Blood will be the ONLY Tank SpecFollow

Which would be Blood DPS or Frost Tanking =P

How much does Unholy DPS out do Blood DPS at higher gear levels?

Nah, that can't be it. If you hit an off-target with HS on Heroic Saurfang, you will get aggro and he will hit you and getting hit by a blood beast = wipe. Besides, they have -90% damage taken from ALL aoe damage, iirc. I wouldn't really know why Blood does better there - I know it's sometimes a better choice because the self heals come in handy (you get a mark that deals ********* of damage to you and on heroic healers basically have to heal through it the entire fight long), but as to why it's that high specifically, no clue. It would just suggest that on a pure tank&spank fight blood is pretty equal to unholy.

I haven't been playing my Blood DPS DK much lately, not sure why exactly. Anyway picked him back up a few days ago after a few months of only being used to do dailys, so he still had T8 chest and head with a GS of 4823 and properly gemmed/ enchanted(just for reference really).

I was grouping with rogues, mages, other DK's of various specs, and basically every other kind of DPS out there (except feral druids....rare beast nowadays) and was destroying every single one of them on the DPS meters and they had GS higher than mine by a few hundred points sometimes.

I will say that I know how to play my spec, but I can't say whether the other members lack of skill, caring or intelligence left them behind on the meters, but it certainly wasn't gear (well I didn't inspect them I just saw their GS and assumed they might know what they were doing, and improper gearing goes with lack of caring).

I don't raid, and I don't really plan to, just don't have the time really at least I think I don't, how long do raids take usually from starting from zero and getting it together to disbanding at the end? Anyway, I like my spec and plan to keep it because it's how I do the best. I may change at some point but who knows.

Point well made and well taken. That being said though, I really don't plan on Raiding much if at all so me being Blood will benefit me more than being Unholy because of how constant my damage will be compared to the ramp up of Unholy and therefore allow for faster Heroic dungeon runs. Besides I like the Blood playstyle, the rotation is simple which makes trash easy to dispatch and bosses are straight forward, and I can feel good about myself beating the crap out of others on the meters (everyone likes seeing their name at the top, be honest).

Once Cata comes out I may switch to something else, possibly Frost <shrug> will depend. I might try Frost out between now and then just to say I've tried all three DPS specs.

On this same note, I'd also like to say that I think you hit a chord regarding your spec/ cooldown comment. Skill is definitely a big part of your potential but a biger part I think is the spec you choose and your skill with it.

Druids for example have Moonkin and feral for DPS choices, and anyone who knows how to read can do great DPS as a Boomkin, very little skill involved with the spec, but you can still see a difference between those with skill and those without. Feral on the other hand is so skill dependant that regardless of how you're geared, unless you know wtf your doing as a cat, your DPS will blow, but if you are skilled your DPS will be pretty freakin sweet. and DK's are the same, but with a less steep learning curves for the spec you choose, it's really more of a flavor type thing, and I prefer the flavor of Blood...no I'm not a vampire.

Ignorant or sarcastic?



It's not that they're making Blood the tank spec, it's that they're limiting the class and turning it into Warriors with spells, lolcrap. If they'd made Unholy the dedicated tank tree I would've been "nerd!raging" about that too. Clearly this is where you don't get it, considering your final line:





Actually no. I don't live in America and ******** laws don't apply to me. Besides, if I "ragequit" over a stupid change in a company, they can't fire me since I just quit, albeit in a rage. Though more likely I would've sued the company for forcing changes upon me with the sole purpose of getting me fired. I'd probably win as well - and get some air time.

I guess some ******** laws apply to me after all. All the good ones.

Edited, Apr 14th 2010 1:52pm by Mazra

I was only really shocked that they chose Blood as the tree when, from the beginning, they had a vision or idea of frost = tank because of how the presences were laid out.

