You can use any of the macros out there for Warriors, shield block will already be 0 for a DK. I guess if you wanted to manually calculate set shield block to 0.

How does crit rating affect the T9 4P set bonus? Is it a direct link? I haven't done any extensive testing, but with ~35% crit chance, I was only seeing one in maybe 10 dot ticks "crit" in a heroic run. My average dps was higher, but I'm not sure if that was the bonus in action or just the better gear. Does the effect normally show in the default Blizz FCT as a normal "sticky" crit, or just doubled damage? If it's not a direct link and 1/10 ticks is normal, that'll become 1/20 when 3.3 changes it to remove Frost Fever.

Is it normal for an Unholy DK in 232-245 gear to be at 5k dps with 5-man buffs with this set bonus? I'm seeing talk of 11k in raids... I don't know how a few more raid buffs can more than double our dps.

5mans are an absolutely terrible way to judge DPS. The fights typically last less than 30s or so, so a significant portion of the fight is spent getting diseases/procs up, which is reflected in your average DPS at the end of the encounter. Furthermore, those missing buffs can make a TREMENDOUS difference. I will typically have 5-6k average AP in a standard 5man run, while I probably push 8.5k average in raids (if not higher). You will also always be missing some important raid buff (be it 20% haste, extra crit, reduced armor or what have you). Finally, the 11k numbers you see being tossed around are often the result of encounters with significant AoE or damage increasing components (i.e. twins or Anub).

Ah, a perfectly logical answer. That makes total sense. I assumed Kings, Sanc, Windfury and my own buffs would be the brunt of the dps boosts, but now I realize raid DEBUFFS play a part as well, along with time on target. I also assumed 5man aoe would be about the same as 10/25-man, but I'm guessing the same things apply.

So I guess my dps is pretty normal, now I'm just interested in the set bonus.

The set bonus scales with your own crit percentage, although I'm not sure if it was spell crit or melee crit chance. Looking at my recent parses doesn't give an answer, either, since the disease crit percentage is always less than the melee crit percentage, but above the death and decay crit percentage. But the answer must be somewhere in the threads.

It is usually around 40ish percent, so definitely worthwile. Do you track your disease crits by looking at the scrolling combat text or do you use Recount or something similar? By simply relying on SCT it's near impossible to really get the correct impression of your number of crits. Besides, what Darkside mentioned also applies here, full raid buffs also increase your crit chance by quite a bit (although 10% is unrealistically low).

Testing has show that 4pc T9 was critting at the same rate as your melee crit, minus the innate crit suppression on bosses.

You still get 3% crit out of Ebon Plague, so the 6 points is not all wasted with another DK. ATM on the live game, there is nothing else to get that is worth dropping the talents for. In 3.3 where Reaping and Epidemic are useful, you would have somewhere to point the extra points, like Necrosis.

Something I've always wondered, the strength gained from HoW and BoK does it double/triple dip into the bonus strength bonus's from ravenous dead and veteran of the third war? If so(Because I've always assumed it does and can never wrap my head around how to do this) how would I go about getting an accurate number for my buffed strength while not able to get a pally to buff me, stupid question I know but then again that is this thread purpose :P. Thank you in advance.

Percentage bonuses from buffs and talents are multiplicative, so they all affect each other, yes. The HoW flat bonus is just added on before multipliers. "Double-dipping" usually refers to an ability benefiting twice from raid buffs, or from two different types of buffs that aren't normally meant to overlap (i.e. melee and spell raid buffs).

Ah, thank you for correcting my misunderstanding of the terminology then . I guess my actual question would be if the strength from BoK is added before or after multipliers are calculated.

Since BoK is itself a multiplier it does not matter. (base + absolute values) * talent multiplier * BoK multiplier yields the same result as (base + absolute values) * BoK multiplier * talent multiplier

Absolut values includes strength from gear, totem, MotW and such.

