Thoughts on Tanking and Blood going into Legion (LONG)

[Philondra]

One minute cooldown for a speed boost isn't terribly long. It's more that the duration is only three seconds. You could always talent for it to bring it up to 4.5 seconds (still really short), and this will probably be the default talent if Death and Decay's crowd control abilities don't work on whatever fight we're doing.

[redfella]

Mass Entanglement and Typhoon are both available to all Druid specs and have very situational uses.

What? Why are other Druid specs relevant when comparing utility between tank specs? The choice isn't to bring one more DPS/Healer into a raid in place of a tank. Sometimes you do need more than one use of some utility in the span of a single cooldown, so having more than 1 of said type of utility is a good thing. Some utility is inherently situational, yes, but it still has it's uses and only shitty players don't use theirs when appropriate.

I can think of only 2 fights in HFC where I used typhoon and none in WoD at all where I used Mass Entangle.

It is useful on many fights with trash mobs spawning. Quickly manipulating where trash goes is useful AND while not always required, we all (at least I really do) enjoy having mobs tightly grouped.

I don't really understand why people are pigeonholing these utility comparisons to only raid bosses, there's shitty trash to be cleared every week, and I figure Mythic+ will play a bigger role than dungeons did in past few expansions (Mythic+ will likely stay relevant a lot longer and requires more effort obviously). Having X or Y specs in group/raid makes non-boss content faster or less of a hassle as well -- it matters imho.

As to Affinities, currently on beta they do less dmg than simply staying in Bear form, however using them requires the Druid to NOT be actively tanking something. I assumed the person I had been responding to was referring to tank specific utility in his post.

I'm really expecting the Affinities to be brought a bit up sooner or later, seems silly to put something in just for flavor that is never used (then again, Blizzard has managed that with a lot of talents in the past, so it's not a given). In any case, a tank is still a tank even if he is using HotW on pull before it's his turn to taunt -- and in raid setting the Affinities could become useful (you aren't required to stay in bear 24/7). The extra healing is nothing to shun if it means you can take one less healer to an encounter since Affinities might let you help enough to squeeze that little bit of extra healing required. Same can be said if they manage to make the Feral/Moonkin affinities work for increased single target burst / aoe burst in situations where you want to take an extra healer instead of a DPS in to an encounter.

[Deleted]

Rofl, you need to relax. All the shit you keep posting are literally covered by the whole class. You don't bring a damn tank cause he can dispell or cause he has a heal he can cast while he's not tanking, you bring a tank to fit your raid. If your raid covers everything already, there is no other damn reason to bring a tank other than to keep aggro, do as much damage as possible and to not die (or make healers spend too much mana on said tank). There is no such thing as "help out your raid" in serious raiding, you're there for a certain reason. Just like you bring that extra Shadow Priest to Mass Dispell doesn't mean you should be spamming globals thinking you're helping when in reality, you're not. And that is where Blood utility is good: No one else has AoE grip.

Why would I not mock DH sigils? The grip is weaker (which you would know if you had beta access) and the AoE fear breaks on damage so it's completly fucking useless (oh and btw, DK's also have AoE fear with a CD a lot lower than sigil, but again, you completly ignored that talent cause reasons). If I want AoE silence, I'll bring a Boomkin. Again, you assume a tank is only worth by his utility. If you had bothered checking loggs at all, you'd know that DK's are in a pretty damn good spot now compared to other tanks while being the only one that brings something no other class or specc does (and again, the DH grip is nothing compared to DK one). Stop talking about abilities you think you know about without having tried them out yourself. Just cause Toweliee says it's the best doesn't mean it's so.


