Aeryn

Personally, I find it a bit irritating that all seemingly important damage reduction talents are scattered all over the trees. And if you were to take most of them (23/15/33 or so), I wonder if you'd still be able to function sufficiently in your other tanking role: building threat.

Rumor has it that that Blizzard didn't want one single tanking tree similar to Paladins, Druids or Warriors. Supposed that's true, it might mean that you could (have to?) choose any one tree with maybe minor branching two another for adequate threat building and damage mitigation.

 

Adrammelech

I would say the reason is "Blood Rune Mastery" the tooltip doesn't state the chance to proc, but halving the cooldown of your blood runes for 5 seconds allows you to spam more blood strikes. It would seem like the cycle is plague strikes to put up the debuff, spam blood strikes, dump runic power into death coil and repeat.

 

Lurker

I'd really like someone to check my math, since I'm used to spells and not melee theorycraft. I think I got the Normalization formula right (off of WoWwiki), but I'm not sure how to average damage with crit chance (e.g, Average damage: 1857*1.33(crit chance?) = 2469/5 = 493 DPS)? I thought I saw that somewhere before. So, it's entirely possible this could be a page full of math failure. :P

Modifiers for 53/0/18

BASE VALUES - I ganked a DPS warrior's stats, so these might be higher or lower, depending. He's late T5/some T6, which is probably where you'll be when your Naxx geared.
Assumes ~12000 Armor, 550 (150+400) Strength, 25% Crit, 1320 AP (+550 raw AP)
Weapon: 386 - 580, 3.5speed, 138 DPS *Cat's Edge, basically.

MODIFIERS LIST
Global
+15% damage (total or physical?)
+5% Critical Strike chance
75% of total Threat
6% Damage Dealt = HP in Blood Presence
15% Physical and Shadow damage after Critical Strikes (can always assume this is up after a point)
+16% total Strength
+3% total Stamina
+15% total damage when above 75% Hp.
+20% Physical damage dealt, +5% averaged. (Hysteria)
Double damage dealt to target (not by DK) for 10 seconds at 100 Runic Power. Averaged to +20% damage. (Runic Blade)
??% Chance on hit to reduce Blood Rune Cooldown by 5 seconds. (Blood Rune mastery)
20 AP per 1000 Armor. (Bladed Armor)
+50% armor for up to 12s at 100 Runic Power. Averaged to 10% armor (13200 avg, 18000 for 12s, or 264 AP (+24 avg.) +360 AP during ability). (Icebound Fortitude)
*Might be better not to average these, for cooldown stacking.

Blood Strike Base (60% weapon damage + 164 per disease) - 1B
15% Total damage PER DISEASE (30% for two diseases)
3% critical Strike chance
+50% critical strike damage bonus
20% chance to make Death Coil take no Runic Power

Plague Strike (Weapon damage + 72, +704 Shadow over 12 Seconds) - 1B 1U
3% Critical Strike chance
+50% critical strike damage bonus
+9 seconds for Dot.
+15% Weapon damage
+150% Runic Power Generated

Degeneration (60% weapon damage + 182 shadow damage(?) over 21 seconds) - 1U
+9 seconds for Dot.
+150% Runic Power Generated

Death Strike (weapon damage)
No specific modifiers

Mark of Blood on self
Healing done +5%, up to 300

Death Coil - 1230 Shadow Damage
+15% damage dealt (1414 at 100 Runic power, 717 at 50 Runic Power, 353 at 25 Runic Power, etc.)

AFTER TALENTS

Character sheet after talents:

Strength: 638 (adds 176 AP)
Attack Power: (1320 + 240 + 176 + 550) = 2286 (+163 DPS)
Crit Chance: 25% + 5% (global) = 30%. 33% for Blood/Plague Strike.
Crit Damage (Physical): 2.5
Physical damage multiplier: (Presence)1.15*(Bloody Vengeance)1.15*(Hysteria Avg)1.05*(Blood Gorged)1.15*(Dancing Runeblade Avg)1.20 = 1.92
Physical damage without Averages: 1.52
Spell damage multiplier: 1.15 (Bloody Vengeance)

