One thing I do like with DRW is that it's essentially a ranged ability - you can pick up new adds at range with it while continuing to dps your main target, which can come in handy since it's still farther a reach than untalented IT. I do agree that it's biggest drawback is that it uses a global tho.
I'm also very biased against a single Necrosis point. Overtime, i have no threat issues. I'd rather have an ability that can change the flow a little bit, so to speak
Now that the Necrosis bug was fixed I assume we can use Gravity's threat analysis again. Based on that Necrosis and Subversion are our strongest passive threat talents.
I will keep DRW for now. The strong opener is worth a single talent point.
So I wonder for tanks which hit capped but has low expertise, can IT be a part of our rotation? I'm planing to change Hearth Strikes to Icy Touch on the second part of Blood rotation (thou only 2 HS can be changed) I wont be able to test it for a few days unfortunately. Anyone tried something like that?
I wasn't much clear in the first post, I'm sorry. What I mean is, if I'm having troubles with threat due to low expertise, can IT be my savior here? I won't use HS (which is bound to expertise) and use IT instead more often and lower the chances of my strikes to go waste. I'm asking how much benefit do I get if I do this. Any testings yet?
Rotation I was using:
IT - PS - DS - HS - HS
DS - HS - HS - HS - HS
Rotation I plan to use now:
IT - PS - DS - HS - HS
DS - IT - IT - HS - HS
What do you mean how much benefit? A lot. Asking this kind of mathematical question is pointless: Even if you were on 45 Expertise, you'd be doing more TPS by spamming IT. So now that you're exceptionally low on Exp (which affects everything except IT), surprise, spamming IT is more threat than your normal HS/DS combination.
How much benefit do you get? Do some testing of your own, and discover the blatantly obvious. Spamming IT is better TPS than a normal rotation even with your gear tuned to benefit the normal rotation.
On the topic of Necrosis vs. DRW:
Firstly, just to remind everyone, the Threat per Point value of Necrosis is above that of Subversion, and they're both above Sudden Doom. Secondly, while DRW isn't bad, it's not exactly useful either.
If you want to use DRW on a pull, you have to spend two minutes spamming DnD/HoW to build-up RP, then waste the first GCD of your engagement on it, only to gain a fraction of your threat increased, as someone correctly noted it isn't affected by Frost Pr.
Is it a great tool on tank-swaps? Yes. But how often do you need it in that capacity? Festergut is pointless, as your OT will swap out of FP/Def Stance/Bearform/Right Fury, and also you'll be taunting off a tank which has had the better part of a +80% DPS buff, so Fester threat is irrelevant. When else do you tankswap? Sindragosa: So what? Everyone's busy breaking prisons. TPS isn't remotely an issue. The only time when I feel DRW has truly made a difference was on LDW and Marrowgar, both of which are non-issues. Almost every other time, I'd rather have an extra GCD than spend the first second of engagement on doing what is an elaborate auto-attack, which will set me up for more threat within the next 10 sec.
Frankly, I'm not going to lobby for either Necrosis or DRW. I'll be happy to be rid of a clunky mechanic that doesn't work well. If DRW was something you used because you valued your snap-agro, start with IT-IT-BT-IT. Who cares if it messes up your next cycle. Big deal. Nothing will tear anything off you after three ITs.
If you're that bugged by the messy first cycle, switch to IT-IT-BT-DS-HS. Using a D rune and a U rune for DS will still result in the U and an F rune cooling as D runes, and you'll start the next cycle exactly as you'd have done before.
Want more snap agro? Take that talent point and put it in Black Ice. Necrosis will undoubtedly be more sustained TPS, but sustained TPS wasn't a problem for the Blood DK tank even before the IT change.
Want more agro-security? Put it in Virulence. Fuck Necrosis and DRW, IT is the new TPS tool.
I just ran nexus hc and they will most defenetily nerf IT. And to come back to the question of Müdür: Yes you can practically spam IT whenever you have a frost or death rune and it will give you an enormous boost of TPS.
I can't believe how great it is and how much fun ICC will be tonight, I wonder if they'll hotfix nerf it before that...
