Blood DK - How To Burst Shredders on Siegecrafter Blackfuse Heroic

[Zabuzan]

Hi there,

We recently lost our Prot Warrior tank, I play a Prot Paladin. Originally, we were doing the stacks like this:

War - 3 - KILL SHREDDER
Pal - 2
War - 4 - KILL SHREDDER
Pal - 4
War - 5 - KILL SHREDDER
Pal - 7 - KILL SHREDDER
REPEAT

This obviously trivialised the shredders and made the Overloads a non issue.

We've had to have our Frost DK reroll Blood. He doesn't have many useful tank trinkets like the Malk one. His gear is pretty good somewhere between 565 and 570ilvl, so more than sufficiently geared this tier. Unfortunately, he's struggling to have enough DPS to burst the shredders down prior to the 4th Overload. We've switched the order to the below:

Pal - 3 - KILL SHREDDER
DK - 2
Pal - 4 - KILL SHREDDER
DK - 6 - KILL SHREDDER
REPEAT

However, even with 6 stacks, our DK isn't managing to get the Shredder burned down before the 4th Overload, which obviously drastically increases chances of a death.

I was wondering if you helpful folk could provide any tips for what he should be lining up to burst the Shredder down, he may already be doing so (obviously a Blood DK is going to be a mile off a Prot Warrior for Shredder burst) but I'm hoping that he is missing something that could be easily fixed. It would be even simpler if there was a way for us to go back to:

DK - 3 - KILL SHREDDER
Pal - 2
DK - 4 - KILL SHREDDER
Pal - 4
DK - 5 - KILL SHREDDER
Pal - 7 - KILL SHREDDER
REPEAT

As this would allow us to tank the shredder on the boss from probably the 2nd and definitely the 3rd shredder onwards, trivialising it once again and also ensuring that the 4th shredder would be dead quickly enough that both tanks could help focus down the mines that follow shortly thereafter.


For reference, the belt order that we've had the most success with is:

Emp Missile
Emp Laser
Emp Missile
Emp Laser
Emp Mines
(at which point the boss is 20-30% and a wipe usually follows, assume we get another Emp Mines at that point from the next wave)

We've also recently attempted:

Emp Missile
Emp Laser
Emp Magnet
Emp Missile
Emp Magnet
Emp Mines
Emp Laser

Which was very easy once the 1st emp magnet was done, but were struggling to get through consistently.

Current comp:
2 tank, 6 DPS, 2 heal. Have managed a ~10% wipe with a solo heal burn strat as well, but have since lost a DPS and are unable to go any further with that.

Would appreciate any tips or advice.
Thanks,
Zab

[Eklypto]

Do you have a link to this DK while in his tank gear as well?

[Zabuzan]

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

There you go, should have thought about that before.

Unfortunately, I haven't been logging anything since he started tanking for us on SC last reset, as we've mostly been wiping to strat change reasons, but the shredder killing is going to be an ongoing issue. I'll try and see if I can get some logs from tomorrows raid if needed.

- - - Updated - - -

There may also be some overlap from his DPS gear in there, I'm not sure if that's the exact gear set he wore for SC last night but it should be broadly similar - guessing the crit gems are from his frost MS set which he used on Thok before hand? I know relatively little on the Blood DK front with regards to current gemming - haven't touched mine since early TOT.

[Coalbane]

We have a prot warrior and blood dk tank in our guild. I asked our warrior how they do it and this is what he said:

There are 7 shredders throughout the fight. Warrior solos the 1st, 2nd and 3rd. DK solos the 4th. We kill the 5th together. Warrior solos the 6th and 7th.

The stacks go like this:

1st shredder: 3 stacks on War, 0 on DK
2nd shredder: 5 stacks on War, 2 on DK
3rd shredder: 7 stacks on War, 4 on DK
4th shredder: 0 stacks on War, 6 on DK
5th shredder: 2 stacks on War, 7 on DK
6th shredder: 4 stacks on War, 0 on DK
7th shredder: 6 stacks on War, 2 on DK

Warrior kills most of them because shield slam crits for 7 to 12M and DK's rune strikes hit for like 800k. When the dk does the shredder, warrior has no stacks and spends rage killing and slowing mines instead of actively mitigating.

On a personal note, since I play a DK myself, I can suggest that your DK uses his DRW, ERW, and a Strength potion immediately after the add casts Death from Above, since the add takes increased damage for 5 seconds after he lands.

Also, I just looked at your dk's armory page and he's doing it wrong. After tanks got the Riposte passive in 5.4, blood DKs started prioritizing Parry/Dodge, not Mastery/Stam like your DK is still doing. Due to parry hasting and the increased crit chance from Riposte, this stat priority vastly increases our DPS.

[Zabuzan]

On a personal note, since I play a DK myself, I can suggest that your DK uses his DRW, ERW, and a Strength potion immediately after the add casts Death from Above, since the add takes increased damage for 5 seconds after he lands.

