[LEGION]: FROST Death Knight

[Clash the DK]

You're not required at all to take Frostscythe to get value out of Obliteration, it also synergizes with Murderous Efficiency, Shattering Strikes, Avalanche, and Icecap. You have a prejudice about the ability, and it's clear. You hate it for the wrong reasons, you think it's called Obliteration so that means Obliterate is the focus. No, it doesn't have to be. It ties to a name of an ability but is just that, a name nothing else.

Your prejudice for that point makes most of your argument just not worth much. Why should talents not have other talents that increase their value? Why should we be absolutely shoehorned into "use this ability because it has a similar name to the talent"? Yes Rime throws a wrench into your ability list when using Obliteration, but that doesn't diminish it's strength.

We will be gearing for Crit. Obliterate will have over a 50% crit rate. Obliterate synergizes with those talents that scale well with Crit. Obliteration doesn't really add anything. Obliteration may guarantee a OBL crit by use of FS, but that takes a gcd that could be used for OBL. At a 50% crit rate, it washes out. Your better off just using Obliterate and totally ignore half of the value of the talent in the hopes of triggering Rime so that you can devalue the other half of the talent... Do you see my point? Damned if you do, damned if you don't.

There is nothing wrong with talents increasing the value of other talents. But if you are required to take 1 talent in order to rationalize taking another, then something is wrong. There is a difference. Each talent needs to hold value in comparison to the other two talents in their respective tier independently. I.E. If I don't want to play with FSc and I dislike BoS, then I'm forced into taking GA with no alternative because Obliteration only works if I took FSc in the first place. I hope you see the difference.

And yes, Rime throws a major wrench into things when using Obliteration and it does/can diminish it's strength. If you get "lucky" and and real off 3 Obliterates which all proc Rime, then congratulations, you would have a more powerful talent in Horn of freaking Winter (a crappy tier 2 talent that nobody is going to take).

Also, pointing out my prejudice regarding the thematic aspects of Obliteration does not dismiss the facts of my main argument. That's bush league. You're better than that.

[Maxweii]

You do not know 100% that we will be gearing crit. Right now, yes we are looking at crit as a good stat. However that's without sims and without finalized tuning so for all we know it could be the second best stat, or even third somehow.
If you're sitting at high crit then you gain immense value from it in the form of the rune cost reduction, if you have low crit you gain immense value from guaranteed crits on a couple of hits in a window where it's needed. Highs and lows of both sides of it.

If you dislike talents and thus don't take them that's on you not on the talents. If you can't seperate your dislike of a talent from your views on how it plays out, then your bias is just so blinding that you don't want to see straight. I don't really like Breath, but it's the best sustain talent in the 100 tier row. Frostscythe does not make or breath Obliteration, it just adds a ton of value to it. You aren't forced at all to take Glacial Advance, you just want to act that way because you don't like two talents so you are thus "forced" to never touch them.

[Clash the DK]

You do not know 100% that we will be gearing crit. Right now, yes we are looking at crit as a good stat. However that's without sims and without finalized tuning so for all we know it could be the second best stat, or even third somehow.
If you're sitting at high crit then you gain immense value from it in the form of the rune cost reduction, if you have low crit you gain immense value from guaranteed crits on a couple of hits in a window where it's needed. Highs and lows of both sides of it.

If you dislike talents and thus don't take them that's on you not on the talents. If you can't seperate your dislike of a talent from your views on how it plays out, then your bias is just so blinding that you don't want to see straight. I don't really like Breath, but it's the best sustain talent in the 100 tier row. Frostscythe does not make or breath Obliteration, it just adds a ton of value to it. You aren't forced at all to take Glacial Advance, you just want to act that way because you don't like two talents so you are thus "forced" to never touch them.

Puuuulease. We will be gearing for Crit. You know this too.

And you don't gain immense value from Obliteration in the form of the rune cost reduction. If you were to trigger Rime with all 3 Obliterates during Obliteration, that means you are "saving" 3 runes every 1.5 minutes. If you are "unlucky" and do not trigger Rime with 6 Obliterates, then you are "saving" 6 runes every 1.5 minutes. That is not immense value. Crappy Horn of freaking Winter is still better...

[Deleted]

You are however completely ignoring the guaranteed crits, even though your crit could be 70%, 100% still makes you rely on it being a crit, instead of very likely.

[Maxweii]

You are however completely ignoring the guaranteed crits, even though your crit could be 70%, 100% still makes you rely on it being a crit, instead of very likely.

I'm just not bothering with it anymore, I mean I get that some people don't like some talents for whatever reason, but to then state it's just plain bad beyond that when it's obvious their bias is showing.... yeah.

