Does it mean that, skip EP and take only CF talents is better choice if I'm raiding often with another DK with EP? Or just drop EP and CF from build too?
And if I do understand right, aplication of EP does delete CF? Or something alike?

If you have another Unholy DK with CF/EP in your raid you can skip this talent and put the points in NotD.

Talent Calculator - World of Warcraft

You will benefit from the debuffs, the only thing you miss is the third disease (which only benefits Blood Strike and BCB in a classic DW build).

Except if it change on 3.0.8 :
- If another DK have EP, and you are spec only with CF, you have a 3rd disease. The problem is when there is a third DK.
- BCB benefit from the 3rd disease.

Afaik EP overwrites CF as of 3.0.8.

Indeed.

Maybe I wasnt completely clear in my statement a few posts ago:

EP now overwrites CF

Thus if there is another deep Unholy DK always present, you can skip the CF-talent and just get somethign else.

overwrites CF of other DKs u mean right?
I have same question.

I'll try to put this as simple as possible then:

Any mob can only have 1 application of either Ebon Plague or Crypt Fever, not both

So,
- No multiple applications from multiple DKs.
- No CF next to EP

- Only 1 EP at any time will be up, nothing more.

I hope this is clear enough.

Well then its bad idea go 0/20/51 w/o CF and EP?
our 2 tanks have CF+EP

I actually like that build alot, with the KM nerf Deathchill might actually be quite useful.

The only thing bugging me is Merciless Combat really. God that talent seems useless. 12% damage increase on a FEW select skills, only when the target is below 35%?

I don't have any numbers, but it sure sounds like garbage to me. Hell, I'd be more inclined to ditch those points in On a Pale Horse, or Epidemic.

The other thing that doesn't convince me at all is desecration, but that horse has been beaten to death. It's a real shame the first tier talents in the Blood tree are such garbage. Bladed Armor is awesome, but it's basically a 10 point talent, the first tier being so utterly useless.

Nevertheless, I used to be a 44/27 DW, and like the build alot. I may be wrong, but it didn't seem to be the overpowered one. Sadly, it seems that build isn't competitive anymore.
Gonna have to switch to 32/39 or some variant of it, I guess. It's too bad 44/27 got hurt in the way of nerfing 32/39, which seems balanced now.

Please delete this post.

hi guys...to start i wanna thank you all for making posts like this one which are very useful for players like me who wants to play his/her class in the better way...after a frustrating blood start i went unholy for the last month...rly apreciated its huge aoe dmg but blood's single target was more funny in my opinion...btw let's start talking about 2w...
this is my gear situation The World of Warcraft Armory still need some good weapon...as fast/fast i use split greathammer/hatestrike and for slow/fast i use reaper of dark souls/hatestrike (can't get better for now....hope to be lucky on next malygos/naxx)...i still miss some decent neck like KT's one and bracers...
i have got some questions plz help me if u can
1. which is the bloody hit cap for dw dk? i red that post u linked but it only confused me cos some ppl said it was 11% (talking about hit % without talents like virulence/nocs) and other ppl said it was 8% (lower than 2h hit cap?!?)
2. i'm trying out the 10/31/30 atm...can notice a reduction on KM procs and maybe those 5 points can be replaced to grant me some nice upgrade...don't know if this spec its the better i can use...i willl see...0/32/39 took me under 3k atp so i can't drop bladed armor
3.as dw dk have i to drop all +16 crit gems on my gear to get only +16 str gems?if yes plz gief some nice explanation
4. talking about numbers they are low atm....i tried today on an heroic dummy with fast/fast and can't go above 2.1k dps popping gargoyle too but without ghoul and horn...my rotation is standard like IT/PS/HB/BS/BS/DC SPAM--->IT SPAM WITH DEATH RUNES (refreshing PS) until i got again the 2 blood runes and i start again the rotation...is this a wrong one? my low dps at hero dummy can be caused by wrong rotation? or maybe by low hit (i remember to you - hit = -dmg/-KM procs...maybe with some more hit this spec can do better numbers don't know)

ty for reading/answering
Oblivion

Your main and offhand have the same chance to hit.

