ok - first post - prepared to be flamed

right now I am 2H Unholy specced, but I would like to make a move for a DW spec (if it competes with 2H dps output which will be one of my questions)

3/31/37 (posted in this thread) sounds almost like what I would want to try ... with a couple of tweaks to adjust to my style of play => 3 / 31 / 37

- instead of 2/3 Rime I picked 1/1 Lichborne and 1/1 Deathchill (one offensive KlickIt and one defensive KlickIt instead of a percentage chance that might or might not screw up my rotation routine)

- 3/3 Outbreak, 1/1 Corpse Explosion (getting a boost in the patch to come) and 2/2 Unholy Aura instead of 5/5 Desecration (so far I have seen a lot of movement in Naxx which often robs me off my Desecration location so I thought Unholy Aura as a Raid buff to be the right choice; Outbreak an Corpse Explosion came up because we are actually AOEing a lot)

Any kind of comments are very welcome.

What gear / stats are preferable on the DW approach? Haste obviously becomes a lot more important when the white damage plays a bigger role, right? STR > AP > Haste > Crit? What is the +hit that I MUST reach before looking at other stats? What 1h weapons are your choice for a DW build?

Last question - where would an equally equipped DW spec (3/31/37) rank when compared to 2H Unholy or Blood? I have a 2H Blood Gonzo in my raid who I need to leave behind

ps: One additional thought - that is not only a DW question, but Frost/Unholy spec related. If you add up to 30 max RP with Runic Power Mastery, would that not enable you to use some RP dumps even while having the Gargoyle up for the max duration? Just a thought.

For my own personal preference I look for:

#1 STR/AP
#2 Hit
#3 Crit
#4 Haste
#5 Everything else

Str/AP for me is always first because it increases our damage in two ways.
Raw Attack Power bonus
APC - Attack Power Coefficient

NetDamage = (BaseDMG + AttackPower * APC)

Attack Power coefficient allowing Attack Power to act like Spell Power causing most of our spells to do more damage.

Hit is a very important stat for a DW spec DK, much more then some realize because we need so much of it to reach the hit cap unlike a 2h DK who only needs 9%, we need 25%(with NoCS). In addition, if you miss with one of your abilities, it can really screw up your rotation. A good way to test this is to take a 1h weapon you have no skill in and attack the training dummy, see how effective you are executing your abilities.

Critical Strike Rating is next because for me it affects
Killing Machine - Rank 5/5
After landing a critical strike from an auto attack, there is a 50% chance your next Icy Touch, Howling Blast or Frost Strike will be a critical strike.

Icy Touch and Howling Blast are 2 of my top 3 dps abilites, with melee attack usually first or second behind Howling Blast.

The base chance to miss a raid boss while dual wielding, auto-attack, both hands
Hit cap @ 80:
28% or 918.12 hit rating
32.79 = 1% Hit(1%)

28% (base miss chance) - 3% (Nerves of Cold Steel) = 25% needed from gear, or 25 x 32.79 = 819.75 rating.

Spell hit cap @ 80
17% or 445.94 spell hit rating
26.23 = Spell Hit(1%)

Spell Hit, only effect Icy Touch, Howling Blast and Death Coil. If you pick up Virulence from Unholy, the spell hit will be attained by simply being Special Attack capped.
17% (base miss chance) - 3% (Virulence) = 14% needed from gear, or 14 x 26.23 = 367.22 rating.

Each point of hit rating increases chance to hit with melee weapons and spells, so you will be spell hit capped well before you are melee hit capped.

I really like the build, Bloody Vengeance was up almost 100% of the time, Abominatin’s Might seems to be up a lot also and Sudden Doom, along with other talents, made Death Coil do insane dps, and I like the healing aspect of the talent tree. I almost never had to worry about watching my health bar. However the blood talent tree seemed to scale with better gear so with my current gear, it was hard to match the dps output I am seeing from builds like 0/32/39 or 10/31/30.

Honestly I think this is probably a good move. For a DW build OB isn't that stout and that's just about all you can use a Rime proc to do. That or DS. The only real effect it has is punching your rotation square in the nuts. (Well, it does actually produce an extra 5 RP, that's another effect)

Thanks for your reply and explanation. I am not a master calculator when it comes to this, but I see a problem when I bump into it ... 819.75 sounds like a bloddy lot of hit rating.

I just checked the gear that I can get with my 10 ppl Naxx raid + some heroic items + some faction items + +hit gems ... and I am summing up to 591 hit rating. That would leave me with a 6.79% miss chance, am I right? Am I missing something? How does one reach that 28 (25) % hit cap?

You don't. That was never a goal. The only class/spec that ever even remotely considered that were the combat potency rogues of TBC.

A good number to try for is spell hit cap, which is 17-3=14% (13% if you happen to have a Draenei shaman in your group-not raid, group only) assuming you have a shadow priest in the raid. Past that +hit is a bonus, but not a stat to worry about.