[Icedcoffeee]

Obliteration would be much more appealing if they brought back the old talent that let you stack Rimes and KMs up to 2. (On the alpha iir.) Should just replace Frozen Pulse, no one likes that talent anyways.

[Clash the DK]

You are however completely ignoring the guaranteed crits, even though your crit could be 70%, 100% still makes you rely on it being a crit, instead of very likely.

No, we covered that. You also have twice as many chances to proc Rime instead of using FS.

I'm just not bothering with it anymore, I mean I get that some people don't like some talents for whatever reason, but to then state it's just plain bad beyond that when it's obvious their bias is showing.... yeah.

I don't mind your general sunny disposition regarding most matters. But you can't put a positive spin on Obliteration.

Obliteration would be much more appealing if they brought back the old talent that let you stack Rimes and KMs up to 2. (On the alpha iir.) Should just replace Frozen Pulse, no one likes that talent anyways.

Outside of Obliterate automatically casting Howling Blast when Rime is triggered during Obliteration, having the ability to store Rime charges would be my next alternative. But I doubt they would go further than 2 charges. Firing off 6 Obliterates with a 60% chance for Rime...probability says that we would still have to use HB during Obliteration in that scenario. But it would most definitely be an improvement.

[Deleted]

Rime+Obliterate auto-casting would mean that Rime doesn't affect HB damage during Obliteration in PvP. You can't just do like 500k+ in a single GCD. There are more aspects to a game than just the one you're gunning for.

Stacking a couple of Rimes is also ridiculous since you'll become a instant cast sick damage melee mage of sorts.
I do genuinely agree with max that you're being very selective in what you like, you put a very negative twist on things. I enjoy Frost a lot more here than I do on live, regardless of shortcomings of the artifact and/or talents. For instance, I think that Crystalline Swords probably is the worst artifact active trait of all of them that I've looked at (mage, warrior, hunter, dk) yet it still feels reasonably smooth. I don't have to like it, but one can still appreciate mechanics.

Here is another example, I personally think Sindragosas Fury is probably the worst artifact golden in the game - Not because of its damage, cooldown, tuning blahblah I know, I love the way the spell looks. You summon Sindragosa as Arthas did with the Frostmourne before, she goes out and strikes everything down in your path. I would personally prefer it to be like a Gargoyle, follows you and attacks your targets, add a snare to it for a twist if you will.

With that said, they'll tune its damage to be worthwhile the CD, or they will nerf the CD to keep its damage. I like its visuals, but I dislike its functionality. No matter what they do to it short of "what I want" I won't like the ability, but I will still use it and I can appreciate it for what it will be. Longer CD, really big and strong hit, especially for AoE.

I could go on a rant how its not X because its not what I want, and I genuinely feel that is what you're doing with your arguments. Alas, I won't bother trying to convince you to think my way, I'm just trying to tell you that liking something and respecting its design are two different things.

[Makro]

Outside of Obliterate automatically casting Howling Blast when Rime is triggered during Obliteration, having the ability to store Rime charges would be my next alternative.

How about making it affect the next X obliterates within a certain time limit (like 6 within 20s)?

[RuneDK]

I'm just not bothering with it anymore, I mean I get that some people don't like some talents for whatever reason, but to then state it's just plain bad beyond that when it's obvious their bias is showing.... yeah.

I think it will be a moderately okay talent at the beginning. As our crit goes up, the value of Obliteration goes down...The fact we're seeing around 50% crit in Heroic Dungeon gear makes me think this is going to be similar to WotLK with some classes obtaining 70% crit in the final tier. That in and of itself makes the talent bad, no max level talent should lose value as we gear up. It will still be mediocre with high crit, but GA will be much much better with high crit than Obliteration. A big thing moreso is, the fact that if you get any rime procs in the 8 seconds Obliteration is up, it then again lowers the value of Obliteration. You don't want to sit on a rime and use Obliterate since it doesn't allow stacking of Rime(something I think we should be able to get two stacks of, like brainfreeze for frost mages is on live). With the fix of the bug on Rime, I see getting 1/2 regularly during Obliterations duration and that gives us less time to actually use the talent for what we're supposed to as that's two globals.

[Baddok21]

Obliteration
Instant 1.5 min cooldown
Requires Death Knight (Frost)
Requires level 100

The Death Knight gains 4-5 Charges of Obliteration that last 20 seconds. Each Charge of Obliteration spent allows Frost Strike to Trigger the Killing Machine Effect, Each charge of Obliteration spent empowers Obliterate to deal 40% additional dmg as frost, Each charge of Obliteration spent empowers your Frostscythe to deal 15% additional dmg to all targets hit over 6 seconds.

and to clarify Obliteration charges only affect one ability at a time you dont "gain" all 3 effects when using a charge

This basicly makes Obliteration an Empower effect that scales with your stat distribution.

