Death Knight: Cataclysm Simple Q & A
 

Welcome to the Death Knight Simple Questions thread. This thread is for all your simple questions which you expect to have simple answers and thus do not require their own thread.

Note that all forum rules still apply: we said simple questions, not stupid questions (which have no place on these forums). You're still expected to make a reasonable effort to find the answer yourself by searching and reading the threads and making use of spreadsheets and any other tools that may be available. If, however, you're fairly confident that your question is not easily answered with available information, but don't think it will generate sufficient discussion to require it's own thread, this is the place to ask.

Blood Tap
 

Is Blood Tap really usable at all, considering that each spec can turn certain runes into Death Runes?

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Hi,

I have very simple question, and I hope, that this is the right topic to ask.

We try to kill Alysrazor. I run as a DK tank. I have trouble with killing the adds. 2-3 times/10 fight I can manage alone, but during the other try DPS must help. 1-2 times the adds will live until the tornado phases.
My ilvl364-365. I use Impatience of youth trinket, Golemblood potion, strenghts food+flask, and rune of fallen crusader on my Magmaw mace (359)
I use DRW on CD. (together with IPoY trinket and GB poti)
Hit: 4.23% Exp: 21
I try to use every GCD, so if neccessary pull the adds, i use the pull-stop-hit-pull method.
Our druid give me the thorn spell, paladin give aura.
How can I improve my DPS a bit more?
If I change some of my gear to DPS gear it can decrease my survavibility,isn't it?
What is your suggestion?

Impatience of Youth is a bad trinket. Use Essence of the Eternal Flame, Heart of Rage, or License to Slay for your dps trinkets. DRW is a survivability cooldown, not a damage cooldown on this fight. The weapon does not benefit from the damage buff, so using it is actually a DPS loss because of runic power wasted that could have been used on Rune Strike. The same is true for Raise Dead. You could also put Fallen Crusader on your weapon instead of Swordshattering for this fight.

Simple question regarding 2h vs DW frost (I cant use SimCraft at the moment : <).

Is it better to use Heroic Skullstealer Greataxe (391) or 2x Obsidian Cleaver (378) in normal firelands gear? And how big of a difference is there, or is there notable one at all?

Is it possible for an Unholy DK to soak a full shard in HM Bale by properly using AMS, AMZ, Death Pact, Death Strike, Health Stone, and receiving heals?

Edit - Icebound Fortitude as well.

Nope. The reason SPs can do it is because of the 6sec of 90% DR with Dispersion. DKs don't have anything even close to that. AMZ and AMS would only last like 1 tick each past 10 stacks. DP/DS/HS aren't good enough heals, and IBF is only 20% DR, which won't help at all near the end like Dispersion does.

Even if healers could somehow keep you up, you'd be such a mana sponge, they wouldn't be able to last the whole fight.

I have a question about the Frost priority system.

The guide says that Obliterate becomes first priority after diseases when either KM is up or "if both Frost/Unholy pairs and/or both Death runes are up". It then goes on to explain why this is: "Keeping runes on cooldown is next on priority. This means getting one of each rune on cooldown before starting on the other set of runes." My question is this: does Obliterate retain this high priority when two runes of only one of the types are up (such as FFU or UUD)? This would only come into play in the rare instances where you're either runic capped or Rime is up (because only those take priority over just Obliterating anyway when you can), but with the RNG of Runic Empowerment, having odd runes up is more frequent than it was in Wrath. I can see arguments for it either way, and was curious to find out if it had already been figured out.

I think you're asking "what do I do if my RP is capped and I have UUFfdd" or "what do I do if my Rime has procced and I have UUFfdd." if that's what you mean, then in the first case I'd frost strike followed by oblit and in the second I'd HB and then oblit. Quick and dirty mental math seems to equate either a frost strike vs one second of a rune cooldown, or a howling blast vs one second of a rune cooldown. Assuming an 8 second rune refresh, one second of a rune would be roughly equal to one sixteenth of an obliterate, again, according to my quick and dirty reasoning. One sixteenth of an obliterate, in the form of one second of a single rune wasted, should not approach the damage lost by losing a potential (45% chance) of a rime proc, nor should it approach the 66% of a frost strike you're losing in RP by obliterating while capped.

I haven't raided as UH since ToC and I'd like to ask three things about current UH:

1) Which stats does the ghoul/garg inherit? I'm under the impression pets inherit your Str, but not your AP (meaning Bladed Armor does not affect the ghoul), in the UH thread there was discussion the pet doesn't inherit your Crit. I assume it does inherit your haste/hit though?

2) Who is the optimal target for Frenzy? Assuming roughly equal ilvl, is there some class that gains disproportionately more than us? I'm tempted to assume Ferals

3) While there is clear indication Haste is king and Mastery second, (while hitcapped, of course) I am safe in assuming not exp capping isn't an issue, correct? This would suggest an almost zero mastery, as practically, the only mastery you'll end with is from items that have it as base. Everything else should have either/both Hst+Mst and if not should get reforged to them.

1. The Ghoul and Gargoyle only inherit the DK's Strength, Haste, and Hit. You're correct that they gain nothing from AP. Note that the Ghoul's Expertise is based on your Hit, so having 8% Hit Rating on one's character will give the Ghoul 8% Hit and 26 Expertise. I say Hit Rating since a Draenei's racial and the talent Nerves of Cold Steel do not add onto it. The first isn't too much of an issue, and the latter most definitely isn't.

2. Once upon a time a Fury Warrior was the best target for Frenzy because their Mastery boosts the effects of enrages. Since their Mastery got nerfed though, it's pretty much best to use it on ourselves just before Gargoyle. There are cases where a Haste-loving spec and appropriately skilled player in the raid might benefit from it more than the DK, but that call is made case by case.

3. Depending on how one plays, capping Expertise isn't an issue. Unholy usually has enough free time that a dodge here and there isn't a big deal. That said, the better one's gear is the higher the value Expertise will have because of stronger hits and wasting more resources as we get higher Haste. In situations where we're GCD-capped most of the time (Sinestra for example), Expertise should be capped because of the wasted globals.

Expertise shouldn't be capped normally because you aren't GCD capped and you will run into periods of time where Runic Empowerment just isn't proccing or isn't proccing enough. Another reason why haste is very good is because it helps the downtime during rune regen.

After countless hours on Heroic Ragnaros tonight, I noticed my Outbreaks and Howling Blasts were missing every once in a while, which was really getting on my nerves. I took a look at my character sheet and this is what I saw:



Runic Focus - Spell - World of Warcraft

Since when did the Runic Focus passive effect not take full effect? Is anyone else experiencing this issue?

Runic Focus is still providing the full effect, you forgot to factor in "Nerves of Cold steel" which provides 3% melee hit while dualwielding at max rank. So at a hit rating conversion of 120.109 per 1% of melee hit and 102.446 per 1% of spell hit 603 hitrating would put you just where you are at atm in terms of both melee and spellhit.

Edit: to hit spellhit cap you would need 820 hitrating total.