Im pretty sure you could say that strength > everything. Even hit pre-cap and expertise.

However, I think its also a matter of preference. People usually don't like their attacks missing, because it throws them off. Thats why most people aim for the 8% melee hit cap. Not only is it a great dps booster, it also removes those annoyances from both spells and melee attacks.

After that you get expertise for a 2H unholy build (more physical attacks than spells), this is a tricky point, because strength relatively is more powerful and because this doesn't affect spells anymore the gap is bigger as well, so you're having trade-offs between dps+comfortability vs more dps. What you chose is for most people preference. Because ive seen very high dps numbers with both.
Spell hit cap is a bit in the same boat. Only missing spells comes down to 3 abilities in general: Deathcoil / UB ticks and Icy Touch. Of which the latter is the only one that can be an inconvenience (missing DC or UB ticks wont offset your rotation).

Also a missed or dodged SS doesnt have a huge impact, because the runes refresh instantly, and rune cushioning allows them to refresh faster so your next rotation wont be offset.
So for unholy 2H rotations in particular I'm pretty sure that is why strength has such a high value over hit and expertise, because it is simply stronger. However people go with hit and expertise because both best gear provides it and because it lifts a burden so to say.

I am greatly interested by this change. Based on the other changes as well, this looks like we are going to see 2H unholy take a step up on DPS, and see the downfall of most (if not all) DW specs, depending on how they shift the frost tree around.

Also to add my two cents to the strength versus hit/exp discussion... on paper, strength is king. There is no arguement or question there. In practice, some opt for the hit/expertise cap because frankly, knowing your abilities will land can be a huge boost in some encounters. Since we aren't fighting only patchwerk clones all day, there may be times where you just NEED attacks to land. That being said, I agree with the above two posters... it's mainly up to personal preference. I, for one, am a fan of capping hit and expertise.

One change I would love to see is desecration becoming a 2 point talent, granted that in theory it's a powerful talent but in practice it falls very short of it's intended benefit.

It makes me glad to see that Blizzard is committed to keeping 2H specs viable without simply breaking DW specs.

Desecration is a decent talent, however its spell animation is annoying, especially with Fire around that it can make it harder to see. Unless they fix the animation, I wouldn't want to see more DKs spec into it.

Exp/hit cap is a user preference really. To me it sounds nice to cap it as a DK because it is nice to have diseases to land, however as a Paladin it isn't as that great because Judgement cannot be dodged/parried, similar effect for DK spells.

This will really be an interesting set of changes for the deep unholy among us.

I'm very interested to see the new frost tree, because since the 17/54 cookie cutter has become so popular I'm interested in a change. One of the main things holding me back on that was the AoE damage and threat you get out of UB. When you're dpsing, you still will want/need the garg, and it sounds like his nerf will be short lived. When you're tanking/OT and adding DPS, this opens up all kinds of new options (maybe a blood-based or even tri-spec) depending on the new frost tree. At least it opens the door for me not to be fighting for EP and for RL's to stop having to say "Only one unholy!"

As always, the details of this really matter in the overall implementation, but as far as an idea, I'm behind it.

I agree. I think the Gargoyle nerf was a little harsh. So with it getting buffed Unholy is def going to be getting some dps love. I
still think that dw will be viable come next patch, though depending on the shift 32/39 might not be so hot. Unless they mess with black ice and Killing machine 20/51 will still be strong. So I think time will tell the tale.

This may be a bit off topic, and may sound a little foolish. However, I am noticing a fairly large amount of partial resists, not so much on Death Coil, but rather on Scourge Strike. I'm not entirely sure how partial resists are calculated, if it is taken from being slightly under spell hit cap, or if it has something to do with spell penetration. If it is affected by the later, would replacing a socket with spell penetration be worth it? Or should I simply deal with the partial resist? Any information on this would be greatly appreciated. Thank you for your time.

Thank you for the prompt reply, and yes to clarify it was in PVE (forgot to mention that). Thanks again for the help.

As an additional note, what is *actually* responsible for partial resists on bosses is weapon skill. For example, if you tried to scourge strike a level 80 mob with 1 weapon skill, aside from parries/dodges, the strikes you DID land would be mitigated in half (which is actually the most a SS can resist, it will always hit for at least half damage)... until you're weapon skill was at or near max. Since Raid bosses count as your level +3, and there is currently no way to raise weapon skill beside the level max, you will always see partial resists in raids.

Another side note, when you see a strike that says, say "Your SS hits X for 4000 (200 resisted)", you wouldn't have originally done 4200 damage, but actually quite a bit more. The (X resisted) is actually before modifiers/buffs/talents/crits, so in reality, if half a strike was resisted, you might actually see something like "Your SS hits for 2.5k (1.9k resisted)". Just some food for thought. I can't tell you how many time's I've seen 5500(900 resisted) when my SS crits that don't resist always break 8k.

Hey Zurm, since you seem to be hanging around for a minute, I am curious as to whether the stat weights in the current OP are still the current "best guess" or whether there has been any changes to these as the time has gone on, and 3.08 was implemented. I love this particular thread because it seems the most current on the site regarding Unholy DPS, and would just like that first post to continue to be the best "go to" for information that I can refer people to. =)

And thank you for speaking on the spell penetration thing, that was something I've been curious about as well!

Thanks for that Zurm, that's what I wanted to know. =)