So we know the talent lines are going to be Blood, Frost and Unholy, which are also linked to the runes the DK will use. It seems obvious, that special ability within each talent tree will require Runes of their specific type.
In a way, this is a specialistion on top of a specialisation. Not only do you put your talent points in a specific tree, but you also need to pick the proper runes. It's going to be interesting to see how 'flexible' a deep spec Death Knight can or can't be when it comes to using 'off spec' abilities.
After all, if I 'need' to have all unholy runes selected in order to effectively use the last few active talents of the unholy tree, then this prevents me from using any core Blood or Frost abilities.
Unless of course, you can change your selected runes on the fly, which might allow for somekind of 'twisting'.
As for the talents, I think Death Knights are in luck... because they have more than 1 purpose. Class that have only 1 purpose (i.e. Rogues, Hunters, Mage, Warlocks = purpose is damage) usually end up with 1 strong pve talent tree, 1 strong pvp talent tree... and one talent tree that's kinda 'meh'. The 'meh' tree may change with gear level or even every other patch, but there's always one.
Look at a class like warriors - They can tank and do dps. Much like the Death Knight. The Warrior's 3 trees are pretty clean cut in their purpose, Tanking (Prot), PVP Dps (Arms) and PVE Dps (Fury).
While this does limit 'hybrids build', it also makes the class less of hassle to spec and streamline. I guess there's a possibility that Blizz will somehow make all 3 specs viable for tanking, dpsing and pvp... but I wouldn't hold my breath.
So what little we know of the deathknight's abilities can be summed up as:
Army of the Dead - Spell summons undead minions (ghouls) to fight for Death Knight. These creatures run around and attack things at random.
Unholy Embrace - Target is embraced by a silhouette of darkness for 6 seconds, corrupting any healing spells and effects cast upon or currently affecting the target to cause damage for 50% of their healing potential instead of restoring health. Any damage shields cast upon or currently affecting the target will also be instantly consumed, dealing 50% of their absorption potential in damage. Once afflicted with Unholy Embrace, the target cannot be afflicted with Unholy Embrace again for 1 minute.
Death and Decay - An area-of-effect damage spell.
Blood Boil - A damage-over-time ability that after the duration refreshes two of your blood runes.
Death Coil - Bornakk commented on this:
We understand that Deathcoil is a spell Deathknights had in Warcraft 3. While things may change, we simply haven’t made a final decision regarding this yet.
My guess is...
Unholy: Army of the Dead, Unholy Embrace (I suppose it could go with Blood, but the name makes it kinda obvious), Death & Decay, Death Coil
Blood: Blood boil
Frost: ???
Going of this, my guests are as follow:
Unholy will be the pvp tree. Unholy Embrace is a pvp ability and it'll probably be the key ability for DK in pvp. Slap this on a target with low Health and burst it down and it's GG. The ability to summon undead might sound powerful, but it really depends how they handle it... it could be on a long cooldown or they could be very weak (think Resto Druid trees).
Blood will be the dps tree. Not that much to go on that one, but Blood Boil sounds like the quintessencial dps move - a Damage over time that 'refund' the energy used for it. I expect the DK to have many 'bleed' effect and possibly way to increase damage, this will make for a very easy synergy with rogues (Rupture) and Feral Druid (mangle, lacerate, shred).
Frost will be the tanking tree. Going both with a process of elimination and logic - the mage's frost tree is all about survability and making oneself harder to kill. Typical frost abilities usually increase durability or slow down the ennemy. Deep frost DK ability may be able to slow down the attack speeds of bosses, which could be the key to their tanking mechanism. Frost will also probably control the DK's snare... smart design would be to put some of the snare/armor low in the frost tree, to make it a good 'off tree' for pvp, while keeping the tanking mechanism abilities deeper in.
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Great post, but upon reading through this seemed to contradict what i had heard.
I believe this to not happen only because from my sources DK's tanking is supposed to be built around parrying as pallies are build around blocking, and with this in mind slowing down the attacks seems to be something that would be bad for the Death Knight.
Or maybe I'm completely off.
Quote:
Deep frost DK ability may be able to slow down the attack speeds of bosses, which could be the key to their tanking mechanism.
I believe this to not happen only because from my sources DK's tanking is supposed to be built around parrying as pallies are build around blocking, and with this in mind slowing down the attacks seems to be something that would be bad for the Death Knight.
Or maybe I'm completely off.
On the contrary, I think it works perfectly what we know so far... let me explain,
High parry rate + Slowed ennemy attack = Not much damage taken.
High Parry Rate + High Threat 'counter attack' = Cool mechanism, but kinda hard to pull off, especially against fast attacking mob.
High Parry Rate + High Threat 'counter attack' + Slowed Ennemy Attack = On to something?
Suggestions:
Sword of the Frost
Frost Rune Ability
Coats the blade of the DK with a coat of ice, which increase the size of the weapon and makes it harder for the opponent to strike past it as well as deliver stinging blows. Increase parry rate by 30%, threat generation by 10% from all attacks and reduce damage taken by 5% for 10 sec.
