Blood Talents

[unKnowN6]

This post really isn't about subspecs, as Lichborne has become the talent of choice because of the self heals, but the blood tree itself.

I have been experimenting with a spec such as this: ah, cant post links. The talent tree looks like:
033
2220
0132
202
311
30
1

Let me explain my choices.

1. I know I did not choose blood parasite. After looking at recount, etc, I realize that the blood worms healed for only a minuscule amount. I decided to drop the talent points in favor of AM.

2. Why AM over BCB? Well, theorycrafters (which I certainly am not one) suggest that BCB beat out AM by a small amount. However, am I the only dk tank that is not having any trouble holding threat? I find threat easy, which is why I leaned toward AM. It buffs AP for allies, which is helpful. It buffs strength, which translate into increase into almost every attack we use for tanking. Also, correct me if I am wrong, strength increases our chance to parry.

I am still trying out new things (spent almost 200gold respeccing since just yesterday), and would appreciate some constructive responses.

All the best.

[Ikkatsu]

OP's Spec: http://wowtal.com/#k=Yfqetmg.a8t.deathknight.

Now onto the break down.

Blood Parasites: Whilst they may only heal you for a little bit they actually REALLY help the raid healing as its an AoE heal now... not a single target heal.

Blood-Caked Blade: Garbage for tanking at the moment unless you keep diseases up... and if you're keeping diseases up then you're harming your survivability by losing out on an extra 2-3 Death Strikes per minute.

Abominations Might: Situational. You should only ever take it if you're running 10 Man raids and you have no-one else to grant the buff. If you have a Paladin, Marksman Hunter or Enhancement Shaman you don't need it.

The current "base" spec to work from is as follows:

http://wowtal.com/#k=tw8YqfTvu.a8t.deathknight.

Whilst my personal spec is as follows:

http://wowtal.com/#k=tw5VdPUc0.a8t.deathknight.

[unKnowN6]

A little off topic, but I was just wondering what is your hit rating Ikkatsu? Just want to know what I should be roughly aiming for. Mine is pretty low, mostly because lower level tanking gear (regular and heroic instances) barely have, if any, hit. Is this something I should be concerned about?

[Ikkatsu]

A little off topic, but I was just wondering what is your hit rating Ikkatsu? Just want to know what I should be roughly aiming for. Mine is pretty low, mostly because lower level tanking gear (regular and heroic instances) barely have, if any, hit. Is this something I should be concerned about?

Mine is actually VERY low at present, same with expertise.

Hit = 2.52% | Cap is 8%
Expertise = 12 | Cap is 26

Its fine enough for Heroic Dungeons, but i need to get it up more for Raiding... Death Strike was parried four times in a row on Tron Council

http://eu.battle.net/wow/en/characte...kuzetsu/simple

[unKnowN6]

Haha, ouch. Mine is roughly that as well. Should the goal be to get 8%? Because, if so, it would really be taking away from our avoidance, mitigation, and health.

[Ikkatsu]

Haha, ouch. Mine is roughly that as well. Should the goal be to get 8%? Because, if so, it would really be taking away from our avoidance, mitigation, and health.

I've been heavily following what Sufferings has been posting.

He suggests that whilst getting Hit and Expertise to the relevant caps will of course improve your survivability through Death Strikes and Blood Shield, you don't want to do it all in one go as it will take away from your Avoidance and Effective Health. Try and find a happy balance, such as keeping Mastery over 90% (Ideally atleast 100% but current pre-raid gear levels dont allow it without heavily reforging) whilst also keeping both Parry and Dodge over 10%. Everything else should then go to Hit/Expertise until the cap.

That's my personal route anyway!

It's just a shame that Expertise/Stamina and Mastery/Stamina gems on my server are either non-existant or INSANELY overpriced!

[bumrush]

OP's Spec: http://wowtal.com/#k=Yfqetmg.a8t.deathknight.
Blood-Caked Blade: Garbage for tanking at the moment unless you keep diseases up... and if you're keeping diseases up then you're harming your survivability by losing out on an extra 2-3 Death Strikes per minute.

