Yay, a Death Knight thread. I got the screenshot of the costs/cooldowns, so I figured I'd try to get a rudimentary DPS rotation going.

War Pirate :: Talent tree Deathknight
Edit: Moved a point to Heart Strike instead of the Improved Mount.

Here's the build I'm looking at. It gets all the obvious DPS talents in Blood and the synergy talents in Unholy. Heart Strike is actually just filler. I don't think it's going to get used much in a raid (except for frequent phase fights) because it cleans the diseases, which are damage themselves (as well as what applies them), as well as increasing Blood Strike's damage. You can do this rotation using 3 Blood Runes and 2 Unholy runes, and it will be completely sustainable. That last rune is pretty rough to nail down, between Frost and Unholy. Another Blood rune would probably be a bit redundant, unless Mark of Blood comes into play (fight specific. A DK on the Healing meters? D: ).

Frost: Mind Freeze (which might be important, but we have Rogues and others for this), Frost Blast (knockback, which may be important for some fights. I think its damage will be negligible).

Unholy: Anti-Magic Shell (Survivability, especially at every 20s), Death Grip (Very, very unlikely to be of use to a DPS DK), Death Strike (More DPS), Hysteria (proc reliant if used while keeping normal rotation). If Degen misses (and doesn't refresh the Dot), this extra Unholy rune would give you a bit of a cushion, too. You can skip a Plague / Degen for a Raise Dead, too.

Another Blood is a bit redundant, except instead of being proc reliant, you have to drop a Plague Strike or Degeneration in favor of Hysteria. Switching presences mid-fight might also become a strategy, since Blood Presence's healing may be beneficial (Blood Tap, less Rune Tapping, less healing). The extra 5% strength there may blow Unholy's Haste + GCD out of the water (especially since DKs get a massive 16% extra Strength in talents).

Example DPS rotation - 3 Blood(1,2,3) & 2 Unholy(5,6) & 1 floating. - {# Runetype(Slot#,Slot#,etc.)}
This assumes Runes have a 10s cooldown. It's hard to eye it on the videos that are out, but that's my guess.

Blood Presence - 15% damage and healing 4% of damage done
Unholy Presence - 15% Haste and -0.5s GCD.

Plague Strike - 1 Blood, 1 Unholy, no cooldown
Degeneration - 1 Unholy, no cooldown
Blood Strike - 1 Blood *5s Cooldown

Note: There is the possibility with the existance of the 'refresh DoT' talents, that Blizzard will change the fact that dot tics reset when the debuff is applied (thus you have a constant interval of three seconds). This rotation assumes that will be true (or else these talents will never likely never be used).

General theory:
Blood(1) and Unholy(5) are used by Plague Strike.
Unholy (6) is used by Degeneration.
Blood(2,3) are used by Blood Strike.
Rune(4) is spare.

Unholy Presence
mm:ss
00:00 Plague Strike - 1 Blood(1)/Unholy(5) restored at 00:10. Disease falls at 0:21. 2 Blood(2,3)/1 Unholy(6) available.
00:01 Degeneration - 1 Unholy(6) restored at 0:11. Disease falls at 0:31. 2 Blood(2,3)/0 Unholy available.
00:02 Blood Strike (up at 00:07) - 1 Blood(2) restored at 0:12. 1 Blood(3)/0 Unholy available
00:03 Plague Dot Tic
00:04 Degen Dot Tic
00:05
00:06 Plague Dot Tic
00:07 Blood Strike (up at 00:12) - 1B(3) restored at 00:17. 0B/0U available. Degen Dot Tic
00:08
00:09 Plague Dot Tic. Probably have a lot of Runic Power at this point, so best to dump it here if possible. (use the floating Rune)
00:10 Gain 1B(1)/1U(5). Plague Strike. 1B/1U restored at 0:20. 0B/0U available. Degen Dot Tic
00:11 Gain 1U(6). Degeneration. 1U restored at 0:21. 0B/0U available.
00:12 Gain 1B(2). Blood Strike (up at 00:17). 1B(2) restored at 0:22. 0B/0U available. Plague Dot Tic
00:13 Degen Dot Tic
00:14
00:15 Plague Dot Tic
00:16 Degen Dot Tic
00:17 Gain 1B(3). Blood Strike (up at 00:22). 1B(3) restored at 0:27.
00:18 Plague Dot Tic
00:19 Degen Dot Tic
00:20 Gain 1B(1)/1U(5). Plague Strike. 1B/1U restored at 0:30.
00:21 Gain 1U(6). Degeneration. 1U restored at 00:31. Plague Dot Tic
00:22 Gain 1B(2). Blood Strike (up at 0:27). Degen Dot Tic.
00:23
00:24 Plague Dot Tic
00:25 Degen Dot Tic
00:26
00:27 Gain 1B(3). Blood Strike (up at 0:32). 1B(3) restored at 0:37. Plague Dot Tic
00:28 Degen Dot Tic
00:29
00:30 Gain 1B(1)/1U(5). Plague Strike. 1B/1U restored at 0:40. Plague Dot Tic