Also, I just looked at your dk's armory page and he's doing it wrong. After tanks got the Riposte passive in 5.4, blood DKs started prioritizing Parry/Dodge, not Mastery/Stam like your DK is still doing. Due to parry hasting and the increased crit chance from Riposte, this stat priority vastly increases our DPS.

Thanks for the below points in particular, will pass on.

- - - Updated - - -

Given that the main source of dangerous damage on Siegecrafter is from the Shocks at higher stacks, I assume that pushing for Parry/Dodge shouldn't see a massive survivability drop?

Am I right in thinking the standard DK prio is:
Mastery > Stamina > Expertise (7.5%) = Hit (7.5%) > Parry > Dodge > Haste

What is the new priority for optimal DPS?
Parry / Dodge at the top (balancing for DR?) > then what?

Thanks,
Zab

[Coalbane]

Given that the main source of dangerous damage on Siegecrafter is from the Shocks at higher stacks, I assume that pushing for Parry/Dodge shouldn't see a massive survivability drop?

Am I right in thinking the standard DK prio is:
Mastery > Stamina > Expertise (7.5%) = Hit (7.5%) > Parry > Dodge > Haste

What is the new priority for optimal DPS?
Parry / Dodge at the top (balancing for DR?) > then what?

Thanks,
Zab

To what Shock are you referring? The Electrostatic Charge from the boss or the Overload AoE from the Shredders? In either case, he can AMS for survival and get a full runic power bar for DPS, in addition to his other survival cooldowns. He should not have any trouble surviving, since he should be using said CDs at higher stacks anyway.

After 5.4, the stat priority I use for blood is:
Hit (7.5%) & Expertise (7.5%) > Parry > Dodge > Mastery > Crit > Haste

That is because I still prefer to emphasize survivability over pure DPS (since blood is my offspec and things tend to hit harder in 25H). However, better geared tanks and/or 10H blood dks sometimes prioritize Crit higher than Mastery or Avoidance. Also, I do not believe blood dks try to balance parry/dodge at all any more, since the DR on dodge rating is so much steeper than parry and we theoretically indirectly make up the difference in survival through parry hasting.

You can find the relevant theorycrafting on the internet on EJ or the wow forums. I'm too lazy to go looking for it.

[Zabuzan]

Thanks for that, appreciate the boss, I was referring to Electrostatic Charge when I said Shock, but had been messaging from work and wasn't quite switched on!

Will scout out EJ myself as well, see what's cracking.

[Deleted]

Is he dodging Death from above? He shouldn't (the boss take more dmg for 5 seconds after, so anything in counts). Eat it with AMS and as the Shredder comes down he can hit it with like a Rune Strike followed by a BIG Death Strike and maybe another RS or DS. Under 35% Soul Reaper crits are hilarious.

[potatoe]

The mastery build is killing his dps.

Should be avoidance build if that's what you are after.

http://www.mmo-champion.com/threads/...nting-more-DPS

http://www.mmo-champion.com/threads/...hlight=maximum

Avoidance also helps with Scent of Blood procs for bigger Blood Shields

There is a whole thread (not necessarily targeted at 10 man hardmodes) with some pretty good commentary about taking avoidance (specifically, parry).

Blood Tanking Wanting more DPS

My takeaways from the thread:

Parry/Dodge
Gives 75% of dodge+parry as crit.
http://www.wowhead.com/spell=145676/riposte

Parry Haste
Procs when you parry an enemy attack.
Bosses don't proc haste when they parry anymore, but players still do!
For this reason, stack Parry way over dodge. Do not try to even them out. source 1 / source 2.

Scent of Blood
Increases Death Strike healing by 20%. Stacks up to 100%.
Procs on dodges/parries (avoidance!) and autoattacks (parry haste!).
http://www.wowhead.com/spell=49509

Most people in the thread are advocating something like the following stat priority:

Hit+Exp to 7.5% > Mastery to 150% (or whatever makes your damage smooth/comfortable) > Parry > Dodge > Other

[Zabuzan]

Thank you very much for the feedback, I really appreciate it Hopefully we'll get his build sorted for tonight and we'll see the shredders melting in no time!

[kvarleva]

We have a different setup with me taking the first shredder at 3 stacks.
What I do is prior to the add entering is that i pop Army on the second stack.
and as soon as the shredder spawns i pop Ghoul, DRW for double Dots with outbreak.
I usually have him around 30-40% just before death from above, use Soul Reaper and make
sure you have full bar of runic power. Spam Death Coils just as he's about to land.

Use pots if you need if you need some extra dmg, and if he got 4-set make sure to use up runes before DRW.
Its usually just the first add thats problematic with low stacks.

As mentioned before have him focus on a Parry build more then Mastery.

[potatoe]

Not sure if the below applies to heroic...

My understanding is that the main tank strategy here is to have the tanks trade back and forth between the shredder and the boss because the boss will heal the shredder if it is too close.

