4.3 Death Knight Tanking Guide and Discussion

[Lancet]

Hey all,

Have recently been asked to main my Blood DK. I REALLY enjoy the DK class and am wanting to perfect my game play. Obviously I have read all the guides about my rotation, gearing, and using DS correctly.

However, using all this information in the middle of a fight can be rather hectic!

My main problems come with keeping my disease up 90%+ of the time and keeping up Bone Shield as much as possible without overriding it if it's already up. I think some sort of Power Aura setup is the solution for this, the only problem is I have never used this addon before.

Can anyone point me in the right direction where I may be able to find a decent PA setup for Blood? Also any other tips you can throw my way would be very much appreciated.

Thanks all.

[SSHA778]

If you're using Power Auras Classic, then you'll just want one aura to check for the corresponding debuffs.

e.g. for Frost Fever, my entry is:

Activation > Debuff
Judgements of the Just/Infected Wounds/Frost Fever/Thunder Clap

Similarly, for Scarlet Fever (or it's equivalents):
Activation > Debuff
Scarlet Fever/Demoralizing Shout/Demoralizing Roar/Vindication

It can be a little bit of a nuisance to set up if you don't have any idea what you're doing, as all the customization can be overwhelming. As a note, what I copied and pasted doesn't include pet debuffs.

For Bone Shield, there's probably a simpler way, but I have 2 separate auras, which only show if both are true. The first one checks the cooldown. The second one checks my current stacks.

1) Spell Cooldown > Bone Shield (you'll need it to check the aura ID of the 2) here; a Google search will probably work)
2) Buff > Stacks = 0 > Bone Shield

I'll see if I can get around to posting a screenshot or two since that would probably make it clearer, but that won't be for a while.

[Pope]

Hey all,

Have recently been asked to main my Blood DK. I REALLY enjoy the DK class and am wanting to perfect my game play. Obviously I have read all the guides about my rotation, gearing, and using DS correctly.

However, using all this information in the middle of a fight can be rather hectic!

My main problems come with keeping my disease up 90%+ of the time and keeping up Bone Shield as much as possible without overriding it if it's already up. I think some sort of Power Aura setup is the solution for this, the only problem is I have never used this addon before.

Can anyone point me in the right direction where I may be able to find a decent PA setup for Blood? Also any other tips you can throw my way would be very much appreciated.

Thanks all.

I've got some Power Auras, I made them myself. I'm not quite sure if I should post the whole setup, it's a bit cluttered.
Oh, and it's in german, you have to change the names.

Diseases/Relevant Tanking Debuffs
Shows a red Icon when the 10% is not active

Version:4.23; b:0; g:0.0157; target:true; icon:Spell_Holy_Vindication; buffname:Blutungsfieber/Rechtschaffene Schwächung/Demoralisieren/Schwäche; begin:3; x:215; isAlive:0; bufftype:2; alpha:0.5; owntex:true; combat:true; size:0.15; y:-40; texmode:2; inverse:true; finish:3; timer.h:0.8; timer.Texture:AccidentalPresidency; timer.enabled:true; timer.Relative:BOTTOM; timer.Transparent:true; timer.ShowActivation:true

Shows a light Icon when the 10% is active

Version:4.23; target:true; icon:Spell_Holy_Vindication; buffname:Blutungsfieber/Rechtschaffene Schwächung/Demoralisieren/Schwäche; begin:3; x:215; isAlive:0; bufftype:2; owntex:true; size:0.15; y:-40; texmode:2; finish:3; timer.h:0.8; timer.Texture:AccidentalPresidency; timer.enabled:true; timer.Relative:BOTTOM; timer.Transparent:true

Same thing with the 20% attackspeed reduce
red one

Version:4.23; b:0; g:0.0392; target:true; icon:Spell_DeathKnight_FrostFever; buffname:Frostfieber/Infizierte Wunden/Donnerknall/Richturteil der Gerechten/Erdschock; begin:3; x:260; customname:Frostfieber; isAlive:0; bufftype:2; texture:0; alpha:0.5; customtex:true; combat:true; size:0.15; y:-40; texmode:2; inverse:true; finish:3; timer.b:0; timer.g:0; timer.h:0.8; timer.Texture:AccidentalPresidency; timer.enabled:true; timer.r:0; timer.Relative:BOTTOM; timer.Transparent:true; timer.ShowActivation:true

light one

Version:4.23; target:true; icon:Spell_DeathKnight_FrostFever; buffname:Frostfieber/Infizierte Wunden/Donnerknall/Richturteil der Gerechten/Erdschock; begin:3; x:260; customname:Frostfieber; isAlive:0; bufftype:2; texture:0; customtex:true; size:0.15; y:-40; texmode:2; finish:3; timer.b:0; timer.g:0; timer.h:0.8; timer.Texture:AccidentalPresidency; timer.enabled:true; timer.r:0; timer.Relative:BOTTOM; timer.Transparent:true

If you want, I can change the names to the english ones and edit them. But it's 2:40 here, and I need to go to bed.