All of the tank specs can tank, some better than others in different situations, and people chose Blood mostly because it had higher effective health pools with the stamina buffs and the self healing mechanic so a 40k Health tank really had like 45+k because of how he could heal through some of the damage coming in. With the trend for higher level WotLK instances being More Health > More Defense, Blood seemed to win the battle. Each of the trees have a tank talent, Blood = Will of the Necropolis, Frost = Unbreakable Armor, Unholy = Bone Shield (although DPS specs take it too). Frost was an easier tanking spec to learn and use in Heroics, has good single target threat (not as good as blood) and superior AoE threat as well as the talent that improved your Frost presence....the tanking presence. Also on another note... the 51 point talents in Blood and Unholy, DRW and Gargoyle, are purely DPS talents, whereas the one from Frost, Howling Blast, is used very effectively as an AoE tanking talent as well as a good AoE DPS talent.

Making blood the tanking tree just doesn't make sense to me. If they can move talents around from one tree to another which they have discussed doing already, making Frost the tanking tree while adding the tanking talents from Blood and Unholy just seems more natural to me. Make Unholy the DW spec, put in ToT, and make Blood the 2H DPS spec.

A point which cant be stated enough. I still have the Skada log from a Deconstructor 25 run where my DK came second on the charts with a gearscore of 4900. The person who beat me had 5900 so I wasnt ashamed.
At this time I was Frost Spec, before 3.3.3, when Frost was vastly inferior to the other trees.

And to the people who say "I dont like Blood Tanking so I wont play the next expansion" please realise that the next expansion will basically be a new game. The way blood plays could be completely changed. And the way healing is being changed there is a good chance that the self healing from Blood will be a huge part of the tanking. They say it will take roughly three of the Healers largest heals to completely refill a tank, so in that kind of a situation a tank who can heal himself for 20% every time runes are off cooldown is a huge advantage.

Quick quibble.

If a healer heals someone to full with 3 greater heals, their heal is in fact more effective than a 20% self heal.

Thank you, Amanda! And now back to Steve for the weather!

I actually thought about it as I typed it out, but figured I couldn't be bothered editing it. I still doubt they'll let a 20% self-heal exist if Priests only get 33% heals as their greatest heal. Basically you'd only need a Renew/Rejuvenation/Riptide on the tank and he'd fix the rest himself.

Moz, I understand their reasons for going with the Blood tree, but I reserve the right to not like it - not one bit!

Edited, Apr 16th 2010 5:28pm by Mazra

Having played around with my Death Knight for a couple of days now as tank, I just want to say this:

If they don't move Hungering Cold, Howling Blast and Lichborne into the Blood tree, I will kill someone. Seriously, those three spells are what make the game for me. Having so much control over an AOE situation makes heroics fun to tank - which is alpha and omega for me, otherwise I get fed up with it and it becomes a chore, causing me to eventually abandon the class in disgust.

Alone the fact that once you pop DnD, you're not out of AOE options is enough for me to love the tree. I can toss down a DnD and still have ranged AOE options available in the form of Howling Blast (glyphed). I can round up mobs and use Hungering Cold to either AOE interrupt (meaning I get two of those, since I'm a Blood Elf) or use it to incapacitate running mobs.

Also, Moz, you need to spec Frost for uber heroics farming, seriously. Hungering Cold ice blocks count as 'frozen' targets, meaning you get the Shatter effect on them. Huzzah!

Fire's AoE is truly unimpressive in Heroics. Or, more specifically, it is only slightly more damage for a much higher mana cost. It's good on paper, but terrible in practice--things die too fast for it.

For the past week I've been Fire on my Mage. In heroics, I think I've had maybe 3 LBs actually explode on trash mobs. My AoE when trying to use them has been abyssmal.

And my DpS with 3 FS casts is lower than it was as Arcane in the same instances. The thing is, as Fire spec, your Flamestrikes aren't really more impressive.

Arcane buffs that go to FS: +3% Damage, +3% Spell Damage, +6% haste, 15% of Intellect as Spell Power, +3% crit damage. Add to that increased spirit which translates to crit from Molten Armor.

Now note that ALL of these buffs also buff Blizzard.

Fire buffs that go to FS: 40% damage/4 seconds from crits, +6% crit, +3% damage, +6% crit (again), +10% fire damage, +3% crit. Of these, only +3% crit and +3% damage apply to Blizzard (I may have missed one, to be fair).

Now, let's look at the abilities used in either (or both) rotations:

FS9 is 873 to 1067 damage with 780 over 8 seconds in a small area, with a cast time of 2 seconds. The initial burst gets 23.57% of spell power, and the DoT gets 48.8%.

