Current Deathknight raid performance and how we got there.

[Deleted]

Hey fellas! After seeing 97% of the mythic content there is (at archi p3) and swapping from rogue back to my old DK main in middle of progress i noticed several lack of oomphf _in my opinion_ on our dps.



To give my opinion a better understanding, lets begin where the current raid started.

- Hellfire Citadel launches and with frost dk being considered top tier dps spec for the first time in 6 years at close to full bis gear.
Frost dk overperformed and was brought down with nerfs most of them reverting or lessening the buffs we got at patch. That nerf was success and was relatively well received within our community.

- Other strength dps begins to pull ahead pure dps classes as gear increases, especially warriors and retribution benefiting from trinkets far more than for example caster dps do. (while i still think that agility trinket was far more powerful than str trinkets combined since i played sub rogue at 98%ish bracket)

- Str trinkets get nerfed, and the already medium performing deathknights get hit twice by doing so. Currently we are being dead last class on single target with combat rogue, arms warrior and survival hunter doing it worse on SIMULATIONS!. On real life scenarios it does not look that bad but its still worse situation than any other class has.

I cannot speak for heroic/normal players since i don't raid at that level currently, but the picture i'm getting from them about the "we are doing great!"-sort of balance was being achieved because of playerbase consisting mostly from people unwilling to be the best they can be. And so, skewing the results as deathknights are easy to play and easier to master than most of the top performing dps specs in the game, making the average dk get better numbers than say average subtlety rogue.



What i'm hoping to accomplish with this thread is healthy discussion IF and WHY are we being on the low end of the dps once again (like in the last 2 expansions once geared), are we really doing that great/bad with all the evidence being accounted for and what should be done to bring this class the best it deserves.

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My thoughts about the things i'm probably going to be asked/accused of to save readers from endless flaming offtopic sea:

- "Why is nr1 dps on mythic Gorefiend Deathknight if we suck so much" Well the reason being the unique mechanic requiring delicate amount of damage to souls of the players inside Gorefiend. And we definitely have that thing sorted out with our diseases doing almost perfect amount of dps on them while we can focus killing adds/boss. Pair us with executing warrior and that mechanic is almost automatically being taken care of instead of assigning other classes to that task. This ofc lets things look pretty skewed up because of deathknights getting "free" source of damage compared to the rest who are told not to touch the souls.

- "I'm seeing mr streamer X from worldrank top20 guild doing really great on the stream and definitely not being the last on that fight, you´re lying!"
There are lot of things that can cause this that you are not observing well enough.
Most of the guilds that have the worlds best players are not streaming cutting edge content when they're progressing and what you are seeing might just be boss on farm, some dps trying to pad the meters.
Or that for example range dps are being assigned to do certain task that lowers their numbers compared to melee sitting on boss.
Maybe you are witnessing a truly dedicated streamer trying to give his best to look better on stream compared to other people on raid who are just doing "another farmboss" while possibly eating cookies while doing so and end up parsing low.
You might be witnessing some nice numbers caused by lucky say, breath of sindragosa streak that happens to caught your attention and suddenly that thing ends up being average, easily doable in your eyes as you're forgetting the bad pulls he made.

- "Why do top guilds keep deathknights if they're so poor as you say?" We are poor, but not poor enough for long time world's best DK players to abandon their favorite spec that maybe someday might end up getting a buff. And most of the hardest fights on Hellfire Citadel revolve around tactics utilizing our unique grip tools (Xul´horac, Archimonde, Mannoroth are much easier with grips) necessitating to keep death knights in roster for those interested in being the best guild possible. So there will always be deathknights raiding be they terrible or not.

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Some links that you might find useful:
http://www.simulationcraft.org/
https://www.warcraftlogs.com/statist...gregate=amount
As for how to read the logs, you have to learn that by yourself. For example that 4th place combat rogue is only being used only on fights that it totally overpowers against competition and so it ends up at the top of that meter against for example shadow priests that can't swap to better spec depending on fight.