I honestly don't care too much about disease uptime, I'd rather want to see if both debuffs are up.
I can post the rest of my Power Auras too, but I'd rather do that tomorrow.

Oh, and for Bone Shield, I use two Auras.
One for "Action Usable", and another one that disables the first one if Bone Shield is usable, but still up. So I don't override it.

Version:4.23; icon:ability_deathknight_boneshield; buffname:Knochenschild; x:-192; bufftype:7; owntex:true; combat:true; size:0.15; y:-247

Version:4.23; icon:ability_deathknight_boneshield; buffname:Knochenschild; x:-192; alpha:0.1; owntex:true; mine:true; combat:true; size:0.02; y:-247; inverse:true

[Nivrax]

I just use CLC-DK. While "hit this next' is kinda worthless for a Blood, it have rune, disease and cooldown watchers build in pretty nicely.

[Keju]

Hey all,

Have recently been asked to main my Blood DK. I REALLY enjoy the DK class and am wanting to perfect my game play. Obviously I have read all the guides about my rotation, gearing, and using DS correctly.

However, using all this information in the middle of a fight can be rather hectic!

My main problems come with keeping my disease up 90%+ of the time and keeping up Bone Shield as much as possible without overriding it if it's already up. I think some sort of Power Aura setup is the solution for this, the only problem is I have never used this addon before.

Can anyone point me in the right direction where I may be able to find a decent PA setup for Blood? Also any other tips you can throw my way would be very much appreciated.

Thanks all.

That's a common misuse of Bone Shield. You don't want to try to keep it up as often as you can, you want to make sure it is available to put up before a big boss hit or sequence of big hits. It should be used as a cooldown, not like an aura that you just spam.

[Pope]

That's a common misuse of Bone Shield. You don't want to try to keep it up as often as you can, you want to make sure it is available to put up before a big boss hit or sequence of big hits. It should be used as a cooldown, not like an aura that you just spam.

While that is definitely true, I see his intention. Power Auras really helped me watch my Bone Shield. Before I made an aura for BS, I sometimes refreshed it while still having stacks, which is stupid

[Lancet]

That's a common misuse of Bone Shield. You don't want to try to keep it up as often as you can, you want to make sure it is available to put up before a big boss hit or sequence of big hits. It should be used as a cooldown, not like an aura that you just spam.

Obviously for large amounts of predictable DMG (Impale) I'd save my BS for this. But there is a lot of fights where it is steady DMG (Morchok 20% +, Warmaster P1). Where BS up time is very valuable and makes it easy on the healers.

[SurrealNight]

I'd have to 2nd CLC-DK, while I don't use it myself the concept is the same as what I do and that is put your disease and CD information in one spot (which you can then drop right next to your char on the screen so you can watch it while not standing in fire).

I just find power aura's confusing if you play more than one char since even the default UI has various aura affects all different colors and meanings. That is just me though.

[Montiele]

What stat Tank Death Knight should stack?

[Deleted]

What stat Tank Death Knight should stack?

lol? mg learn to read... all i can say...

[Montiele]

lol? mg learn to read... all i can say...

I am not sure between Mastery or Stamina.

[Nillo]

I am not sure between Mastery or Stamina.

There's a lot of topics about stamina vs mastery you just need to look harder.

p.s. there is no simple answer to mastery or stamina as there are quite a few factors that may make it swing in either direction.

[Keju]

There's a lot of topics about stamina vs mastery you just need to look harder.

p.s. there is no simple answer to mastery or stamina as there are quite a few factors that may make it swing in either direction.

And on top of that, on heroic, some of the harder bosses are easier if you stack Stam, and others easier if you stack Mastery. But this is the end of the line for level 85 where stats are so out of proportion from the difficulty that you can just stack Stam and be safe regardless of boss.

[Shiveron]

By the end of the tier you should be stacking stam anyways. You can easily phase out all green gems and parry socket bonuses in your gear for solid deepholm iolites and still maintain more mastery than you can use. Right now raid buffed when I enter heroic madness as the solo tank, I buff up to 302.9k health (more if we have our resto shaman instead of our disc priest) and still have 33.14 mastery (205(?)% blood shield) and can max my blood shield without trying and take no damage from impales.

[Lancet]

My guild is planning to look at 25H Spine.

As a DK Tank they want me on the Bloods (there is no way they'll let me tank Almag. The MT is GM and is very stubborn).

Could anyone give me some advice as the best way to tank these adds?

Thanks all.

[Shiveron]

My guild is planning to look at 25H Spine.

As a DK Tank they want me on the Bloods (there is no way they'll let me tank Almag. The MT is GM and is very stubborn).

Could anyone give me some advice as the best way to tank these adds?

Thanks all.

Get a new guild or send your GM to this thread so we can tell him he's an idiot. If he's anything BUT a Dk tank he NEEDS to be on bloods. We aren't in any way shape or form suited for tanking mass amounts of adds, especially pushing third plate with a million bloods running around. Sounds to me like your GM is a lazy ass and just doesn't wanna learn to kite.

