gnomeDK – Your Pink Haired Guide to All Things Death Knight

102 Comments

1. by Noto, on April 17 2009 @ 6:14 am

   

   Hi,
   i’m playing with your 12/59 Unholy Build and, i gotta say i was playing DW in the earlier versions, thats why my experience with this kind of builds is pretty small. Anyway i’ve tested it for some time at the Nemesis puppet and got the best dps compared to other 3.1 speccs. But one thing i still dont know about is, what presence am i playing with?
   I thought at first ‘well we have imp. unholy presence, so play this’ but when i switched into blood presence my dps was getting better. What presence would you recommend to be played with your 12/59 specc?
   Seas
   Noto
   Total Comment by Noto: 1

2. by Dedbitt, on April 17 2009 @ 9:47 am

   

   For PvE DPS you always want to be in Blood Presence. The bonus to damage will always out do the increase in haste from Unholy Presence, plus the faster global cooldown is useless since it throws off your rotation when you account for seperate rune cooldowns. The only time I’ve seen Unholy Presence used seriously is in PvP, but personally I go with Frost Presence since to me survivability = fun in PvP (it is no fun doing damage but dying a lot).

3. by js, on April 17 2009 @ 12:50 pm

   

   I duel speced my DK and tried the 12/59 build in one spec and the 13/51/7 in the other. After testing I had much more dps in the Frost spec. 1800 on the unholy and 2200 on the frost using 3min on the dummy. I still think i can do better, but don’t know how. Any help would be nice. http://www.wowarmory.com/character-sheet.xml?r=Twisting+Nether&cn=Mirikh&gn=The+Army+of+The+Undead
   Total Comment by js: 1

4. by Dedbitt, on April 17 2009 @ 1:51 pm

   

   Just keep in mind that test dummy results and real raid results don’t tend to match. You also may play better with the frost play style than the unholy, which would explain the numbers. Whatever works for you is what you should stick with, hence why I posted builds for all three trees.

5. by Vanga, on April 17 2009 @ 10:56 pm

   

   Can you elaborate on including Improved Unholy Presence in the Unholy dps build? Since we’re dpsing in blood presence and improved speed doesnt result in higher dps, why should we pick it? It looks like a pvp talent to me. Wouldn’t 2 points in Morbidity result in more dps? Especially since you also recommend Glyph of Dark Death…
   Total Comments by Vanga: 2

6. by mKopenhagen, on April 18 2009 @ 3:43 am

   

   Would Ghoul Frenzy be worth taking to keep up pet? And is Imp UP really necessary?
   Total Comment by mKopenhagen: 1

7. by ege dai, on April 18 2009 @ 8:17 am

   

   aahm what is RD? raise dead? then why? im using 12/0/59
   Total Comments by ege dai: 4

8. by Dedbitt, on April 18 2009 @ 11:14 am

   

   Vanga – Melee DPS have been shown to benefit from improved run speed in raids for years. It doesn’t directly increase DPS, but the faster you get to your target the sooner you do damage and thus the better your DPS is. Unholy Aura before patch 3.1 was a must for hardcore raid guilds because of this. If you scout out similar guilds now you’ll see their melee are going with speed increasing boot enchants. This ability it twice as good as those enchants and it allows you to use a pure DPS boot enchant instead.

   mKopenhagen – Ghoul Frenzy is better for ghoul DPS than uptime IMO but it certainly isn’t a bad talent. The problem is it doesn’t seem to be worth giving up other talents for by the theorycrafting numbers. You could dump Imp UP, pick up a run boot enchant, and then pick it up if you want, though. If you are having ghoul uptime issues, however, then there is probably a play style issue going on more than a missing talent. With the introduction of AoE avoidance for the ghoul one can keep the ghoul up in most fights.

   ege – RD in the rotations stands for runic dump, i.e. use up your runic power. There is a rotation key listed above all of the builds going over what the shortcuts mean.

9. by Néfarious, on April 18 2009 @ 7:06 pm

   

   I have found this thread realy useful and am currently using the 12/0/59 spec, getting around 4.1k dps in raids. What I was wondering is when you would advise to use gargoyle in a fight, do you use it at your first runic dump oppertunity ot get it back up asap or save it for when you use your trinkets etc?
   Total Comment by Néfarious: 1

10. by Pythies, on April 19 2009 @ 12:03 pm

    

    your imfo on the sigals is wrong they do only about half what your info shows.
    Total Comment by Pythies: 1

11. by Voldemart, on April 19 2009 @ 6:18 pm

    

    The tooltip in the sigils are wrong
    [Sigil of Arthritic Binding]
    Equip: Increases the damage dealt by your Scourge Strike ability by 91.35.

    [Sigil of the Frozen Conscience]
    Equip: Increases the damage dealt by your Icy Touch ability by 111.

    [Sigil of Awareness]
    Equip: Increases the base damage dealt by your Scourge Strike by 189, your Obliterate by 336, and your Death Strike by 315.

    It was not a nerf, only a typo according to blizzard.
    Total Comment by Voldemart: 1

12. by Vanga, on April 19 2009 @ 11:00 pm

    

    Thank you for answering my question.. still i keep wondering why Morbidity isnt included in the build, we seem to use Death coil quite a lot…
    Total Comments by Vanga: 2

13. by George, on April 20 2009 @ 6:57 am

    

    Greetings Deb. Can you suggest two 68-80 lvling builds (unholy & blood) based on the new patch?
    Total Comments by George: 4

14. by Dedbitt, on April 20 2009 @ 11:28 am

    

    Néfarious – Gargoyle gets its best use when you time it with procs that increase your strength. It’s attack power is directly based on yours at the time of use, so you generally want to have Fallen Crusader just gone off and any other trinket procs or on use gone off as well. That being said, if you know you can get a couple of uses out of it then waiting too long for procs could hurt. It is really going to depend on how quickly your raid is doing the boss in question. Gargoyle rocks when maxed out, but the other runic dumps don’t suck either so it is going to be a matter of timing based on your proc luck and your raid’s DPS.

