New tanking spec for DK?

[zaalnek]

The standard tanking spec prior to the most recent talent changes was frost/blood, generally to frost aura, and (blade barrier a few patches ago, but recently...) veteran of the third war for blood, as far as I'm aware.

The way I see it, these are the real tanky-like talents we have so far-
(*=Spell mitigation talent)

Blood
Blade Barrier
Spell Deflection*
Abomination Strength (not really but people would cry if I didnt list it)
Will of the Necropolis

Frost
Toughness
Lichborne
Frigid Deathplate
Unbreakable Armor
Acclimation*

Unholy
Anticipation
Unholy Command
Magic Suppression*
Bone Shield

Being that Frost Aura, the main reason I was planning on going down frost so far, is Extra useless for tanking now, I see no reason to go down further than Frigid Deathplate.

Blood, with Blade Barrier being a first tier talent, is worthy of about 5 points (or 10 if you dig Bladed Armor, which I do). Yes, Dark Conviction is nice, but not if you want Frigid Deathplate And Bone Shield.

Unholy, which I formerly had no intention of going very far into for tanking, is looking much more appealing with the death of Frost Aura, and also the change to Unbreakable Armor. Bone Shield will be up more often than Unbreakable Armor, (and potentially mitigating more damage as well), in addition to Magic Suppression which imo is the best spell mitigation talent DKs have, and I believe these to be worth the swap to unholy.

With the current build I'm looking at something along the lines of this now:
http://www.worldofwarcraft.com/info/...51101020100000

What do all of you future DK tanks think of the changes/plan on doing?

[Magro]

Seems like you've missed some key talents to me.

Bone Armor, the primary reason for going so far into the Unholy tree is missing.
Frost Rune Mastery is always nice, considering Frost Fever will be up 100% of the time (or, theoretically, should be up 100% of the time).
Bladed Armor - Personally I'd give that a miss when i spec for tanking. Yes, I know the added AP is a godsend and boosts pretty much everything, but I believe there are more valuable talents available.
Necrosis is a pretty nice talent to go for - an additional 25% damage from auto-swings. Added thread is a godsend.

Theres a few more, but its late and i cba to keep going back and forth ><

My tanking spec at 80 Would be http://www.worldofwarcraft.com/info/...00000000000000

Thats assuming nothing changes, and unless testing proves it to be inferior. That spec would be going for a more of a single target tanking - Priority isnt caster-bosses etc, but more of a generalisation (aka, tank n spank or so).

That would also be for 2 handed tanking. Didnt go for the additional 4% 2handed weapon damage, as 5/5 Necrosis makes up for that, and gives extra.

Debating about 2 points from Necrosis into Glacier rot. I'd need to test what would give the biggest benefit. (10% flat, but im assuming Glacier Rot would provide a larger damage boost - However, Necrosis would provide more steady tps - so its debatable again.)

[zaalnek]

Seems like you've missed some key talents to me.

Bone Armor, the primary reason for going so far into the Unholy tree is missing.

Bone Armor no longer exists, it has been renamed to Bone Shield and I did take it in the build I linked. And I agree, I too am just as much, if not more concerned with single target physical mitigation more than "caster" npcs. I hope the stigma blizzard has set in place isnt Too strong... :-\

[Magro]

Bone Armor / Shield, same thing xD Thats what i meant atleast <.<

You sure? I cant see it in there :s You took Crypt Fever instead in what I can see, but probably a simple mistake.

[Zealic]

I'd go Frost too, but if you like the stuff in the other Builds, i'd go something like this.. Seems to me that we need to deal quite a lot of damage to keep aggro

Edit: Or maybe this for the Howling Blast

[Gestalt]

I still can't get the "two specs" thing out of my head. Given the possibility of having two talent specs and switching freely (probably in a rest zone or some such), I'm happy to specialize a bit more than I otherwise would.

Frost/Necrosis:
http://www.worldofwarcraft.com/info/...00000000000000
Still a bit of shuffling to be done with stray points there, but the essentials are down.

I'm musing on this as my "screw around spec"
http://www.worldofwarcraft.com/info/...01130223133101

Also considering a 2h Frost/Blood spec, a bit more anti-caster heavy:
http://www.worldofwarcraft.com/info/...00000000000000
What can I say? I love the frost tree :-P

p.s: lol autoattack (+15% speed, +25% damage as shadow, +15% from Bloody Vengeance)
http://www.worldofwarcraft.com/info/...00000000000000

[Aust]

I really think Blizzard is being lame with DK talent trees. Divide them up, one for dps, one for PvP, and one for tanking please.

And for those of you who have never tried tanking, roll a Prot Pally. You can be top threat, top damage, and heal yourself between pulls too!

