That's not what we're saying. The new weapons serve two purposes:

1. Help starting DK tanks get to 540 Def. without having to farm Loken for a week.

2. Give more geared DK tanks an extra option for fights (MT Sarth with drakes, Hatefuls on Patch, etc) where their threat output is less important than taking as little damage as possible.

Callaloo I have neither, but I do have jcing and bsing...if that..accounts...and Raedix in fact I am not getting what ya'll are saying lol. Your first point doesn't really apply atm just for the fact of I'm not a starting DK tank, but how does (what the axe is like 18 points of def?) really help, I realize the weapon is maybe 20 more points of stam then the destroyer and stam is stam, but is it worth it?

Yep, my first point doesn't apply to you. I don't see how you "don't get what I'm saying". The axe gives you gearing options in two ways: First, if you use it as your "only" weapon, you could gem for STA or for hit/exp instead of DEF... depending on your gear, this might be better for you. Second, if you swap weapons, you can gear to be uncrittable without the weapon, and swap in your Inevitable Defeat (or whatever "DPS" weapon you have) for fights where the DPS is likely to be threat capped (Malygos, KT, etc), and swap in your Defender for fights where you're likely to have trouble surviving or where threat doesn't matter much (MT Sarth+3, Hateful tank Patch, etc).

Are you ignoring the fact that 18 points of Def is ~2.2% miss/dodge/parry before DR? Right now I use [Black Ice], which has 1.5% avoidance (but much less STA, no STR, and no Def-cap headroom)... and it's ilvl213! Clearly, for survival stats, the Defender is better.

Anyway, can you please proofread your posts better? It's hard to divine what you're saying much of the time. This is EJ, not the WoW forums...

Well first off my post were regarding the fact of have multiple weapons and switching between them. Of course if you use the destroyer as your only weapon you can free up your gems in the other gear. My point was having to leave all the def gems in your gear so that when you switch weapons you remain uncrittable thus having just extra def whenever you are using one weapon and just enough when using the other, that seems silly to me.

Again I know that the 18 points of def is more migration, but my point relates to all the recent talk about once you are def cap do we really want more def or do we want to go for our stam and etc, why have 18 more def to tank a boss when you could have straight stam and avoidance?

You are not listening to what is being said. Defense is avoidance. And presumable, the tanking weapon has more stam than your other weapon. There is not really a question here at all.

Please read my post in its entirety. The ifs and buts means I'm right on track. :-)

However, I cannot get your spreadsheet to work. I enter all the numbers and I take into account runeforging etc, but I'm still off by a huge avoidance either by character sheet or by avoidance calculations in-game.

Knowing the accurate diminishing returns curve on defense is important. Although, after recollection of my time on the PTR last week, I'm inclined to believe in you without a working spreadsheet or the numbers that defense suffers more harshly.

I had calculated that my total avoidance loss with the 4% parry vs 25 defense runeforge was 2% and not 1% as expected. This lead me to theorize that defense had a significant diminishing returns curve. (Forgive me, but I couldn't find the diminishing returns on defense these past weeks and it's been the topic of conversations with many wow friends...)

Summary: trying to conclude once and for all that at 540 defense for the "soft crit cap" that defense suffers from diminishing returns such that itemizing for dodge is more effective to increase avoidance.

Tundra stalker, GoG, and Acclimation are replaced and surpassed by 2h-Wep Spec, Dark Conviction, and Vetran of the Third War.
As to your question if its hurting me? Only on ONE Fight...see way below for explanation.

As far as I can tell I am better able to MT with that spec Talent Calculator - World of Warcraft than I was with the resist spec.

VotTW gives me 1 more expertise than Tundra, 6% more STR and STAM vs 10% damage and 5 expertise.

GoG is replaced by my 4 piece set bonus and the damage is replaced by a static increase to damage from VotTW, DC, and 2H spec. Spell Deflection is a poor replacement for Acclimation but again neither is really that necessary...ends justifying the means I suppose.


Now before anyone calls BS as my current spec changed to the good ol resist build...the ONE fight I have found that I absolutely NEED the resist is....

soloing Onyxia (dramatic pause)

That is why I changed to the resist spec today...and it was WORTH it.

15 minutes = 165.50 Gold, 5 epics = 7-13g to vendor an 18 slot bag, and 2 boe blues to either vendor or AH.

all in all - 225g for 15 min of work...and even after the respec I still net 175g. When I go back it will be a net of 125...still great 15 minutes of work.

Not sure why I had Rune mastery in that original spec as it is completely worthless if you are frost.

But Talent Calculator - World of Warcraft is what I ended up with....perhaps you armory'd me at a weak moment...
Spell deflection was a filler to get to VotTW but for what ever reason I didnt pick up Subversion instead and drop Spell Deflection...thanks for pointing that out.