15. by Dedbitt, on April 20 2009 @ 11:30 am

    

    The sigil tooltips are being pulled from Wowhead. When I checked last week they hadn’t updated a lot of the new patch info onto their main site. If you visit http://ptr.wowhead.com you’ll see all of the updated info based on the PTRs.

16. by Dedbitt, on April 20 2009 @ 11:30 am

    

    Vanga – Morbidity isn’t bad by any means, it is just worth less compared to a lot of other talents. Morbidity for DPS is only half useful. The Death Coil damage increase is good, the healing is mostly useless, and the Death and Decay is meh unless you are dealing with constant AoE with strong AoE tanks. However something like Bladed Armor boosts your DPS all the time, not just on a secondary runic dump (Gargoyle and in AoE typically Unholy Blight come out before Death Coil). In theory Blizzard wants each talent point to be worth the same. The points for Morbidity go into things other than DPS boost, so most talents which are just DPS boosters will tend to out perform it.

17. by Dedbitt, on April 20 2009 @ 11:30 am

    

    George – I’m working on some updated leveling builds, so look for a post on that shortly. In the mean time here are a blood and unholy build. Details about them will come in the later post.

    Blood Leveling – http://www.wowhead.com/?talent#jfVMqhcIcbof0stZfMh0xf
    Unholy Leveling – http://www.wowhead.com/?talent#jfcMZZf0hIxfdgcqMcsux

18. by Osirium, on April 21 2009 @ 12:46 am

    

    Well, im sorry to say that the rotation for 12/0/59 specs is a bit flawed imo because of one small gap in between the rotation where u stay there just doing white-attacks:

    IT-PS-SS-BS-BS-RD (first cycle getting the 2 DR up)
    SS-SS-SS-RD

    So lets imagine you have 0 RP with BP active at the beginning of the fight, you start your cycle until the first RP dump, the problem is when you get first SS you get a 8sec CD, mainly the reason why you have the RP Dump there but still you can do either a single DC or a UB to fill in untill u get the SS CD up for the 3xSS. Even after using DC/UB for rp dump you still end up waiting 3secs to be able to perform the 3xSS and in between SS you still have 1sec before beeing able to use the third one. So i still end up having a small gap where im doing nothing but auto-attack, any suggestion for that cause i’ve tried several variables and they all ended with similar results.
    Total Comment by Osirium: 1

19. by Ghizz, on April 21 2009 @ 1:56 am

    

    for your 12/0/59 build, i pull off 1.8K dps while for the blood build, i pull 2.3K…should i stick with the unholy buuild cuz you said it does better dps than blood or frost.
    Total Comment by Ghizz: 1

20. by Deathnun, on April 21 2009 @ 4:17 am

    

    We want PVP Builds!!!!!!

    Whats the cookie cutter arena build atm?
    Total Comments by Deathnun: 2

21. by kei, on April 21 2009 @ 8:14 am

    

    Why did u put 2 points to Night of the Dead in the 51/2/18 Blood Build ? What is it for ? Is it better to put those 2points elsewhere ?
    Total Comment by kei: 1

22. by Nate, on April 21 2009 @ 9:01 am

    

    On behalf of unholy presence, the only time you would use it in viable spec would be in dual wielding in order to fit in an extra spell with stacked haste into your rotation. with increased speed your runeforging procs more often, increasing frost damage and keeping fallen crusader up at all times.
    Total Comment by Nate: 1

23. by Dedbitt, on April 21 2009 @ 10:54 am

    

    Osirium – For best DPS you want to keep as many runes on cooldown as possible for as much time as possible (the idea being you are getting off lots of special attacks in the process) in addition to using all of your runic power and never letting it cap at 100. That is perfect DPS based usage of resources, and as in all cases of perfection it is very hard to pull off consistently. The “flaw” in the rotation is you have a few seconds down time, which from a fun factor does suck. However it isn’t that you are waiting for certain runes while others are available, none of your runes are available. That’s going to happen when you are being so efficient with rune usage. That is also probably why you keep seeing that result, I’m sure you are trying rune usage efficient rotations and they lead back to the same thing.

24. by Dedbitt, on April 21 2009 @ 10:55 am

    

    Ghizz – The unholy vs blood “which is better” was based on the theorycrafters’ testing, numbers, and simulations. A lot of results I saw put blood very, very close to unholy in some cases. We should also note most of those death knight players have tended to play unholy more than anything else, so they are going to be better at it. It is not at all surprising for a player with a different play style to see different results. You may just like/play blood better, hence the DPS difference. The ranks I give are for informational purposes. Picking the build for you includes that information, but also includes what you want to play and what works for you. If you like blood and you got consistently better DPS with blood, then spec blood. If any unholy death knight gives you grief just show them up on the damage meters

25. by Dedbitt, on April 21 2009 @ 10:55 am

    

    Deathnun – I haven’t see any real cookie cutter arena/PvP builds yet. Two things you can look at, though. One is check out the top rated death knights and see what they are doing, if you see a pattern then you have your cookie cutter build. Two is check out the Elitist Jerks Death Knight PvP thread. They don’t list cookie cutters, but one post had four “viable and very strong in their own rights” arena builds. Here’s the direct link:
    http://elitistjerks.com/f38/t37419-deathknight_pvp_thread/p17/#post1169307

26. by Dedbitt, on April 21 2009 @ 10:56 am

    

    kei – If you look at the blood tree you’ll note that we’re out of DPS boosting talents with that build. Hence we move over to unholy for some nice things. Night of the Dead certainly isn’t your best two talent points in the build, but they help with your ghoul pet which is a DPS boost for blood builds (compared to mandatory DPS element for unholy). Army of the Dead is also a nice ability if used right. Personally I like to summon them right before a boss pull (they don’t taunt bosses and their aggro doesn’t transfer to you). If you don’t use these abilities then you can certainly use the points elsewhere, such as Blood-Caked Blade.

