All that does is move the BS-pest part of the rotation a little earlier. That will work one time but then in the next rotation your diseases will have that much less time left on their durations. All that matters is the period between pestilences, which you haven't changed.

Speaking of priority vs. rotation, I've recently been playing with GoHB and I've found that it adds a really fun mechanic when keeping diseases up. It works basically like this:

1. Start with Icy Touch for applying FF.
2. FF will stay up passively by using Rime procs most of the time, so only use Icy Touch to refresh FF if you don't have a Rime up.

In general, this feels a lot like using Glyph of Scourge Strike for 2-handed Unholy, and the spread of GCDs that open up make things easier in fights with a lot of movement. With AMS soaking thrown in for extra Frost Strikes, I find it offers a comfortably opportunistic style of play. Is anyone else trying GoHB? My gear is inadequate for data analysis, but I'm curious how it performs in higher level raiding compared to the expectations coming out of simulations.

GoHB doesn't make a whole lot of sense to me with the current mechanics. Since OB is your hardest hitting attack and diseases do 15% more damage now, you always want to have both FF and BP up on as many targets as possible at all times. If you're using HB to refresh FF and a U rune to refresh BP, this means you'll be left with a spare Frost rune which will rot until you have a U rune recharge. Glyph of IT would seem to me to give you a lot more mileage, esp. since youll have a lot more RP available for Frost Strikes.

I've been playing 017054 for the past month and a half now and I gotta say it's the most fun i've had as a DK since the old 32/39 spec.

Anyways, has it been said that the Relentless Earthsiege meta gem is better than the Chaotic Skyflare meta gem yet? A guildie mentioned the relentless to me and I can see how it might be more worthwhile to use it since one nightmare tear can be used for the whole requirement and the rest of your gems can be just pure str.

Also, I noticed the 0/17/54 build on the OP did not have dirge in it. Does the extra 2% from desolation outweigh the RP gain from PS because the rotation is not PS heavy enough?

OP's priority list has "Rime + KM proc" as well as BS higher priority than FS. My question is, if only blood runes are up/about to be up and you have a KM proc w/o Rime, is it better to use FS to consume the KM proc or to continue with BS?

What do you think about 3/51/17 and 2/51/18 for personal dps?
I can't sacrifice IIT, because my guild have some problems with enh shamans.

One thing i noticed for me (not sure if its been addressed yet) but im NEVER running out of RP. IF only using it for when I need a dump to pad rune cds. I was thinking of getting rid of it entirely in favor of the HB glyph, but only using it in the regular rotation in which rime procs. Might be nice for added dmg on AoE. It would replace the IT glyph.

This is, to a degree, true. But you don't want to delay your rune refreshes either by excessive interruption.

Well naturally. If you're in danger of holding runes idle for >3s, you should burn them before dumping the KM proc.

For this specific spec, I'd like to ask why not something like this instead.
2/52/17
Dropping the 2 points from Imp Frost Presence, moving them to Icy Talons, and taking 1 point from Subversion and putting it into UA. I'm not sure whether BCB or Subversion generates more DPS, but to me 21% bonus crit to Oblit seems more than sufficient, and UA feels like it would be the best choice for that talent point,

I took a point out of KM for UA - trading one point in a ppm for one I can maximize during Heroism is pretty beef.

From my understanding, people who use GoHB actually change their rotation quite a bit, using rime procs to refresh FF and using death/unholy runes to refresh PS.. although unless I'm mistaken, they lose an obliterate every 20 seconds, which might not be worth it. ( haven't seen any real simming or parses for it yet )

The problem with GoIT is the rotation is pretty tight as is, I'd imagine a lot of the runic power would go to waste, depending on procs of course.. It might be viable if you plan on sitting in UP though.

Has anyone done the math or simulation to find the best use of Deathchill for specs that take it? Offhand, I can think of three possible strategies:

1. Blindly use it on cooldown. (macro it to all abilities that it affects)
2. Always use in conjuntion with X where X is one of the abilities it affects. (macro it to X)
3. Use it whenever Rime procs if it's off cooldown, and toss out a crit Howling Blast. This would be basically an on demand KM proc.

Also, I'm not sure if this is dual wield specific, but I've noticed this on live:

When I use pestilence while dual wielding it's both converting the spent blood rune into a death rune and converting the unspent blood rune into a death rune.

So pestilencing once gives me 2 death runes, letting me drop Blood Strike from my rotation completely and spend the extra GCD on another frost strike if I have the RP to spare(useful since my spec has Dirge, CotG, and I'm wearing 4 pc T7 at the moment).

Not sure what exactly is causing this however, but it has to be something to do with Blood of the North, since that's the only Death Rune talent I'm specced into.

I haven't done the math , but I'd imagine 3 is the best option, as HB will have the lowest crit chance of all of our abilities, and it's incredible damage in multi target situations.

It's a problem with death runes and pestilence in general, an unholy I know was reporting the same bug with reaping as well, although at least in my case, it only seems to work on AoE.

It also happens with Reaping, its a bug. I wouldn't plan your rotations around an obvious bug that will be fixed eventually.

That is not 100% true though.

Yes you are left with an unused rune, however this whole spec / rotation is better viewed in terms of GCDs. I'm currently running with HB as my 3th glyph as well, mostly because i do some pvp and 5 mans from time to time. (Its very convenient to use an AoE attack to apply FF when mobs die fast,I generally just use a 1 disease rotation for 5 mans)

But in raids, you can definitely benefit from it.