*Strikes done without Hysteria/Dancing cooldown averages

Blood Strike: weapon(386 + 580)/2 = 483 + 537 (Normalized) = 1020 * 0.6 = 612 + (2 disease bonus) 328 = 940 * 1.52 * 1.3 (2 Disease Imp. BS) = 1857 (Average Hit) * 2.5 = 4643 (Average Crit)
Average damage: 1857*1.33 (crit chance?) = 2469 / 5 = 493 DPS
---
Plague Strike: weapon(386 + 580)/2 = 483 + 537(Normalized) = 1020 * 0.75 (+15% Wpn Damage) = 765 + 72 = 837 * 1.52 = 1272 (Average Hit) * 2.5 = 3180 (Average Crit)
Average damage: 1272*1.33(crit chance?) = 1691/10 = 169 DPS
Dot: 704/12 = 58.6 per second * 21(Epidemic time) = 1232 * 1.15(B.Vengeance) = 1416/7 = 202 per three seconds (67 dps) *Does not include AP scaling of spells
---
Degeneration: weapon(386 + 580)/2 = 483 + 537(Normalized) = 1020 * 0.6 = 612 * 1.52 = 930 (Avg Hit) * 2(crit) = 1860 (Avg Crit)
Average Damage: 930*1.30(Crit chance?) = 1209/10 = 120 DPS
Dot: 182/21 = 8.6 per second * 30(Epidemic time) = 260 * 1.15(B.Vengeance) = 300/10 = 30 per three seconds (10 dps) *Does not include AP scaling of spells
---
Death Coil at 100 Runic Power = 1414 * 1.15(B.Vengeance) = 1626/10 = 162 DPS
---
Death Strike: weapon (386 + 580)/2 = 483 + 537(Normalized) = 1020 * 1.52 = 1550 (Avg Hit) * 2 = 3100 (Avg crit)
Average Damage: 1550*1.3(Crit Chance?) = 2015/10 = 201 DPS
---
Auto Attack: weapon[(386 + 580)/2 = 483 + (163*3.5=570) = 1053 (Avg Auto) * 2 = 2106 (avg Crit)
Average damage: 1053*1.3(Crit chance?) = 1368/3.5 = 391 DPS

BS + PS + Degen + DS + DC + Auto DPS:
493 + 169 + 67 + 120 + 10 + 162 + 201 + 391 = 1613 DPS

Physical DPS:
493 + 169 + 120 + 201 + 391 = 1374 DPS

Blood presence HPS (apparently includes Magic damage dealt too)
1613*0.06 = 96 HP/s, 100 HP/s with self Mark of Blood
*Didn't do Rune Tap HPS, because we don't know final rank's value.

DPS During Hysteria/Dancing:
1374*2*1.2 = 3297 DPS * 10s = 32976 total damage. Damage dealt from 10 seconds left on Hysteria: 16480. Total after 20s: 49456 (2472 DPS)

Hysteria Only
1374*1.2 = 1648 DPS * 20s = 38700 total

*These totals are before Armor or any Damage reductions applied, which should just be (DPS*0.xx). This also does not include Icy Fortitude, which happens to increase DPS because of Bladed Armor. That may or may not get used in this rotation, since it would kill Runic Power for Death Coil.

10s Rotation - 3B/3U
00:00.0 Plague Strike - 1B(1)/1U(4) restored at 0:10.0, 2B(2,3)/2U(5,6) available.
00:01.5 Degen - 1U(5) restored at 0:11.5, 2B(2,3)/1U(6) available.
00:03.0 Blood Strike (up at 00:08.0) - 1B(2) restored at 0:13.0, 1B(3)/0U available.
00:04.5 Death Coil@100 Runic Power. Next after PS/Degen/BS, or 14.5, so about every 10 seconds.
00:06.0 Death Strike - 1U(6) - 1U(6) restored at 00:16
00:07.5 DS GCD finished. Lose 0.5s here; you'll be able to spam the Blood Strike key. Using any ability would delay the rotation.
00:08.0 Blood Strike (up at 00:13.0) - 1B(3) restored at 0:18.0, 0B/0U available.
00:09.5 BS GCD finished. Lose 0.5s here; you'll be able to spam the Plague Strike key). Using any ability would delay the rotation.
00:10.0 Gain 1B(1)/1U(5). Plague Strike - 1B/1U restored at 00:20.0

 

Baern

Blood Strike has a 5 second cooldown.

