Okay, so if I get gear for 9% hit and I DON'T take the Dark Command Glyph, my Dark Command will screw up 8% of the time? Is that what we're saying here?
No, there will be a small % chance that it can be resisted (miss), but we have enough tools that it shouldn't be a big issue. Anymore than 9% hit and you are sacrificing too many other stats.
BCB adds another hit every time it procs, if that additional hit is parried, the boss will gain what is usually referred as parry haste. When you, or a boss, parries an attack, it resets its autoattack swing timer to the start, meaning you usually get hit right after a parry. Some bosses have this turned off, but most have it turned on. This is why you never want pets, or players meleeing from the front on a tough boss, why expertise is actually both a threat and a mitigation tool and why additional attacks like dual wield gets, or BCB, aren't such a great idea while tanking.
As for glyph and Dark Command, I'd be tempted to say like every other taunt uses melee hit checks. The glyph would probably give you much more than needed for taunts to never be resisted, which is the point. I don't think they'd put taunts back on spellhit and "compensate" by adding glyphs. I'll run a few tests and update this, but it'd feel weird.
Edit: Oh well, guess blizzard likes going back to old stuff. Dark Command is definitely on spell hit rating, so the glyph is actually useful I guess. With 2 taunts, and decent spellhit+misery+maybe virulence, I don't think it's very important however.
First, 80 RP is not a conservative estimate. Unless you're consciously avoiding Rune Strike and DC, you're not typically going to be sitting around at 80% of cap,and obviously if you're consciously avoiding all RP abilities just to keep RP in store for your DS build, you're sacrificing a huge chunk of single-target dps.
Assuming I'm getting hit and using DS and other skills, yes I will. Runestrike is able to be covered. As is the DC in the Rotation, Plus Some extra at the End of the rotation.
Second, skipping out Unholy Blight misses a huge advantage of being an unholy tank in the first place, which is AoE tanking. You also don't have deep frost talents, so you're just going to suck all around as an AoE tank.
The damage from DS does AoE threat.
You also don't have Unholy Aura or Ebon Plague, so you're dependent on another Unholy DK being around, even though you went so deep into Unholy yourself.
Tanks should not be responsible for party buffs, it does not require an unholy DK or a warlock, even though it can benefit from it. I benefit from shaman buffs as well, and a frost tank gets the same benefits I do. This would be a similiar argument against a dps spec like the DW trispec.
Third, a lot of the "advantages" that you list of your spec are present in the more standard builds being thrown around. Examples: You don't have BcB - neither does the deep unholy tank build. You say you have frost skills to mitigate, but you don't go deeper in frost than the deep unholy tank build.
So then they are good builds also.
Finally, actual numbers: In Naxx-10 last night with my mediocre gear, overall for the night, my average DS hit was 859, and my max crit was 2076. My average SS hit was 2060, and my max crit was 6351. Threat difference is pretty clear.
I assume that you did not have the Glyph of Death Strike, so we need to add 32% which would be 1134/2740
Assuming 3 diseases we get healing of 2835/6850 for healing threat of 1417/3425
For a total threat of 2551/6165 which seems pretty much in the same ballpark as your 2060/6351 (not to mention the benfit of those heals)
Death Strike is situationally useful, certainly, and the healing threat should mean that it stays close to the threat produced by scourge strike against a single target (boss), but with the following drawbacks:
1) Easier time on the healers, but considerably less damage done. The old view of a tank as someone who props up the bottom of the dps charts above the healers is rightly moving into the past. I'd expect to not only be brought for my ability to stay alive and hold threat, but to contribute meaningfully to getting the boss killed as fast as possible.
2) AOE threat - yes, healing threat is split automatically between all targets in range, but neglecting other AOE forms of damage/threat in favour of healing threat wouldn't be ideal - I want those AOE packs dead as soon as possible.
I'd also pick up on the "tanks should not be responsible for party buffs" line - why not? If I enjoy playing as an unholy DK tank, it is most efficient for me to pick up maxed ebon plaguebringer, unholy aura and improved icy touch, as I apply those buffs and debuffs to the party in the course of doing my normal job, at zero cost to myself. This allows warlocks, boomkins, warriors and ferals to make alternative power or talent choices, that boost rDPS. I'm not just a meatshield. I'm an active contributor to everything my team does, and I think that approach is superior to the immovable object style of low dps/high threat tanking. Your mileage may vary.