Chill of Despair
Frost Rune Ability
The air around the DK becomes so cold that it drains the very will of his ennemies. All hostile target within the 10 yard of the DK suffer a -20% attack speed and -20% movement speed for 30 seconds. This work against most (if not all) bosses.
*This also make the DK a decent multi-target tank or a good off tank... if many target are kept together, they all get slowed, which is a big dps drop for the mobs.
Ten Thousand Blade Shards
Frost Rune Ability
Requires Sword of the Frost activated.
The DK's icy weapon shatters under the impact of the blow he just parried, the cursed ice driving itself deep into the skin and flesh of the would be attacker. Deal Weapon Damage + X frost damage, cause MASSIVE amount of Threat, counter attack must be dealt after the parry and before the mob strikes again. This ends Sword of the Frost.
*The fact that it's frost damage mean it can't be blocked/parried and ignore armor as well as take advantage of all spell damage debuff (misery, winter's chill, etc), if the damage is designed to be on par with MS (except, this MS ignore armor), then it could be a rather interesting 'spike aggro' mechanism. It can be made to use the DK'S 'physical hit rating' rather then spell hit like Taunt for warriors or Envenom for rogues.
Of course, I maybe completly wrong and I'm not saying those idea are even remotly balanced... but it's just to show that the idea doesn't go against the information we have.
Edited, Apr 22nd 2008 8:48pm by Tyrandor
High parry rate + Slowed ennemy attack = Not much damage taken.
High Parry Rate + High Threat 'counter attack' = Cool mechanism, but kinda hard to pull off, especially against fast attacking mob.
High Parry Rate + High Threat 'counter attack' + Slowed Ennemy Attack = On to something?
Suggestions:
Sword of the Frost
Frost Rune Ability
Coats the blade of the DK with a coat of ice, which increase the size of the weapon and makes it harder for the opponent to strike past it as well as deliver stinging blows. Increase parry rate by 30%, threat generation by 10% from all attacks and reduce damage taken by 5% for 10 sec.
Chill of Despair
Frost Rune Ability
The air around the DK becomes so cold that it drains the very will of his ennemies. All hostile target within the 10 yard of the DK suffer a -20% attack speed and -20% movement speed for 30 seconds. This work against most (if not all) bosses.
*This also make the DK a decent multi-target tank or a good off tank... if many target are kept together, they all get slowed, which is a big dps drop for the mobs.
Ten Thousand Blade Shards
Frost Rune Ability
Requires Sword of the Frost activated.
The DK's icy weapon shatters under the impact of the blow he just parried, the cursed ice driving itself deep into the skin and flesh of the would be attacker. Deal Weapon Damage + X frost damage, cause MASSIVE amount of Threat, counter attack must be dealt after the parry and before the mob strikes again. This ends Sword of the Frost.
*The fact that it's frost damage mean it can't be blocked/parried and ignore armor as well as take advantage of all spell damage debuff (misery, winter's chill, etc), if the damage is designed to be on par with MS (except, this MS ignore armor), then it could be a rather interesting 'spike aggro' mechanism. It can be made to use the DK'S 'physical hit rating' rather then spell hit like Taunt for warriors or Envenom for rogues.
Of course, I maybe completly wrong and I'm not saying those idea are even remotly balanced... but it's just to show that the idea doesn't go against the information we have.
Edited, Apr 22nd 2008 8:48pm by Tyrandor
Warchief Tyrandor wrote:
Unless of course, you can change your selected runes on the fly, which might allow for somekind of 'twisting'.
The way I understand it you can switch runes, but you have to be out of combat to do that. Also, what I got at Blizzcon (info may be out of date) was that different runes will have different refresh rates, so that "saving" the use of one of the runes for an emergency might be a good idea.
If slowing down an enemy's attacks is how they'll tank, then Death Knights will be used in groups for their Frost abilities, so the other War/Pal/Druid tank can take the damage, with an extra bonus slowing effect.
Unless Blizzard just adds to the tooltip:
Reduces all attack speed and spell cast time by x% if the ability is being used towards the Death Knight.
Then maybe that'll be a bit more useful as a Death Knight as tank.
Unless Blizzard just adds to the tooltip:
Reduces all attack speed and spell cast time by x% if the ability is being used towards the Death Knight.
Then maybe that'll be a bit more useful as a Death Knight as tank.
I have a suggestion for a Blood spell. An AoE Drain Life.
Basically it will be a targeted AoE DoT/HoT, kind of like Consecration, but with a Healing Bonus.
Gather Blood
Blood Rune Ability
Afflicts the ground underneath the Death Knight with demonic power. Enemies in the area of effect will transfer 150 health from themself to the Death Knight every 3 seconds.
Edited, Apr 23rd 2008 2:52am by UnkemptSuperman
Basically it will be a targeted AoE DoT/HoT, kind of like Consecration, but with a Healing Bonus.
Gather Blood
Blood Rune Ability
Afflicts the ground underneath the Death Knight with demonic power. Enemies in the area of effect will transfer 150 health from themself to the Death Knight every 3 seconds.
Edited, Apr 23rd 2008 2:52am by UnkemptSuperman
Why would you assume that they're only melee attackers?