27. by Manifestio, on April 21 2009 @ 1:02 pm

    

    when I looked at your 0/10/61 spec you have two points being spent in the improved unholy presence…if you are playing a serious raid DPS DK you will be in your blood presence for the damage increase…making the second half of the improved unholy presence’s effect useless (the 10% shorter cool down on your runes)…you can take those two points out and put one more in morbidity for the increase in death coil damage and the cool down on death and decay is nice as well…and either spend the other one as you please or do what I will be doing and putting it in Icy Talons in the frost tree…it’s only a 4% attack speed increase but it will help…if you don’t want to put it there you can always place it in Butchery in the blood tree for and increase in your runic power in case you find yourself dumping your runic power faster than you can obtain it (I have never had this problem)…that is all just a personal preference, but I think the 15% movement speed increase is overall useless unless you just have you race your guildies into the next mob or boss.
    Total Comments by Manifestio: 2

28. by Dedbitt, on April 21 2009 @ 1:22 pm

    

    Manifestio – For me and a lot of others the extra run speed does equal increased DPS. Faster you get to the next mob in a multiple mob pull, or get back in position from a throw back or run away, the more damage you are doing and the less time you are wasting (remember DPS = damage per second, and those seconds running count). Of course a PvE death knight is in Blood Presence, but again those two points are worth it for the increased speed. Granted the lack of a raid wide buff has lessened the value. As I’ve said several times before yes you can swap out those two talent points and pick up a run speed boot enchant, but IMO it just isn’t as good. Then again I cry over the increase mount speed talent not having any DPS aspect to it

29. by Manifestio, on April 21 2009 @ 1:47 pm

    

    Dedbitt – I never actually looked at it like that…but even with that I think that leaving one point in the improved unholy presence and taking the other for the morbidity might be better…because with Death Coil being our bread and butter move the extra 5% would help more than the 7% extra speed movement…This way you can keep 8% movement increase and have your Death coil cause more damage, plus in large area mob pulls you will be able to drop Death and Decay more than one time in a long mob fight
    Total Comments by Manifestio: 2

30. by Dedbitt, on April 21 2009 @ 1:58 pm

    

    Certainly a valid substitute/compromise setup.

31. by Algalon, on April 21 2009 @ 2:51 pm

    

    Isn’t there a spec where you have something similar to 12/0/59 but you get black ice aswell ? Abit less on blood maybe ?
    Total Comments by Algalon: 2

32. by Siega, on April 21 2009 @ 5:26 pm

    

    Hello, first of all thx for the nice guide and for patiently answering all questions popping up. I was wondering why Pestilence is not included in the rotation. I am coming from a blood spec over to your 12/0/59 build and with that I was spreading the diseases heavily.
    Total Comment by Siega: 1

33. by Dreadmoore, on April 21 2009 @ 6:43 pm

    

    As an old 12/0/59 Unholy for months, I’m a bit confused when doing my blood “second spec” for DPS. I know the improved Death Strike (with glyph) can do some very “Obliterate Like” numbers, however, unlike Oblit, it doesn’t effect Death Rune Mastery and give death runes when used. (Only Blood strike, which is not viable for a blood design, and Obliterate effect Death Rune Mastery)

    ..unless the tooltip is in error.

    So, that being the case, wouldn’t the best bet for Blood be something like 58/13/0 (to get annihilation, at the very least?)

    What am I missing, I’m a Blood newb by comparison to Unholy. I suspect there’s many of us out there.
    Total Comments by Dreadmoore: 2

34. by Dreadmoore, on April 21 2009 @ 7:23 pm

    

    Nevermind.. I was confusing Death Strike with Blood Strike. My bad. <——- blood newb.
    Total Comments by Dreadmoore: 2

35. by Urial, on April 22 2009 @ 6:36 am

    

    Siega, you could just replace the blood strike in your rotation with pestilence although this would decrease your damage output slightly (as pestilence no longer deals damage). It would also grant you the death rune that the blood strike would grant you.

    I have my doubts about this though as it allows the user to use another scourge strike (or death strike depending on your spec) which if it crits is a much higher damage output then plague strike and icy touch. (The chances of getting crits of both plague strike and icy touch are much lower then a single 2 rune strike as well)

    Hope this answers your question.
    Total Comments by Urial: 2

36. by Urial, on April 22 2009 @ 6:37 am

    

    Also Algalon, there is, it’s called 0/10/61, the main DPS spec of this thread.
    Haha
    Total Comments by Urial: 2

37. by ege dai, on April 22 2009 @ 10:04 am

    

    ahm 1 more question and im done should i use unholy presence or blood presence with 12/0/59
    Total Comments by ege dai: 4

38. by Trithith, on April 22 2009 @ 12:04 pm

    

    51/0/20 – I dish out 4.5k on 10 man and 5k+ DPS on 25man. Progress so far is everything up thru Kologarn. Tonight we plan on working on Iron Council. Full T7.5 – Betrayer – and Maly 25 slot boots. Neck off Laviathan and Helm off Razor. Look me up if you like, Im on Terokkar.
    Total Comments by Trithith: 3

39. by Dedbitt, on April 22 2009 @ 3:27 pm

    

    Algalon – I haven’t seen a cookie cutter build like that, though I’m sure you could combine the two unholy DPS builds into that somehow. Black Ice shines best with the new raid gear, so personally I would still say hold off until you are in more new stuff than not.

