DK tanking on Gara'jal the Spiritbinder

[Ðuracell]

How are DKs doing this fight on heroic? We can't absorb any of the shadow attacks with AMS / AMZ so the voodoo doll targets get raped without straight up shield walling or avoiding the shadow attacks. Am I completely missing something or are DKs just sub par for this encounter on heroic?

[Deleted]

Take the shadow damage, take none of the physical damage. Absorbed attacks don't transfer.

you can parry them, So DRW works on it, bone shield, and IBF also.

[Ðuracell]

Are you using heavy externals on the tanks?

[Loopb]

Are you using heavy externals on the tanks?

You'll take a bit more damage then the other tanks, make use od Bone Shield, IBF, and Pain Supression, make sure you stack blood shield as max as you can, so no one will take damage during a few secs. Make a CD rotation, IBS > ERW > AoD.

Etc.

[Vereesa]

Are you certain AMS/AMZ won't absorb the Shadowy Attacks the boss uses on the tank? I know both my AMS and AMZ negate them as a DPS DK, so I'm not sure why it would function differently if you were the tank.

[NeverStop]

Shadowy Attacks

Gara'jal will periodically use the following attacks instead of his normal melee attacks:

Sweeping Kick
Hammer Fist
Right Cross
Left Hook

These attacks inflict Shadow damage to the target and bypass any absorption effects.

AMS / AMZ is an absorption effect, so they won't absorb the damage, whereas IBF / AoD / Pain Suppression / Power Word: Barrier are %-based damage reduction, so they still work. At least Blood Shield works for his normal melee attacks, so DKs still have some amount of mitigation when Voodoo'd.

However, AMS / AMZ still work against the Shadowy Minion's Spiritual Grasps, so you should use them to prevent getting insta-gibbed when Gara'jal hits the tank for 200k and 5 Shadoy Minions also attack the tank.

[Riemu2k3]

If you can get away with not reforging hit/exp for this fight (cause your raid has enough dps and stuff), try going for max avoidance. Mastery wont help your that much on this fight, due to the absorption stuff in the post above mine. Swordshattering Rune, 1-2 Avoidance Trinkets. Keep Bone Shield up when you tank (preshield it when you dps, so you can recast it when you tank). Use DRW / Trinkets. When you have a Holy Pal, let him divine light spam you when Mastery is up so you really have like 100% absorb on all melee hits. Use IBF when your bone shield is gone / between bone shields. External cooldowns if available.

[Deleted]

You can't absorb hit melee attack as dk, witch kind of make dks the worst tank for this boss, we really depend on our blood shield.

[NeverStop]

Brewmasters really are the best tank for this fight. Stagger is like a passive bone shield that has 100% uptime. Combine that with Purifying Brew and Brewmasters take the least amount of damage when Voodoo'd.

[Maelstrom51]

My group is running double blood death knights and the raid tends to get raped if we don't have Bone Shield or IBF up. Not sure what to do here.

[Deleted]

in terms of gearing for this fight (10m heroic), running 2.5 healers:

Is there any consensus/opinions as to how lethal his normal melee attacks are? I am aiming to hit/exp caps, then debating whether prioritising haste over mastery (or even crit) makes sense since even a base amount of mastery should be able to cover the majority of his melee attacks + minimal avoidance from stats.

Is swordshattering really worth it for 4% less damage on shadowy attacks (2.5 heals) rather than fallen crusader for extra DPS when tanking & not tanking?

[Shiira]

Is swordshattering really worth it for 4% less damage on shadowy attacks (2.5 heals) rather than fallen crusader for extra DPS when tanking & not tanking?

As a dk tanking garajal heroic your job is to take as little damage as possible.

He isn't going to kill you, but he is going to kill the people with voodoo dolls if you take too much damage.

I haven't seen the ten man, but the enrage shouldn't be too big an issue if you can just keep everyone alive.

[bals]

sadly, shield tanks are way better than other tanks on this fight as his melee damage is insane.


our blood dk switched from mastery to avoidance on some of our last pulls, seemed to work way better and less people getting gibbed as he wasn't getting hit 3+ times in a row as often.

[Loopb]

My group is running double blood death knights and the raid tends to get raped if we don't have Bone Shield or IBF up. Not sure what to do here.

No solution to 2dks on this fight, you should re-think your raid comp.

[burbon]

Tbh I think dks are fine for this fight. I took very little damage overall in our 10 man kill, but I had to make a few adjustments. Here's a few things I found worked well for me.

I would recommend going with a more avoidance heavy build for this fight. Virtually all damage on this fight still follows basic melee mechanics even though much of the damage is shadow damage that can't be absorbed. To clarify all of the shadow kicks, punches, etc that the boss does can be blocked, dodged or parried just like normal melee hits. I replaced stone skin with sword shattering to start with and also equipped 2 trinkets with an on use avoidance cd. The darkmoon card is amazing and I also used the dodge trinket from brewfest if that is available.

On pull we would pop lust and I would main tank the boss. I started out with trying to get my blood shield up as quickly as possible and had a 6 stack bone shield up prior to pull so it would be off cd quickly if my charges got consumed. Shortly into the fight I popped DRW and ERW for both damage and trying to stack up as big a blood shield as possible. DRW also has the added effect of giving you a ton of avoidance, potentially allowing you to stack up a bigger blood shield.