Keep trolling and flaming to minimum please! These forums have rules that everyone must obey for your own good. I only want the best for us all! Peace 'n out

[Deleted]

Blizzard surely didn´t handle the nerfs perfectly, but some nerfs were clearly justified (maybe not to full extent). What pains me is that you are mixing up classes and specs at your free will just to make a point:

Currently we are being dead last class on single target with combat rogue, arms warrior and survival hunter doing it worse on SIMULATIONS!. On real life scenarios it does not look that bad but its still worse situation than any other class has.

So first you mention other specs perform a bit worse than frost on single target (which is true), but than you conclude that frost dk is the worst CLASS. This totally makes no sense. It´s not the worst spec (as you stated in the sentence before) and definitely not the worst class, since unholy is one of the better melee in single target. Furthermore simulations are just simulations and single target does only matter to a certain extent.

So while I agree with your points to some degree (mostly the nature of the sudden nerfs), I do not agree how you cherry pick your arguments because it invalidates your entire claim.

[Deleted]

Thanks for response! Yes i resorted to "cherrypicking" because i was anticipating someone to show up with something like: "but combat rogues and gladiator warriors are worse than most dk specs" while the specs that are lower than our best dps spec got other spec/specs to back up their performance. But your claim for unholy being one of the better melee specs in single target baffles me, because i can't find any evidence supporting that statement from either sims or actual player performance on fel lord zakuun logs, be it either 60% or 99% percentile. Care to enlighten me?

[Deleted]

Don't trust sim results and wcl statistics. For example single target/Zakuun.

Did you noticed that simc uh profile? There are a few strange things. 1. trinket choice (Manno/Zak instead of Gorefiend/maiden) is bad 2. uptime of crazed monstrosity (71.86%) is pretty low.

Then look at the amount of parses at wcl statistics. Only a few people are playing specs like arms/feral/enhancer/etc. I assume people who are playing those specs in a successful mythic guild are really good at it, otherwise they would be replaced by another mage/lock/etc. But this results in biased statistics.

Another point is, uh don't have strong procs like retri/Enhancer, so uh can't have _that lucky_ try. Furthermore there are mechanics like seeds/pillars that fuck up your dps. Hence i would say zakuun logs are hardly comparable.

In general i don't think there is a lack in DK dps, there are just a few classes (mage/lock/rogue) which are way to powerful. If blizz would nerf those specs, we would be in a really good spot.

[Blighter]

Don't trust WCL statistics? What? That's the only true representation of how your class is performing, whether there is 3000 logs or 6000 logs it's irrelevant it's enough data past probably 1000 logs per week to make justifiable statements on the state of a class.

When the only 2 spec options you have are in the bottom 5 of a number of fights, and middle tier of the rest. One of them could use a bit of love(please be Frost xoxo). There is no denying it, but it's not going to happen if it was, it would've happened in the last patch.

[Deleted]

Zakuun mythic top ranking unholy DK 93k dps, frost 82kdps (11k less then unholy) and then top ranking rogue 133k, 40k higher then unholy and 51k higher then frost. Frost DKs are one of the lowest on ST dps and then unholy tieing with shamans.
Well played blizzard.

[Deleted]

Look at the Zakuun statistics. At 95/90/80/75 fire mage dominates every other spec. (Unfortunately i can't link it)

So you would conclude, fire mage is the top spec? (or at least one of the top specs)? That is exactly, what i mean with biased statistics.

[Deleted]

Look at the Zakuun statistics. At 95/90/80/75 fire mage dominates every other spec. (Unfortunately i can't link it)

So you would conclude, fire mage is the top spec? (or at least one of the top specs)? That is exactly, what i mean with biased statistics.

