Suno's Fireside Chat - DK Endgame Tanking - Page 27

Dardrious · 03/14/09, 7:27 PM

Originally Posted by Noorm

I noticed that both you and Griefknight posted builds that include epidemic. In light of the longer durations on diseases and the fact that they can be refreshed with a single blood rune, I wondering if the extra 6 seconds is really worth it.

I would imagine that the longer you can keep your diseases up, the more threat you'll be able to generate with other, more powerful abilities. Sure you can refresh with 1 rune, but with epidemic, you can use those extra 6 seconds to do higher threat abilities.

Zerath · 03/14/09, 9:50 PM

Originally Posted by Dardrious

I would imagine that the longer you can keep your diseases up, the more threat you'll be able to generate with other, more powerful abilities. Sure you can refresh with 1 rune, but with epidemic, you can use those extra 6 seconds to do higher threat abilities.

Untrue. What this will boil down to is if IT-PS is more threat than a single DS/HSx2. And we won't be able to make our answer 100% positive until the patch goes live, with all the current changes in the PTR - we can assume what will be higher but still, won't be 100%.

And, iirc, Pestilance refreshing the main targets diseases is a glyph. So, a 1 rune refresh may not be optimal even for that, then.

(Lots of fun that we shouldn't argue about until closer to 3.1 going Live and they stop tweaking/doing major overhauls to our class.)

Regarding IRT - It's a very nice ability for the points we spend but with our current Blood talents, I don't see any open points to take it, much like Grief has stated. We do know that healing is going to be much more difficult and mana regen is taking a huge nerf. It may be asked for us to take IRT.

Non-IRT Build: http://talent.mmo-champion.com/?deat...1&version=9684

(Not time to post an IRT build.)

There is a spare 2 points. I'm highly debating the probability of going DW as Blood. The strikes will hit less but we should, in theory, be able to RS more. And with Scent of Blood + Healers ticking additional RP, we should be able to hit maximum amount of RS. (Pot shoot.)

(No math, yet. No time.)

Rhyls · 03/14/09, 11:03 PM

Originally Posted by Zerath

Untrue. What this will boil down to is if IT-PS is more threat than a single DS/HSx2. And we won't be able to make our answer 100% positive until the patch goes live, with all the current changes in the PTR - we can assume what will be higher but still, won't be 100%.

IT-PS vs HSx2 yes, but vs DS/OB theres a difference in GCDs that has to be considered, which may or may not have a cost associated with it depending on what else you could do with that 1 GCD discrepancy.

Montegomery · 03/14/09, 11:34 PM

Originally Posted by Zerath

Regarding IRT - It's a very nice ability for the points we spend but with our current Blood talents, I don't see any open points to take it, much like Grief has stated. We do know that healing is going to be much more difficult and mana regen is taking a huge nerf. It may be asked for us to take IRT.

Non-IRT Build: http://talent.mmo-champion.com/?deat...1&version=9684

(Not time to post an IRT build.)

First, I'd expect that the two points you left to spare in the non-IRT build would be placed in Rune Tap and Epidemic. From there the obvious talent to swap points is Spell Deflection. While it's now 15/30/45% mitigation, we've lost 10% parry chance at the same time. Aside from Sartharion-esque situations I'd expect IRT to be better.

Warstehgnome · 03/15/09, 1:16 AM

It certainly seems like there is great possibility that Blood could be a great new tree to DW with.

If things remain as they are, and SoB remains 100% proc and then with strikes getting a % bonus instead of flat bonuses for diseases it seems that even with the smaller strikes they will get just the same bonus in damage.

This is quite the interesting time and with 3.1 coming close I am sure SoB will either be nerfed or become less attractive for dual weild. It is just insane for it to happen 100% of the time and have DW burn through that RP sooooo fast.

We would all spec dual-weild, wonder wtf we were doing and then have out of control threat. Well at least the threat we have had during the BoSanc era.

This is a sample build I see, its just the same as most builds but with the DW frost talent involved.
http://talent.mmo-champion.com/?deat...0&version=9684

I am hoping also that we will see a sigil in uld that will boost DS/OB/SS at once. Otherwise it is just seemingly biased!

escariot · 03/15/09, 3:47 AM

So it seems an awful lot of you are planning blood builds come 3.1, did I miss some sort of consensus regarding the changes that's causing blood to be the premier tanking build or something? I've been frost ever since I started tanking and always found it to fit my playstyle best; I believe it when I hear that people have had just as much success tanking as blood or unholy if the playstyle is varied, but I haven't seen anything regarding the ptr changes that makes me understand why blood would be necessarily better than frost or unholy. I don't want to step on anyone's toes by saying frost still looks best in my eyes because I know I'm biased due to my playstyle, but I'm curious why the sudden influx of blood builds that you guys are linking.