The reason I called it "whateveryouthinkisamazingutilitythatatankshouldbedoing" is cause you kept mentioning stuff and I didn't wanna spend 5 minutes writing it down, no need to get all edgy. You tank your way, I tank mine, no need to comment on abilities you have no clue about. There's a reason I've had Alpha access since the first mass mythic cleared wave went out and you still don't :^)

OHH, I'm so sorry, having the alpha access makes you CLEARLY right. Obviusly, I have absolutely no idea how a mass grip, or a typhoon, or a tiger lust or whatever ability works since I'm not in beta, after all before Legion there was nothing. I'm so ashamed I couldn't clear m hfc before may, I'm going to bury myself alive now.

Seriously, I make arguments and examples, you pretty much just keep screaming "WE HAVE MASS GRIP, TANKS DON'T HAVE TO HELP THE RAID, ROFL I KNOW BETTER THAN YOU". Like a 5y old kid.

All of this was born from my assertion that blood damage being the highest among all tanks was perfectly fine considering they had the lowest mobility and utility, which is a point I've actually proven, despite your childish denial. So no, I don't think a " tank is only worth by his utility", this is something that you put in my mouth for no reason at all. I judge a tank (and every other class/spec too) by his ability to do it's work, and I also said it in my previous post, but I also consider whatever extra it might brings (like the paladin bringing aoe heal and defenses, or dh bringing a weak defense cd or a mini spirit link). You think using a couple gdc to perform an out-of-role job is stupid, I think it marks the difference between a sandbag holding aggro and a good tank.

Keep ignoring the fact that in fights where mass grip is not needed we offer ZERO utility, keep rejecting other tanks utility as if they were worth nothing, and keep bragging how good you are with alpha access. I guess we're cool now, we can free this topic from this futile discussion.

[Raiju]

How about instead of tearing eachother apart over whos raid utilty is slightly more situational how about we band together against paladins?

[Philondra]

It's a shame that the mostly civil discussion here has turned sour.

It's very true that Gorefiend's Grasp/Death Grip won't be useful on all fights. However, they are virtually irreplaceable on fights where they can be used. It's not about the quantity of utility a spec has, it's about the quality--I can't picture a bear using Remove Corruption or a prot paladin using Flash of Light.

Another lesser form of utility that we have is that our interrupt is 15 yards instead of the standard melee range.

[Kapaya]

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You started with the personal attacks and then you're calling me a 5y.o kid? My first comment was for the people who kept crying about the damage nerf, and you suddendly started talking about me having no clue what other tanks bring and you took offense in a comment that had no anomosity in it (whateveryouthinkisamazingutilitythatatankshouldbedoing). Yes, I got petty last night and decided to bite back, but nontheless, you derailed a civil discussion cause you took my chose of wording to heart. DK doing high damage is fine, everyone agrees on that. My comments about utility is the list you made that was completly unnessecary (and false seeing as you missed the DK talents that would have done the same thing), where everything you commented about is easily covered by any other role in that class, except for DK's where only Blood have grip which has been proven being stupidly strong. There is only one tank class that has both quality and quantity in utility, and that's Prot Paladin mostly cause there's never a case of too many CD's during any PvE or PvP content.

[redfella]

..there is no other damn reason to bring a tank other than to keep aggro, do as much damage as possible and to not die (or make healers spend too much mana on said tank). There is no such thing as "help out your raid" in serious raiding..

This is one of the weirdest things I've read here, and coming from a Mythic raider I think it's even more confusing. Not caring about helping your raid where you could vs. for example postponing Chi Burst on Monk by 5-10 seconds to line it with raidwide AoE make no sense to me. Using WoD as an example, healing your raid for 500k via Chi Burst means you effectively gave half a health pot to all your raid members during heavy AoE, and when you do this multiple times in a fight, I'd say it's quote worthwhile.

..that's just one example. What I'm trying to point out here is the fact, that if you are raiding in a top guild and going against encounters tuned for a bit higher ilvl, a bit of utility can be helpful and can be the difference between a wipe/kill, even when said job isn't strictly in your role, e.g. Healer helping to pass some DPS check, DPS used to be able to help with HPS checks etc. Saying there is no such thing as "help out your raid" outside of your main role in a fight, in serious raiding, is simply not true.