- the man in black fled across the desert and the gunslinger followed -
Now that the Necrosis bug was fixed I assume we can use Gravity's threat analysis again. Based on that Necrosis and Subversion are our strongest passive threat talents.
I will keep DRW for now. The strong opener is worth a single talent point.
I wonder if Gravity has looked at Might of Mograine as a candidate for swapping into Necrosis as well, something like Talent Calculator - World of Warcraft to get both Necrosis and DRW.
It will maintain a 5 stack uptime constantly when you're tanking actively tanking, the problem is it drops off the second you stop taking hits and then has a ramp up time to get back to 5 stacks. Meanwhile the 245 sigil has nearly the same uptime, nearly the same dodge rating, but is at full strength in a single proc.
In a situation where you're the sole tank and/or constantly tanking something it is of course superior, albeit marginally. The problem is that nearly every single fight these days involves tank swapping or some other gimmick that may drop it. Something like Saurfang where you're swapping tanks every 15 seconds would be the most blatant example where you'd be constantly ramping the buff up just in time to switch to the other tank.
It's the "nearly" part that's at question: The 245 one has a 80% to proc so there's even occasions where it drops of it's own accord.
I think ultimately the problem lies in that they have practically no difference in stat value. I seem to recall a Blue post suggesting they're not "very happy" with the sigils/totems/librams, so I wouldn't be surprised if soon we see them change to something like 5*48 stacks or something.
But currently, I agree, it's hard to determine which is superior.
Firstly, just to remind everyone, the Threat per Point value of Necrosis is above that of Subversion, and they're both above Sudden Doom. Secondly, while DRW isn't bad, it's not exactly useful either.
Is it a great tool on tank-swaps? Yes. But how often do you need it in that capacity? Festergut is pointless, as your OT will swap out of FP/Def Stance/Bearform/Right Fury, and also you'll be taunting off a tank which has had the better part of a +80% DPS buff, so Fester threat is irrelevant. When else do you tankswap? Sindragosa: So what? Everyone's busy breaking prisons. TPS isn't remotely an issue. The only time when I feel DRW has truly made a difference was on LDW and Marrowgar, both of which are non-issues. Almost every other time, I'd rather have an extra GCD than spend the first second of engagement on doing what is an elaborate auto-attack, which will set me up for more threat within the next 10 sec.
Frankly, I'm not going to lobby for either Necrosis or DRW. I'll be happy to be rid of a clunky mechanic that doesn't work well. If DRW was something you used because you valued your snap-agro, start with IT-IT-BT-IT. Who cares if it messes up your next cycle. Big deal. Nothing will tear anything off you after three ITs.
If you're that bugged by the messy first cycle, switch to IT-IT-BT-DS-HS. Using a D rune and a U rune for DS will still result in the U and an F rune cooling as D runes, and you'll start the next cycle exactly as you'd have done before.
Want more snap agro? Take that talent point and put it in Black Ice. Necrosis will undoubtedly be more sustained TPS, but sustained TPS wasn't a problem for the Blood DK tank even before the IT change.
Want more agro-security? Put it in Virulence. Fuck Necrosis and DRW, IT is the new TPS tool.
***I would like to point out that almost 100% of the statements I make are based on ST boss tanking, not AE situations (unless noted otherwise). Inb4 'zomg, i need it for dndz!!1!'.
To pick up Necrosis, you are already going to have to either go 3/3 for Rav. Dead or 3/3 Morbidity then spend anywhere up to 5 talent points to get the talent activated (Necrosis). By doing this you are having to lose some of your means of survivability in the blood tree (MoB or Rune Tap) and drop some threat points (DRW / Subv / MoM) which is somewhat self defeating.
If you wish to get more than 1/5 Necrosis, you are also going to have to drop 3/3 Imp IT (more threat drop) only to see you are then relying on someone else to keep the slowing debuff on the boss 100% of the time, and nerfing your new opener.
A combined choice of the above listed options would be the most viable situation to free up enough for you use Necrosis. Overall my point is, its too expensive to pick up. You lose too many other viable options in this process (mainly due to the 3 prereq pts in morbid/rav dead). Anytime you are losing a valid 'save' talent for threat, its not a good decision (applying to progression content obv).
