Thoughts on Tanking and Blood going into Legion (LONG)

[Mayonnaise]

You should never be using that enchant.

lol ok sure.

[ShiyoKozuki]

lol ok sure.

What's your argument?
5% armor and 5% all stats is really weak compared to fallen crusader's DPS boost.

If something is hitting so hard that that 5% armor will matter(it won't, it's like 1-2% DR), the DPS boost of fallen crusader will reduce the amount of damage you take by killing the boss faster, plus some self healing from the proc.

It's not a good enchant.

[Hanzzy]

You can disagree, just know what your opinion is FACTUALLY wrong.


http://www.wowhead.com/talent-calc/warrior/protection
http://www.wowhead.com/talent-calc/death-knight/blood
CC:
WAR:
Shockwave is one of the best mitigation abilities in the game on trash, giving healers 4 seconds to "catch up" and stopping scary trash mechanics.
DK:
Aphyxiate is single target only and has OVER DOUBLE IT'S COOLDOWN when not hitting 3+ targets.

Mobility:
DK:
Wraith walk is slow and clunky, also a heft cooldown.
WAR:
1200 yard range leap that can be talented to 30 seconds, 2 charges/intervenves. Tied with DH for best tank mobility.

Passive DR:
DK: None. No shield, lower base armor than HOLY PALADINS.
Warrior: 30%+ Block of 30% DR, 30%+ crit block rate. Higher base armor due to having a shield.

100% uptime mitigation DR:
DK:
17% to all damage
WAR:
30% DR on all auto-attacks

Active mitigation:
DK:
Death strike. Heals for ~300k per 45 RP. Scales with max HP and damage taken in last 5 seconds.
WAR: Ignore pain, shield for up to millions. Base amount at max range is around 1m. Have seen a 3m ignore pain. Scales with attack power(weapon, str, etc).

Self healing:
DK:
Consumption, heals for ~150-300k per target. Good AOE healing, bad ST. 45s CD.
WAR:
Victory rush, only after killing a target. Not consistent, rarely used.
Impending victory, talent only. 15% of max hp. 30s CD

Defensive CD's:
DK:
Vamp blood, no damage reduction. +45% healing received and max HP. CD varies, 1.5m cd base, ~45s in reality.
DRW, 40% parry, no damage reduction. 3m cd
AMS, absorbs ~500k magic only damage. 1m cd
WAR:
Demo shout. AOE -20% dmg taken debuff on enemies. 1.5m CD
Shield reflect, 30% magic damage reduction, 25s CD.
Shield wall, 40% DR. 4m CD
Last stand, +60% hp max hp.

Artifact trees:
DK:
6% armor 22% stam
WAR: 28% armor

As you can see, warriors have a better kit in literally every single way you possibly can as a tank.

1) Opinions can't be "factually wrong" as opinion's have no basis in fact.
2) I don't care what some other class has or doesn't have.
3) If a warrior tanks a boss and it dies, awesome.
4) If a DK tanks a boss and it dies, awesome.
5) You worry to much about what other classes can do, if you like the warrior so much better - go play the warrior.

I'm confident playing a DK will not impact myself, or my group's ability to clear the content that game will be presenting to us. If that does become the case, I will come back and post that I was incorrect.

Quick Edit: Vamp blood, 45sec CD you need to work on your runic power generation, I prob have it up every 30seconds (ish). Death strike also heals me for way more then 300k, you need to time it right after big boss hits, I've had it into the 600-700k (with out vamp blood).

[Mayonnaise]

lol fallen crusaders heal is like a band aid. also not everyone is trying to argue on this site. i guess the weapon enchants are just opinionated because i rather have the armor and stat increase than occasional %15 str and a basically non existent heal. to each their own, champ.

[Deleted]

lol fallen crusaders heal is like a band aid. also not everyone is trying to argue on this site. i guess the weapon enchants are just opinionated because i rather have the armor and stat increase than occasional %15 str and a basically non existent heal. to each their own, champ.

I haven't seen any discussion regarding the enchants, but at least in the past Fallen Crusader has always been better than the "tank enchants".

The question remains which is better now; 5% armor + stats vs 15% str + heal? Is it a "i'd rather have X" or is there a clear winner?

[redfella]

@Hanzzy: class balance is not and never will be an opinion, no matter how hard you try to say so.