Given that, as I said just above, the spell hit cap is only 14% and hit is something DW players will be stacking anyway, Virulence has very little value. Getting that one point in Crypt Fevor, then 2 in Epidemic (Keep diseases on targets you pestilence longer) is probably better.

You know that you can use Rime procs to do an additional IT which does way more damage than Obliterate or Death Strike in a DW build? I'm not saying Rime is a great talent, but it's not that bad either.

@Above:
Outside of the Gargoyle phase, Epidemic is a direct DPS increase as it allows you to use a more flexible rotation prioritizing HB, DC, IT and BS over PS while Blood Plague is up.

Maybe a crazy idea to improve the rotations:

- let Rime proc after casting HB, not after casting IT (still a 15% chance with 3/3 talent points)
- additional mechanic of a Rime proc: reduce the cooldown of your next HB to 4sec
- leave Freezing Fog the way it is (next HB does not consume runes)

Rotation without Rime proc:
IT - PS - BS - BS - HB - DC

Rotation with a Rime proc:
IT - PS - BS - BS - HB - DC - HB

I think you will find this DW build more fun if not outright superior to that posted in DPS compendium:

Talent Calculator - World of Warcraft

The permanent ghoul is really good except that without NotD he tends to die and stay dead for a long time. In fights where he stays up and around, he's an amazing boost to dps. Same response i got from my 1/44/26 2H frost idea. I still think i averaged more dps with that build than with my cookie cutter 17/54/0 build, even with the ghoul sometimes dying.

So, does IT do great dmg than OB/DS when DW? If so, whenever Rime procs Fog you can just throw in an IT after your free HB rather than worrying about OB eating your diseases or DS stretching out your rotation.

Actually, in the DC section (as it is called in the DPS compendium) you should have enough runic power to cast DC twice. So you'll be waiting less than 2.5 sec.

Quite a bit more, yes.

Doing that though leaves you with a lonely Unholy rune. Pretty much the only thing you can do with it is Plague Strike, and Plague Strike is pretty damn weak while DW. Sad panda. It would however be more damage than just using OB.

I'm currently testing out the 32/39 spec. I know this is mainly pve discussion but it is performing amazing well in 5 mans and pvp! I'm thoroughly enjoying it although it does take some getting used to rotation / situation wise. I'm finding very tiny dps difference (if any) from an anecdotal pov between blood/unholy presence for PVE purposes.

Pulled 4.3k dps on some heroic boss fights once I got things down.

Question: I have Darkmoon card: Greatness, do you think for DW I should be using Rune of fallen crusader MH + cinderglacier OH? Or should I go with Cinderglacier MH / Razorice OH?

Remember that the analysis assumes the standard DW rotation with Rime and a Death Rune talent. There are some rotational advantages to 0/44/27 which may yet change its final DPS ranking, but none of the currently available DPS tools are very good at modeling any but the simplest rotations.

I will describe three rotations and their generally associated specs in some detail here as a primer for further discussion.



10/31/30 Reaping+Rime
Rotation:
IT>PS>HB>[BS>BS>dc(>dc) | IT>BS>BS>dc(>dc) | IT>BS>BS>HB>dc]
IT>PS>HB>[IT>IT>dc(>dc) | IT>IT>IT>dc(>dc) | IT>IT>IT>HB>dc]
*Full rotation is 12 to 16 GCD. The three branches are [no Rime proc | single Rime proc | double Rime proc].

This is generally considered the standard DW rotation. The primary disadvantages are low HB/IT crit rates and low Frost Fever tick density.



0/44/27 BotN+Rime
Rotation:
PS>IT>[IT>HB | HB>dc]>BS>BS
...
dc>HB>IT>PS>dc[>OB]>HB
PS>IT>[IT | dc]>HB>BS>BS(>dc)
*Do line 1 once, then repeat line 2+3. Full rotation is 12 to 14 GCD. The branches on line 1+3 are [Rime proc | no Rime proc]. The [>OB] on line 2 is inserted into the rotation if the IT on line 2 procs Rime.

0/44/27 allows a 3xHB rotation to dump Rime procs effectively, because 1H OB does damage roughly equivalent to DC and does not remove diseases in this spec. HB/IT crit rates and Frost Fever tick density are both significantly higher than the standard Reaping+Rime rotation. UA is available for CD stacking.


10/31/30 Rimeless
3/31/37 Rimeless
0/31/40 Rimeless
Rotation:
PS>IT>HB>dc>BS>BS
...
dc>HB>PS>IT>dc>HB
PS>IT>dc>HB>BS>BS
*Do line 1 once, then repeat line 2+3. Full rotation is 12 GCD.

These specs running the Rimeless rotation are arguably the top DW rotation/spec combinations right now. There are several significant advantages. HB/IT crit rates are very high despite not having Rime (due to near perfect spacing for KM proc consumption). Frost Fever tick density is very high. It also loses less DPS to high latency (due to 12 GCD per rotation).

