DK Tank - i'll lose to much hp to fast

[Tcip]

Hi

I'm a DK Tank. I've got: 551 in def and 25.88% dodge, 18.81% parry 30.8k hp (with out any buff).
Some healers say i'm losing o much hp to quick.. So i need some help.

I maybe should chance some def gem to parry or dodge gem? or is the stats ok, and i just need to go with stamina gems?

My Talant Build: 53/8/10
My Spec: See here

[Whitcher]

You're not seriously specced like that...are you?

[insurgi]

have you taken a look at dk tank guide on this forum mate? may be helpfull
in general DK tanks are a tad weak.
may not just be you and/or your spec

[Craas]

You're not seriously specced like that...are you?

Instead of posting something that stupid, you could give him some more constructive information.

Uhhh... That talent build is the same that I use on my DK tank, hmmmm... only thing I could notice is that you have the trinket from Brewfest Boss (not the hp one)

Do you have the health one with 170stam? (if yes, use it)

you are really over def cap needed as it seems, so you can replace those "def rating gems" and socket and enchant your chest with 275 hp and blue/purple gems so you get the socket bonus

PS. Dodge is more important than parry for DK's

Something I also noticed is that you have the same "level" of gear that I have on my DK but you still have 2,2k hp less than I have without frost pres

If this doesn't help either you are bad or your healers are bad...

REMEMBER TO USE YOUR CD's!!!


EDIT: Get a new sigil

[crabmousse]

You're not seriously specced like that...are you?

/facepalm

spec is fine mate, lose the defense gems, stack some stamina. like the other guy said, use the stamina brewfest trinket if you have it. if you have more stamina healers will magically stop whining usually.

DK tanks really, really suck right now. really badly. but that's at hardmode content, you're fine for normal 10/25 mans as far as I'm concerned, tell these healers to stop whining and l2p, they're used to 45k unbuffed pala tanks blocking all damage.

[Dapuh]

i do not see any problem with that spec either...

dk's are a bit squishy, the CD's are kinda low, use Vamp Blood at trash mob pulls etc.

and get a tank trinket

gemming avoidance sucks, stay with stamina.

and dk tanks do not suck at all...

[Iniquity]

Roll a proper tanking classes.

In my guild we use a DK for lots of fights in togc25, there is no difference in healing him or pala/warrior.

[vegastommy]

You're not seriously specced like that...are you?

..... R tard

spec is cookie cutter....

[Bael]

Roll a proper tanking classes.

I guess that rules out warriors.

But enough with the foolish troll.

Tcip, I'd recommend changing all but one of your purple gems to simple +stam gems (keep one purple so the meta stays active). I'd even suggest using a 'solid' gem in your shoulders, because you have more than enough defense. I would agree that if you have one available it may help you to swap your dodge trinket for another stamina booster (keep the trinket in your bag in case you have a specific fight where you need more dodge).

Your spec looks fine. I tend to not care for hysteria for tanking, but there's absolutely nothing wrong with it. It's as good as about anywhere else I'd put the point. I tend to favor a point in ravenous dead for the extra parry via strength.

I think your setup looks like a fine base. You seem to be coming along well at least on paper. Your hit rating is high, but that's just a byproduct of the gear available to you. Because your defense is as high as it is, I might suggest an agility enchant on your cloak since it'll give you more dodge, armor, and attack power all at once. As for the chest, I tend to prefer +10 stats enchants, because the stats scale with talents like veteran of the third war and buffs like blessing of kings. If you change all of that and still have excess defense, I might also suggest the 30 stamina/15 resilience should enchant. It costs 10,000 honor (150 stonekeeper's shards worth of honor).

Based only on what I can see in the armory, I doubt your health pool is falling very quickly, but I do think it could be higher. If you do feel your health falls too quickly, I can only guess the cause might be something basic. Try to make sure no targets get behind you for very long. Certainly don't let them stay there. And while I'm hesitant to mention it, be sure you're in frost presence. I say that not to insult or be rude. I've met many who are under the impression that they need to be in the presence that matches the name of their preferred talent tree. That isn't the case. Frost presence is meant to be our shield/defensive stance/righteous fury.

Beyond that I can only emphasize cautious pulling and not letting the complaints of weak healers discourage you.

[Jonisawsom]

I pug a decent amount of heroics on my healers so I see quite a few tanks that are well geared and not so well geared. DK tanks seem to scale well with gear and currently I find them to be a tad weak if they are not in very high level gear. My DK tank is in mostly i200 epics and some blues, and after the nerfs I noticed quite a big difference in how squishy I felt. This may just be my experience, but that is what I have noticed.

Of course this isn't really an issue to me because for the most part my toons are over geared for healing heroics, I just happen to notice who takes more damage. Then again I also healed a warrior tank the other day in H ToC who was in mostly i213-219 and above. For the last fight alone, I did 600,000 healing, and about 3700 HPS (mostly to the tank). DPS was low but I was literally just spam healing the tank hoping to keep him up.

So take the suggestions you got here. Make sure you are using your CDs at appropriate times, and if you still get complaints then it is most likely your healers that are under geared or just suck.

[Snowie]

I pug a decent amount of heroics on my healers so I see quite a few tanks that are well geared and not so well geared. DK tanks seem to scale well with gear and currently I find them to be a tad weak if they are not in very high level gear. My DK tank is in mostly i200 epics and some blues, and after the nerfs I noticed quite a big difference in how squishy I felt. This may just be my experience, but that is what I have noticed.

