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Death Strike and You: An Advanced Guide to Death Knight Tanking
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Post by
Orranis
Thanks for this guide, very thought out and covers some awesome stuff. I do feel as though there are times when I don't use my runes as effective as I should.
I especially like what you say about pulling with IT/Pest rather than Outbreak and I'll be giving that one a go. I would ask now when Outbreak is best thrown in? Likely after you've built agro and need to refresh your diseases?
Soon as your other diseases fall off. Maybe for some adds you'd want to fall back to IT, but generally after that it's just cooldown management.Thank you very much I had been desperately looking for one... but all I could find are those saying go disease-less and that never felt right to me...
The only time you should ever have diseases off, excluding maybe Chimaeron, would be if you're in dire need of the healing of if someone else is providing the debuffs on afflicted targets (i.e. if you have the 20% speed reduction from a DPS DK, you only have to worry about Blood Plague, if you have a prot paladin on the same target, you don't have to worry about diseases).
Post by
Drunkenvalley
What does pallies have that provides the Scarlet Fever debuff again?
Post by
apocalypsa
What does pallies have that provides the Scarlet Fever debuff again?
Hate to say it, but wowhead is a database you couldve looked it up yourself...
Vindication
Post by
Drunkenvalley
What does pallies have that provides the Scarlet Fever debuff again?
Hate to say it, but wowhead is a database you couldve looked it up yourself...
Vindication
Thanks for the link.
Post by
Galhamon
So this may or may not be super helpful for this guide as it seems to be more aimed at raid tanking, bu here goes. For heroics I pull with Outbreak and taunt. So my initial "rotation" looks something like this; Outbreak>Taunt>Oblit.>RS>filler>DS(if I have not managed to dodge/parry incoming attacks). Of course I use Horn of Winter just before the pull and I taunt as I am running at the boss so that I can meet then halfway, I also find that I am always in the habit of running through a boss to turn it immediately. I do this to be more friendly to Rogue's and other melee DPS to give them faster access to their favorite place to be, and to be sure that the rest of the group doesn't eat damage. I find that this gives me an amazing threat lead on the boss so that the DPS can open strong on the boss as is the case very often, and I like to not have to struggle to get threat back from a DPS that has opened a little to heavy just cuz I hit the boss with one ability. Since generally in PuGs the above mentioned offending person wont stop doing damage so that I can get threat back.
Post by
Trishi
Not smart. Taunt doesn't generate threat, it set's your threat to the same as the highest threat on the table.
Outbreak isn't the optimal choice, but using taunt before any dps have even touched the target is, pardon my bluntness, stupid. All that does is risk not having a tauntn available if an overzealous dps manages to out-aggro you fast, which sure can happen with hunters if you use the rotation you posted.
And Obliterate isn't for Blood. Don't waste runes on it.
Post by
apocalypsa
DS does more damage than OB for blood, unless youre specced in Annihilation which you shouldnt. Taunt at the start of a fight doesnt do anything(except for the 3sec fixate) and it prevents you from taunting if a dps gets an early streak of crits while youre still starting your threat rotation.
Pulling with outbreak is sub-optimal as described in the guide.
Better would be to IT while walking, PS while turning the boss around(dont walk through him as it makes you susceptible to hits as you cant parry/dodge, strafe in a halfcircle instead) and then start your normal rotation. This causes as much threat while providing much better survivability. While you probably wont die in the first few seconds, it does give healers the time to position themselves and set up their heals while also saving a bit of mana.
Post by
Orranis
Not smart. Taunt doesn't generate threat, it set's your threat to the same as the highest threat on the table.
Outbreak isn't the optimal choice, but using taunt before any dps have even touched the target is, pardon my bluntness, stupid. All that does is risk not having a tauntn available if an overzealous dps manages to out-aggro you fast, which sure can happen with hunters if you use the rotation you posted.
And Obliterate isn't for Blood. Don't waste runes on it.
While pretty much everything the guy said is wrong in so many ways I can't even explain, there are some cases where taunts are a legitimate way to pull. Whenever we do Nefarian, I've instructed my DPS to hold back a few seconds, and I always pull him with taunt to get him as far away from Onxyia as possible as quickly as possible, keep Deathgrip off cooldown for its taunt if anything goes wrong, then go for an IT+PS rotation and instruct my DPS to go balls out whatever they want.
EDIT: Also: UPDATES! UPDATES GALORE! NEXT FIGHT WILL BE CHIMAERON: YA'LL WILL LOVE THIS.