If a DK brings party/raid buffs to a raid, that's more reason to bring them. Thats like saying you shouldn't use horn of winter because as a tank I'm not responsible to use it or a warrior tank not using shouts. If you have buffs you can bring and use, then you need to. Our Auras are unique to our class and we should be providing that buff regardless of spec.
If I had to do the build, I'd probably do this instead: Talent Calculator - World of Warcraft
Replace Scent of Blood by Dark Conviction, more threat which would be useful without a hard hitting ability, and Scent of Blood is pretty terrible. Also get Mark of Blood for an additional cooldown abiltiy, at the cost of Veteran, but I guess that's arguable. Still a good talent when you know something bad is coming, heals plenty on a tank. Then take one point out of necrosis and the wasted point off Crpy Fever to put them into unholy aura, assuming no one provides it. Else I'd say 5/5necro and 3/3veteran of the thirdwar with the points.
I'm not 100% sure I'd tank with that though, threat might be an issue especially against fury wars which still have shit for threat management, but do more damage than ever. Maybe with smart paladins using salvation and stuff like that, but still seems like a risky build, especially if you get a lucky string of avoidance early on, and your deathstrike doesn't heal anything(overheal doesn't generate threat). Would be very similar to prot warrior prewotlk when rage starved early in the fight.
The biggest issue with the build though is, why? Maybe on a few specific fights, 6% stamina and the additional magic resistance would be worth having, but for 90% of the time, it wouldn't. Maybe it'd become a common second build for dedicated tankers once they add the dual spec, but honestly I think deep unholy is just more flexible when it comes to your everyday main tanking, including trash and adds based bosses.
The other issue with relying on DS healing threat (aside from the 'overhealing produces no threat" aspect), is that it become significantly less good the more mobs you engage. Scaling threat > inversely scaling threat.
Now, there can be fights where DS is a great tool even if you do have SS. I tend to use it between cooldowns to help my healers out a bit, but 90% of the time when Bone Shield or IBF are up, it's going to be overheal.
@ Nanjani:
Question: What do you think about taking 3 points out of Magic Suppression and putting them into Outbreak? [Huge caveat here, as I haven't hit 80 yet. and even when I (finally) do, I don't anticipate doing 25 man content.]
Basically, do you think the cost of Magic Suppression (1 point per 1% reduction) is acceptable? It seems very high to me.
The cost is very high, however there really isn't anywhere else to put those points. They're largely a matter of personal preference. Desecration, outbreak (which just so you know does very little added overall damage, and is really only useful for snap aggro), wandering plague, etc. What it comes down to is the Unholy tree has lots of toys for dps builds, but a lot of fluff for tanking builds. I desperately wish we had something along the lines of Frigid Dreadplate somewhere in our tree to toss some points into.
Anyways, back to your question, yes Magic Suppression is expensive, but is moderately useful. Couple it with a AMS glyph for the best effect I suppose. In reality, its not magic damage we're worried about. All the tank types will take roughly the same damage from magic Its the hard hitting bosses and/or the bosses with parry haste mechanics that we're really worried about. I say a little prayer every time I step up to Patchwork.
It seems that one point to get a 3rd Disease would be a point well spent.
I'm not 100% sure I'd tank with that though, threat might be an issue especially against fury wars which still have shit for threat management, but do more damage than ever. Maybe with smart paladins using salvation and stuff like that, but still seems like a risky build, especially if you get a lucky string of avoidance early on, and your deathstrike doesn't heal anything(overheal doesn't generate threat). Would be very similar to prot warrior prewotlk when rage starved early in the fight.
I think this is the biggest reason not to, my avoidence is not high enough yet to be "damage starved"
The biggest issue with the build though is, why? .
DK's are new, the DW trispec worked, I wanted to see if a tank trispec could work. This is the time to explore. On paper the threat looked very appealing. In practice it seemed to work.
I'd like to thank everyone who helped explain why DS Tanking might not work. I'm not sure how often damage starvation would occur, but its a good enough reason to not risk the raid.
