Hisstok

Full naxx clear last night
WWS
Armory

After patchwerk, I switched to unholy stance, didn't notice much of a dps decrease (but it did decrease) But my dps does seem lower than it should be, I know that I have way too much expertise (victim of itemization) and am missing the sigil, and axe, but I don't think those and a few minor enchants = more than 1k dps.

Anyways, Rotation question
Since when you let a rune stay lit up for one cooldown before using it, it refreshes in 8.5s instead of 10s (therefore no net change) wouldn't it be a more effecient use of killing machine procs to use a rotation something like IT-OB-FS-OB-FS-BS-RP dump in order to use up the KM procs as fast as possible to try and get more of them (does the ICD start when you use it or when it procs?) This rotation also makes runic power mastery less desirable as you can burn RP as you gain it, so you can move around some talent points for utility.
I didn't actually use this rotation except on dummies, but in testing on them dps seems just about the same, but requires more focus and it isnt as macro friendly.

 

Nooc

Like you said it was your first time as Unholy. It is most likely that you play 17/54/0 a lot tighter.

However with that being said, I have seen similar results. I was 17/0/54 up until this last patch were I tried almost every spec posted here on EJ. At my low gear lvl the best I could do self-buffed on a target dummy was 2350ish sustained.

I ended up going with a 21/50/0 build and with the same gear (both specs had the respective venture co. sigil) I was able to sustain 3000ish dps. It might be possible that deep frost is superior or that it out performs at low gear / unbuffed levels. I would also like to hear others, more informed input on this if they have had similar results.

edit: Forgot to say I'm using the 6x IT rotation.

 

EwokChilli

@Tauwyt
Well, i checked your armories and your friend has 78 more strength and with that 120 more AP. So, he's got a little bit more AP, out of the box, and he'll get slightly better improvement from BoK. But, by basic theory, he should hit FS for (120/14)*(3.4)*(.6)*(1.3)*(1.1)*(1.1) = 27.5 more on hits, and crit for 67.4 more. So, the fact that he was 200 better than you on the low end and 600 better than you on the high end seems to indicate that he had something else you didn't. Sounds like he could of had flask on or something. But mostly, it just sounds that for 1 FS (your low FS), he had a buff you didn't, like Unleashed Rage or some other AP buff. Beyond that, RNG could easily account for the rest of the difference. He was doing less overall damage than you, which means he may of consistently later getting into his rotation meaning he would have all the appropriate buffs on mobs he hit whereas you might of had a few strikes without all accounted buffs.

@Vies
I'm glad I was at least useful to someone. My guild still thinks I'm retarded.

Just remember that for weaving in FS, your autoattack swings with haste are probably only going to be down to about 2.5 seconds still, at best. I feel comfortable with saying that you should do your first 2 strikes, FS, second 2 strikes, Dump. And that should catch most of your KM procs with a very small % of them being overwritten. There's no reason to make your rotation more difficult than is necessary.

 

JALbert

There is no internal cooldown on Killing Machine. The only danger you run is having one proc off a swing before you've used the previous one, but with a 2 Hander you should have plenty of leeway to use them before your next autoattack.

 

vies

Hahah, your rotation actually seems to work the best out of the 3 or 4 I've tried thus far Ewok. Not burning BT at the beginning is nice too, so I can pop an extra UB for any fight that goes for more than 2 mins. I think that's about what I was doing with FS weaving, but I'll do some more testing with that in mind later just to make sure.

I think I sorta know how you feel though. One of my friends tells me to spec unholy practically every day, and I'm pretty sure some of the others feel the same even though they don't say anything.

edit: @Nook: yeah, I forgot to mention the results I posted were indeed on a dummy that was <35% health. However, I did also test the frost spec on a dummy in another city that was >35% health. On that one, my dps was about even between specs.

