This is very specifically not the case. Three trees, three trees to tank or DPS with. Not "Tank gear as a DPS spec" but "proper, solid tank spec".

There's a Relentless Assault Revenge Spam tanking build floating around some top end guilds use for naxx just to make runs faster actually. It's survivability is a bit lacking but it cranks out about 4-4.5k dps on patchwerk.

Taken directly from a Blue post by Ghostcrawler:

"Our intent is not to force DKs down one tanking tree any more than they were before."

MMO-Champion BlueTracker - Are DK tanks being pidgeonholed?

So this means as a DK tank i essentially should not be stacking avoidance gems, but instead be stacking defense gems? If what i have read is correct then the Gargoyle rune gives .75% avoidance (.25% of each) and 2% stam, whereas the 4% parry rune gives a straight up 4% avoidance(which actually accounts to more than 4% damage reduction) which would actually be better than the 2% stam in most situations?

I am currently at 30.5k hp unbuffed, 24.37% dodge, 19.44% parry with most of my gems going to parry/stam, str/stam, expertise/stam depending on the slot and bonus of the item they are in. I am also entertaining the idea of dropping gargoyle and putting the 4% parry rune on, but in order to do that i would have to somehow get the naxx defense trinket to drop, or change my gems to def, def/stam gems. If the above statement is correct then i would actually be increasing my avoidance significantly by doing so, and it would be the correct decision from a stricktly tanking standpoint when not taking threat into concideration?

Also, is it possible/does anyone take into account the additional defense you recieve from Sigil of the Unfaltering Knight when concidering the 540def cap? aka: if I am sitting at 534 defense with this sigil equipt i could say i am above the cap at all times while in combat with a proper rotation?

Generally yes, unless you are tanking as unholy with the Scourge Strike glyph and not hitting IT often enough. That problem will also crop up in 3.1 with the Glyph of Disease if you re-apply diseases with Pestilence.

There is always going to be an infinitesimally small chance that you get crit before you get IT up unless you pull with IT, but you will also be at full health if that happens, which means it should only kill you if the mob can one-shot you with a crit.

While I don't agree in general, the DK class does have talents specifically aimed at tanking. Blade Barrier, Toughness, and Anticipation are the "bare minimum" point investments the vast majority of tank builds take. Optionally, many builds also invest in Improved Icy Touch for the thunderclap equivalent. So this is 15 or 18 talent points for really nothing more than "tanking".

As we progress down the trees, each has the option of additional tanking talents. For example, Spell Deflection, Frigid Dreadplate, and Magic Suppression are all "tank" talents in each of the trees, while the "signature tank talent" in each tree is Vampiric Blood, Unbreakable Armor, and Bone Shield. Of those, Vampiric Blood offers no DPS increase, while the other 2 do offer some dps benefit.

Looking at my own spec, I'd count 22 talent points spent in "tanking-only" abilities (BB, Toughness, Anticipation, IIT, Frigid Dreadplate, Unbreakable), and most DK-tank builds are probably in that ballpark of 20-27 points spent in talents that would be ignored in a DPS spec. That does mean the majority of our talents are spent on "threat" (dps) talents or Utility talents. I have always kind of chuckled at the people who just rattle off "well, DKs can tank and dps in any spec", sure, we _can_ tank when not tank specced, but the serious tanks will have spent at least the 15-20 points on the "tank" talents. This is a stark contrast to warriors or paladins though, who spend many more talent points for "tank only" talents than we do, but have dedicated trees for their roles.

Yes, this procs 100% of the time IT is used and lasts for 30 seconds. At 534, this sigil will add 10-11 defense to reach 544-545 defense. As long as you keep the buff up by using IT once every 30 seconds, your defense never falls.

That having been said, mind that you don't overdo it using an unholy tank build which may not be using IT much(due to glyph of SS and doubly so with the new Glyph of Disease). Uptime is very low with such a build.

Until I read some of your observations, I did think that avoidance was going down the gurgler for DKs with the loss of the Miss out of Lichborne and Parry out of Blade Barrier. I've tallied up my avoidance and it did seem like the talents were making up for the lack of a shield - talents which have been changed and their avoidance removed.

My current thoughts on the matter, after reading the comments on warlock redesign and that above, has Blizzard moving to simplify the game so that there is less... overlap in moves, perhaps making them more unique.

The spikiness of avoidance tanking also doesn't appear to be well understood by the general WoW population and tends to invite doubts and whispers from people about your gear. I would presume the changes are to address this by making DK tanks to be "like one of the others" where mitigation and HP pool is more important that avoidance. If comments about how BC gear progressed ring true, it's likely that the avoidance would be regained in gear, however.

Regarding the Parry Rune vs Gargoyle, the total avoidance is 1% or so in difference and my Defense dropped below the cap. Not low enough that the tanking badge Sigil couldn't make up the difference, though. I managed to pick up a couple of tanking swords and tried to find an advantage in using it with Parry instead of my 2H. Not much luck. The parry theoretically should increase TPS by increasing the number of swings with the swing timer getting reset, but there's also the loss from having to DW. It warrants much more testing than I'm prepared to do, given their similarity in DPS/TPS, to judge their difference. The DW and 2H talents would further affect the results.