Not if you are using Outbreak to apply diseases while also having 2/3 or 3/3 in Epidemic. Diseaseless blood is for lowbie blood tanks.

The only threat issues I have are with off targets when a frost DK is present, other then that I haven't been having threat issues either. I do not believe that it is an indicator of Blood threat being OP as much as it is of you getting your ability priority correct. Here is my spec. I took some points out of things to get a few in Virulence so that Mind Freeze doesn't miss... while I obtain better hit gear... so until my gear improves, I don't have AM or BcB.... but its not been an issue in dungeons, as I am certain it will be in raids.

[Ikkatsu]

Not if you are using Outbreak to apply diseases while also having 2/3 or 3/3 in Epidemic. Diseaseless blood is for lowbie blood tanks.

The only threat issues I have are with off targets when a frost DK is present, other then that I haven't been having threat issues either. I do not believe that it is an indicator of Blood threat being OP as much as it is of you getting your ability priority correct. Here is my spec. I took some points out of things to get a few in Virulence so that Mind Freeze doesn't miss... while I obtain better hit gear... so until my gear improves, I don't have AM or BcB.... but its not been an issue in dungeons, as I am certain it will be in raids.

"Diseaseless" is the term used for Blood Tanks that only use Outbreak to apply the Diseases, not having 100% Disease Uptime.

Blood-Caked Blade only worth having in the following conditions: You're having issues with threat (lol) and you run with 100% Disease uptime. Otherwise, like i said, its a garbage talent.

Even in raids, threat is not an issue as long as you follow the correct threat priority: Rune Strike > Heart Strike > Death Strike.

After the first 60-90 seconds of the fight, your Rune Strikes will have put you so far ahead on Threat that you can calm down and start focusing Death Strikes as your priority as well as Pooling RP for Lichborne Healing and Ghoul Sacrifice.

[bumrush]

I was under the impression "Diseaseless" was the term used for post 4.0 DK tanking when you simply didn't bother with diseases at all, as you did not yet have access to Outbreak. Either way, we are in agreement that BcB is only useful if you are having threat issues, and I don't see that being a problem if you are using your resources effectively.

[Deleted]

Personally I love the Bloodworms, just wish I could get them to show on Recount, don't seem to be on there at all for me.

[Deleted]

Its fine enough for Heroic Dungeons, but i need to get it up more for Raiding... Death Strike was parried four times in a row on Tron Council

I was going Parry/Miss/Dodge Spam yesterday night in Baradin Hold with 3.7 Hit and 12 Expertise

On Lichborne: I don't use it. I'm fine. I survive fine. When I go on a Cooldown Streak then its either usually because the Healer is OOM, or its some big bad boss ability. To get any real use out of Lichborne you need to pre-stock a lot of RP. By the time you've stocked it all, the moment where you needed LB is long gone. Unless you can predict the future because its some boss ability or something, LB is fail. Stopping using Rune Strike for LB pooling imo just dumbs down our rotation even more, which fails. You'll use what... DS, HS for Blade Barrier, BB if you need Scarlet Fever which you probably won't. 2-Button Rotation basically. How fun!

Blood-Caked Blade: Garbage for tanking at the moment unless you keep diseases up... and if you're keeping diseases up then you're harming your survivability by losing out on an extra 2-3 Death Strikes per minute.

Outbreak grants you a free 30-50% Disease uptime depending on how many points you spend into Epidemic. Besides that, its 1 DS more per-minute. Anyway.

[Avatar Killer]

The only threat issues I have are with off targets when a frost DK is present

Why are you having ANY kind of threat issues with a frost dk present? just use BB instead of HS if there are more than 3 targets. and using D&D also prevents that too.

[Foibles]

Personally I love the Bloodworms, just wish I could get them to show on Recount, don't seem to be on there at all for me.

Turn off 'group pets with player.' Bloodworms are great, I've had some 26k aoe heals from them.

[Needonboots]

Yeah Bloodworms are amazingly useful. 20k+ crit AOE heals, with abotu 10k AOE heals otherwise really help, and I always seem to have 1-2 up at a time.