Question about glyphs, i've been doing some simming recently and i just thought id try ultraxion/patchwerk type 1 target tankspank -fight with having DnD glyph instead of DC like suggested in this guide, i found out DnD came out better in both those fights which i do not entirely understand. Is there an error in this guide or did i do some mistake with my simming, seeing as how the guide clearly states that for a single target fight, glyph of DC and SS are the way to go?

Precisely, and i wasnt talking about AOE situations, i was talking about single target tank and spank so that's why im so intrigued by my sims. And yes for me at least DnD works just fine on ultrax, assuming you place it anywhere near him lol.

I know that you`re not talking about AoE but still im saying that DnD can't be better than Death Coil maybe if you have 2,3+ targets up all the time then might be but otherwise i don't think so. About Ultraxion every time when i put down Death and Decay (on different spots) i can see the debuff on the boss but he isn't taking any dmg from it and i couldn't find any logs with death and decay either.

I loved Bleeding Hearts and was an early proponent of it! Unfortunately it's been broken for quite a while. But that's exactly what I was talking about.

Right now the best I've been able to find is TinyMeleeStats which gives you a small box you can put anywhere on your screen and list stats you want (AP being relevant here). It's what I'm using now, but not optimal compared to the lovely BH.


Chidorihq, we've been around the block on the Ultra DnD issue a few times - if it's really fixed I'd love to know but haven't tried in a while. I suppose I could try again on LFR, but you should know if you've read the thread we'll want proof. The problem is that the debuff appears to be applied but then you look in your logs and there's no DnD damage. Please provide proof.

On the issue of Unholy Frenzy, if you can talk to your focus target and time it right, it might be worth it, but I generally just time it with my gargoyle, which is much simpler. It's probably a tiny overall raid dps gain at best to give it to a feral or other class, while the potential loss is larger. I'm not saying it's bad to do, just that in practice (much like the ongoing IBT debate) it's likely to result in dps loss rather than gain like the numbers might suggest.

I'll be interested to see what other folks have to say about DnD vs DC glyph for single target. My in-my-head-while-driving napkin math suggests it shouldn't line up but if we have evidence for it I'd love to use DnD glyph which will help a lot on add fights - now if they would just fix the Ultra DnD issue I'd be in heaven. BTW, does anyone know if the tentacle adds on Madness get hit by DnD either? It just occurred to me as I was posting this that since they're not actually on the platform it might be an issue too (as opposed to DW limbs which clearly are on the platform).

My mistake, after doing some research i found out it actually doesn't damage the boss, eventhough the debuff sometimes appears on the boss. However my first post regarding the glyphs wasnt about Ultraxion in particular, was merely talking about single target tankspank boss so ultraxion seemed to fit the part as an example. Couldve might aswell used raiding dummy i guess, however i'm still curious as to whether if anyone else here has gotten better Sim -dps using DnD -glyph insteadof Death Coil?

Regarding Madness fight, I can confirm Tegu's post. According to my logs, DnD indeed does not work on Wing Tentacles and Deathwing.

Regarding Glyph of Death and Decay: It is fairly simple to calculate whether or not to switch glyphs for a certain encounter: Simply check your (or someone else's) logs for the encounter you're pondering, and do some math on the abilities' total damage. Just dont forget to take into account glyphs that are already applied.
Example: Lets assume you're looking at logs from a fight in which you were using Glyph of Raise Dead, Glyph of Scourge Strike and Glyph of Death Coil. You want to decide whether or not it is worth switching glyphs. As units of measurement we will use 1% of total dps, and we will note XX% to refer to an ability's percentage of your total dmg (for instance, DC% means the percentage of dmg done by DC). Also, to put some context in the calculations we will use numbers from a typical single target encounter, in this case a normal Zon'ozz kill:
DC% = 21.6%
SS_shadow% = 19.3%
SS_physical% = 17.8%
FF% = 5.4%
DnD% = 4.5%
UB% = 2.3% (stands for Unholy Blight)

Removing Glyph of Scourge Strike will cost (SS_shadow%/1.3)*0.3 dmg, in our case 4.45%.
Removing Glyph of Death Coil will cost ( (DC%+UB%)/1.15 )*0.15 dmg, in our case 3.12%.
Applying Glyph of Death and Decay will add DnD%*0.5 dmg, in our case 2.25%.
Applying Glyph of Icy Touch will add FF%*0.2, in our case 1.08%.

So with these numbers, it would not be optimal to change glyphs. However, under different circumstances, where more than one target is available, these figures can change dramatically. Ideally you should check your own logs or other DK's logs to make an informed decision for each encounter separately. On Yor'sahj HC, for example, DnD% can reach 14% unglyphed, thus applying Glyph of Death and Decay would mean an increase of roughly 7%, which is much higher than any other glyph (Tegu's logs of that encounter demonstrate this nicely, and his DnD% reaches 21% glyphed. Thank you Tegu).

Regarding Unholy Frenzy and Gargoyle: the OP states that haste values exceeding ~1600 will not benefit our Gargoyle:
If I understand this correctly, this means that it is pointless to use Garg right after UF, assuming your haste is well above ~1600. I personally did some testing on a dummy, wearing ~2100 haste gear and counting gargoyle shots per summon. I found that regardless of using UF before the cast, the gargoyle shoots 16-17 times per summon. These are rough results based on only a handful of summons, but they were enough to convince me the OP is accurate, and further increasing Haste does not affect the Gargoyle.

Since I have seen my pet positioning himself wierd aorund each arm or wing, I thought it's about putting DnD in some unusual location. Tried alot around the wing but did not work, so I guess I have to say too, that DnD on Wing (which are 2) does not work, dont waste runes.

@Wigee of course you`re missing potential procs when you`re not hit or expertise capped but i don't think that it's worth dropping stats for expertise because even then the randomness of this weapon is insane for example i'm running with 4 expertise and last week on Morchok (World of Logs - Real Time Raid Analysis 4:25) i didn't get a single proc from the weapon. I don't think that there is a Death Knight who is running with 26 expertise just for a couple more (possible) procs for the price of crit or mastery which will boost more your dps (even your tentacle's dmg).

@Wigee:
I would agree with Tegu. My last raid (not a very good performance on my part I'm afraid: World of Logs - Real Time Raid Analysis) I saw tentacle damage ranging between 2% and 11% of my damage for any given fight. I believe I'm at 4 expertise as well.

Clearly you don't need capped expertise for the tentacle to proc (obviously, if you weren't hitting the boss at all you wouldn't proc, so lower expertise only reduces a fraction of your chances to proc). As has been stated a number of times, all of the other secondary stats add more to your dps than the occasional parried/dodged attack.

@ Tegu and Hinenuitepo. Although I understand your reasoning, the fact that tentacle damage can be such a huge part of overall dps is the reason why I question whether it is in fact worth it to reforge 1 or 2 pieces to get more expertise. I'm not suggesting 26% or anything near it , I'm looking for optimization of potential procs. It seems like it would be an overall dps gain to sacrafice a couple hundred crit/mastery and gain the increased tentacle damage. So I guess what I'm really asking is has anyone broken this theroy down?
Lol also I'm not a casual warlock asking questions about an alt, I've switched to my dk Hordpain per the needs of my guild and play him as my main, however I am unfamiliar with Simcraft and was looking to see if anyone out there has ran the #s

Thanks Gakpad for clearing that up for me, seems much more logical then the recomendation a couple pages back to try for around 15% expertise. I wasn't sure if Gurth procs were from melle swings or other attacks,seeing as they are from all attacks in general and like you said unholy runic dump cant be dodged it makes sense to not worry about expertise at all as unholy. Thanks again.