im gemming and forgeing right. I think I am but I may be wrong so I came here for help. i have almost 14% in each dodge-perry and about 106% mastery. But my hit is crap cause i read some where that we didnt really need it? Seemed wrong at the time but i went with it. Please I am really asking for help not smart butt answers. Thanks =)
    I'm not sure if im gemming and forgeing right.


    Gem and forge for avoidance. There is (almost) no reason to use pure stamina gems or enchants (unless perhaps you are doing heroic raids)

    But my hit is crap cause i read some where that we didnt really need it?


    Hit is not needed except for threat. If you feel your ability to hold threat is fine, then you don't need more hit. If you miss with Death Strike you dont lose the runes so you can try again and the time wasted is trivial.

    The only caveat is Heart Strike. If you hit 1 target and miss 2, you will lose the rune and your multi target threat will be bad. I advise more slightly more hit if you are having trouble tanking multiple targets (heroics, trash) rather than single targets (raids).

    For the most part your gear seems okay except for a slight bias towards stamina. You want to maximize avoidance and mastery and avoidance socket bonuses.

    Besides gear, always think about mitigating damage. This means using Death Strike as much as possible. As your gear gets better (str), your DS shields will prevent more and more damage. Use Anti-Magic Shield and Icebound Fortitude when the time is right, and rather than using Bone Shield every cooldown, save it for when enemies use their most damaging abilities.

    Hope this helps. glhf


    edit: DEFINITELY switch your weapon runeforge to Swordshattering asap. your healers will thank you.
    Rune of swordshattering expertise to parry
    Put a +40 mastery gem in your relic
    Head put a parry/mastery gem instead of parry/stam
    Dodge to parry on your neck
    +40 mastery gem in your shoulders dodge to mastery
    Stam/mastery in your chest +75 stam chant
    Bracers +50 dodge chant expertise to mastery
    Hands stam/matery gem +65 mastery chant
    Mastery/stam +40 mastery dodge to parry on your belt
    Parry/mastery mastery/stam on your legs
    +40 mastery +35 mastery minor movement on boots
    Dodge to mastery on earthquake trink
    Remember that you are not trying to match the % dodge/parry, the DR's come from the stat numbers not the %.
    Use your cd's wisely, vamp blood is good to use any time you're in a healing intense phase, especially glyphed.

    Edit: I logged in pvp gear, obviously, but yeah. Do that and profit. Also, I wouldn't worry too much about abom's might. Most raids someone else will bring the buff anyway, but keep it if you raid with the same ppl and they need the buff. Put those points into lengthening your diseases in the unholy tree, which can improve your survivability because of the longer debuff up-time.

    This is what happens when you're bored at work, btw. I normally won't critique someones gear like that. I hope you're not offended by that.
    I think you are gemming and enchanting wrong. Always go for mastery over all other stats. Stacking stamina will just make your healers angry. With mastery you basically heal yourself and save your healers mana. You will be a sponge for heals if you stack stamina. I am around 150 health or so and never have a problem. Also hit does not matter DKs hold threat very well. With 4.1 hit is even more useless bc now our interrupts will always land. Stack mastery and if you can’t reforge to mastery go avoidance.
    Thanks guys +) about to lo in and do some twinking now =)
    I am around 150 health or so and never have a problem. .


    I stack avoidance and never have a problem, and healers liked it when i get more avoidance. Mastery tanks and avoidance tanks are both viable. One or the other, dont do both at same time.

    Other then that i envy you for your helm, the dragons havent droped one yet.
    The following is not by any means the best or only possible way to gear/play, but it's what I (and my healers) prefer to do.

    Your job, summed up in a few words, is to control a situation and while doing this, make life for your healers easy. This means you need to prevent yourself from taking spike damage. Spike damage is when you all of a sudden drop very far in health. For example if you avoid 5 hits, and then get hit 3 times in a row, your healers will panic. This is bad.

    You're a Death Knight. The nature of the current Death Knight tank is that they take more damage than the other tanks overall, but we are the best at preventing spike and the best for eating magic damage. For this explanation, lets ignore magic damage.

    So, a lot of people (above me) seem to want to stack avoidance. I don't like avoidance. Avoidance is very unpredictable. You may get 40% avoidance, but you could very well still only avoid 10% of incoming attacks. My point is it's random.

    Stamina is nice and all, especially since it gives your healers a buffer zone to heal you back up, but you'll mitigate minimal damage and end in your healers being angry. Also it's really only optimal in 25 mans because you have more healers who can toss heals on you, but that's a different story.

    I chose mastery as my path. If you learn to time your death strikes optimally, as well as have a fair amount of health, it's probably the best combination right now. You just need to learn how to save your death strikes for when you take 1-2 melee hits before you use it, just so you can get the biggest heal/shield possible.

    Mastery prevents spike by giving you a much larger shield after you take significant damage (25-40% of max health). So if you steadily drop 30%, and then get healed right back up, it'll make it harder for a boss to quickly burn you down below the 30% health line.