FS8 is 688 to 842 damage with 620 over 8 seconds in a small area, with a cast time of 2 seconds. The initial burst gets 23.57% of spell power, and the DoT gets 48.8%.

FS 7 is 471 to 575 damage with 424 over 8 seconds in a small area, with a cast time of 2 seconds. The initial burst gets 23.57% of spell power, and the DoT gets 48.8%.

Blizzard is 3408 damage in a large area, channeled over 8 seconds. The entire spell gets 114.29% of spell power as damage.

For this (very simple) comparison, we will be using my Mage. I have 2200 SP in Fire with 20% chance to crit (both rounded down slightly), 1230 Intellect and 600 spirit.

That would give my spells the following values in Fire spec:
FS9 = [((970+519)+(780+1073.6))*1.13]/2 = 1888.23 DpS on a non crit. When it crits, it becomes: [1.4(((2*(970+519))+(780+1073.6))*1.13]/2 = 3402.882 DpS I do not recall if the tics can be criticals or not, but if they can, then we can add 600 to each value (non-crit is 2488.23 overall DpS and a crit is 4K overall DpS).

So, yes, it is decent.

However, take Arcane (same gear, but higher stats due to talents):
***Note, I AM factoring in the 3% from Arcane Empowerment, because we are considering Heroics so it is perfectly conceivably that you may have no one else in the party applying the buff.***

*Arcane's spell power for this comparison is 2385 due to the 15% Int->SP*

FS9 = [((970+562)+(780+1164))*1.06]/1.88 = 1959.9 on a non crit. If the DoTs can crit, we add 660 to this value. If the main strike is a crit, the damage is 2823.66 (with another 660 if the DoT effect can crit).

Even before I go on, it is clear that Fire's AoE is NOT that superior to Arcane's. Fire will only crit 4.x% more of the time than Arcane. My mage had 32% crit as Arcane. So, assuming 32% vs. 36% active crit on FS...

(1888.23)*.64 + (3402.882)*.36 = 1208.467 + 1225.04 = 2433.505 DpS expected from FS over an entire dungeon, if each casts's DoT can run it's course. If the DoT can crit, this is 3K.

With Arcane, it is:

1959.9 *.7 + 2823.66 *.3 = 1371.91 + 847.08 = 2219 DpS from Arcane for the whole run, assuming the Dot can run it's course. With DoT crits, it is 2879 DpS.

So, a whole spec change has only a 121 DpS difference between the two main spells (Fire will have a smaller DpS boost over Arcane as you downrank).

However, Arcane manages to get 1100 or so DpS out of Blizzard, when Fire could only get 960 DpS out of it.

So, we have two options. Fire can do FSx3 and then spam Fireballs or do FSx3 and use Blizzard. Living Bomb isn't an option as it will almost certainly not explode in anything but the Frozen Halls instances. If they choose the first one, Arcane ends up with SUPERIOR AoE DpS. If they choose the latter, they just SLIGHTLY edge out Arcane by being quite a bit more Mana inefficient.

In practice, Fire just isn't the better AoE spec *in heroics*. If you have raid encounters where you can place LB on adds, though, or the trash doesn't die in under 12 seconds, then Fire is superior.

Not to mention that you should see a 2-3K DpS drop from Arcane to Fire, minimum, on bosses due to the loss of CDs (as has been discussed in this thread, I believe, in relation to DKs). If you have a +magic damage buff from DKs, Druids or Locks, that can go up to 4K. Yes. I HAVE done 9K DpS on bosses in Heroics with my Arcane spec due to CDs lasting nearly the whole fight. Once I would have gotten 10K, but those skeleton adds on Prince whatever-his-name-is increased my fight time. :(

Best I've done with Fire is 5.5K so far. Oh, and I was hitting 9-10K BEFORE 2pc T10. I switched to Fire very shortly after getting it and hadn't really tested Arcane with it.

But this wasn't off topic at all--nor was I bored. >.<

Pfff, just spec Arcane, spam Arcane Explosion and pull in 4k like the Mage in Culling of Stratholme earlier.

And Poldaran, self-heals or not, I won't like it.

Edited, Apr 17th 2010 4:52am by Mazra