I completely despise dual-wielding for Death Knights...

[Florena]

The only reason they're forcing DWing is so each spec is "different". That's their biggest goal with these class changes, making everyone feel speshul. There is no other reason. Waxing poetic about lore is pretty pointless.

I still want to know if WW Monks are losing their passive that gives them the option between DW and 2H. They're getting a fist wep artifact but are they losing the passive and being forced to DW forever?

Probably not. Just like I doubt frost dks will be unable to equip 2 handers.

[Thrif]

No, it's not. Blizzard is wrong in WoW, because their own iconic death knight is two handed sword dps. Knights dual wielding swords historically is very rare, and so having a spec for that, but not for the two handed guy is wrong for that reason too- but that's not even relevant. It's wrong by Blizzard's own baseline.

Dual wielding (although maybe not two swords) was more common through history than going into combat with a 2-handed sword. In truth, no weapon designation the DK has ever had has ever been faithful to actual knights. The bottom line is that knights very rarely ever fought with 2-handed weapons, so defending it because it's "faithful to the knight fantasy" is just wrong.

Enabling dual wielding was trouble from the start. The devs at the time even pointed out that dual wield gradually eats whatever it is attached to, and promised that they would take care. But now you have a tank spec, a dual wield spec, and a pet spec, and there's nothing left for the guy that wants to dps with his two handed sword- that spec didn't end up making it, because dual wield ate him up, just like they said years ago.

Just because you have a pet doesn't make it a pet class. There's what, two buttons designed to using your pet? Compare that to actual pet classes, which have at least a dozen. Unholy DK is way more about hitting things with big 2-handed swords than it is interacting with and dealing damage through a pet.

[RockmSockm]

Many people play and enjoy dw frost and if you take that away they have NO OPTIONS to dual wield. While with 2h frost removed there are still options for dw. Whether you like dw or not dks have beem able to do it since wrath.

There are no 2hand dps options. We told them in WOTLK you can't add dw, it will water down the class and never work. Years later, they are rectifying that situation.

We have pet class and dual wield. We have lost 4 specs, gained a knock off beast master and saved dual wield.

The wrong boy died!

[Kithelle]

There are no 2hand dps options. We told them in WOTLK you can't add dw, it will water down the class and never work. Years later, they are rectifying that situation.

We have pet class and dual wield. We have lost 4 specs, gained a knock off beast master and saved dual wield.

The wrong boy died!

Umm...wow...just wow...I don't know what to say about this absolutely moronic claim you keep making...just because Unholy uses a pet doesn't negate the fact it wields a 2H weapons...as much as you'll stick your fingers in your ears and scream "LA LA LA CAN'T HEAR YOU"

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They're "wrong", because they're making a change that is inconsistent with a past vision of the spec. That's the point he is trying to make, I think.

Also, 2hand Frost may be weaker than DW Frost, but A) it's still competitive, and B) Blizzard's job is to balance the game, and if the numbers are really so upset, they can change them.

Like I said, I don't see why they couldn't continue to support both specs, seeing as they're still relatively close in numbers. *IF* they can *ONLY* support one spec, though, then I feel it truly needs to be 2hand, because again, Dual-wielding has never been shown to be an iconic part of the Death Knight's identity. I would even argue it directly undermines it, as there has never -- not a once -- been a "pair" of Runeblades, and Runeblades are the entire basis of the class itself.

It's their lore, their story, and it is THEIR GAME...they can do whatever they want...people really need to stop making excuses to justify why THEY THINK DK shouldn't DW...well you know what...you'll be wielding a pair of Runeblades in Legion.

[Shelly]

Ah. Looks like there was a break in communication at some point, my apologies.

That said, I do agree that DW Frost tanking was completely viable from 3.2 and onward. I ran it myself at the beginning of ICC and it was fun. I just ended up switching to Blood since I got 25m Bryntroll instead of DWing ilvl232 swords.

Yeah, does explain a lot. :-)

And yeah, Bryntroll was the weapon that made blood tanking, though it was still a pretty hard uphill battle. I mean they were competent and competitive but just the fact that they were like Druids without complete coverage of the hit table but without the same massive amount of avoidance, HP and armor just freaked a lot of people out. Which has a lot to say for the buff/nerf cycle that DKs went through so hard in LK.

