Archives for Guide category
23 Apr
Death knights get to open up even more at level 68. Blood starts really pumping up the damage, Unholy gets even more AoE and some damage help from the blood tree, and Frost is finally a viable leveling build. Read more… »
22 Apr
Leveling talent builds continue on through Outland pretty much like they were in Ebon Hold. Frost doesn?t become viable until level 67-68 and On a Pale Horse is a huge talent to lose for trying something different, given all of the riding around you?ll be doing on a ground mount.
You may also notice I?m skipping reactionary and cooldown based talents a lot. This is partly because of my own play style, but it also reduces the number of things to keep track of. As a starting out death knight you?ll find you have plenty of things to watch by default as it is. Read more… »
21 Apr
Back before Wrath launched I had posted guides on leveling a new death knight, including leveling talent build suggestions. The patches since then have changed the talent trees so much I figured some updated versions were called for. So I’ll be putting up new posts this week based on those original posts, with suggested talent builds for 55-58, 58-68, and 68-80.
These builds are based on both my own experience leveling up (back in beta and again when Wrath launched) and the very in depth death knight forums on Elitist Jerks.
These talent builds are meant to be suggestions for those looking for a place to start. You may want to rearrange some talent points for abilities you like (or to avoid those you dislike). You can of course do something completely different. Please keep in mind these builds were designed to be efficient in terms of solo level play, so they do not take grouping heavily or tanking into account. They also should not be used for end game play, unless you do nothing but questing.
From level 55 through 58, as you quest around Ebon Hold, you?ll earn talent points as part of your quest rewards. By the time you finish you?ll be level 58 with the appropriate number of talent points. Read more… »
14 Apr
As with the tank builds I posted this information is based heavily on the Elitist Jerks Death Knight forum and are considered to be the top DPS builds in patch 3.1 for all three talent trees. As with any published talent build there are things to keep in mind. These were designed based on providing the best raid DPS and nothing else. They are cookie cutter builds and not everyone likes that. There is nothing wrong with adjusting these builds to suit your own play style or needs, however you should expect your tweaked build to lose DPS as, again, these builds are already tweaked specifically for raid DPS.
Based on both PTR testing and DPS simulators the following builds, all things being equal, are thought to perform best for raid DPS. They are ranked here from top to bottom as best to “worst.”
#2: Unholy Two-Hand: 12/0/59 (best in Tier 7 raid gear)
#3: Blood Two-Hand: 51/2/18
#4: Frost Two-Hand: 13/51/7
Yes, there are no dual wield builds listed. That is because dual wield is once again not a serious competitor with two-handed builds. There are viable dual wield builds, but you will be hurting your raid DPS significantly just for the play style. For more information on dual wield in patch 3.1 check out the Elitist Jerks thread on the topic.
Now let’s go over the details of the four top raid DPS builds listed above. Read more… »
7 Nov
Now we can have some fun with talent builds. After level 68 things really open up for death knights. Blood builds start really pumping up the damage, Unholy builds gain the self healing of Blood builds, and Frost is finally a viable leveling build. Read more… »
6 Nov
Leveling talent builds continue on through Outland pretty much like they were in Ebon Hold. Frost doesn’t become viable until level 69-70 and On a Pale Horse is a huge talent to lose for trying something different, given all of the riding around you’ll be doing on a ground mount.
You may also notice I’m skipping reactionary and cooldown based talents. This is partly because of my own play style, but it also reduces the number of things to keep track of. As a starting out death knight you’ll find you have plenty of things to watch by default. Read more… »
5 Nov
With death knight talents being one of the more unstable things during beta testing until recently there haven’t been a lot of postings about builds. Since things have settled down so I’ve compiled a list of good leveling builds you might want to consider for starting out with your own death knight. These are based on both my own experience leveling up on the beta servers and the very in depth, very long death knight thread on Elitist Jerks.
These talent builds are meant to be suggestions for those looking for a place to start. You may want to rearrange some talent points for abilities you like (or to avoid those you dislike). Feel free to play around with the available talent builders online before expansion hits. You can of course do something completely different, but please keep in mind these builds were designed to be the most efficient in terms of solo level play. Read more… »
22 Oct
Glyphs are spell and ability enhancements that can be created by inscription, the new WotLK profession. Since inscription was introduced in patch 3.0.2 last week there are probably some inscribers in your guild already skilled up to around 365. If not your realm’s auction house is sure to be stuffed with glyphs.
You can get all the details on glyphs from WoWWiki.
Since glyphs are available already you know what that means… we get to squirrel away more stuff before expansion! That reminds me, Blizzard you are welcome for the sudden increase in bank storage purchases.
So let’s get down to it and look at the glyphs available to death knights now. Keep in mind there are more glyphs than these, but we’re limited to the ones created by 375 skill or lower until after expansion. Read more… »
17 Oct
Preparing For Your Death Knight is for those players planning to switch their mains to a death knight and are willing to go the extra mile before expansion to help speed up their death knight’s development after expansion launches. These steps are by no means required if you want to level a death knight, but they do help speed up the leveling process.
One of the few downsides to changing your main to a death knight is having to start over with professions. While not much will take away from the annoyance of dealing with low level profession grinding on a hero class character, Blizzard is at least helping on the other end. With the new Northrend recipes you only need to get your professions to around 350 before you can start learning all new ones. This will allow us to continue our professions easily once in Northrend without costing us an arm and a leg (easily obtainable for us undead, though it may be) grinding from 350 to 375 with just Outland recipes. Read more… »
16 Oct
Preparing For Your Death Knight is for those players planning to switch their mains to a death knight and are willing to go the extra mile before expansion to help speed up their death knight’s development after expansion launches. These steps are by no means required if you want to level a death knight, but they do help speed up the leveling process.
Consumables certainly won’t make or break your ability to level your death knight quickly, so you don’t need them. However, if you have the money or materials to get some made they certainly do help. In beta testing it was taking death knights anywhere from 20 to 40 hours played to get to Northrend, depending on skill and efficiency. Keep those numbers in mind when looking at how many of each consumable you want to stock pile. Read more… »
