Blood in BfA - How do we compare?

[Deleted]

I've seldom followed recent class change news but I did read that Blood is seemingly doing good as a tank in the Alpha, but how do we fare against others? Has much changed at all or are we still basically the DPS/Leech tank that prot warriors/pallies will overshadow in Heroic/Mythic? Is the playstyle still similar to Legion?

[Nebster]

Preacher did nice tank comparison a week ago, but I think there were more changes to tanks after his test.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uKPy9LxCqJY

I dont have Beta, but from what I see on videos and talents Blood DK can still heal himself quite nice with Death Strike, Blood Plague and Voracius (http://bfa.wowhead.com/spell=273953/voracious)
IMHO this talent will be nerfed before Live.

The main thing that we will have to get used to is lack of haste in start of expansion.

TL;DR I am not dissapointed by Blood as it was in worse state at the start of Legion and class tuning in patches made it really nice to play. I hope for the same in BfA.

[Deleted]

They'll be functional, since the main stuff's all there.

It'll be tricky with the pruning, and Blizzard's "Let's take the most picked talents and put them all on the same row" meme, but at the end of the day Blood still gets the job done. Blood Plague is there, and ridiculous as ever.

Gorefiend's is down to 15 yards from 20, it'll take some getting used to.

[msdos]

Nothing can be worse than the start of Legion where Runetap was under powered, Blood didn't have Icebound fortitude and Boneshield fell off from auras and AOE and DoTs.

I don't see Voracious getting nerfed. That might be the only thing keeping Blood playable in the beginning with low haste levels. If it does, it'll probably be later on in the Xpac when we start scaling too well.

[Vakna]

It's going to be rough at the start, with the massively nerfed Death Strike healing and low haste meaning you spend most of your runes just keeping up Bone Shield, it's very slow to generate RP.

However with the new Active Mitigation changes and tank vulnerability to magical damage, AMS remains an incredibly powerful tool to combat that, combined with tons of mob displacement and CC ability they just need a bump in stat percentages to dominate that top spot in M+ once again.

[kran1um]

It's going to be rough at the start, with the massively nerfed Death Strike healing and low haste meaning you spend most of your runes just keeping up Bone Shield, it's very slow to generate RP.

However with the new Active Mitigation changes and tank vulnerability to magical damage, AMS remains an incredibly powerful tool to combat that, combined with tons of mob displacement and CC ability they just need a bump in stat percentages to dominate that top spot in M+ once again.

Agree. Blood DK really seems slow and needing haste big time. I have to pool or keep gen at least 45 for that runestrike when needed. No more spammy spam spam.

[Khain]

It's going to be rough at the start, with the massively nerfed Death Strike healing and low haste meaning you spend most of your runes just keeping up Bone Shield, it's very slow to generate RP.

However with the new Active Mitigation changes and tank vulnerability to magical damage, AMS remains an incredibly powerful tool to combat that, combined with tons of mob displacement and CC ability they just need a bump in stat percentages to dominate that top spot in M+ once again.

Massively nerfed Death Strike? DS got buffed by 50% from our live version, and Blood Shield got a nice buff as well too.

[Vakna]

Massively nerfed Death Strike? DS got buffed by 50% from our live version, and Blood Shield got a nice buff as well too.

Yeah but we lost all our Artifact boosts, go play some Blood on beta, you DS nowhere near the amount you do on live.

[Khain]

Yeah but we lost all our Artifact boosts, go play some Blood on beta, you DS nowhere near the amount you do on live.

Not because of the artifact, it buffs your DS by 35% maximum. You can't compare the endgame DK with green/blue geared DK from the beginning of expansion. Right now DKs get an insane bonus of versatility from concordance, on top of legendaries, tier set and endgame armor values. But if you compare DK from BfA beta with the DK from the beginning of Legion we are much better off now.

[Vakna]

Not because of the artifact, it buffs your DS by 35% maximum. You can't compare the endgame DK with green/blue geared DK from the beginning of expansion. Right now DKs get an insane bonus of versatility from concordance, on top of legendaries, tier set and endgame armor values. But if you compare DK from BfA beta with the DK from the beginning of Legion we are much better off now.

If you think the few percent from Versatility and gear is what makes DS heal so much you are just straight wrong. You can use the Hemostasis talent that emulates Skullflowers legendary so that is also irrelevant. DS just straight up doesn't heal as much as it used to. If I'm getting trucked in Legion I literally lay on hands myself with each DS, I can be getting equally trucked in BfA and heal myself maybe 40% hp max. Then have to wait ages to use another DS because of low haste.

DK will still be super strong once you get geared, but the gear is not gonna affect your DS healing directly, it doesn't scale that way.

[msdos]

but the gear is not gonna affect your DS healing directly, it doesn't scale that way

That's why I think Voracious won't get nerfed. That will keep us scaling with gear early on, each Strength upgrade will actually feel meaningful this time around (plus the armor/str scale change). Tbh the scaling is the only thing I'm really looking forward to if I play this expansion.

I'm gonna look at stacking versatility early on, because our scaling is going to be WAY better out of the gate than it was in Legion. It was almost non-existent in Legion, you didn't feel like anything was scaling whatsoever until you got the 3 major traits, which took forever. It's like your power was in the hands of the content updates for the artifact weapons... So glad they're doing away with them.

[Nebster]

Blood Shield got a nice buff as well too.

So will Mastery be more usefull again?

[Enrif]

I just copied my DK over and browsed some talents and also the pvp talents. and there is something that made me curious

http://www.wowhead.com/spell=207018

Murderous Intent Honor Talent
Replaces Dark Command
10 yd range
Instant 20 sec cooldown
Requires Death Knight (Blood)
Intimidates the target, increasing their damage taken by 3% for 6 sec. Each unique player that attacks the target increases the damage taken by an additional 3%, stacking up to 5 times.

Your melee attacks refresh the duration of Intimidated.

With PvP talents working in PvE, this would give a Group a flat 15% Damage Bonus on single targets for having a DK tank.

Or do PvP Talents not work while in Dungeons/Raids? not sure here

Same Question for
http://www.wowhead.com/spell=199642

Necrotic Aura Honor Talent
Requires Death Knight
Requires level 60
All enemies within 12 yards take 8% increased magical damage.

[Deleted]

Honor Talents dont work in Dungeons & Raids, open world only (war mode enabled).

[Enrif]

too bad, those would be awesome utility for group content

[kran1um]

So will Mastery be more usefull again?

Right now haste. DK needs Marrow to do more rune gen, or make blood boil do some as those are our two buttons mainly pushed, right now heart strike is...well...

[Crucio]

With my copied character... Blood honestly feels VERY similar to live. It's slightly slower, but nothing outrageous. I think it feels pretty great honestly.

[Rooskie1993]

With my copied character... Blood honestly feels VERY similar to live. It's slightly slower, but nothing outrageous. I think it feels pretty great honestly.

Yeah but that's your copied char who has legendaries, tier sets, antorus gear. 120 it's different and from what i've heard it's slow like you have under 10% haste even with full haste gear.

[Marrilaife]

But if you compare DK from BfA beta with the DK from the beginning of Legion we are much better off now.

"Better than complete garbage" doesn't say much, Legion launch blood was one of the worst specs in the entire game (generally the whole DK class was). It got better over time, but Legion launch dk was utter trash. Let's hope never again.

[JohnSmith99]

Would be good for group content. Might be..