improving my dps as frost dw

[shingoy]

hello everyone, first of all, sorry for my english =P

I decided to open this topic because I'd like to know what could I do to improve my DPS as a frost dw DK... browsing through top dps charts on http://wowmeteronline.com I've came across DKs doing like 10k dps on particular fights, I know they probably have like all the BiS available currently and I don't expect to be doing that much DPS, but after doing OS 25 tonight I noticed that my DPS when I had the BiS back from T7.5 didn't change much from what I'm currently wearing, follows my armory:
http://www.wowarmory.com/character-s...d&n=Morbidkill

and this is the combatlog from my last toc 10 man / onyxia run (didn't save the log for the OS run but it was around 4k dps):
http://www.wowmeteronline.com/combat/log/1069236

me and my guildies aren't top notch but we try to improve ourselves as much as we can... so please bear with me =P
theoretically my rotation is:
it > ps > ob > bs > bs > dump
ob > ob > ob > dump
trying to cast howling blasts whenever rime and km procs

I say theoretically because I try to adapt my rotation by using the priority system, trying to keep diseases up all the time, dumping my rp when it's full, doing ob's as much as I can and casting HoW in downtimes

here's a video of me fighting vs anub on toc 10:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ww09L07rnPQ&fmt=22

this fight is probably the fight that I can get my highest dps...

as you can see on my armory I'm 1 point below the exp cap and waaaaayyy above the hit cap, but I have no idea on how to lower my hit rating to get that extra expertise and more str, besides, I'm still wondering which weapon should I use as my main hand weapon... I've tried switching them a few times on different fights but I didn't notice much different at all...

now that I have the Victor's Call trinket from ToC 10, I decided to make a macro for the following strikes: Obliterate, Blood Strike, Death Strike, Plague Strike and Frost Strike so they use the trinket prior the strike itself, and I use the Rune Strike macro, looking something like:
#showtooltip "Rune Ability"
/cast !Rune Strike
/use Victor's Call
/cast "Rune Ability"
and I would like to know if you guys think it's a good idea to use that trinket whenever it's up or save it for bursts with heroism, and as for the rune stirke, if is there a problem doing that

I'm using the stat weights for frost dw from EJ to look for upgrades on LootRank.com but I noticed some weird results, like Valorous Darkruned Battleplate being better than Thassarian's Battleplate of Conquest, or Mark of Supremacy and Shard of the Crystal Heart being the best trinkets that I can get doing 10 mans, and on Rawr, my theoretical DPS dropped from 3.7k on my old T7.5 BiS to 2.9k on my current gear

so... to finish it up, I would like to know what should I look for to improve my gameplay and therefore raise my DPS

sorry for the huge post, any help is appreciated, thanks in advance!

[Dreager_ex]

me and my guildies aren't top notch but we try to improve ourselves as much as we can... so please bear with me =P
theoretically my rotation is:
it > ps > ob > bs > bs > dump
ob > ob > ob > dump
trying to cast howling blasts whenever rime and km procs

I say theoretically because I try to adapt my rotation by using the priority system, trying to keep diseases up all the time, dumping my rp when it's full, doing ob's as much as I can and casting HoW in downtimes

DW frost is a bit more technical than other specs tend to be. It has a lot of on the fly rotation manipulation. In such cases they have a priority system that goes like this.

(FF + BP, Diseases) > (KM Rime procs) > Oblit > Blood strike > FS

With Frost strike always being last even if your RP bar is over flowing. (Which it shouldn't be if you are doing it right.) Also a lot of people like to use glyph of disease so if you are one of those people I'd save your cooldowns (that boost your AP) for right before you apply your diseases. That way you can apply buffed diseases and use Pest. to keep them up the entire fight. If you do use glyph of disease you will sub (FF + BP, Diseases) for Pest. whenever possible.

BTW, after having looked at your spec, if you decide to get Glyph of Disease, you are going to have to spec out of Icy Talons and Imp Icy Talons, as you won't be using Icy Touch that much.

http://talent.mmo-champion.com/?deat...WBwr,aMI,10128
^ spec normally used with Glyph of disease, it offers you more personal DPs but it doesn't give your raid the Icy talons buff, but if you have shamans in your raid (which I assume you do) they will be dropping windfury totem, so I don't think it will matter much in the end.

now that I have the Victor's Call trinket from ToC 10, I decided to make a macro for the following strikes: Obliterate, Blood Strike, Death Strike, Plague Strike and Frost Strike so they use the trinket prior the strike itself, and I use the Rune Strike macro, looking something like:
#showtooltip "Rune Ability"
/cast !Rune Strike
/use Victor's Call
/cast "Rune Ability"
and I would like to know if you guys think it's a good idea to use that trinket whenever it's up or save it for bursts with heroism, and as for the rune stirke, if is there a problem doing that

I'd save the trinket for when your guild usually uses Heroism/Bloodlust, if you have enough time between the start of the fight and the heroism/bloodlust go ahead and you it.