This rotation is exceptional in movement fights. First of all, its simplicity makes it much easier to execute on the move. Secondly, the rotation only requires continuous melee contact for 1.5 sec out of 20 sec (BS>BS). In every 20 sec rotation, you get one period of 7 sec (PS>IT>dc>HB+1), one period of 6 sec (PS>IT>dc>HB), and one period of 5.5 sec (BS+1>dc>HB) where you can continue to execute the rotation at full DPS on the move from up to 30 yards away. That's something even most ranged DPS specs can't do.

Being a tight 20-sec rotation, Desecration overlap improves its uptime for the 0/31/40 and 3/31/37 specs. Both specs offer optional Unholy Aura, and 0/31/40 offers optional 3/3 Crypt Fever (if there is no Unholy DK in the raid). 0/31/40 has great AE with "Ghoul Explosion" and the best single-target DPS (even with sub-optimal Desecration uptime, due to improved Ghoul uptime). However, this comes at the cost of threat reduction.

Actually, Methods' spreadsheet I was using allows you to do a rotation not bound to the rune cooldowns, the rotations I used were ~180 seconds long and not bound to "PS>IT>BS>BS>HB>DC..." but to some priorities I compared and then used the best one. For 0/32/39 for example my priorities were something like this: Keeping up Blood Plague>DC if RP is 90 or higher>HB>IT>BS>DC if RP is 40 or higher>PS.

@Avnos:
Fallen Crusader+Razorice are the runes to use as 32/39.

Hidden, first I must say you have been very great with all the information you have given in this thread, its really helping me out. Second, I looked you up on armory and I noticed that you are using the 10/31/30 spec. Is there a reason why you are using that over 0/32/39? And is it better? Also, I saw that you have a very fast MH and a very fast OH. Is this superior to a slow MH and a fast OH?

I wasn't saying that your analysis was based on a standard Rime-Death Rune rotation. I didn't know what rotations you used in your analysis because you didn't specify. I was pointing out that my comparison was based on the first rotation I described and therefore could only be rightly considered one piece of the puzzle in analyzing the 0/44/27 spec. When I said "simplest rotations," I did not mean the simplest rotations to execute, but rather the simplest rotations to model, which included priority systems like the one Method's tool used.

At this point. I am stuck doing a lot of analysis manually where optimizing KM, Rime, and HB cooldown is concerned. I am particularly interested in thoughts and work done regarding the differences between the three known approaches to tackling the problem.

Specifically:

Approach 1: 2xHB 4xIT per rotation when Rime does not proc off Rime-IT or Death-Rune-IT. Typical specs of 10/31/30 and 0/32/29.

Approach 2: 3xHB 2xIT per rotation. Rime procs go to IT/OB. Typical spec of 0/44/27.

Approach 3: 3xHB 2xIT per rotation. No Rime. Typical spec of 10/31/30, 3/31/37, and 0/31/40.



2xIT generally do slightly more than 1xHB, but eat twice as many KM procs and take an additional GCD (one interesting tank-n-spank rotation is to alternate Death Rune use to space out KM usage better and increase the chance for Rime-proc HBs). Currently available tools can model Approach 3 pretty well, and the numbers look very promising when you consider the fact that they generally overvalue the effectiveness of KM for Approach 1.

One other possibility I am considering is a Rimeless variant of 0/44/27. HB density and HB crit chance are both very high with the Rimeless rotation (which leads to increased GoG impact). With poor Desecration uptime, 0/44/27 can overtake the Desecration specs (not taking into account increased Ghoul uptime for 0/31/40).

Regardless of how the theoretical numbers turn out in the end, though, I think the Rimeless rotation may end up with the highest DPS in practice overall due to Icy Reach and the simplicity of execution.

I'm still wondering why you think a rotation not specced into Rime will do more damage than one specced into it? You can't use the points anywhere else effectively and you'll obviously want to use the Rime procs only when they're a DPS benefit, not to use the Rime proc every time it shows up.

In case you didn't know, Methods's spreadsheet has rotations more like they're in real combat than those theoretical "...>...>..." rotations. You see the runes' CDs, your Runic Power, the DoT uptimes, Gargoyle duration/CD for every GCD and can do a rotation consisting of as many abilities as you want. For my ~180 seconds rotations I've specified every ability usage on myself and a priority system as stated above came out as stronger than a standard 2RuneCDs rotation.

Rime is more than a free Howling Blast every once in a while. It's 15% critical to Icy Touch too.

The new change to the Frost Strike Glyph is quite interesting. Seven Frost Strikes will cost slightly less than six Death Coils. This makes going to Guile of Gorefiend more attractive. However, doing so will cost you the Ghoul or threat reduction.

I'm concerned about spreadsheet numbers when it comes to the ghoul. Assuming ghoul uptime can be tricky at best. I also noticed that people sometimes forget that even in a ghoul friendly fight, the person who specs ghoul only gets at most 50% more uptime (most fights end about 4 minutes). Ghoul is better for trash but so is AoE.

Frost Strike hits harder than Death Coil unless you have something like 4k+ AP, no GoG, and 5/5 Impurity. Frost Strike is just plain better than Death Coil, the new glyph means you can get out a really smooth rotation without Dirge. I'm giddy with anticipation.