[Keju]

Get a new guild or send your GM to this thread so we can tell him he's an idiot. If he's anything BUT a Dk tank he NEEDS to be on bloods. We aren't in any way shape or form suited for tanking mass amounts of adds, especially pushing third plate with a million bloods running around. Sounds to me like your GM is a lazy ass and just doesn't wanna learn to kite.

Spoken like a true bad player and/or someone that either hasn't done this before, or doesn't know how to do it.

It almost all comes down to the simple task of kiting and not just standing there taking all of the blood melee on the face. Also make sure you have the 2 stacks of the buff that prevent damage. We always have our bloods tank (me) stand on one side of his back on the pull and the rest of the raid on the other side so that I get the 2 stacks right off the start.

It's quite simple for a DK to tank the bloods. You have a damage mitigation buff (2 stacks) provided by the boss and then your blood shields from DS are more than sufficient to soak the rest. All of the damage you take is physical. Up until the 3rd plate you just stand there by the plate in the center of it and AOE all of the bloods to death.

For the 3rd plate you kill about 12 (you can't just kill 9 unless the rest of your raid DPS is so high that they get the Amalg low enough by the time 9 bloods die because the bloods crawl back into the hole and respawn) bloods by yourself while the raid gets the Amalg HP low. From then on you just kite the bloods by running sideways (strafing) at full speed to the tail and back. You hardly get hit by bloods at all because they move much slower than you. You also get to DS all you want while kiting which again, does more than enough mitigation to keep you alive. Do this twice unless your raid DPS with Bloodlust on the Tendon is enough to get it in one lift. If you need to lift the plate a second time, you will probably need the help of a DPS to kill the initial bloods saved for the Amalp pop so you can kite more of the time and limit the amount of melee swings hitting you, or if you did alright the rest of the fight you should have all of your big CDs and be able to handle it on your own.

I've done this both as a Protection warrior and as a Blood DK, assigned to blood adds duty. And I find it actually easier on the DK because I can drop DnD on the raid before running to kite to the tail and back and not have to worry about new bloods spawning and going after another raid member. I also find it easier on the DK because I do way more DPS than any other tank in the game and can kill the bloods all by myself while the rest of the raid gets to burn the Amalg instead of having a DPS player help kill the bloods in time.

If you have priests in your raid you can also have them Leap of Faith on you in the event you get caught up and are struck by too many bloods or you need pulled back to the raid to pick up threat on new bloods. I've had this done a few times while learning the fight, but on most recent kill didn't need it at all. But you can also have a rogue trix you or a hunter MD you if you are too far away and a lot of bloods spawn and go after a player instead of yourself, but that isn't really just a Blood DK tip, more universal...

[Shiveron]

Spoken like a true bad player and/or someone that either hasn't done this before, or doesn't know how to do it.

Im 8/8H on both a prot paladin and my dk so saying im bad and haven't done it is wrong. Im not saying we can't do it, im saying we're shit for it. Sure picking up aggro may be easy coz you can just DnD and lololol your way down the spine, but not single person I know would suggest having a blood dk do bloods for progressing the hardest fight in dragon soul. It makes no sense. We get gibbed for even the slightest tiny ass mistake and you can't deny that. Especially since we dont take any damage and can't build up a blood shield for just in case. A bear can absorb/dodge and a prot can block. They don't need a blood shield to help them stay up. Not to mention if they have a warrior all he has to do is jump around the spine and not take a single hit, or if geared enough, just sit and tank em.

[Keju]

Im 8/8H on both a prot paladin and my dk so saying im bad and haven't done it is wrong. Im not saying we can't do it, im saying we're shit for it. Sure picking up aggro may be easy coz you can just DnD and lololol your way down the spine, but not single person I know would suggest having a blood dk do bloods for progressing the hardest fight in dragon soul. It makes no sense. We get gibbed for even the slightest tiny ass mistake and you can't deny that. Especially since we dont take any damage and can't build up a blood shield for just in case. A bear can absorb/dodge and a prot can block. They don't need a blood shield to help them stay up. Not to mention if they have a warrior all he has to do is jump around the spine and not take a single hit, or if geared enough, just sit and tank em.

But all we have to do is spam DS while going "lololol" up and down the spine and we keep our blood shield up easy as pie. And then we have DnD glyphed for uptime and don't have to jump back into the fray to pick up threat on the newly spanwed bloods. The fight isn't hard for any tank to stay alive. It's just a DPS crunch and healer dispell timing fight.

You don't have to be able to jump around to not take hits. The blood move at somewhere between 33%-50% slower than any class' walking speed all on their own. You just strafe so in the event one does hit you, it doesn't hit your back, as well as allowing you to DS them.

And way to ignore my comment where I said I have done the fight on both a Prot Warrior and on a Blood DK and it was EASIER on the DK. Both the healers and I agreed.

[Egarts]

Another day, another DK question!

Here are logs to fight I have question about.
Why is one of our DKs (Hunger) is dying on Yor'sahj so much? Last week (logs are here) he died even more.
Is it case of "not enough Death Strikes"? Or maybe healers just hate him?

Thanks in advance :)