You dont look at statistics you look at the top rankings and if you look at statistics you should not look at anything below 99%

[Deleted]

You dont look at statistics you look at the top rankings and if you look at statistics you should not look at anything below 99%

Usually i don't look at statistics. In this case i did it, because Problim was referring to. But why should i only look at 99%, many of them are just lucky tries and don't represent the strengths of the classes.

[Icedcoffeee]

For as long as I can remember, Death Knights have not scaled well. We are typically strong at lower ilvls, but get less out of higher item levels. Combo that with bad trinkets for both dw frost and unholy, a bad tier set and weapons for dw frost, and the ring being 'meh' for frost. (Personally, I think we should get to choose the stats on the legendary ring.)

I'm mostly frustrated that both Frost specs are performing so poorly. Based on the mechanics, DW Frost should be great on most of the HFC fights (cleave), but is middling at best. And does anyone play 2h Frost anymore? Its bad at single target and aoe/cleave.

[Kiki b]

I'd use Gorefiend as a base, not Zakuun. Gore kind of shows more of how the specs are designed, and UH and Sub are about dead even on that. Unholy has the add damage boosting their numbers, and Sub has balls out single target, its checks and balance. Dk's can't be god like single target because they have pretty strong aoe, it works out pretty well.

[Deleted]

You dont look at statistics you look at the top rankings and if you look at statistics you should not look at anything below 99%

No, you should look at your level.

inb4 "but I'm a 99% player"

[Halliax]

Great thread! Its real hard to keep a mythic spot as frost DK nowadays, there isnt a single fight where we do great, and we are real terrible on single target fights. Starting mythic progression I received a tip from my raid leader "go unholy or die (rot on bench)", according to him there isnt why gear a frost DK in a mythic group.

[Blighter]

Look at the Zakuun statistics. At 95/90/80/75 fire mage dominates every other spec. (Unfortunately i can't link it)

So you would conclude, fire mage is the top spec? (or at least one of the top specs)? That is exactly, what i mean with biased statistics.

When a Fire Mage is capable of doing over 100k DPS pure single target, when you factor its AoE potential. Yes it would be considered a top spec. Is it Arcane level? No, of course not but Fire as a stand alone performer is just as good as if not better then most other ranged specs this tier. It just so happens that all 3 mage specs are really damn strong this tier so it looks weaker in comparison in a mage discussion. You cannot seriously be trying to say Fire isn't good or that mages aren't fortunate that they can play any spec an be a force to be reckoned with on any encounter.

Just FYI Fire Mage beats Frost DK on 10 out of 13 Fights granted they cheese on Soc but it still happens. We'll see what happens when the Fire mage mains kill Archi could well be 11 of 13 Fights.

An Fire Mage goes basically even with Unholy, with it 7-6 in Unholy's favour matching cheese for cheese though again only a single Fire mage parse on Arch so we'll see if that changes. So our BEST option, is even with the weaker of 3 specs for Mages.

Stats show nothing though

I'd use Gorefiend as a base, not Zakuun. Gore kind of shows more of how the specs are designed, and UH and Sub are about dead even on that. Unholy has the add damage boosting their numbers, and Sub has balls out single target, its checks and balance. Dk's can't be god like single target because they have pretty strong aoe, it works out pretty well.

You say that, but said Sub rogue can just go Combat for balls out AoE dmg as well if the situation calls for it.

Unholy DK can't just switch to Frost for balls out single target, though that should be the case.

[Deleted]

No i don't want to argue fire is weak or something, it was just an example to show you how a small sample size effects statistics. In case of Zakuun there are just 18 ranked fire mages. And keep in mind, fire is heavily proc dependent, just 1 or 2 need lucky procs to distort statistics.

How would it look like if there would be more than 1000 logs? Do you know it? I don't.

[Deleted]

Frost is currently the lowest ST-spec of all-time looking at fights like Zakuun. Unholy DK's sit at roughly 90-93k at 99+%, which is the same as both Shaman specs.
Safe to say DK's (as a class) are the worst class on single-target.
Rogues are roughly 30k higher on average.

