Frost Tanking - Howling Blast/Obliterate

[mandible]

couldn't find anyone talking about this.
Currently I find that Howling Blast even on only one target out damages Obliterate for the same rune cost.

Now that Howling Blast is losing it's cooldown is there any good reason to be using Obliterates? and if so then I guess I should reclaim my points from Annihilation though 3% crit isn't a horrible benefit I guess.

Anyone mind taking a poke at my spec?

The World of Warcraft Armory

See any glaring holes?
Also I know my trinkets are brutal, have been farming the crap out of HoL for weeks trying to get that trinket to give me some room on the defence cap.

[Crunchbite]

Keep in mind that Obliterate is physical while HB is magic. If you're hitting a boss mob, and you don't have the benefit of sunder/expose armor, I would imagine HB would always outperform (unless it's frost resistant, of course). When you're hitting clothies in Wintergrasp, though, OB is your bestest friend.

[Prunetracy]

Are you using the Glyph of Obliterate? The glyph significantly increases Obliterate's damage, and makes it scale even better with gear (namely weapon upgrades).

Generally, Obliterate easily outstrips Howling Blast on single targets as long as your weapon isn't green or you're duel-wielding.

[mandible]

That would be my problem.

Until 3.0.8 I'm using a green +def weapon. Will be getting the new epic bop one when the patch comes out.

Thanks.

[Varucard]

Is the new epic def 2hander bop or boe?

[mandible]

There's two, one is +parry the other is +defence. From what I have seen it's BOP and needs 440 blacksmithing, but I could be wrong as there hasn't been a lot of discussion about it.

[Urrick]

I tend to use HB if AE tanking, and oblit on single mobs. With the DnD glyph change I'll switch that one to the oblit glyph, but I don't think I'll change my strat.

Really hoping they are BoE when those weapons go live. Otherwise I'll use the mats to get a Destroyer made.

[mandible]

In my current gear HB does more dmg to single targets than obliterate.

Here's one of the new weapons

http://static.mmo-champion.com/mmoc/...eldefender.jpg

[Raggnarok]

Both 2h crafted tank weps are not going into the game, it is a good thing really, allows you to grab a weapon that will generate threat, since getting def capped will be sooo much more easier with the sigil and runeforge.

[mandible]

No it wont but, yeah just read that.

[Ray]

1. Dont gem for stam if your using a green weapon due to it having def. Get a DPS 2h and gem for def.

2. OB is going to hit like a pansy with that weapon. Get a better weapon, get the glyph, and OB will rock the socks off HB for single target.

3. your spec is a bit off. drop FA like its a bad habit really fast. Its a fail talent. you didnt fill out Rime, which im not sure why. Also, drop points out of accimilation unless your speced for a certain fight, its totally useless. Pick up deathchill and macro it to HB and OB for big openers. Also, I would pick up either Morbidity or Merciless Killer.

[ttocs]

I had a discussion about the 2H tanking weapons last night.

It's a good thing that they're out. They were lackluster in threat (especially if you already had something like a Titansteel Destroyer or better), and some DK tanks were going to keep those weapons no matter what. Technically, even though they're the only 2H tanking weapons in the game, they become "best in slot" for avoidance, because they're pretty much the only ones for that slot. Rather, they want you to use your weapon for threat, and gear elsewhere for avoidance.

With the Sigil, the Runeforge and a decent amount of gear, you should have no reason to need a weapon with any +def on it.

[mandible]

Morbidity? Why would a frost knight ever use death coil?
Threat isn't an issue, almost all my gems are +defence and with that being the case I still need the green weapon and the huge +def blue belt. ( may change my bracers gem as I think I put that in there because that gem was in my bank )

Since Threat is a non issue I have spec'd as much into mitigation as possible where FA and Acclimation are quite good talents. You can read some of Satorii's articles in here going over it, but basically almost every encounter has some sort of magic dmg component and this makes healing me quite a bit more trivial when I run around with 230+ resistance on any given fight.

