Death Knight Tank- Cataclysm

[Bfarm]

Let me start off by saying that i used to play a Blood death knight tank in a 25 man progression guild. I have taken a ~4 Month break from WoW and was looking over new spells, talents, etc. I would like to hear your guys opinions on the NEW talents rune system and overall tanking mechanics. Im also looking for any information on how masteries are looking now. Feedback from beta tester espicily would be greatly appreciated.

Also looking for any talent builds if you guys have any links saved.

[patrins]

as far as talents and tanking mechanics, everything is going to change.
the rune system looks really good at the moment.

[Lerciolas]

Yesterday I tried to tank with a DK in Cata.
Spec was all points in blood except Butchery and only 1 point in both SoB and Abom might.

I have to say that tanking was much more enjoyable than actual 5-mans. Threat is sometimes an issue,
expecially if DPS goes aoe heavy like on live. A standard start with DnD, diseases and BB is a good lead
in threat if the dps focuses only a target, on which is necessary to unload anything else to keep aggro.

As for the rune system I have to say that I did not buy Runic Empowerment (no money on premade), so no rune refreshment. However I felt the starvation on two occasions, strangulate (there are a lot of casters in the instance) and adds spawning. Otherwise I only think this is a matter of getting used to it, like with the original system when the dk class was created.

[Maerad]

I think the new DK tanking build is by far better then the other tanks. No, not for the dmg or something like that, I really mean the system behind. Like rune refreshment, more combinations like use skill x to gain y - way more fun and a FUCKLOAD of CD's - I LIKE CD'S

And before I never got runetab, because IMHO it's just useless with a healer doing healspam on you like mad. In cata and the "automatic refresh when <35% hp it will rock - you could even have enough time to use it!

My dreams simply came true - good dmg absorb, good selfheal, a fuckload of usable cd's D

[Zao]

Currently DK Tanking on Beta feals a bit...unpolished.
This is mainly due to the new rune system and not the tree itself (which is 90% fine.)

The new rune system has some unpredictability, wich makes you feel like you don't have the total control over what's happening. Mind you, that's already a problem on live. But on live the rune regeneration was much more predictable.
Havin control is one of the main things about being a tank, and blizzard reduced our control over what's happening through a few changes:

DG having an 8 yard minimum range. This in conjunction with IT not having the increased threat any more, can get very annoying if a melee pulls threat from a mob in the pack while Dark Command is on cd.
The fact that each and every one of our cds either uses a rune (Blood for VB and Unholy for BSh) or costs a massive amount of RP (DRW) doesn't help either.
Oh, and the current system on how we apply our 10% damage debuff is also very inconvenient.

But it generally still is fun to play a DK tank on beta. There are just a few things that should be tweaked, and I hope that our love portion comes soon (no DK changes in the last two patches ;( )

PS: The third mastery (lifeshield) is NYI on beta. For Vengeance you can check out this.

Edit: For more specific questions on DKs, check out this: http://www.mmo-champion.com/threads/...ead-First-post!

[Kindran]

The reason blizzard is changing the rune system is to make it feel like we are not GCD locked. They fixed that, but now they have created "grey" areas. If an add spawns or an ability is needed during this time we are screwed.

*Runic empowerment isn't that useful as a tank because we hardly use Death Coil.
*DnD costing one rune is amazing except for the fact that it screws up the starting rotation. DnD>IT>PS>Pest>BB (for AoE) and we have 1 frost rune left over, what will we use it for? lol

Imo a lot of things still need to change for DKs to be on equal standing to other tanks. Having more CDs to use is both nice and crappy. It just means I will have to fill another bar so I can put even more abilities to crowd the screen.

One thing that I do not like at all for DKs is that in order to use our CDs we have to forgo threat and vice versa. No other tank has to make this sacrifice and it truly is unfair. Not only is it unfair, Blizzard is intentionally leading the DK class to not attacking and instead using CDs.

DK class needs love and I would like it to be soon =(
I feel like they gave half of the DK away and just left a cliffhanger.

[Joesgetndown]

Idk if they changed it. But last I read runic empowerment Procs off of rune strike. But again. I havent read anything as of late on RS

[Lerciolas]

One thing that I do not like at all for DKs is that in order to use our CDs we have to forgo threat and vice versa. No other tank has to make this sacrifice and it truly is unfair.

This. Except for IBF, which is free with talents, DK's cooldowns all cost runes. The only way out is Blood Tap, which is itself a cooldown.

[Haven]

As far as I can judge, things seem far from finished with the DK. I'm not in the beta, so I can be wrong, but I have a strong feeling that Runic Empowerment is a slot machine built in so that we have actually some buttons to press between the new doubled rune CDs. That's what fears me the most - random resource generation that may lead to unlucky Unholy spamming IT or Frost spamming BS.

[Zao]

Idk if they changed it. But last I read runic empowerment Procs off of rune strike. But again. I havent read anything as of late on RS

Correct.

