Idea to Balance Deathknights

[rwh531]

So I have been giving it a lot of thought because I am getting sick of people going Omg 2k+ arena ratings only because my class is overpowered.

I came up with a Solution

#1 Make death runes standard runes that are always on the Rune bars instead of taking the place of other runes
However using a Death Rune would cost you 30 runic power
(the talents that currently grant death runes would be changed into 2 point Talents that to reduce the runic power cost by 25/50%)

Some abilities would now require a Death rune to use and all still of these abilities would continue to have their own internal cooldown.

Icebound fortitude
Bone Armor
Strangulate
Rune tap
Hysteria
Anti Magic zone

This change in turn would stop a Deathknight from blowing all their defensive abilities at the same time or before entering combat the 10 second rune cooldown would still apply

The upside for the Dk's would be they no longer need to burn their precious Frost/unholy runes on defensive abilities
The upside for everybody else is Dk's would no longer be able to use all their damage reduction abilities together

[Copain]

To be honest, I don't see why people think the DK's are so OP... I can completly serve a DK like he's nothing as a Prot Pally... THen again I s'pose we are a bit Op right now. The only thing that I find realatively strong about them is the removal of HoTs, but I actually LIKE that, it makes it so healer druids don't clean up as healers anymore.

[rwh531]

To be honest, I don't see why people think the DK's are so OP... I can completly serve a DK like he's nothing as a Prot Pally... THen again I s'pose we are a bit Op right now. The only thing that I find realatively strong about them is the removal of HoTs, but I actually LIKE that, it makes it so healer druids don't clean up as healers anymore.

Prot palies pretty well destroy all other melee classes they always have.

Dk's are doing way to much damage with shadowfrost in pve raids so much so the good ones are out dpsing everybody by quite a large margin (including warriors and mages) (the spec used is getting destroyed on 3.1 so it is not really a issue)

In fact the only real problems with Dk's all stem from their survivabilityand having the best 2 distance closers in the game.

Rune tape, Icebound fortitude, Bone armor, sacrifice ghoul (they can all be used back to back)

Deathgrip is way better than a warriors charge/intercept because unlike warriors who have to sling themselves into the enemy and his team mates the Death knight can simply deathgrip mr,squishy pop Chains of ice and anti magic zone while the dk and his team kill mr,squishy without getting blown up by the other teams casters.

Chains of ice is well simply godlike brings the enemy to a dead halt and then the enemy regains 10% of his speed each second for 10 seconds, with the pvp gloves the ability is nearly spamable.

And last but not least the talent Chilblains in the frost tree turns a high damage frostbolt called Icy touch that diseases the target increasing the damage caused by all other abilities and adds yet another effect to slow the target by 30% from 20 yards away for 10 seconds

They got a Aoe Snare that also increases the Dk's damage in the unholy tree that is like a paladins consecrate the snare it self sucks but who cares because it happens when you cast Plague strike yet another attack Dk's use anyway.

[z8472]

we have 1 closer not two and it's on a 35sec cd talented the best u can get is 25sec. Chains of ice only holds someone in place we still have to get to them and without death grip we have no way to do so since we can't break snares or cc. Your argument about blowing all are cds well at best that gives us a 10s shitty bubble. Even though we can still be cc'd, rooted, and feared in that time. So ya don't see your point man. And I find your changes really complicated. I wouldn't want to see them implemented. Just learn some strats about dks if your a mage and you see a green bubble around us don't waist your time dpsing just blink away if your a rogue and we pop IB vanish wait for it to wear off than stun lock us to death or disarm us the list goes on. Were a new class still people just need to learn how to play there strengths against our weaknesses and stop the QQ were here to stay

[Battousai]

To be honest, I don't see why people think the DK's are so OP... I can completly serve a DK like he's nothing as a Prot Pally... THen again I s'pose we are a bit Op right now. The only thing that I find realatively strong about them is the removal of HoTs, but I actually LIKE that, it makes it so healer druids don't clean up as healers anymore.

The HoT removal is gone and damage to Plauge strike increased too much, it was useless vs most...and completely says BAM fuck you to others. If only they would see that about Hunters Mana drain as well and fix it.

