Achillies heel of DK?Follow

Disarm! a DK power is based in runes right? and were are those runes eminating from? the weapon! so say a warrior just keeps disarming a DK, the Knight's attacks would be rendered useless wouldnt they?

They should have an ability like Bite Face or something for just that situation. Once a DK gets disarmed he can bite the warrior stunning him and getting monster crits.

Rogues are getting a 60 sec cd disarm (also disarms shields) called Dismantle, as it stands. Stell weapon chain now only halves the duration of disarm. That said, I'm sure a DK will be able to use Runic Power abilities while disarmed.

I'd say their real Achilles heel is that they have no MS effect - devastating in PvP. Intrestingly they;ve been given the Vindication health reduction mechanic instead. They're going to be a bad class in 2v2, most likely.

The biggest weakness as it stands is a lack of actual anti-caster abilities. For their supposed role, Rogues are actually way better against most casters. I see no way for a DK to kill a Disc priest simply because of the zero healing reduction and very limited spell interrupts. One single Frozt spell (Mind Freeze) on a 15sec CD is pretty terrible. Everything they can do right now can already be done better by Warriors and Rogues, including tanking and DPS, so I am sincerely hoping they add another anti-caster component or an MS-like effect to Diseases.

Trust me, all that will happen is the DK is Frost Nova'd just like a Warrior. Death Grip is on too long a cooldown to counteract it. Now if Lichborne is changed to include movement impairing effects then game on, but until then there is no way for a DK to close down a Mage. Warriors and Rogues will remain comprehensively better at defeating casters.

I think I am missing something because I don't recall Blizzard stating the DK would be the "anti-caster class", but that they would be the "anti-caster tank" which has nothing to do with PvP at all. Discussing the DK's weaknesses in PvP is one thing, and certainly a good thing to discuss, but let's not get it confused with their, in the words of an above poster, "supposed role" at the same time.

all speculation aside, i think that we have to realize that blizzard is probably still adding a crap load of abilities to the DK class, so i dont think we have to worry about buffs and nerfs just yet.

Look how Paladins were changed from the original beta to release (think that's when all the changes happened). A total retooling of various aspects of the class. Not saying this will happen to Death Knights though. What I am saying is that there is some validity to the "it's only alpha" argument. It's quite possible there will be big changes before release for DKs, or even before beta testing, but I would agree the odds are not in favor of that happening.

The more time goes without big changes though, the better the odds are that Blizzard is happy (for now) with the way DKs are.

I seem to recall the DK's having an ability called Strangulate, which uses up their runic power and silences the target. The more runic power, the longer the silence. So they have Mind Freeze and Strangulate... and if need be you can just death grip someone in midcycle of a cast. I really dont think casters are going to own them. Shadow Priests are going to be a lot better in the expansion and I think they're going to be one of the strongest classes against DKs. Warriors and Rogues wont do so well i think since DKs have a lot of self healing mechanics, and lichborne is amazing.

Priests and Pallies I think will be the counters to them.

Strangulate, Mind Freeze, Chains of Ice, Death Grip. Yeah, some of their "utility" abilities have a lengthier cooldown, but they make up for it by having a lot of them on an infinitely renewable source.

Right now Death Knights are looking overpowered. Yes, I know it's still beta. Yes, I know they start out sporting incredible gear. You can make any excuse that you want, but it doesn't take a rocket surgeon to look at their mechanics and list of ablities, slot them into potential arena teams, compare them to potential opponents, and reach a conclusion.

As for whether or not they get changed, like some others I wouldn't expect to see any significant re-tooling until after launch. I think their tanking aspect needs a lot of help, as all three of their trees seem to be geared more towards damage and damage-facilitating utility than anything else. The tanking tools are spread out among all three trees instead of concentrated into one, and most of them feel really unfocused or misplaced, especially in Frost.