40. by Dedbitt, on April 22 2009 @ 3:28 pm

    

    Siega – Pestilence is for AoE situations and the rotations I listed are for single target. With AoE you’d use Pestilence instead of a Blood Strike for unholy builds and the rest of the rotation will likely get thrown off if you use Death and Decay. For me AoE rotations are really situational and less structured.

41. by Dedbitt, on April 22 2009 @ 3:28 pm

    

    Dreadmoore – Death Rune Mastery does affect Death Strike as well as Obliterate now. Blood is different from unholy in that you have a nice, two rune strike (Death Strike) but you focus on a one rune strike (Heart Strike). With unholy it is all about Scourge Strike, Plague Strike doesn’t even come close.

42. by Dedbitt, on April 22 2009 @ 3:29 pm

    

    ege – Always use Blood Presence when doing PvE DPS. The Imp Unholy Presence talent is for all the time 15% run speed buff.

43. by Ark, on April 22 2009 @ 7:31 pm

    

    i have a question about the 12/0/59 spec, wouldn’t it suck not having dark conviction with the 5% crit and all?
    Total Comments by Ark: 4

44. by Trithith, on April 23 2009 @ 9:05 am

    

    51/0/20 – 4tw, you get all the treats from Blood along with imp death strike which crits for 12k and self heals.. AND you get all the passive auto attack buffs from Unholy, like Necrosis, and Blood Caked Blade. Not sure if its gear dependent but Im more then content sustaining 5k+ dps.
    Total Comments by Trithith: 3

45. by Guatalupe, on April 23 2009 @ 4:59 pm

    

    Hello there, and thank you again for posting all of this information. It’s often overlooked how much work goes into these types of things when all we have to do is visit a site and peruse for a few minutes, when you all do the dirty work!

    That being said, I am frustrated with my DK and I want someone’s opinion. I believe I am gear-capped, but I need someone else to say it. I’ve currently tried both the 12/0/59 Unholy and 51/2/18 Blood builds listed above. With these, and even my prior hybrid 50/0/21 build, I have not been able to break much over 2.5k on the boss dummy. No matter what I do, cooldowns I pop, etc; it won’t budge. Now, keep in mind this is the boss dummy (in the middle). On the standard 80 dummy I do around 3.4k, but I’m guessing that might also be due to the proximity of the other dummy nearby (heartstrike?).

    Anyway, currently, my glyphs are not tweaked for either spec on your site, but I do have the DS glyph from my old build. I really don’t want to switch out glyphs until I’m certain what I want (pricey). However, do you think this would change much for me, that they aren’t in yet while I test? The jump from 2.5 to 3k seems more than a glyph can handle.

    So I’m asking, look me up on Armory; Guatalupe, Silver Hand. I’ll try to leave my gear in for awhile so it’s logged on the site. Let me know if I’m maxed with what I have to work with.

    Thanks!
    Total Comment by Guatalupe: 1

46. by Rueryuzaki, on April 24 2009 @ 2:57 am

    

    oky so ive been useing the 12/0/59 build now… i see ppl saying that the Imp UP isnt really worth it and i see ur point in saying that getting to the mob faster is good for dps to… however… since we are dps we dont need to get to the mob faster… cuz if we are beating the tank there then we get killed and tank has to go thru all that trouble to get aggro on the whole mob… also… im under the impression that toughness and bladed armor stack ( i may be rong so correct me if i am) so wouldnt it be better to get 6% more armor to increase ur AP by however much… rather than having 15% run?
    Total Comments by Rueryuzaki: 5

47. by Rueryuzaki, on April 24 2009 @ 3:01 am

    

    oh and, wouldnt getting either the +85 ap or the +60 ap to ur wepon or the +? (<<< idr how much the titanium wep chain gives atm) hit rating be better than a “chance” at 15% str for only 15 second? cuz thats kinda wat mirror of truth is for if u use it or if ur like me and use Fury of the Five Flights (<<< both trinkets for those who dont know)
    Total Comments by Rueryuzaki: 5

48. by Dedbitt, on April 24 2009 @ 10:21 am

    

    Ark – Crit isn’t all that for us and the gear brings in crit upgrades you you (one of the reasons the build is better with the gear).

49. by Dedbitt, on April 24 2009 @ 10:23 am

    

    Guatalupe – Unfortunately I’m seeing your tank gear atm. However I do note that you only seem to run 10-man raids (nothing wrong with that), so comparing yourself to death knights running 25-man content then you are far from gear capped. If you are comparing your DPS with death knights you don’t know well then stop. One, they are likely running 25-man content and have a higher level gear. Two, and this isn’t directed at anyone, but I believe numbers when someone links a WWS report. Just because someone says they do X DPS doesn’t make it so. Three, there is a major DPS boost from going solo on a boss dummy to being in the raid. You’ll never solo a boss so the test dummies numbers aren’t nearly as valuable as you may think. Also keep in mind you’ll have far fewer buffs in a 10-man than you would in a 25-man, so again you can’t compare with 25-man players. To really check numbers get into a raid and check your damage meters there, or even better see if you or someone can run a WWS report on the fight and look at that instead.

50. by Dedbitt, on April 24 2009 @ 10:23 am

    

    Rueryuzaki – The run speed question has been dealt with a lot at Elitist Jerks. From late WoW 1.0 on the consensus has been that melee need faster run speed and that whatever stat loss they take is worth the increased speed. I’m a former rogue, so I’ve always been focused on melee DPS myself. You can’t measure the increase by any model but the increase is there for the vast majority who have tested it in real raids. And again, it is a personal choice. I really don’t care what talents anyone outside my guild goes with, whatever works for you is fine.