Deathstrike is obviously quite useful. I leveled my DK as unholy with a deathstrike glyph and saw heals as big as 8k come in. That was in blues. They are however rare, and I assume are double crits (DS crit, followed by the heal critting). Non-glyphed the best we can really plan on is something along the lines of 1.5-3k healing per DS. A healthy chunk and worth using. I still use SS as my main U+F attack, although I do DS if I know the heal will land. If I could fit a DS glyph in I would, although there are just too many useful majors currently. Although be aware that your RP will rarely be maxed for any length of time. And yes, I tried the Chill of the Grave + Dirge build out on a dummy. It was a staggeringly large DPS/TPS drop.
On to glyphs.
Glyph of Bone Shield- A must have for unholy tanks. Period. The end.
Glyph of Dark Command- It's unacceptable to have taunt resisted with any sort of frequency. Until you get some +hit I'd be sure to pick this up. Once you've obtained a moderate amount of hit, a case could be made for dumping this glyph due to DG being able to back it up quite often.
Glyph of Death and Decay- I miss this glyph. Cuts the incoming damage on trash dramatically. With this you can pull absurdly large packs and survive. Unfortunately quite useless outside of this type of situation and pvp.
Glyph of Icy Touch- This is what I've recently slid into my 3rd glyph slot. Honestly, I could live without it, but going from zero RP to DnD -> grip -> PS -> IT -> Pest -> UB, instead of waiting a bit longer for the UB is fairly nice if your mages/hunters/locks are as suicidal as those in my raid.
Glyph of Anti-Magic Shell- I'm seriously considering picking this up over Dark Command or IT. Double duration for 15s of CD is quite worth it.
What to skip:
Glyph of Rune Strike- The crit bonus does not outweigh the cost. The only reason I would consider using this is due to a druids Nourish providing RP. Quit often you will have your RP spike to full while MTing. Regardless, I'm still not sold. If I could turn it off whenever I wanted, I'd be more inclined to take it.
Glyph of Icebound Fortitude- You'll save more RP with the IT glyph. If you're conserned about not having the RP when you need it, macro in Raise Dead and get the Raise Dead minor.
Speaking of minor glyphs:
Raise Dead- +20 RP on summon is very nice for those oh !@#% moments where you can't get off a Mind Freeze or IBF. On the topic of the ghoul. The average lifespan of your ghoul in Naxx will be roughly the time it takes to click twice a "/castsequence Raise Dead, Death Pact" macro. Don't get any crazy ideas about leet ghoul dps.
Pestilence- !!! Amazing minor glyph. Get it.
Horn of Winter- Because what else are you going to get to fill the slot? Blood tap does like .5% damage when you have 35+k hp. Does the corpse explosion glyph even work? I tried it while leveling and it never did a damn thing. I guess Death's Embrace would be if, on the rare occasion, all the the following conditions were met; a) you have less than full health, b) you have lots of RP, c) you pop lichborne. You'll never heal your ghoul. Never. Ever.
As far as sacrificing ghouls goes. Can we Death Pact a ghoul we raise if it brings up a player instead of an NPC? Often we'll finish a battle and someone will pipe up on Vent "Why am I a ghoul?". To which I promptly reply, "Oh, sorry about that. I was trying to sacrifice you." With so many heals coming in, I can never tell if it actually works if it's a player, although the players never seem to die so I'm assuming it doesn't. Very annoying. Wish they'd take out the player ghouls when not specifically targeting someone.
They are adding a new spell to rez players specifically, and making the current raise dead npc only, GC said in a recent post about DKs. Yeah it's annoying as hell to not be able to death pact if you rez someone, especially since most of the time you want to use death pact is because stuff isn't going well, and that means there's people dead that will get autotargetted.
For the glyph of dark command, it's not that necessary. Assuming misery/imp FF and a decent hit rating, the resist chance will be low. Depending on your build, you can also consider Virulence(I know I do, hate icy touch being resisted) and then you're looking at a very small chance of it being resisted. Then you factor that boss taunting is actually not that common, you taunt trash or adds much more often, so need way less hit rating, and it's not an issue. Finally, you can always grip+dark command at the same time(no GCD), and the chances the 2 miss at the same time, even with low hit is very low, enough that it should never be an issue.