I read it as Melee DPS, Magic DPS, Tanking... like Paladins, except with ranged DPS replacing Holy (or Druids, wth Feral split into Cat and Bear). Unholy would be their tanking tree, Blood their melee DPS tree and Frost their magic DPS tree.
Unholy Embrace won't make it to live, at least not in anything resembling the current form. There's just no way that kind of an ability could ever be balanced - some much weaker form? Sure. But I'd imagine they'd want to avoid giving Death Knights a "LOL HAERM TOUCH YOU WIN" ability or Arenas are going to get a little silly.
EDIT:
Even assuming Frost is the tanking tree, it could be a reactive ability... like a Mage's Frost Armor on crack.
Edited, Apr 23rd 2008 7:57am by RPZip
I read it as Melee DPS, Magic DPS, Tanking... like Paladins, except with ranged DPS replacing Holy (or Druids, wth Feral split into Cat and Bear). Unholy would be their tanking tree, Blood their melee DPS tree and Frost their magic DPS tree.
Unholy Embrace won't make it to live, at least not in anything resembling the current form. There's just no way that kind of an ability could ever be balanced - some much weaker form? Sure. But I'd imagine they'd want to avoid giving Death Knights a "LOL HAERM TOUCH YOU WIN" ability or Arenas are going to get a little silly.
EDIT:
Quote:
If slowing down an enemy's attacks is how they'll tank, then Death Knights will be used in groups for their Frost abilities, so the other War/Pal/Druid tank can take the damage, with an extra bonus slowing effect.
Unless Blizzard just adds to the tooltip:
Reduces all attack speed and spell cast time by x% if the ability is being used towards the Death Knight.
Then maybe that'll be a bit more useful as a Death Knight as tank.
Unless Blizzard just adds to the tooltip:
Reduces all attack speed and spell cast time by x% if the ability is being used towards the Death Knight.
Then maybe that'll be a bit more useful as a Death Knight as tank.
Even assuming Frost is the tanking tree, it could be a reactive ability... like a Mage's Frost Armor on crack.
Edited, Apr 23rd 2008 7:57am by RPZip
Quote:
Why would you assume that they're only melee attackers?
I read it as Melee DPS, Magic DPS, Tanking... like Paladins, except with ranged DPS replacing Holy (or Druids, wth Feral split into Cat and Bear). Unholy would be their tanking tree, Blood their melee DPS tree and Frost their magic DPS tree.
I read it as Melee DPS, Magic DPS, Tanking... like Paladins, except with ranged DPS replacing Holy (or Druids, wth Feral split into Cat and Bear). Unholy would be their tanking tree, Blood their melee DPS tree and Frost their magic DPS tree.
I didn't even think they could have a 'range' dps tree, mostly because of lore and favor - those DK obviously are WC3 dk, not WC2.
They wield two handed edged weapon, so weapons with very poor caster stats (although Blizzard can just re-itemize I suppose) and they wear plate. There's something 'wrong' with the conceptual idea of this guy standing back with the clothies and throwing frost bolts. But maybe that's just me.
They do have Death & Decay listed... and a channeled AE spell doesn't work very well with a pure melee class. So you might be on to something.
Quote:
Unholy Embrace won't make it to live, at least not in anything resembling the current form. There's just no way that kind of an ability could ever be balanced - some much weaker form? Sure. But I'd imagine they'd want to avoid giving Death Knights a "LOL HAERM TOUCH YOU WIN" ability or Arenas are going to get a little silly.
Yeah, it might get canned altogether, or nerfed bad... or get a 30min CD put on it so it can't be used in Arenas. Who knows? But going off the ability, this would be a superb pvp moves and would most likely make whatever tree it belongs to the pvp tree.
On the other hand, who knows where Blizzard want to take pvp next? I heard that the next expansion won't have such a 'Stamina explosion'. And new abilities like Seed of Corruption (for pve), Mass Dispel, Cloak of Shadow, Bestial Wrath would be way too powerful in vanilla WoW, but they're 'fine' in TBC.... who's to say what new and powerful abilities the other class will get? Unholy Embrace may not seem that powerful at level 80.
Quote:
If slowing down an enemy's attacks is how they'll tank, then Death Knights will be used in groups for their Frost abilities, so the other War/Pal/Druid tank can take the damage, with an extra bonus slowing effect.
Unless Blizzard just adds to the tooltip:
Reduces all attack speed and spell cast time by x% if the ability is being used towards the Death Knight.
Then maybe that'll be a bit more useful as a Death Knight as tank.
Unless Blizzard just adds to the tooltip:
Reduces all attack speed and spell cast time by x% if the ability is being used towards the Death Knight.
Then maybe that'll be a bit more useful as a Death Knight as tank.
Yeah, I don't claim the ability suggested was properly balanced or the way to go, I was just tossing it as an example.
Edited, Apr 23rd 2008 1:17pm by Tyrandor
Edited, Apr 23rd 2008 4:02pm by Tyrandor
Draeneipally, those comments does not belong in this thread, keep it in the Death Knight FAQ thread. Please feel the atmosphere in this thread, as it is a good discussion even though most of the comments here are speculation.