1) Actually, the 2h hit cap is also 8% now. The 11% figure is the *spell* hit cap, including virulence and assuming someone has the spell hit debuff up on the boss (Shadow priest or Boomkin). They don't give the *full* hit cap (the one for capping white damage) because hit rating is pretty worthless after the spell cap. The melee specials hit cap is 8%, or 5% if you have Nerves. The spell hit cap is 17%, or 14% if you have Virulence, or 11% if you have virulence and can assume a spriest or Boomkin in your raid (and make sure they have the talents, some balance druids skip it).

2) I believe 10/31/30 is only for people who have an unholy dk in the raid with them, and so don't need unholy aura and can't use crypt fever. If your pet is dying much, go back to 31/39+1.

3)Str is better for *every* death knight than is crit, no matter what spec. The difference is extra big for a DW build. It's just a better stat, especially if you get kings. Strength has always been the best stat. For DW, strength is even better than hit *before* the first hit cap.

4)Your rotation sounds fishy, but you should use a simply priority system anyway - the priority is: 'PS/IT if disease/desecration is down', HB, IT, BS, DC, PS. Your heroic dummy dps isn't indicative of actual dps, either. Also, I'd need to see your actual spec to make sure it's reasonable - here is a 10/31/30 I would use: Spec.

This is where I'm at right now as well. I was really happy with 44/27 (gargoyle, no pet), as it fit my play style. I went to Naxx with a 44/27 variant (replacing garg with pet) and I hated it. It felt gimped and awkward.

I have a few questions. I'm using slow/fast with mediocre gear right now.

Blood-Cake Blade seems really underwelming to me. 3 talent points and I'm only getting 2% extra DPS out of it. I can't help but think I'd get more use putting those points into Outbreak and Epidemic. Thoughts?

I don't like having the pet. It just doesn't fit what I envision my DK to be. Without the pet, how does Corpse Explosion stack up as an AOE RP dump? Obviously, I lose single target DPS, but add some AOE. Is gargoyle still viable?

My last issue is with Frost Strike. It seems light in terms of damage, plus with the KM change, it's a shame to accidentally blow a KM proc on FS. How does Death Coil compare to Frost Strike as the RP dump with dual wield? I'm using the KotEB 1 hand sword as my main hand. Until I get better gear, is it more advantageous to go without FS?

Thanks.

I'm also going with a 0/33/38 build, but I chose Death Chill for the spare point, which is macro'd to HB. Since it is no longer consumed if KM is up, I think it slightly makes up for the KM nerf. True, you only get another .5 PPM by using Death Chill, but I don't find I need more range that often.

Did some testing this morning on a few specs. First, I stayed in my pre-patch 0/32/39 spec, and ran two DPS tests of about 15 full rotations, first on the level 80 grouped dummies, then on the Boss dummy. Here are the results of that test, using the following rotation:

IT - PS - BS - BS - HB - DC Dump (2x)
IT - PS - HB - IT - IT - DC Dump (2x)

Group:


Boss:


Then, I respecced to 10/31/30, swapping a few free points here and there. Using the same rotation, here were my results:

Group:


Boss:


I then wanted to give 0/21/50 a try. With this spec, I used the following rotation:

PS - IT - IT - BS - BS - UB - DC
PS - ITx4 - DC Dump

The results are as follows.

Group:


Boss:


Test conditions across the board:
Same Weapons (Slow/Fast)
Same Armor
No Cooldowns
No Trinkets
Horn of Winter at all times
Bone Shield (with exception of 10/31/30)

I don't know how conclusive you all feel the tests are, but I will likely go back to some variation on 0/32/39 that omits Crypt Fever and includes Night of the Dead. What I DO know is that this is very expensive, haha. At some point, once an epic 2h drops for me, I will likely test 17/0/54 against these specs for further comparison. Right now all I have is the H-VH Pike and the De-Raged Waraxe. Hope some of this information helps you guys out a bit.

Next, I'd like to ask about the viability of a shallow frost, deep unholy DW build based on Scourge Strike. Because I am both terrible at math and completely new to theorycrafting, I am not sure how it would work in application, but there are a lot of abilities based around SS that seem very appealing, that may just work with some shallow DW support. Has anyone tried it, or is it just a waste of gold on respeccing to attempt it?

