Raid Problem?Follow

I was just thinking today, do DK's have an aggro drop? So far warriors are the only class who don't, and unless I missed something in the abilities, neither will Death Knights. Will this mean that Death Knights won't be brought into raids as often? I mean, obviously, arms/fury warriors do, and they can survive an aggro pull with their plate armor (so can DKs), but with the amount of damage it looks like DKs are are going to be putting out, both burst and constant, will we have a FD, vanish or the like?

Moonkin don't either.

The solution? Stop DPSing for a few seconds when you get close to the tanks aggro.

While I agree that threat and threat-dumping won't be much of an issue, I don't really see DK's as a class big on raiding unless there are some encounters in the game that can only be tanked by them. (Though looking at their list of abilities, that's looking doubtful.) They bring damage, but almost zero utility to a raid beyond their improved Presence auras, so unless their damage is huge, I am talking Rogue-like in potential... as said, probably only one or two per raid tops. A Blood Knight with his constant healing could serve as a sort of Shadow Priest for a melee group, and 6% extra health from a Frost Knight might be key on a min/max fight like Brutallis, but beyond that... they're even worse off than Ret Pallies are.

Doesn't paly Bubble drop agro?

Surprised that no one has mentioned the talent to reduce threat by 25% when in Blood or Unholy presence (Subversion, Blood tree).

Icy Touch, a group +10% Str/10sec buff proc, and healing other party members for 4% of the damage they deal (plus Rune Taps) make DK's a decent team player for raids IMO.

We'll just have to wait and see how much things like Heart Strike affect raid bosses though.

/sigh ... When are people going to learn that the bubbles do NOT drop aggro, they just make you immune so any targets turn their attention away from you? When the bubble wears off you still have the same amount of aggro you did before, greater if you were doing anything while in the bubble. /sigh ...

Yeah, nobody brings Affliction Warlocks or Arms Warriors to raids. Raid-wide damage boosts are terrible!

Don't forget those horrible Shamen.

...is a deep Blood talent only.

As stated, this is the primary PvE role of a DK, being a melee Shadowpriest. You'd have to give that up, and a load of DPS, and +10% group STR, and the joy that is Dancing Rune Weapon, just in order to sink 8 points into an ability that is inferior to comparable baseline abilities for classes that dont have to give up anything for them. Arms Warriors and Afflic locks do tons of damage in addition to their utility and damage boosting.

Well...dunno what to say to that.

We bring an Arms Warrior along and he makes top-5 in MH, granted he has awesome gear.

Just to state the obvious ... With ten classes to fill 10/25 raiding slots it seems obvious that on average no class will have more than 1-2 slots. So what exactly is your point Gaudion ?

Logic would indicate that with 10 classes to fill 25 spots, each class would have on average 2.5 spots.

I know, I know; that's crazy-talk! But it's true.



Quite. Not doing as much damage is not the same as doing no damage. People bring Affliction Warlocks and Arms Warriors for solid DPS and the raid debuffs, not because they're top damage (they are, situationally, but that's partially a factor of who they're grouped with; a Retadin in a group with an Enhancement Shaman, Feral Druid and DPS Warrior does pretty well too).

While Blizzard has said they're junking the trees anyway, the damage you get out of Unholy (or speccing that deep into Unholy, anyway) would have to be extremely low for it to not be worthwhile to bring one to a 25-man raid. 10-mans, of course, are a different story; raid-debuffs aren't nearly as effective because there aren't enough people to benefit off them, but in a 25-man an additional 9% magic damage is amazing.

Incidentally, the "but it's not as good as a baseline spell (CoE) qqqqq" is a retarded argument. Faerie Fire and CoReck aren't as good as Sunder Armor either, but they stack; the question is not "Should we bring a Warlock or a DK?" but rather "Having brought a Warlock, how can we stack that magic damage even further?". Just because another spell/class/whatever also increases the magic damage is not an argument for not bringing another massive debuff.

Actually, technically, raids won't need any of them unless they need one or two to tank and/or off-tank. All of their buffs/debuffs do not create a demand for their inclusion the way one needs a tank or healer or a Shackle or whatever. That said, though they're not necessary, there is still plenty of reason to bring one, but no more than one, of any given Death Knight spec. The problem is when you try to include more than one of any given spec. Two Unholy Knights, for instance. Ok... Why? Try to sell that to me on any argument that isn't, "They do amazing DPS." Odds are, I'm not buying.


The problem is, the real world does not work like that. People don't divy up raid spots based on equal opportunity. If you want to see all of the raiding content and reach the very, very end of the game, you min/max. You can take two-to-four Combat Rogues or Destruction Warlocks without a penalty because even though their buffs/debuffs don't stack, they do raid-topping DPS. Conversely, if you take two Blood Knights, one of their buffs goes completely to waste and you are left with just their DPS. If you take two Unholy Knights, one of their buffs goes completely to waste and you are left with just their DPS. If you take two of any spec of Death Knight, they have zero compensation beyond their DPS. This is further compounded by the fact that the class offers no innate buffs/debuffs. They can't even switch to a different Presance aura because all of the Imp. X Presance talents are so deep in their respective trees.

I'm not saying Death Knights are unique in this way. There are plenty of classes in that same boat now. As I brought up earlier, Ret Pallies. Most raids take one per raid tops. But that is the way they are. Hence my statement about their DPS potential actively reflecting their numbers in raids. That, SelinaKorain, was my point. It was just a statement. An opinion. I really don't understand why this is so hard to comprehend or why everyone's getting their panties in a knot over it.


My argument is that any given type of Knight will not stack with themselves for the most part. So it's going to come down to their DPS. As for the comparison of Warlock's debuff vs. Death Knight's debuff... well, yeah, there's no point in arguing if you can take both. But if you can't (a situation less likely to occur in a 25-man but highly probable in a 10-man), which one are you going to take? The debuffs are nearly identicle, so again, it would come down to the class' DPS.

Edited, Aug 13th 2008 2:26am by Gaudion