Don't try to turn this thread into another Death Knight FAQ thread.
Rate Down for you.
Edit: oh my rating you down made you go from Good to Decent.
Edited, Apr 23rd 2008 11:31am by Ryugan
Don't try to turn this thread into another Death Knight FAQ thread.
Rate Down for you.
Edit: oh my rating you down made you go from Good to Decent.
Edited, Apr 23rd 2008 11:31am by Ryugan
Actually removed the posts :P.
I wanted to do it, but I don't want people to QQ over me using my admin power, now that there's legitimate 3rd party comment, it's all good =D
I wanted to do it, but I don't want people to QQ over me using my admin power, now that there's legitimate 3rd party comment, it's all good =D
Warchief Tyrandor wrote:
Quote:
Why would you assume that they're only melee attackers?
I read it as Melee DPS, Magic DPS, Tanking... like Paladins, except with ranged DPS replacing Holy (or Druids, wth Feral split into Cat and Bear). Unholy would be their tanking tree, Blood their melee DPS tree and Frost their magic DPS tree.
I read it as Melee DPS, Magic DPS, Tanking... like Paladins, except with ranged DPS replacing Holy (or Druids, wth Feral split into Cat and Bear). Unholy would be their tanking tree, Blood their melee DPS tree and Frost their magic DPS tree.
I didn't even think they could have a 'range' dps tree, mostly because of lore and favor - those DK obviously are WC3 dk, not WC2.
They wield two handed edged weapon, so weapons with very poor caster stats (although Blizzard can just re-itemize I suppose) and they wear plate.
Well, considering one of the ideas being kicked around is that they'll start at around level 70 when you create a Death Knight, this isn't as big of a deal as it might otherwise be; they wouldn't even have to reitemize, just put the new items into the expansion. They can also dual-wield (and with the 2.4.2 changes, most "Main Hand" caster weapons became One Hand), so they could just not put any caster 2Hs into the game and make them do that.
It's still far too early to do anything more than just minor speculation, though.
I hope it's 70, but I keep hearing 'anywhere between 55-70', in which case that would make the 'nuke spec' not very viable until much higher level.
Still, it's possible. DWing two caster weapons would result in a pretty sick +dmg result, especially since you can then enchant both with +dmg as well.
I just don't see it from a flavor point of view however. This class is designed to make all your Arthas-wannabe fantasy come to live... and Arthas (and other DK) are all about in your face combat.
Edited, Apr 23rd 2008 8:37pm by Tyrandor
Still, it's possible. DWing two caster weapons would result in a pretty sick +dmg result, especially since you can then enchant both with +dmg as well.
I just don't see it from a flavor point of view however. This class is designed to make all your Arthas-wannabe fantasy come to live... and Arthas (and other DK) are all about in your face combat.
Edited, Apr 23rd 2008 8:37pm by Tyrandor
Ryugan wrote:
Draeneipally, those comments does not belong in this thread, keep it in the Death Knight FAQ thread. Please feel the atmosphere in this thread, as it is a good discussion even though most of the comments here are speculation.
Don't try to turn this thread into another Death Knight FAQ thread.
Rate Down for you.
Edit: oh my rating you down made you go from Good to Decent.
Edited, Apr 23rd 2008 11:31am by Ryugan
Don't try to turn this thread into another Death Knight FAQ thread.
Rate Down for you.
Edit: oh my rating you down made you go from Good to Decent.
Edited, Apr 23rd 2008 11:31am by Ryugan
Dang, you slammed DP and my crappy FAQ with one post...well played.
Also, I would think that they would have to add new weapons as the DK is rune based, not mana, rage, or energy based. Unless they just rework it so all weapons have rune slots.
Well, I sincerely doubt DKs will have the ability to significantly debuff boss attacks... every boss fight would have to be buffed to counterbalance it as, as has been said, a group would just bring a Death Knight along to debuff and tank with a Prot Warrior.
I expect the tanking mechanic to proceed along the lines of normal tanking with Parry instead of Block+Parry. I do not anticipate Dodge being any more of a factor than for Warriors.
The DPS mechanic interests me a great deal more, specifically the Blood and Unholy trees. I would see Unholy as the 'magic' damage tree, packing spells like Army of the Dead (no way is that crap baseline) and/or Unholy Embrace, as well as Shadow-based damage-over-time and chance-on-hit abilities. I wouldnt be shocked to see a 41pt talent that heals the group based on Shadow damage caused, like a Shadow Priest, but with a big sword and hatred for all that lives. Here is where I'd expect to find life-draining, leeching and attack/casting speed debuffing if they are implemented.
