I have calculated the exact numbers and I am not sure if this has been mentioned so forgive me if I am asking a dumb question.

Is Frost Strike better to use than Rune Strike as a frost tanking build?

I have been looking for discussions on this but I haven't found one yet. Bucknasty mentioned this in his post but he also said he had not found evidence of it.

I would think Rune Strike is better simply because it is unavoidable and deals roughly twice as much threat as a normal swing. It's definitely better Threat per RP as it costs a noticable amount less than FS and generates about the same amount of threat as a melée swing + frost strike.

Frost Strike is unavoidable. It's also pure Frost damage and thus not affected by armor mitigation.

The idea of comparing the two seems flawed. Rune Strike is a next melee attack that requires a dodge/parry and Frost Strike is an instant available so long as you have the RP and the GCD. I don't believe RP is so scarce while tanking that one can't use both.

Hopefully none of my questions were asked befor, or seem too stupid to be answered:

1.) In an unholy specc, when socketing my gear (being already hit capped), will it be useful to go for a bonus like 4 crit or 4 haste or the like, when you got to sacrifice 16 strength for 16 ap und 8 crit?

2.) AP does not improve my ghoul, right? And this won`t change for the next few weeks or longer?

I was more suggesting that FS is still resistable and can miss (poor phrasing, sorry about that--I blame not enough caffeine in my system when I posted) but, then again, Rune Strike is also affected by miss and armor's DR so I guess it comes back to their RP costs. To be honest, the two abilities shouldn't be compared--one is a made-to-order tanking-only ability and the other is a generic strike with a frost-tree flavor (a good strike, but not an über tanking tool).

With that being said is it wise to macro RS into my rotation or should I avoid doing that based on the dmg from FS and possibly not having enough RP to use it when needed, or does it even matter.

You do still want to use Rune Strike in your rotation, especially with the upcoming changes involving it receiving a much larger threat modifier. It's there to smooth out the penalties of missing with any of your attacks. You should still find that you have enough RP for Frost Strike too.

In my opinion it's not wise to macro RS, simply because there will be times when you want to have a specific amount of RP for something in the fight. For example, 20RP for IBF before a predictable burst, or 60RP(soon 40) for UB before adds spawns. You can stop pressing anything for a few seconds to make sure you have the RP, but that sounds a bit counterproductive to me. Instead, I bound RS to my mousewheel, so I just roll my mousewheel during the fight and RS everytime it's up, unless I don't want to.

Either way though, you want to use RS every cooldown. At low level of gear threat is a non issue, but we're running into threat issues more often now that people are pushing 5k DPS, especially fury wars and their total lack of threat dumps. It's GCD free damage too, which is good.

Runestrike is when YOU parry/dodge, not your target.

Having just hit 80, with tanking aspirations in the range of normals and heroics, which build do you think is the best overall in survivability, AoE tanking and utility? I've tried poking around, but it's mostly been about raid tanking and the challenges they face.

They're the exact same builds pretty much. Frost might be a bit better on the mitigation early on(lichborne, frigid dreadplate and ibf time+UA), but unholy has the upper hand for heavy AE encounters(halls of stone/caverns of time mostly, but every trash encounter is AE now so it doesn't hurt). I personally dislike frost, in terms of gameplay so I never actually speced it more than to test a few things out, but it's purely a matter of taste since both specs perform very well in heroics, probably equally. Blood is generally bad, until they patch then it will be pretty ok I think.

Another gear related question,
If I have 520 defense, how much resilience would I need to become crit immune?

Or, what is the chance for a boss mob (lvl 83) to get a crit on me?

This is based on numbers in this thread: [FAQ]Working theories of raiding at level 80

The chance should be 5.6%.

At 520, you have 4.8% chance to not be crit, meaning you need another .8%.

In resilience, that's... ((1 resilience / 1 percent) * (81.97497559 rating / 1 resilience)) *.8 percent = 65 resilience rating

Is the healing increase from Vampiric Blood counted before or after mortal strike?

Short Answer: It doesn't matter.

Say it's before.

150% health from healing X 50% is 75% healing.

After:

50% healing +50% extra healing is 75% healing.

Hungering Cold


Does a free HC from Rime generate RP?
Does HC deal double damage when the targets are inflicted by another DKs IT as well?

Pestilence currently has no target limit; it will hit everyone within range on the spell upon casting.

WoW. Don't know why I thought it was just two. Sorry for that stupid question.

what profession do you guys think would go best with a tank DK?

I was thinking mining and JC or BS. you'll get the extra HP from mining, but i don't know if JC would be better or BS, or another option which I have not yet considered. Thanks.

Just looking at stamina for simplicity:

• JCing lets you use [Solid Dragon's Eye] instead of [Solid Sky Sapphire] in 3 slots, which is worth 51 stamina. Database mining indicates that when epic gems are released the relevant cut will probably be [Solid Majestic Zircon], if so that cuts the JC advantage to 33 stamina.
• BSing lets you add two extra sockets. That's currently worth 48 stamina, and might climb to 60 stamina with epic gems.
• Enchanting nets 48 stamina via ring enchants.
• Mining is 50 stamina
• Leatherworking, as of the next minor patch, gives 50 more stamina than the best bracer enchant

Of those the "best" is probably the JC/BS combo - since there's a wide variety of gem options it means you can be much more flexible with gear choices. By contrast both enchanting and leatherworking only offer AP as an alternative to stamina, which isn't very useful for a tank. Mining, of course, is only stamina. Then again, Mining is easy to level and might even make you money.

This question is aimed at the Death Knights that have been pvp'n since release. I have always pvp'd heavily on my rogue, holding a rating of usually around 2200 in 2's. I have rerolled this DK for tanking purposes and I have done no pvp at all since I rerolled but I enjoy my DK enough that I want this to be my main in pvp as well.

My question is what pvp builds at the moment seem the most efficient overall for a 2v2, 3v3 environment. The team I will more than likely be running is with my priest friend (disc) in 2's, and with a hunter in 3's.

No idea; however, there is a relevant DK thread in the PvP forum that might have an answer for you. If I recall, DKs are looking like the solid "fifth guy" in 5s, ok in 3s, and way up in the air in 2s as they can't be built into a "survive and outlast" team (they have no way of actively burning mana, or even entering melée range after DG is used). Theory goes that they'll be rather durable as 'stance' swaps aren't as bad as a warrior or Druid, allowing them to turtle up in frost AND pop defensive CDs if they get focused.

My personal experience in BGs hint at fears and stuns being a proble moreso than "simple" kiting (DG + CoI is really good for keeping someone close-ish) as IBF won't break a stun so it must be used proactively. IMO, DKs will turn into the early focus target simply because of their utter lack of stun breaks and sole fear break.