Thoughts on Tanking and Blood going into Legion (LONG)

[Xeoshades]

I am just wondering why Frost has a stronger Death Strike then Blood....

[Philondra]

You don't honestly believe that they'd reduce our RP spender to 1% weapon damage, do you? The weapon damage is obviously a data mining error (or if it actually went into the beta, then someone mistakenly changed a value.)

The healing reduction is probably correct, though. What a shame.

[Deleted]

Someone tell Blizz is not april fools anymore.

Seriously, we've been asking for less frequent DS but with higher healing, and they instead keep the cost the same but futher nerf the healing.
I'm speechless.

[Resurgo]

You don't honestly believe that they'd reduce our RP spender to 1% weapon damage, do you? The weapon damage is obviously a data mining error (or if it actually went into the beta, then someone mistakenly changed a value.)

The healing reduction is probably correct, though. What a shame.

After seeing what they've come up with for blood? I think I'd believe anything at this point. They've pretty much gutted any risk/reward from the spec. And nerfed an active mitigation ability down to the level of Death Coil on current Live. Wouldn't surprise me and wouldn't shock me to see DK's get shelved after this.

[Deleted]

From the forums:

The 20% healing was tested on alpha and it proved to be too low, why the hell change it back? So we have the most underwhelming active mitigation ever?

The 'nerf' to Death Strike was mostly a misnomer. Bone Shield is an absorb now, so counts towards Death Strike. It also effectively stacks additively with self-healing from other sources, which there are much more of now, such as from the artifact.

So that explains what their reasoning behind the change is (it doesn't explain why that change affects frost and unholy as well).
It doesn't change the fact that they've further reduced the importance of using your active mitigation, as they've shifted it to completely passive mitigation. There's no thought involved in Bone Shield, it's simply up all the time. Wasn't the intent in legion to make active mitigation matter more?

[Milocow]

From the forums:

The 'nerf' to Death Strike was mostly a misnomer. Bone Shield is an absorb now, so counts towards Death Strike. It also effectively stacks additively with self-healing from other sources, which there are much more of now, such as from the artifact.

So that explains what their reasoning behind the change is (it doesn't explain why that change affects frost and unholy as well).
It doesn't change the fact that they've further reduced the importance of using your active mitigation, as they've shifted it to completely passive mitigation. There's no thought involved in Bone Shield, it's simply up all the time. Wasn't the intent in legion to make active mitigation matter more?

"Bone shield is also now an absorb" yea a fucking absorb that reduces the strength of our ds heals now u wanna nerf the heals even more wtf blizz for real
"Self healing from other sources" you mean shitty leech that requires our blood shield to be up, which you just indirectly nerfed the uptime of bloodshield? Wow blizz wow

[Deleted]

I'm pretty sure they mean blood plague and the insane healing from the Blood Feast @ HS, especially now that it has no target cap.
I'm personally really fond of Bone Shield being AM now, we're the only class who had AM that was not off GCD, now its very easy to maintain when needed.

[Philondra]

"Bone shield is also now an absorb" yea a fucking absorb that reduces the strength of our ds heals now u wanna nerf the heals even more wtf blizz for real

I think what blizzard means is:

If bone shield simply reduces damage taken and death strike heals 30%:
Take raw 100k damage. Bone shield reduces to 80k. Death strike heals 30% of the post-reduction damage, or 24k.

If bone shield counts as an absorb and death strike heals 20%:
Take 100k damage. Bone shield absorbs 20k, so you take 80k damage. Death strike heals for 20% of the pre-absorb value, so you heal for 20k.

It still works out to be a nerf, but about a 20% one, not a 50% one.

[Deleted]

Yeah but it still doesn't explain why affect unholy survival with this change. If they wanted to change blood side of thing, why not tune it especificaly for that spec instead of changing all 3 specs in the process?

Blizzard changes normaly create an equal number of problems that they try to solve.

[Deleted]

http://us.battle.net/wow/en/forum/to...5956?page=5#86

Is this guy serious or just trolling. He should be bashed immediately, because that is just the kind of feedback we DON'T need at the moment.