As far as your scenario of just IT spam off the start, I could see that being useful if someone is just horrible at playing a DK tank. No one should have problems w/ openers if you have a hunter/rogues in the raid.
However, I disagree w/ just saying DRW isnt 'useful'. The main selling value of the DRW is the amount of dmg it is able to do if used nearly on cd (90secs). It does much more dmg than you would be doing w/ a buff DC from Morbidity or having pts in Sudden doom, and its only one talent point. It also still adds a very low increase to your threat values (due to not buffed by Frost Pres) which makes it not just a complete DPS mechanic.
On the same note, tank DPS isn't irrelevant. I have seen top kills slip away on a 0% wipe (boss at 5k hp). Before this gets flamed to high hell and back: Am I saying that you should put your personal DPS higher than anything on your priority list? No. I am just saying you shouldn't just worry about only doing TPS by sitting there spamming IT the entire fight. As a blood DK you should be pulling ~4k dps depending on the fight. It will be a factor on progression content and finely tuned enrage timers. DRW is very much worth 1 talent pt.
Name a single talent point that can produce those types of numbers.
Originally Posted by Pintofbrew
If you want to use DRW on a pull, you have to spend two minutes spamming DnD/HoW to build-up RP, then waste the first GCD of your engagement on it, only to gain a fraction of your threat increased, as someone correctly noted it isn't affected by Frost Pr.
This isnt 100% true, its actually much easier than this. All you need to do is have a resto druid keep rejuv/WG up for about 30secs before the pull and you should be fine, especially as your are casting HoW/IT/PS on the way in. Like I posted earlier, you can even AMS to get full runic during the first few seconds of the fight if you are going in dry. I do it every time I open on a boss (Example -Sind frost breath / LK 1st infest / etc).
Also, you will have a free gcd at some point during your rotation w/in the first 20seconds of a boss fight(ie a non rune ability). DRW > DC.
It will maintain a 5 stack uptime constantly when you're tanking actively tanking, the problem is it drops off the second you stop taking hits and then has a ramp up time to get back to 5 stacks. Meanwhile the 245 sigil has nearly the same uptime, nearly the same dodge rating, but is at full strength in a single proc.
In a situation where you're the sole tank and/or constantly tanking something it is of course superior, albeit marginally. The problem is that nearly every single fight these days involves tank swapping or some other gimmick that may drop it. Something like Saurfang where you're swapping tanks every 15 seconds would be the most blatant example where you'd be constantly ramping the buff up just in time to switch to the other tank.
^I agree 100%.
There is only a handful of fights that I favor using the 264 sigil over the 245 one. Any fight I tank DW frost, I favor the 264 sigil more times than not. The fight where it shines the most is Princes when you solo tank the 2 melee mobs (Valanar and Taladram). Its near impossible to have it fall off at any point during that fight.
If they want more people to use it, they will either need to buff the amount of dodge per charge or nerf the amount of charges needed to get it at full capacity.
On a side note, the new DW frost spec (getting the additional 4% str) has a solid feel:
Overall I agree that DRW is a better place to put the "free" point in the standard Blood build listed in the original post, despite its clunkiness and a feeling of having to unnaturally force it into a rotation. While I don't consider the increased damage provided significant in terms of a raid's dps, it's certainly more than Necrosis' damage and the possible threat advantage of Necrosis is more than negated by the boost to Icy Touch.
There is only a handful of fights that I favor using the 264 sigil over the 245 one. Any fight I tank DW frost, I favor the 264 sigil more times than not. The fight where it shines the most is Princes when you solo tank the 2 melee mobs (Valanar and Taladram).
Aren't DK tanks better utilised on Keleseth, though? They have the most tools for picking up the shadow blobs from range, and AMS to survive an Empowered Shadow Bolt if everything goes wrong. Is there something I'm missing here?
Aren't DK tanks better utilised on Keleseth, though? They have the most tools for picking up the shadow blobs from range, and AMS to survive an Empowered Shadow Bolt if everything goes wrong. Is there something I'm missing here?