If you have low crit you will spend 2-3 charges on FS to boost your FSc or OB
If you have high crit you will spend maybe all your charges just on FSc or OB and rely on your natural KM procs and natural crit rate
The rune cost will not change so that Haste and Bloodlust effect still carry value

Most reasonable way to design this talent as you no longer waste the CD while using RIME, you no longer ignore this talent once geared in enough Crit (FSc/OB have benefits regardless of your crit rate), and allows for rotation style changes based on the situation it is used. And this does not prop up Frost strike so much so that BoS will require even more adjustments to remain viable.

[Kainslife]

Puuuulease. We will be gearing for Crit. You know this too.

And you don't gain immense value from Obliteration in the form of the rune cost reduction. If you were to trigger Rime with all 3 Obliterates during Obliteration, that means you are "saving" 3 runes every 1.5 minutes. If you are "unlucky" and do not trigger Rime with 6 Obliterates, then you are "saving" 6 runes every 1.5 minutes. That is not immense value. Crappy Horn of freaking Winter is still better...

Horn of Winter is the best talent in that row if you're going for a Breath of Sindragosa build.

[Deleted]

I think it will be a moderately okay talent at the beginning. As our crit goes up, the value of Obliteration goes down...The fact we're seeing around 50% crit in Heroic Dungeon gear makes me think this is going to be similar to WotLK with some classes obtaining 70% crit in the final tier. That in and of itself makes the talent bad, no max level talent should lose value as we gear up. It will still be mediocre with high crit, but GA will be much much better with high crit than Obliteration. A big thing moreso is, the fact that if you get any rime procs in the 8 seconds Obliteration is up, it then again lowers the value of Obliteration. You don't want to sit on a rime and use Obliterate since it doesn't allow stacking of Rime(something I think we should be able to get two stacks of, like brainfreeze for frost mages is on live). With the fix of the bug on Rime, I see getting 1/2 regularly during Obliterations duration and that gives us less time to actually use the talent for what we're supposed to as that's two globals.

Gear won't scale as it has before. They add a LOT more initial stats on gear and far less in raiding and onward. Its all about evening out the relative power. Dungeon gear should be relevant and well geared (Only secondary stats). Primary stats will still keep going up at normal rate, however.

[Clash the DK]

Rime+Obliterate auto-casting would mean that Rime doesn't affect HB damage during Obliteration in PvP. You can't just do like 500k+ in a single GCD. There are more aspects to a game than just the one you're gunning for.

Stacking a couple of Rimes is also ridiculous since you'll become a instant cast sick damage melee mage of sorts.
I do genuinely agree with max that you're being very selective in what you like, you put a very negative twist on things. I enjoy Frost a lot more here than I do on live, regardless of shortcomings of the artifact and/or talents. For instance, I think that Crystalline Swords probably is the worst artifact active trait of all of them that I've looked at (mage, warrior, hunter, dk) yet it still feels reasonably smooth. I don't have to like it, but one can still appreciate mechanics.

Here is another example, I personally think Sindragosas Fury is probably the worst artifact golden in the game - Not because of its damage, cooldown, tuning blahblah I know, I love the way the spell looks. You summon Sindragosa as Arthas did with the Frostmourne before, she goes out and strikes everything down in your path. I would personally prefer it to be like a Gargoyle, follows you and attacks your targets, add a snare to it for a twist if you will.

With that said, they'll tune its damage to be worthwhile the CD, or they will nerf the CD to keep its damage. I like its visuals, but I dislike its functionality. No matter what they do to it short of "what I want" I won't like the ability, but I will still use it and I can appreciate it for what it will be. Longer CD, really big and strong hit, especially for AoE.

I could go on a rant how its not X because its not what I want, and I genuinely feel that is what you're doing with your arguments. Alas, I won't bother trying to convince you to think my way, I'm just trying to tell you that liking something and respecting its design are two different things.

What you forget is that they now have very specific tuning capabilities that only affect PvP. If Obliterate+Rime were a problem, that could be toned down and only in PvP. But...is that type of infrequent damage really that far out of line with what some other classes are bursting?

I don't really get your comment regarding the Rime/charges idea. Howling Blast is a spell. We use it. Having a couple of charges doesn't transform the spec into something else.

As for the rest of your comments, the difference between my complaint and your complaint/s is viability. All of the stuff you listed can be tuned to be effective and viable. Obliteration will need to be redesigned to be viable. This whole thing is not about "what I like". If I wanted to just complain about an ability that I don't like, then that would be BoS. Not what this is about.

