How many DK Tanks are gunning for Shadowmourne?

[TomHuxley]

Uhhh if the gap size applies to a tanking dk, it applies to a dps dk. Nothing on that axe screams "not for a tank"

I agree. And if you have a ranged-heavy raid comp it may well be that the DK tank would benefit the most. I was only responding to some of the "I can equip it so I want it" mentality I was seeing.

In the specific case of Horaxe above it makes sense; there are only two players that qualify and the fury warrior passed to him, so a major congrats to Horaxe.

That said, I've yet to see anyone try to make an argument that this will be BiS for DK tanks, let alone a major upgrade over other available weapons. The fact that on its own it provides nice stats is not compelling. Granted, there haven't been any hard mode 2H weapons reported yet from 25 man PTR testing, so it's not really a discussion we can have yet, but it seems to me that if you are in competition against melee DPS (including other DKs) that it needs to be shown that the weapon is actually a similar upgrade for tanks, not just that it can be used by them.

YMMV.

Edit: I recall a similar discussion in BC over the legendary weapons that dropped from Illidan...some fury warriors got them, and several more seemed to feel that they deserved the same shot at them that a rogue did...but they were larger upgrades for rogues, so most guilds gave their rogues first shot (all other things being equal with player standing).

[Krenian]

That said, I've yet to see anyone try to make an argument that this will be BiS for DK tanks, let alone a major upgrade over other available weapons.

Alright then. I will.

By far, this weapon will be BiS for tanking DKs. Here's why.

Threat wise:

- No other weapon has a top end like that, so all your physical attacks will be increased by an amount that no other weapon in the game so far has. That alone warrants it BiS for threat.

- The 'proc' component if it is led to believe that it is what it is right now, will add more AoE threat and again, no other weapons in the two handed directory has that proc. Again, BiS.

- The 'proc' also boosts up your damage by giving you the single stat that gives you the most damage to your skill: Strength. No other weapon will give you 360 Strength at the end of the proc. That's more than the Darkmoon Card: Greatness was giving you.

Avoidance wise:

- You can effectively increase the weapon's health pool by nearly 100 points by putting three sockets in the weapon purely Stamina. As we well know, most (Read: not all) weapon sockets are not the most amazing therefore you maximize your damage potential by adding whatever you want. In the case for this weapon being a tank, you can effectively maximise your Effective Health, making it (and I'm taking a shot at the dark because I haven't see the Season whatever they're at pvp weaons) one of the prime BiS weapons for effective health.

- The sheer amount of strength you can put in gives you a sizable avoidance potential. Placing Strength in the three slots instead will net you nearly 300 Strength, which is well over 12% extra Parry. That's WITHOUT calculating the proc which will add another 4% more Parry. A weapon that can potentially net you 16% parry without diminishing returns affecting it is not one to scoff at and makes it quite the avoidance weapon to boot.

To end this: Yes the stats on the weapon that they increase are not in any means a tanking stat. There's no dodge, no parry, no defense, not even expertise. But to say that the weapon itself would not be BiS for DK tanks is having your head stuck in the sand without really wanting to see the truth.

Looking at the ICC weapons and what was found so far (on a rather bad datamining site, mind you), there is one weapon that has a 'tanking' proc to it which steals life that could be considered the 'prime' weapon. But it has two slots, and much less than the Legendary does.

I'm still going to maintain that the axe is BiS for DK tanks.

But like some people have mentioned, it will come down to who can use it to the maximum potential in a situation where it may arise to min/max. Some guilds will figure out their own way to give the Legendary. My point in this whole thread is to try to make people realize that DKs are unique in this position because they have two handed weapons to use and as such, EVERYTHING is fair in the game to go after. The reason? Because Blizzard wants you to use the damaging Two Handed weapons.

Simple as that.

[Baervar]

Well it comes down to aggro generation and survival in the end.

1. Is your aggro not enough and are you forcing your dps to take it slow - i.e. capping dps because of it? This will most definitely improve that dept. But i really doubt this will be the case unless you're not playing your rotation properly (then again i don't know that much about dk tanking but i've never seen threat to be the issue when ours was doing it).