Post by
Galhamon
I do more guild runs than anything else so people know to keep it in their pants until I land some solid hits on the boss, and I do switch off between Obliterate and Death Strike in the beginning, it really depends on the boss. And I totally didn't proof-read my post well enough, I don't actually run through it, I turn it to get some hits in along the way. Generally I Runestrike it as I am turning it, which really the only reason that I will use Obliterate in the beginning I never it use it beyond the opening and I find that I am doing less and less lately. Again I am not raiding and I am sure that my tactics will change when I get there, but I will be raiding with the same people I am doing dungeons with so some common issues shouldn't be when other guildies get to that point. And I have noticed that if I don't throw a taunt in almost immediately that my initial threat percent is pretty low (for my liking that is) and I have to blow it anyway a few seconds into the fight, maybe I need to pick up omen to get a better tracker than the ingame on to see better taunt results.
Post by
Orranis
which really the only reason that I will use Obliterate in the beginning I never it use it beyond the opening
There's literally no point to using Obliterate. Ever. It does less damage, provides less threat, requires both diseases up, has the same rune-cost, and drastically lower survivability. Sure, you can in Five-Mans, but it doesn't do anything for anyone. And I have noticed that if I don't throw a taunt in almost immediately that my initial threat percent is pretty low (for my liking that is) and I have to blow it anyway a few seconds into the fight, maybe I need to pick up omen to get a better tracker than the ingame on to see better taunt results.
This makes no sense. Taunt provides
zero
threat. It will equalize your threat to the targets highest threat target, and give you a three second 'fixate' in which it only attacks you. If, as you said, your DPS are waiting a few seconds before attacking, taunt gives zero threat benefits.
Also: I'm moving the boss section to a different thread, to prevent too much reserved posts messing with things. I'll leave the reserved posts, but this will be solely for the basics, with a separate fight for the bosses.
Post by
Wuten
I do more guild runs than anything else so people know to keep it in their pants until I land some solid hits on the boss...
I'm not sure why, but this had me cracking up for a while. :P Probably because I know where you come from with that statement.
Post by
apocalypsa
He just doesnt like sloppy seconds... Thats why you want dps to hold back a little, to prevent early crit streaks.
Post by
Fwibbles
thanks for making this guide; I was able to down Baron Ashbury in DA form and Lord Walden from 75% solo thanks to that DS/Blood Tap Section and look 'leet' in my crappy gear.
Question, though..
I'm a dwarf with impetuous query.. would you recommend macro-ing IQ and Stoneform to any of the other survivability cooldowns or keep them by themselves?
Post by
Orranis
thanks for making this guide; I was able to down Baron Ashbury in DA form and Lord Walden from 75% solo thanks to that DS/Blood Tap Section and look 'leet' in my crappy gear.
Question, though..
I'm a dwarf with impetuous query.. would you recommend macro-ing IQ and Stoneform to any of the other survivability cooldowns or keep them by themselves?
I never recommend macro-ing cooldowns together. If you do, make sure you have them elsewhere as well. It removes a whole lot of the usefulness of using them with reaction, and generally makes you unable to min/max each of their usefulness.
Post by
Fwibbles
thanks for making this guide; I was able to down Baron Ashbury in DA form and Lord Walden from 75% solo thanks to that DS/Blood Tap Section and look 'leet' in my crappy gear.
Question, though..
I'm a dwarf with impetuous query.. would you recommend macro-ing IQ and Stoneform to any of the other survivability cooldowns or keep them by themselves?
I never recommend macro-ing cooldowns together. If you do, make sure you have them elsewhere as well. It removes a whole lot of the usefulness of using them with reaction, and generally makes you unable to min/max each of their usefulness.
I see, thank you.
Post by
168916
This post was from a user who has deleted their account.
Post by
Orranis
Note though that some people like to macro Rune Tap to DS or whatever - on the grounds that it's a small enough heal that it's better to maximize the number of uses per fight than to save it for the perfect moment. And particularly you don't want to save up Rune Tap since you want it to already be on cooldown when it gets refreshed by will of the necropolis.
I wouldn't macro it to DS, just set up a Power Aura for it. What if you want to pop a Bone Shield when your runes are on cooldown, to help mitigate damage during down-time?
Post by
631457
This post was from a user who has deleted their account.
Post by
Orranis
Updates to the Death Strike section.
I've stopped updating the boss guides completely as of patch 4.2 coming out in a week, and will update with the new bosses as I progress through them. I'm also thinking of updating Alcotraz's guide, and then throwing them all together and having these threads locked. Thoughts?
Post by
apocalypsa
I wouldnt throw them together. If you look at other class forums, they usually have multiple threads per spec. If you'd update the "beginner" guide we'd have a beginner guide, advanced guide and an encounter based guide, and throwing them all together would kinda remove the point to have an easily accessible beginner's guide.
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