Why would I not mock DH sigils? The grip is weaker (which you would know if you had beta access) and the AoE fear breaks on damage so it's completely fucking useless (oh and btw, DK's also have AoE fear with a CD a lot lower than sigil, but again, you completely ignored that talent cause reasons). If I want AoE silence, I'll bring a Boomkin.

AoE silence with a larger radius than Boomkins beam is, for all intents and purposes, better than what Boomkins offer. One second delay is manageable when you have timers or are expecting the cast. Their fear sigil also works as a AoE interrupt. DH grip is about the same value than Druid Vortex+Typhoon grip, but wastes only one GCD. I don't really get the "best or pure shit" attitude your choice of words seem to indicate, sorry if I misunderstood your meaning.

You tank your way, I tank mine, no need to comment on abilities you have no clue about. There's a reason I've had Alpha access since the first mass mythic cleared wave went out and you still don't :^)

Wow. I won't even go into why you shouldn't talk to people in such a condescending tone.. I do need to straighten out that alpha invites were not given automatically for "mythic cleared". I still have bunch of guildies missing access while they had cleared all of the content back in November/December.



Protadin is pretty much the only tank that can offer a variety of utility in pretty much all encounters, but other tanks have niches that are very useful too. No tank, imho, is shit tier in that aspect and in the grand scheme of things.

In the end of day, tank utility is for min/maxing and won't make or break a fight apart from DK mass grip if Blizz decides to be as retarded in Legion as they were in HFC. For example, I can honestly say Xhul'Horac/Mannoroth with and without DKs felt like different fights to progress on.

[Kapaya]

This is one of the weirdest things I've read here, and coming from a Mythic raider I think it's even more confusing. Not caring about helping your raid where you could vs. for example postponing Chi Burst on Monk by 5-10 seconds to line it with raidwide AoE make no sense to me. Using WoD as an example, healing your raid for 500k via Chi Burst means you effectively gave half a health pot to all your raid members during heavy AoE, and when you do this multiple times in a fight, I'd say it's quote worthwhile.

Yes, it's good utility but again, I am not arguing against utility of other classes, I am talking that no one else brings the utility DK does and it should not be dismissed as something weak and the only reason DK should top damage is cause they don't bring a ton of utility.

AoE silence with a larger radius than Boomkins beam is, for all intents and purposes, better than what Boomkins offer. One second delay is manageable when you have timers or are expecting the cast. Their fear sigil also works as a AoE interrupt. DH grip is about the same value than Druid Vortex+Typhoon grip, but wastes only one GCD. I don't really get the "best or pure shit" attitude your choice of words seem to indicate, sorry if I misunderstood your meaning.

I am not saying it's best or pure shit, not at all, in fact I am stating the opposite: Other roles bring the utility that you're asking, it does not have to be a tank, but the one utility Blood DK brings in Legion no one else does. While you can achieve similar results with DH grip or Vortex/Typhoon, it is not the same and you know that to be very true. By the time you get everything together (not on top of eachother like grip), the adds are already stunned and dying if a DK did it.

Wow. I won't even go into why you shouldn't talk to people in such a condescending tone..

Yes, that was petty of me. Like I said, I decided to bite back last night cause being treated like an idiot cause you don't agree with someone is pretty upsetting.

[Deleted]

I dont know if i missed this in the thread, but does bloodfeast artifact talent heal counts heart strike cleave damage or just the main target hit?

[shonist]

that moment when you are reading a blood dk post and you end knowing when a guys use your druid spells or not.

:/

[Deleted]

I have a feeling blood will be the best scaling tank in Legion along with druids, that's the way it feels on the beta anyway. Obviously it's impossible to tell without access to multiple tiers and such, but from a class mechanics perspective that's my general feeling anyway.