Did I miss the memo? Are most of the DK's tanking the ptr content speccing blood or is it just excitement from existing blood tanks regarding buffs to their favorite spec? With UA looking better than before and imp frost presence also looking nice, I was still planning on sticking with frost (and mourning the death of lichborne while I'm at it). I'm a bit saddened that howling blast is a 10s cd but the overall threat should be about the same from what I've heard, and it adds a little spice into the rotation I suppose.

Quietvicks · 03/15/09, 4:48 AM

So I was testing Hodir on the PTR, and since frozen blows is no longer reflectable, it seems the way to go about it is to pop a cooldown type ability each time he gains the buff. Does anyone else see Blizzard pushing tanking towards being able to survive otherwise impossible to mitigate abilities with several cooldowns, and the classes that can do this the most often (DKs) having the largest advantage? For say, a warrior or paladin, you need to bring priests and paladins to pop the extra cooldowns needed to bridge the gaps between longer than 1 minute cooldowns, it seems.

Does this seem like poor design, making it so tanks NEED cooldown abilities for the tank to survive a given boss's abilities, while at the same time giving some tanks more cooldowns more frequently than others?

Alandris · 03/15/09, 9:39 AM

From a frost tank point of vue i was wondering if it was still worthing putting 3 points in rime .

Since HB cd has been increased to 10 sec i won't benefit as much as before from the rime proc .
I was wondering if i should put those points in something more usefull like maybe the new scent of blood or annhilation (i usually don't use obliterate) or virulence .

Maybe it could be interesting that we could use HB even if it's on cd with the proc.

richard · 03/15/09, 11:25 AM

Originally Posted by Alandris

I was wondering if i should put those points in something more usefull like maybe the new scent of blood or annhilation (i usually don't use obliterate) or virulence.

What kind of weird spec/rotation do you have if you don't use obliterate?

If you're already frost specced, just keep the points in rime, spec into annihilation and start using obliterate.

Warstehgnome · 03/15/09, 12:31 PM

We have not had a memo put out about blood tanking at all, we are simply blood tanks whom are very excited to see blizzard acknowledge some serious concerns blood has had since we became 80 tanks.

Frost is all well and good, but the hefty hefty stat increase you get with blood, along with the higher damage(in most situations) on the PTR is going to result in higher tps #s. Along with the new standard rotation of IT>PS>DS>HSx2>RP then DSx2>HSx2>RP which will free up some of our GCDs that are at the moment completely screwed up if we miss a HS in a 4xHS rotation(one which I use atm and thank god I have a ton of hit/exp gear).

I was frost for a month or so and liked it a lot, though I switched to blood and once I got used to the playstyle, it is just better for survivabilty. I have so many cooldowns atm I just can not die.

A 6.5k heal every 30 seconds, a Guardian's Spirit + Last Stand button(VB), Mark of Blood which is nice on physical bosses, two dodge trinkets, along with Lichborne. Blood's survivability just can not be beaten at the moment for effective health.

Hopefully they do entirely reform lichborne to at least a shade of its old state, as blood I won't miss it terribly, but it certainly does help!

Flamingcloud · 03/15/09, 1:26 PM

If SoB is 100% chance, no cooldown, and procs on offhand attacks. As well as currently 0 remotely good 2 handers for tanking in Ulduar it may open some real possibilities for dual wield tanking. Other factors could include the proc rate on the new parry enchant, and the expertise buff currently on ptr that was never documented anywhere.

It would bring runic power to current BoSanc levels on the average swing speed boss as you would effectively get 15-20 runic every 4 seconds. This isn't broken by any stretch of the imagination but coupled with the far larger advantage dual wield would have in stats due to no new Inevitable Defeat yet it could finally bring real viability to dual wielding.

GrizleyCQ · 03/15/09, 2:32 PM

Originally Posted by Warstehgnome

It certainly seems like there is great possibility that Blood could be a great new tree to DW with.

If things remain as they are, and SoB remains 100% proc and then with strikes getting a % bonus instead of flat bonuses for diseases it seems that even with the smaller strikes they will get just the same bonus in damage.

This is quite the interesting time and with 3.1 coming close I am sure SoB will either be nerfed or become less attractive for dual weild. It is just insane for it to happen 100% of the time and have DW burn through that RP sooooo fast.