Blood I see as basically a Warrior tree; lots of physical damage from stacking Bleed effects and I expect an AoE cleave-like ability. I would expect to see a Bleed that procs on crits and stacks quite highly, and DK melee output to somehow scale in proportion to the number of Bleeds currently on the target, either as a staple five-pointer like Flurry/Frenzy or a 21/31pt 'Strike' talent that either renews or consumes Bleeds. For instance;
Ravaging Strike
1 Blood Rune, 10sec cooldown
Causes weapon damage + xx for every Bleed effect on the target
Refreshes/Consumes all Bleed effects (depending on the mechanic they choose)
A 41pt or 51pt Blood talent Id like to see would be another Strike that is only active after say 5 Bleeds, that consumes the Bleeds, does decent damage, and heals you for a percentage of damage caused. I would also really like to see a 5-point talent (maybe 45-50 in the tree) that reduces all healing received by the target by a single-digit percentage for every Bleed effect. The game has enough insane burst damage classes without adding one, I quite like the idea of an unstoppable, intractable enemy that slowly cripples your ability to fight back, instead of 3-minute-Mage syndrome of blowing your cooldowns for frontloading.
Anyway, that's my thoughts. I do not expect Frost to be exciting, just endless threat and mitigation-enhancers without which DKs couldnt tank Hogger. Unholy will be the 'meh' tree with dispellable abilities and debuffs, that most likely dont scale well with gear (think Enhance Shaman before 2.4), and Bleed will be basically a cross between and Arms Warrior and a Fury Warrior, and I expect it to kick ***.
Any thoughts?
~sins
PS - if this sounds OP to you, imagine how OP Felguards were just before TBC was launched; at lvl60 it rocked, at lvl70 it kinda blows. Talents at 70 will balance far differently at 80.
I expect the tanking mechanic to proceed along the lines of normal tanking with Parry instead of Block+Parry. I do not anticipate Dodge being any more of a factor than for Warriors.
The DPS mechanic interests me a great deal more, specifically the Blood and Unholy trees. I would see Unholy as the 'magic' damage tree, packing spells like Army of the Dead (no way is that crap baseline) and/or Unholy Embrace, as well as Shadow-based damage-over-time and chance-on-hit abilities. I wouldnt be shocked to see a 41pt talent that heals the group based on Shadow damage caused, like a Shadow Priest, but with a big sword and hatred for all that lives. Here is where I'd expect to find life-draining, leeching and attack/casting speed debuffing if they are implemented.
Blood I see as basically a Warrior tree; lots of physical damage from stacking Bleed effects and I expect an AoE cleave-like ability. I would expect to see a Bleed that procs on crits and stacks quite highly, and DK melee output to somehow scale in proportion to the number of Bleeds currently on the target, either as a staple five-pointer like Flurry/Frenzy or a 21/31pt 'Strike' talent that either renews or consumes Bleeds. For instance;
Ravaging Strike
1 Blood Rune, 10sec cooldown
Causes weapon damage + xx for every Bleed effect on the target
Refreshes/Consumes all Bleed effects (depending on the mechanic they choose)
A 41pt or 51pt Blood talent Id like to see would be another Strike that is only active after say 5 Bleeds, that consumes the Bleeds, does decent damage, and heals you for a percentage of damage caused. I would also really like to see a 5-point talent (maybe 45-50 in the tree) that reduces all healing received by the target by a single-digit percentage for every Bleed effect. The game has enough insane burst damage classes without adding one, I quite like the idea of an unstoppable, intractable enemy that slowly cripples your ability to fight back, instead of 3-minute-Mage syndrome of blowing your cooldowns for frontloading.
Anyway, that's my thoughts. I do not expect Frost to be exciting, just endless threat and mitigation-enhancers without which DKs couldnt tank Hogger. Unholy will be the 'meh' tree with dispellable abilities and debuffs, that most likely dont scale well with gear (think Enhance Shaman before 2.4), and Bleed will be basically a cross between and Arms Warrior and a Fury Warrior, and I expect it to kick ***.
Any thoughts?
~sins
PS - if this sounds OP to you, imagine how OP Felguards were just before TBC was launched; at lvl60 it rocked, at lvl70 it kinda blows. Talents at 70 will balance far differently at 80.
Well, as a melee class, unless they have some insane burst damage and/or a way to counter healing, they won't be worth much in pvp.
Ret paladin have insane burst damage - possibly the highest in the game - but they're more or less useless in Arena unless they're paired with a Warrior... because they need the MS effect.
You do suggest a healing reduction talent in the Blood line, but if they're damage is 'over time' instead of being burst, it will need to be so powerful in order to be effective in pvp as to be overpowered in pve.
I do think that blood talent tree will be the 'pve dps' tree, and I do think it will be based on damage over time bleed effects. If nothing else, Blood Boil is pointing in that direction. But I don't think Blood will be very good in pvp. Much like the Warrior and Rogue sustained dps trees (Fury and Combat) are awesome in pve, but terrible in pvp.
Ret paladin have insane burst damage - possibly the highest in the game - but they're more or less useless in Arena unless they're paired with a Warrior... because they need the MS effect.
You do suggest a healing reduction talent in the Blood line, but if they're damage is 'over time' instead of being burst, it will need to be so powerful in order to be effective in pvp as to be overpowered in pve.
I do think that blood talent tree will be the 'pve dps' tree, and I do think it will be based on damage over time bleed effects. If nothing else, Blood Boil is pointing in that direction. But I don't think Blood will be very good in pvp. Much like the Warrior and Rogue sustained dps trees (Fury and Combat) are awesome in pve, but terrible in pvp.