51. by Dedbitt, on April 24 2009 @ 10:23 am

    

    Rueryuzaki – As for weapon enchants even the nerfed Crusader beats any standard weapon enchant. Strength is SO much better than raw AP because it does so much for us. Unbuffed I have 1335 strength, 15% of which would be 200. That’s 400 AP for 15 seconds and the buff averages 1 ppm, so that averages out to be 100 AP constantly. All of the AP numbers go up even more when you include talents that work directly with strength.

52. by roxos, on April 24 2009 @ 5:20 pm

    

    OK. ive read every single post theresbeen. and i definitly have to say amazing advice. ive been rolling 17/0/54 since i hit 80.now im not signifinitly geard but i pull around 3.2k dps in 5 man heroics. when im 25 man raid buffed i pull around 4.5-5k. if you wanna check my toon is roxos,server nazgrel.it is definitly a great spac and gear mix
    Total Comment by roxos: 1

53. by Clairdelune, on April 29 2009 @ 5:51 am

    

    I have to argue with you about presences. I was in the “blood is best” camp for a long time. now after the patch i am more convinced than ever that for a frost spec unholy-pres does much more damage. The thing with a frost spec is that with the right glyphs we generate a ridiculous amount of runic power. Using the rotation you have above for the frost spec you end up havening a few times where either you are overloaded on runic power or letting runes sit there unconsumed. Have your frost DKs try your spec you have up there in blood then switch them to unholy and tell them to use frost strike whenever they cant Obl yet due to rune cool downs. my dps went up 13% with unholy doing double frost strikes instead of using blood and only one frost strike. The rotation feels cleaner too.
    Total Comment by Clairdelune: 1

54. by Aralia, on April 29 2009 @ 11:58 pm

    

    What r the best glyphs for the frost spec
    Total Comment by Aralia: 1

55. by Kyal, on April 30 2009 @ 9:54 am

    

    I?m running the 51/2/18 Blood DPS build, the EJ forum shows that you can pump 7k+ DPS Right behind the 0/10/61 Build by like 20 damage. I pumped out 6k on 25 man with 10 naxx gear, it works
    Total Comment by Kyal: 1

56. by Dedbitt, on April 30 2009 @ 10:45 am

    

    Aralia – The glyphs are listed with the build links, in the lower right of the window.

57. by Crazyking, on April 30 2009 @ 5:56 pm

    

    On the subject of melee dps getting more time on target by having increased movement speed. wouldn’t On a Pale Horse be better then with it being 5% more and reduced fear/stun time also allowing more time on target? since you only get the movement from the Imp Unholy pres, since blood is best dps stance.
    Total Comment by Crazyking: 1

58. by Alhawaii, on April 30 2009 @ 9:19 pm

    

    Hey I was wondering, why leave Morbidity with just two points and why have two points in unholy presence? it seems like a waste to me, wouldnt you put that extra in Morbidity and increase the damage of your DC by 5%?

    i’m very curious about this, please give me your opinion.
    Total Comments by Alhawaii: 2

59. by Alhawaii, on April 30 2009 @ 9:19 pm

    

    BTW, im referring to the 0/10/61 build
    Total Comments by Alhawaii: 2

60. by Dedbitt, on May 1 2009 @ 9:42 am

    

    Crazyking – You run all the time, how often are you stunned or feared in a raid? They both increase DPS uptime, but one is more seldom used than the other.

61. by Dedbitt, on May 1 2009 @ 9:42 am

    

    Alhawaii – Imp Unholy Presence has been discussed a few times in the earlier comments. You should find the info and opinions you are looking for in there.

62. by Krythys, on May 1 2009 @ 7:33 pm

    

    Everybody keeps talking about 2 handed.. and yes this is a 2 handed forum… but if no one works on a dual wield spec it will be left in the dust… i use a 0/17/54 spec
    http://www.wowhead.com/?talent#jZG0jxZf0hIxcdt0q0csut:roLVM
    the thing i use though is both of my action bar lines… rotation is PS-IT-SS-BS-BS-than either UB OR DC
    change to next rotation line and it is PS-IT-BS-DnD and than by this time you will have enough RP and procs to drop gargoyle at most likly its strongest… rinse repeat. if you stick close to it, there are no waiting to start rotation again, it is quick and fast. and with gear i have stacked haste massivly, i sit at about 18% unbuffed haste, and my dps will on 25 man raiding 3500-4500dps. and i don’t even have 4 piece T7.5, i just think dual wield should be mentioned and it’s not a viable way to get some massive dps. Good hunting guys
    Total Comment by Krythys: 1

63. by Aqularian, on May 3 2009 @ 2:07 pm

    

    Ok, I am newb to lvl 80 DK’s, I have switched from my 80 arms/fury spec. My question is, on wow-heroes.com my Warrior is rated 2450 and my dk is rated 1600, I know that gear is the main reason for the scoring dif on wow-heroes. What spec would be the best for me without true epic gear. right now i am hitting for around 1780dps on the main dummy( i know that it doesnt translate to real accurate dps) but it does give a hint of expected dps.
    Thanks in advance

    Aqularian
    Total Comment by Aqularian: 1

64. by Dedbitt, on May 3 2009 @ 7:38 pm

    

    Aqularian – Any of the end game specs would work, though 0/10/61 would probably be best used once you get geared up. As for the wow-heroes.com rating that’s a question better suited for their community. I’m not very familiar with their system myself.

65. by Pamma, on May 5 2009 @ 12:15 am

    

    I really question your glyphs under your 2h Frost Dps Spec. Why would you want imp Death Grip? How would that buff your dps? The other two glyphs you have posted give as little a dps boost as Imp Death Grib.

