Now that you've played one...

Discuss.

Well. It took a while to really figure out a decent skill rotation, or at least a better one than "Just use the ones that light up!". And every time I looked at my talent trees, I had another seven talent points! Geez. One could get used to that, I think.

So my li'l guy, Anarath Dawnhunter, was a lot of fun. Took him to 68, to Orgrimmar, then put him to bed. I mean, he had a long day, yeah? So then I took Sin'serrar out to Northrend. Yes, I want to get Anarath out there, too... but he's got ten level to go. Hmph!

Spec-wise... at the moment, I went ahead and made Anarath all Blood. I figure I'll try out each spec one at a time, then work on my pickin'-n-choosin' later. But full blood (2 points away from the dancing runeblade :3) was working nicely. My health didn't drop much, and I spent most of my time with a full Runic Power bar.

And the Experience itself.... well, hell, I'm tempted to delete my guy and remake him again just to be a part of the Epicness again. ^__^

Instead of rushing on and leveling like mad I've spent a lot of time figuring out the class with a training dummy and have a few things to say. They might be no brainers to everyone else already but I think they're cool to know. I"m not home so I won't remember all the little details. Because at home I remember everything. It has nothing to do with not being able to log in. The overall info is good though.

Erekose is frost specced. I actually tried to respec twice but couldn't even pick out talents without getting bored because frost is too fun. And yet this is the tanking spec? Rock on!!!! It certainly feels like Fuji said, a mage in plate. Only better!

Oh and btw... Erekose is another name from the Eternal Champion universe of books written by Michael Moorcock. It's comprised of multiple book series about different champions and damn awesome. It's where Yyrkoon is from and where Elric is from too. Aeolric is a merging of Aeolus and Elric. It's also where Gary Gygax got many many ideas for D&D. Gygax says he took alignment and the planes directly from Moorcock's work.

Runes and runic power:
You get your two frost, two blood, and two unholy. Burn them up and they refresh in about 8 seconds. Some spells use runes and some use runic power. Using a spell that costs runes creates runic power. Runic power is similar to rage. You start a fight with zero runic power and it decays when you're out of combat. Through a wise use of spells costing runes and spells costing runic power it is possible to have an infinite spell rotation.

Frost infinite spell rotation:

Icy touch - cost 1 frost and causes frost fever

Plague strike - costs 1 unholy and causes the disease blood plague.

Pestilence - costs 1 blood, causes shadow damage to all targets within ten yards and spreads any diseases from the main target to nearby enemies.

Howling blast - 1 frost 1 unholy, deals an aoe frost damage and does DOUBLE damage to enemeis infected with frost fever.

Frost strike - 40 runic power, causes weapon damage. Can not be blocked, dodge, or parried.

Frost strike again.

Global cool down is 1.5 seconds. Cast these spells in that order every 2 seconds and you can keep it up indefintely. The idea is you load up a target with diseases, spread the diseases around, then howling blast ftw!! Frost strike gives you something to do for extra damage/threat while runes are refreshing. I'm seeing strikes as rage dumps right now.

That's the basic but there are many variations. You can throw death grip in there to start things off. Currently I'm thinking of death grip as a one target avenger's shield.

To summarize here's the basic pattern:

Icy touch - plague strike - pestilence - howling blast - frost strike x2

I find that you can mix it up a lot but the main pattern you can not miss is pestilence BEFORE howling blast. Spread that frost fever around.


Lots more to say but back to work I go!

I'm digging Blood right now, though I did find some talents in Unholy that make me reconsider that tree. Something about putting more emphasis on the plaguebringer aspect that's looking neat. I'll try the other specs out at the full 51pt. talent potential.

What I'm liking about Blood is that I have no downtime. I can Icy Touch somebody for Frost Fever, Plague Strike something for whatever that disease is called, then follow up with Pesilence and Boiling Blood for a bit of damage on everything around me. After that it's a matter of popping alternating Death Strike, Heart Strike, and Death Coil to my hearts content, with the occasional rebuff on diseases. So it kinda looks like

Icy Touch - Plague Strike - Pestilence - Blood Boil - Death Coil - Death Strike x2 - DC - Heart Strike x2 - DC - repeat.