Ive been very much on the EH side of the fence since i started tanking with my DK. Recently though with possible mana intensive fights like General Vezax i've been thinking hard about how i should start gemming for ulduar. The gear itself will be stacked with natural avoidance (avoid t8 ofc ) but to gem dodge/def instead of pure stam is what i have been looking at the most.

Talking witha warrior friend we are both under the opinion that EH is probably the best way forward. Stam is a no-bullshit stat that tells you exactly what its going to do. It will soak x amount of damage. Dodge/Parry will give you a CHANCE to dodge/parry/be missed. Stats based on RNG (anyone who played a hot streak mage will know this frustration) are very risky imo. Just because you do have 50% avoidance doesnt mean that you WILL avoid 50% of the time there is just the chance to. (not saying it wont even out mathematically)

You also have to take into account how much health you would sacrifice by bringing avoidance up. In my current gear changing all my gems i would gain ~4% avoidance but lose 4-5k hp. Stam also stacks with kings meaning that in the long run i end up losing even more health.

As a tank with enough HP you will be able to tank vezax enrage and spam healing, because oyu know the hp can take it. As a tank with high avoidance if you get just 1 bad streak of 2 hits you are most likely going to fall over.

This is a flawed analysis.

You are mixing 2 scenarios, 1) incoming dmg is 5000 DPS. , 2) incoming dmg is 50,000 DPS (4% dps = 2000 ; 100% = 2000/4 * 100 = 50,000)

So, it's *not* the same.

What you are telling us, is: 40% of 5000 is the same as 4% of 50,000.

Of course they are. And this is actually a counter point to your thesis, avoidance isn't something that's OP, it's just a stat that scales to incoming dmg.

But you shouldn't try to confuse people with 2 different DPS value and try to pass them as 1.
What you are seeing here is that avoidance scales to incoming damage. But it's a static decrease comparing the first % to the last %.

For the heck of it, you don't even need to put in the 90% figure in your example, let's imagine incoming damage is 100 billion DPS, if I go from X to X+1% avoidance, I'll avoid 1 billion DPS!! (where 0<x<98, X E I)

OMG NERF!!! 1 billion DPS avoided!!!

j/k, but you get my point.

(now assume a 5000 DPS scenario)
Say if you avoid 50dps with 1 % of avoidance , you will avoid exactly 50 dps for every 1% of avoidance.
The "the reduction in terms of percentage of current damage" as you put it doesn't really matter, unless you can stack it to be 100% immune. (which is IMPOSSIBLE to do with current gear)

And frankly blizzard has (tried to) avoided that with skill ratings, they can very surgically fine tune how much avoidance you get at each level to avoid 100% avoidance happening. (no pun intended.. =p)

And if that's not enough, put a hard/soft cap on % of avoidance. (which they also did.... )

Avoidance isn't OP as you put it, it works differently compared to say block or armor, but it's just situational which is better. E.G.: Say if a boss hits soft but hits *very* fast, then higher armor is better than avoidance.

It's just situational.

Another skill you mentioned, Will of the Necropolis (SP?), you said that's the spike-safe-guard. May be so, but not like we are the only one that has such a mechanism.

paladin has that skill. Ardent Defender - Spell - World of Warcraft
If you actually compare the spells in detail: Will of the Necropolis - Spell - World of Warcraft

Theirs is just a 30% decrease under 35% hp and ours is 15% reduction under 35% and a bunch of restrictions.

See a difference? Now if Dk doesn't avoid more, why would anyone take a pal over DK? They won't.

DK *make up* the differences via avoidance. That's just how the class is designed. Avoidance is better in some fights and reduction is better in other fights, it's balanced as long as the raids have a good mix of damage that favored to either.

War just owns on fights that favor reduction.
Druid is good at taking straight damage and they have flat avoidance that doesn't depend on HP. (and they need not to spend on def. as much as other tanks)

All 4 tanks have their own forte, and in different situations, one may seemed OP compared to the others.

I have to ask, do you even play another class other than Dk at high level? (an honest question...)

I have a dk (dps and tank) , druid (tank and heal.. and now trying out boomkin), priest, hunter, rogue and mage. And needless to say, I see it from different aspects, DK seemed about right at tanking. (meaning as a healer, I don't really notice *that* much of a difference from the different tanks in most fights)

In essence, I disagree with your analysis with the reasons above.

A sidenote, I think DK's are struggling a little in raids as DPS. Ever since they took the stack-ability away with our auras. ( i mean, you can take at least 3 pals and up to 5 that can still provide a benefit to the raid on top of their own role). Don't really *need* more than 1 dk per raid really. (same can be said for rogs? but they do better DPS now in most raids i've seen, and trick of the trade isn't bad).
Fury I think is in the same boat, but their shouts is *ok* to have. anyhow I digress on regarding dps.

I disagree. They are about the same IMO.