@Mayonnaisse: Fallen Crusader is superior to Stoneskin Gargoyle in every way, it's a trap enchant and has been for years.

Something being better than something else is not an opinion. Enchants,talents and classes aren't only aesthetic - there are clear power and utility values involved.

If you play in world 1000+ guilds these things don't matter THAT much because the problems that hinder your progress arise from general incompetence of many raiders in the group, rather than a few percentage differences here and there.

[Mayonnaise]

@Hanzzy: class balance is not and never will be an opinion, no matter how hard you try to say so.

@Mayonnaisse: Fallen Crusader is superior to Stoneskin Gargoyle in every way, it's a trap enchant and has been for years.

Something being better than something else is not an opinion. Enchants,talents and classes aren't only aesthetic - there are clear power and utility values involved.

If you play in world 1000+ guilds these things don't matter THAT much because the problems that hinder your progress arise from general incompetence of many raiders in the group, rather than a few percentage differences here and there.

oh fantastic then. if you would be so kindly to show me where fallen crusader is better in every way i will be happily to switch to it. winky face.

[Deleted]

After doing some mythic dungeons on an 826 Blood DK, it's pretty tough. Granted, I don't have that many points in the artifact, I have 13, because it's my off-spec. But still a lot harder than my Brewmaster, who's also not a good tank.

[Mayonnaise]

I haven't seen any discussion regarding the enchants, but at least in the past Fallen Crusader has always been better than the "tank enchants".

The question remains which is better now; 5% armor + stats vs 15% str + heal? Is it a "i'd rather have X" or is there a clear winner?

i pref is stoneskin for progression and fallen for out gearing. i dont know what the best is either but i prefer the stats

[Khiyone]

i pref is stoneskin for progression and fallen for out gearing. i dont know what the best is either but i prefer the stats

You don't need Stoneskin Gargoyle even on progression. Fallen Crusader's increase isn't "occasional" either, it's generally ~70% uptime and can be more (haste-scaling rppm).

[Mayonnaise]

You don't need Stoneskin Gargoyle even on progression. Fallen Crusader's increase isn't "occasional" either, it's generally ~70% uptime and can be more (haste-scaling rppm).

thats super cool, but is there any evidence that actually backs up that claim or nahhhh??

[Tehr]

<SNIP>
As you can see, warriors have a better kit in literally every single way you possibly can as a tank.

I have gotten Death Strikes in the millions before, so while I agree that Ignore Pain is superior, I think that Death Strike is definitely nothing to scoff at (also, see below for my logs, I averaged 500k Death Strikes in the logs I kept for 7/8 Mythics). Additionally, I would contend that Vampiric Blood is the best defensive CD in the game right now. Your uptime is at minimum 20%, and when considering how dungeon pulls work, that moves closer to 50% since the CD . Additionally, because it affects external healing on you, it's roughly equivalent to a normal damage reduction (assuming incoming heals). It's kind of like Shield Wall and Last Stand combined in that way, except on a MUCH shorter CD.

I do personally think that Warrior is a better tank, especially in raids, even if only for the fact that Ignore Pain does better when a DK isn't taking enough damage to cause Death Strike to scale well, and their mobility is just a slap in the face to DKs, but I don't think that it's fair to say that Warrior outclasses DK in every way.

thats super cool, but is there any evidence that actually backs up that claim or nahhhh??

https://www.warcraftlogs.com/reports...et=4&options=8

Those were my Mythics last week (doesn't count Vault of the Wardens, we had to do that on another day because of time constraints).

Across every single pull, JUST the heal from Fallen Crusader averaged 8.83% of my total healing. It ticked 512 times, and I cast Death Strike 867 times, for an average of 203k and 509k heals, respectively.

https://www.warcraftlogs.com/reports...t=4&options=16

That is the same thing except it shows my buffs. I had a 71% uptime on the 15% strength buff, which is nothing to scoff at. Of course, this data is actually pretty misleading because it counts downtime for breaks and whatnot. If you assume that I kept up Bone Shield 100% of the time during actual combat (which is the case except for a few rare exceptions), then I actually had a 95% uptime. Even if you give yourself some wiggle room and cut it 5%, that's still 90% uptime.

While I think Stoneskin Gargoyle is definitely not as terrible as it used to be (lol 2% armor and stamina iirc), and the secondary stats DOES improve your offensive capabilities by a slim margin, I think that Fallen Crusader is without a doubt superior in every way.

