Frost/DW tank spec

[Sinzii]

WorldofWarcraft.com -> Info -> Classes -> Death Knight -> Talent Calculator

This is my frost spec ive been using to tank for a while now yes its DW but im looking for info on wat i should get or wat i should drop from the tree.
i know some may say this isnt the best for tps but i mainly OT which i enjoy so im not as concerned with TPS but my tps is quite fine in nax and other 10 mans.Im mainly looking for how i could maximize survivability and/or get rid of stuff thats useless.

[Satorri]

Okie dokie, if you're looking to prune/adjust the tree, here's what I'm thinking:

1.) Chill of the Grave is too good to leave off, in my figuring, which normally I'd say is for more frost strikes, but also I'd point out it's nice to be able to bump up your RP quickly for a Mind Freeze or IBF.

2.) Hungering Cold and Icy Reach are both nice, however the first is highly situational, and the latter is really more of a convenience (wouldn't expect your to be doing wide area HB's anyway, since it's wasted on stuff without Frost Fever which means you need to collect them anyway). Either or both of those could be traded off. Your build has plenty of good mitigation and I'd expect you're on the sunny side of threat potential for a DK tank, many people trade off a LOT more dps talents for the sake of splitting trees for survival.

3.) I love Killing Machine and I miss it terribly when I'm tanking as Frost, but the cold hard truth is, even if you have dps weapons with strong amounts of Crit on them, you're not going to be much past 10% crit, and that's only if you're lucky. As such, even with dual wielding Killing Machine isn't going to give you the same value you'd like it to. That's 5 pts that while it may hurt your sensibility to move will probably give you more elsewhere.

4.) I love Lichborne in concept, 25% avoidance is pretty huge, but the 3 min CD means I tend to shy away from it in favor of digging deeper into my secondary tree (where I can actually benefit from that one more point of course).

5.) I understand why you took Morbidity. I have found the same desire when tanking as frost to have some steady aoe threat to count up while you setup your big HB threat spikes. At the same time, I think you can probably get more out of leaving DnD out of all but the most situational fights in favor of saving those runes for more frost-style threat. If you want to get your burst off sooner, I'd suggest only setting Frost Fever and quickly Pesting to get it around, immediately followed by your HB. If you juice it with Deathchill you won't miss the DnD baseline threat at all.

So, if we leave Lichborne, but prune out HC, Icy Reach, Killing Machine, and Morbidity, and add-in Chill of the Grave, you have 9 points freed up for other things. Personally I'd put them into Bladed Armor and Rune Tap (the healing is quite nice for life extension and having a more-than-just-emergency health spike at your control). And I'd put the remaining 3 points into Scent of Blood (again, more RP is good, and it'll go off pretty frequently), Annihilation (3% crit on Frost Strike and Death Strike is nice), or Ravenous Dead (3% strength is threat and avoidance, and it scales very well with endgame tank gear). My personal taste would probably be Ravenous Dead > Scent of Blood > Annihilation, but that's really a matter of personal choice.

Alternately if you want more survival, I'd highly recommend putting those last points into Frost Aura and/or Acclimation. Spell damage is not at all a situational affair in Northrend. It's a very rare fight that has no spell damage being passed around. Remember, these resistances apply to anything that's not strictly physical damage, not just "spells."

[Njordus]

WorldofWarcraft.com -> Info -> Classes -> Death Knight -> Talent Calculator

Im mainly looking for how i could maximize survivability and/or get rid of stuff thats useless.

Not Dual Wielding would help with survivability. And getting rid of useless DW talents would help not to waste talent points.

[Sinzii]

Not Dual Wielding would help with survivability. And getting rid of useless DW talents would help not to waste talent points.

well the reason i duelwield is cause of the defense cap ill switch to a 2 hander once i am able to reach cap without one handers or i find a nice solid 2 hander for tanking

[Jandon]

It's not difficult to reach defense cap when you use BS crafted gear, enchants and some early earned rep rewards. For level 80 instances you need 530, heroics 535 and for raiding 540. Being a few points shy of crit-cap'd isn't going to kill you...DW'ing will.

Seriously, get out of DW tanking.

[Sinzii]

It's not difficult to reach defense cap when you use BS crafted gear, enchants and some early earned rep rewards. For level 80 instances you need 530, heroics 535 and for raiding 540. Being a few points shy of crit-cap'd isn't going to kill you...DW'ing will.