Dks are ok on live...a bit too much damage for the survivbility and utility they provide. However, on PTR...they are insanely OP...hop on there and enjoy god mode for a little bit, there's really no way it goes live.

I can regularly burst for over 30k damage in 6 secs with multiple specs given a semi lucky crit streak...which is actually quite common.

[Battousai]

And last but not least the talent Chilblains in the frost tree turns a high damage frostbolt called Icy touch that diseases the target increasing the damage caused by all other abilities and adds yet another effect to slow the target by 30% from 20 yards away for 10 seconds

Chillblains got buffed to a 50% snare, and is much higher in the tree, so multiple specs like Blood and Unholy will have it.

[tvveeder]

As for what you are talking about with the best closer I beg to differ... I fail to see how it's any better than charge, intercept, or pounce. You say... well you can just death grip then CoI someone and they are wrecked... but the problem is you don't think about what other classes have to counter.

Death grip a mage, CoI, most likely he will have blink up, he blinks away, slows you, and you are fucked.
Death grip a lock, CoI and most likely he will have Death Coil up so he DC's you and then casts a fear and unless you're frost you are fucked.
Death grip a priest, CoI him and most likely he will bubble then psychic scream and unless you can break fear you are fucked.
Death grip a hunter, CoI him and there are a few scenarios...
- BM hunter will cast beastial wrath, hit you with concussive shot, and kite you to death.
- Survival will wing clip you, disengage to get far away, then nuke you and concussive shot kite you to death.
- Marksman hunter will scatter shot you, disengage, concussive shot and kite you.

The only class I can think of that is ranged and doesn't have a mechanic to break CoI, slow/kite a DK, or anything to that effect is elemental shaman... but they are struggling in PvP right now anyways and seriously need some work.

Now you talk about CoI after death grip, when really if you're up against a caster you want to death grip, strangulate, then CoI (unless you have chillblains then you can use IT just as well) but you had better hope you can kill that squishy in less than 4 seconds because as soon as the silence is up guess what happens... read above and that is what will happen. So who wants to complain about DK closers now? Now not only does it suck that most every class has a mechanic to get out of it... but also it can be dispelled if I'm not mistaken. If I'm wrong then correct me but I'm pretty sure it can be dispelled.

Now as for defensive capabilities. Well lets just break it down.

Icebound fortitude - lasts for 12 seconds, reduces damage by 15% (unless you are wearing tank gear, and that's not a huge number) and you are immune to stuns. The only people who should complain about this is rogues because of stun locking, the damage reduction is a joke and anyone who says this is overpowered needs to refer to paladins and their shields.

Anti Magic Shield - lasts for 5 seconds... let me repeat that... FIVE SECONDS. It negates most magic damage and turns it into RP. With a glyph it can last 7 seconds. If you time that right that will effect 2 castable spells tops and about 3 or 4 instant cast spells. Wow that is so overpowered. Once again I say anyone who wants to complain about this can refer to paladins and their shields.

Anti Magic Zone - has to be picked up through talents and to be honest if casters can't come up with a way to avoid this then you just don't understand the meaning of the word strategy and shouldn't PvP in the first place. It's a stationary shield! If the throws it up guess what... don't stay near him, don't attack him while in it... focus elsewhere. Once again... pally, shield, refer.

The only thing I will say that Dk's do excel in and possibly needs to be normalized is their survivability. The only thing I can say that REALLY needs it though is death strike. If you are spec'ed a certain way a well placed DS crit can just about full heal you even with low health. Rune tap is a talent, and to make it any good you have to pour 4 points into it and glyph it. So I will say that is fine as is. Vampiric blood is a talent and that's no different than last stand for warriors so there's no reason for that to be nerfed. Mark of blood was already nerfed so that doesn't matter. Death pact requires rezzing a ghoul and sacrificing it and it's being changed in the patch to where it can't crit heal you (which I do agree with). I've broken things down between the different classes so many times it's not funny and really it's unnecessary because if you think DK's have better/more mechanics to make them excel at PvP than every other class you need to stop the QQ and quit the game because you don't know all the mechanics of the other classes and you can't analyze a class to pick out it's weaknesses and exploit them.