I accept the point, yes, however there is the possibility with Death Knights for damage-based self-healing. Warriors require burst/MS simply because they lack self-healing apart from a few PvE-oriented talents, their health bar is like a death sentence that never stops ticking down. Ret Paladins I consider a fundamentally broken concept (heavily crit-dependent one-dimensional burst in a world with Resilience?) so I don't like to use them in any comparison.
With the apparent 'evil' alignment of Death Knights, I wouldnt be surprised to see a moderately powerful damage-dependent self-healing utility that builds over time, leaving them vulnerable to bursting classes like Warriors but solid against long-lasting foes like Holy Paladins and Druids. A class that can leech health at a moderate rate changes the combat dynamic, particularly with abilities like Unholy Embrace stirring the pot.
This would of course have to be outside the 'tanking' tree, or risk a tank in low-end 5mans that doesnt actually need healing with good enough DPS.
And why exactly would a PvP healing debuff need to be shockingly powerful? -5% per Bleed effect (assuming they proc relatively often) stacking ten times? That's just Mortal Strike that takes longer to build up, which wouldnt be too bad in PvE either considering all the bosses with annoying self-healing and the sore lack of Arms Warriors in endgame PvE.
With the apparent 'evil' alignment of Death Knights, I wouldnt be surprised to see a moderately powerful damage-dependent self-healing utility that builds over time, leaving them vulnerable to bursting classes like Warriors but solid against long-lasting foes like Holy Paladins and Druids. A class that can leech health at a moderate rate changes the combat dynamic, particularly with abilities like Unholy Embrace stirring the pot.
This would of course have to be outside the 'tanking' tree, or risk a tank in low-end 5mans that doesnt actually need healing with good enough DPS.
And why exactly would a PvP healing debuff need to be shockingly powerful? -5% per Bleed effect (assuming they proc relatively often) stacking ten times? That's just Mortal Strike that takes longer to build up, which wouldnt be too bad in PvE either considering all the bosses with annoying self-healing and the sore lack of Arms Warriors in endgame PvE.
Nice post Tyr ... in fact the ONLY nice post on this forum so far!
RATE UP!
... Oh wait.
I appreciate the sentiment Jord. Figured we might as well get some discussion rolling here, even thought this is all speculations ;p.
True enough. Somewhat like a Warlock's drain spec, but melee oriented. Since they have plate, that could make them into nightmare for durability fight.
I do have to say that I find your assumption that Unholy will be 'gimmicky/bad' a bit odd. I know it's been seen before (i.e. The rogue subtlety tree was a joke for the better part of 3 years and only recently got some love), but Blizzard has been doing a great job with making every tree at least useful in one aspect of the game.
Remember the DK is a huge selling point for the xpac, I doubt any of the trees will be anything short of superb.
Well, you gotta be careful here. That sounds a lot like a Rogue's wound poison, but weaker... and Wound Poison is already a lot like MS, but weaker (Arguable I suppose). Any melee based healing debuff will be compared to similar abilities in the game, it's human nature.
Not to mention that while Arms Warriors in endgame pve are rare, rogues aren't. We get our rogues to put wound poison on fights like Anetheron, and with 2-3 rogues beating on him, it stacks to 5 within seconds.
To bring up two entire new points,
Unholy Embrace in pve, we've been all over how it might be too powerful to even make it to live because of pvp... but what about the pve application? It could make for a very interesting dynamic to have bosses that heal themselves, actually 'kill' themselves with that debuff instead. While the good old strat of 'kick the healz!' has been around forever, actually alternating between interupting and 'embracing' could be an interesting twist. On boss like Anetheron who leeches life everytime he hits, it would be interesting to see him 'kill himself' for 6 second every minute...
How good will dps be?, this one of my main concern. While Arms and Fury warriors are great in the damage department, Ret pld are limited to specific comp in arena and hardly raid viable... and dps feral as well as balance druid are more or less a joke in both pve and pvp. Will DK Dps compare to other dps class? Will they be the kind of class that you bring one of for the buff (i.e. Enhancement Shaman, Shadow Priest, etc)?
Edited, Apr 25th 2008 1:13pm by Tyrandor
Quote:
With the apparent 'evil' alignment of Death Knights, I wouldnt be surprised to see a moderately powerful damage-dependent self-healing utility that builds over time, leaving them vulnerable to bursting classes like Warriors but solid against long-lasting foes like Holy Paladins and Druids. A class that can leech health at a moderate rate changes the combat dynamic, particularly with abilities like Unholy Embrace stirring the pot.
True enough. Somewhat like a Warlock's drain spec, but melee oriented. Since they have plate, that could make them into nightmare for durability fight.
I do have to say that I find your assumption that Unholy will be 'gimmicky/bad' a bit odd. I know it's been seen before (i.e. The rogue subtlety tree was a joke for the better part of 3 years and only recently got some love), but Blizzard has been doing a great job with making every tree at least useful in one aspect of the game.