As for the rune strike in your macro, I really don't see an issue that it might cause, although I doubt you will ever need it much, unless you are tanking. Typically i have Runestrike on my hotbar near the end so I can click it if it ever comes up. You have plenty of time to hit it, it doesn't go away, and typically if you have the opportunity to dodge enough to make it part of your DPS, your tank is doing something wrong. :P

as you can see on my armory I'm 1 point below the exp cap and waaaaayyy above the hit cap, but I have no idea on how to lower my hit rating to get that extra expertise and more str, besides, I'm still wondering which weapon should I use as my main hand weapon... I've tried switching them a few times on different fights but I didn't notice much different at all...

If its just 1 point of expertise, I wouldn't worry too much about it. But if you really want more Expertise, I'd sub out that purple gem in your chest for its epic quality gem.

As for hit rating you really can't have too much when it comes to DW, any sort of Hit rating you have is only going to buff your melee damage, which should be a huge part of your DPS.

Another thing worth mentioning is I'd sub out one of your blue/prismatic gems for a straight Str gem. You have 3 and you only need 2 for the meta gem, and you gem more DPS out of a STR gem than anything else. My suggestion would be the one in the gloves since it has the lesser set bonus. (assuming you replace the gem in your chest with its epic quality version.)

I decided to open this topic because I'd like to know what could I do to improve my DPS as a frost dw DK... browsing through top dps charts on http://wowmeteronline.com I've came across DKs doing like 10k dps on particular fights, I know they probably have like all the BiS available currently and I don't expect to be doing that much DPS,

To be fair a lot of the end game fights right now are sort of gimmicky and cator to the AoE DPS'er. (I mean in Heroic 25-man ToC) I could easily see a frost DK getting 10k+ on a couple of those fights without any real effort.

Anyway, as for helping you upgrade your DPS, aside from the above mentioned suggestions, I'd also like to suggest you get the new sigil off of the Triumph badge vendor, its amazing for Frost DW.

[Gravve]

Give this rotation a try with Glyph of Disease.

IT - PS - OB - PEST - BS - FS's

OB - OB - OB - FS's

Then, repeat this as long as you don't let your diseases drop due to killing adds, lag, etc.

OB - PEST - BS - OB - FS's

OB - OB - OB - FS's


As far as having a priority system.. eh. If you stick to your rotation, that's all you need. Our class doesn't really have the mechanics for on-the-fly-changes.

[Dreager_ex]

As far as having a priority system.. eh. If you stick to your rotation, that's all you need. Our class doesn't really have the mechanics for on-the-fly-changes.

If you are using your Rime procs correctly, your rotation won't always be that clean. So yeah it kinda does have the mechanics for on-the-fly-changes.

[Gravve]

If you are using your Rime procs correctly, your rotation won't always be that clean. So yeah it kinda does have the mechanics for on-the-fly-changes.

Rune attacks will do more damage than a rime, if it's a single target situation. Rime should only be used if two criteria are met.

1. All runes are on cooldown
2. Not enough RP for a FS


If you stagger your rotation for a rime proc, then you chance losing time on your rune's refreshing because you didn't use them soon enough for the 2SR to apply.

AE situation, sure. Single target, nuh-uh.

[Claym]

Rune attacks will do more damage than a rime, if it's a single target situation. Rime should only be used if two criteria are met.

1. All runes are on cooldown
2. Not enough RP for a FS


If you stagger your rotation for a rime proc, then you chance losing time on your rune's refreshing because you didn't use them soon enough for the 2SR to apply.

AE situation, sure. Single target, nuh-uh.

You missed the biggest time when Rime should ALWAYS be used. When KM procs. KM Rime is the highest priority attack of a Frost DW DK, second only to keeping diseases up.

[Dreager_ex]

Rune attacks will do more damage than a rime, if it's a single target situation. Rime should only be used if two criteria are met.

Rime should always be paired up with a KM proc, that's what I mean by using them correctly. Im not telling the guy to just drop every thing for a simple rime proc by itself.

If you stagger your rotation for a rime proc, then you chance losing time on your rune's refreshing because you didn't use them soon enough for the 2SR to apply.

And thus comes into play learning how to manipulate your rotation because if you know how manipulate it you can slide back into a normalized rotation after having used a KM+Rime proc.



Edit:

You missed the biggest time when Rime should ALWAYS be used. When KM procs. KM Rime is the highest priority attack of a Frost DW DK, second only to keeping diseases up.

Gah, you got in before my post.

[Gravve]

I'de have to read a bit about that before I could commit, but off the top of my head using my averages, a KM'd FS would do more damage than a KM'd Rime HB, and it wouldn't cause me to lose a GCD in my rotation. I have about a one to two second window for deviation in my rotation or I'll lose my disease stack. Stopping my rotation for an HB isn't really plausible. I could probably manage it if I had a perfect rotation thus far and see a dps increase, but if I've lost any amount of time from having to move out of an AE and out of melee range, or whatever the situation may be, then it would cause me to have to use a FR and a UH for reapplying disease, and the damage loss would be about 15k all said and done.

I can see your point, though. It's pretty much free damage but it just isn't enough damage to lose my disease stack for in a single target situation.