I will go craft the destroyer now that I wont be able to craft a guardian, but like I said I have to still wear some crappy pieces to make that defence cap. ( most notably my belt and weapon )

The big upgrade I need to get to make my life easier would be the trinket out of HoL, but that little thing is really avoiding me. Once I get that the cap will be more manageable.

Thanks for your post though, made me go back and micro more of my gear.

Oh scott I forgot about the Sigil

[Satorri]

Some frost knights would rather rely on DnD than trust to HB for aoe threat, that's why Morbidity. They want to be able to spam it. Personally I think it's a bit of a waste.

As for the HB vs OB balance, here's the full list of factors (off the top of my head) for a single target:

Oblit = melee damage (reduced by armor), weapon based (possible for weapons to outscale AP, but I'm not sure it's a one way trip), parriable/dodgeable + melee miss chance (with my values I know that means a total of about 7% total miss chance at worst on a boss), some damage increased by diseases but if you glyph it that is a smaller dependency and the damage will increase overall.

Howling Blast = frost damage (no armor to reduce damage), AP based (doesn't scale quite as rapidly as weapon damage, though there's more in the big picture), spell hit chance but no parries/dodges (again, with my stats this is about 9% miss chance before Misery/Imp FF which would drop it below), requires Frost Fever to do full damage.

Depending on your gear one may be better than the other. Dual wielding obviously moves HB way in the lead, as does a poor 2-hander. If you're hitting more than one thing, HB always wins, though that wasn't what we were discussing.

Oblit can be damage buffed by sunder/expose armor and gets crit buffed by kitties and fury warriors. HB gets damage buffed by Ebon Plague/Earth and Moon/Curse of Elements, gets hit buffs by Spriests and Moonkin, and gets crit buffs from Elementals, etc. There seems to be a lot more buffing available to spell attacks, so don't underestimate the group effect either.

Smartest thing is to gauge damage with your gear and raid comp and then decide accordingly.

[Ray]

Morbidity? Why would a frost knight ever use death coil?
Threat isn't an issue, almost all my gems are +defence and with that being the case I still need the green weapon and the huge +def blue belt. ( may change my bracers gem as I think I put that in there because that gem was in my bank )

Since Threat is a non issue I have spec'd as much into mitigation as possible where FA and Acclimation are quite good talents. You can read some of Satorii's articles in here going over it, but basically almost every encounter has some sort of magic dmg component and this makes healing me quite a bit more trivial when I run around with 230+ resistance on any given fight.

I will go craft the destroyer now that I wont be able to craft a guardian, but like I said I have to still wear some crappy pieces to make that defence cap. ( most notably my belt and weapon )

The big upgrade I need to get to make my life easier would be the trinket out of HoL, but that little thing is really avoiding me. Once I get that the cap will be more manageable.

Thanks for your post though, made me go back and micro more of my gear.

Oh scott I forgot about the Sigil

I did armory you, and you had more stam gems than def gems. So, no, your not gemmed for def. FA is fail, hands down. There is no reason to ever take it above more threat talents. If your not having threat issues in your gear, then your DPSer are not very good. Accimilation is so situational and since we dont use frost resist on Sapp anymore, then there is no reason to take it.

I would also not worry about the HoL trinket. If you cant get to def cap without it, then youll never be able to upgrade it.

Lastly, geming for parry is a huge nono. If you want to gem for avoidence, use def or dodge.

[Satorri]

I did armory you, and you had more stam gems than def gems. So, no, your not gemmed for def. FA is fail, hands down. There is no reason to ever take it above more threat talents. If your not having threat issues in your gear, then your DPSer are not very good. Accimilation is so situational and since we dont use frost resist on Sapp anymore, then there is no reason to take it.

I would also not worry about the HoL trinket. If you cant get to def cap without it, then youll never be able to upgrade it.

Lastly, geming for parry is a huge nono. If you want to gem for avoidence, use def or dodge.

"If your not having threat issues in your gear, then your DPSer are not very good."

This is some faulty logic. I don't have trouble with threat and my dps'ers burn scary hard, much harder than the instances demand, which further means that the dps can show restraint rather than going all out and testing the tanks' lead.