Also, I think the 20% chance of Blood Strike causing Death Coil to cost 0 Runic Power is to force you to have a more flexible rotation, as are the increased activation time talents. I would expect that staying at 100 runic power at any one time will be detrimental to your dps, other things like Degeneration DoT lasting 21seconds + 9 seconds will mess with rotations, although in order to make sure every Blood Strike has degen up you'll probably just end up replacing 2 out of 3 Degen with Death Strike. Would that fit? Plague Strike DoT would last 21 seconds too, talented, so you'd have a spare GCD then too, if you Death Striked you'd be left with an extra Blood Rune, which you could then Blood Tap and Death Strike again, but doing so might delay your Blood Strike. You could also Hysteria when it's available.

As well as all of that, by going 18 into Unholy you can't get Nerves of Cold Steel from Frost (5% melee hit). Although you lose 5% Strength, you gain 5% hit and allow yourself to pick up Frozen Runeblade to compensate a little, assuming swapping Runes is simplistic enough that you'll be able to swap in a Frost rune to activate it, then swap it out again before bosses.

I don't know, it's all fairly complicated and it's not helped by the fact that I am rubbish with rotations and maths. I does appear that DK dps will be at least fine at the moment though, once you add in Battle Shout and Totems/Unleashed Rage certainly.

 

Feorthas

Eh... It's not a given that Frozen Runeblade will even be useful for DK tanks as we do not know whether the Frozen 'Buff' will overwrite Windfury in any way.

If I were doing a Blood/Frost build, I'd probably try something like the following: 53/18/0 Build

Optional: Swap 4% parry for 16 AP/1000 armor (if you want/need to OT, the parry will be vastly more useful than the AP, so I kept it in.)

The only real downside that I can see to that spec is the lack of some PvP Specific or hardcore tanking (5% HP with Frost Presence, for example) talents that are available at that level; however, getting access to chromatic runes is definitely going to be useful in a PvE Environment as you'll be able to get more bang for the buck out of your 6 runes. Admittedly, swapping one Blood or Unholy rune for a Frost rune so that you can be the on Icy Touch duty--similar to warriors being on TClap duty at times--is a steep price to pay but there's at least a chance you'll be able to compensate for it with some procs here and there.

Of course, depending on how easy it is to hitcap yourself in WotLK, or if 2H is the 'way to go' for DKs--both DPS and Tanking-wise--I'd probably go something like this 53/0/18 build, which is most likely very similar to what has already been posted.

 

Baern

I was/am assuming it will work like Seal of Righteousness, although obviously if it works like Flametongue it's use is drastically reduced. I didn't really think about it, but the name suggests it will probably work like Flametongue, which would be disappointing.

I think 5% hit is a pretty big deal even with 2h, with Imp. FF on a target you'd only need 1% hit to cap (0 for Draenei?), meaning you can drop almost all the +hit on your gear and concentrate on other things. It could be that you can't avoid +hit on your gear, though, in which case you may be better spending points elsewhere and avoiding Frost entirely, for a DPS build anyway.

Also, Scent of Blood looks to be a PvP talent, and I'm completely unsold on Heart Strike in a raiding build. I would drop Scent of Blood for Blade Barrier (assuming it's not too difficult to get rid of all Runes once every 15 seconds), and then put the deflection talents back into Bladed Armor, along with the point from Heart Strike. Although unless Blade Barrier has some hidden cooldown, or it is much more difficult to use up all 6 runes than I am imagining, then it looks too powerful for a 3 point talent.

 

Lurker

I think subbing Deathstrikes for a 1:2 degen/DS would improve DPS, since Degen itself leaves much to be desired at face value. When you refresh the Degen disease, you wouldn't be doing anything requiring disease stacks, so it'd refresh perfectly with a 30s duration and 10s rune recharge, if it even fell for a split second. Good point. One note against it is that Death Strike doesn't get a bonus from Dance of the dead, like Degen does. I don't have hard numbers on what abilities produce how much Runic Power, so that's still up in the air. On the other hand however, DS probably generates its own Runic Power.

Plague Strike is still pretty kick ass though, so that'd be debatable in regards to subbing DS. Even using the Unholy and Blood rune seperately, for DS and Rune Tap, for instance, you could still refresh the dot in time, or within half a second of each other (think it's the latter). It's also in the same boat in regards to Dance of the Dead.