[Aldurok]

One thing that I do not like at all for DKs is that in order to use our CDs we have to forgo threat and vice versa.

I had an idea about this. Haven't really fleshed it out, but here's the basic:

Change Crimson Scourge talent so that instead of "proc"ing off plague strikes, it procs off us using our defensive cooldowns. Something like:

Crimson Scourge: Your defensive cooldowns now have a chance to give you Boiling Rage (buff), which allows you to use your Blood Boil at no rune cost. This buff does not stack and is consumed by using Blood Boil.

Bone Shield: Each time a bone charge is used up, you gain Boiling Rage
Icebound Fortitude: When you take damage that is reduced by Icebound Fortitude, you have a 50% chance to gain Boiling Rage
Vampiric Blood: When you are healed by an ability or effect that is increased by Vampiric Blood, you have a 50% chance to gain Boiling Rage.
Dancing Rune Weapon: Each time you parry an attack while Dancing Rune Weapon is active, you have a 50% chance to gain Boiling Rage.
Anti-Magic Shell: If Anti-Magic Shell is completely removed by absorbing magic damage (not dispelled or run out of time), you gain Boiling Rage.

Obviously % chances are just placeholder things to give idea. This could make using your defensive cooldowns still allow you to have access to a threat ability, and gets rid of the currently awkward Crimson Scourge mechanic with PS.

[Kindran]

Change Crimson Scourge talent so that instead of "proc"ing off plague strikes, it procs off us using our defensive cooldowns.

Except that, unless they change Blood Boil, this will do absolutely nothing for our threat as BB does very little threat and is only used to apply the debuff atm.

awkward Crimson Scourge mechanic with PS.

In the current build I don't even take Crimson Scourge not because of it being tied to Plague Strike, but because BB is horrible and Morbidity is still WAY better for AoE threat.

http://www.wowtal.com/#k=YfF0Njtb.9sm.deathknight
^ This is currently the build I favor to take care of any situation that comes to mind. Sure some talent abilities like Scarlet Fever may be picked up by other people and therefore I could spend those points elsewhere, but I prefer (atm atleast) to have the best self reliance build in the current Beta build.

[Aldurok]

Oh ya, I forgot to note that I'm still suspecting that when they go back and retune threat on our abilities, they're going to bump up BB's threat a lot so that Crimson Scourge is actually a talent worth considering.

If they don't, then ya, I guess it is pointless. Unless you use my idea with double (or triple) the proc chances and you can truly spam BB like a mofo (every GCD), which would be dumb but kind of funny. Sound effect of BB would get on entire raid's nerves.

[Kindran]

I doubt that Blizzard will up Blood Boils threat that much if they even raise it at all. My reasoning for this is that they are even thinking of getting rid of AoE abilities for tanks completely.

At the moment we are thinking of nerfing any of the really passive AEs, including Swipe, Death and Decay, Damage Shield and Consecrate. All of those abilities (well, maybe not Damage Shield) would still be usable, but they would be more situational.

The bottom line is that we think all tanks need to be able to trivially handle the massive adds or straggling adds situations easily, or none of them should be able to.

>Source http://forums.worldofwarcraft.com/th...eNo=2&sid=2000

Going to be interesting on abilities like Blood Boil too.

[Narshe]

I doubt that Blizzard will up Blood Boils threat that much if they even raise it at all. My reasoning for this is that they are even thinking of getting rid of AoE abilities for tanks completely.

DnD is too good on threat atm even in single target situations, and also cheap to use. DK tanks use it off CD on every pull and its gone from being "situational" to mandatory in the rotation. Theyre lowering the effectiveness some (maybe too much atm) and raising its cost (1 of each rune again) so players will use it to react to situations. I dont see this as "getting rid of aoe abilities."

Dk also have a 3 target HS and BB like you mention. BB dmg/threat will need to be raised since its not working correctly on beta atm, theres too many talents in Blood focusing on using BB so it wouldnt make sense for BB to continue being weak.

[Aldurok]

Actually, I see that as an argument FOR them raising BB's threat. They say they want to get rid of passive aoe threat abilities. BB isn't passive, you have to actually hit the button each time to use it, and don't have infinite resources for it.

The other abilities mentioned in there are basically fire and forget (except swipe, which is "spam the shit out of it and nothing else" pretty much for aoe threat).

Having BB as a high threat AoE would help keep our AoE threat up while making us have to actually work at it instead of just dropping dnd.

Plus, could add into my idea that BB's used with the Boiling Rage buff generate extra threat. Would make CD's a little powerful, reducing damage and in a round-about way increasing threat, but that would justify using runes for them.

I just like the idea of BB becoming a "core" tank ability, since it's the only offensive ability we have that really seems tied in to blood. Except maybe bloodworms.

[Kindran]

DnD is too good on threat atm even in single target situations, and also cheap to use. DK tanks use it off CD on every pull and its gone from being "situational" to mandatory in the rotation.