A *good* tank has around 35k hp. (I've seen 40k+ .. but they just stack sta more?)

35% of 35k is 12250. I really don't think it's leap-frogged that often.

If you are a newly nax 10 geared pal tanking patchwerk, may be, but with nax 25 geared tanks, it's much less lea-forging than b4.

And since pal is more "reduction" tank than a DK is. I think it's actually about the same if not more chance of a pal under ardent defender than a DK is with WoTN.

But anyhow, it's about the same IMO. Let's put it this way, for a boss with 2 lucky spike (that didn't get avoided/block/whatnot when the tank in question is somewhat at low hp) it's far more likely that those 2 consecutive hit kill a DK than a pal. Due to it's lower % and can only be triggered once every 15 seconds. (a pal will take exactly 35% less dmg than the Dk on the second blow.)

To say WoTN is far superior is a gross exaggeration.

If you are to say WoTN gets trigger more, that I won't disagree with. But that doesn't mean it's far superior. In the times that makes it count, where spiky dmg happened by chance, that will kill a DK but not a pal. I say it counts for more.

Skill by skill, I still say ardent defender is superior.

Now in the grand picture of tanking, I think both are about equal for each class, since DK is more of an avoidance tank and more chance to avoid the 2nd consecutive blow that would otherwise kill the DK.

While pal may survive the 2nd blow by the means of more % reduced from talent and more "reduction" skill.

Both are somewhat balance IMO. (only that pals have better stackability than DK's)

To conclude, I'll return your comment, "But pretending like Ardent Defender is NOT as useful or better than WotN is ludicrous."

Can't say I agree.

Hodir, Vezax, Thorim hit for 20+k (even big bots on Mimiron). They will leapfrog Ardent Defender, but WotN will get them reduced.

For hard hitting like 20k+ you metioned, I agree that WoTN is better.

What about all those other bosses that doesn't hit that hard? (not all bosses hit that hard? aye?)

It's situational.

Now, this is my stance and part of my first reply in this thread, "it's balanced as long as the raids have a good mix of damage that favored to either. "

If there are an over-abundant of boss that hitting over 20k, (that they literally 2-shot most tanks...).
Then it's more of an game/encounter imbalance, not the mechanic itself (that it's a symtom, not the cause, sort to speak).

(sort of like if the game suddenly has 90% does magical dmg instead of physical, then a warlock will tank better than a warrior, but doesn't mean a warlock's tanking is "far superior" to a warrior, they tank different things. Like a pal is better at tanking less but faster dmg, dk is better when avoidance is favored)

EDIT: i am wondering, did u read my previous posts that leads up to the one you quoted? or beyond that part where you quoted me?

All bosses in Ulduar hit for more than 12k and almost all of them hit for ~20k. Ignis hits lightly (especially after all the nerfs) and Auriaya hit for only 15-17k IIRC. Everyone else, Steelbreaker in Iron Council who's only 1/3 of the fight, hit harder (in the 20k range).

As for tank HP, any decent tank who doesn't exclusively stack avoidance has over 40k fully raid buffed.

And no, it's not a game/encounter imbalance that things are hitting harder in Ulduar. It's supposed to be more difficult to heal than the Naxxramas nonsense where the boss hits for 8k and your TTL is incredibly absurd. You won't be two shot since your HP is over 40k but if healers are taking a nap you're going to die.

Lastly, you're right, a Paladin is better at tanking "less but faster damage", we call those mobs "trash mobs" or during the boss fight "add duty" and Paladins do excel at it with their AoE and blocking. That's not how bosses hit though and every Protadin I know carries a seperate set for bosses (with less block and more stamina). Anyway you should be glad zagor didn't respond to your other points, because they're mostly completely wrong.

I still swear by stacking massive amounts of stamina.

In Ulduar it seems the only bosses that pose a real threat to tanks are the ones with big burst damage. Stamina gives you and your healers more margin for error, and can prevent deaths that potentially lead to wipes.

I rolled nightelf specifically to get 2% free avoidance with no diminishing returns, so i don't really lose that much by focusing entirely on stamina, as has been said in this thread previously, itemising for stats that are still based on luck can be dangerous, since if you get 'unlucky' on a fight like vezax, you will repeatedly put pressure on the healers.

This weekend i broke 50k hp raid buffed, and I think the ability to take two or even three hits from vezax without a heal will reduce the pressure on that fight, not to mention things like Mimiron's plasma blast.

Masses of HP + Will of the necropolis owns on any fight with burst damage, not to mention hp pool directly affecting the effectiveness of death strike heals now. Think i healed myself for 200k+ on last vezax tries.

The flip side of that though is: healing huge hits that weren't avoided puts a strain on healers as well, especially in fights where mana is already at a premium (General V).

Why is this thread still around? The changes in 3.1 brought tank avoidance levels in line- Frost DKS have an extremely minor advantage. It's nowhere near large enough to care about considering that most tanking specs have a few little bonuses over other tanks.


Please don't turn this into a "Should I go avoidance or EHP?" thread.