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Back on the topic of how to fix Obliteration:

One problem my idea addresses that a charge system doesn't is the resource bottle neck. If we just granted charges to Rime, we would still have an excess of resources and over-cap RP during Obliteration. That doesn't necessarily feel good. But having Rime auto-cast during Obliteration would semi balance out the fact that Obliterate only costs one rune during the time frame. Neither idea is right or wrong. I'm just bringing up the extra benefit.

- - - Updated - - -

How about making it affect the next X obliterates within a certain time limit (like 6 within 20s)?

This is a reasonable idea. Not sexy but it is practical. Although, this path would officially devalue Crit after we worked so hard to have it buffed. We would just weave FS and OBL back and forth.

[RuneDK]

Gear won't scale as it has before. They add a LOT more initial stats on gear and far less in raiding and onward. Its all about evening out the relative power. Dungeon gear should be relevant and well geared (Only secondary stats). Primary stats will still keep going up at normal rate, however.

We haven't seen the gear creep for the next tier, or even from heroic dungeons to mythic raid gear. We honestly cannot say with certainty that what you're saying is true. Keep in mind...Warriors aren't even hitting 50% crit in Mythic gear in Warlords....so I honestly would not be surprised if fire mages and warriors are pushing 60-70% crit in the final tier.

EDIT: to be clear, I was never saying WE will hit that level of crit, I think Crit and Haste will have break points where Mastery is just a better stat until the next break point. However, I don't think the jump from Tier 19 to 20, we(general player base) will get 1-2% more crit...There will be a power creep big enough for us to notice.

[Deleted]

We can, Blizzard said so - that is my reference :P

[RuneDK]

Horn of Winter is the best talent in that row if you're going for a Breath of Sindragosa build.

As is right now? not really...you can keep breath up for over a minute without it. I have had ZERO problem with resources while screwing around on beta and have never taken horn of winter. If they nerf our resource generation, yes it will not only make horn of winter better in general, but especially for breath of sindragosa. However, as is on the beta...it's really not.

- - - Updated - - -

We can, Blizzard said so - that is my reference :P

Blizzard has also said a lot of things that didn't work out(look at triage healing for instance). I'm simply saying we cannot say with certainty that the power creep will be small. Maybe not as big between tiers as before..sure...but it will still be noticeable.

[Maxweii]

Obliteration would be much more appealing if they brought back the old talent that let you stack Rimes and KMs up to 2. (On the alpha iir.) Should just replace Frozen Pulse, no one likes that talent anyways.

I don't think there's anything really wrong with Frozen Pulse, just that we have so many resources as is it's nigh impossible to use.

I think it will be a moderately okay talent at the beginning. As our crit goes up, the value of Obliteration goes down...The fact we're seeing around 50% crit in Heroic Dungeon gear makes me think this is going to be similar to WotLK with some classes obtaining 70% crit in the final tier. That in and of itself makes the talent bad, no max level talent should lose value as we gear up. It will still be mediocre with high crit, but GA will be much much better with high crit than Obliteration. A big thing moreso is, the fact that if you get any rime procs in the 8 seconds Obliteration is up, it then again lowers the value of Obliteration. You don't want to sit on a rime and use Obliterate since it doesn't allow stacking of Rime(something I think we should be able to get two stacks of, like brainfreeze for frost mages is on live). With the fix of the bug on Rime, I see getting 1/2 regularly during Obliterations duration and that gives us less time to actually use the talent for what we're supposed to as that's two globals.

Like I said in the post before, it has it's strengths and weaknesses weather you have high or low crit. The higher it is the more you just use OB for the reduced cost and don't worry about FS during it. It turns into a quick pooling ability for runic power. Otherwise it turns into a guaranteed way to get crits via KM procs, which high or low crit will work well for Frostscythe.

[RuneDK]

I won't argue that is has strengths and weaknesses. However with GA being fixed along with RW in the next build...we'll have to see if there's still the same strengths. Keep in mind, GA scales with haste as well. Right now on beta it has a 13 second cool down(15% haste(level 92), on the pvp realm it's 14.3s cooldown at 5% haste) for my DK. So...In the minute and a half cooldown of obliteration I can get 6 GA's in. Which also hits everything near it's eruption point...At best you'll get three maybe four Frostscythes. That's not even including RW with or without the frozen soul trait and gathering storm talents.

All I'm really saying is, it's going to need to do more for it to remain strong through the expansion. GA or Breath is going to overtake it in the first tier of raiding most likely.

[Baddok21]

We can, Blizzard said so - that is my reference :P

Blizzard also said for WoD they wanted Spells for Hybrids to scale with weapon dmg