You want me to break down a DK's weaknesses? I'll do it right here just to prove a point.
Outside of melee range they are garbage.
If you force them to burn their CD's they are very susceptible.
If you can slow them and kite them they have very little to counter with.
If you have fears use them to your advantage. If they have Lichborne yes they will be able to break it... but it's a 3 minute CD so they won't have it up at all times.
Last I have a 4 letter word that I will reiterate... KITE!

And as for what z8472 said he is exactly right. Warriors and rogues have counters for us that will destroy us if they use them right. Both have disarm, and rogues can stun lock. If you try to stun and they have IBF up you can either CoS and Vanish or CoS and sprint away out of reach and then stealth, rinse, and repeat stun lock. Ret Pallies have just as much survivability as DK's do with their instant cast FoL's and shields, so they can go toe for toe. Prot pallies should demolish DK's because they are overpowered and all their damage is holy so it's not mitigated by armor anyway (not to mention most DK abilities will either have trouble hitting them or be mitigated a lot by armor).

Chillblains got buffed to a 50% snare, and is much higher in the tree, so multiple specs like Blood and Unholy will have it.

Do you know what you are talking about? Chillblains is rank 7 in 3.1... I highly doubt you will see any unholy or blood builds with it because they wont waste 30 points in frost just to get it.

Dks are ok on live...a bit too much damage for the survivbility and utility they provide. However, on PTR...they are insanely OP...hop on there and enjoy god mode for a little bit, there's really no way it goes live.

QFT. On PTR they made certain changes and didn't think about the numbers I believe. PS critting for 6-7k unbuffed and DS critting for 5-6k unbuffed is too much. That will get changed big time. Also they buffed SS a little too much on PTR but that will get changed as well. I wouldn't be surprised to see DS turn out to be a totally new mechanic.

[Battousai]

Try Frost strikes...then imagine.

4 FS to 2 Oblits

Add up the damage and tell me what you plan to spec in 3.1 when everyone else is Unholy.

[tvveeder]

So I have been giving it a lot of thought because I am getting sick of people going Omg 2k+ arena ratings only because my class is overpowered.

I came up with a Solution

#1 Make death runes standard runes that are always on the Rune bars instead of taking the place of other runes
However using a Death Rune would cost you 30 runic power
(the talents that currently grant death runes would be changed into 2 point Talents that to reduce the runic power cost by 25/50%)

Some abilities would now require a Death rune to use and all still of these abilities would continue to have their own internal cooldown.

Icebound fortitude
Bone Armor
Strangulate
Rune tap
Hysteria
Anti Magic zone

This change in turn would stop a Deathknight from blowing all their defensive abilities at the same time or before entering combat the 10 second rune cooldown would still apply

The upside for the Dk's would be they no longer need to burn their precious Frost/unholy runes on defensive abilities
The upside for everybody else is Dk's would no longer be able to use all their damage reduction abilities together

I saved this for another post intentionally. So what you are proposing is your mechanics are better than blizzards because abilities like these would require a rune that DK's don't innately have. Not only do they not innately have them, they are required to spec into talents for them and use abilities to generate them in place of their BFU runes. Also on top of that, you are suggesting they go away from the system they have worked on for months upon months to add death runes alongside the rest of them and change certain abilities to require death runes? Are you serious? That's the dumbest change I've heard yet. I would rather them nerf the abilities and keep them the way they are than go to something like this because there are builds that don't revolve around using death runes (not many but there are). On top of that, suggesting they change their system to have 8 runes (when 6 is difficult enough to manage with all the GCD's involved) that would actually probably in the long run buff them. Not to mention the fact that you list hysteria in the list makes me lol.

Hysteria is a garbage arena talent/ability and you know why? Yes it buffs damage but it also eats away 1% health every second, so on top of people doing damage to a DK he is doing damage to himself, so unless he has the greatest healer in the world he is going to die very quickly. If you wanted to bring up abilities that effect arena a lot you should have talked about Vampiric blood and Mark of Blood.

Here is how I will break this down. Lets say you add 2 death runes along side and you switch all these abilities over to using death runes. You just gave DK's a buff and you know why? They no longer have to make the decision between, "Do I want to increase my damage output or do I want to use a survival ability? How about both?" Rune tap, Mark of Blood, Vampiric Blood, AMZ, Unbreakable armor, they all require runes to use. The only ones that don't require runes that are survivability talents are IBF and AMS. But the way you break it down anyway guess what? If a death rune costs RP then it would be pretty much the exact same as it is right now.