I'd use Gorefiend as a base, not Zakuun. Gore kind of shows more of how the specs are designed, and UH and Sub are about dead even on that. Unholy has the add damage boosting their numbers, and Sub has balls out single target, its checks and balance. Dk's can't be god like single target because they have pretty strong aoe, it works out pretty well.

It shouldn't work like that. Rogues and mages aren't supposed to shrek everything while only single-targeting meanwhile DK's are doing 15 million padding and doing the same dps.

Anybody who looks at fight statistics on WCL can go back to first year of high school math.

[Deleted]

inb4 "but I'm a 99% player"

Hi I'm a 99% player warcraftlogs.com/rankings/character/6715455/latest#boss=0

[lagunablade]

I blame that 60% unholy class trinket nerf :P. Also blizz did say that true dps classes should do more dps than hybrid classes. I think this idea and trying to balance between pvp and pve just messes up a lot of things.

[Deleted]

nah they say hybrid tax no longer exists, but it clearly does, blizz just dosnt want to come out and say it

[Deleted]

No i don't want to argue fire is weak or something, it was just an example to show you how a small sample size effects statistics. In case of Zakuun there are just 18 ranked fire mages. And keep in mind, fire is heavily proc dependent, just 1 or 2 need lucky procs to distort statistics.

How would it look like if there would be more than 1000 logs? Do you know it? I don't.

Thanks for being smart person. We are at that point that soon 100 guilds have killed last boss on mythic. Those few best ones have had it on farm for few weeks already and within those guilds there are always some people who tend to toy with lesser played specs now that everything is just on farm, and so they are playing with unusually high skill and gear compared to most of the playerbase and there are usually windows of opportunities for them to "whore" more dps from trivial things that bring nothing meaningful for their kill. If there aren't that many parses then this is usually the case.

For as long as I can remember, Death Knights have not scaled well. We are typically strong at lower ilvls, but get less out of higher item levels. Combo that with bad trinkets for both dw frost and unholy, a bad tier set and weapons for dw frost, and the ring being 'meh' for frost. (Personally, I think we should get to choose the stats on the legendary ring.)

I'm mostly frustrated that both Frost specs are performing so poorly. Based on the mechanics, DW Frost should be great on most of the HFC fights (cleave), but is middling at best. And does anyone play 2h Frost anymore? Its bad at single target and aoe/cleave.

I agree with you here. Before the first nerf struck we were doing it really good, being nr1 on most of the fights because the mechanics in this raid really support DK throughput. Now after 2 nerfs we are being middle pack, sometimes even beating 2 classes on fights that we really shine (Xhul'horac) and less so in single target fights.

I'd use Gorefiend as a base, not Zakuun. Gore kind of shows more of how the specs are designed, and UH and Sub are about dead even on that. Unholy has the add damage boosting their numbers, and Sub has balls out single target, its checks and balance. Dk's can't be god like single target because they have pretty strong aoe, it works out pretty well.

As i previously stated in my opening post the Mythic Gorefiend is not really comparable, because of the unique mechanism that unholy DK fills with most ease. As for your claim about us being strong in aoe i cannot support that statement, and neither can logs.
On mythic Shadow-Lord Iskar (~30sec priority target aoe window every 1-1.5min) we are only middle of the pack beating druids and priest dps specs even when the fight almost yells for frost dk.
And on mythic Xhul'horac, the perfect unholy fight this tier we are losing it to every class there currently is above 90th percentile where i think this fight is on its most comparable state (people above this percentile probably didn't have bad luck with having to run surges away from raid while still keeping the proc-lucky parses on 99th/max out from skewing up the results)

nah they say hybrid tax no longer exists, but it clearly does, blizz just dosnt want to come out and say it

The hybrid tax issue has been heavily discussed before and Blizzard denies its existence. We are not here to prove them wrong, but to bring healthy discussion for our beloved class. Lets keep that issue on its own threads right?