Also, currently in the Alpha, there's no way to change Runes from the latest I've read (and no respecs, which is annoying). I also believe there's talk that you won't be able to do it anywhere; likely only at a special NPC (not the trainer, at least for now, but that would make the most sense), so mid instance switching is out for now.

2H Blood won't need too much hit for bosses. That should be taken care of with gear easily. Dual wielding, if it proves good for damage, definitely might need that talent though (and dual wielding would benefit more from Frozen Runeblade). However, it's a weapon enchant from what I can tell, which means no Windfury totem, unless that's also changed.

 

Feorthas

Good point; I'd definitely reposition those points into Bladed Armor and then ponder keeping points in parry or maxing armor.

As far as the higher-tier defensive talents go (Blade Barrier, Spell Deflection, etc.) I'd probably avoid them unless I knew that I'd need to offtank something on a regular basis and, even then, probably avoid Spell Deflection in favor of maxing blade barrier and keeping as many points in DPS talents as possible.

 

Baern

Looking more individually at talents, and having way too much time on my hands in my post exam period, Midnight Sun looks very weak when compared to the deep spell damage reducing talents in Prot/Prot/Feral. Improved Defensive stance, for example, is 6% to all magic damage for 3 talent points, Spell Warding is 4%/2 points and the new (admitedly higher tier) druid talent is 3 points for 10% armor/10% spell reduction.

While I understand that there will be some differences, I don't see why it can't be made all schools. It could be that the DK is deemed adept enough at combating spell damage and it is simply filler, I don't know, but I would guess at significant amounts of the spell damage in WotlK being Frost and Shadow, and if that is the case why not just make it all schools? Or perhaps it is due to pvp considerations.

Other than that, the problems I have are more with the tree layouts than the talents, going deep frost seemingly forcing you not to take some of the better tanking talents, for example, but I expect them to change before release so it's perhaps not worth considering in too much detail right now.

Frozen Runeblade did get me thinking though, and I even had a look at it.
Couple of things I have noted.
Currently, it appears as though it should be ranked. In fact, the only rank of Frozen Runeblade (rank 1) available in the spell data calls upon (not sure if that is the correct terminology to be using) the proc spell of rank 1 flametongue weapon. Again, I'm not sure if I've explained this as well as I could, but in effect Frozen Runeblade rank 1 is Flametongue rank 1.
Frozen Runeblade rank 1 - http://urlshort.com/wotlk/site/views...?spellid=49142
Flametongue rank 1 - http://urlshort.com/wotlk/site/views...p?spellid=8024
And the 8026 spell in question - http://urlshort.com/wotlk/site/views...p?spellid=8026

From this I would say it is safe to assume Frozen Runeblade is unfinished in it's current alpha form. It either will become ranked and be Flametongue for DKs, as in an identicle spell, or something else. Until the spell is finished then speculation on it's use is somewhat limited. I would question the logic of having it scale with spell damage though, I would honestly like to see all DK abilities scale with AP, and the Impurity talent done away with.

But anyway! The reason I decided to look into it was simple, I wanted to see if there was any chance of it being an alternative to Windfury. Obviously Flametongue isn't competitive with Shaman windfury weapon, but the totem only works on white attacks, so it might not be quite so clear, especially if (as I believe is correct?) regular melee attacks don't generate Runic Power.
A few things aren't known at the moment, how much extra damage Frost Strike will cause with Frozen Runeblade for example, although if you were fitting it into a DPS build you probably won't have that anyway. It's worth noting anyway.

Reason I wanted to look at was thinking about an extra melee and the problem of needing an Enhancement shaman. Not that Unleashed Rage and SoE totem aren't huge anyway, but it was simply to consider if a DK would suffer as badly as, for example, a ret pally or a dps warrior without a shaman.

Anyway. Using Cat's Edge and stealing the rotation from above, and the forumlae too for that matter, basically, because I'm only looking for a "rough" idea, as I really don't expect it to be better than WF, or even competitive, I just want to see if it could close the gap somewhat.

Using 70 seconds, so 7 cycles and 20 (well, 21) unhasted auto attacks, we would expect to see 4 Windfury procs. Maths is not my strongest point, but with 445 extra AP (31ish extra dps?) you'd hit for 1162 on average non-crit, x1.3 for crits and the average WF attack is 1510. Now, I assume mulitply this (and this seems to be missing on your calculations Lurker, I am unsure if it is or I am overlooking something? If I've missed it my maths is even more broken than it probably already is!) 1.45 for Blood Pressence, Blood Gorged and Bloody Vengence.
So, 1510x1.45 = 2190
2190x4 = 8760 extra damage over 70 seconds, or 125 dps.