 

Feorthas

Couple of recent observations/comments:

-New sheet went up yesterday--same place as the old one. Changes on the front worksheet.
-Weapons are amazing for sustained dps--had a blood DK upgrade from the crafted mace to a Death's Bite yesterday and is damage shot way way up, even with "just" 10m buffs.
-Sartharion10 +1 is perfectly doable with an offtank in a dps spec (respecced for 25s before malygos and we decided to run OS +1 on a whim); seems to be more of a gear/execution with spec providing wiggle room thing than anything else.
-Holding off on testing 0/44/27 until next week at least--want a solid Naxx25 parse of 21/50 first and Naxx25 was hell for parsing last week (wintergrasp bug kept nuking Blackrock's Northrend and resetting /combatlog)

I am not your personal Frost Deathknight knowledge base. If you have a simple question, ask in the simple questions thread; if you have a more esoteric, specific, or complicated question, ask in the spec-appropriate thread.

My PM, WoWmail, and, especially, chat boxes are NOT the appropriate places for these questions.

 

dbl219

@Vies

EDIT: Bah, turns out you answered my question. Was asking if your results were on <35% health target dummies. Is Necrosis overkill damage still not being properly factored in? Or is Merciless Combat the overriding factor in this discrepancy? Or both?

I have fun putting out 3100-3200 DPS on 1% dummies, but I think people forgetting this factor seems to be skewing the pool of information regarding 2h Frost, as most people are too lazy to bother with actual raid parses, myself included.

 

vies

I wish I could tell ya, dbl. I am thinking of going back to unholy for this week's 25 man naxx, then back yet again to 21/50/0 frost for next week's. A couple guys in the guild have WWS, and I don't anticipate getting many upgrades(combo of not much dps plate dropping and bad rolls on my part when an upgrade does drop) so I shouldn't have to worry about taking too many changes into consideration. Though when it comes to parsing, I'm at a loss. This is honestly the first time I've played a class that got me this interested in it.

Don't really feel like going through more respecs/reglyphs, but then I did tell people I'd go unholy for this week's run. WTB dual spec like right now.

 

ZackRoss

Well I've been running with 21/50 since yesturday, I did a 10 Man Naxx run with it and I was pulling steadily 2.5k DPS on most pulls, haven't even gotten to Patchwerk yet though. I don't have my 4 Piece yet, 6 Non epic's left on my char tho, and I've got a Strength Gem in every slot. Might my rotation be off or is it just not enough proper Gear to pull out amazing dps numbers?

 

vies

I'd say it's mostly your gear. I got gear pretty much every time we did Naxx, and I noticed my dps go up by a decent amount practically with each piece I got. You may want to replace a few of those str gems with hit gems if you're not at least close to being melee hit capped(8%). If you're worried about rotations then just scan through the last few pages, jot down the rotation(s) you like, and give them a try. Best way to improve is to just experiment with different things. And, of course, follow the advice of some of the esteemed people of EJ. That's what I've been doing, and I'm a damn sight better than I was the first time I ran Naxx.

 

Janraea

Here's my math comparing IT6,BS2,OB2 against the standard 21/50 IT,BS,OB2 rotation, using unmodified numbers from the spreadsheet, and showing my work:

I'm going to assume 4xT7, but otherwise everything is as the spreadsheet assumes. KM is not included in the totals at this point, as far as I can tell, I'll discuss the impact of that afterward.

1) In Blood presence, pulled from the Backend table 'Expected Values', column 'avg':
IT = 2550
FFdot = 427
OB1d = 5017
BS1d = 2077
FS = 4565
Normal Hit = 2069 (2.49 speed)

In a standard 21 seconds, we get: ITx2, OBx4, BSx2, FSx6, FFDOTx7, Swing x (20/2.49).
The strike total is (2550 * 2) + (5017 * 4) + (2077 * 2) + (4565 * 6) = 56712, and the strike dps is 56712 / 21.0 = 2700.6 dps.
The disease total is 427 * 7 = 2989, and the disease dps is 2989/21 = 142.3 dps.
The white damage total is 2069 * (21.0 / 2.49) = 17449.4. The white dps is 17449.4 / 21.0 = 830.9 dps.
Net dps is 2700.6 + 142.3 + 830.9 = 3673.8 dps.