Blood Presence
00:00.0 Plague Strike - 1B(1)/1U(5) restored at 0:10.0, 2B(2,3)/1U(6) available.
00:01.5 Degen - 1U(6) restored at 0:11.5, 2B(2,3)/0U available.
00:03.0 Blood Strike (up at 00:08.0) - 1B(2) restored at 0:13.0, 1B(3)/0U available. Plague tic
00:04.5 Degen tic
00:06.0
00:07.5
00:08.0 Blood Strike (up at 00:13.0) - 1B(3) restored at 0:18.0, 0B/0U available.
00:09.0
00:10.0 Gain 1B(1)/1U(5). Plague Strike - 1B/1U restored at 00:20.0
00:10.5
00:11.5 Gain 1U(6). Degen - 1U(6) restored at 21.5, 0B/0U available.
00:12.0
00:13.0 Gain 1B(2). Blood Strike (up at 00:18.0) - 1B(2) restored at 00:23.0, 0B/0U available.
00:13.5
00:15.0
00:16.5
00:18.0 Gain 1B(3). Blood Strike (up at 00:23.0) - 1B(3) restored at 00:28.0.
00:19.5
00:20.0 Gain 1B(1)/1U(5). Plague Strike - 1B/1U restored at 00:30.0
00:21.0
00:21.5 Gain 1U(6). Degen - 1U(6) restored at 31.5.
00:22.5
00:23.0 Gain 1B(2). Blood strike (up at 00:28.0) - 1B(2) restored at 00:33.0)
Etc.

This doesn't assume any Blood Rune Mastery procs, which I think encourages "Rune Dumping" within the time of the proc (5 seconds). In all likelyhood, BRM will only reduce the cooldowns of runes used within that buff's duration, too. BRM procs will be a good time for things like Hysteria and Rune Tap if you're running 3B/3U. From this, I think 3B/3U will be the most versatile DPS spec, allowing you to do various things according to the procs, or even waiting on a Plague Strike / Degen and using them. Along with Rune Dumping, Dancing Runeblade may prove exceptional here, if it's a straight 100% damage increase like I think it is. It's got a short cooldown, but it's hard to theorycraft because I haven't seen a maximum Runic Power amount yet and that goes for everything else related to Runic Power.

I was also considering a 6U rune, Death Strike spam with occasional Degens.

Edit: Dur, Summon Gargoyle is a talent not in my build. D;

Edit: Frost Strike is also a talent. Durr again.

Last edited by Lurker : Today at 6:47 PM.

Hah!

/victory

Corpse Explosion has a 100% chance to give enemies a disease that lasts 9 (12) seconds.

I was my understanding that abilities either used runes or runic power, but not both. Spells that use runes build runic power, spells that consume runic power cost only the runic power and do damage (or last longer) depending on the amount of runic power you have, up to a maximum of 100 (+30% talented).

The exception seems Blood Tap, which costs health.

There are interrupts in Frost and Blood. Strangulate uses runic power though, not runes. You can also use Blood Tap to give yourself a chromatic rune if needed, or Empower runeblade to renew some runes on demand.

As abilities that consume runic power don't use runes to cast this will not be the case. The runic power spells that do damage are mostly AoEs though. Only Death Coil & Dancing Runeblade are DPS runic power abilites, that I can tell.

Heart Strike I am also iffy about, but as you say it's a bit of filler.
I would probably get Mark of Blood over Imp. Rune Tap, too, because it seems like it might have more possible use in a raid.

My bould would probably go for:

War Pirate :: Talent tree Deathknight

With the remianing point in Heart Stike or On a Pale Horse.

Abilities Used: Blood Strike (5, 1B), Plague Strike (1U, 1B), Degeneration (1U), Death Coil, Mind Freeze (and/or Icy Touch, Frost Blast)
Runes on Blade: 3B, 2U, 1F

General theory:
Blood(1) and Unholy(4) are used by Plague Strike.
Unholy (5) is used by Degeneration.
Blood(2,3) are used by Blood Strike.
Rune(6) is for mind Freeze.