I'm hesitating between going back to Death Strike(I have Oblit glyphed atm from dps spec) or trying AMS. AMS seems very good because that's a long time of magic invulnerability, but I also liked death strike because 5-6k heals are always good, even if half of it goes into overheal, and from my experience, it doesn't happen that often unless you use death strike purely reactively, I usually tend to just spam it instead of SS if I'm fine on threat and I'm not under bone shield or IBF.
And Aquarian yeah my bad forgot about the 3rd disease for 1point, I'm too use to having the whole pack, so yeah I guess one point off something to get it. Still not sure it's that good though, I guess that'd need testing, as long as you keep aggro you'd be fine.
And Aquarian yeah my bad forgot about the 3rd disease for 1point, I'm too use to having the whole pack, so yeah I guess one point off something to get it. Still not sure it's that good though, I guess that'd need testing, as long as you keep aggro you'd be fine.
Nah, the Damage starvation scared me, gunna try something based on the Blood Tank Rejju posted (p12)
Less contriversial and much higher threat, should do ok for AoE
Plus it seems Blood tanks will be buffed soonish
Only real question:
Is there any serious issue that using more strikes (row 2 is 5 attacks not the 3 that Frost/Unholy have)
Will that increase my chance to be boss parried?
Has there been any comparisons done concerning a point in Bladed Armor versus points in 2-Hand Spec? I browsed the thread, saw it mentioned but never answered.
I'm liking Talent Calculator - World of Warcraft as a frost Tank spec, and the question then becomes 5/5 Bladed Armor, 1/2 2hSpec or 4/5 Bladed Armor, 2/2 2hSpec.
In short: Is a single point in 2hSpec more or less than Bladed Armor.
Second: I'd like to ask you folks an opinion question. A fellow guild DK said that they thought frost strike was a waste because "I'm spamming runestrike, so I don't have the RP for it".
Personally, though this may be because I'm undergeared, I have plenty of RP available for both Runestrike and Froststrikes.
Finally, I have a question regarding Tanking rotations. I'm aware that (with Obliterate Glyphed), IT -> BS -> Oblit -> Oblit -> RP dump is supposed to be the best frost DPS rotation. is It safe to assume that this is also the ideal tanking rotation, or should Death and Decay show up when it's off cooldown for the bonus threat.
With the previously mentioned rotation, it also seems to devalue Epidemic if one is using IT in every rotation anyway, which would give a build more like this: Talent Calculator - World of Warcraft
This makes the question simpler -- where should the last point go?
I'm curious if any tanks have had any threat issues yet, in 10 or 25 man content, because I am seriously considering a hybrid build that takes most unholy stuff, plus a couple points in Frigid Deathplate. I know that Blizzard has said that they want threat to be of minor concern (but still present) in tanks minds, but this doesn't mean that a lack of say, Rage of Rivendare, is really going to cripple an unholy tank.
Build I was thinking of - Talent Calculator - World of Warcraft
-Icy talons for faster rune strikes, so more threat. Right now I can Rune Strike just about every auto attack. Faster auto attacks means more Rune Strikes, right?
-AMZ and what not because I hear it's nice for some encounters.
-Ebon Plaguebringer, which will keep my Strikes hitting decently hard and provide good raid utility.
-No reaping, because frankly I do not think it incredibly valuable though it is nice. Two of my blood strikes nearly equal my one scourge strike, depending on buffs and debuffs, and I do not think it is a significant loss. This is an idea I also got from the Unholy DPS discussion.
-Lack of Unholy Blight. This is the sucky part. I love UB, but I think that what I gain in Frost might make up for it. I do not feel that UB contributes a huge amount of single target threat, and I have been able to hold aggro no problem on AoE packs using an AoE rotation.
-Lack of Bladed Armor, 2H spec. Direct losses to threat that would hurt, probably a lot. But how much? I know I could lose them right now and have little trouble. The way my threat scales with raid damage is pretty amusing but I'm not sure if losing these two would be critically damaging.
I do gain a slight bit of threat from going as far into frost as I do go, from Imp. Icy Touch, Icy Talons, and Annhilation.