2) In Unholy presence, pulled from that same table:
IT = 2216.9
FFdot = 371.1
OB1d = 4362.4
BS1d = 1806.4
FS = 3969.6
HB = 3418.0
White hit = 1798.9 (2.1652 speed)

In a 20 seconds, we get: ITx6,OBx2,BSx2,FSx7.28, HBx.6.
The .6 chance of a rime proc each rotation is pow(1-.15, 6) = .37715 ( the chance of not getting a proc), so we get .6 Rime procs per 20 seconds.
The strike total is (2216 * 6) + (4362.4 * 2) + (1806.4 * 2) + (3969.6 * 7.28) + (3418.0 * .623) = 56661.7. 56661.7 / 20.0 = 2833.1 dps..
The disease total is (371.1 * 6.67) = 2475.2. Disease dps is 2475.2 / 20.0 = 123.8 dps.
The white damage total is 1798.9 * (20.0 / 2.1652) = 830.8. White dps = 830.8 / 20.0 = 830.8 (close match to blood, as expected).
Net dps = 2833.1 + 123.8 + 830.8 = 3787.7 dps.

Note that rotation 2 gains more from the 4xT7 bonus than does the first rotation, they are almost dead even without that bonus.

Now for the impact of KM - a perfect player with a good rotation (one that does not have two rune-using frost abilities in a row) will be able to use almost every KM proc on FS (pushing a rune ability back 1 gcd for a rotation does not hurt the rotation, as the rune-cushion allows you to go back to the old rotation afterward. Multiple KM procs within ten seconds mean you have to ignore the second one to avoid pushing the rotation back. This hurts (2) more than (1), though it's not a big issue. If, as I understand it, UP increases KM proc rate just like other hastes, you will get 15% more KM procs with (2), and they will be worth 15% more with (1), which almost balances out.

In UP, Fallen Crusader will also proc more often, increasing the uptime somewhat. Both should get equal dps from the ghoul, unless it is affected by UP (I heard a rumor, but didn't check on it). Blood tap should be slightly better for (2) than for (1), because of the free gcds it has sitting around at low latency.

Additionally, (2) handles latency better than does (1) - up to 100ms of latency + human reaction time has no impact on (2), but will reduce the dps of (1) by up to 6.2%. A typical network latency is around 25ms, and a high-end button-mashing frequency for a teenager is around 10ms (but you'll regret that when you're 30), so we'll use 35ms as the net latency: (2) is not reduced at all, and (1) is reduced by 2.23% (1 - 10.5/(10.5+7*.035)). This only applies after the 4xT7 bonus is in use, of course.

Final numbers: theoretical with perfect latency and 4xT7: 3674 vs 3788, (2) wins. With reasonable (low) latency, 3590 vs 3788, (2) wins more solidly.

I request that, if you disagree with my numbers, use of the spreadsheet, math, or assertions, that you correct me by pm before correcting me in a post - if I don't fix whatever you think is wrong, feel free to humiliate me afterward :-) I'm particularly interested to hear if I'm misinterpreting the spreadsheet in any way - I didn't verify those numbers independently, and I just used the gear that was already in it. I think I understood how all the numbers *I* used are generated, but there are other numbers I can't follow, so I might very well be misunderstanding something.

 

Feorthas

@Jan:

Your math is close, and you're using the raw numbers correctly; however, there are some discrepancies.

