Blood on the PTR

[Khain]

Yeah, I'm leveling as blood, and It's super strong specially in AoE.

[pmkaboo]

Anyone else feeling that Blood on the PTR feels really strong DPS-wise? I seem to be scything through packs of elites in Tanaan that would've at least bogged me down in Live - the combination of Heart Strike and Bonestorm once you get a full stack feels like it's just melting down whatever's in front of me. Just trying to get a feel for the spec now, anyone else feeling the same?

not really, only tried a couple of heroic dungeons and on aoe im actually pulling less dps than on live, not a big surprise since i only have two boils instead of 6, and on single target im being outdpsed by people in tanaan gear(thats ilvl 700, no set, no trinkets, im 740 bis). obviously these are just heroics so survivability is pretty hard to test out, but from looking at my skills and having a couple of tries on the raiding dummy, id say im a lot more fragile aswell. hopefully its gonna be a lot better with artifact and 110lvl.

[Paxz19]

On beta blood dks do a bunch of damage, vengeance DH and Blood dk have huge numbers currently on both AoE packs and boss damage.

[Khiyone]

On beta blood dks do a bunch of damage, vengeance DH and Blood dk have huge numbers currently on both AoE packs and boss damage.

In what world do blood dks on beta do good boss damage? Prot pallies are the only tanks that can actually do decent dps at the moment in raids.

[threeks]

On PTR I feel like blood AOE is great if you can keep your d&d up and just basically spam HS.

[Paxz19]

In what world do blood dks on beta do good boss damage? Prot pallies are the only tanks that can actually do decent dps at the moment in raids.

Was just running +5s and our blood dk was doing great, if you really think Prot pallies are the only ones doing decent damage you seem a bit misinformed. Look at blood dk and vengeance dh along with prot pallies, they are all doing really good dps.

[Khiyone]

Was just running +5s and our blood dk was doing great, if you really think Prot pallies are the only ones doing decent damage you seem a bit misinformed. Look at blood dk and vengeance dh along with prot pallies, they are all doing really good dps.

I'm not talking about Mythic+; I specifically mentioned raids in my post. Of course Blood is going to do well there because dungeons focus on burst AoE. In raids, though, Blood is below dps specs.

[Paxz19]

I'm not talking about Mythic+; I specifically mentioned raids in my post. Of course Blood is going to do well there because dungeons focus on burst AoE. In raids, though, Blood is below dps specs.

In raid testing yesterday they pulled good numbers, lower than prot pallies but in line with DH and above everything else. "boss damage" can be applied to a lot of things but I'm in the same world you're in I bet your blood dk you're referencing just isn't playing at their best or to the potential of what they can be because in testing they were doing quite well.

[Xeoshades]

Wanted to post something and see what you folks think.
First suggestions and feed back:

Soulgorge: "This is not the Plague Leech your looking for, but could be..."
This ability is not fun by making bloods play style a complete mess, spec crippling on multi-targets, weak on single target... The added rune cooldown reduction is only noticeable on 3+ targets infected with Blood Plague, however you will end up using so many runes and gcds to micro manage that in the end it simply is not worth the effort. As for a single target encounter you simply do not get enough stacks to warrant this talent.

How to fix: I will be plain here. Delete this talent to free up the slot for something else. However if for some reason this talent must stay then a few adjustments could be made.
1. Allow Blood Boil to spread Blood Plague again, however not apply it with Soulgorge talented.
2. Players will Deaths Caress Blood Plague to single target, Blood Boil to spread to all other targets.
3. Soulgorge when ready.

This will fix the chunkiness of current Soulgorge talent interacting with Blood Boil and Deaths Caress. A rune and 3 gcds will be used in order to maintain a fluid use of Soulgorge, saving the new rune generating for the rest of Blood's kit. This could be really fun!!!

Mark of Blood: This one is simple, I do love this ability and happy to see its return from WoTLK. I even don't mind the RP cost it has been changed to, however.... If Mark of Blood will only heal on Auto-attack, 2% of victims max health will not cut it.

How to fix:
1. Please adjust this to a higher percent (5% min) or allow all direct damage to apply the heal (Single target spells, autos)

Bloodworms: This talent should be baseline... This is Bloods version of a minion which this spec has gotten Army and limited Timmy removed. This talent slot can be easily freed up for something else.

If Bloodworms can't be baseline, then please provide a bit more fluff to them. Via return the aoe heal popping. This way DKs can bring a bit more utility to the raid for all melee players. (5% missing health is not much, and most of the time Melee dps should or will be close to max health, but for all the massive aoe phases, every little bit of health return helps)

Blood Tap: I really want to like this talent... I love it on live, but PTR... it is not strong nor does it give you that control it once did. It just takes to long for it to refresh to help out in those dire need moments or even to depend on to be placed in a rotation.

How to fix:
1. Lower the Cooldown from 60sec to 30sec. Keeping the reduced by 1 sec whenever a Bone Shield charge is consumed.
2. -OR-, Change it to RP usage lowers the cooldown by x amount, much like what Red Thirst does but for all RP usage. This will allow strong synergy with Bonestorm, Mark of Blood, Death Strike.

Rune Tap: While I loved this ability on live (Life saver), but with all runes being the same type... There is no longer this feeling of keeping / having a rune to spare to activate this talent. It worked in Live for the reason we could pool Blood Runes for this or extra dps, however in most cases a Heart Strike with Blood Feast (From Artifact) will provide better recovery. Also Will of the Necropolis(Free help when you need it most) and Foul Bulwark (Provides Free great benefits for so many skills and abilities that depend on max health) are just simply better... did I mention they to are also free.