Remember the DK is a huge selling point for the xpac, I doubt any of the trees will be anything short of superb.
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And why exactly would a PvP healing debuff need to be shockingly powerful? -5% per Bleed effect (assuming they proc relatively often) stacking ten times? That's just Mortal Strike that takes longer to build up, which wouldnt be too bad in PvE either considering all the bosses with annoying self-healing and the sore lack of Arms Warriors in endgame PvE.
Well, you gotta be careful here. That sounds a lot like a Rogue's wound poison, but weaker... and Wound Poison is already a lot like MS, but weaker (Arguable I suppose). Any melee based healing debuff will be compared to similar abilities in the game, it's human nature.
Not to mention that while Arms Warriors in endgame pve are rare, rogues aren't. We get our rogues to put wound poison on fights like Anetheron, and with 2-3 rogues beating on him, it stacks to 5 within seconds.
To bring up two entire new points,
Unholy Embrace in pve, we've been all over how it might be too powerful to even make it to live because of pvp... but what about the pve application? It could make for a very interesting dynamic to have bosses that heal themselves, actually 'kill' themselves with that debuff instead. While the good old strat of 'kick the healz!' has been around forever, actually alternating between interupting and 'embracing' could be an interesting twist. On boss like Anetheron who leeches life everytime he hits, it would be interesting to see him 'kill himself' for 6 second every minute...
How good will dps be?, this one of my main concern. While Arms and Fury warriors are great in the damage department, Ret pld are limited to specific comp in arena and hardly raid viable... and dps feral as well as balance druid are more or less a joke in both pve and pvp. Will DK Dps compare to other dps class? Will they be the kind of class that you bring one of for the buff (i.e. Enhancement Shaman, Shadow Priest, etc)?
Edited, Apr 25th 2008 1:13pm by Tyrandor
1 post
I still think that that the basic
Frost= Tank
Blood= Damage
Unholy= Disputed.
The felblade thing sounds interesting- Will it be like soul shards? I guess if a person knows enough about balancing talents then if frost and blood are filled, the question is... Whats left?
Unholy will be the pvp tree. Unholy Embrace is a pvp ability and it'll probably be the key ability for DK in pvp. Slap this on a target with low Health and burst it down and it's GG. The ability to summon undead might sound powerful, but it really depends how they handle it... it could be on a long cooldown or they could be very weak (think Resto Druid trees).
Blood will be the dps tree. Not that much to go on that one, but Blood Boil sounds like the quintessencial dps move - a Damage over time that 'refund' the energy used for it. I expect the DK to have many 'bleed' effect and possibly way to increase damage, this will make for a very easy synergy with rogues (Rupture) and Feral Druid (mangle, lacerate, shred).
Frost will be the tanking tree. Going both with a process of elimination and logic - the mage's frost tree is all about survability and making oneself harder to kill. Typical frost abilities usually increase durability or slow down the ennemy. Deep frost DK ability may be able to slow down the attack speeds of bosses, which could be the key to their tanking mechanism. Frost will also probably control the DK's snare... smart design would be to put some of the snare/armor low in the frost tree, to make it a good 'off tree' for pvp, while keeping the tanking mechanism abilities deeper in.[][] Text[/][/]
Frost= Tank
Blood= Damage
Unholy= Disputed.
The felblade thing sounds interesting- Will it be like soul shards? I guess if a person knows enough about balancing talents then if frost and blood are filled, the question is... Whats left?
Warchief Tyrandor wrote:
Unholy will be the pvp tree. Unholy Embrace is a pvp ability and it'll probably be the key ability for DK in pvp. Slap this on a target with low Health and burst it down and it's GG. The ability to summon undead might sound powerful, but it really depends how they handle it... it could be on a long cooldown or they could be very weak (think Resto Druid trees).
Blood will be the dps tree. Not that much to go on that one, but Blood Boil sounds like the quintessencial dps move - a Damage over time that 'refund' the energy used for it. I expect the DK to have many 'bleed' effect and possibly way to increase damage, this will make for a very easy synergy with rogues (Rupture) and Feral Druid (mangle, lacerate, shred).
Frost will be the tanking tree. Going both with a process of elimination and logic - the mage's frost tree is all about survability and making oneself harder to kill. Typical frost abilities usually increase durability or slow down the ennemy. Deep frost DK ability may be able to slow down the attack speeds of bosses, which could be the key to their tanking mechanism. Frost will also probably control the DK's snare... smart design would be to put some of the snare/armor low in the frost tree, to make it a good 'off tree' for pvp, while keeping the tanking mechanism abilities deeper in.
10 posts
Quote:
www.retromud.org
This mud has had fallen, and death knight for over 10 years.
Fallen are evil warriors that have spiritual magic they gain from selling thier
souls over to the 'Nameless One.' A powerful God that was imprisoned in one, of the six planets of the world, known as Crypt. Each fallen has a sword, that is a physical manifestation of the 'Nameless One.' By killing the living they can syphon the soul from the recently killed. Then increase the power of thier fellblade. Fellblade can change its size (one hander or two hander), can increase its weight (for purpose of increase stuns/misses in melee), and change into eight damage types, fellblade has a special attack that does the pure damage type imbued on the blade (in addtion to the attacks they are already gratned).