-White damage is much easier to handle if you move from per-swing damage to DPS immidiately and add everything on top of that baseline.
-KM is calculated swing by swing in the sheet and applied immidiately to the first valid proc based on the same basic multiple independant chances probability math that you used a few times. In IT BS OB OB, KM will add almost exactly the damage listed on the sheet during an infinite fight, even if you check out and go on autopilot (if you can while grinding through your rotation). In fact, if you do try to change things up, your dps will drop, so gogo autopilot!
-KM on 6IT will be very similar to KM in the second listed rotation on the sheet (HB rather than OB); while you do have some gcd wiggle room, you will still end up using a large number of KMs on IT just by accident. Even if we assume a 50/50 IT/FS KM usage rate, you end up decreasing your average KM bonus by 1100 damage vs pure FS (which never happens, but is what we aim for)
-Fallen Crusader will maintain 1PPM in Blood and UH presence so your effective bonus will actually go down slightly; I just hacked UH weapon swing speed increase in to see what would happen, in conjunction with the damage loss, and you end up with blood KM being 16.43% ahead of UH KM (on the usual rotation) rather than the 15% you would expect (again, this is the PPM mechanic getting in the way).
-I leave fractional disease ticks out and round down to get the number of whole ticks I should expect. IT BS OB OB gets 6 rather than 7 as the 7th happens 11 seconds after IT is refreshed (however, if blizzard fixed the whole dot-refresh mess, I'll gladly fix this as it should always result in a global damage increase!)
-There are a few more little issues but they only come out to be worth ~226 dps for IT BS OB OB (3900-ish vs 3670-ish)
-I'd be willing to credit 6IT for some of the identical holes in the paper-napkin math (KM, mostly, is what it looks like) but it's KM damage will be very close to the HB spam rotation (140-ish?)

As far as the psychology/reaction time/etc, I'm staying very close to predicted at 200-250ms of lag (my vision can also see a 72Hz flicker straight on and I have an excellent reaction time as well ) so the pseudo-queue blizzard implemented to kill the need for stopcasting, lag-compensation macros is working to virtually eliminate that kind of ping (however, I can still die to heigan while being right behind the tank, so I'm definitely lagging ;D) and cut down a ton on the response time issues that have been brought up.

And yes, it blows to play "zOMG MASH KEYS" well before your 30s .

Basically, I still think IT BS OB OB will stay ahead if performed right but 6IT certainly has a bit more room for error (3s?).

I am not your personal Frost Deathknight knowledge base. If you have a simple question, ask in the simple questions thread; if you have a more esoteric, specific, or complicated question, ask in the spec-appropriate thread.

My PM, WoWmail, and, especially, chat boxes are NOT the appropriate places for these questions.

 

Fugazor

I will do little comparison of 17/54/0 and 17/0/54 in Naxx10. Just please note that: as 17/54/0 I had worse group and less buffs (Imp. WF, HoW vs WF, EP, HoW, BL, spell hit), also I dpsed in BP which is most likely inferior especially under pressure. On the other side "unholy" Naxx was lagging. I also did tanking on many fights but it is interesting to see tank dps too.

Boss	Frost	Unholy	Comment
Anub'Rekhan	3138	3377	Pretty similar but Unholy kill was way faster (2:44 vs 1:36)
Faerlina	3873	4619	Unholy one is higher due to more aoe
Maexxna	3739	4108	Again similar with much master kill from Unholy (2:34 vs 1:49)
Noth	3775	3337	Frost aoe seems better
Heigan	3073	867	Died due to lag sadly
Loatheb	4726	4024	Frost gain advantage of not depending on pet
Patchwerk	2157	2351	MT in both cases, pretty much same dps
Grobbulus	3663	3704	Pretty much same, given less buffs Frost won
Gluth	1882	1829	Again tanking and again same dps
Thaddius	2514	2502	Tanking then dpsing in tanking gear, same dps
Razuvious	3146	3173	Pretty much same, given less buffs Frost won
Gothik	972	636	*yawn*
4 horse	1420	1486	Seems like tank dps is balanced perfectly
Sapphiron	2812	xxxx	Sorry WMO refused to say Unholy number
Kel'Thuzad	2769	2429	Same length of kill, aoe adds due to MT tanking them in both cases

If you look from OT side dps is pretty comparable and actually higher as Frost if I would had BL, EP and spell hit. If you look from dps side it is comparable too but again Frost would come on top with BL, EP and spell hit. If we add on top of that Unholy kills were faster due to better setup which should benefit Unholy more (Garg, army) it is even more clear that Frost won.