A note here, I'm assuming it would just be a 1.45 multiplier, but could it be 1.15x1.15x1.15? It doesn't make a huge amount of difference, with the latter method resulting in 131 dps rather than 125.

My maths could be screwy, and the other glaring problem is that WF scales, so in a melee group with Battle Shout, Unleashed Rage, SoE totem and elixers/food/flasks/scrolls and so on, WF will obviously do much more damage. Even with any damage reduction through armor 125 dps is clearly an under estimate, but still.

Frozen Runeblade would, assuming no misses/dodges (which seems fair as I have done the same for WF), hit 20 times from regular melee attacks in the 70 seconds. Each 10 second cycle contains 5 melee strikes, adding a further 35 attacks.
So, in ideal circumstances with the above rotation, you would hit 55 times with Frozen runeblade effect. As this is ideal, I will forget about 16% full resists, and various partial resists, but they would have to be considered.
Anyway, in order to reach the (unrealistically low) WF damage of 8760, each proc would need to do 160 damage on average.

The current max rank of Flametongue would do 122 damage per attack with 0 spell damage, and if Frozen Runeblade were to do the same then it would contribute 96ish dps. This would seemingly get a 1.15 multiplier from Blood Pressence, meaning 140 damage per attack.
Couple of things I haven't added here, is that Frozen Runeblade would be affected by CoElements, Misery and possibly Winter's Chill (frost mages might not be popular at the bleeding edge, but they're still fairly common even in PvE), as well as a number of Frost talents depending on build. I only feel comfortable including Black Ice, however, as if we're stripping away all external buffs from WF it is only fair we do the same for Frozen Runeblade.
So, 147 per attack then, still 13 less than (the low estimate of) WF.

At this point it looks as though the two are close, but obviously that isn't actually true. WF not only scales much faster from external sources (AP buffs) but also with the DKs own abilities. This scaling changes if you spec deep frost, however, with Frozen Runeblade gaining from Tundra Stalker and Frost Strike, and WF will actually scale less quickly through talents than Frozen runeblade. If it scales with Spell damage, then deep Unholy will cause it to scale even faster, due to Impurity and Rage of Rivendare. Theoretically, Frozen Runeblade could scale 15% through Blood Pressence + 10% through Tundra/Rivendare, 5% through Misery, 13% through Malediction CoElements and 5% through Black Ice, along with some extra damage through frost strike.

I will take another look, and probably not bore everyone with pointless speculation that time, when the Frozen Runeblade ability is updated.
At low-mid range gear levels or low levels of buffs (10 men perhaps), though, I would not be entirely suprised to see Frozen Runeblade out perform Windfury. Maybe even at higher gear levels for Frost or Unholy spec. A lot will, of course, depend on it's scaling.

Upon a little reflection, I see no reason why it shouldn't be competitive, or better even. There is a large enough thread on it already, but I see no reason why a melee group should require a enhancement shaman any more than a ret pally, or any other number of individual melee specs.

 

Raika

Perhaps if blizzard wants to keep with the Dual Wielding they will make the strikes function like storm strike for dual wielding. However, this raises all kinds of other questions about how the different modifiers would change when hitting with both weapons.
I have to say these trees are the least straight forward trees I've seen. It seems like they want to keep options open.

 

Lamaros

It's possible they just grouped them by "feel" and have thrown them out to be tested and heavily changed based on that testing, also.

 

Lurker

I did Presence/Gorged/Vengeance as 1.52, which is 1.15*1.15*1.15

I also assumed Improved Blood Strike would be +30% total damage (Excellent), instead of +30% weapon damage (Not bad) or +30% of its bonus damage (328 for 2 diseases, or 426 after the talent. Pretty paltry for three talent points).

As an aside, I think the Strength Scrolls will be pretty nifty for DKs. I need to find out what overrides it, if anything besides standard strength potions. Anyone know offhand?

 

Kethgar

A few sources have mentioned a DK talent called Improved Icebound Fortitude, as shown below:

Improved Icebound Fortitude - "Increases the duration of your Icebound Fortitude. In addition your Icebound Fortitude will dispel any damage over time effects and replace them with heal over time effects."