Has there been any comparisons done concerning a point in Bladed Armor versus points in 2-Hand Spec? I browsed the thread, saw it mentioned but never answered.
I'm liking Talent Calculator - World of Warcraft as a frost Tank spec, and the question then becomes 5/5 Bladed Armor, 1/2 2hSpec or 4/5 Bladed Armor, 2/2 2hSpec.
In short: Is a single point in 2hSpec more or less than Bladed Armor.
Second: I'd like to ask you folks an opinion question. A fellow guild DK said that they thought frost strike was a waste because "I'm spamming runestrike, so I don't have the RP for it".
Personally, though this may be because I'm undergeared, I have plenty of RP available for both Runestrike and Froststrikes.
Finally, I have a question regarding Tanking rotations. I'm aware that (with Obliterate Glyphed), IT -> BS -> Oblit -> Oblit -> RP dump is supposed to be the best frost DPS rotation. is It safe to assume that this is also the ideal tanking rotation, or should Death and Decay show up when it's off cooldown for the bonus threat.
With the previously mentioned rotation, it also seems to devalue Epidemic if one is using IT in every rotation anyway, which would give a build more like this: Talent Calculator - World of Warcraft
This makes the question simpler -- where should the last point go?
~Ragereaver of Gorefiend
Ages ago in the beta thread it was calculated that 1pt in bladed is valued higher than 1pt in 2h spec. That being said, 2h spec is still a strong area to put points, just be aware that it only effects our physical damaging abilities.
Froststrike is not a waste. Not at all. You'll have plenty of RP for FSing, even when using RS whenever possible (which you should be doign.)
In regards to the endless posts validating specs based on rotations... please realize that we are not DPS. We do not stand behind the boss and run through set rotations. Sure there are plenty of encounters where all you do is build threat and try not to die. There are, however, many more encounters where you've got to pick up adds, interrupt 16k frostbolts, deal with parries that will totally destroy the possibility of perfect rotations, reactivity pop AMS, proactively pop IBF, the list goes on. Know your ability priorities, adjust to the needs of your healers, watch DBM/Bigwigs, and you'll be successful. Keep blade barrier up, keep diseases up, rune strike, dump excess RP, SS/Oblit, etc, etc. If you expect to walk up to Kel'thazud and expect PS -> IT -> BS -> BS -> SS -> whatever -> Repeat, to work... you're sorely mistaken.
There must be like 30 different builds on this thread, if not more, and I have read them all. Is it safe to conclude that blizzard did a pretty good job of not making one or two cookie cutter specs? Talent trees have a lot of mandatory talents, but it has a lot of room for personal preference as well.
My view on it, for all it matters, as I haven't done a lot of tanking yet:
*5/5/5 is mandatory.
*Threat is (almost) a non factor at this point.
*For heroic instancing and AoE tanking, frost is better since unholy has bone armor which is gone fast with multiple mobs hitting you. While frost gets 3% miss, 6 more seconds on IBF and gets UA.
*With better gear and high avoidance levels, bone armor will last longer and therefor becomes stronger/better.
*For more AoE threat, unholy is the better (easier?) spec.
*(Deep) Blood lacks major tanking talents (being looked into). However there are builds who go upto 23 points into Blood to get 6% more stamina/strength and 6 expertise from Veteran of the Third War.
I forgot to mention earlier and am unsure if this has been mentioned previously, but lichborne should ideally be popped in conjunction with bone shield. This will usually push the up time of that instance of bone shield greatly and will result in less total bone shield downtime. This can appear to be counter intuitive for many people, as many tanks appear to be saving (and often not using) lichborne due to its "long" cooldown.
In general, if I know an encounter is over 3 minutes, I'll use it right away with bone shield. If I know I'll only get two off over the duration of the encounter I tend to hold onto the last use for a bit in case the healing gets a little dicey at the end.
Everything debated in this thread will change. Keep in mind GC is simply stating things they're thinking about but significant changes are coming.
They understand that the Blood tree is the weakest of the three for tanking and it will be buffed.