So you are correct, DK's would no longer have to choose between doing damage or survivability, but at the same time that changes nothing for other classes. So yes they can't open with their defensive abilities, but after 3 abilities you burn one defensive ability, after 3 more runes, you burn another, after 3 more you burn another, after 3 more you can burn another, and you can still rotate them with no issues whatsoever. Or you can look at it as they use 6 runes, burn their survivability runes, and are still able to stack shit and do DPS all at the same time, so in essence you just buffed the DK according to your theory, the only difference is they can't burn all in the beginning (which they can't do anyway for the most part due to RP restrictions).

[tvveeder]

Try Frost strikes...then imagine.

4 FS to 2 Oblits

Add up the damage and tell me what you plan to spec in 3.1 when everyone else is Unholy.

I plan to spec frost or blood anyway because I hate unholy, but frost strikes only got a 15% buff... Go back and look at the buffs SS got.

30% from outbreak.
Contribution damage from diseases up increased (a percentage will always beat a baseline number especially with scaling).
And the baseline number was increased.

What was decreased? It was reduced from 60% to 55% weapon damage. I dunno... I think the SS buff has FS buff licked.

[Battousai]

I plan to spec frost or blood anyway because I hate unholy, but frost strikes only got a 15% buff... Go back and look at the buffs SS got.

30% from outbreak.
Contribution damage from diseases up increased (a percentage will always beat a baseline number especially with scaling).
And the baseline number was increased.

What was decreased? It was reduced from 60% to 55% weapon damage. I dunno... I think the SS buff has FS buff licked.

I get regular FS crits for 6-8k (usually somewhere in the middle. Now glyphed and talented for extra RP...I can pull 4 of them off back to back. Say half crit...3.5k+7k+3.5k+7k = 21k and add 2 more Oblits for 7-8k each gyphed...for 4k and 8k.

Thats half my shit critting and I just did 33k in less than 10 secs...the duration of a HC. Thats not theory crafting...I've had higher totals, or lower totals in 6 sec (unholy presence).

And this is less likely to get the nerf bat than me Scourge strikeing for 10k.

[tvveeder]

I get regular FS crits for 6-8k (usually somewhere in the middle. Now glyphed and talented for extra RP...I can pull 4 of them off back to back. Say half crit...3.5k+7k+3.5k+7k = 21k and add 2 more Oblits for 7-8k each gyphed...for 4k and 8k.

Thats half my shit critting and I just did 33k in less than 10 secs...the duration of a HC. Thats not theory crafting...I've had higher totals, or lower totals in 6 sec (unholy presence).

And this is less likely to get the nerf bat than me Scourge strikeing for 10k.

True... but in order to do that you have to do nearly 2 full rotations to develop 130 RP to drop 4 FS's all at once, not to mention unholy will have the ability to do the same thing potentially with DC and a strong DC can crit for 6k+ under ideal circumstances. Not to mention as unholy you can technically...

PS > IT > SS > BS > BS > Dump > SS x 3 > Dump > SS x 2 > BS x 2 > Dump > SS x 3

With the glyph of SS. Let's do the math there with 33% crit (which is easy to get as unholy).

5k + 10k + 5k = 20k in around 3 seconds... and it can refresh diseases so you don't have to PS > IT again and can spam your big nuke ability. So really you can argue for both.

[rathok]

As for what you are talking about with the best closer I beg to differ... I fail to see how it's any better than charge, intercept, or pounce. You say... well you can just death grip then CoI someone and they are wrecked... but the problem is you don't think about what other classes have to counter.

Death grip a mage, CoI, most likely he will have blink up, he blinks away, slows you, and you are fucked.
Death grip a lock, CoI and most likely he will have Death Coil up so he DC's you and then casts a fear and unless you're frost you are fucked.
Death grip a priest, CoI him and most likely he will bubble then psychic scream and unless you can break fear you are fucked.
Death grip a hunter, CoI him and there are a few scenarios...
- BM hunter will cast beastial wrath, hit you with concussive shot, and kite you to death.
- Survival will wing clip you, disengage to get far away, then nuke you and concussive shot kite you to death.
- Marksman hunter will scatter shot you, disengage, concussive shot and kite you.