First off, here's a link to my armory: Sabellian

As you can see, I'm sorely lacking expertise, and there isn't much gear that I can see myself getting with my guild's current progression status that can help me to remedy this. Tonight, while running TotGC10, I received these: [Gauntlets of Mounting Anger]. What I was wondering was how I should fill the yellow socket. Normally I'd throw a +20 Cardinal Ruby in there without a second thought, but the expertise issue is really starting to frustrate me. Is there a better way for me to get at least some of that much-needed expertise through gems?

To give an idea as to my progression and what's available to me, we're currently struggling to down Faction Champions in TotGC10, and the only hard-modes we haven't done in Ulduar are Mimiron, Yogg-Saron, and Algalon (all of which are to some degree in sight; we've been working on them, but progress is slow). Everything else is obviously done, and with the except our GM's struggle to pull together a halfway decent 25 group by the time Icecrown comes out, we're effectively a 10man guild.

I know a lot of Icecrown loot is decked in expertise, and I was wondering if anyone had any advice on how I could handle this.

Thanks.

Looks like a [Accurate Ametrine] would fit nicely, especially since you'll be losing some hit anyway, not to mention you're not quite capped either.

Kinda off-topic but did anyone found out what is causing ghoul missing from combatlog parses and how (at least try) to prevent this from happening?

I use glyph of Disease as a DPS and would like an addon that tells me at any given point what my AP is, so I can effectively refresh when my AP is at it's most. I was under the impression Bleeding Hearts was ideal for exactly this, but I can't get it to function. When enabled it doesn't appear anywhere, no commands produce any result and it's not registered as consuming any memory.

What I'd like, is either a pointer in the direction of a similar addon, or a suggestion as to why Bleeding Hearts won't work.

This issue has been around for a while. The person tracking the combat log needs to see DK casts summon Ghoul X, so that WoL knows Ghoul X goes with the DK. If the log misses that event, the ghoul damage is still in the log, just it isn't added to the DK's damage.

My question is on recommended raiding specs pre 4pc t9. I have viskag and malice from ulduar, and I'm very familiar with DW frost, but it seems everyone is unholy 2h. My 2h is Earthshaper, which puts me WAY over the hit I need (I'm sitting at like 12.5%) In reading over the threads i see what I should spec/gem, but don't see comparisons. is 2h Unholy still superior, even without 4 pc t9? Or would I be better, in my situation, DW frost with viskag?

Kind of in the same vein as Para's question, what metrics, beyond runnings sims, can be used to determine your optimal spec with regards to Blood vs. Unholy? The first idea I had was calculate total EP using both specs weightings and go with whichever one is higher, but that isn't accurate because 1 AP for each spec would result in different deltas for total DPS.

The best answer is to spec Blood one week and Unholy the next and compare. Then once you find which one works best for you and your group, you can use sims to get the EP for it.

For current content where Twins and Anub are the hardest, Unholy should always win on personal dps due to AoE.

The addon On Screen Stat Display (or OSSD) displays a given stat on the screen (yes, the name is explicit) in a small frame that you can move easily. You can choose any stat, including AP. The addon is available on curse.com.

Do the proc from heroic version of Death's choice stacks with the one from non-hero version still in PTR? I've heard it was not inetended and will be fixed in 3.3.0. Anybody has an idea?

I'm researching DK DPS classes to decide which talent tree I want to pursue and am stymied by a major inconsistency that I hope someone can help me resolve.

I have looked up a number of Unholy DK DPS guides, both here at EJ and elsewhere, and found that they concede best single-target DPS to the Blood class. I grant that nearly all of them haven't been updated in the past three months and many don't specifically address 3.2.2 changes, however minimal.

However, excluding Faction Champions, and with the realization that there are two bosses to DPS during Val'kyr Twins and Northern Beasts (albeit nerfed damage to the former and partial availability of the latter), and lastly assuming accurate results from Player Ranking - DPS to Bosses - Death Knight - All Region - Normal Mode(25), of the top 80 DKs to DPS a ToGC25 boss:

00 are Frost,
13 are Blood, and
67 are Unholy.

What am I missing? Is there something simple that explain this disconnect?

Thank you in advance for your time.