Seriously, get out of DW tanking.

im at 535 without dw but i do tank nax and ive tried with a 2 hander its just awful i get crited way more then i get parry example being when i was tanking patch with a 2 hander i died almost immediatly next week i did duel wield and we downed him first try without me even going below half same gear cept dw and same raid set up

[Sinzii]

Okie dokie, if you're looking to prune/adjust the tree, here's what I'm thinking:

1.) Chill of the Grave is too good to leave off, in my figuring, which normally I'd say is for more frost strikes, but also I'd point out it's nice to be able to bump up your RP quickly for a Mind Freeze or IBF.

2.) Hungering Cold and Icy Reach are both nice, however the first is highly situational, and the latter is really more of a convenience (wouldn't expect your to be doing wide area HB's anyway, since it's wasted on stuff without Frost Fever which means you need to collect them anyway). Either or both of those could be traded off. Your build has plenty of good mitigation and I'd expect you're on the sunny side of threat potential for a DK tank, many people trade off a LOT more dps talents for the sake of splitting trees for survival.

3.) I love Killing Machine and I miss it terribly when I'm tanking as Frost, but the cold hard truth is, even if you have dps weapons with strong amounts of Crit on them, you're not going to be much past 10% crit, and that's only if you're lucky. As such, even with dual wielding Killing Machine isn't going to give you the same value you'd like it to. That's 5 pts that while it may hurt your sensibility to move will probably give you more elsewhere.

4.) I love Lichborne in concept, 25% avoidance is pretty huge, but the 3 min CD means I tend to shy away from it in favor of digging deeper into my secondary tree (where I can actually benefit from that one more point of course).

5.) I understand why you took Morbidity. I have found the same desire when tanking as frost to have some steady aoe threat to count up while you setup your big HB threat spikes. At the same time, I think you can probably get more out of leaving DnD out of all but the most situational fights in favor of saving those runes for more frost-style threat. If you want to get your burst off sooner, I'd suggest only setting Frost Fever and quickly Pesting to get it around, immediately followed by your HB. If you juice it with Deathchill you won't miss the DnD baseline threat at all.

So, if we leave Lichborne, but prune out HC, Icy Reach, Killing Machine, and Morbidity, and add-in Chill of the Grave, you have 9 points freed up for other things. Personally I'd put them into Bladed Armor and Rune Tap (the healing is quite nice for life extension and having a more-than-just-emergency health spike at your control). And I'd put the remaining 3 points into Scent of Blood (again, more RP is good, and it'll go off pretty frequently), Annihilation (3% crit on Frost Strike and Death Strike is nice), or Ravenous Dead (3% strength is threat and avoidance, and it scales very well with endgame tank gear). My personal taste would probably be Ravenous Dead > Scent of Blood > Annihilation, but that's really a matter of personal choice.

Alternately if you want more survival, I'd highly recommend putting those last points into Frost Aura and/or Acclimation. Spell damage is not at all a situational affair in Northrend. It's a very rare fight that has no spell damage being passed around. Remember, these resistances apply to anything that's not strictly physical damage, not just "spells."

tyvm ill try this out and ty for staying on topic and not getting into the dw vs 2h thing i really appreciate that u litterly wrote like a whole paper on it its gonna help me out alot

[Satorri]

Dual wield tanking is not the end of the world, my gear is hardly introductory, but I'm nearly unparried when I tank Naxx in my current gear (it was about 0.4% last run). I don't DW normally though because I don't like the synergy with my build, but don't make it out to be the end of the world, it's no less dangerous than being within 0.5% of uncrittable.

There's a large availability of expertise on tanking gear, even if you aren't scraping every point you can find.

[Satorri]

And, no prob Sinzii =)

I'm a firm believer that there is no single best way for things to work these days, especially when it comes to playing a DK.

[Bullwerk]

im at 535 without dw but i do tank nax and ive tried with a 2 hander its just awful i get crited way more then i get parry example being when i was tanking patch with a 2 hander i died almost immediatly next week i did duel wield and we downed him first try without me even going below half same gear cept dw and same raid set up

I'm not a DK tank, just an old stalwart warrior that grasps some mechanics. I would say your week to week success has more to do with the RNG and healers understanding the fight and the types of incoming damage. DW will cause more parries by a good margin and if you are standing infront of the boss at all thats not just hurting you (if the OT) but making healing on the MT harder. I understand the drive to DW tank given the plethora of 1 handed tanking weapons and the stat boost provided but bosses like patch just hit too hard to risk even more more needless attack. If you have 540 defense in both sets of gear then the 2 hander is the way to go regardless of RNG and group anomolies, if you are only 5 or so points shy find a way to close the gap and move on. both DK's in my guild have already put together 2 hander tanking sets that exceed 540 with the available crafted gear and easily recievable instance and rep rewards. Hell with a 2 hander you are better off in the parry department than any other tank, thank your lucky stars for that one. Besides it just looks cool tanking with a big nasty 2-hander. Just my 2 cents worth.