How to Fix:
1. Make this ability on a charge system costing no runes. This will mean it also does not provide RP, but that is a good trade off for its limits.
2. Just remove this talent, free up the slot.

New talents: Now for the fun part. Reading above, you will see a few talents that could be removed and in there place here is a few that could fill those slots. All talents are from DK prior, and fit the theme.

1." Blood-Caked Blade" / "Runic Strike": Lvl 57 talent: Passive: Chance to gain 10 runic power on parry of an attack. Gain 1 runic power per second while in combat.

This talent will resolve the odd (few points shy on rp to spend on an ability) Also great way to earn a on demand Runic power pool using Dancing Rune Weapon. Blood dks have had these two talents from wotlk.

2. "Hysteria": Lvl 56 talent: 3 Min Cooldown: Induces a friendly unit into a killing frenzy for 30 sec. The target is Enraged, which increases their physical damage by X%(20%), but causes them to lose health equal to X% (3%) of their maximum health every second.

This gives dks a nice needed raid utility spell which rivals prot pally (blessings). The on demand damage increase for 1 ally target or on self can help for a burst, and the health per sec drain is a good trade off. More dps but at the price more healing needed. Blood DKs used to have this ability during wotlk.

3. Blade Barrier: Lvl 90 talent: Passive: While 3 runes are on cooldown, reduce all damage taken by X% (10 - 15%).

This helps smooth out the incoming damage while rewarding players that actively use their abilities. This would be a good middle ground talent in between Foul Bulwark and Will of the Necropolis. Blood DKs used to have this ability during wotlk.


A flavor enhancer.... New Blood Boil animation is great!!! However could we get the old bloodier on hit animation tacked on as well :3

There are a few more things, but all above are what stands out like a sore thumb on the PTR. I hope you enjoy the read and shines some light on a spec topics.

[Philondra]

*snip*

A fair chunk of what you're saying would be ridiculously overpowered (5% max health return from Mark of Blood? Don't even get me started on what you've done to Soulgorge...)

Rune Tap isn't *that* far off from where it needs to be if you consider it in the context of providing on-demand survivability vs. the reliable yet small effect of WotN and the swinginess in maximum health from Foul Bulwark. I just think the numbers need to be tuned slightly higher, whether that's by increasing the damage reduction (unlikely) or by making it generate 15 RP instead of 10 (more likely).

I also find it interesting that you don't even mention Tombstone, which I find to be a laughably terrible talent. Soulgorge being unfavored is in large part due to the number of hoops it requires you to jump through just to break even, whereas in many cases Tombstone is an out-and-out survivability *loss*.

[Xeoshades]

Only left Tombstone alone purely for a "Combo Point" system if players want for blood. Pool up the Bone Shield charges and pop Tombstone, rinse / repeat. Also very slim cases Tombstone can be used as a poormans BOA Tanking Trinket. Via stack and use all cooldowns that boaster stam. It is quite a large shield.

Yeah the skill sucks, and I would never use it... But some like it.

Soulgorge... I have yet to meet someone that enjoys this talent. Are you the first? If rapid and spectral can be "grab and forget" I think a simpler more fluid Soulgorge should be created. Would be playing with disease much like we are doing in live with BB + Outbreak.

I do like your Rune Tap suggestion, via more RP on use.

[Philondra]

No, Soulgorge is probably the worst of our talents (personally, I think Tombstone is worse, but it can be fixed through some number adjustments; Soulgorge needs a major overhaul to make it worthy)

I'm trying to think of other ways to make Soulgorge less obnoxiously maintenance-y without making it degenerate, like your suggestion is (you propose removing several obnoxious steps and adding in one easy one to essentially get a free 40%-ish rune regeneration buff, assuming a three mob pull), but I'm having a lot of trouble.

1. Soulgorge is now a single-target spell with a 24 second cooldown. It consumes your Blood Plague on your target to give you X% rune regeneration rate. While you are benefiting from this increased rune regeneration rate, Blood Plague may not be applied again to that target. Blood Boil functionality is unchanged.
2. Soulgorge passively grants you X% (some very low value) rune regeneration rate for every enemy within 8 yards that has your Blood Plague on it (this is probably inherently unbalanceable, too.) Blood Boil functionality is unchanged.
3. Soulgorge passively grants you X% rune regeneration rate while you have 2 charges of Blood Boil (essentially trading Blood Boil damage for more runes; note that this passive won't be active 100% of the time because you'll want to Blood Boil enough to keep Blood Plague up)

I don't know, these are probably pretty degenerate, too, but the talent seems inherently unsolvable.

[Xeoshades]

What do you think if Soulgorge, eating all your Blood Plague, just provided a massive RP (30 RP) return and refill 1 rune per Blood Plague Leeched. Then had a 1.5 / 2min cooldown or so?

Besides the talent destroying the normal flow of blood, its flawed because how unbalanceable it is with no cooldown and Blizzard fears the Blood Boil Soulgorge spam.


Blood Boil keeps its normal Blood plague. RP and Runes are now the ones limited by the max your character can hold. 100-110 RP, 6 Runes. This would be sorta a reworked version of Plague leech, but with RP benefits and multi-target.

But meh either way, I just hope blizz addresses quite a few issues. So far balancing for Blood has been next to none. Kinda worried.

[Bladeweaver]

I like the idea of deaths caress into blood boil to spread plague so that it takes 3 gcds to enhance rune generation.

The numbers could be tuned so it doesn't become op

[Deleted]

I'm not talking about Mythic+; I specifically mentioned raids in my post. Of course Blood is going to do well there because dungeons focus on burst AoE. In raids, though, Blood is below dps specs.

And where's the problem?