Beyond that, Blizzard has as much as admitted that they pretty much use the arena as a litmus test for class balance right now and adjust accordingly. I am expecting significant DK changes after a season or two in the arena, but not really before.

that would depend theo. based on what im seeing now, DK's dont have the same kind of "unlimitability" that warriors do. for DK's, its all a matter of how fast they use their runes, and theres a cap on that. since theres a cap on that, there is a cap on the amount of runic power that can be generated in any given rune cycle. proper speccing and what not can change this of course, but ultimately i think its going to come down to one of two thing:

1.) runic power for an optimal DPS rotation is achievable on a regular basis, thus allowing a death knight to be limited only by GCD's, cooldowns, and threat (like warriors are now). if this is the case, 1.0s GCD ftw.

2.) runic power for an optimal DPS rotation is not achievable on a regular basis, forcing the DK to endure some "downtime" between using abilities, or more likely craft a differeing optimal DPS rotation that accounts for the loss in runic power somehow. if this is the case, having a lowered GCD wont matter so much, so staying blood would be best.

based on what im seeing now, id say that #2 is more likely. not just because of the limitations on class mechanics, but also because of the bonuses a properly specced blood presence-using DK will apply to their group. as it stands now, i think itll be a lot easier and more profitable in the long run for optimal DPS rotations to be formulated with the 1.5s GCD instead of the 1.0s GCD. personal DPS may or may not be higher with a 1.0, but i think its safe to say that overall contribution to the group will be higher by using blood presence.

Can DK's switch Presences easily midfight, the way Warriors can switch stances or Druids can switch forms? What’s the tradeoff?

If there's little to no downside, perhaps it would be worth starting fights in unholy presence so you can use your runes as fast as possible, then switch to blood presence while they replenish, then back to unholy again.

Theo

In regards to your comment



As of TBC, we only have 3 classes really capable of doing the 2h dps. Enh. Shammies, Wars, and Ret Pallies. I don't know of many enh. 2h shammies out there... so I'm not going to even go into their mindset. But for retadins and MS wars, it's pretty simple. 2h you have a really low hit cap so for the best raid dps, you need to get hit capped. It isn't that hard and raid specced ret pallies only need like 90hit rating or so thanks to precision. The problem with those specs is the damage is in form of bursts and it doesn't go well with raiding. Slow and steady wins the race. Wars only really have MS and Whirlwind as big hitters when raiding. Sure you can do heroic strike and spam rend/slam... but that brings it back to the rage thing. MS and Heroic strike will eat up your rage seeing as how they don't build it up. Heroic Strike is not instant either so i really dont like it for DPS on 2h. Rend is worthless pretty much and slam is ok. But the fact is about dps concepts for classes is the term... DPS-damage per second. The more attacks you can get in, the better. Warriors only excel at the dps as fury because of the DW and raw AP they get from it. They're not rage starved like a MS war. If a war is not getting attacked, they're going to have a hard time generating rage.

Now for a Ret pally standpoint... They have the same mechanics almost but they have the option of SoC (Alliance) or SoB(Horde-which is better) which kind of gives them some sustained dps. SoB is by far better than SoC... RNG is never a good thing when compared to consistency in SoB. Horde Ret pallies and DKs will fall in love with each other. In raiding, you'll be seeing that makeup quite often.

I'm really afraid that DW will affect DKs and force them to spec it. The diseases offer a steady stream of DPS to make up for the weapon swing timer. The DK strikes are instant and from what I can tell Blood Strike and Plague Strike will be the better contenders for staple DPS moves. Obliterate is massive dmg but takes off your diseases. If you're not Unholy then Obliterate will be a terrible waste of runes. Typically for melee classes, the white dmg surpasses the yellow. Rogues by far get higher ratio from white:yellow. I just don't want DKs to be forced to go DW to maximize dps... I've played plenty of my rogue and war... I really don't like the idea of having another character follow that concept. Theo, if you could detail the current diseases available to DKs... as they will determine their viability in raiding dps.