Learning to play Unholy. Feels very hectic for newcomer?

[Hielolanza]

I primarily main mage but want to learn DK for fun and as an alternate dps class. Coming from mage playing a death knight feels very hectic compared to the more simple proc based gameplay of a Frost Mage. Using plague leech/blood tap/defile there's a lot of cooldown tracking while also managing what sometimes feels like 4 seperate interrelated resources (runes, runic power, blood charges, diseases as a source of runes w/ plague leech) is quite difficult and my weakauras are quickly becoming pretty cluttered. Sudden doom as a proc also feels like it works against the goal of avoiding runic power capping at times, and I don't want to even think about properly pooling runic power to maintain max dark transformation. Any advice to learning to properly play Unholy instead of constantly feeling like a fish gasping for breath?

[Deleted]

IMO you should go for tunic corruption and necroting plague atleast for more then 1 target, while it is not the strongest it is kind of easy and you dont need to watch for ressources that much. Also it is kind if common to cap ressources while bloodlust is active and at the pull it can happren too. When you decide to play with NP then go for unholy blight too.

[Coalbane]

You can take Runic Corruption instead of Blood Tap. The difference in overall dps is small and you'll have one less resource to manage. Then focus on using your main resources, Runes and Runic Power, without letting them cap. The goal is to prevent them from capping; you don't have to keep them fully depleted. You'll get used to the feel of how expending one type of resource will directly or indirectly lead to gaining the other type. Weaving in Plague Leech for "free runes" will come with practice. Pooling RP for DT is only a small gain and not worth worrying yourself about right now. After you get a feel for the ebb and flow of Runes and Runic Power, you can focus on pressing damage buttons in the optimal way. Learning to manage your resources is key.

[Dnusha]

dk is a heroic class man, not for noobs like yerselv trollface.jpg


seriously though, start from learning how/when your runes transform from one to another (order) so you could plan you actions further. (i recommend CompactRunes addon). (THIS WAS IMPORTANT PART OF THIS MESSAGE)


Then use your normal rotation, spam ss,fs, at 80-90 RP use DC(use SD every time, you never know when you can get another proc), if you see that abom is fading from your pet (weak auras, tmw will help you) start to store your rp so you could get abom back asap. Use soul reaper all the time (weak auras, tmw). Dnd- a little better than ss, defile does almost 3x dnd dmg, use it all the time or save for a few sec if AOE phase is incoming.

about plague leech and blood tap:
plague leech is basically 2 free death runes every 45 sec on demand. why no like? everything is awesome about his talent. for pve most of the time it means free 2ss or 1PS+1ss.

blood tap is another 2 free death runes on demand but you need to stack teh buff with DC to get them(12 stacks, 5 per rune). awesome on demand runes! (just don't cap stacks from death coil) btw Runic corruption is also pretty good (difference is minimal, if you find yourself too overwhelmed with buttons).

both talents are very good if you know when to use them (i.e. trinket procs, aoe phase free bloodboils, free rp for sindragosa, numerous pvp situations). look at them as your small cooldowns and gap closers.(need a rune for soul reaper, dnd, strangulate)

and don't forget DK is a heroic class, man, it's not some two button disaster-excuse-of-a-class (like a lot of classes post 6.0)

[Hielolanza]

You can take Runic Corruption instead of Blood Tap. The difference in overall dps is small and you'll have one less resource to manage. Then focus on using your main resources, Runes and Runic Power, without letting them cap. The goal is to prevent them from capping; you don't have to keep them fully depleted. You'll get used to the feel of how expending one type of resource will directly or indirectly lead to gaining the other type. Weaving in Plague Leech for "free runes" will come with practice. Pooling RP for DT is only a small gain and not worth worrying yourself about right now. After you get a feel for the ebb and flow of Runes and Runic Power, you can focus on pressing damage buttons in the optimal way. Learning to manage your resources is key.

thanks I'll take that too heart, maybe I'm too used to mage where keeping any resource (proc or cd) up for too long can be damning.

dk is a heroic class man, not for noobs like yerselv trollface.jpg

simply ebin

[Deleted]

Maybe I can chime in to help you a little, being a Mage myself. What greatly helped me improve my play was to learn which spells use which runes. Blood Boil? Blood Rune. Plague Strike? Unholy Rune. Icy Touch? Frost Rune. While those are just very basic examples it is the first step in properly managing your runes. Spending runic power requires a little less preparation and planning. You basically never want to let it get capped. There are moments in which that isn't possible but generally speaking you should use your runic power while waiting for runes to come back up.
Other than that, you can try different specs. Try tanking once in a while, try frost if you're feeling like it. Just play as much as possible and you will get experience on how to manage everything.

[Deleted]

Read through Skullflower's guide, It's the best one available.

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1...O8/edit?pli=1#

[Deverick]

Like others have said, go through Skullflower's guide and just play your DK a lot. Go through LFR, Heroics, and best of all Challenge Mode dungeons. Try to find a consistent Challenge Mode group, friends of mine have called it the Hyperbolic Time Chamber of WoW. It improves your skill in your particular class and as a player. You can read all the guides you want but you'll need to practice, practice, practice.

[Maxweii]

Best advice would just be practice. DK has a baseline 1s gcd, so it more then likely will feel very fast compared to how a mage is with it's procs and cast times. All specs inherantly have a high APM, Frost being a bit lower because of the slow down, but even then they all play very fast. It's just a class that takes practice to get into the flow of, especially Unholy with it's many resources and forms of damage.

Skull's guide will def set you on the right path to being able to get good practice in!

[Evida]

about plague leech and blood tap:
plague leech is basically 2 free death runes every 45 sec on demand.

every 25 sec...

[Barael]

I main tanked every T10-T15 heroic raid boss (except Sha of Fear) on my DK and all I got to say about the Reaping bug:



So I wouldn't worry if the "advanced" UH mechanics seem a bit... opaque. You're not alone.

[Alanar]

Like others have said, go through Skullflower's guide and just play your DK a lot. Go through LFR, Heroics, and best of all Challenge Mode dungeons. Try to find a consistent Challenge Mode group, friends of mine have called it the Hyperbolic Time Chamber of WoW. It improves your skill in your particular class and as a player. You can read all the guides you want but you'll need to practice, practice, practice.

I like that bold part a lot,

Well played