Understand that bone shield charges do not get consumed so long as you have a big enough absorb up to mitigate a white hit. The other thing to note is that bone shield does help mitigate all dmg by 20%, meaning if you can keep it up 100% you can take substantially less damage from shadow attacks and managing your blood shield is key to making that happen.

During all this I try to always have drw and any other avoidance cds, like on use trinkets, cycling throughout ever tanking phase. When you are off tanking, be sure to monitor your blood shield as you can go into main tanking, when the other tank gets banished, with a 500-600k absorb up going in. Having this absorb up will mitigate all hit hits, leaving you to deal with shadow damage that, as I said earlier, can all be dodged or parried, favoring a more avoidance heavy build.

If you are the tank who is pulling the boss you should likely use IBF during the first set of voodoo dolls, because if you wait for the second time you tank, or the third fixate, you may not have it up at the end for the frenzy when you need it most. Additionally, you want to be using AMS on CD as it will greatly mitigate any shadow bolts from the other realm. I would also recommend speccing into AMZ and use it liberally when you have nothing else to do.

If you do all these things and call for raid cds such as devo aura, barrier, rallying cry, etc and ask for externals as needed (BoP will completely negate all damage on this fight if you have a pally) you may find more success than taking the traditional approach you would with most other fights. After getting the hang of the pace and tempo of this fight I only called for one external at the very end, aside from our warrior's safeguard which he used on cd I believe. Also remember that stam and mastery don't help us very much on this fight as compared to most other encounters.

Here's a vid of our kill. It's a hunter PoV but you can still see my damage intake and voodoo doll damage on his raid frames for reference. By the time we got the the end, IBF was up and it was gg as I didn't really take much damage during the frenzy. GL and I hope this was helpful.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MA5WVrFGqTM

[kaelleria]

Burbon... No offense to you or any other 10 mans out there, but the amount of damage going out to the tanks and the voodoo doll targets in 25 mans absolutely dwarfs the amount of damage that goes out in 10. Its simply not possible to keep your bone shield up and blood shield up the entire time on 25 and your raid suffers.

While you definitely can kill it with a DK tank, its just that much harder with one due to our class mechanics. At this point in time, why shoot yourself in the foot if you have another option?

[SurrealNight]

Brewmasters really are the best tank for this fight. Stagger is like a passive bone shield that has 100% uptime. Combine that with Purifying Brew and Brewmasters take the least amount of damage when Voodoo'd.

Only melee damage can be staggered so it doesn't do us any good on Shadowy Attacks or the minions, we also have less CD's to use (only Fort Brew and Dampen Magic). BrM are awesome at taking out quite a few minions when ported since we can roll around then Touch of Death the severer at the last second of the debuff.

[Maelstrom51]

Only melee damage can be staggered so it doesn't do us any good on Shadowy Attacks or the minions, we also have less CD's to use (only Fort Brew and Dampen Magic). BrM are awesome at taking out quite a few minions when ported since we can roll around then Touch of Death the severer at the last second of the debuff.

The Shadowy Attacks can be blocked to reduce damage, so I'd think stagger would work too.

[burbon]

Burbon... No offense to you or any other 10 mans out there, but the amount of damage going out to the tanks and the voodoo doll targets in 25 mans absolutely dwarfs the amount of damage that goes out in 10. Its simply not possible to keep your bone shield up and blood shield up the entire time on 25 and your raid suffers.

While you definitely can kill it with a DK tank, its just that much harder with one due to our class mechanics. At this point in time, why shoot yourself in the foot if you have another option?

Yes he melees harder in 25 man. No, I don't believe it's impossible to keep 100% uptime on boneshiled and 80-90% uptime seems more than realistic for blood shield. Gara'jal hits the tank approximately 25k harder per white hit, which is only about 20% harder and you have 4 people sharing voodoo doll instead of 3 to help mitigate that increase. This increase in damage seems to be consistent with all other forms of boss shadow damage in 25 as well. Dwarfs is hardly the appropriate word to use here imo.

When you get fixated by the boss and the other tank went down, by stacking avoidance, having a full hp absorb going in, and 6 stacks of bone shield, with another 6 ready to go at a moments notice by getting it on cd going into the fixate, you should be able to keep it up full time even on 25 man. If not, let's not forget how many external additional cds are available in 25 over 10 to help mitigate that fact not to mention far more absorbs from healers helping your bone shield uptime even more.

I've competitively raided progression content in both 10 and 25 settings and am well aware of the differences. I do agree that dks come with their challenges on this fight, but the damage differential between 10 and 25 is not quite as alarming as you're making it out to be. Check logs if you don't believe me.

[SurrealNight]

The Shadowy Attacks can be blocked to reduce damage, so I'd think stagger would work too.

Stagger Instant
You shrug off physical attacks, causing 80% of the damage to happen instantly and the remaining 20% to be divided over 10 sec.

I looked at one of my logs and 0% of the various Shadowy Attacks were absorbed. I do have absorb #'s on the minions though but that could be from Guard.