Apparently they wanted us to use talents such as Bone Armor, Vampiric Blood and Unbreakable Armor for emergencies only and understand that while we have these abilities up we tank very well but without them we are sub par. They're thinking about upping our over-all mitigation in Frost Presence. They're also thinking of tying IBF to defense, (Yes PVP'ers are upset with this change). Expect Bone Armor to be nerfed.
Apparently they don't want us to be avoidance tanks and want us to value defense more then avoidance. I don't understand GC's statement that they didn't want DK's to be avoidance tanks, DK's don't get a shield, there are only one or two 'tanking' two handers and 0 tanking sigils in the game. The synergy between BA and avoidance should have, and was imo, apparent for a long time.
Rune Strike was meant to be a threat tool for tanking, not a Rogue gibbing tool, it's damage will be nerfed while it's threat increased. PVP'ers are really upset with this change.
A couple nice things: Looks like the permanent ghoul, (at the least), will get avoidance, hopefully gargoyle will as well; Horn of Winter will probably be changed to generate RP, nice change! A separate spell for rez'ing other players as opposed to rez'ing a pet.
While I've read that DK's are successfully tanking in Nax I'm guessing that Blizz felt that the class would have trouble in the next tier without some changes.
Pre-WOTLK I only played one character as my main, which was a Protection Warrior, with WOTLK I changed to Death Knight since I seriously needed a fresh start.
I tried out Unholy, but didn't like it too much. While most of the posts I read here stated that Unholy is superior in AoE tanking I believe that Frost is at least as good. The core of Unholy is Bone Armor, so while maybe being better in AoE tanking which I still doubt, they will also take way more damage than a Frost tank during an AoE pull since their bones will be gone in just a few seconds.
Most trash pulls in for example Naxxramas (both 10-man and 25-man version) die in just a few seconds. It is very nice to spike your threat as quick as possible since no matter how much you warn people you always have some trigger happy AoE DPS in your raid.
Even if the CD for Deathchill is 3 minutes the Deathchill > Howling Blast combo is an absolute killer threat wise on AoE packs. If you time and plan your Deathchill right you really will get addicted to it.
There are a few points in my build that are filler points or "I couldn't find anywhere else to put them" points, but overall I tried to keep my TPS/DPS as high as possible while having lots of "o shit" buttons and mitigation talents/spells.
Another build I have been looking into but didn't try out yet is Blood/Frist build
This build sacrifices a few tanking abiltiies and deep Frost talents to pick up some Blood talents including Veteran of the Third War. It boosts expertise, avoidance, stamina (so health pool too) and it gimps your TPS a tiny bit. Might be worth considering it and I would like to see what others thing about that build.
Now a few things about GC's post I don't get. He says that DK's were not meant to be avoidance tanks or at least not designed as avoidance tanks. DK's have a hard time stacking defense compared to other defense using tanks, our armor is pretty ok and our health pool too (still both less than a Druid). As far as I could see, read and compare to fellow tanks we have one of the best avoidance of the tanking classes. Please correct me if I am wrong.
Druids sit around 35%-40% avoidance, I am sitting at 45% avoidance with my partially Naxxramas gear (I still have 3 blues too).
So how do we have to gem/enchant then? Until now I was gemming +16 def as much as I could, but reading all this makes me wonder if we should not try out effective health tanking and gem for +24 sta as much as we can (while keeping defense above 540, no doubt).
Hope my post was clear, lots of ideas coming when I was writing so it might be a bit messy :P
Cooldown Usage
I was wondering how to optimize cooldown usage from a frost tank point of view.
I have in mind a simple "tank and spank" encounter with no predictable spike and a few magic damage, 6 min long.
What do I have, or hope I will :
Icebound Fortitude: 16s duration, 1 min cooldown
Unbreackable armor :20s duration, 1 min cooldown, glyphed
Lichborn : 15s duration, 3 min cooldown
AMS : 5s duration, 1min cooldoww [Repelling Charge] (RC): 15s, 3 min cooldown [Valor Medal of the First War] (MVFW) : 20s, 2 min cooldown
I have took an excel sheet and try to see if I could always be on a active cooldown.