We would all spec dual-weild, wonder wtf we were doing and then have out of control threat. Well at least the threat we have had during the BoSanc era.

This is a sample build I see, its just the same as most builds but with the DW frost talent involved.
http://talent.mmo-champion.com/?deat...0&version=9684

I am hoping also that we will see a sigil in uld that will boost DS/OB/SS at once. Otherwise it is just seemingly biased!

In general you would favor a flat bonus as dual wield and a percentage bonus as 2h.

Just some random numbers to illustrate the point...

If dw average strike is 500 from weapon damage and 2h is 1000 from weapon damage then a +100 damage bonus per disease favors dw and a +10% damage per disease favors 2h. With 2 diseases up the flat bonus would mean total strike damage of 700 from dw and 1200 from 2h. Percent bonus would be 600 and 1200.

I haven't done the serious math on it yet but I have a hard time believing that DW with SoB will generate any more threat than 2h. For one thing you're giving up 2h mastery for 4% damage. For another the 2h build may throw less runestrikes but they will hit considerably harder. As a percentage of mainhand damage my gut tells me that a 2h will have more runestrike damage and less white damage than a dw setup. What it really comes down to is what percentage of my mainhand white damage is replaced, at a high threat 150% bonus, by yellow runestrike damage?

Warstehgnome · 03/15/09, 3:06 PM

Yes, you seem to be correct in that stream of logic.

I am quite sure DW will still be a viable option(not that I am currently DW or seroiusly plan on it). I have a long day of overtime today at work. I am going to do some sample math for DW using existing 1handers we know in Uld and see how it relates to some current weapons or even the Stormedge from Uld as far as strike damage and how it relates to threat given the stats I run with on live unbuffed.

Warstehgnome · 03/15/09, 5:19 PM

I have done a few hours of math and have gotten some average aggregate data regarding DS versus HS using my own AP and an Ulduar weapon, Stormedge which is not all that spectacular and even less impressive than a BoH. Please let me know if any of the formulae are off or any of my calculations are incorrect!

Stormedge:
212.3dps
594-892, 3.50.
AVGDMG= 743dmg
Assuming OPDK unbuffed AP: 3182
AVGDMG= 1538.6 w/AP scale.

Attack Power Scaling:
Attack power (AP) increases your base DPS by 1 for every 14 attack power. For example, an AP of 28 will give you 2 DPS. To convert DPS into average damage per swing: (Weapon DPS + AP/14) * Weapon Speed. -WoWwiki
Example:
(avgdps+(AP/14))*speed
(212.3+(3182/14))*3.5
(212.3+227.29))*3.5
1538.6 contribution from atkpwr

Death Strike Formulas:
[(g).75] +225.75 = x

Modified Formula(Blood Spec'd while Blood Gorged and DS glyph assuming 40RP)
[(g).75]+225.75 = 1.86x

Heart Strike Formulas:
[(g)(.5)] + 368 = y

Modified Heart Strike w/blood gorged/2hspec/bloody strikes/2 diseases/20% extra from BS glyph
[(g)(.5)] + 368 = 2.603y

Actual #s!
Death Strike (FU)
[(1538.6)(.75)] + 225.75 = 1.89x
1153.95 + 225.75 = 1.89x
1379.7 = 1.89x
X= 2607.63
2607.63 Damage per Death Strike when Glyphed+fully talented.

Heart Strike (B)
[(1538.6)(.5)] + 368 = 2.603y
769.3+368 = 2.603y
1137.3= 2.603y
X= 2960.39

2960.39 Damage per Heart Strike w/blood gorged, 2h spec, 2 diseases, 20% glyph, and Bloody Strikes.

Conclusions
This does not reflect anything else other than non-crit, average damage. Though, if you were able to connect with your HSs, it would seem that they would be the optimal choice in a rotation. Thus giving credence to the need for Death Rune Mastery compared to just using DSx2HSx2 in a 2nd part of a rotation.

HS also seems like it will be the better choice given gear since both benefit from MoM, yet only HS benefits from Subversion(9% more crit). HS also has the added benefit of launching a free DC at the mob in question dealing around 1100dmg on the PTR during my testing using only HoW and my blood buffs.

I searched through this thread to find something to correlate this using the words Death Strike Heart Strike but came up with nothing relevant.

eu-craig · 03/15/09, 6:34 PM

I have a small question to ask, I may of missed it in the 17 pages of posts here, but when your tanking Sartharion 3D, when Vesperon's Twilight torment is in affect, can you still damage yourself if your attacking Sartharion even though he is immune to all damage?