    Would love to hear back. Thank you!
    Total Comment by Pamma: 1

66. by Dedbitt, on May 5 2009 @ 7:16 am

    

    Pamma – I’m not sure what glyphs you are seeing with the frost DPS link. I see Frost Strike, Icy Touch, and Obliterate. Frost Strike reduced resources use, Icy Touch increases resources, and Obliterate is a direct damage increase. I don’t list the Death Grip glyph with any builds.

67. by Melyian, on May 5 2009 @ 1:44 pm

    

    For Frost build, I suggest using HB glyph over IT. It is easier to manage in rotationwise and you’ll find yourself never doing more than 1 white dmg while waiting for CD since you’ll continuously FS and HB when rhime etc… So now rhime has really shined through.

    Basically same rotation just take out IT and PS.

    HB>OB>BS>BS>FS>FS (usually ~3)
    OB>OB*>OB*>FS

    * indicates where you need to refresh FF or not. Also whenever you’re getting a rhime proc, just go ahead and cast a free HB since you’ll be doing more big damage overall.

    So far I found that this works really well in BG. And I’m pretty sure that it will in 3v3 up. As for 2v2 it’ll be quite tougher to manage.
    Total Comment by Melyian: 1

68. by Wizfuzz, on May 5 2009 @ 3:47 pm

    

    Hello everyone.
    I am struggeling with my dps, i use the 0/10/61 build.
    I use the rotation mentioned here in the forum.
    I can not get over 3.0k on boss dummy and got around 4k tops in 25 man.
    I got full 7.5 and 213 items on rest.
    Weapon inevdible defeat, so that is the biggest upgrade i suppose.

    Am i where i am supposed to be conserning dps?
    I have this constant feeling that DK`s are pumping out 6k in 25man, can someone honest comment that?

    (Wizfuzz on aggramar EU server).
    Total Comment by Wizfuzz: 1

69. by Robotbee, on May 6 2009 @ 9:10 am

    

    Hi! Great guides btw. I have been hardcore unholy for a while (as a tank), but now I am trying blood DPS. I just can’t seem to find a straight answer on why DS is so much better than Oblit now. Do you really get better DPS out of DS than out of oblit? Even specced to annihilate? Is DS the go to ability now just because speccing to annihilate costs too many other good talents?
    Total Comment by Robotbee: 1

70. by Ark, on May 7 2009 @ 1:00 am

    

    Is Armor Penetration a good stat to have for dps DK?
    Total Comments by Ark: 4

71. by Dedbitt, on May 7 2009 @ 11:24 am

    

    Ark – It is an okay stat, but not a leading one. That is the case for all melee DPS. I know Blizzard buffed it in patch 3.1, but strength and crit are still better IMO. Compared to haste I’m not sure what the ratio of damage value is, but haste is also a so so stat for us. That being said, if the rest of an item is an upgrade then armor pen certainly doesn’t hurt so go for the upgrade.

72. by Fanth, on May 8 2009 @ 3:42 pm

    

    Hey I was wondering which stats to stac would u recommend for unholy DPS? with blood I went for hit/exp max at first and then as much str/aP as possible but I’ve never been unholy so im pretty muhc clueless there.
    I did hear other specs wanted more crit than blood, is that what I should be gemming for?
    Total Comment by Fanth: 1

73. by Dedbitt, on May 8 2009 @ 5:48 pm

    

    Fanth – You’re more close than you realize. Hit cap first and always, whatever spec. Expertise is less important for unholy since unholy specials aren’t physical, but basic melee is still going to be your #1 damage dealer so it is still a good stat. Then just pile on the strength. Always take strength over AP, you get a lot more milage out of it.

74. by Dedbitt, on May 8 2009 @ 8:40 pm

    

    Robotbee – Death Strike does more damage than Obliterate in classic blood DPS builds, which do not include Annihilate. Imp Death Strike talent gives it a major damage boost and Death Rune Mastery works for both Obliterate and Death Strike now, so one Death Strike leads to two Heart Strikes. Plus there is the Death Strike glyph for a small damage boost. Blizzard posts have even commented multiple times that they deliberately changed things so Death Strike would be the two rune strike for blood (Obliterate is for frost, Scourge Strike for unholy).

75. by Kadran, on May 15 2009 @ 10:03 am

    

    I keep hearing that DW is no longer a viable spec, yet I am currently running 0/13/58 and doing 4k dmg on a regular basis with 5k spikes on non movement fights. Our other DK is blood and her and I are usually fighting for number one on a meter. Any ideas why EJ still says DW is bad. In my usage that spec seems to be right in line with my 2h dmg. Thoughts?
    Total Comment by Kadran: 1

76. by Ark, on May 16 2009 @ 11:46 am

    

    I am currently 17/54/0 frost 2h dps, i find it to be the best spec in the game for single target dps at the moment. I can usually keep up to rogues and hunters in single target. But, guilds like Ensidia and Method all have their dps death knights specced as unholy. I never really liked unholy other than for massive AoE in naxx. Blood 51/0/20 or 50/0/21 are also favourites of mine. Just wanted to know what other people thought was a good spec right now (even if it may not be listed above).
    Total Comments by Ark: 4

77. by Ark, on May 18 2009 @ 11:10 pm

    

    Nvm, they are unholy because of the T8 set bonuses
    Total Comments by Ark: 4

78. by Falfnir, on May 19 2009 @ 5:59 pm

    