Of course this isn't really an issue to me because for the most part my toons are over geared for healing heroics, I just happen to notice who takes more damage. Then again I also healed a warrior tank the other day in H ToC who was in mostly i213-219 and above. For the last fight alone, I did 600,000 healing, and about 3700 HPS (mostly to the tank). DPS was low but I was literally just spam healing the tank hoping to keep him up.

So take the suggestions you got here. Make sure you are using your CDs at appropriate times, and if you still get complaints then it is most likely your healers that are under geared or just suck.

just quoting this person as he is speaking the truth, Dk's scale horrendously at low levels of gear because of the hefty nerfs to cool downs and armor etc. However at top end gear, tier 8+ you do scale perfectly fine and actually make the best heroic tank at high end gear as you dont have issues with lack of rage/mana that all the other tanks have, when they simply out gear the instance by a large amount.

From my point of view i would avoid going blood for 5 mans, unless you really want to work at your threat. 5 mans are mostly aoe based because of the large quantities of trash, frost or unholy work out better. But if you are main tanking in 10 mans or 25's blood all the way because of the vastly superior survivability and single target threat combo provided by blood. Only issue is you will be as useful as a chocolate tea pot in aoe trash, so do as i do and grab the biggest nastiest mob(s) and let your other tanks grab the rest.

[Stieger23]

A ringing second to what everyone else said about gemming and enchanting for HP over avoidance. They're dead-right. The only reason to have a non-Stam gem is 1) meta requirements 2) stamina slot bonus (and only consider it then).

Now here's the trick: death knight tanks are weaker than other tanks right now. Doing heroic beasts I die much more easily than my pally co-tank to slow healer transitions during the tank swap for two reasons: one, she has a shield which means that our nearly equal HP, exactly equal avoidance and exactly equal base armor mitigation is supplemented with an across the board 1593 point reduction in all incoming damage from her shield. And second, if she dies she doesn't die... at least once per pull. Nothing you do is going to make a difference in that regard.

[Noxia]

I don't know... I've got some offspec tank gear and I'm focusing on avoidance. Something like 73% avoidance buffed and sigil up. What really annoyed me today was this druid tank who had around 500 less gearscore than me, yet he still took less damage than me and he also had quite a bit more HP than I did. Is it because of the goddamn block (or in this case the druid version of it)? He took in more hits than I did according to recount, but still he somehow managed to recieve less dmg. Maybe I got lucky with avoided hits during IBF. Maybe they should buff dk tanks. Maybe I'll have another drink. Not going for pure stamina either, but gemming avoidance stat + 15 stam on non-blue sockets for the bonuses. It's more of a personal choice, I want to take less dmg and avoid as many hits as possible when I'm tanking, not to be high on stamina sponging massive amounts dmg.

I think we should get a block mechanic. Why do you people say we scale perfectly fine when we've reached high gear levels? I think that's totally absurd. If we scale bad we scale bad, no matter what kind of gear we have. Classes that scale better scale better no matter what gear they have. I mean, if you get shitloads of bonus % to stamina from talents (good scaling), the better you scale with stamina gear. Doesn't matter what gear you have, the scaling - these % incresaes - always stay the same. Our scaling got nerfed big time with the frost presence nerf.

[Slacky91]

Go frost or unholy tank, best tank speccs

[vegastommy]

Go frost or unholy tank, best tank speccs

Wrong

Unholy threat isn't even viable in end game guilds. You get caught too fast, FD/Vanish/mirror image and caught again.

Frost is ok....

Blood for tanking bosses though is superior.

[Cirayne24]

Go frost or unholy tank, best tank speccs

What?!

[Archimand]

here my advice from experiance drop the 3 points in subversion for rune tap and improved rune tap and get it glyhpd after that nerf i found myslef using it nearly each cooldown to help keep myself up at least till i got some better gear

[Paraffinum]

I don't know... I've got some offspec tank gear and I'm focusing on avoidance. Something like 73% avoidance buffed and sigil up. What really annoyed me today was this druid tank who had around 500 less gearscore than me, yet he still took less damage than me and he also had quite a bit more HP than I did. Is it because of the goddamn block (or in this case the druid version of it)? He took in more hits than I did according to recount, but still he somehow managed to recieve less dmg. Maybe I got lucky with avoided hits during IBF. Maybe they should buff dk tanks. Maybe I'll have another drink. Not going for pure stamina either, but gemming avoidance stat + 15 stam on non-blue sockets for the bonuses. It's more of a personal choice, I want to take less dmg and avoid as many hits as possible when I'm tanking, not to be high on stamina sponging massive amounts dmg.

I think we should get a block mechanic. Why do you people say we scale perfectly fine when we've reached high gear levels? I think that's totally absurd. If we scale bad we scale bad, no matter what kind of gear we have. Classes that scale better scale better no matter what gear they have. I mean, if you get shitloads of bonus % to stamina from talents (good scaling), the better you scale with stamina gear. Doesn't matter what gear you have, the scaling - these % incresaes - always stay the same. Our scaling got nerfed big time with the frost presence nerf.

What are you talking about? first of all druids have no block mechanic and naturally have more armor then DKs hence they take less damage, and gear score is an awful connotation of gear quality, it hardly means anything at all.

[Lilbwnr]

umm actually dodge is equal to parry now it was fixed a few patches ago

[hellboyy]

noxia has a point. i've seen dk tanks with better gear (not just score, i have inspected to compare) go down quicker than other tanking classes with less avoidance+hp in there gear. this is very true if they are trying to tank multiple raid mobs that hit hard.