Features of this mud, won't make it to the World of Warcraft realm as it seems, yet there is a weath of ideas that does make this class unique. A spell that allows to engage in melee even while stunned, asleep, paralyzed, during physical holds (Cannot parry however). A spell to increase ones strength, to reduce ones age by draining youth from another player, area affect spells that come from the fellblade (Known as waves).
Death knights on RetroMUD have existed for many years as well, and are a follow up class of fallen, but cultist, jomsviking, and sentinel classes may also join this class. Death Knight have ability to increase amount of nonphysical damage that the fellblade can inflict, they have a spell that reflects damage by converting incomming damage to out going fire damage, self haste spell that allows for chances to get more attacks every so often.
The death knight class on RetroMUD is not just evil warriors, its warriors that are possessed by a sword. This sword grants favor to those whom feed it souls. Which in turn determines its power. So is WoW going to make Death Knight just your typical mud's evil warriors, or are they going to make Death Knight into a guild similiar to what RetroMUD has?
This mud has had fallen, and death knight for over 10 years.
Fallen are evil warriors that have spiritual magic they gain from selling thier
souls over to the 'Nameless One.' A powerful God that was imprisoned in one, of the six planets of the world, known as Crypt. Each fallen has a sword, that is a physical manifestation of the 'Nameless One.' By killing the living they can syphon the soul from the recently killed. Then increase the power of thier fellblade. Fellblade can change its size (one hander or two hander), can increase its weight (for purpose of increase stuns/misses in melee), and change into eight damage types, fellblade has a special attack that does the pure damage type imbued on the blade (in addtion to the attacks they are already gratned).
Features of this mud, won't make it to the World of Warcraft realm as it seems, yet there is a weath of ideas that does make this class unique. A spell that allows to engage in melee even while stunned, asleep, paralyzed, during physical holds (Cannot parry however). A spell to increase ones strength, to reduce ones age by draining youth from another player, area affect spells that come from the fellblade (Known as waves).
Death knights on RetroMUD have existed for many years as well, and are a follow up class of fallen, but cultist, jomsviking, and sentinel classes may also join this class. Death Knight have ability to increase amount of nonphysical damage that the fellblade can inflict, they have a spell that reflects damage by converting incomming damage to out going fire damage, self haste spell that allows for chances to get more attacks every so often.
The death knight class on RetroMUD is not just evil warriors, its warriors that are possessed by a sword. This sword grants favor to those whom feed it souls. Which in turn determines its power. So is WoW going to make Death Knight just your typical mud's evil warriors, or are they going to make Death Knight into a guild similiar to what RetroMUD has?
Am I the only one who found that a bit random?
And I'm pretty sure that Warcraft had evil warriors weilding runeblades that ate souls before whatever RetroMUD is..... what is that anyways?
Death Knight made their first appearance in the Warcraft lore in Warcraft 2, which I believe predates retromud. And even if it doesn't, it isn't like the idea of an evil warrior possessed by a sword is anything unique and new (Elric...)
Yeah, corrupted Paladins never existed in any format or any fantasy world before this MUD. Thanks for digging up the sourcing and exposing the evil conspiracy for all to see!
Hell, if you want to look at it that way the Ringwraiths in LotR are basically Death Knights, except they're being possessed by their rings... not the sword. It's not a new concept at all.
I just don't see it from a flavor point of view however. This class is designed to make all your Arthas-wannabe fantasy come to live... and Arthas (and other DK) are all about in your face combat.
WC2 Death Knights were casters, actually. Most of their abilities migrates to Liches in WC3, but not all... and I don't see Blizzard adding yet another pure melee class to the game, honestly. Between Rogues (all kinds), Arms and Fury Warriors, Enhancement Shaman, Feral Druids and Ret Paladins the melee slot is pretty contested... so while I expect Death Knights to have a melee DPS tree, I would be shocked if they don't have a casting tree.
It does fit with their lore, just as well as a melee class does, and it gives them a much wider pool of abilities to choose from. *shrug*
Edited, Apr 26th 2008 4:21pm by RPZip
Hell, if you want to look at it that way the Ringwraiths in LotR are basically Death Knights, except they're being possessed by their rings... not the sword. It's not a new concept at all.
Quote:
I just don't see it from a flavor point of view however. This class is designed to make all your Arthas-wannabe fantasy come to live... and Arthas (and other DK) are all about in your face combat.
WC2 Death Knights were casters, actually. Most of their abilities migrates to Liches in WC3, but not all... and I don't see Blizzard adding yet another pure melee class to the game, honestly. Between Rogues (all kinds), Arms and Fury Warriors, Enhancement Shaman, Feral Druids and Ret Paladins the melee slot is pretty contested... so while I expect Death Knights to have a melee DPS tree, I would be shocked if they don't have a casting tree.
It does fit with their lore, just as well as a melee class does, and it gives them a much wider pool of abilities to choose from. *shrug*
Edited, Apr 26th 2008 4:21pm by RPZip
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