    Well, first off, blood presence is all well and good for raiding dps, but dont shun unholy presence just because of the melee haste, the faster cooldown on all your abilities is very useful for micro managing your RP and RD methods, blood presence IMO is just too slow to effectively manage your RP, you will eventually get a full 100 RP and be unable to effectively dump it in favor of using your main attacks, especially in unholy spec, keeping you UB up and managing both when to shoot off your gargoyle and DCs while managing your rune cooldowns is much easier in unholy presence, therefore less downtime between using your runes while in blood presenceyou have a full second of downtime before you can use another rune attack or RD.
    Second,I am specced 17/0/54.
    Morbidity is a useful talent for unholy DKs due to how much we do use DC, you can easily replace the talent points in Dirge in favor of using the IT glyph and replace the desecration ability for the extra 5% tp crit from dark conviction in the blood tree, and since I use unholy presence, i have no need for the Imp. unholy presence. My rotation goes:
    IT, PS, SS, BS, BS, UB, wait for cooldowns, then SS, SS, SS, DC or gargoyle if crusader or greatness procs.
    I find that unholy DKs benefit greatly from having the UB up at all times, in the long fights it really helps out more in sync with the unholy presence.
    Total Comments by Falfnir: 2

79. by Falfnir, on May 19 2009 @ 6:04 pm

    

    I forgot with the increased melee haste (even if by a small margin), that means more necrosis hits, more blood caked blades procs. All in all i believe it more than makes up for the 2% dmg loss from blood presence.
    Total Comments by Falfnir: 2

80. by Dedbitt, on May 20 2009 @ 3:01 pm

    

    Kadran – The EJ people are running 7-8k DPS in Uludar. These are the really hardcore, near perfectly geared players with near perfect raid/buff setups. Their numbers show a big drop off for DW. If it works for you, great. That may change with better gear.

81. by Dedbitt, on May 20 2009 @ 3:01 pm

    

    Falfnir – With blood presence there isn’t much “wait for cooldowns” as your rotation demands. That’s why the global cooldown benefit of unholy isn’t great for PvE DPS, your runes are still going to take 10 seconds to cooldown and for most it doesn’t improve their button mashing ability. Increased melee hits and Necrosis is nice, but you’re giving up 15% buff to all damage (including those big Scourge Strike hits and crits) for that.

82. by Quarkstars, on May 21 2009 @ 2:13 am

    

    Hey, since i had money to waste i dual specced blood and frost dps(mostly for utility purposes for raids, if we had a blood id go frost and vice versa). the blood is absolutely perfect, but there is a minor tweak i would make to frost dps(albeit personal preference). i would go with the howling blast glyph, and here is the reason. tho it may not proc all the time, rime can give u a considerable advantage to ur dps here. say ur in a fight, and ur going thru the rotation said above, and rime procs. since howling blast can now infect with frost fever, u can essentially save it for when plagues run out, replacing icy touch in your rotation. then use the spare frost rune to pop unbreakable armor giving u 25% increase to strength. Not only do u replace icy touch with a stronger dps move that will crit, u can trigger a self-buff without screwing ur rotation(i know some people dont even use unbreakable armor cause they hate screwing their rotation rythem, so now u can)just before u start spamming obliterates and frost strikes. as long as u cast icy touch first as well, u will still get the howling blast dps increase from blood plague not running out quite yet(does more damage when a disease is on target). try it out. i haven’t read all the comments so i dunno if anyone mentioned it or not yet. Also, ive never really had a problem with runic pwr so i would get howling blast anyways, so like i said its personal prefernce.
    Total Comments by Quarkstars: 2

83. by Quarkstars, on May 21 2009 @ 2:21 am

    

    oh i forgot to mention pop deathchill before hand as well
    Total Comments by Quarkstars: 2

84. by Dedbitt, on May 21 2009 @ 10:30 am

    

    Quarkstars – Just be careful not to drop Icy Touch too much, as it gives a nice debuff to the target and, depending on your spec, buff to you and your raid. Also keep in mind 1 rune vs 2 rune attack differences. Yes 2 runes do more damage than a 1 rune attack, but how much DPS might you be losing by not doing two 1 rune attacks for disease refresh, and how much DPS loss from not having Blood Plague and Frost Fever both ticking? Check out your WWS logs from raids (get WWS running ASAP if your guild doesn’t post it already) and you may be surprised how high up disease damage is for your personal damage breakdown.

85. by Trithith, on May 26 2009 @ 11:11 am

    

    51/0/20 – I can not say it enough. Im pulling 6200+ dps single target in Ulduar.

    Also, Armor pen is HUGE for DK’s. Im sitting at 37% base armor pen. My crit raid buffed is 42% and my hit is capped. Expertise is just under cap. AP raid buffed is 5600. ( out of combat )

    Im currently using 2pc bonus 7.5 and 2pc bonus 8. Rune Edge as a weapon and a handful of other 25man Ulduar drops.

    Its as easy as keeping diseases up, and spamming DS over HS. Then dump runic power with DC. Use Hysteria & RuneBlade when its up ( usually can do that combo twice per encounter if you fire it off right at the start )

    /the end
    Total Comments by Trithith: 3

86. by Thalorin, on May 28 2009 @ 1:36 pm

    

    My guild has been pwning Ulduar recently, Ive been raiding as blood spec. I had full T7.5 – which gave me the 4 piece bonus.
    My rotation was —> IT, PS, HS, HS, DS DCx2
    DS, HS, HS, HS, HS, HS, DC

    Problem is, now that I have been replacing my tier pieces. I lost my bonus and dont generate enough RP for two death coils under my first rotation. And with the DS glyph, you get extra crit if RP is under 20% and its not.

    Should I still continue with this rotation? Will it improve once I get more ArP. gear? Or should I start with a new rotation.
    Total Comment by Thalorin: 1

87. by Dedbitt, on May 29 2009 @ 10:38 am

    

    Thalorin – I’d consider not replacing the 4 piece T7.5 bonus until you can get the 4 piece T8.x bonus. One or two piece replacement isn’t going to be a big DPS boost, so if losing the bonus is a larger DPS loss then the math seems pretty clear. Just hold on to the T8.x pieces until you have enough to justify the change.