My spec actually had allot of thought put into it when we were forced to drop 3 points from Morbidity. Guile is not missed in the slightest...I still hit for 5-6.5 K Runics and OB's, I have the extended timer from my gear, I rarely notice a time when the 805 chance to make a bloodrune causes my rotation to fail...and even if it did my threat in 25 mans is still very formidable.

Simply work on the math. With the fact that with the added +def on a weapon we can change gear to whatever the situation requires. Now, what weapon would you use instead that will give you the same stam and avoidance for mitigation fights?

im a bit stuck as to where to put the last 4 points in my frost spec, anyone care to help?

Talent Calculator - World of Warcraft

How good is Killing Machine with a 2h?

The only talents i can see worth investing in (not all of course) would be Merciless Combat, Two-Handed Weapon Specialization, Icy Reach or Subversion

But im a lil stuck as to where to invest the last 4 points, unfortunaly we only have 1 semi-active ench shammy so Imp icy talons is pretty needed, raid wise.

The way I see it, you're going to use oblit, so Subversion is probably the biggest gain per point you can get, giving 9%crit to both BS every other rotation and 9%crit to oblit. Then you have one floating point, doesn't really matter where it ends, I'd take Icy Reach because I like the range on IT, but matter of taste it's very situational and mostly useful for trash, 2H weap spec would probably be better. KM with a 2H is pretty bad. Even in DPS gear, so in tanking gear it's even worse.

Look all my point was trying to get at was if we find out it's not so good to stack def why use the weapons? Looking at everything I have now if I use the new weapon and new tanking enchant I go up to about 584 def, that's what 44 def points I have to play with? I only have 3 16 def gems in my gear so that knocks it down to the point where (if I did all my math right) I still have about 33/34 extra def rating. Of course I could just drop the tanking enchant for the parry or (actually since we have seen that parry is the weakest stat why do we tank with it?) guardain, and that drops me down to only being a few above...I think lots of math and I'm eating pizza.

Don't get me wrong this can be great in later gear, but right now I have all pre naxx stuff cause I haven't been lucky at all with drops in naxx since we start 3 weeks ago.

Here's the thing - the majority of us that are responding to your questions are almost "completely" geared with T7 raid. Sadly, I have a few more pieces to go but I can tell you - it's rather difficult once you start upgrading Blues to Epics to maintain the 540 if gemming for Def/Sta/Hit-Exp. So, just remember that when we respond.

Now. The Parry enchant is a solid 4% uneffected by DR. That's what makes it an amazing enchant for us still.

Also, how many pieces of armor do you have enchanted for Def? That weapon + enchant also frees up the typical Back, Chest, and Bracer slots for additional stats and stam.

@ Rathore:
You're losing nothing with Acclimation seeing as it's worthless. But, you are losing a bit with Tundra Stalker. That's more dmg/tps and expertise which also transfers to dmg/tps.

Also, I'm so confused why so many DKs are wanting to get Rune Tap for those "OH ****" moments? Do you not trust your healers? You're job is to Main Tank so you need to spend your points accordingly, not Main Tank-but-at-the-same-time-heal-yourself. Blood DKs will do that but that's due to other reasons.

For those "moments" - you have IBF along with UA. If you're not feeling 'ok' with that - spec Unholy Tank for BS and IBF.

I don't know why you think it's not good to stack def; this thread is full of people explaining that it is good to stack def. It's better to stack dodge, but there is no 2H weapon with dodge except staves, so that's not really relevant. The bottom line is that every point of avoidance helps, and the new crafted weapons give the ability to get avoidance from your 2H weapon, which was previously effectively impossible. Bottom line: It's more avoidance than other options. More avoidance is better than less avoidance.

Further, if you don't understand why people use the parry enchant, you may want to do some more background reading. This has been explained in some depth already in this thread, but once again: The reason parry is weak is because parry rating converts into parry at a very low rate (thus you'd get more avoidance from an equivalent amount of dodge rating), and because parry is subject to a very aggressive DR curve. The parry enchant has neither of these drawbacks - there is no equivalent dodge enchant, and it isn't subject to DR. Obviously it's an extremely good enchant. Again, parry is avoidance. More avoidance is better than less avoidance. This is why we use the parry enchant. Now do you understand?

No, it's avoidance. Not mitigation, and certainly not migration. I'd normally assume this was a simple typo, but you went on to question why you'd choose defence when you could choose avoidance, so apparently you don't understand the concepts.

Ok i genuinly have read through all 55 pages of this thread and I'll admit I'm somewhat blinded by science.

So if you don't mind ive got a few questions i though you guys could clear up for me:

1) Has there been any kind of concensus as to a Blood tanking build?

2)If there is one are talents like Rune Tap and Mark of Blood involved? If not why not?

3)Is Acclimation really useless? (or really a word for that matter? I thought it was Acclimitisation but hey...) I've had resists hit 230 which isnt bad without a scrap of resist gear on, thats handy isnt it? :s

4)Should I invest in the new Tanking two handers comign out next patch or just stick the Def rune on my weapon?

