Instead of reviving my old thread, I've decided to make a new one to reflect fixes/tweaks to blood as well as reiterate current concerns with blood in general.
1. Excessive downtime for blood on beta compared to live which makes the rotation fill slightly clunky, this was caused by the 1 second gcd being made baseline. However, this has resulted in a rather high downtime for us as tanks (I believe the exact number is 34%) which leaves us to twiddling our thumbs a fair bit. Many have suggested that the reintroduction of crimson scourge as well as reducing the cost of rune strike from 30 to 20 rp can and will fix our downtime issue and should be added, there are of course other options and we would gladly welcome them. Point being of course, is it is a known issue and we would like our downtime to shrink back to something normal like it is on live (I believe the number is around 16%). - While we wish for our downtime to drastically decrease we do NOT want a band aid fix via returning us to the 1.5 gcd. What we want is a reduced rp cost cost to rune strike and the return of our original blood tap so we can continue our game play as it is on live a la gaming runes and then using bt to fill in the gap.
2. Blood dks like myself have repeatedly asked for a raid cd and our requests have fallen on deaf ears, I strongly feel Blizz should finally sort this out for us. The following is a lore based exampled for a raid cd:
Pact of the Dark Fallen: corrupts the ground around the death knight and his allies placing an absorption shield which protects them for 20% of all incoming damage, lasts 10 seconds. 3 minute cd (Note this ability does not benefit the user, only the raid)
The reason I have chosen the name 'Pact of the Dark Fallen' is because it's roots lay in ICC just as many of the new dk abilities from cata do. I have chosen to borrow the name from the Blood-Queen Lana'thel encounter because it fits perfectly with the current blood dk lore. Just as she was a vampire who drained the life force of her targets to sustained her self, we too do the same. We drain the very life essence from our targets to both heal and shield ourselves from further damage. Furthermore, the name fits into the lore of dks as a whole because, we are in fact, the dark fallen and made a pact to defend Azeroth the moment we broke free from the Lich King's grasp at Light's Hope Chapel.
3. Return abomination's might to us. I know that might has been converted to provide 5% mastery instead of an ap boost with mana regen, that being said, paladins should not be the only tanking class to provide the buff. I would like to see abomination's might returned to blood dks so that we too can provide the mastery buff in mists.
- In regards to both 2 and 3, the reason we have continuously asked for both a raid cd as well as a buff is because we are currently the ONLY tanks who provide neither. If it is in fact the dev's intention to balance all tanks on the active mitigation scale and make them as equal as possible blood dks will be sat for tanks who DO provide the aforementioned types of utility. This is why we insist you be given both a competitive raid cd as well as an updated might buff for the raid.
4. We are currently missing 10% added armor due to the removal of toughness. Paladins and Protection Warriors get 10% passive armor buffs. We would like for our to be balanced and the 10% armor added back as well as our 6% damage reduction perhaps in the form of a buff to blood presence. - The armor buff was given at the beginning of Dragon Soul to finally solve our spike damage issues. Its removal along with the 6% damage reduction from blade barrier leave us susceptible to spike damage. Please return these abilities to us.
5. Seeing as paladins gain charges of holy power from the use of both crusader strike and hammer of the righteous, we dks should gain scent of of blood stacks from heart strike. This would allow for more synergy and over all tanking class balance by giving a purpose to heart strike aside from mere threat.
List of issues that have been or will be fixed in the next beta build:
1. Scarlet Fever now also causes your Blood Boil to refresh your diseases on targets it damages.
2. Blood Boil base damage has been increased by 80% and AP Scaling increased to 19.2% from 9.6%.
3. Death Strike weapon damage increased by 33% and additional damage increased by 79%.
4. Soul Reaper is now a Blood Specialization spell, costs 1 Blood.
I would like to thank the devs for the current fixes to blood. We are all most appreciative and look forward to further fixes and tweaks to blood.