88. by Fingertwo, on June 1 2009 @ 1:40 am

    

    I’m probably the greenest player here with a question like this, but I need to know, what does it mean to do a runic dump? I’m trying to reconfigure my 78 DK, and i see rotations that tell you what to do then do dump, and I don’t know how to do that? any explanation would be nice despite the laughter I may get for not knowing this! Lol
    Total Comment by Fingertwo: 1

89. by Proletariate, on June 6 2009 @ 10:45 pm

    

    Thanks for all the great information. In your Blood 51/2/18 build, don’t bloodworms suck up healing in AoE healing effects? This is not something you wnat to do to your raid buddies, is it?
    Total Comment by Proletariate: 1

90. by Unavailable, on June 8 2009 @ 7:15 pm

    

    I’ve been using 0/10/61 for awhile now and just now am starting to push 4k+ overall dps and 6k+ dps single target dps and I see a lot of other dk’s using the frost build posted here and I was wondering what I could do more dps with, I don’t have any ulduar gear unfortunately, I am hit capped and I have T1 furious mace. also don’t you think using this build would push more dps then the one linked here? http://thottbot.com/death_knight/t#2/bIQnxn0dL1/e4Cy1.
    Thanks in advance if you need to know some of my stats look me up on bladefist my char’s name is Unävailable.
    P.S. I’m a hardcore pvp’er so I’ll be in pvp gear 9/10 times.
    Total Comments by Unavailable: 2

91. by Unavailable, on June 8 2009 @ 7:17 pm

    

    Sorry posted the wrong build meant to link this one
    http://thottbot.com/death_knight/t#2/bEknxT1dL1/e4Cy1
    Total Comments by Unavailable: 2

92. by Andrew, on June 9 2009 @ 1:17 pm

    

    I do not understand what runic dump is. Can someone please explain me what it is?
    Total Comment by Andrew: 1

93. by Cister, on June 13 2009 @ 8:37 am

    

    I have a question about the Unholy dps Rotation… what si Runic Dump?? i can’t see it as a skill or something
    Total Comment by Cister: 1

94. by Eulogy, on June 16 2009 @ 4:50 am

    

    Andrew and Cister – Runic Dump refers to the any skill that uses runic power such as Death Coil, Unholy Blight, etc.
    Total Comment by Eulogy: 1

95. by Dedbitt, on June 17 2009 @ 12:45 pm

    

    Proletariate – Hadn’t heard that myself, but haven’t touched Blood personally since beta leveling to be honest. Bloodworms can certainly be dropped for a raid build, they are bonus DPS but not a lot.

96. by Dedbitt, on June 17 2009 @ 12:46 pm

    

    Unavailable – BAsed on the numbers you posted it sounds like you are close to max. Unfortunatly gear matters, so using a lower end weapon and gear than people in Ulduar will make your DPS less than theirs. In the meantime try out an Unholy DPS build (the pre-Ulduar gear one) and see what that does for you AFTER you’re use to it and playing it well (don’t look at first day results and dump it, it is a different play style you need to skill up on).

97. by Thergothon, on June 20 2009 @ 6:02 am

    

    What would you think of a spec like this

    http://talent.mmo-champion.com/?deathknight=23050000000000000000000000003200500000000000000000000000230220335003215000150003022151&glyph=082527040506&version=9947
    Total Comments by Thergothon: 2

98. by Dedbitt, on June 29 2009 @ 1:28 pm

    

    Thergothon – Your build is close to the considered optimal Unholy DPS build, but not quite. If you want something better then go with what has been posted. There really isn’t much room to negotiation in terms of best DPS output when it comes to the cookie cutter builds. As always whatever works for you works for you.

99. by Rueryuzaki, on August 4 2009 @ 6:59 pm

    

    IM going with the 12/0/59 atm… i have “almost” all valorous gear or better… with the exclusion of about 2-3 items on me… im usually in the top 5 or so on DPS charts… always beaten by a lock or sumthing… lol.. but i was just wondering if perhaps with the new 3.2 coming out… is there a better build?
    Total Comments by Rueryuzaki: 5

100. by Deki, on August 5 2009 @ 5:36 am

     

     As i press the link of your 12/0/59 build i get to the page with a build missing 15 points!
     can i get a link to the complete build so i can take it over, or can someone give me another link to this build!
     Total Comment by Deki: 1

101. by scl, on November 3 2009 @ 4:15 pm

     

     i have dk with dual spec blood and frost dk:D
     and frost is better in raid because it does more aoe(are of effect)so when you crit with 1 spell u crit to all:D i hope it helped
     Total Comment by scl: 1

102. by Draconiclove, on January 23 2010 @ 2:36 pm

     

     I have been playing a DK, for about 6 months now, I am working under the 51/2/18 with Rune of the fallen Crusader on my new Quel’Delar, Full Tier 9 gear all enchanted, my rotation is sucking and I can’t seem to break 3.8k on my DPS. My current rotation is: Heart Strike, Icy Touch, Plague Strike, Death Strike, Heart Strike x2, Obliterate, Death coil x3, then Blood Strike. I have the Needle-Encrusted Scorpion and Mark of Supremacy as my Sigils. I am also using the major Glyphs of Dark Death, Death Strike,Dancing Rune Weapon, and minor glyphs of Pestilance, Raise dead, and Horn of Winter. So what am i currently doing wrong that has my DPS dropping instead of going higher? Can some one please email or leave a message for me on this? It would be most appreciated. Thanks again.
     Total Comment by Draconiclove: 1

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