The mixing of energy and rage is a great effect, because you can't really run out of steam. Using Death Coil gives the runes more time to cool down, and by the time I'm out of energy my runes are all back up. With the 20% chance that every hit I have will give me a free Death Coil, I don't run out of runic power either. And the instant attacks.....not just from instant abilities. The parry coming out of just raw strength is wonderful.

I also noticed what Blizz was mentioning about every spec being viable for each role. I'm thinking that I could build a Blood-based tank spec by switching out Vendetta and Butchery for the parry-increasing talent, gettting the spell damage reduction talent that's based off parry, getting the armor buff when health runs low, and specing down frost for the armor buff, frost / shadow damage increase, 3% crit increase and Lichbane. I wouldn't have the raw strength of the build I've been looking at, so I would lose a bit of parry, but I would gain a bit more survivability and I'd have great threat increase while in Frost Presence. (Something I found from last night's Ramps run with 3 other DK's and a Healadin - I was pulling aggro off a frost spec in Frost presence even though I was getting 25% less threat from my build. The output these things do is sickening.) That's for another time, though. For now I just want to see how hard I can hit something. And so far, I'm pleased. 1200+ white-hit crits with everything up and running at 58 makes me very, very happy.

*edit* Not to make it sound bad for anybody. The tank said so himself that he needed to learn what he was doing and might need a while. I just found it odd that 55% threat difference between him and me wasn't enough of a gap for him to learn with.

From your posted spell rotation it sounds like you were doing aoe damage which is always a recipe for getting aggro.

The occassional Blood Boil and Pestilence were causing me a few issues with that, but I'm finding the more I play with it that those abilities aren't really worth using without having multiple mobs around. I get one talent to boost the damage Blood Boil does and that's it, so they only hit for 50 or so unless if they crit. I've pretty much cut them out of my solo rotation now. The problem I'd mentioned with pulling was when I focus-fired the tank's target. It's a new class and he was still learning how to work a DK as a tank, though, which I think has more to do with it.

I have a new love now.

Remember how I said I was going Unholy because of the AoE and super cool plagues and all that?

Well I gave frost a whirl to see how it works out for me because there is an overwhelming amount of Unholy DKs and guess what?

I ain't going back (For a long time)

Reason why? Howling Blast.

I absolutely love this ability, and the fact that it does double damage to those inflicted with Frost Fever means that it can effectively crit for 4x the damage. My highest crit was ~1954. Don't forget it's AoE

My rotation goes something like:

Icy Touch - Plague Strike - Pestilence - (Death Chill whenever it's up to make Howling Blast crit) - Howling

Blast - Blood Boil - Frost Strike x2

Occasionally I'll use the 51pt talent to reapply Frost Fever instead of going through the whole rotation again (Yay I found a use for it even though it's 60 RP, I'm thinking of skipping it)

New topics are created for each spec within the DK forum section This is done so we can have a place for spec specific discussions and keep them organized from the start. Who knows, maybe our little murloc DK forum will be a ray of light within the myriad forums out there that say things like my dk has balls of steel and I can solo everything.

Yep Raka I totally agree. Frost is da bomb.

The first few days I kept hearing about how much damage blood put out and how awesome unholy is. Both of them do look damn awesome. Then last night I grouped up with a couple other DKs and they were like freaking frost, it's op and unstoppable.

Your spell rotation is virtually the same as what I'm using too so I guess great minds think alike. Has anyone else tried dual wielding yet? I've tanked as dw a few times and it looks like my dps lowered but that could be because of the lack of strength.

With two fists of reckoning I tanked BF and then ramps. BF things went nuts a bit and the healer complained other people were taking damage. Then I tanked ramps and it was a breeze. So I think the biggest challenged to DK tanking is actually... get this... other death knights who are not used to the playstyle.
Coming from a melee dps background will certainly help but then also having played an aoe class such as warlock or mage will help too.