By using the default rotation you can skip out on icy touch from time to time if rime procs. And while that leaves you with an unused frost rune, it means you have an extra GCD for Frost Strikes for example.

I'm not saying this is the way to go though, because relying on rime to get your FF up is a risky thing to do in general. I will probably switch to Blood strike once the 5 man madness stops, since we have a FF mage.

But yea, GoHB can be used to save yourself a GCD without sacrificing anything for it (you dont lose obliterates. You just use the first UF runes that are intended for IT+PS, on PS alone and leave the frost rune alone.
The only problem is that if you get a rime proc about 12 seconds into your rotation, and you skip the IT refresh. You'd have to refresh FF halfway into your rotation which WILL cost you an obliterate. (Hence why i probably wont use it for raids).

But in that case there is the option of a rotation we discussed earlier, where you use the more flexible death runes. (so if you have to renew FF halfway in you only lose a BS instead of an Obliterate)

So a little math to clarify just how bad the RP swamping is.

First half of a 20 sec rotation; IT, PS, BS, BS, OB, FS, FS
7 GCD's
Second half; OB, OB, OB, FS, FS
5 GCD's

Now, since the very start of the first half uses single runes, and the second half double runes, second half can't begin until PS unholy rune has refreshed. We use 6 GCD's in 10 seconds, assuming 200 ms and natural human reaction, you will have around 0,5 idle time before the second half.

When a KM Rime occurs, it means that one of your FS GCD's will be replaced by a HB, meaning you suddenly have 1 second overtime instead of 0,5 sec idle time. SO from a pure math point of view, it would take two full rotations without a KBRime to neutralize the first KMRime, and three rotations to neutralize each one after that (Each non KMRime reduces your overtime by 0,5 sec).

Now for RP. A full rotation generates 135 RP, and burns 128 RP, leaving you with 7 RP gain per rotation. When a KMRime occurs, you suddenly burn 32 less RP and generate 5 extra RP, meaning you gain 32+7+5=44 RP on a KMRime rotation. 32 of those RP are already reserved for the extra GCD mentioned above, but we still gain 12 RP on top of that.

Now, each GCD has the value of 32 RP. Simulating 7 rotations and assuming KMRime procs on two of them (Quite likely);

5*0,5 = 2,5*32 = 80 RP (the 0,5 idle time)
5*7 = 35 RP
+ 88 RP (KMRime rotations)

35+88-80 = 43 RP (One GCD over 7 rotations)

RNG is a big part of this issue, if you get a lot of KMRimes in a short span of time you will get RP swamped quite fast. Using KM for FS'es and only holding on Rime procs as previously suggested will reduce the chance of having KMRimes, and a long period of no KMRimes will eventually lead us back to the starting point of 0,5 second idle time.

This may not even contribute to anything, but I felt I needed to write it up to clarify for myself at least, and though I might as well share it.

Blindly macroing Deathchill, as with any ability with similar effect for any class, to anything is both lazy, inflexible and bad. Moreso with Deathchill than say, Cold Blood, since we among the other possible uses for it have the option to greatly amplify an already good AoE (Howling Blast, obviously) for all the situations where a number of additional targets (such as lasher wave on Freya) come into play at intervals that are not exactly and invariably two minutes apart (all of them).

Even on static single target fights (or as close as you realistically get, such as Patchwerk or somewhat further off the mark, XT) I see no gain whatsoever from macroing Deathchill; have your trinkets procced? Is it heart phase? Do all relevant raid buffs apply to maximise the effect of a guaranteed crit? Will anything else happen within the next x seconds/minutes that it's better to save the Deathchill for? The minor gain you can, likely with a deal of rng/luck, possibly get out of macroing Deathchill to make sure it goes off on every cooldown is only a gain because you fail to activate it manually in the very rare situations where hitting it every cooldown is better than waiting with using it until you can get more out of it which has nothing to do with maths or simulations.

2 points in Icy Talons does nothing for you. Either you don't have someone dropping WF and you need to get IIT or you have WF and its overwriting IT.

I can see the merit of using GotGhoul as the third glyph when one has to provide IIT (like me), as GoIT is not a viable alternative to GoDisease to begin with due to RP glut. However, that also means he can't move the 1pt from IIT to NotD.
The best compromise I can come out with is 2/3 BCB, 3/5 KM, and 2/2 NotD.

As the ghoul will last for 1min, and Raise Dead will have a 1.5min cd (which won't start until the ghoul dies), I am still trying to figure out which option will yield the best dps:
1. Sacrificing the ghoul after 30s, so that Raise Dead will always be up in sync with UA, or
2. Letting the ghoul live its entire duration, and push back the usage of UA by 30s every cd, or
3. Using UA every 2min regardless whether Raise Dead is up or not.

I am inclined to believe it's #2 since we will want to pop the UA+Ghoul macro while Unholy Strength and/or Greatness is up, and they aren't guaranteed to be up every 2min.

I will give #2 a try this coming week, and I will update you on the result (if our fights are parsed).

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
In the topic of DW frost, I have been using 3/53/15 spec (with IIT, and 4/5 KM) since Wednesday, and my dps has been mediocre (i.e. <5.5k), which is far lower than 6.5k and above reported by concept84.

Even though concept84's spec is clearly better in term of personal dps and he used the GoDisease rotation, I find it hard to believe that the few points difference in spec and slightly different rotation have been responsible for the >1k gap in dps. That makes me suspect that 4t8.5 bonus is somehow responsible for a substantial chunk of our dps difference.

Ah, not really planning around it, just curious if anyone knew what the exact cause was.