    I can go MUCH more in depth, but I'll stop here for now.

    EDIT: I like the rune of SSG just for the guaranteed bonus from armor, but swordshattering is also very optimal :).
    Really 'good' mastery DK's take time to learn. There are all kinds of little weird mechanics + cycling CD and stuff that are basically required just to be on par with other tanks.

    Since it sounds like you are still getting used to blood it wouldn't hurt to go avoidance for a while. Avoidance is also good if your mostly running 5m stuff cause of the trash packs.

    Just decide which route you are going to take and gem/reforge for that every chance you can get, but don't avoid the other option if it's available.

    You need just enough stamina to reach an acceptable level for the healers for the content you are doing. So this number constantly changes as you progress, but you shouldn't have to blue gem for it or even use SSG as the free +4% parry is much more mitigation than the armor bonus.

    You never need any hit/expertise really, I'm tanking raids with 0.5% hit and 15 expertise...

    DK Tank Stat Weight

    Anyone know what the stat weight is for exp, hit, master, dodge parry?
    Tank stat weights are difficult to determine, especially DK's.

    Some people claim hit/expertise aren't necessary, and they aren't, but others prefer not missing. Expertise and hit aren't going to make you take less damage, but they can lead to more consistent damage, which your healers might prefer more. That's something you'll just have to find out yourself. Don't go out of your way to hard cap them, though, because you'll be giving up too much.

    In terms of actual number values, I can't help you there but the order for maximizing damage reduction is this:

    mastery > lower of dodge/parry ratings > higher of dodge/parry ratings >>> expertise to soft cap > hit > expertise
    thats what i was afraid of lol i was just looking for some numbers to improve my stats best i could
    Try forging away your hit/expertise (starting with hit) and see how you feel. I bottomed these stats out personally and don't miss it. You are going to "feel" the misses but try to stay focused on if your survivability is improving.

    Your gems are ALLLL over the place. Just use the mastery gems that match your sockets and stick to those.

    Fractured Amberjewel
    Puissant Dream Emerald
    Fine Ember Topaz

    In the end I say you want as much mastery/parry/dodge as possible from your gear. The only trick is picking one and stacking it above the other choices when possible.

    Death Strike bug?

    While I was tanking, I noticed that ALOT of times, death strike doesn't activate when I click it. It just flashes and does nothing.

    Can anyone help me fix this problem? It's getting really annoying since it prevents me from healing when I tank.
    I have the same problem until I heartstrike on occasion just posted about it
    There is an issue where your runes 'look' like they become death runes but really aren't useable. You have to swap out of blood and back into it in most cases (or die).

    Try that if your noticing your DS's not activating when it looks like they should.
    The bug hadn't been fixed yet. It's annoying as hell.

    Any temporary fix?

    Rolling a DK, what's more fun UH or Frost?

    I really enjoy playing on my Ret pally and do decent enough in raids.

    I'm thinking of rolling a DK as my next toon I know nothing of the class and am wondering what people's opinions are... what's more enjoyable? UH or Frost?

    Are they proc based, CD management or priority system based?

    Most likely will be doing heroic dungeons and see where I go from there.
    Not to sound like a jerk here, but what ever happened to people just trying things out for themselves and seeing what you like? Both specs are good but they are different play styles. Nobody here is going to be able to tell you exactly what you will like to do.
    I agree with Sariane but ill give out my opinion.

    I like both frost and unholy. I played as unholy with my dk but then changed to frost. Never looked back. Frost has the burst and damage i look for. Frost also has one of my favorite ccs in the game, Hungering Cold.
    I agree to try them both. Technically I believe Frost is better DPS than Unholy right now but for all you know they could flip that in a week or two. It really only matters once you hit raid levels.

    I prefer Frost myself and stayed so even when Unholy was on top, if I wanted a pet I'll log on my hunter =P

    Having some trouble with blood macros..

    I'm trying to write a macro that will use Vampiric Blood, then Rune Tap, then Lifeblood (Herbalism). The problem being, I also want to be able to use it when I get Will of the Necropolis procs, but I can't. It just resets back to Vampiric Blood and won't let me Rune Tap anymore.

    Can anyone help me out?
    /cast Vampiric Blood
    /cast Rune Tap
    /cast Lifeblood
    That's actually what I'm using right now, but... It doesn't use Rune Tap when I get WotN procs. I don't know why, but it just resets back to Vampiric Blood and won't use Rune Tap.
    There's no 'reset' with that macro, it just executes those abilities and will only ever show whatever you have set as the #showtooltip or Vampiric Blood as that is the first cast. Even if Rune Tap is available it will show Vampric Blood. If you don't have a Blood Rune available or Rune Tap is on cooldown it won't go off.

    If you want to hit the button for each item you have to do a /castsequence.
    Right, but with a Will of the Necropolis proc, it doesn't even take a rune, but still won't cast with that macro.