Its odd, because I can't seem to find this ability on any of the death knight talent calculators. Is this 'talent' actually a skill, or is there an error of some sort somewhere?

 

Lurker

It's trainable, Rank 1 being at level 72 (and being the only rank).

 

Feorthas

That's plain-old Icebound Fortitude; it sounds like the Improved version that Kethgar mentioned is either an old, or possibly as-of-yet undiscovered, talent. The 'Improved' bonuses sound pretty sweet in my opinion but they're almost undoubtedly overpowered. Just think about how that would trivialize any boss with a strong bleed effect, such as the Bear in ZA (or is that just a straight up 'physical' effect?).

 

Kaldris

I know that most people here are trying to figure out a reason why a Deathknight would be useful as a tank, as other tanks in this game have a specific role (druid is high damage mobs, paladin is AoE mobs for instance)

One thing that I haven't seen anyone consider, wouldn't a deathknight be viable as a avoidance tank?

here's my reasoning - I'm going to copy my warriors unbuffed stats in stamina gear to get us started. I am also going to consider this at a level 70 range, so I can draw better comparisons to what we have now, all stats are listed as unbuffed percentages.

32% dodge
22% parry (without talents)

so this is my unbuffed stats as a deathknight, I also have reached the defense cap as well of 490.

the 490 defense cap also increases my chance to be missed by 5.6% (140 extra defense over your max, each defense point giving .04% to be missed)

The only thing we have to add from here is a boss' innate miss chance of 5%, so here is the attack table now:

32.00% dodge
22.00% parry
10.60% miss
15.00% crushing
20.40% hit


Here's my specc: Avoidance Spec

I've specced the innate 5% to parry, so we now have to add that to our current parry chance. This leaves us with 15% chance to crush and 15.40% to hit. This final bit is made up with Blade Barrier.

When my DK has no runes available he gains an extra 30% parry for 15 seconds. Now we are going to assume runes take 10 seconds to regenerate themselves, and that each rune has a separate cooldown.

For the easiest discussion, I am going to enchant 3 blood runes and 3 unholy runes into my blade and I am going to spam plague strike (if my information is correct plague strike has no CD on it and takes 1 blood and 1 unholy rune per cast) With that in mind it will take me 4.5 seconds to expend all 6 runes (1.5 second cooldown on each cast) as soon as those runes have been used up I will recieve Blade Barrier, pushing my parry up another 30%. Now my attack table looks like this:

32.00% dodge
57.00% parry
10.60% miss
00.40% crushing

There is now .40% left on the mobs attack table, and a full 1.6% more avoidance I need to obtain from the boss being 3 levels ahead of me. There are quite a few ways to obtain this last amount. The easiest way would be raid buffs, so lets give myself; an agility elixir (35) an agility food (20) a Mark of the wild (20) and a blessing of kings (10% of total agility.) My unbuffed agility on my warrior was 200 IIRC so for the sake of argument lets say my DK has 150. adding totals from the buffs together I will obtain another 97.5 ( [35 + 20 + 20] X 10% ) + ( 150 * 10%) Every 30 agility gives my character 1% to dodge (30 agility is the highest amount you need at the moment for a tanking character to receive 1% dodge, so I think it is a good basis to assume the DK will have) so that gives me just over 3% more dodge, now my attack table looks like this:

35.00% dodge
57.00% parry
09.60% miss


I know have 100% avoidance, I cannot be hit by anything but magic, I also have specced Spell Deflection giving myself an extra 15% reduction to magic attacks.

The benefit to this type of a specc is the way DK's use abilities, our runes refresh like Rogues energy, we don't need to be hit / do damage to gain rage like Warriors or have to worry about mana efficiency like Paladins, so our threat can remain very high.



I think deathknights will now be the new avoidance tanks.


EDIT: Things not considered, Hunter Viper Sting and Balance Druid's Insect Swarm, for a total extra of 7% to miss
EDIT2: Rogues don't gain rage...

 

MeCh

Gift of Arthas is a free disease assuming the DK is tanking.

 

Lamaros

It seems everyone is in some agreement (at least for those who havn't actually played the class!) over what the better DPS and tanking talents are for the DK. At the moment the Blood tree looks to be the clear winner on both account, with the Unholy tree being useful also.