[Sinzii]

I'm not a DK tank, just an old stalwart warrior that grasps some mechanics. I would say your week to week success has more to do with the RNG and healers understanding the fight and the types of incoming damage. DW will cause more parries by a good margin and if you are standing infront of the boss at all thats not just hurting you (if the OT) but making healing on the MT harder. I understand the drive to DW tank given the plethora of 1 handed tanking weapons and the stat boost provided but bosses like patch just hit too hard to risk even more more needless attack. If you have 540 defense in both sets of gear then the 2 hander is the way to go regardless of RNG and group anomolies, if you are only 5 or so points shy find a way to close the gap and move on. both DK's in my guild have already put together 2 hander tanking sets that exceed 540 with the available crafted gear and easily recievable instance and rep rewards. Hell with a 2 hander you are better off in the parry department than any other tank, thank your lucky stars for that one. Besides it just looks cool tanking with a big nasty 2-hander. Just my 2 cents worth.

yea i understand i was a tank warrior pre bc up until 70 i know the whole parry mechanic but what im really trying to say is that until i do get the defense cap without im staying duel wield since its working fine now.
and actually from the healers in the guild im not even hard to keep up

[Blueduck3285]

WorldofWarcraft.com -> Info -> Classes -> Death Knight -> Talent Calculator



This is the build I am leaning towards. I two DW for tanking but only DW for heroics. For endgame I will be 2H'ering. At this point I cant stack enough experties to make up for the DW parry, and in heroics, I dont get hit hard enough for it to matter. I also noticed that with DW I had to look at changing my rotation, I actually seemed to have lost a bit of threat gen in switching. Keep in mind that the idea was for DK's to tank with 2H but blizz always intended for it to be an OPTION. That being said, the best thing to do is test both builds out and both types of weapons and see which one fits your play style.

I may end up sticking with 2H'ers when I round my Def gear out. I dont need to stack as much hit or experties and can through some dps enchants on without sacing my defensive capabilities.

I have tanked as both unholy and frost, a unholy frost hybrid, and alil into blood. I love frost. The only shitty part is, water ele's. Keep in mind that all the frost damage in the world will get you nowhere on a water ele. A few instances have them so be prepared. Best thing any tank can do is learn his surroundings and what he is coming up against. My MT told me to never get rid of any Def gear, I now see why. Changing a piece or two can get me more hit if needed, more experties, more resistance. For those that are still leveling, never throw it away until you get something better to replace it, never know when you might need it.

[Satorri]

By the by, there are actually some scattered tank weapons in Northrend that make this far more feasible and nice on threat for a DK tank. Specifically there are a few one-handers with tank stats that have a slow swing speed!

This is perfect for 2 reasons, one is reducing the number of swings for parry potential (if you don' t have a lot of expertise), and boosts a lot of your special damage for your weapon damage based attacks.

[tenebraxis]

Hmmm. I've read all the articles about parry-gibbing and DK DW tanking that i could find and i have one statement and a few questions.

First, Patchwerk is one of the few raid bosses that has been confirmed not to have parry haste and therefore should maybe not be used as an example for or against DK DW tanking. i say this in regards to one of Sinzii's posts but is not a shot at Sinzii in anyway.

Secondly while there are some, admittedly intelligent, people running around on various forums posting the exact calculations on why DW increases parry gibbing to a point where damage becomes a dangerously spikey affair i was wondering if these people who had factored in all these numbers had factored in Rune Strike and its potential macros. I mean if Rune Strike procs it delivers a hit that cannot be parried/dodged/blocked right? and if a DK's parry is high enough (increased by the extra stats on his second weapon and the very nature of the DW mechanic) would that not proc more often? And if Rune Strike procs more often would this not in turn lower the parry-able strikes he makes and lower parry-gibbing?

I am actually asking because i am naturally a curious person and i can only grow as a player by asking questions. I am not throwing down any sort of gauntlet to the 'elites'

if anyone knows the altered calculations could you let me know?

As for the original post. even though you DW i would remove the points in killing machine or blood of the north and reallocate them in bladed armor in the blood tree. It gives a nice attack power boost in my opinion and higher Attack power = higher threat. personally i would ditch killing machine. I know its a very nice DW talent but personally i'd rather have the attack power boost. Maybe thats just me though. then again i haven't seen much use out of blood of the norht. most people seem to like death runes but i think it just screw up my perfectly balanced rotations more often that not.

edit= Now that i think on it Frost Strike cannot be blocked dodged or parried either. If that was thrown into a rotation with Rune strike going off at every possible oppurtunity i am sure that would also alter the parry gibbing calculations as well would it not?

