Unholy DK Alpha Testers, Please Read! (Unholy Legion Discussion)

[pixelated senpai]

i mean obviously try 8 but are you asking like
if u have 5-7 wounds should you fester again, or just apocalypse right there
im not sure if thats answered with tuning yet whats more dmg efficient

yes, this is pretty much what im asking. So ideally 8 stacks every time in a perfect world, but would less that 8 but more than 4 be ok or how ever the amount.

[Deleted]

i mean obviously try 8 but are you asking like
if u have 5-7 wounds should you fester again, or just apocalypse right there
im not sure if thats answered with tuning yet whats more dmg efficient

8 is still preferable considering that's more ghouls doing dmg, stacking debuffs and exploding for dmg. But that just might be me due to using Bursting Sores.

Single ghoul > Scourge Strike DMG-wise (with traits and so on)

[Deleted]

still wish belcher was larger just looks silly at currentsize,but at same time quite funny aswell. And could you say why its favored?

The ghoul's 'AOE' is a frontal cone. The Belcher's is a 360° gas cloud. Plus like Maxweii side, it has more base health. The grip is also useful situationally, it's just a little clunky as you have to manually move it to where you want the add to be grabbed.

Quick question, how many festering wounds should i have before using apoc?

8 stacks, no ifs or buts - especially when you take the traits that 1) make them explode when they die 2) trait that makes them give debuffs

[Deleted]

Also dont forget ghouls apply claw debuffs as well. Just dont use apocalypse without 8 wounds. if you've got 7, just burst 1/2 and fester again, or wait for talent to kick in from pet, or something. I cant ever see a solution where non 8 is a good choice.

[Maxweii]

8 is still preferable considering that's more ghouls doing dmg, stacking debuffs and exploding for dmg. But that just might be me due to using Bursting Sores.

Single ghoul > Scourge Strike DMG-wise (with traits and so on)

Unless you're talking about doing say a dungeon at 100 right after you get the weapon, we don't have apoc yet

[Deleted]

Unless you're talking about doing say a dungeon at 100 right after you get the weapon, we don't have apoc yet

What do you mean by we don't have it?

Obv I mean Beta.

[Maxweii]

What do you mean by we don't have it?

Obv I mean Beta.

Mmmm I think I got mixed up in all the prepatch talk and such and though it was being mentioned in the sense of when we didnt have the artifact yet :x

[Deleted]

With 7.0 right around the corner, do we have any information about when to expect the first sims for the patch?

[Kainslife]

With 7.0 right around the corner, do we have any information about when to expect the first sims for the patch?

AMR has the sims set up for Unholy and Frost already.

[Deleted]

AMR has the sims set up for Unholy and Frost already.

Don't put much faith into AMR sims just yet, until they're verified by the usual sim sources. I believe a few specs have come up wrong from the AMR side. Not sure how Unholy holds up, but I'd wait on multiple sources.

Besides, we already know sims for stats and talents and the rotations are pretty set in stone now the bugs are fixed.

[Maxweii]

Don't put much faith into AMR sims just yet, until they're verified by the usual sim sources. I believe a few specs have come up wrong from the AMR side. Not sure how Unholy holds up, but I'd wait on multiple sources.

Besides, we already know sims for stats and talents and the rotations are pretty set in stone now the bugs are fixed.

Careful, mentioning those sims like that will summon a post saying how well tuned and good they are. It's like magic.

[Deleted]

i want to ask if anyone has tried using DS instead of deathcoil while DA is up, DS costs 45 rp( not sure correct me if im wrong) and dc costs 35rp, so shouldnt it be better to use Deathstrikes instead of deathcoils during da, since you get 10% more dmg on it in same gcd. or does ds rp spent not effect da? if anyone has tried pls say so

[Kainslife]

Don't put much faith into AMR sims just yet, until they're verified by the usual sim sources. I believe a few specs have come up wrong from the AMR side. Not sure how Unholy holds up, but I'd wait on multiple sources.

Besides, we already know sims for stats and talents and the rotations are pretty set in stone now the bugs are fixed.

I mean they're publicly verifiable and they've worked directly with SimCraft so I think we can trust them.

[Kronik85]

Can anyone link these AMR sims please. Having no joy on the webby itself.

[Deleted]

I mean they're publicly verifiable and they've worked directly with SimCraft so I think we can trust them.

We'll have to wait and see once other sim sources are available.

Can anyone link these AMR sims please. Having no joy on the webby itself.

Link here.

[Zoopercat]

@Veilyn You can verify everything on the spell wiki. For example, I picked a spell at random, Frost Fever. You can see everything about it to know if it's working correctly. But if you don't want to verify things, not to worry. We've had a LOT of people testing out the DK simulations, and had 2 people work with us to QA every ability for DKs (and some other classes, we're still working through some classes for triple verification).

Our process: we test each spell out in game to make sure the dmg matches what the simulator shows. While the community verifies everything, we also work with a couple of people to specifically check each spell one by one. This is why the simulator has so few bugs now. The amount of triple checking we do is pretty crazy. But that doesn't mean it's bug free, by any means. So if you find something, let us know. As of right now, there are no outstanding mechanic bugs.