The only class I can think of that is ranged and doesn't have a mechanic to break CoI, slow/kite a DK, or anything to that effect is elemental shaman... but they are struggling in PvP right now anyways and seriously need some work.

Now you talk about CoI after death grip, when really if you're up against a caster you want to death grip, strangulate, then CoI (unless you have chillblains then you can use IT just as well) but you had better hope you can kill that squishy in less than 4 seconds because as soon as the silence is up guess what happens... read above and that is what will happen. So who wants to complain about DK closers now? Now not only does it suck that most every class has a mechanic to get out of it... but also it can be dispelled if I'm not mistaken. If I'm wrong then correct me but I'm pretty sure it can be dispelled.

Now as for defensive capabilities. Well lets just break it down.

Icebound fortitude - lasts for 12 seconds, reduces damage by 15% (unless you are wearing tank gear, and that's not a huge number) and you are immune to stuns. The only people who should complain about this is rogues because of stun locking, the damage reduction is a joke and anyone who says this is overpowered needs to refer to paladins and their shields.

Anti Magic Shield - lasts for 5 seconds... let me repeat that... FIVE SECONDS. It negates most magic damage and turns it into RP. With a glyph it can last 7 seconds. If you time that right that will effect 2 castable spells tops and about 3 or 4 instant cast spells. Wow that is so overpowered. Once again I say anyone who wants to complain about this can refer to paladins and their shields.

Anti Magic Zone - has to be picked up through talents and to be honest if casters can't come up with a way to avoid this then you just don't understand the meaning of the word strategy and shouldn't PvP in the first place. It's a stationary shield! If the throws it up guess what... don't stay near him, don't attack him while in it... focus elsewhere. Once again... pally, shield, refer.

The only thing I will say that Dk's do excel in and possibly needs to be normalized is their survivability. The only thing I can say that REALLY needs it though is death strike. If you are spec'ed a certain way a well placed DS crit can just about full heal you even with low health. Rune tap is a talent, and to make it any good you have to pour 4 points into it and glyph it. So I will say that is fine as is. Vampiric blood is a talent and that's no different than last stand for warriors so there's no reason for that to be nerfed. Mark of blood was already nerfed so that doesn't matter. Death pact requires rezzing a ghoul and sacrificing it and it's being changed in the patch to where it can't crit heal you (which I do agree with). I've broken things down between the different classes so many times it's not funny and really it's unnecessary because if you think DK's have better/more mechanics to make them excel at PvP than every other class you need to stop the QQ and quit the game because you don't know all the mechanics of the other classes and you can't analyze a class to pick out it's weaknesses and exploit them.

You want me to break down a DK's weaknesses? I'll do it right here just to prove a point.
Outside of melee range they are garbage.
If you force them to burn their CD's they are very susceptible.
If you can slow them and kite them they have very little to counter with.
If you have fears use them to your advantage. If they have Lichborne yes they will be able to break it... but it's a 3 minute CD so they won't have it up at all times.
Last I have a 4 letter word that I will reiterate... KITE!

And as for what z8472 said he is exactly right. Warriors and rogues have counters for us that will destroy us if they use them right. Both have disarm, and rogues can stun lock. If you try to stun and they have IBF up you can either CoS and Vanish or CoS and sprint away out of reach and then stealth, rinse, and repeat stun lock. Ret Pallies have just as much survivability as DK's do with their instant cast FoL's and shields, so they can go toe for toe. Prot pallies should demolish DK's because they are overpowered and all their damage is holy so it's not mitigated by armor anyway (not to mention most DK abilities will either have trouble hitting them or be mitigated a lot by armor).

Do you know what you are talking about? Chillblains is rank 7 in 3.1... I highly doubt you will see any unholy or blood builds with it because they wont waste 30 points in frost just to get it.

QFT. On PTR they made certain changes and didn't think about the numbers I believe. PS critting for 6-7k unbuffed and DS critting for 5-6k unbuffed is too much. That will get changed big time. Also they buffed SS a little too much on PTR but that will get changed as well. I wouldn't be surprised to see DS turn out to be a totally new mechanic.

FYI, never open with death grip or you just gave them a gauranteed win.