Now days between mastery and versatility they've really got the knobs needed to uptune or downtune every class pretty easily without massive community freak-out.

Then again there was the DW Frost buff for HFC that was reverted after a week, so it's not like the roller coaster has totally shut down. :-)

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Exactly. If they can't support both 2hand and DW'ing, then drop DW'ing, because this just completely kills the "class fantasy" that we were sold from the start. Death Knights *NEVER* dual-wielded before Wrath, and Thassarian is the only one who has consistently dual-wielded, and he's a pretty weak example at that. There are enough dual-wielding classes as it is; it doesn't resonate with the themes of the class, nor the spec, nor even the element itself of "Frost". It was a poor fit from the very start, and if they can't support both, then eliminate dual-wielding.

How does it do that?



That's the announcement trailer to sell us on DKs.

We get a holy paladin with his priest friend arriving in Howling Fjord - probably Moonguard since they then spend the rest of their time dicking around that zone until the priest friend gets kersmashed by a yeti and the paladin pisses his armor and then somehow ends up in Borean Tundra/Dragonblight. Once there he gets DK'd - which lead to a lot of speculation as to how we'd become a DK since the WC3 DK was a fallen paladin/hero that was still alive that turned to the Scourge - and now he's all Army of the Deading someplace in probably Grizzly Hills.

That class fantasy as shown is almost completely unholy really.

Or maybe you mean Death Knight's in general and Arthas in particular? Well here's the list of DK abilities from WC3:

http://classic.battle.net/war3/undea...thknight.shtml

Again, all Unholy abilities - though Death Pact was a general one that was then turned into a talent later.

I get you don't like the idea but Unholy and Blood are still around to give the massive 2H fantasy and with warriors they wanted to maintain the uniqueness of Titan's Grip so Frost - which was falling into the DW niche anyway since they were introduced - was finally set full on for DW to be the 2x1H DW plate melee class. It's not a bad fit and it's right in line with the lore and with the game progression as a whole.

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Dual wielding (although maybe not two swords) was more common through history than going into combat with a 2-handed sword. In truth, no weapon designation the DK has ever had has ever been faithful to actual knights. The bottom line is that knights very rarely ever fought with 2-handed weapons, so defending it because it's "faithful to the knight fantasy" is just wrong.

OK, this one the nerd in me just can't let go by. Sorry, but no, unless by Dual Wielding you mean shield and main hand that's completely off. Using polearms - which require 2-hands - was the most common and most effective means of fighting for centuries and that's world-wide.

Outside of that using a shield was probably #2.

2H's for personal combat overtook shields once more people could afford better armor. Full plate basically let you ignore anything that wasn't a big ol' fuck off mass weapon (axes & maces mostly) since you could deflect off your armor.

Now I'm not saying DW wasn't effective or unused, however to competently DW you need to be extremely ambidextrous, you need to really know where each limb is in relation to the other and that is really really hard if you aren't naturally gifted. Even if trained if you naturally prefer one side to another you'll leave a massive hole in your off-hand defense.

It was just a lot easier to either hide behind a big chunk of iron and wood or to parry and attack using a 2-H.

Here's a video of Claymore vs Longsword, which isn't an unlikely pairing:


Here's Rapier (1H) versus a longsword:


Here's Rapier & Main Gauche vs Longsword:


Here's Rapier & Main vs Rapier & Main:


Those all should give you a strong idea of how it would work out. As it stands when using an off-hand you normally use it almost as a shield since your main blade is often in the way.

That being said the best example of DW fighting probably remains Eskrima, here you can really see some strong stick work.

[Crruor]

You also have to consider it from a design perspective, 3 specs being 2hander is very boring, having 1 be dual wield makes more sense.


Also, theme wise i agree. Blood 2hander, frost 2hander (both are about heavy hitting abilities lore/theme and playstyle wise) and unholy should be the dual wield spec as its the kill slowly with many pokes (dots) spec. If anyone remembers the starting quest where you had to torture enemies with your dual blades to get intel out of him, that imo was very unholy like.


That said, unholy as always been 2 hander and frost almost always was better as dual wield, so it makes sense for the to continue that.