I'm compiling some additional info that references some of these suggestions.

My favorite S3D spec is posted, though I should provide alternatives as well. These additions should be up early next week. Hopefully by then we'll have some concrete info about 3.1 changes. If so, I'll put off amendments until I've put those changes into perspective.

I'll rephrase my request in another fashion. The best tanking reference I found during BC was the following thread, which I would like to see emulated at least a little bit for DKs in the near future:
The Protection Guide

Actually, several "class" type threads include a variety of information, some of which is situational, some of it is just "basic" but good reference. Another "detail" example would be the scaling of IBF to defense. The answer is on this forum, but not in the OP. Anyway, it would be nice to see the thread be informative on the level of other class threads around EJ, that's all I'm conveying.

So far my career as a Deathknight has only been unholy dps (I havent been 80 very long) recently my guild decided they wanted me to tank shadron on Sarth+3 drakes and even more recently they've decided they want me to mt sarth lol. My question is out of the 2 unholy tanking builds you listed the one with anti-magic zone doesnt go ne deeper into unholy that build in general is appealing to me cuz I for one like the magic resistance provided by unholy but my problem is I'm the only dk in my raids so I have to provide EP and I kinda need imp icy touch as well what build would you suggest me pref one that went deep into unholy to where I could get anti-magic zone but still get like EP and the other needed talents keep in mind this is mostly just geared towards tanking sarth but me as a tank should last even after we down him.

Probably something like 9/11/51 Unholy tank w/ AMZ

Talent Calculator - World of Warcraft

Tanking Sarth with 3 drakes is just about cooldowns and good positioning. You typically won't have issues with threat because dps only has 30 seconds before the first drake lands and by the time the drakes are dead you have had 2 minutes of solo dps time. I know some people go max hp/tri spec builds, but if you need EP you don't have much choice. The one thing about you MT Sarth, EP is lost on all 3 drakes which is where the bulk of the heavy dps will be...

Yeah we really need another Death Knight if we had another I'd spec completely different but so far I've been tanking shadron since we started attempting 3 drakes and we've been getting pretty close so thats just with ep on one drake.

I'm continuously amazed at how many people constantly forget that Expertise raises your TPS as well. Apparently we've all forgotten how combat roll tables work, and that if you're reducing the chance be dodged and parried, you're increasing your chance to hit. Not to be confused with reducing your chance to miss however, as that can only be done via hit rating. If you've got the most minimum amount of Expertise (26), you're eliminating chance to be Dodged (6.5%), and reducing chance to be Parried by 6.5% as well. Which means you're moving 13% from the Dodge and Parry portions of the combat table over to the Hit portion. That is why Expertise is so important, not only for the reduction of Parry-hasting the boss, but because it scales twice as well as hit rating, until you reach 6.5%. After that it scales the same, minus Parry-hasting considerations.

I'm not sure if this was directed at me, or just a reply with your thoughts in general, but you quoted me... so, I can only guess.

At any rate, my gearing goals have always been melee hit cap and expertise minimum, then stacking as much expertise as I can without sacrificing too many other stats. I have the option of 35,500 HP unbuffed, but I prefer to tank Naxx with 29500, while maintaining 37 expertise (9.25), 293 hit (11.17% spell), and 30k armor. People ask me why I don't have 40stam on my bracers (opting for 15% expertise instead), and it's because I simply don't like being dodged/parried. I've run as high as 57 expertise (with food and elixir) with solid results, but I'm at a point now where all I want to do is generate more TPS and DPS... so I regemmed def (to remove the +27 hit gems), swapped to RotFC, switched to DB (for the +hit until I can get Grim Toll, thus allowing Inevitable Defeat to return), and added in Mark of Norgannon to make up for the loss in expertise from ID.

Math aside, I've found that after hours / days of testing, I always come back to "more expertise is more DPS/TPS". Now, I know there is a sweet spot somewhere in there between the absolute expertise cap, and less expertise but more DPS stats (like STR and CRIT perhaps) but I'm really not at the point where I want to regem specifically for anything other than hit, exp, stam.

TLDR version? Assuming you are going for max DPS/TPS as a tank, Hit, Expertise, then more expertise IMO.

I have a question. With the Frost tanking builds, on AoE, You exclude HB from the rotation. I don't understand why since HB is a AoE ability that consumes the same amount of runes as OB and about the same amount of damage, (Maybe 1k less or 1.5k), But is AoE instead of OB. Using OB seems less efficient/optimal for controlling AoE Mobs. The only way I could see why you would use OB over HB is if a rime proc was up, but let's say the proc is up, That just emans you can do another OB after/before you HB. That's just how I see it.

Personally I use DND -> IT -> Pest. -> Blood Tap+HB (with Deathchill) as starting rotation with frost spec in AoE situations. You do lose PS, but as frost it's not actually a big source of threat compared to the initial gain from HB-crit. While OB tends to deal more damage than HB on single target, whenever I'm tanking more than 2 targets I use HB instead if it's not on cooldown.