You express a lot of your personal leanings as altruistic guidance. Please stop that, it's not constructive. If you have an opinion offer it as such, offer your rationale, don't assume you've got the best ideas.

As for gemming, there are plenty of ideals that are harder to meet, you get more avoidance point for point out of dodge rating than parry rating, more often than not, but that doesn't mean it's a no no, it's just not the best. Sometimes it's all that's available.

[mandible]

Thanks for the comments, I didn't realize the defensive rune was 25 Skill, not rating. That will be plenty to let me change my gear around.

[Feanorr]

I saw someone posting some math about OB vs HB on mmochampions; here it is: Post patch frost tank builds (3rd post).

He didnt take sunder armor into acount but then you have to take curse of elements (or equivalent) into the equation too.

What it show is that if you have every OB talents, the OB glyph, the OB sigils and a very good weapon, then OB is better yes.

However, it doesnt take the new KM into acount.


As for Annihilation, if you plan to use HB over OB, the critic of annihilation wont affect neither HB or IT, cause it affect only melee (if the tooltip is right anyway).

My weapon is this one Wraith Spear - Item - World of Warcraft and on the PTR, my HB does more damage than OB. It's not one of the top weapon but still an epic. And it allow me to free a glyph, the sigil and 6 talents points, annihilation and subversion (well even more since I will use a shorter rotation with HB and so I dont need epidemic either).




EDIT: ok I am not really good at theorycraft math's but let's try and if someone can check it, it would be great.

OB damage:

Using a Inevitable defeat with 3000 AP.

Calculate the damage for a 2 disease obliterate:
Oblit = (3000/14) * 3.3 + Avg weapon damage + 292 + 146 +146
Oblit = 1691 base

Add in the glyph (20%), Tundra stalker (10%), and 2h spec(4%) and you should see a pre-armor oblit hit for 2322.

A sundered boss should have around 25% damage reduction

For a 2 disease Oblit
Hit = 1741 damage
Crit = 4267 damage (245% crit damage w/ talents)



HB damage:

Average damage of HB rank 5: 270
HB AP coefficients (taken from EJ DPS compendium): 0,1

so base damage = 3000 x 0.1 + 270 = 570

Multiplier: IT on the target (+100%), Glacier rot (+10%), Black ice (+30%), tundra stalker (+10%), 2H spec (+4%)

So: 570 x 2 x 1.1 x 1.3 x 1.1 x 1.04 = 1864

I am not sure 2H spec apply to HB so if it doesnt the damage is a bit less: 1793

A boss with curse of the elements (to compare with one with sunder) will take +10% spell damage so:

Hit = 2051 .................................................. .......... 1972 without 2H spec
Crit = 5026 (245% crit damage w/ talents) ................. 4832 " " "


Now, taking crit chance into acount is a bit more difficult; not for OB that have the base crit +27% from talents. But for HB the base crit is the spell crit (I think ), and there is no straight boost from talents, but there is KM that make it crit and have a 5ppm



If someone can check if it's good, it will be great; and if someone know how to take the crit chance (including KM for HB) into acount it will be even better ^^

[Lightmgl]

Killing Machine is now being changed to be a PPM and not a proc off critical hits. This means it can proc off all your specials and autoattacks even if they do not crit. This would be a drastic boost for non dual wield/tanking DKs for using HB in a rotation.

[Satorri]

Yeah, I'm liking the new KM, but there will need to be plenty of data collection to figure out its value now. With "Auto-attack hits have a 50% chance to proc" it is easy napkin math, but now we'll need to find out what the PPM cap is, and what rate you can get it proc'ing at with a 2-hander.

Usually in the past this sort of buff will still proc more with dual wielding, but there will be a ceiling you will hit where you won't be able to pass it (avoiding people using the fast/fast high crit proc method is my guess for why they're making this change). You won't get the same PPM (proc per minute for those not familiar with the term) with a 2-hander, but at least now we know it'll proc while you're tanking even with a 2-hander.

Personally, for my frost tanking, the removal of the CD on HB means I won't touch Oblit again, and by the same means I will probably not take Annihilation in my tanking builds.