Do you know why DnD is mandatory for when we have multiple targets on us? Due to the way that DK mechanics work we need to build up to our main abilities. If we had 3 mobs on us lets just say, Using heart strike alone would hardly do anything as it requires diseases. To place these diseases and spread them to the other targets it takes 3 GCDs. It is this reason that we use DnD, it allows us time to put diseases on the targets we are tanking and the damage on DnD does not require diseases (unless you have Rage of Rivendare for unholy and etc)

If DKs could use our normal rotation while tanking multiple mobs and still keep agro then there would not be a need for DnD. For single target tanking DnD is not as good. Sure it may do some decent threat with 2p10 and glyph but it still is surpassed by other abilities. It requires too many runes to be spammed, runes that can be used for Death Strikes.

The other abilities mentioned in there are basically fire and forget (except swipe, which is "spam the shit out of it and nothing else" pretty much for aoe threat).

This actually proves my point more. Blizzard is adding a CD on swipe for bear (6 seconds last time I looked) and they don't want it to be spammed at all. If we were to use BB solely for AoE then it would be a copy of swipe except with 10 second CD due to rune refresh.

Having BB as a high threat AoE would help keep our AoE threat up while making us have to actually work at it

Spamming BB would be as mindless as pressing DnD once every 15 seconds (or hitting swipe as a bear) for pure AoE. Using BB would still not solve the threat problems at the very start before our diseases are placed, DnD does this.

[Aldurok]

And of course you can only have one of the two on your bar at a time . . .

Swipe spam is possible only because bears pretty much have unlimited rage in aoe, especially when they have high crit (from agility) and their swipe crits on multiple targets grant them rage, so swipe ends up free.

BB, even with my idea, won't become spam-able. Just tune the % chance so that it pops once or twice (or whatever) over the course of the cooldown normally. Ya, you might get lucky RNG and get more, or unlucky and get none.

DND is only necessary now because dps goes apeshit aoe any time there's more than 1 mob. If you just asked them to wait until they hear the first BB, we wouldn't need it.

I know this for fact, I've done it on live with T10 geared dps (with me being T10 geared). Yes, you have to work for it a bit more, but with all the death runes going to BB, with diseases up, you generate enough threat to keep them on you (5xBB then pest, then tab DS and 2xBB, repeat).

I've also had people who start too fast (before DND has time to tick) pull off me on aoe. DND is not the cure-all for aoe tanking, teaching bad players to be better is.

The cd's with a % chance to proc Boiling Rage in my idea would simply be tuned properly, and in aoe having BB available more will help pick up the aoe threat loss of DnD while still making us have to actually use abilities instead of fire and forget.

[Kindran]

If dps attacked before DnD can do damage it more than likely means you are pulling way to slow because DnD should be the opening move out of anybody with you (unless you have another tank) on the pack of mobs.

What I am trying to say in my past post in this thread is that a DK tank takes way to long to get a solid AoE threat. I remember a certain warrior saying that he hated how he had to fight a DK tank for threat when (s)he caught up to him after about 20 seconds in AoE. The fact is, DKs do not have burst AoE and comparing it to the other 3 tanks we are dead last in burst AoE threat. If this stays how it is then people will not want a DK tank just because they would have to wait in order to do their job.

Now for burst single target threat a DK out performs the other tanks by miles because the threat mod on Icy Touch is overpowered on live. In Beta the threat mod on IT is gone and I am wondering how it will play out compared to the other tanks. I am assuming that the damage increase from our abilities due to them not being used as much as live will be enough.

I've also had people who start too fast (before DND has time to tick) pull off me on aoe. DND is not the cure-all for aoe tanking, teaching bad players to be better is.

Most of these people are not bad players, they are just used to being able to instantly DPS because the other tanks allow them too.

[Organoth]

The Rune system needs some tweaks but the Talent Tree is great so far. We get a 3rd Disease, Scarlet Fever, which means bigger Death Strike heals and through talents we get free Blood Boil procs by using our Plague Strike. It gives us nice free AoE threat, also that 3rd Disease we get also means extra threat from those Blood Boils. From the looks of things we will be able to use DnD at the pull put won't need to keep it in our rotation. Through our standard IT, PS, HS and DS the Plauge Strikes give us free Blood Boils and those Blood Boils give us our 3rd Disease making Blood Boil our main focus for AoE Threat. That and Heart Strike hits 3 targets now up from 2 in WotLK helps even more.

Some people have been saying IT no longer produces increased threat but one of the more recent Blue Posts stats that is only for other specs and not Blood. Also don't forget that Blizzard doesn't want tanks to have massive AoE threat in Cata. We are supposed to be going back to the gold old days of heavy CC use and killing packs of mobs one at a time in order of priority. They don't want the "pull the room and spam AoE" that we have today. Our general AoE should not have a problem holding mobs that ppl are not attacking.