The fight itself isnt really hard at all, it doesnt matter who tanks what tbh. A feral druid running around using FF on the nucleus is just as effective as a DK. The Empowered Shadowbolt is near a non issue if you are collecting them correctly regardless of what healers are doing.
The upside is how much a Frost DK shines while tanking both of the melee hitting mobs. UA / 18sec IBF / Imp Frost pres / 3% miss from talents / more avoidance and mit from using 1h Tank wpns / etc all favor a frost dk.
I havent tried to tank both of them on my druid or paladin, but I would assume its less optimal when compared to a DW frost tank.
With the buff to IT threat, I personally feel DRW is of less value as a threat tool. I actually went back to Blood for tanking from frost in 3.3.3 and while I'm specc'd into DRW at the moment, will shuffle things around again to get into Necrosis.
Necrosis adds more constant DPS/TPS while DRW adds burst.
In a VOA25 yesterday trying out Blood again I opened with ITx2 PSx2 HSx2 ERW DSx2 HSx2 asking the hunters/rogues to not tricks/MD me and was very happy with the result.
The Top Hunter was the only one chasing me for threat, occasionally when I had 4 death runes up and needed to refresh diseases I would ITx3 PS, HS x2 bursting my TPS above 14k. The Hunter who was averaging 8k+ TPS went the entire fight without having to feign.
Previously, I would use DRW for burst threat right before refreshing disease but with the new IT I think we can focus less on TPS talents and move more focus into desired playstyle and survivability. A nice step forward in terms of making specs less "cookie-cutter'.
-Edit-
I have also replaced my Glyph of DS for DnD which makes trash tanking much like frost (effortless). While it less optimal for ST encounters and would be best if I carried stacks of both glyphs, tanking is my offspec so am more than happy with the trade-off.
I'm puzzled as to why one might choose Necrosis over DRW due to the IT buff. Yes, the new IT makes DRW's burst threat less useful. It also makes Necrosis' sustained threat less useful, though. After trying the new IT last night, I'd even go so far as to say that the threat from either DRW or Necrosis is going to be useless in almost any situation - IT is so good that you can effortlessly get far more threat than you need with that talent point unspent. If you don't want to care about damage potential (for which DRW is the clear winner by a mile), then get something protective, like Spell Deflection or Mark of Blood. Or go for Virulence to help IT consistency, or Black Ice for AoE threat.
I am glad to see someone finally brought it up. With Endless Winter (EW) now giving 2/4% bonus to str, how valuable has DK frost tanking become. I am going to use my character as a basis, I need to say this is mostly an alt and have only cleared the first wing of ICC normal, resulting in a major gear difference than most of you. (well armory is down at the moment).
So assuming that you only have 100 str without EW you will have a parry rating from the str of 25 or .54% parry. now assuming you take 2/2 EW it will bost your total str to 104 giving you a total of 1 extra parry rating or an extra .0217% to parry. so if you just take that to 1000 str you will have a parry rating of 250 or 5.434% parry un talented and talented you will have 5.652% parry a bonus of ~.218%
As you see this str bonus only gets better with the more str you have at 2000 str its about a .5% difference with the talent
I was testing in my gear last night DW spec my GS is only about 5300 and i run just shy of 11% hit and running 21 exper. On a ST boss fight steady tps was between 6k and 9k with a peak threat of 12k. The rotation i was using was
IT>PS>OB>BS>BS>IT>PS>OB>IT>IT (RPDUMP). I noticed a few thing the first being i almost always had a RS waiting to be used (taking full advantege of a 27% parry).
EDIT: The second being i was never starved for RP and while i almost never did a dump BC my runes were ready if I had a KM proc i could FS right away and not worry about losing my rotation.
Because my gear is not optimal I do use Victor's Call trink to get me to 21 expertise so my actual HP is only about 37k.
I think I will be DW frost tanking in the future.
I have not tried this spec. myself but I saw it posted on another message board. The original message had a link to a well geared and experienced DKs armory page.
Its looks to be maximizing IT threat capabilities while grabbing useful tanking abilities (i.e. Unbreakable Armor, Improved Frost Presence and Veteran of the Third War).