Now I am quite surprised by those results as I didn't felt that way. I felt that I screw a lot while being Frost, had worse group setup and overall before I compared both I was sure that Unholy will stomp Frost easily due to that. Now it seems that even with worse raid Frost pulled same numbers so I am quite shocked. I will respec to Frost and try it tomorrow in Naxx25.

 

Janraea

>White damage:
I did that both ways, but only posted the math for one of them, since they agreed with each other.

>In fact, if you do try to change things up, your dps will drop, so gogo autopilot!
This is only true if your rotation has to deal with a single- to double- rune switch. Because of the way runes refresh (if you leave it active for 1.5 seconds and then use it, it will refresh after 8.5 seconds instead of ten), you sometimes can afford to swap two adjacent abilities for one rotation any time you like, without affecting the list of abilities being used. This is not the case for a rotation that has 6 ITs in a row, but it is true for a more realistic rotation that spreads the frost abilities out.

>Fallen Crusader and KM ppms:
Do you recall what threads that testing was done in? I was assuming that the UP haste was handled just like normal haste, but I think there was a test at some point that I can't find.. If you know of evidence that PPMs don't treat UP like they do every other haste, it would definitely have an impact on my conclusions.. I don't think KM can be so much stronger in blood that it would outweigh the dps difference in 4xT7 though.

If FC has the same proc rate for UP and BP, it will provide the same net bonus to dps for each, since they both scale about the same with AP. (I reran all those figures with 100 more ap and got that they scale extremely close to each other, assuming that weapon and gear both improve at the same rate).

>There are a few more little issues but they only come out to be worth ~226 dps for IT BS OB OB (3900-ish vs 3670-ish)
Could you say (or pm me) what those are? I'd like to make my math more accurate where possible.

> it's KM damage will be very close to the HB spam rotation (140-ish?)
I don't think you're giving the player enough credit for FS-swapping to handle KM procs. While a 15% lower damage on abilities would make KM do about 15% less damage (assuming you're right about the ppm being unaffected by unholy haste), very few of those procs will actually fall on ITs if the player is swapping right and using an auditory indicator of KM procs - essentially only the ones that proc so close to an IT cast that the player can't react to them. All he has to do is hit FS reflexively when he hears it, and skip the next FS in the rotation - it's not nearly as complicated as some of the HB-KM schemes you find in the DW threads.

> I'm staying very close to predicted at 200-250ms of lag
Since your sheet has the 4xT7 bonus deactivated, I assume you're not using it? Without 4xT7, the Antiseptic rotation only takes about a third the penalty from latency as with it - I believe you're doing a 6gcd rotation with a 1 second cushion much of the time, and only switching to a 10.5 without a cushion when you save up the RP/proc Rime, so 200ms of lag would only damage your dps by about3.5%. I'm not precisely sure how the latency queuing works, so that impact may be minimal, anyway.

>dot-refresh mess
Yeah, I didn't do the math on that one. If we try to get in 6xIT without hurting the FFdot count very much, our rotation will be way too rigid to really play - I'd guess I lose about a third of that dot damage from refreshing.

>Basically, I still think IT BS OB OB will stay ahead if performed right but 6IT certainly has a bit more room for error (3s?)

Generally 2 seconds of spare time. I think the fact that the comparisons put them so close together (within a couple percent) means that we'll have to start using WWS to compare the results of the two builds, particularly the effects of KM. They're definitely close enough that different stat weightings can put one or the other in the lead, depending on gear (IT-heavy scales better with AP, Oblit-heavy scales better with crit and WPD, IT-heavy scales better with haste, etc).