However if you are capping the raid DPS by a random ammount X and that ammount's larger than the DPS increase that this weapon would bring to your best contender, than yes, it would be the best decision for a guild for the DK tank to get it. Though again i doubt dk's have that much issue with threat - even on fights like hodir and vezax where it becomes more important than normally.

2. Survivability: I haven't seen all the 2h drops on ICC25. I have seen an axe that has a chance on hit to steal ~2.5 HP from the target somewhere (don't know whether it was data mined or not) so that seemed like a good decision for a DK in terms of both survivability and threat, and that's just one example. Sure a lot of stamina and 3 sockets sound awesome, but by the time you complete it there may be other weapons with just as much socketing/stam bonus potential out there and less DPS, and as long as you're not lacking in aggro you will be hurting your raid by taking this over a DPS class.

Anyway i wouldn't give this to a tank firsthand if i lead a guild, no matter how much he'd plead. Just doesn't make sense to me.

[Maelstrom]

If the stats are what they are looking like they will be, the weapon (with my preferred style of gemming) will give my DK Tank:

280 Str = 617 AP and ~ 0.92% parry
30 Agi = 60 armor and 0.5% dodge
298 Stam = 2977 health

Every proc of the weapon will boost my AP by 107 and my parry by ~0.16%, so at 9 stacks (i.e. before it detonates) it will grant an additional 1.43% chance to parry. When it detonates it will do the same damage in my hands that it will in the hands of a dpser. As a Blood DK I run a high count of swings for potential procs.

All that on top of the tremendous threat/damage value I get out of the huge crit and ArP values.

If you think 2% avoidance is trivial, you're missing something in terms of how survival works.

So, like I said above. If your sole measure of value is total raid dps, yes it is better in the hands of a dpser. If you value your tanks threat and survival, it is anything but a waste in a DK tank's hands.

Just quickly going over the points:

• That parry value will be enormously diminished by your own diminshing returns from forceful deflection, also you will not need a legendary weapon to keep threat from your DPS, so any extra threat is marginal in utility at best (Other than the psychological benefits for your DPS who probably don't look at the threat meter anyway).
  
• Quick napkin math suggests you will get a better avoidance gain from a hunter/druid agility polearm due to the much lower DR on dodge from the agility compared to parry. Not to mention the increase in armour. Although I used the paladin agi:dodge conversion as I was in an instance so couldn't relog to my alt.
  
• The shadow damage proc from Shadowmourne is currently affected by things like Crusade and DK blood presence, so DPS have a larger effect on that as well. Although I'm not sure if this is intended or not, will have to see.

Considering the "meh" parts of the weapon in terms of avoidance and low agility-armour, compared to the unanimous "holy ****" upgrade DPS recieve, I still remain unconvinced.

[Wars]

I do not believe the quantifiable portion of reasoning here is going to really justify anyone actually getting the axe. Whether they be dps or not. While the conjecture of why or why not is great, if someone is going to get the axe, it will not be because they prove they need it more or less than the next person. If that is the case, then there is just some very low socialization going on in that guild.

What I mean is, this weapon will go to the dk tank if that person has been an invaluable asset to the guild. If the fury warrior has put the team over the hump on multiple occasions then he/she will get it. The ret pally? They'll get it.

A lot of guilds like mine use EPGP, the shards will simply more than likely go to the person with the highest overall EP, aka best attendance and whom does want it. There is nothing to say that by the time cataclysm(aka 4.0) rolls around, we won't have two of these in a guild who starts raiding ICC the week it comes out.

Raiding ICC for the next 8 months(at least) with it being "clearable" for about 5 of those months on normal mode, should be enough time to generate multiple legendaries provided the questline is outlined correctly.

[Wars]

Moreover, on another idea, the weapon is ilvl 284 right now according to the info we have. The heroic 10man lich king(this is guess-timation at the moment) weapon is 7 ilvls higher than normal 10man stuff, that means that heroic 25man lich king weapons will be ilvl 284. Exactly the same ilvl, just less item budget slightly because of the legendary status.

