Dual-wield or 2-H: Where will you go in 3.2Follow

3.2 is bringing the revival of an old DK skill: Dual-wielding. The new talent: makes Dual-Wielding viable in a PvE environment. There are still two problems that discourage many people. The first is the hit penalty, decreasing the chance of our weapons to hit by 24% roughly(21% with 3 points in Nerves of Cold Steel). This could be fixed by gemming for hit, with the loss of Str and AP gems. Secondly, you will have to invest two extra points than a regular Frost DPS build, causing a bit of trouble constructing builds. I wanted to see the Zam DK community's opinion on this, and whether they would give this old skill ago in the Colosseum.

Edited, Jul 17th 2009 8:29am by Lichbourne

Too early to tell. Speculation does nothing but soak up time.

To clarify: The main issue with DW is that when a Strike misses it messes up the rune refresh timer and thus your rotation (or priority cycle).

Also: You cannot just gem enough hit to cap for DW in your 2-hand gear, you need to gear differently (including changing stat weights).

The talent is obviously for people who like to DW not necessarily for min/maxxers. Some folks prefer the look and vibe of DW and this is Blizzards answer to them. In no analysis yet is there a clear advantage of going DW over 2-hander and the frost tree continues to be reliant on abilities that depend entirely on weapon median damage for which 2-hand performs better, generally.

In the end it won't really matter if you're DW or 2-hand unless you're doing hard mode content. The game just isn't that hard anymore for folks to stress 10ap here or 22 crit there. Play what you like is the new theme and this talent is great for those who really want to swing two weapons around and still keep up on the meters.

It sounds good, but it really isn't worth it. Parry Gibbing may not increase damage taken by a lot with DW, but it does increase it. If the avoidance on weapons was really high, this could be worth it. But, it just isn't. I think you get something like 1% more avoidance at the loss of threat, with the best weapons in the game.

Even if they introduce this change, you still have to remember a few things. The hit cap is an obvious one. Beyond that are Rune Strikes, which are not currently included in this talent. For one, this will lower your RS threat by a lot (and your rune-related strikes/frost strikes by a small amount). Beyond that, you end up with fewer FSs, because RS will be sucking your RP with any tolerable level of avoidance.

And then you have to remember that FS can now be dodged and parried. This is a BIG issue for tanks. Add to that a vastly increased hit cap and FS isn't looking so pretty.

It is one thing for a DpS to DW--they can eliminate Parry, which helps a lot when gearing. And, while it certainly sucks to miss an attack, it is less detrimental for them to do that than a tank.

I'll keep my 8% for 2-handers if I can.

I know. I'm just pointing out that the "advantages" aren't nearly as good in the defensive stats as people imagine they are, making DW less appealing before you even factor in gear and threat problems.

People seem to be discussing the tank aspect of DW at this time. I was really asking whether DW DPS was viable in the eyes of the Zam community.

Even DWing, you shouldn't need more than 8% hit for your specials to land. It's white attacks that get penalized with DW.

Depending on the mechanics of the class (i.e. how much dmg is white vs. yellow and if you have any talents that scale well with white hits) you'll end up with a different valuation for hit. See Combat Rogue vs. Mutilate Rogue vs. Fury Warrior.

It may well end up that even with DW once you hit your special cap (same as DW as it is for 2H), hit is "useful" but not the strongest stat point for point.

When I first heard Blizzard describe the DK class, they said it was a 2h wielding tank class with the ability to dps. They later said while they would add DW as an option, it would never be better than using a 2h, and if it ever became better than 2h, they would fix it (like they did with shadowfrost). I love using a big 2h, and it makes me extremely happy to know that Blizzard has my back on the 2h vs. DW argument. It is also a safer bet to go with 2h, because if 2h is ever inferior, it won't ever be inferior for long.

Basically I don't care what changes they make to the DK class, I will always use a 2h. ***** DWing, leave that for shamans, rogues, and warriors.

Unless 2-handing suddenly starts doing some major sucking I'll stick with 2-handers. Less hassle to upgrade, look cooler, more bursty damage (which is good in PvP) and no need to level up a new weapon skill.

The hit cap for rogue specials (315) is different (more) than the current 2-hander auto-attack hit cap (263). In a raid, rogues (and other DW'ers) need to cap for specials to be effective for similar reasons that DKs will have to cap for strikes: Missing a special attack is a major DPS loss. DKs have the added incentive to not miss special attacks due to the rune refresh timers.


Also, news for you DW haters: As of right now Frost with BS spam out performed my deep Blood build....

.... no I'm not kidding... /cry

moar nerfs inc!

The Specials hit cap doesn't change for abilities that use Spell Hit (synonym for Specials Hit) regardless of how many weapons you're swingin', this includes all Strikes as far as I'm aware. This was covered in the thread above quite clearly.

Point is that you need to get to the specials cap for DW to become reasonable for raiding which is a bit more Hit Rating than we normally gear for. We'll either have to spend a bit more in gear itemization or talent points for Virulence. Both of which will remove those resources from straight-forward DPS stats or talents. With rotations as tight as they are to min/max, we'll have no choice but to invest in Hit.

From some limited testing on the PTR I'm seeing Blood as a slightly better sub-tree to DW Frost but the 3-point investment in Virulence would take some of the bite out of it and force us to go instead for Necrosis and, shudder to think, BCB!

Oh, wowwiki spell hit article, and the melee hit one.

How deep into Blood?

I am assuming an Oblit, FS, BS based rotation with loads of Death Runes from both trees, DRM and BotN ???!!!, used for BS spam.

I'm guessing maybe this or if not than dropping VotTW for HB. But having both VotTW and some TS helps with the need to gear for expertise.

Also would Unholy Presence be beneficial as DW usually does well with haste?

I still wouldn't want to tank with DW as a tak using a 2Her just looks cooler IMHO.

No, you are correct. Kind of trying to find what DK abilities use which. Makes a big difference for a DW. I would imagine at most gear levels a DW build more utilizing melee hit tables would win until the spell hit was achieved pretty much via raid buffs and gear, while not overly stressing hit either of course.



So 3 abilities use spell hit.

Melee weapon DW hit is 27% hit to be capped. (Source )

The rest are specials and capped at 8%. (Source )

So BS is 8% hit. Your awesome dagger you use off hand is 27% as is the other dagger in your main hand. Your IT is !7%.



edit:

I think some stuff isn't included in the spell hit on wowwiki. UB, Pest, BB and other similar spells I would imagine use spell hit. I could be wrong.

Edited, Jul 10th 2009 7:16am by Horsemouth

edit: changed the dagger example as i hit a wrong button. at first it was IT at 27% but that was wrong. IT is really 17%. As obviously I chose that example because it showed all 3 aspects of DK in one swoop. I initially entered in wrong and i beg your forgiveness.

Edited, Jul 11th 2009 7:00am by Horsemouth

I agree with that, until the statement "IT is 27%".

My understanding is that spell hit is not derived in any way from melee hit. This notion is corroborated by wowwiki spell hit. If wowwiki is incorrect or incomplete, is there a better source of info you could direct me to?

After playing hundreds of hours on an enhancement shaman, it sure seems like shock spells hit much more often than DW autoattacks.

Edit: also, wowwiki DK guide specifically says IT is capped at 17% which exactly matches ordinary spell hit rather than DW hit.

Edited, Jul 11th 2009 4:28am by CyanCentaur