[ShiyoKozuki]

Random question/thing I noticed(?):

Bone shields haste scales with haste. I'm getting 13% haste from it now instead of 10%, and when I get bloodlust I get even more haste from it. What's up with this?

[Saiyendra]

Random question/thing I noticed(?):

Bone shields haste scales with haste. I'm getting 13% haste from it now instead of 10%, and when I get bloodlust I get even more haste from it. What's up with this?

Separate haste effects are multiplicative.

[Tojara]

Death strike isn't bad, what's bad is our mastery. It made sense to nerf it to oblivion when we moved to death strike healing based on damage done in WoD, but we aren't at that level anymore. I don't remember the exact number, but we got 6.25 or 6.5% blood shield absorb per 1% of mastery. What do we get now? Like 2%? It's pretty pathetic honestly.

What adds to the above is that it makes one our artifact traits pretty bad when you consider a passing breeze will normally strip our blood shields. Realistically the only way you make much use out of unending thirst is incredibly trivial content, you're off tanking, or the encounter is purely magic damage. You can make use of it pooling and machine gunning death strikes, but that doesn't exactly 'fit' with how we have historically been played. Although to be honest, the last couple expansions really didn't need you to time death strikes at all so much as trying to keep abilities on CD and not trying to cap runes/RP.

If I'm just looking at whats currently available DKs seem absolutely fine, but I think what people in this thread and other notables who talk about balance are more concerned about is what inevitably is coming when harder content comes out. I can breeze through heroics just fine on my DK, and mythics really aren't that bad either. DKs are fine for that content.

What we ultimately suffer from when looking forward is our utility is completely gutted in favor of spreading it around to DHs and other classes. Our only real CD is pretty strong, but it's our only CD. Our artifact ability is strong, but only against several targets. Single target wise I feel pretty weak comparatively. It still floors me that mass grip is a 3 min CD base, while my alt DH (not counting being an elf) can interrupt an entire group 3 times in a single minute. Is it really against "class fantasy" that an ability such as gorefiend's that have been a staple of DKs be so gimped in comparison? It's pathetic really.

I don't think we are awful but I hate looking at my artifact tree because most of it sucks. Avoiding a bunch of the single point talents because they are bad should tell you something. Like said our active is shit unless there are a lot of targets and our golden traits really aren't that amazing save the VB one (but again, that ones terrible unless there are a lot of targets). Combine that with the lack of meaningful decisions in our base talent tree (to be fair this has been the case for years) and you don't really have a lot to be excited about. I can understand them nerfing red thirst a couple weeks ago, but it perplexes me that they can't see why the standard talent selection that we pick is the way it is. All those other talents are fucking garbage and need to be buffed or completely redesigned.

I guess it makes sense that they don't know what they are doing tank balance wise when you look at the tool kit of a warrior this expansion. Ignore pain being what it is should give you a good indication of this.

[Deleted]

I guess it makes sense that they don't know what they are doing tank balance wise when you look at the tool kit of a warrior this expansion. Ignore pain being what it is should give you a good indication of this.

Ignore pain is not a broken mechanic per se, and wars toolkit might be a bit exagereted but it's no so out of logic. It makes sense for wars to be the highest dr tanks, since they lack self healing and their dps is shit level. What makes IP so ridicolously overpowered is a high ap scaling, and the ability gets futher boosted by Never Surrender/Indomitable + Drango Scales and Dragon Skin. I guess everyone agrees that wars are in dire need of a general nerf, but sadly it won't happen for long, IF it will ever happen.

By the logic above, it would make sense for dks to be the lowest dr tanks due to their high selfhealing and damage. Sadly, Blizzard nerfed both multiple times, making the previous argument invalid. Even if viable, dks struggle to find something they really excel at, and I hope the devs will eventually reconsider what they did before the Nighthold opens.

[Deleted]

but sadly it won't happen for long, IF it will ever happen.

[Zeckka]

oh fantastic then. if you would be so kindly to show me where fallen crusader is better in every way i will be happily to switch to it. winky face.

Wait you're being serious? You actually use stoneskin? Lol

[Highwhale]

Stoneskin is better for tank in my opinion. 5% armor (considering our DR is low) is good plus i prefer have constant +5 str/stam than random proc of +15% str.

[Mayonnaise]

Wait you're being serious? You actually use stoneskin? Lol

*snort* hehe yeah.