PvE 2H DPS, Frost and Unholy confusion..

[Kaspar]

Okay, so I'm not on the PTR and I've been throwing together some builds to see what I should pick in 3.1

The problem is that Unholy, which I have been for a long time, now has two totally different choices for a subtree.
Going blood seems like the weakest choice for me, because the 10% increase in shadow damage in frost should overthrow it with ease.
So as it stands 0/10/61 should be THE unholy build of choice right now?

http://talent.mmo-champion.com/?deat...4&version=9757



But what about frost? I tested frost in 3.08 and it's damage was pretty good, but the rotation was a mess. With the changes to rime, disease duration and the new gylph of disease, it should be a LOT smoother. But is it's damage on par with unholy? I see a lot of people taking unholy as a subtree for frost, which I cant understand, becase Necrosis and BcB haven't really shined in my eyes. The 5% crit and 4% 2h damage in blood seem much more reliable.

http://talent.mmo-champion.com/?deat...4&version=9757


So what should it be?

[DarkAxius]

Well, the Blood subtree on Unholy means you have a lot more attack power from your Bladed Armour and you scale with upgrades, while the Frost upgrade is a flat extra 10% damage.

When I DPS I run as Frost/Blood just for the extra damage added. I choose this for Bladed Armour typically as the DPS increase from the armour is hard to give up. I imagine as Unholy the same should apply.

[sinaii]

The 12-0-59 comes out on top at early 3.1 (pre-ulduar equip). However 0-10-61 scales much better as you get Ulduar gear (mostly due to the armor not being much higher making bladed armor not scaling as much as Black Ice).

This was proven by Methods back on EJ. (http://elitistjerks.com/f72/t37087-u...ps_discussion/)

As for frost, 17-51-3 seems to come out as the cookie-cutter frost 2h at the moment. More to come though, as we might see another PTR build soon.

Note that most specs chose an unholy subspec a few builds ago when permaghoul was attainable at 15 points - which no longer is the case.

... while the Frost upgrade is a flat extra 10% damage.

Not quite true. It enhances everything except Melee/BCB/Necrosis (yes, Necrosis will not scale with ANYTHING except white dmg in 3.1) - which still is a decent part of your damage done. However, again, 0-10-61 will come out on top at a certain gear level.

[Fordtuff]

17/51/3 is the most smoothest rotation ever.

May i ask which rotation you are using?

[Bael]

If I were to guess the rotation with his 17/51/3, I'd imagine it'd be

(glyphed) Howling Blast, (glyphed) Obliterate, Blood Strike x2, (glyphed) Frost Strike

At this point I appear to be 4 RP shy of a 2nd Frost Strike, but the number of globals that have passed suggest my runes and HB cooldown aren't perfectly ready yet. So I'd probably use Horn of Winter as filler to get another Frost Strike. Then...

Obliterate x3, Frost Strike x2

But as I say this is a rough guess. I'm not fully confident I've got a feel for the setup in 3.1 yet.