[Blueduck3285]

With the numbers you are refering to, they dont have runstrike in there mostly because its not on the GCD but on Swing timer. This being the case, the numbers you are seeing are more or less refering to the spells that arent part of the swing timer, these being the mainstay of DK dps and threat.

My auto attacks arent what keep my threat and dps going.

[Wars]

Yes that would very well reduce the effective parry-gib chance on DW tanking.
The chance of being parry-gibbed in heroics is very low as even if something does hit you twice in a row + a special, after some 10man/heroic gear, you're not going to get killed by this.

With more hit gear I think that DW tanking would be quite acceptable, getting parry-gibbed is a very rare thing. While a 1% chance of happening is not huge, it does deter a whole lot of people from the playstyle.

[tenebraxis]

Thank you blueduck and edited. Im too tired. lol

Thank you Wars.

[Njordus]

Hmmm. I've read all the articles about parry-gibbing and DK DW tanking that i could find and i have one statement and a few questions.

First, Patchwerk is one of the few raid bosses that has been confirmed not to have parry haste and therefore should maybe not be used as an example for or against DK DW tanking. i say this in regards to one of Sinzii's posts but is not a shot at Sinzii in anyway.

Secondly while there are some, admittedly intelligent, people running around on various forums posting the exact calculations on why DW increases parry gibbing to a point where damage becomes a dangerously spikey affair i was wondering if these people who had factored in all these numbers had factored in Rune Strike and its potential macros. I mean if Rune Strike procs it delivers a hit that cannot be parried/dodged/blocked right? and if a DK's parry is high enough (increased by the extra stats on his second weapon and the very nature of the DW mechanic) would that not proc more often? And if Rune Strike procs more often would this not in turn lower the parry-able strikes he makes and lower parry-gibbing?

I am actually asking because i am naturally a curious person and i can only grow as a player by asking questions. I am not throwing down any sort of gauntlet to the 'elites'

if anyone knows the altered calculations could you let me know?

As for the original post. even though you DW i would remove the points in killing machine or blood of the north and reallocate them in bladed armor in the blood tree. It gives a nice attack power boost in my opinion and higher Attack power = higher threat. personally i would ditch killing machine. I know its a very nice DW talent but personally i'd rather have the attack power boost. Maybe thats just me though. then again i haven't seen much use out of blood of the norht. most people seem to like death runes but i think it just screw up my perfectly balanced rotations more often that not.

edit= Now that i think on it Frost Strike cannot be blocked dodged or parried either. If that was thrown into a rotation with Rune strike going off at every possible oppurtunity i am sure that would also alter the parry gibbing calculations as well would it not?

Off hand attacks. And your DPS, and therefore your threat, while DW will be lower.

This DW tanking crap is worse than MS warriors trying to DW DPS.

[Satorri]

Njordus, you're as short-sighted as you are stubborn.

Dual wielding works well with Frost, Tenebrax, since your usual moves are IT, HB, FS, and RS, none of which can be parried (or dodged or blocked for that matter). Your only parry opportunities come from PS (which you can avoid doing often by disease juggling with Pestilence), Blood Strike, and Oblit (which should be only occasionally in rotation). Combine that with a slow main-hand (even slow off-hand if you're tanking and not trying to pick up extra on-hit procs), and you may find you don't have too much vulnerability to parry hasting.

Now, Dual Wield tanking is really nothing to worry about outside of raids. With enough expertise to offer 5% parry avoidance I don't get parried in heroics or under. I'm not sure how far I'm over the worst case scenario, but I am certainly over it. In raids is a different matter. I clocked my Naxx run tonight and over the course of the whole run I had 1.2% parry on my melee attacks on the worst boss fight. I currently have 5% avoidance, like I said. I have been tanking with my 2-hander, but in my dual set, I have 6.25% parry avoidance, which means had I been using it I would've been unparried. In fact the only reason I favor my 2-hander right now is because it gives me more pure Str and Stam.

[Sinzii]

ty all for helping me and to the ones saying dw is bad(put that into lighter terms rather then ex"DW IS A DUMBASS IDEAD AND STUPID FOR TANKING") u obviously missed the point i can care less but i do like when ppl back up there openion with facts and examples tyvm i will be switching to a 2 hander when i meet the defense cap without 1 handers cause as of now my expertise is a bit too low