Unholy Presence
mm:ss
00:00 Plague Strike - 1 Blood(1)/Unholy(4) restored at 00:10. Disease falls at 0:21.
00:01 Degeneration - 1 Unholy(5) restored at 0:11. Disease falls at 0:31.
00:02 Blood Strike - 1 Blood(2) restored at 0:12. Reusable at 00.07.
00:03
00:04
00:05 Mind Freeze - 1 Frost (6) restored at 00.15. Reusable at 00.13.
00:06 Cast Death Coil if Sudden Death Procced.
00:07 Blood Strike - 1Blood(3) restored at 00:17. Reusable at 00.12.
00:08 Cast Death Coil if Sudden Death Procced.
00:09 Plague Dot Tic. If Runic Power is 80 or higher cast DancingRuneblade here.
00:10 Repeat.

Blood Presence
00:00.0 Plague Strike
00:01.5 Blood Strike
00:03.0 Degen
00:05.0 DC if procced/Mind Freeze if not.
00:06.5 Blood Strike
00:08.0 DC if procced/Mind Freeze if not, and not on CD.
00:08.0 Dancing Runeblade if Runic Power is 80 and no DC proc.
00:09.5 Dancing Runeblade if Runic Power is 80 and DC proc.
00.10.0 Repeat if possible.
00.11.0 Repeat if possible.

As you can see, with Sudden Death procs, the runic power vairable, et cetera, it's all a bit unknown at the moment. The chances are you will also have to consider Hysteria and maybe Mark of Blood in a raid, or might need to interrupt with Mind Freeze or Strangulate, or slow with Icy Touch.

I think 3/2/1 is a good combo, because you can then blood tap if you need to cast a 2 frost spell, but still have enough for your other abilities.

Yeah, I have no idea if it scales with Dmg/Healing/AP or if it gets new ranks/scales with level/whatnotelse. If it's 435 (talented and the screenshot I saw) at level 80, it's not worth jack, especially on a 1 minute timer, so I kinda assumed it was going to scale. I figured if there was a nasty boss tuned around having the Mark, DK would respec for it. And actually, now that I think about it, Degenerate would probably interfere with party healing if there were HoTs involved. Direct healing would be up to the Mark. There's a lot of conditional stuff for DKs, and that's exciting, but a bit daunting to take all of it into account.

Also, I'm betting burning any Runic Power when you have GCDs available (between 1st and 2nd Blood Strike, between 2nd Blood Strike and next Plague Strike) will prevent you from capping it out (and not utilizing excess Runic Power generated, ignoring procs) since Plague, Degen and Blood should all generate Runic Power. The preview videos I watch had party frames up, and the Runic Power bar (gray bar) was very volatile, like Rage, so it should be fluctuating a lot and probably be plentiful in a raid.

Mind Freeze is a good option if you need a ranged spell / spell damage on a rune, but Death Strike is an instant strike for weapon damage, and that's likely going to outdamage the 200 Base Frost damage my screenshot of Mind freeze has, but that's subject to scaling like Rune Tap (I imagine Blood/Unholy DKs will not gear so much towards spell damage, and towards Str/Hit/Haste since some spells benefit and scale from AP, but that's a bit much to speculate on). Death Strike will be tied to the same Rune slot, so it'll hit every 10 seconds. That takes up one GCD after the Plague/Degen/Blood combo, leaving you two free for Runic Power dumps, the only one not tied to runes currently being Death Coil (which, I have a feeling will get a cooldown or cost an Unholy rune).

Gah, sorry for the large amount of parentheses.

Another topic that hasn't got much discussion is that of the DKs tanking capabilities. This is an interesting one given that the DK has been talked up as a viable dungeon tank and also as a raid spellcasting boss tank.

Tanking generally:

As far as tanking goes generally the DK has a few skills and abilities.

Frost Presence: Costs 1 Frost rune. The Death Knight takes on the presence of frost, increasing armor by 45% and threat generated by 25%.

The DK has two tauntlike abilities:

Blood Boil: 0 Rune cost? 10 sec CD. Causes all disease effects on targets within 30 yards to painfully errupt, dealing 104 damage and forcing the target to attack the DK for 3 seconds.

Death Grip: 1 Unholy. 45 sec CD. 8-30 range. Draws the target toward the Death Knight and forces the enemy to attack the DK for 4 sec.

And two damage reduction talents:

Icebound Fortitude: Consumes all runic power. 1min CD. Casuses the DK to become immune to stun (does not break stun) and increases his armor by 50% for up to 12 seconds.

Anti-Magic Shell: 1 Unholy. 20 sec CD. Absorbs 75% of the damage delt by the next harmful spell. Damage absorbed generates runic power. Lasts 5sec.

Blood Boil is obviously servicable as a taunt, should the DK need one, while Death Grip has a variety of possible applications. Compared to other tanking classes it seems DKs will be able to taunt with a similar effectiveness. (I am unsure about the way Blood Boil works exactly, perhaps it does damage per disease, in which case it works even better as a taunt, especially as an AOE taunt when combined with some of the skills in the Unholy tree as it may be a good threat generator).