5)To Virulence or not to Virulence? I can't find a definitive argument

6)If Robocop and a minotaur with a jet pack had a fight who would win?


Cheers
Mike

1) If you mean currently, no, the general concensus is anything but unholy sucks, unless you're in very early tanking gear where frost is as good/better than unholy. If you mean next patch, people are working on builds, but I guess it'll need to wait. Most versions don't go DRW or Blood Gorged, stopping at the tier before(and taking everything on that tier) then getting frost and unholy goodies.

2) Rune Tap is certainly a good tanking talent, I like it when I use an unholy/blood hybrid for sartharion tanking, it's excelent to heal yourself during a wall when your healer will take a few seconds to position and the bad guy is still breathing in your face. Mark of Blood not so much, it seems rather weak because it's not reactive but proactive, meaning you need to know when you will need it before you use it, and also MAYBE(I'm not sure I haven't tested in a long time) it only procs off hits or parries, not misses or dodges.

3) There's currently no fight where it's useful at least. The only fight that it will proc often and stay up is sapphiron, and frost resists is mostly unnecessary for the fight, even undergeared.

4) Both, see previous posts

5) Matter of taste, and spec. For unholy it's pretty good, for blood not so much. Also depends on your gear and how much hit you have, and if you run 10man or 25man(in 25 you'll often have misery or FF, in 10 not that much). I usually don't bother unless I have useless points, which rarely happens in the first 2 tiers of unholy, even when I skip morbidity.

6) 49.

I did a little experiment with dodge and defense since I got my Repelling Charge today. I took off both of my trinkets which are now the +84 dodge and +84 defense and compared dodge/parry/miss with each of them on vs none. The 84 dodge gained me 1.51% dodge according to the character sheet. The 84 defense gained me a total of 1.58 avoidance between parry/dodge/miss.

Am i missing something or is this accurate?

I have these stats before trinkets...

Defense rating of 652
Dodge rating of 440
Parry rating of 404

I hope this is enough information to analyze.

Defense rating doesn't have diminishing returns. Defense skill does not have diminishing returns. The parry/miss/dodge from defense skill has diminishing returns.

Thus, stoneskin is less than 3% avoidance.

Incorrect. Fire up the PTR and test it yourself. Stoneskin is a full 3% avoidance. Only ratings and agility diminish.

Oh? I was merely going by what I had read elsewhere (the PTR hates me, else yes, I would try for myself). I do apologize for the mistake. There is still much merit to 1% avoidance over 2% stamina, however, the first generally being stronger from an item budget point of view. How to factor in IBF scaling is another matter.
Defense rating is very, very close to dodge rating in terms of total avoidance, if that is what you mean. Defense is slightly weaker at same preexisting amounts - your character page doesn't show your miss % post-DR. But as has been discussed, defense is hardly a wasted stat after 540. Far from it. Depending on your dodge, it is very likely even ideal.

deleted

Building on Icecicle's VotTW/Frost spec, and taking a hint from the Frost DPS thread:

The current best dps rotation for Frost involves skipping Plague Strike and Goes (roughly): OB > OB > IT > BS > dump; repeat. You have to start with a Death Rune up to make it work but that's easily accomplished with Blood Tap. Since our damage and our threat are for most purposes the same thing, it seems feasible to me to skip Epidemic and adjust Icecicle's build to something like Talent Calculator - World of Warcraft

The idea is especially appealing to me because I'm generally second tank and as such DPS on a fair number of encounters. This really isn't too far off a standard Frost 2h dps build, while maintaining almost everything I could see you wanting in a Frost tanking build. The 5 points in KM are all floaters; distribute as you see fit. Some other stuff could be shifted around depending on need as well - obviously if you need to get IIT that takes care of that.

The big advantage I see to dropping Epidemic is not having any RNG factor with only 4/5 BotN, and getting a little bit of GoG. The biggest downside I see is diseases not lasting as long on AoE packs, but since you reapply FF constantly in this rotation, you can replace the BS with a Pestilence and call it a day. Post-patch Howling Blast + FF on all mobs is going to be very handy aggro, and it's not at all bad now. If I'm missing something huge with epidemic and/or a reason not to use the Frost dps rotation for a tps rotation, apologies...it's really late here.

Actually, given this, I have no difficulties swapping from Swordshattering to Gargoyle on a longer-term basis. It's 1% avoidance vs 2% stamina from my weapon, but the ability to regem away from pure +def is priceless to me. I'm quite literally sitting on gear upgrades in my bank that I can't equip--even with enchants, prismatics, etc--without going below 540 defense. I'll stay at or above my current defense level, while gaining stamina, avoidance, expertise, hit, and armor. I suspect this will work out to be a net avoidance/stamina gain in general, not just for me, once gem/enchant changes are taken into account.