I don't understand the Sart3D spec from the OP, if you're going to respec for Sart3D, why not spec:

Talent Calculator - World of Warcraft

Lose:
- Mark of Blood (pretty weak)
- SS (use DS instead), death runes (use BS), basically just threat.

Gain:
- Imp. IT (wont need to rely on a warrior coming by to keep TC up, tricky as it is)
- Lichborne (awesome to keep up a really long BS when Vesp+Shad are up)
- Unholy Aura (easier zone/wave avoiding, for (part of) your raid as well.

Why would you drop survivability for threat, did you ever wipe on Sart3D because you lost aggro after your raid is finished with the drakes?

I've been running fairly deep in Blood ,for Sarth, to a point where I feel I can be confident I will live as full on blood spec and save on respeccing every time we go.

The AMS and IBF are the 2 cooldowns keeping me alive, Vampiric blood is a plus pre 3rd drake portals. Good heal rotation with protections from the priests, called in vent by me when my cd's are down no probs so far.
I will lose blood aura and imp rune tap which I hope arent huge enough to make a difference between a win and a wipe.

Although Blood isnt so great for AoE im kind of getting used to it and found I'm enjoying the spec more than Unholy.

I'll post some WWS after our next attempt.

Totally agree on above post though, threat has never been an issue, you stand for most of the fight on your own on Sarth til they burn him down. Plenty of threat at that point.

I'm not sure I would attempt this until your guild is comfortable with the encounter.

I have been hoping someone who has run this fight consistently as unholy or trispec would give it a shot and see if they found it easier or harder to survive. Any takers?

Death strike is a bad idea. I've had upwards of ~5 whelps/blazes on me due to the healing aggro generated. Add tanks have taunts on CD enough as it is without having me make it more difficult. It should be obvious why having a single whelp strike you is a bad idea. It's relatively easy to time (I've killed him using DS), but those mobs "fade" in, and it's impossible to avoid that add aggro 100%. Additionally, if you do get the adds, you cannot keep up Blade Barrier indefinitely without BloodBoil/Pestilence (if he's immune). Dropping a pestilence on some lava blazes is a great way to solidify aggro on some adds.

You could effectively argue that, since threat is a non-issue, that you could just spam PS/IT instead of DS.

I prefer mark of Blood for the period when drake 2 is dead but the portal adds are not. It's during this period that you take the most damage. You take more damage from melee in Sarth3D than you do fire, if you're mitigating appropriately. During the peak of all damage (big breaths + 2x melee haste/dmg buffs), I find Mark of blood very useful (lichborne can also be nice here, but is still RNG-susceptible).

Regarding IIT, it depends on your guild's positioning. Mine tanks the drakes very close to Sarth, and my frost-DPS-DK's pestilence hits him without any repositioning. If our positioning is unique and a significant number of DK tanks find difficulty keeping him imp-TC'd, then I'll add/substitute appropriately. This build is popular amongst the leading DK's I stay in close contact with, but perhaps we're a minority.


Blood S3D:

This spec requires more external cooldowns. This makes it less interesting to me. I've had more than a couple kills as unholy with zero external cooldowns. Clearly, RNG can make things harder with any build, but that would be near-impossible as blood. Also, if GS is burned on you while VB is active and you'd otherwise be gibbed, VB's usefulness for that breath was lost. A paladin cooldown would be better for that case and save GS for when you have -no- cooldown available.

I know that many of you tank S3D as deep blood and I've noted its viability for that encounter in the OP.





EDIT - I wanted to comment about the OP and it's contents. I've trimmed off the top generic information, and added some additional links to outside references. If you haven't read this guide, you should. It has a large, comprehensive, accurate tanking section with information like IBF scaling and runeforge comparisons, as well as all basic tanking information. It's quite complete; restating many of those facts would be redundant and useless.

I do, however, want to make this a max-two-stop shop for all relative info, and there's a wealth of additional info that I read daily that I would like to share. I'll have it all compiled and added by the end of the week.

If it seems to be the consensus to paste the info in that guide into here and develop a post similar to Quigon's, I'll look into doing that. I originally had planned to have nearly every useful link available here and have this thread be a hub instead of a bible, but I'm open to suggestion.

Hmmm , im not sure where you are standing that you get whelp adds, never had those. I get the odd lava blaze which is quickly picked up. In terms of cool downs I'm not sure what unholy does at this point that blood cant.

For the first 2 drakes blood > all due to the higher hps and self heals. Breaths cannot kill a blood spec Dk until phase 3.


Blood

For drake 3 IBF and AMS if you have the repelling charge trinket plus vampiric blood this is good for 1 breath too (unless I've just been exceedingly lucky.

Spell deflection (bonus if procced) plus will of necropolis another bonus.

Unholy

IBF and AMS and what ?

Bone shield is no longer viable on its own for breaths what is the extra CD unholy has is my question ?