[Zeckka]

Do any other bloods feel like blood shield could be stronger? I mean compared to a Warriors new Ignore Pain it seems so small.

I guess outside of talents Warriors have no self heal but I mean that's the iconic Blood Death Knight theme.

Thoughts?

[redfella]

While you can achieve similar results with DH grip or Vortex/Typhoon, it is not the same and you know that to be very true. By the time you get everything together (not on top of eachother like grip), the adds are already stunned and dying if a DK did it.

Very true about it being miles ahead of the alternatives, but at least there is more alternatives now so getting the best mass grip will no longer be such a high priority, while it will certainly be a bonus.

Adds being stunned before grip has been an issue for some guilds already and it's more about players being stupid than something that will surely happend with better raiders.

Do any other bloods feel like blood shield could be stronger? .. I mean that's the iconic Blood Death Knight theme. Thoughts?

They wanted to tone down selfhealing across the board for Legion, so DK taking a big hit is not unexpected. Instead of the bursty healing and health spikes they've brought DK to a better place imho, where the healing is constantly trickling in via Blood Plague, smaller Death Strikes and other abilities and on the flipside we've gone from getting spiked a lot to handling incoming damage better.

I like the change, even thought I do miss those big Death Strikes at times.

[Keiyra]

The extra healing is nothing to shun if it means you can take one less healer to an encounter since Affinities might let you help enough to squeeze that little bit of extra healing required. Same can be said if they manage to make the Feral/Moonkin affinities work for increased single target burst / aoe burst in situations where you want to take an extra healer instead of a DPS in to an encounter.

Have you even tried the affinities? They are no wear near what you are suggesting. Taking one less healer, HAH. The affinities are basically garbage except for their passives and that's not changing without a drastic redesign (and we know thats not happening anytime soon).

[Deleted]

Do any other bloods feel like blood shield could be stronger? I mean compared to a Warriors new Ignore Pain it seems so small.

I guess outside of talents Warriors have no self heal but I mean that's the iconic Blood Death Knight theme.

Thoughts?

It get significantly stronger with artifact traits and the fact that you have more or less 100% uptime on it makes it pretty strong in the long run. I do know what you mean though but I feel that it would be too strong without the uptime being lowered.

I'd rather see a little increased base healing on DS as there's points where you can get one large DS off but the next one heals an insignificant amount due to low damage intake in the last 5 seconds, but it's a minor issue of mistiming the second one so you can work around it and I can live with a minor weakness. As blood is more than solid on the beta right now.

[Deleted]

I am not certain this has been posted, but I just got the "hidden skin" for Blood from the withered treasure scenario.

I don't know how to post pictures, so here is the imgur link:

http://imgur.com/a/xNVAg

[Raiju]

Yes, it's good utility but again, I am not arguing against utility of other classes, I am talking that no one else brings the utility DK does and it should not be dismissed as something weak and the only reason DK should top damage is cause they don't bring a ton of utility.

DK's advantage with grip is very nice - but being over emphasized because of the current tier we are in. Never have we had such a night & day difference to ahving GG available, and likely we never will.

I'd also refrain from bragging about getting into legion beta because you managed to kill archimonde before end of 2015. Particularly if your attitude towards tanking is to do the minimum required in what is undebatably the easiest role in raiding, should you just do the minimum.

[Hashcrypt]

Not to get too offtopic, but do any beta testers have experience with Blood PvP? Wondering how viable they are and what niche they're filling in bg's and arenas.

[Gemini Soul]

I wonder with them removing IBF our "Shield Wall" if we are going to be gimped on certain boss mechanics where a flat 40% DR for X seconds is extremely useful. Our 3 min CD is 40% parry for 8 seconds, not everything can be parried and at only 40% it has 60% minus your normal parry of not working.

[Highwhale]

One of the best DK utility - AMZ. I don't how it on Legion but in WoD if used with good % of resolve it can absorb more damage than your HP pool.