As for the APLs (rotations). If you see a default rotation, it means it's pretty solid. I'm sure it can be improved, but the idea is you'll see small improvements (as opposed to large jumps). If you see a "template" rotation however, it needs more love. In those cases, it wouldn't be uncommon to see big improvements in damage when fiddling with the APL.

Like Kainslife said, we also work directly with the SimC folks, sharing info and bug reports back and forth. We're all just geeks here, and having 2 simulators is making both better and both more reliable
@Maxweii the magic fairies summoned me! Hello


edit: Important note: The simulator is for Legion, and we have all of the legion set bonuses, trinkets, legendaries, artifact traits, etc implemented. HOWEVER!!! WE do not have WoD T18 sets or trinkets implemented. So keep that in mind if you're testing pre-patch stuff. That will skew results (and make them not very useful)

[Loot]

edit: nvmmmmm

[Deleted]

snip

Don't answer my doubts with well constructed thoughts and logic - how dare you! Jokes aside, I'll definitely go check it out and work my way through - thank you for the reply!

edit: nvmmmmm

Prepare for DA ~15 seconds before it comes off of CD. Build up 8 stacks of Festering Wounds and 100 RP. When it's used, dump RP, pop all wounds and continue dumping RP.

[Makro]

After beating the crap out of the garrison trayning dummy on the PTR, I finally got into beta and started beating on the order hall one.
I really liked unholy on the PTR and I still love its concept, but playing it with full artifact is a whole new beast.

Don't you guys feel like it has a lot of abilities/talents/traits working against each other? I'll try to explain what I mean...

Dark Arbiter requires pooling SD proc(s) and enough RP for 3 DCs (and possibly 8 wounds for fast RP from Apoc).
Apoc requires 8 wounds for the maximum result.
Shadow Infusion promotes pooling RP to DC when DT expires or, alternatively, Necrosis promotes alternating SS/CS to DC.
Finally, we have Scourge of Worlds that makes you pool runes (and ideally wounds) before using DC in order to cast as many SS/CS as possible.

All the above elements are pretty straightforward and sound interesting on their own, but when combined I feel they create a huge mess.

For example: Apoc is coming off cd so you start building your 8 wounds (doing so without overcapping wounds is pretty annoying btw), SD procs and/or you need to DC to avoid overcapping RP and you get a SoW proc. You are now supposed to spam SS/CS as much as you can, but doing so will consume the wounds you were building for Apoc.

Something similar happens when you get a SoW proc during Arbiter: you are now supposed to spam SS/CS to use the proc but, at the same time, you have 3xDC ready that you really wanna cast asap to buff Arbiter.
Not to mention the fact that if DT ends right after Arbiter DC spam, you have no resources to trigger Shadow Infusion (if you picked the talent).

Last but not least, Necrosis might even end up being the best talent of the row on paper (probably in combination with CS and a lot of mastery) but can't be used properly every time you have to cast DC or SS/CS back to back (as already pointed in the awesome google doc linked by Veilyn 4 days ago).

I also don't like much the fact that it's worth using SS/CS without wounds during SoW (is it still the case?), but I usually have zero wounds only right after Apoc so I can live with it.

Now, I know sims and in-game testing will provide a priority list to follow (that will most likely tell me to ignore Necrosis/Shadow Infusion/SoW procs during Arbiter and while building wounds for Apoc), but to me it doesn't feel right. I like procs and I don't like wasting them, so when I find myself in a situation where I hope nothing procs (and this situation was not caused by personal error), I'm not exactly happy.

...or did I miss something and I'm playing it entirely wrong?

[Inhubad]

I'm going to answer this in a real simple way.

First, you no longer have to pool ressource for your ghoul, because it works on the cooldown of Dark Transformation. It still work when the buff is active. So one thing to no longer worry about.

The main idea here is to maximize the most damaging ability, in this case Dark Arbitrer. You no longer care about SoW or wounds when DA is up you only want to spend as much RP as you can. There are ways to take care of the other two when DA is up, like priotizing FeS, wich does give more RP per GCD so we like that. During DA you've have to see every GCD filled with a DC as massive DPS increase with every next GCD having a lower value. Casting 1 DC at the start is worth a lot more than casting 3 at the end. So during DA when you don't have RP, you have to ask yourself what's the next ability that will permit me to do more DC in the next 10 second. Usually the answer is FeS, but sometimes you only have 1 rune and you can't wait for 1 to come up, because you'll do a 7s DC instead of a 6s one, so you SS/CS.

The second most damaging ability is Apocalypse, the ghouls do a lot of damage with the damage increase, DoT, melee, and the explosion when they die. It's worth a lot more than a 30% increase on a couple of SS/CS, use it before DA, so the ghoul can apply there dot and you won't waste a GCD during DA

Necrosis is shit because it forces a style of play that never fitted unholy. Everytime you'll prepare for something or pop a CD you'll simply forget Necrosis.

For SoW, when it was 50% it was completly worth it to spam SS/CS without wounds, but with a 30% buff I don't think it's the case anymore, here's what I do. I always try to stay above 3 wounds, so when SoW proc there is lesser chance I'll have to FeS.

Necrosis and SoW are rotation increase, while DA and Apoc are CD increase wich have a lot more impact.