The damage reduction abilities that the DK has are less exciting. Anti-Magic Shell looks very nifty, but when we compare it to the Warrior's spell reflection, well, what exactly is so great about it? The Warrior's ability has a lower CD, lasts for the same length, and reflects the spell.

Icebound Fortitude is also a little underwhelming. We will probably have similar or lower armor than the Warrior and the Paladin, and much lower than a Druid. The only thing all that special about this ability is that we become stun immune.

Nothing here indicates a specific uniqueness in DK tanking. Looking elsewhere...

Tanking Talents:

Deflection: Parry increased 5%.
Spell Deflection: Spell damage decreased by 15% whenever you parry, lasts 10 seconds.
Blade Barrier: Parry increased by 30% when you have no runes active, lasts 15 seconds.
Will of the Necropolis: Armor increased by 15% when below 35% health.

Frost Aura: 5% more health for party. +25 Frost Resist.
Toughness: 10% more armor from items.
Deathchill: AOE Icy Touch, causes increased threat.
Runic Power Mastery: Abilities and spells act as if you have 30% more runic power.
Midnight Sun: 6% less damage from Ice and Shadow.
Aclimation: 15% chance on spell hit to boost resistsnce by 15sec, stacks up to 3 times.
Chill of the Grave: Icebound Fortitude lasts 5 sec longer.

Unholy Command: Lowers Blood Boil and Death Grip CDs.
Lichborne: Immune Charm, Fear, Sleep, 25% chance to miss, for 30sec.
Magic Suppression + Imp.: 7% less damage from magic. Anti-Magic shell covers whole party and stops 100%.
Bone Armor: 4 bones that reduce damage by 40%.

In the blood tree the combination of Deflection, Spell Deflection and Blade Barrier has a very good chance of granting the DK 15% spell damage reduction for most of the time and +35% parry. The cost of these talents is 23 talents. Who knows what Will of the Necropolis is doing up there.

The frost tree gives some boost to health and armor, notably in allowing Icebound Fort to last 22 seconds, but the more unique abilities here are the bonuses to resistance (especially Frost resist), and the magic damage protection from frost and shadow. Midnight sun will cost you 33 talents. Aclimation will cost you 43.

The unholy tree provides some more immunities to go with stun from Icebound Fort, though on a much longer CD, and gives some magic damage protection. Bone armor and Imp magic supression will cost you 32 talent points.

If the DK is going to tank with some uniqueness it seems to me that it should go for magic damage, as we're told, but the abilites that contribute to that are scattered over all three trees. Between all the trees you could get up to 28% magic damage reduction for frost and shadow whenever you parry, but that would cost you 98 talent points and is impossible.

What is possible is 23/15/33, where you pick up up to blade barrier, up to Nerves of cold steel, and up to Bone Armor. Giving you 22% magic reduction whenever you parry, bone armor, 100% reduction from anti-magic shell for you and your party, and the ability to go stun, charm, fear and sleep immune. But you don't get a whole lot else and it seems a bit of an effort to go in order to give yourself something unique to lay your hat on. On top of that, the tree you skip the most is Frost, the one we associated mostly with tanking. But why go heavy frost when all you get is some improved resitances and armor?

I would imagine the Anti-magic shell has it's usefullness over warrior spell reflect, because warrior spell reflect does not reflect a large number of spells, and magic-type abilities.

Eg the anti-magic shell would be very usefull against any kind of splash/aoe damage that spell reflect doesn't counter (Eg Illidans frontal aoe ability, leotharas, tidewalker etc) Also spell reflect doesn't actually reflect alot of spells from normal mobs, let alone boss-types. (Spell reflect doesn't work on the shades in karazhan going upto shade/illhoof).

Here's a thought: Looking at Acclimation, it sounds like we may be looking at some more 'stacking debuff' type boss fights. If so, Death Knights with Acclimation will suddenly become the Premiere tanks for those fights simply because not only would the minimum acceptable level of resist be lower for them (in a more casual, or at least 'newbie raid', environment) but they'd also be able to basically guarantee that any debuffs will stack more slowly on them.

So, assuming that Acclimation may just be the "Must Have" in the Frost tree, you are now required to have 43 points in the tree in order to max it out. Going from there, if Frost strike is worthwhile you might as well pick it up along with Chill of the Grave, Tundra Stalker, and Hungering Cold. At this point, we're at 0/55/0 and have 16 talent points remaining, leaving it impossible to both get Lichborne from the Unholy tree and the Parry bonuses from Blood. Right now, I'd err on the side of passive talents and pick up the 5% Parry, along with 3/3 Epidemic from Unholy, and either put the final three points in Dark Conviction or Subversion (probably Dark Conviction since 'DPSing' in tank gear probably wont exactly require additional threat reduction.

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.

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.

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

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.