 

krapniknil

Im not dps for my guild. Im a tank. However for fun sometimes I respec dps and ITx6 gave me 900+ more dps than every other spec on the dummy in Ebon Hold (single target, HB only hits the dummy). I havnt tried it in a raid yet but on the dummy i got 3000 unbuffed DPS. I even tried 32/39 DW and i have twin 150 dps 1h'ers. ITx6 was superior.

This is the ITx6 build i used.
Talent Calculator - World of Warcraft

The Rotation (just for the sake of writing one) is IT>BS> RP DUMP>IT>OBLIT>RP DUMP>IT>RP DUMP
But the truth is there is no rotation. There is no rotation that I followed. I followed these rules. Rule 1 is the most important, and you follow the most important rule first.

1) When Rime procs, use howling blast. You will probably cast 2 spells before you realize rime has procced but thats okay
2) When you have over 65 RP, cast 2 Frost Strikes. Also cast FS if all runes are on cooldown
3) If a unholy rune is active, cast Obliterate. Since you get death runes from this, that means you will only be casting 1 Obliterate at average once every 10 seconds because thats the only time you should see a ready unholy rune
4) If a blood rune is active, use Blood Strike
5) If a death rune is active, use Icy Touch



Do not try to sync your Killing Machine procs with FS or HB. Your main goal in the rotation is just to get into a state where you cast nonstop. Every DK should be able to get into this state because every DK has the same rune/RP creation ability. I got into a perma cast state without any set bonuses. When you use this build, use it with the mindset that Killing Machine doesnt even exist. dont let KM get into your mind.

Only cast howling blast on Rime procs. This is a big thing that let me get a perma casting pace with the spec. Your unholy runes want to be used on oblit for death runes. Your death runes want to be used on IT for rime procs.

Considering the Mechanics of how blood and unholy runes will rotate into death runes, you should get to cast 3 Icy Touches, 1 Obliterate, and 1 Blood Strike every ~10 seconds (lag not included). This alone gives you 100 Runic Power to cast 3 Frost Strikes. That totals 8 seconds out of 10 seconds. However, i swear, try it yourself and something special happens to cause you to usually be able to cast 9.5 things every 10 seconds, and you will still end up having a rune up and even in unholy presence you wish you could cast faster to use up everything. Something is happening, somewhere, to create more casting opportunity. I havn't yet figured out what is causing this to happen, but try it and you will see that you will be pushing unholy presence to its maximum and you will still not be able to make yourself completely drained.

It is fine to use Obliterate when you have a unholy rune / blood-death rune combo. However remember Obliterate is only to be used when a unholy rune is active. Do not use unholy-death runes on Obliterate, unless you have a 1 unholy-death rune + 1 unholy rune combo active, then its ok. Obliterate will always try to use the unholy rune over a unholy-death rune.

Glyphs are FS, IT, and Obliterate. Lesser Glyphs i like to use Pest, Raise Dead, and Blood Tap. Sigil is 100% no exceptions going to be the one that increases Icy Touch damage by 200. Unholy presence is to be used.

Heres how i like to use Unbreakable Armor. You create a macro with /cast Blood Tap and under that you put in /stopcasting and under that you put /cast Unbreakable Armor. This will not cast both at the same time, you have to mash the button 3-4 times to get it to work. What i like to do is whenever UA is ready i use up all of my runes quickly and i put all my runes on cooldown, then i spam my macro while spamming my frost strike button. This should cast 1 frost strike and activate your UA at the same time. After that you can cast 2 more frost strikes and then all your runes will be active again and the perma cast pace will continue.

 

Khaosknight

You are doing it wrong.

If you can pull 3000 dps with that abyssmal *priority system* which rune clips and wastes FS's among other things.