With all the death runes this build will be playing around with, thanks to Death Rune Mastery and Blood of the North, it appears you could IT dump.
The rotation would be:
Death Strike x2
Blood Strike x2
Icy Touch x6
Producing some wicked threat!
I'm not wholeheartedly advocating this build but I am saying it offers some interesting advantages.
I have not tested the DW version extensively but so far it works well. I had slightly less Health (around 700 less than my standard blood tanking spec) but a lot more mitigation with the double tanking weapons and the frost talents. I was usually GCD locked and close to full on runic power. Threat was a non-issue but my DPS was in the toilets compared to any other tanking spec.
The rotation was awkward and I think I will drop the disease glyph and just go single disease tanking.
I have not tried this spec. myself but I saw it posted on another message board. The original message had a link to a well geared and experienced DKs armory page.
Its looks to be maximizing IT threat capabilities while grabbing useful tanking abilities (i.e. Unbreakable Armor, Improved Frost Presence and Veteran of the Third War).
With all the death runes this build will be playing around with, thanks to Death Rune Mastery and Blood of the North, it appears you could IT dump.
The rotation would be:
Death Strike x2
Blood Strike x2
Icy Touch x6
Producing some wicked threat!
I'm not wholeheartedly advocating this build but I am saying it offers some interesting advantages.
I have not tested the DW version extensively but so far it works well. I had slightly less Health (around 700 less than my standard blood tanking spec) but a lot more mitigation with the double tanking weapons and the frost talents. I was usually GCD locked and close to full on runic power. Threat was a non-issue but my DPS was in the toilets compared to any other tanking spec.
The rotation was awkward and I think I will drop the disease glyph and just go single disease tanking.
The only 'interesting advantage' I really see is the ability to get IIT in a blood build, which I think was discussed previously somewhere, at the loss of only 1% avoidance, but you can't really do any more than that since it has to come out of WOTN which is so far down the tree. It's not like you really need points in frost for IT spam to be dominating single target threat, even as blood you could dual wield tank weapons if you wanted and spam IT and hit 15-16k TPS with just a 'hit whatever button looks fun' rotation (Tried that on deathwhisper last night and confirmed, soon as my 5 stack wore off, my tps would rocket up and I'd steal her right back, it's really pretty overpowered in those kinds of situations).
The only 'interesting advantage' I really see is the ability to get IIT in a blood build, which I think was discussed previously somewhere, at the loss of only 1% avoidance, but you can't really do any more than that since it has to come out of WOTN which is so far down the tree. It's not like you really need points in frost for IT spam to be dominating single target threat, even as blood you could dual wield tank weapons if you wanted and spam IT and hit 15-16k TPS with just a 'hit whatever button looks fun' rotation (Tried that on deathwhisper last night and confirmed, soon as my 5 stack wore off, my tps would rocket up and I'd steal her right back, it's really pretty overpowered in those kinds of situations).
I don't think you are understanding the point of this build, take another look: Talent Build
In this build you pick up talents that improve your IT, not because you need a major buff to your TPS but because they are on the way to the incredible mitigation talents in the Frost tree. Since your IT is going to be hitting like a truck and you can spam it due to BotN and DRM you are able to safety switch out DPS weapons for tanking weapons.
Since IT produces a lot of threat and is available often you don't need to take any more DPS/TPS talents at the end of the Frost tree and instead you can invest your points into EH talents in the Blood tree.
I've been messing around with this build and it has some major advantages and disadvantages.
Disadvantages-
-very poor threat on more than 3 targets
-low dps
-the 3-9 second range after pull is somewhat low TPS
Advantages-
-Ridiculously high single target threat (so much so I switch to Death Strikes to help "mitigate" damage)
-Once you get your Death Runes rolling you can pick up 1-3 adds very easily
-Nearly equal health to normal Blood (slightly less because of 2-hander vs. tanking weapons)
-Equal or greater mitigation than normal Frost (greater because almost no frost use two tanking weapons)
At this point i'm just messing around with this so any feedback would be greatly appreciated.
03/23/10, 10:35 PM