If I max stam (at the cost of other stats) Boneshield + a priest shield saves me from a breath. Additionally, unholy gets anti-magic zone a self-sufficient breath CD.

My CD rotation:

AMS
IBF
AMZ (most often I'm back to AMS here)
If needed: BS+ shields. (certainly back to AMS here)
If needed #2: other class CD's.


Unholy also nabs spell deflection, so that's not an advantage of Blood.

My priests know to shield be before every breath, assuming I have BS up.

Obviously Blood is very viable for S3D. However, I find that I'm more self sufficient as unholy, and I can tank with no external CD short of a shield. I've tanked him as blood and I felt more vulnerable.

The only CD im getting is guardian spirit (holy) or pain supression (disc), and only when my own is on CD, so again where is the difference ?

AMZ wont save you from a breath with its nerfed state iir certainly didnt last time i tried it.

Seems to me each spec has 2 viable CDs and another that needs support.

I'm not trying to be arguementative but over all Blood seems to be easier to heal due to the increased hps and self heals. I just cant see where Unholy is better. Especially if you take the encounter as a whole into account.

Anti-Magic Zone now lasts 10 seconds or until it absorbs [10000 + 2 * AP] spell damage.

It is, as stated above, a self-sufficient breath CD.

Granted, it's not difficult to GS or PS a tank.


Edit- added the Lichborne/IIT build and modified the Blood build to point out its 3DS effectiveness.

I have always done Sarth3D as unholy, even post nerf to BS AMZ etc.. I recently re-gemmed and lost a decent chunk of HP so i usually sit on 29-30k with 3 drakes (including Commanding shout.)

With the BS glyph and popping dodge or parry trinket, the 6 charges usually last 2-3 breaths, and i survive each one with only the BS mitigation. AMZ still prevents a death. Altho, i do cut it close on the majority of breaths, we never wipe to my death. I have a Disc priest on me which helps, but since the BS glyph and the CD change on AMS, i rarely have the need for Pain Suppression.

I do want to try a Blood Spec in the future for a Naxx, as i am always looking for something different. but i dont think i will try it on Sarth...

I thought this forum was about min-maxing? Sorry but I find it ridiculous to argue using Death Strike is wrong because you might out-aggro your whelp tank. First of all, you could hold your DS during the single moment the whelps spawn, but even then, I've never ever pulled whelps with DS, only time I've pulled is with a badly timed rune tap, solely my fault. Even then, if you really have such a bad tank that you pull aggro with DS, use IT/PS instead, as you said.

How can IIT ever be bad, what if you have a Prot Paladin whelp tank, or what if TC runs out at a tricky moment, what if your whelp tank dies somewhere later in the fight with (an unlucky enraged blaze, healer OOM, we've had it) where it doesn't have to be a wipe perse? It's simple better to not have to rely on someone else, when it only costs you threat.

Lichborne is not really as RNG as you claim either, it's a straight 25% miss, which in 99% of the cases will extend the life of your bone shield in the tough phase. It's far less RNG than say, spell deflection.

I think it's wrong to use the argument that some "DK's you are in contact with" say so, this is not something you need experience for (even though I have plenty), you just can't argue ever that threat is any more use in this fight than Lichborne, IIT and Unholy Aura combined.

If you want you can even swap MoB with Lichborne, but come on, you really think MoB beats LB for tanking, ever?

Are we ignoring the entire part that says it reduces magic dmg by 75%? Which one does the shield do? 75% of the flame breath or absorbs[10000 + 2 * AP]

Note I haven't tanked sarth3D, but through rough estimations of what the mechanics of the fight are its easy for me to get a basic Idea of how difficult it is.

I just want to agree that IIT should always be taken by a tank. This is an endgame thread and while I believe that using advanced slightly more complex tactics like this falls into that category, its our job to hold our own, I don't think switching something like DS / or IIT is a good suggestion for an endgame scenario, At least not for the points that were stated. between healing aggro and having someone use pestilence when there is any number of scenarios that could make that completely impossible. I know one of my DS can heal up 1800 HP, added up that is a lot of cushioning for healers, therefore extending your survivability, much more than spamming IT/PS. Maybe I'm wrong but I believe every available rune should be worked into some sort of survivability at every second possible.

That being said the comment of "All the top DKS I talk to" bothered me somewhat. I appreciate any persons opinion, but they should no doubt be discussed in this thread with every other person to come to a common ground where a good chunk of reputable tanks in here can throw their idea into it. Then again its not my thread so in the end I have no say over what goes in the OP

both. It absorbs 75% OR 10000+2*AP.

so if you have 5k AP the shield will absorb 20k damage MAXIMUM.

Edit: that was directed at aroarian0

Ya but which one eats the flame breath? This is a question of coding cause the wording makes it seem like if its one attack(flame breath) it will take 75% of it. But if its little attacks constantly (blizzard from saph) it will absorb 75% of the dmg and last for 10sec or until it absorb 10000+2*AP.

If you cast right before a breath is it going to absorb 75% or only absorb 10000+2*AP