[highwind01]

With Frost strike always being last even if your RP bar is over flowing. (Which it shouldn't be if you are doing it right.) Also a lot of people like to use glyph of disease so if you are one of those people I'd save your cooldowns (that boost your AP) for right before you apply your diseases. That way you can apply buffed diseases and use Pest. to keep them up the entire fight. If you do use glyph of disease you will sub (FF + BP, Diseases) for Pest. whenever possible.

BTW, after having looked at your spec, if you decide to get Glyph of Disease, you are going to have to spec out of Icy Talons and Imp Icy Talons, as you won't be using Icy Touch that much.

There are 2 different dw frost specs

the first offers melee haste as raid buff, this spec is NOT possible to play with glyph of disease (as pestilence "refreshs" dont refresh the raid buff)

the second one doesnt skill the melees haste buff and uses glyph of disease.

If u cannot be sure that another frost dk or an enhancement shaman offers the haste buff ALWAYS SPEC IT - this is crucial, NEVER go with the second if there isnt any melee haste buff present.


also, dont spec bcb !
EJ "spreaded" this builts without subversion and they havent updated it since.
the oblit and bloodstrike crit subversion offers is only very very slightly behind the damage bcb offers but aggro reduce is a must.


there is a very good guide on this by fenira of ensidia
http://www.ensidia.com/home/guides/d...-dps-guide-32/
(scroll down to "Frost Rotation" and than to "Alternative Spec")

I use the alternative spec as we dont have an enhancer at the moment (and because it is much more forgiving) and the dps of it is still very very good, on a "normal tank and spank" like koralon i do about 6k dps fully raid buffed without a single piece of t9 gear (2 ilvl 245 weapons though)

[Dreager_ex]

There are 2 different dw frost specs

the first offers melee haste as raid buff, this spec is NOT possible to play with glyph of disease (as pestilence "refreshs" dont refresh the raid buff)

the second one doesnt skill the melees haste buff and uses glyph of disease.

If u cannot be sure that another frost dk or an enhancement shaman offers the haste buff ALWAYS SPEC IT - this is crucial, NEVER go with the second if there isnt any melee haste buff present.

That's essentially what I meant. Thanks for clarifying.

Edit: I just realized that sounded kinda catty :P Don't take it the wrong way, Im just too tired to give thorough advice. lol

[Gravve]

also, dont spec bcb !
EJ "spreaded" this builts without subversion and they havent updated it since.
the oblit and bloodstrike crit subversion offers is only very very slightly behind the damage bcb offers but aggro reduce is a must.

I agree. BCB is terrible for DW. Subversion probably is lower dps contribution than BCB if you run the Icy talons spec, but it is a definite dps increase for the Glyph of disease build, and with the added threat reduction, it's definitely worth the points.

[Dreager_ex]

IDK, maybe my Tanks are awesome, but I never have issues with pulling aggro even when I run in and Pop death chill and hit HB on an AoE pull right off the bat. Well, obviously I pull then but they easily get the aggro right back and I don't pull off of them for the rest of the fight.

[lolzpop]

use 2h ;D i have no idea ..

[Dreager_ex]

use 2h ;D i have no idea ..

Way to add to the thread :

[Emcee]

Let's see, reasons to use RIME + KM instead of FS + KM.

FS in talents has more crit%, and it's a strike which we inherently have more melee crit rating than spells. Meanwhile howling blast crit rating is like 15% in dps gear...Yes a crit FS does slightly more, but it has a much higher crit rate than HB, so KM isn't contributing as much. Reason Number 2, howling blast is a spell and therefore your global cooldown is affected by haste. Frost strike isn't. Won't make that big a deal, but depending on your haste this might be useful *shrug*

[shingoy]

omg thanks a LOT everyone! this post is being REALLY helpful to me, so much info I'm trying to absorb here... I'm glad I asked that =D
I wish I could use the spec without icy talons but unfortunately we do not have any enh shaman in our group =\
maybe I will try that spec once just to see how it goes heheh
that guide by Fenira is really amazing, I just read it and there's a lot of great information over there
I see I have a lot of options here.... and I'm going to try each of them to see which one will help me go even further
about wielding a 2 handed I really didn't want to do that right now because I believe the dw frost can be really competitive against the 2h builds availables for DK

a question I got... why is BCB so bad for DW DKs?

[highwind01]

a question I got... why is BCB so bad for DW DKs?

it isnt bad at all, its just that u dont have enough points remaining if u spec subversion and everything usefull in the frost tree

[Gwa]

if u are using glyph of disease, try....

1st rotation : IT>PS>BS>BS>OB>FS>FS>Blood tap>Pest
Subsequent rotations: OB>OB>FS>FS>FS>OB>Pest>BS....repeat ad infinitum

then u need to use ur death runes by the time 10secs remains on disease timer so u can use the blood runes to refresh diseases by 1-2secs remaining. This will maximise the number of obliterates....if done correctly Ob should account for about 40% of your damage.

Try acherus' disease timer...it helps