An alternate strategy is to tank the shredder on the boss and have both tanks dps it. If they time their taunts on the boss properly, they should get quite high stacks of overload. The damage done by the two tanks should overcome the amount of healing the boss does to the add. For this strategy, you should probably tank the boss nearer to the spawn point of the shredder.

For more on the alternate strategy, see

http://www.reddit.com/r/wow/comments...thread/ceqdrc7

[edit]
FYI, you can search this sub-forum for "shredder" and find a few interesting threads

e.g.

http://www.mmo-champion.com/threads/...1#post23201967

http://www.mmo-champion.com/threads/...fuse-stack-CDs

[Zabuzan]

;[edit]
FYI, you can search this sub-forum for "shredder" and find a few interesting threads

e.g.

http://www.mmo-champion.com/threads/...1#post23201967

http://www.mmo-champion.com/threads/...fuse-stack-CDs

Had already done as much and come across both those threads!

Post 10% hp nerf tonight, should have no problem anymore with the shredders anyway... wish us luck! Our DK has now gone to a parry build and perhaps the most useful tip is using AMS to ignore DFA and burn through it.

We have tried a strat tanking the shredder on the boss, but it's not massively cohesive to do so with our belt kill order as we are tanking the boss at the opposite side of the room, meaning the shredder would take a long time to get over there anyway.

[Roc]

Had already done as much and come across both those threads!

Post 10% hp nerf tonight, should have no problem anymore with the shredders anyway... wish us luck! Our DK has now gone to a parry build and perhaps the most useful tip is using AMS to ignore DFA and burn through it.

We have tried a strat tanking the shredder on the boss, but it's not massively cohesive to do so with our belt kill order as we are tanking the boss at the opposite side of the room, meaning the shredder would take a long time to get over there anyway.

Isn't Death From Above physical damage? If so, AMS would not be worthwhile at all.

Edit: Unless AMS prevents the knockback, and you have a decent blood shield to absorb the damage from DFA, then it makes sense.

[Zabuzan]

Can confirm, AMS works to avoid the knock back. The physical damage component isn't crazy dangerous anyway, but with everything else going on at that point I imagine having a blood shield up before hand is pretty much a given.

Thanks for all the advice guys, the DPS increase was massive on SC yesterday. The shredders were melting and even without the health nerf they would have been dying well before the 4th overload

[Whiteout]

we swap every shredder so always have 3-4 stacks per shredder and have never had a problem killing it before the 4th overload. The best thing to do is run the 4pc and save 1 ds for the DFA then when he lands do DS > DRW >DS > DS > then rs dump. I usually peak as high(or higher) then our warrior tank when doing this and they are one of the best at killing shredders. Using DRW in the opener is kinda dumb as you will gain alot more dmg from those HUGE DS vs the couple extra dot ticks that youll gain. hope these help

[Deleted]

Back when we were progressing this boss back in october (so much worse gear) our dk was having issues killing them too, so we came up with this brilliant stack tactic: (obv never seen before).

Paladin (me): 3 - Shredder
DK : 2
Pally : 4 - Shredder
DK : 4
Pally : 5 - Shredder + reset
DK : 7 - Shredder
Pally : 4 - Shredder (shredder spawns a second before 4th stack)
DK : 2
Pally : 5 - Shredder

At this point the boss should die but otherwise just get another stack on pally and kill one more add.

[rhapso]

Did they fix the knockback removal of DfA and AMS? I tried using AMS on it and it knocked me up in the air every time (no missile turret active at that time).

[Xkiller9000]

To what Shock are you referring? The Electrostatic Charge from the boss or the Overload AoE from the Shredders? In either case, he can AMS for survival and get a full runic power bar for DPS, in addition to his other survival cooldowns. He should not have any trouble surviving, since he should be using said CDs at higher stacks anyway.

After 5.4, the stat priority I use for blood is:
Hit (7.5%) & Expertise (7.5%) > Parry > Dodge > Mastery > Crit > Haste

That is because I still prefer to emphasize survivability over pure DPS (since blood is my offspec and things tend to hit harder in 25H). However, better geared tanks and/or 10H blood dks sometimes prioritize Crit higher than Mastery or Avoidance. Also, I do not believe blood dks try to balance parry/dodge at all any more, since the DR on dodge rating is so much steeper than parry and we theoretically indirectly make up the difference in survival through parry hasting.

You can find the relevant theorycrafting on the internet on EJ or the wow forums. I'm too lazy to go looking for it.

Hit/Exp > Mastery > Haste is still really good, and provides a dps boost from significantly shorter rune cds

[Nillo]

Hit/Exp > Mastery > Haste is still really good, and provides a dps boost from significantly shorter rune cds

Are you ever going to give up on spreading this misinformation?
Haste is not good if you're already gcd capped which happens pretty often in 5.4 due to SoB changes.
Haste also doesn't really do anything that parry can not do.
Haste is shitty if you need burst like you do on the siegecrafter adds