The key issue I've found in the 10 instances I've tanked is people think they're a DK and since any DK spec is supposedly viable for tanking they don't have to watch aggro. This is not true. Any spec has the potential to tank IF you take the tanking talents the class offers. And while you may be in all plate and able to take a hit your healers are still not designed to aoe heal everyone as if they're the main tank.

Not waiting the six seconds until the whole pull is on the DK and he's slapped a disease or something on everyone before you start with the AoE is a way to pull aggro for any dps class. The sense of invulnerablility the propaganda about DK promotes makes this even worse.

In time though everyone will find what works and then it will be even more fun. Tanks will learn how to slap aggro fast. DPS will learn how much threat each spell does. And healers will be less overworked. For now though it's one hell of a wild ride.


Lastly I have a simple request. Can I have my DK join a group and NOT tank for once please??? I keep asking and no one steps up to the plate

Find us a healer, and I'll see how Blood tanks. I'm curious to try it out anyway.

Also, it's possible your dps dropped because of a loss to AP or even raw weapon damage. I look at the Strikes in the same light as Mortal Strike or Sinister Strike, the heavier the weapon the better the hit. You've also gotta factor in that you have a higher parry rate than any other tank your level, which also makes the swing speed irrelevant. Plus, the two-hander had a nice chunk of strength on it, which may have pushed your AP higher than the combined weapons do and given harder-hitting spells.

OR maybe one of the other three death knights, since these groups have tended to be dk x4 +healer can step up to the plate too.

ANd jikii, I bought those weapons because you said they were good Now you tell me not to use them.

Seriously though, it wasn't that much of a drop in dps and I think maybe if I went with two of the razorice runes instead of what I was runing it might actually be higher than with the two hander. I think that with gear that has more strength and eventually some haste that dual wield will be amazing. When icy talons procs that's melee haste increase right there and having two fast weapons will take adventage of it.

The reason why I chose to dw tank was for fun and experimentation. The idea behind why it would work is basically the same reason paladins/warriors look for fast weapons. More hits, more things happen. Now think about that times two

Er...those weapons are good. I was just offering possible reasoning is all. I'm sure that extra talent points and messing with runes will do the trick.

Also, when discussing warriors and weapons, there's a split. Fast will help with Heroic Strike, while slower help with Devastate and Revenge. When you start throwing in instant attacks, they contradict +damage abilites that rely on regular attacks. There's a whole lotta theorycrafting that goes on there that I just don't wanna bother considering at this moment.

Word of advice from somebody who's relied on their weapon as their main threat generation tool: invest in a weapon chain. Blacksmiths can make them again at higher levels, so they should be more available. Being disarmed early on is the worst thing that can happen to you outside of an opening stun.

You would say that a chain to prevent disarming is more important than a rune?

It's only happened a few times on the DK but man I hate being disarmed. As a paladin I didn't even notice until HotR was released.

So some forum searching is saying that the tanking specs are like this:

Blood: Lots of fast threat. Ret pallies as tanks.

Unholy: Aoe tank ftw. Throw a warlock into plate. Kind of like Ner'zhul eh?

Frost: Best migitation overall for both physical and spell damage. Threat is a combination of some magic aoe and some melee damage. Middle of the ground for single target Vs Aoe.

So I guess I really truly am addicted to tanking now. I want to dps too with this DK to try it out so badly though!! But dps just feels 'easy' these days in a group.

I'd say to go with the parry/ disarm effect rune if you've got it, in retrospect. I forget about that one when it comes down to it.

And trust me, you don't have to tell me about how bad being disarmed blows. It's like a pally tank getting silenced.

They actually gave paladins a few spells that work when silenced now

Just like I can taunt and shield slam while disarmed. It helps, but it doesn't make it pleasant.

Gratz on having a way to work around that mechanic now, btw.