First off, you missed the point of the ITx6 build. Which is, to do 6 Icy Touches. In a row. Not 1 Icy touch, then faceroll, shit yourself and repeat. The rotation (without RP added) is thus:

BS BS OB OB

IT IT IT IT IT IT

the reasoning behind this is that your frost strike is your highest damage strike. Frost Strike costs 32 RP. Icy touch (glyphed/talented) generates 25 RP. this means a 6 IT rotation generates 150 RP.

so what must you do?

assuming absolutely NO Killing Machine procs, (and 4 piece t7) this is your new rotation.

BS BS OB OB <70 RP> FS FS <8 RP>

IT <35 RP, if you get a KM proc, use FS, if not..> IT <60 RP, if still no KM do one more...> IT <85 RP, and no KM still?> then do FSx2, bringing you back to 21 RP, with 3 death runes left. continue.. IT <46 RP, if KM procs, use FS> IT < 71rp, if KM procs, use FS> IT <96 RP, which is HEYO 3 FS worth> so proceed with FS FS FS. and then repeat from the top. With that rotation, you don't even need the 130 RP tank if you do it perfectly.

second, you said :
Do not try to sync your Killing Machine procs with FS or HB.

This is the exact opposite of what you need to do.

Your highest damage spell is Frost Strike, followed by Obliterate, then IT. (with HB tieing for third, simply because you don't use it often)

If you have KM up. and 32+ RP, and you choose not to FS, you are doing it wrong.

Next, your bit on OB:

NO!

*hits you with rolled up newspaper*

NO!

You ONLY use obliterate in the first cycle of each 20 second rotation, and the cleanest way to do this is 2 in a row, if you do 1 OB, then a BS, then an OB, then a BS, it will cause some severe rune clipping and delays later on.


As far as Rime procs go, i tend to save mine for the end of a rotation, or if i notice them with <2 seconds left i just blow it. HB is a decent damage spell, however it's not worth soaking up a KM proc that could be used on an FS. So use freezing fog procs with caution.



Edit: in the case of no 4piece t7, cast Horn of Winter right before you start, and you should be able to replicate this rotation.

 

Janraea

You're both doing it wrong (though Khaos is closer).

Krapnikil... First of all, there is no way to chain cast in Unholy Presence, which is kind of the point of the build. The best possible rotation only gets 18/20 gcds filled. If you're running a lot of latency, you'll fill up all your time, but that's a separate problem.

There is no workable priority system for a BotN/DRM build. Nothing that's humanly doable, at any rate. The interplay of death runes is simply too complicated.


Khaos: "First off, you missed the point of the ITx6 build. Which is, to do 6 Icy Touches. In a row."

This is a terrible idea. Not only is it basically impossible to avoid munching KM procs with those all in a row, it's also impossible to not cap your RP. I wish I'd never started calling it ITx6, people keep thinking that that's how they should play it. The best rotation I've come up with so far is more alternating - IT,BS,FS,OBlit,FS,FS,IT,IT,FS | BS,IT,FS,IT,IT,FS,Oblit,FS,(HB/FS). The starting rotation is BS,(Rune Tap),IT,BS,FS,OB,-,-,OB,-,FS.

>You ONLY use obliterate in the first cycle of each 20 second rotation, and the cleanest way to do this is 2 in a row

If you try to use two obliterates in a row, you'll find that you can't the second time around. There has to be something in between them, if you do choose to have them in the same half of the rotation, because the one of the two runes used by the second Obliterate won't be used until 12 seconds after the Oblit - this means there's no room to push the ITs back to catch a KM proc with FS, you'd be losing rune-time.

 

Khaosknight

Don't mean to sound like i'm flaming you or insinuating a fight or anything, but did you read my post? The part where i mentioned threading FS between the IT?

