Trafficing with the dark side
Posted 07-03-2009 at 02:35 AM by Aethelas
Originally I was going to name this blog 'Baby's got blue eyes' but I'm guessing that referring to a song title like that for a blog entry that's about my experiences with my deathknight is sort of pushing it… Other than that I've been having quite a bit of fun on my deathknight. I'd like to add that my comments and observations are my own, your experiences might be competlely different.
When I decided to level my deathknight it was out of curiousity for the new mechanics and in part to see what the hell made them the completely powerful tanks they appear to be. Well having levelled one as frost and unholy I've seen a couple of instances during my levelling time where I got to fool around with the half arsed frost specc I figured out myself.
Having tanked a lot on my warrior, and playing my hunter before that, spamming a one sided ability next to keeping up another rotation has become an inate ability. That same inate ability makes me completely nervous when there's nothing to spam. No really. I find myself in this nice and serene environment where I can wonder what button to press next during the 1.5 second global cooldown.
The change of going from a dynamic priority rotation with an additional button spamm at the side to just a rotation (and lets face it, figuring out the right rotation is a bit of work, but when you got it you got it) is quite big for me. In fact I've found myself randomly tapping my foot or simply was frustrated whenever I had a little gap in the rotation (for example when I lacked the runic power for another frost strike).
If I hadn't macro'd in rune strike to most of my abilities I think I would have made two simple castsequence macro's to sustain the rotation variants I've been using.
So far I've tanked some heroics and part of naxxramas 10 man and 25 man. My gear is not the best but I am amazed of the things I can pull of at the moment. My aoe threat is severely lacking at the moment but my single target threat appears to be way higher than it was on my warrior at that gear level. According to my sustained tps mod I managed to sustain 4800 tps at patchwerk even though my burst threat sucks in comparison, the two paladins I tanked with litterally pulled every piece of trash of me within the second of me hitting my first ability.
There is so much potential. I don't need to take damage to keep up my threat output. While I lack burst I can steadily build my things up. And that's going to get lots better since I'm not even near the melee hitcap and the first expertise hurdle…
Potential is good. But does the dark side really have cookies?
Well there's definitely a different sort of attraction going on. Interestingly I've started enjoying playing my warrior more after experiencing tanking with a frost Deathknight. For me the experience is litterally cool and calm. It feels controlled, constrained even, where my warrior makes me psych up to unleash hell. In essence things come down on the difference between Death's grip and Charge. One being the you come to me and fight me on my therms, again; controlled. The warrior makes me connect to something more primal, it's more in your face so to speak. Some unbalanced core mechanics aside - I think blizzard got things quite right. Both tanks feel distinctively different, in a way that's very true to their concept.
One hell of an experience and I know I picked the right class/role for a main for sure.
Aethelas
Ps. I love the look of the Deathknight T7 shoulders, very characteristic!
When I decided to level my deathknight it was out of curiousity for the new mechanics and in part to see what the hell made them the completely powerful tanks they appear to be. Well having levelled one as frost and unholy I've seen a couple of instances during my levelling time where I got to fool around with the half arsed frost specc I figured out myself.
Having tanked a lot on my warrior, and playing my hunter before that, spamming a one sided ability next to keeping up another rotation has become an inate ability. That same inate ability makes me completely nervous when there's nothing to spam. No really. I find myself in this nice and serene environment where I can wonder what button to press next during the 1.5 second global cooldown.
The change of going from a dynamic priority rotation with an additional button spamm at the side to just a rotation (and lets face it, figuring out the right rotation is a bit of work, but when you got it you got it) is quite big for me. In fact I've found myself randomly tapping my foot or simply was frustrated whenever I had a little gap in the rotation (for example when I lacked the runic power for another frost strike).
If I hadn't macro'd in rune strike to most of my abilities I think I would have made two simple castsequence macro's to sustain the rotation variants I've been using.
So far I've tanked some heroics and part of naxxramas 10 man and 25 man. My gear is not the best but I am amazed of the things I can pull of at the moment. My aoe threat is severely lacking at the moment but my single target threat appears to be way higher than it was on my warrior at that gear level. According to my sustained tps mod I managed to sustain 4800 tps at patchwerk even though my burst threat sucks in comparison, the two paladins I tanked with litterally pulled every piece of trash of me within the second of me hitting my first ability.
There is so much potential. I don't need to take damage to keep up my threat output. While I lack burst I can steadily build my things up. And that's going to get lots better since I'm not even near the melee hitcap and the first expertise hurdle…
Potential is good. But does the dark side really have cookies?
Well there's definitely a different sort of attraction going on. Interestingly I've started enjoying playing my warrior more after experiencing tanking with a frost Deathknight. For me the experience is litterally cool and calm. It feels controlled, constrained even, where my warrior makes me psych up to unleash hell. In essence things come down on the difference between Death's grip and Charge. One being the you come to me and fight me on my therms, again; controlled. The warrior makes me connect to something more primal, it's more in your face so to speak. Some unbalanced core mechanics aside - I think blizzard got things quite right. Both tanks feel distinctively different, in a way that's very true to their concept.
One hell of an experience and I know I picked the right class/role for a main for sure.
Aethelas
Ps. I love the look of the Deathknight T7 shoulders, very characteristic!
Total Comments 2
Comments
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Funny, I have my DK at 79 and I'm thinking the same thing. I refuse to level my DK because the simple fact - I will enjoy it. It will take time away from building up my warrior (whom 'is' me, and has most of my achievements and history, even if he's a reroll late-BC). The thing is, I love control and power, what you said about the above, chalks it up to one of the ways I like to fight battles (on my terms).Quote:In essence things come down on the difference between Death's grip and Charge. One being the you come to me and fight me on my therms, again; controlled. The warrior makes me connect to something more primal, it's more in your face so to speak. Some unbalanced core mechanics aside - I think blizzard got things quite right. Both tanks feel distinctively different, in a way that's very true to their concept.
My warrior is very much about taking their rules, and making them mine, i.e. charging into a pack, Fearing, then running back to safety. Or, powering through unfair odds and praying that when the dust clears I'm the last one standing through oppertunity and instant gut-reaction (as well as using every single GCD effectively).
Playing my DK makes me feel like a painter taking slow deliberate strokes and making sure each one is quality. It's relaxing, flowing, and important that each is done right the first time (or your rotation gets f'cked up.)
The warrior, is like you said (to paraphrase to a word) - twitchy. Always smashing the hell out of the next button that's going to be used when the GCD is up, and due to my time tanking- thinking there's a third or fourth button I should be pressing at the same time. It's high-stress.
Not to get into a class debate, but this is how I feel:
In the end, the two are about equal for fun, even if there is a power struggle between. The lack of stress playing a DK actually does cut into the fun factor. a boss kill is a boss kill, a wipe is a wipe, pvp is gives me small kicks, but knowing what I do about DKs, if they use their abilities properly (until they're balanced) they can really dominate most matchups.
However, the warrior - you might be doing what feels like twice as much or three times as much for the same results. However, the internal rewards feel so much better. When a boss dies you want to high five the room. When you die (boss or pvp) if you don't have the childish desire to throw the keyboard, you want to buckle down and come back bigger and badder to win.Posted 07-03-2009 at 09:09 PM by Conreeaght 
- *blink*
Nice to see people get the same out of this experience *nods*Posted 07-04-2009 at 01:12 AM by Aethelas