With this exact same ilvl there will of course be a comprable weapon from lich king hard mode 25man. But I can guarantee that will be difficult as hell and 85% of us will never kill it. Myself included.

[Maelstrom]

Oh indeed I just don't want a sudden fallacy floating around and having people saying that DK tanks get just as much benefit from it. I would never denigrate a guild's choice of who got it, there are much larger social elements at play here.

[TomHuxley]

To end this: Yes the stats on the weapon that they increase are not in any means a tanking stat. There's no dodge, no parry, no defense, not even expertise. But to say that the weapon itself would not be BiS for DK tanks is having your head stuck in the sand without really wanting to see the truth.

No, no, it just means we don't have the other weapons to compare it to yet. Maybe it will end up being that way, IDK. It's not like anyone is suggesting it will be a piss poor tanking weapon, it's just not clear to me that it will actually be BiS for tanks, while it almost certainly will for DPS (since that's obviously who it's being itemized for).

If it is, then it is. We'll have to wait to see the whole loot list. And of course if your guild gives it to you for other reasons, then more power to you!

[Synapse]

No, no, it just means we don't have the other weapons to compare it to yet. Maybe it will end up being that way, IDK. It's not like anyone is suggesting it will be a piss poor tanking weapon, it's just not clear to me that it will actually be BiS for tanks, while it almost certainly will for DPS (since that's obviously who it's being itemized for).

If it is, then it is. We'll have to wait to see the whole loot list. And of course if your guild gives it to you for other reasons, then more power to you!

DKs are itemized towards using dps 2handers to tank. Thus, by design, a the best dps 2hander will be the best dk 2h tank weapon. This one even has the added bonus of three slots for that much extra stam.

I remain unvoncinced

[Destruyen]

Thus, by design, a the best dps 2hander will be the best dk 2h tank weapon.

the "best dps 2hander" is sometimes not the best dk tanking weapon. i don't know much about dk stats and stat values, but i thought in 3.0 the 2hand mace from naxx25 trash was bis for dk tanks. the best dps weapon however was betrayer at the time.

either way, we haven't seen the full loot list yet, and there might be a very nice 2hander off a hardmode somewhere that will beat shadowmourne.

and threat is really a non-issue in most all fights except very strict dps races such as hodir hardmode, so it comes down to stam/avoidance.

[Synapse]

That's a risky assumption. This is the last tier, and they've already said they like the last tier because they can tune the gear better than in the previous tiers, this is also a copmetitor for frostmourne, so it has to be powerful...

[wazdaa]

@krenian
say it turns out to be BiS, does that mean dk tank get's as much use out of it as a melee dps?

let me just give a fictional and admited foolish example, but it brings over the message very well. say in this content there was a legendary trinket

equip:3.000crit rating
equip: chance on melee hit to give 500k damage

i've no doubt it would be BiS for all casters hell even healers, but would you give it to them or to a melee dps?

or if you want it more real thori'dal was BiS for some melee dps aswell, but i hope you'll agree with me that giving it to a hunter gives the guild more bang for it's bucket then giving it to a rogue.

that's all i'm trying to say, i've no doubt this will be a great weapon if not the best weapon for dk tank. but it doesn't mean it's best for the raid to give it to the dk tank when looking at it with a min/max point of view.

as for the threat argument, it's kinda moot bc for it to be one, threat would have to be an issue first.

[Krenian]

@krenian
say it turns out to be BiS, does that mean dk tank get's as much use out of it as a melee dps?

let me just give a fictional and admited foolish example, but it brings over the message very well. say in this content there was a legendary trinket

equip:3.000crit rating
equip: chance on melee hit to give 500k damage

i've no doubt it would be BiS for all casters hell even healers, but would you give it to them or to a melee dps?

or if you want it more real thori'dal was BiS for some melee dps aswell, but i hope you'll agree with me that giving it to a hunter gives the guild more bang for it's bucket then giving it to a rogue.

that's all i'm trying to say, i've no doubt this will be a great weapon if not the best weapon for dk tank. but it doesn't mean it's best for the raid to give it to the dk tank when looking at it with a min/max point of view.

as for the threat argument, it's kinda moot bc for it to be one, threat would have to be an issue first.