As far as your OBx2 problem, I've ran this rotation in a few naxx raids and haven't really experienced that problem. Perhaps it's because I use all my RP in the second rotation (except for the 2 FS's in the first cycle obviously), which i posted above. and i basically use 11 moves in that cycle (6 IT's and 5 FS's) which brings me a little bit past where my first runes have regenerated, so my OBs don't clip. (I have perfect latency)

Jan, my rotation (without RP moves anyway) is

BS BS OB OB
IT IT IT IT IT IT

and I find it to do very good dps, and is definitely a mangageable DRM/BotN rotation. Sure I have to be mindful of my KM procs being eaten up, but after the first Icy touch, my RP is always > then 32 unless I'm in the middle of my rotation, where it is at 21, and the end where it is at 0. So basically, whenever I have >32 RP and get a KM, I delay my next attack to cast FS.

 

krapniknil

Trust me, I am chaincasting in unholy presence. I dont know how its happening but it is. Maybe i'll record a video. My rime procrate is less than 15% (around 13%).

 

Khaosknight

Its possible if you use RP and other resources efficiently, however your above post suggests that's not happening.

 

Janraea

The maximum possible RP generation is 6 ITs, 2 BS, 2 Obliterates, with IT glyph and 4xT7 (which you don't have). That produces 230 RP, with a 60% chance of a rime proc each 20 seconds, so a net 233 RP (the Rime HB is only worth 5 RP.
If you proc Rime every 20s (unlikely), you get 235 RP, which is enough for 7.3 Frost strikes. That's a total of 18.3 gcds out of twenty filled. If you are chain-casting, then you are spending more than 2 seconds of every twenty waiting on lag, deciding what to do next (likely, given your priority system), or doing nothing.

I did all this math before, because the whole point of the build and rotation is to take advantage of the extra gcds from UP as much as possible.

No, I missed that. You're less wrong than I thought, though putting all the ITs in one half of the rotation still leaves you with less wiggle-room for KM-swapping.

 

EwokChilli

@krapniknil
Essentially, you get into a BSx1, OBx1, ITx3 "rotation" (in so many words).

If you're in UP, then your swing speed will be ~2.1-2.2 if you have a 3.4 axe (~40% haste before gear). The "rotation" looks kinda funny. I'm sure it performs extremely well if you have a less than optimal weapon, because if you have high AP but a lacking weapon, then 2xIT > 1xOB, especially against targets with non-sundered armor.

That's similar to why everyone always says Unholy 2h > Frost 2h. 2hUnholy has a lot more unmitigated damage than 2h Frost.

<on a seperate note>
I'm pretty sure that anyone with a brain has already figured this out, but there is practically no reason to ever gem for expertise, so i just found out the hard way. The amount of expertise you get from gear+talents is more than enough. There is little reason not to just gem for all strength except for enough purple gems to activate your meta-gem. I'm fairly sure this is common knowledge, but just giving information while I'm too inebriated to worry about if people will actually need this advice.

 

krapniknil

My "rotation" is the best possible way to chaincast in unholy, and it works. I never "waste" runic power, if you take a look at "rule 2" you see i always use frost strike when i have over 70 RP. Explain to me a better way to chaincast if you think there is one. I never have an empty space of time, I am always casting something.


My rule system is very easy to follow. When i see a unholy rune, i oblit. When i see a blood rune, i bs. when i see over 70 RP, i use 2 FS. In between all that, i IT. Then I HB whenever i see rime proc.

 

Janraea

Link us a WWS next chance you get. And stop saying that your rotation is the 'best' anything, unless you want to post all of the math you used to prove that to yourself.

Give me a list of 40 gcds in which you use every one of them, just a list of the abilities you use in order will be fine. Chain-casting in unholy with 50 points in frost is impossible for any length of time, and I'll be delighted to find the errors in your list of abilities for you.

'I know it works because I have seen it' is not useful evidence - I have already pointed out several ways in which you could be/probably are mis-observing reality. You are either not hitting buttons quickly enough, or you have high latency (>100 ms).

 

Mild Confusion

Can someone please post the current stat values for a 21/50 build without DRM in blood presence? I don't have excel on my computer and am not the best at speadsheets even if I did.