Either we are missing something or this will surely change.

One thing that interests me about the DK is the spellcasting aspect of it. At the moment however the spells of the DK are somewhat limited. They are creature summons, snare/interrupts with a little DPS, or non-damage utility. All well and good in their own right, and things that look to fit with the class well, but insofar as the flat out DPS spells go there are only a few, most of which are only obtainable through talents, and are pretty much restricted to AOE damage.

They are:

Blood Boil
Death & Decay
Corpse Explosion
Deathchill
Unholy Blight

That's a fair amount of AOE damage spells. Deathchill and Unholy Blight are mutualy exclusive but otherwise it is possible for the DK to have up to 4 AOE abilities.

Is there some intention for the DK to AOE tank? Or AOE DPS? In most other respects the DK looks to be a single target class so how are these abilities expected to be used:

Blood Boil is obviously not just an AOE spell, it is also a taunt. It has obvious uses for single and multi-tarket tanking, the onyl question is just how well it does in AOE threat generation. Even if DKs don't AOE tank or AOE DPS this spell still has a place, though.

Death & Decay seems to be a flat out AOE DPS spell. It would also be useful in AOE tanking given how it is placed.

Corpse Explosion is a talented ability, (currently) found 21 points into the Unholy tree. It does damage based on runic power and when combined with the Improved telent will give all targets a disease. There is an obvious application here in combination with Blood Boil that points to Corpse Explosion being a useful AOE tanking spell, but it looks useful as AOE DPS too.

Deathchill is a talented ability, (currently) found 21 points into the Frost tree. It does more damage than Improved Corpse Explosion (40 damage per Runic power as opposed to 18) and also causes increased threat. This seems to indicate it is exclusivly an AOE tanking ability. It also has a useful combination with Imp. Corpse Explosion, in that the talent Glacier Rot will result in this spell doing 15% more damage to all diseased targets.

Unholy Blight is another Unholy disease AOE. This one cas stack up to three times and has obvious combinations with Blood Boil. It seems to indicate to me that Blood Boil may do extra damage depending on how many diseases are on each target, giving BB the ability to be used by an Unholy DK on targets with 4 diseases for improved damage and threat.

At first glance it appears that unless a DK specs for some of these added AOEs then their ability to tank groups, or damage groups, will be somewhat restricted. Blood Boil has obvious problems for anyone not tanking and is dependant on diseases being on the targets, while D&D is on a thirty second cooldown and is not hugely damaging. Were one to spec for Deathchill then the obvious intention is tanking, and in combination with Imp Corpse Explosion and Blood Boil, as well as D&D the potential looks reasonable. Unholy Blight also looks to have potential, depending how Blood Boil works, so the possibilty of properly speced DKs being good AOE tanks looks high.

On pure DPS the options are less good. Only D&D and Corpse Explosion offer the DK ranged damage and while Unholy Blight does not seem exclusive to tanking in the same manner that Deathchill and BB do, it shares runic power with Corpse Explosion.

The intention looks to me to primarily be for DKs to have AOE 'usefulness' instead of any great damage--to do some AOE while bashing on a single target--unless the DK is to be tanking the whole group. This seems in line with the rest of the class, where damage is primarily melee based and spells are grounded more in utility for PvP or types of tanking rather than outright DPS.

A potential Tanking AOE build:

War Pirate :: Talent tree Deathknight

Deathchill, Corpse Explosion, 7(13)% (Frost and Shadow) magic damage reduction, Bone Armor, etc.

Potential DPS +AOE build:

War Pirate :: Talent tree Deathknight

 

Lamaros

Something I noted in trying to make an Unholy build just now:

There are far too few talents in the lower (ranks 3, 4, and 5 are the worst) Unholy tree at the moment. You are forced to pick up too many things for the sake of it. Hopefully this changes.

Talents spots in ranks in each tree:

R1: B:11 F:10 U:14
R2: B:10(21) F:10(20) U:7(21)
R3: B:9(30) F:11(31) U:4(25)
R4: B:10(40) F:6(37) U:7(31)
R5: B:7(47) F:4(41) U:2(33)
R6: B:8(55) F:6(47) U:12(45)

3, 4, 5 are too low. 6 is too high. This needs to be adjusted. 33 Unholy talents at 5th rank v 47 Blood. No good.

 

osmigos