I w as the cookie cutter dw spec of 0/32/39 with IT Sigil and Blood Pressence last night and was testing my dps on the boss dummy in Ebon Hold. My rotation was...

PS IT BS BS HB DC
PS IT IT IT HB DC

and it produced approx. 2200 dps

I changed my rotation to...

PS IT BS BS IT DC
PS IT IT IT IT DC

and it produced 2350 dps

I was wondering if anyone else had the same results? If so, would a tri-spec like 12/20/39 be viable? My guild has a unholy dk raiding with us every night so I took 0/20/51 into consideration already.

I went 0/44/27 2h frost build with 2 KM dumps for sarth 3d last night, previously I tested every single spec that was on this forum on the boss dummy previous to my decision.

On the boss dummy, with zero hp, and using a priority system, I was getting 400 dps more than any of the dw specs that we've previously discussed.

On some attempts w/ the 2h frost build I would sit around 2400 dps, some attemps were as high as 3500 dps. On average, and without getting a string of crazy KM procs, I sat at 2800 or so sustained dps over 6-7 minutes. My wep for 2h is Death's Bite.

On sarth 3d I sat in the top 3 for all of our attempts.

I have angry dread/hailstorm as a combo. I neglected to try that. I'll do so when I get home and report back. I'm not sure I believe that it's going to really make a difference, but we'll see. KM is just too damn streaky now...

In this 3.0.8 patch, I noticed that HB is bugged atm. Have you tried to spam HB even it had CD finished and displayed "The spell is not ready yet."? Also, it seems to have around 4 to 6 sec internal CD. I didn't time the CD correctly though.

If anyone of you spec for HB, your dps is not valid right now until blizz fix the HB CD bug.

Dude... seriously? You need to read up on your spec before you post something like this...

Blizzard re-applied the Cooldown:

Hmm, hadn't thought up that wrinkle on the IT build. Let's do the BA vs RoR napkin math:

25% melee, 75% special damage -> RoR is a 7.5% dps increase.

Let's assume (this is a huge approximation) that half of all damage is affected by attack power and the rest is base/weapon/whatever.

Melee damage gets about a 10% contribution from AP per second ( (1/14 * .85) + (1/14 * .65 * .85) where 15% is your white missrate, is that right?). IT receives 10% * 1.3 (BI) * 1.3 (IIT) * 1.1 (GR) * 1.25 (Impurity) * 1.13 (EP) = 26.3%. DC receives 15% * 1.15 * 1.25 * 1.13 = 24.4%.

For simplicity, let's say we do 50% IT, 25% melee, and 25% DC. Yeah, we're getting deep into approximation territory; danger!

Adding 400 AP thus benefits melee attacks by 40 DPS, IT by 105.2 per hit, and DC by 97.6 per hit. We use IT about 6 times per 20 seconds, and it crits maybe 50% of the time: 47.34 DPS. We use DC about 4 times per 20 seconds, and it crits maybe 20% of the time: 23.42 DPS.

At 4000 AP we'd be doing 10 times that already in DPS: 400 + 473 + 234 = 1107 DPS (solely from AP contribution). Since we said AP contributes half of our damage, double that to 2214. Bladed Armor's approximated DPS boost is 110.7. 110.7 is 5% of 2214.


I have a feeling I got that horribly wrong. But it looks like that direct comparison doesn't come out in the tri-spec's favor, and the deep unholy spec has additional goodies in UB and WP. I'm going to have to think about this more, though, since I'm very worried about dying constantly on trash from DnD bonus threat combined with no Subversion with this build. Better on bosses or no, dying alot is no fun, and neither is holding way back to not pull aggro. And in the end, this is a game we play for fun.


Edit: If you're absolutely only speccing for raids and you absolutely will always have someone else doing CF/EP, you might consider something like this. It's probably higher personal DPS than the traditional style, if and only if you have a constant CF/EP bitch. I'm rather unsure about the worth of Outbreak and Epidemic though; it's definitely more fun to be able to use super-fast spell GCDs for every move except one PS every 15 seconds or so, but whether it's worth the talent points to enable it is questionable.