You're mixing tomatoes with potatoes by using Thori'dal.

Common sense dictates that it's a bow, hunters WILL use it more often. Their main weapon is their ranged weapon slot.

This is a completely different situation where both will be using the weapon as a main weapon.

[flood]

as it lookes now i decided to give it to our most dedicated DK dps first.. as some of u says u can still do the quest line for the epic one and then just have it in my backpack waiting for him to finish with his legendary first.. even thou i am one of the starters of the guild going back 3 years and he joined us in naxx25, its going to be BiS for DK tanks but i think it will be a little better uppgrade for a dps DK.. and i will still get it.... but not first, i think that u have to look on that aspect also even if im GM/officer and relly want that axe.. cant be to greedy.. people dont tend to like that as we speak the one getting the axe has no clue he will get it.. i dont think he know he is even close of getting it so i hope he will be happy

[wazdaa]

You're mixing tomatoes with potatoes by using Thori'dal.

Common sense dictates that it's a bow, hunters WILL use it more often. Their main weapon is their ranged weapon slot.

This is a completely different situation where both will be using the weapon as a main weapon.

how is that mixing tomatoes with potatoes? both get benifit from it, for both it's BiS, you just sense right away it's wrong because here it's very clear the raid would gain more giving it to the hunter rather then the rogue.

[Synapse]

While it isn't that clear who would help the raid more by using the axe. That's why it's mixing different veggies.

[sicness]

While a dps will definitely see a much larger dps increase by using Shadowmourne over <nextbest> compared to a dk tank, the same upgrade for the dk tank will give a higher threat ceiling, benefitting the whole raid's dps cap.

Granted, threat isn't as big a deal as it was before,but it's still there, and the dk tank is ALSO doing some extra dps. There's really nothing on Shadowmourne that justifies dk tanks deserve it less than dpsers.

While it's a valid point that it would increase the DK tanks threat, I have to argue that while threat is a non-issue for the time being then the weapon would be better off for the raid in a dps players hands as they would optimally get more out of it and benefit the raid more due to their added dps. Again, that's while threat is a non-issue.

[Lore]

I don't think threat concerns can really factor in too heavily. Threat is good, certainly, but it's always the tank's #1 responsibility to stay alive.

That said, it has a lot of stamina and 3 sockets, and a pretty healthy amount of parry rating from the strength. It definitely looks like it could be best in slot from a pure survivability standpoint.

Also, keep in mind that this is the last tier before Cataclysm. Depending on how difficult it is to actually craft one of these, it's probably not going to have a big effect on progression. Give it to whoever deserves a legendary, who cares how big of an upgrade it is.

[mero12513]

While I won't directly link the data-mined weapon, there is an axe from 10-man hardmodes which gives 8 less stamina, 2 blue and 1 red sockets, and has a boatload of expertise.

I don't main a DK, so I can't say for certain which is better, but the above Axe might seriously content with Shadowmourne for BiS (from my limited knowledge)

[Airowird]

Blizzard designs the encounters without any Legendary weapons in mind (or all healers would be required to wield Val'nyr to kill Anub).
This means that a DK tank would effectively be able to tank everything with Shadow's Edge or a similar level epic 2H while the DPS are wielding the same quality items as well. With that in mind ...

If you're comfortably above your DPS in threat you will not cap them if they get this weapon and your raid will gain more overall DPS from giving it to a DPSer.
If a DPSer with that weapon would beat you in threat and nobody else comes close enough, Vigilance & HoSanc will solve the problem.
If more DPSers are having issues with a threat cap, you need to improve your threat rotation first. 'Needing' a Legendary for threat only means that your DPS are better players than you and that you should step up your game first.

And before anyone brings it up; No the AoE threat is not big enough to use as an argument.

But in the end it will ofcourse go to the member that deserves it most. Just like all Legendaries have before.