Here is the result : (The left row is in second)
LB IBF UA MVFW RC AMS
0 LB AMS
5 LB
10 LB
15 IBF
20 IBF
25 IBF
30 UA
35 UA
40 UA
45 UA
50 MVFW
55 MVFW
60 MVFW
65 MVFW
70 AMS
75 IBF
80 IBF
85 IBF
90 UA
95 UA
100 UA
105 UA
110 RC
115 RC
120 RC
125
130 AMS
135 IBF
140 IBF
145 IBF
150 UA
155 UA
160 UA
165 UA
170 MVFW
175 MVFW
180 LB MVFW
185 LB MVFW
190 LB AMS
195 IBF
200 IBF
205 IBF
210 UA
215 UA
220 UA
225 UA
230
235
240
245
250 AMS
255 IBF
260 IBF
265 IBF
270 UA
275 UA
280 UA
285 UA
290 MVFW
295 MVFW
300 MVFW
305 MVFW
310 AMS
315 IBF
320 IBF
325 IBF
330 UA
335 UA
340 UA
345 UA
350 RC
355 RC
360 LB RC
And what I have seen from that is that on a 6 minutes fight, there is only 15second ( between 230 and 245) that I have no active cooldown.
The core of Unholy is Bone Armor, so while maybe being better in AoE tanking which I still doubt, they will also take way more damage than a Frost tank during an AoE pull since their bones will be gone in just a few seconds.
BA has a minimum up time due to an internal timer on charges. Don't think controlled pulls when deciding on AoE tanking. Think along the lines of Gothik. Naxx trash is a cake walk for frost and unholy.
In the end, both are fully capable AoE tanks. Frost just spends more time pointing and shooting where unholy spends more time yanking adds directly into an already existing sustained AoE zone.
It's a matter of preference.
Oh and fit Morbidity into that spec. Half the CD on DnD is priceless.
Anyone else have any good suggestions for a setting to have the best balance of threat gain/mitigation as a Frost specced tank?
Armor may be a tad high. It's certainly great, but it will overpower avoidance if it is weighted so high.
Expertise is probably slightly undervalued.
Skip haste all together.
Toss AGI in there in a proper ratio to match dodge. This may undervalue [Inevitable Defeat] if you don't.
Ages ago in the beta thread it was calculated that 1pt in bladed is valued higher than 1pt in 2h spec. That being said, 2h spec is still a strong area to put points, just be aware that it only effects our physical damaging abilities.
Froststrike is not a waste. Not at all. You'll have plenty of RP for FSing, even when using RS whenever possible (which you should be doign.)
In regards to the endless posts validating specs based on rotations... please realize that we are not DPS. We do not stand behind the boss and run through set rotations. Sure there are plenty of encounters where all you do is build threat and try not to die. There are, however, many more encounters where you've got to pick up adds, interrupt 16k frostbolts, deal with parries that will totally destroy the possibility of perfect rotations, reactivity pop AMS, proactively pop IBF, the list goes on. Know your ability priorities, adjust to the needs of your healers, watch DBM/Bigwigs, and you'll be successful. Keep blade barrier up, keep diseases up, rune strike, dump excess RP, SS/Oblit, etc, etc. If you expect to walk up to Kel'thazud and expect PS -> IT -> BS -> BS -> SS -> whatever -> Repeat, to work... you're sorely mistaken.
My question was less about an ideal tanking rotation and more about whether the bonus threat + dmg of Death and Decay made it worth using even on single-target fights.
If the answer is yes, I'll need to see if I can squeeze some points somewhere into Morbidity.
BA has a minimum up time due to an internal timer on charges. Don't think controlled pulls when deciding on AoE tanking. Think along the lines of Gothik. Naxx trash is a cake walk for frost and unholy.
In the end, both are fully capable AoE tanks. Frost just spends more time pointing and shooting where unholy spends more time yanking adds directly into an already existing sustained AoE zone.
It's a matter of preference.
Oh and fit Morbidity into that spec. Half the CD on DnD is priceless.
Thanks for the tip will try that out by moving point out of Acclimation.
What do you guys think on DK tanking gems? Should we just stack +def or cap defense at 540 and go the +24 stamina way. I know there is not just one way to do it and it kinda depends on your raid setup, what you are tanking and what your preferences are, but still would like to hear you guys comment on this.
12/02/08, 8:23 PM
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