[Alubob]

cant remember my tanking build but it was something like 21/45/5 so you got the spell deflection and for bosses the mark, acclimation up the frost tree.. and only anticipation on the unholy tree

although i know with DK i know a few months in we will have some "this is end game tank build" "this is trash tank build".. etc.. set in stone like we do with most classes...

but the joys of DK are that any build is a tank (well unless u went for something little bit weird avoiding all tank type talents) obv some will be better equiped for various situations

[Xerganor]

Due to Blizzard updating the WotLK talent page in between, the posted spec is now messed up, unfortunately.

Blizzard wants Deathknights to be able to tank in different styles with different specs. This is to encourage more DK players to tank, thereby addressing the lack of tanks for five man dungeons.

[saggo]

Think ill go frost too.. If only blizzard had devided the talents so you had more to customize

[Aeline]

If I were to be tanking a magical boss, this would be my spec:
Idea is to hold aggro with Obliterate and Death Coil, and rotate around Antimagic Shield, Icebound Fort, and Bone Shield for mitigation
http://talent.mmo-champion.com/?deat...50051000100000

However if I were gonna be tanking physical damage, I'd use this instead.
http://talent.mmo-champion.com/?deat...00000000000000

[drakhoon]

i was actually thinking of this for a tanking spec...

http://talent.mmo-champion.com/?deat...51051001100000

deep frost and deep unholy, the idea being used to do a good obliteration rotation, with AMS and blood boil for emergencies, and death and decay for AoE tanking when needed, i took both rune masteries with the idea that it cutmy rotation down to 5 seconds for alot of abilites and since apparently a deathknight only has like 4 spells and obliterate isnt one of them i worked on improving the damage out put of what i will most likely be using

[Darkskeleton]

Might as well pitch in mine (Feel free to steal and use for yourself if you agree with my awesome building)

5 Blood/14 Frost/52 Unholy

http://talent.mmo-champion.com/?deat...51151023133101

This build is a bit more focused on threat (namely AoE), and utilizing diseases (obviously while picking up the tier 1 tanking talents in all three trees and the later ones found in unholy).

EDIT: Ok I realized I was innacurate about the next couple sentences, Scourge Strike and Unhloy Blight both give Blood Plague which Plague Strike already gives so they don't actually add two new diseases. Crypt Fever/Ebon Plague still gives one though I assume, so you could still get 3 diseases, correct me if i'm wrong and you can get 4 still. (Blood-Caked Blade was the old 4th disease correct and they changed that to not give a disease right?)

Having both Scourge Strike and Unholy Blight not only increases dps, but also gives you two extra diseases (See Above). Seen the new Death Strike lately? Yeah, 400% (300%?) damage dealt turns to healing for you with all 4 of your diseases up in this build. LOL self healing tank much ^^

That and it gives you good utilization of Obliterate with Anhilation, Dececration, Impurity, etc etc.
Another nice thing is that if Blizzard ends up limiting/not impementing the two talent builds at once per character idea, you can off DPS without getting completely laughed at assuming you have an extra set.

One downside is that without Frigid Deathplate your Bone Armor charges will go down quicker then a penny dropping from the Empire State Building for AoE pulls. But generally AoE pulls are easy stuff, so it shouldn't be too much of a problem as long as your properly geared. (And even if your not you still have Icybound Fortitude to save your but). Against bosses it looks like Frigid Deathplate will be useless and those are the fights that count anyways.

All in all, this is how i'll personally be tanking unless some talents change around in such a way for this to work out unfavorably (which is quite likely).

EDIT: One more thing to add, is that with this build you'd be tanking 2h since so many of your abilities do a % of weapon damage.

And also, you'll have your ghoul out pretty much all the time so that adds to your utility (they have some nice abilities) {Maybe what you could do is have your ghoul taunt some of the AoE mobs for you to hold them for a few seconds to reduce your load, since they can do that (Ghoul Taunt) and then use Explode for nice AoE damage when your ghoul is nearing death, and finally resummon your ghoul using Night of the Dead's effect}

One last thing, out of curiosity your Ghoul's infect ability (causes a disease) doesn't apply to your abilities even though it's your pet because it's not directly your disease correct?

[Kadvael]

i've been thinking to a tanking style spec which finally went like this :

Blood (27 points)

2/2 Butchery
5/5 Blade Barrier
5/5 Bladed Armor
1/2 Two-Handed Weapon Specialization
1/1 Rune Tap
3/3 Death Rune Mastery
3/3 Spell Deflection
3/3 Scent of Blood
3/3 Veteran of the Third War
1/1 Mark of Blood

Frost (5 points)

5/5 Toughness

Unholy (39 points)

3/3 Virulence
5/5 Anticipation
3/3 Morbidity
2/2 Unholy Command
3/3 Ravenous Dead
5/5 Necrosis
1/1 Shadow of Death
5/5 Impurity
5/5 Magic Suppression
5/5 Desecration
1/1 Anti-Magic Zone
1/1 Bone Shield

it's obviously a caster boss tanking oriented template, but it can go for any type of boss i think.