I think what blizzard means is:

If bone shield simply reduces damage taken and death strike heals 30%:
Take raw 100k damage. Bone shield reduces to 80k. Death strike heals 30% of the post-reduction damage, or 24k.

If bone shield counts as an absorb and death strike heals 20%:
Take 100k damage. Bone shield absorbs 20k, so you take 80k damage. Death strike heals for 20% of the pre-absorb value, so you heal for 20k.

It still works out to be a nerf, but about a 20% one, not a 50% one.

Still make no sense to nerf, as little as it may be, our already weak AM.

[Deleted]

After some testing, the active mitigation of Bone Shield does NOT count for active mitigation boss checks, so not sure why it is labelled as it is as of latest build.
As far as weak AM goes, we have an uptime of 100% on Bone Shield, that's nothing to laugh at, and I don't know why some people hate on Blood Feast, it quite literally is insane, especially now that HS has no target cap.

[Ampere]

Wasn't the intent in legion to make active mitigation matter more?

This is Legion. Blood DKs have the "strongest reactive tanking mechanic" and it's not very meaningful.

[Deleted]

I think they should nerf Blood Feast to 10% & Unending Thirst leech to 20% and then buff Death Strike.

[Deleted]

I think they should nerf Blood Feast to 10% & Unending Thirst leech to 20% and then buff Death Strike.

Currently Unending Thirst leech (according to the logs I've seen) only accounts for about 2% of your total healing. Can't remember Blood Feast, but it wasn't that much either. The main reason why DS heals for so little is Bone Shield, which absorbs up to twice as much as DS heals over the course of an encounter.
The "strongest reactive tanking mechanic" in the game is only half as strong as the (totally passive) "lowest preventative damage reduction", which is extremely concerning (on top of that we have our other sources of healing, further devaluing DS). The vast majority of damage mitigation for the "reactive tanking class" is entirely passive.
What that means, basically, is that DS timing in legion matters less than it ever has before (which, ironically, is the exact opposite of their stated goal for legion).

[Deleted]

The class didn't change though, its still the same. Watch the DS and sit on one, that's just how they want you to play.
I don't see a reason to panic, Blood DK has as far as I remember playing always been amazing.

[Kapaya]

http://us.battle.net/wow/en/forum/to...5956?page=5#86

Is this guy serious or just trolling. He should be bashed immediately, because that is just the kind of feedback we DON'T need at the moment.

ROFL THIS GUY

"I didnt really use gorefiends grasp in live I used the remorseless winter ability why because I liked the ability to freeze mob packs and give my dpser and healers a chance to get the ball rolling. On big pulls it was farm more useful then gorefiends grasp."

So he rather use an AoE stun that has a 5 sec channel time to stun for 5 seconds instead of gripping every mob on top of eachother and killing them in 5 seconds?

"Cant forget the removal of unholy blight another AOE threat generator."

?????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????? ???????????????????????

"Forgot to mention this about a certain talent that I hope no body and I mean no body as a DK has ever picked EVER. Purgatory. If anyone picks this talent and uses it and dies I laugh at them. Who in there right mind would use a talent that is possibly going to kill you after you use it."

I mean, surely I'm getting trolled, right? Surely?

[Resurgo]

That guy hasn't even gotten past Iron Reaver on Heroic. It's a shame, but that's simply part of the ignorance. He knows nothing of the kind of spike damage harder fights have.

[Deleted]

Kinda makes the naive part of me think they have something else planned for Unholy & Frost, but it wouldn't be the first time they just fukked up.

[Zorish]

http://us.battle.net/wow/en/forum/to...5956?page=5#95
he continues... someone... stop him...

About frost and unh DS... well - there is some logic there - it would be strange if their version of DS is stronger that spec who is focused around it, while for them it's... situational button... Maybe they planing to totaly replace it for this specs with Death Siphon maybe? just guessing...

[Deleted]

Pretty sure siphon won't see a comeback, its just too good