Some thoughts on Frost DK Cooldowns

[Chamenas]

When I first started tanking back at the beginning of WotLK I went Frost because Blood wasn't as viable (or people didn't understand it yet) and Unholy was only marginal. Frost sort of looked like THE spec, besides, Howling Blast made me giddy and the concept of Frost fit very well. Unholy didn't fit my appeal to wanting to play a Necromancer, so Frost was where the fun was at.

Since Frost was all I had really played, it was all I knew. After patch 3.2, however, I found that I could not keep up with some of the DPS doing ToC threatwise as two-handed frost. The changes to Frost Strike among other things certainly didn't help. So I looked into Blood which had now become more than a viable spec, most of the high-end tanks (who are the ones that actually have to worry about threat) were Blood.

I played it, it wasn't as fun as Frost, but I quickly adapted to managing the cooldowns and enjoyed having more control of staying alive. In 3.3 I felt that I could make the transition back to Frost as a dual-wielder and test it out. I loved it. So I made a full swing back into Frost and have lots of fun managing my threat with all the tools Frost has to offer. However, I found that survival was less in my hands than it had been in Blood. There were significantly less cooldowns to manage and I had to rely on passive damage reduction to keep me alive.

So this got me to thinking. I love creative concepts and coming up with ideas. I wondered how Frost might be able to get more management of their own survival without making them too powerful. Many classes are already jealous of DK cooldowns and wish we had less, though I sort of doubt many of them have played a DK (try tanking @gear content without cooldowns *shudder*)

Here's what I came up with:

Blood has a cooldown in Rune Tap for those who take it, it's a very accessible cooldown since it's only on a 30 second timer. However, Frost isn't about self-healing. However, we DKs do lack shields, and since many Frost DKs now dual-wield, something else came to mind.

Sword-Blocking: Not just parrying, but, rather, using weapon skills in order to defensively react to incoming blows, blocking them almost like a shield would. The mechanics of this would work similar to the block mechanic of a shield. There wouldn't be any damage reduction, simply a chance to avoid an attack via block. The duration of the effect and the amount of block percentage gained are still up in the air, I'm not much of a numbers person, but it would be on a 30 second cooldown, making it readily accessible to Frost DKs so that they can use it whenever it is needed. (It would be attached to the nerves of cold steel talent).

I tried to think about what other cooldowns that Blood has, Vampiric Blood is sort of equated to Unbreakable Armor, and all DKs have Icebound Fortitude, though Frost DKs get a minor increase in duration. I've never really had much affection for the increased duration as I would rather be able to select to use Icebound Fortitude more often than simply to have its effect extend longer, often beyond its needed time.

The other cooldown that Blood has is Mark of Blood, one that I did not utilize as often as I should have. However, I couldn't think of something similar for Frost, and then it occurred to me that it needn't be similar, just something useful.

Decreased cooldown on Icebound: I'll admit I was one of the most bitter by seeing my precious cooldown go from 1 minute to 2 minutes. I've adapted, for the most part, but I still yearn to see the cooldown retain some of that glory. Guile of Gorefiend could be modified to replace the increase in duration with a 10, 20, and 30 second reduction on Icebound Fortitude's cooldown. So, at best, Frost DKs would have a 1.5 minute cooldown on Icebound Fortitude. In a 5 minute fight this gives them one extra Icebound Fortitude over other DKs if they use it on cooldown (1 at onset, another 1.5 minutes later, and then another one at 3 minutes and a final one at 4 minutes all other DKs would get to use one at the beginning, one at two minutes and one at 4 minutes).

Those were my thoughts. Non-DKs undoubtedly hate them. My wondering is whether or not these ideas would make Frost DKs too good in comparison to other DKs, thus making the other specs seem much less useful. And, of course, would they add more fun to your gameplay if they were added?

What this thread is:
> A place to discuss the ideas presented and how they fit into the Frost style of gameplay, particularly with survival
> A place to discuss how these ideas might be made to be balanced and fit into the current frost tree
> A place to discuss how AWESOME and FUN Frost tanking is (particularly DW!)

What this thread is NOT:
> A place to QQ
> A place to discuss why one talent tree is better for DKs than another
> Why you like/dislike X talent in Y tree
> How OP DKs are
> How nerfed DKs are
> Whether or not these ideas should be put into the game
- Note, this is the important one. Because this is related to the thread topic, it may seem like a valid discussion point for the thread. But I want to make it expressly clear that I don't want that in this thread. This is for a couple of reasons:
1. It's only going to incite arguing. Some people may like the idea, some may hate it. Both parties would only argue about such a point, which usually dissolves into personal attacks and flaming.
2. I'm not an employee of Blizzard. I have no say or influence over what goes into the game. There's no point in trying to convince me or anyone else why this idea should or should not be in the game. You're wasting your time by arguing it.

I want this to be a thread to have a fun and pleasant creative discussion. If no one likes the idea, then the thread will die and that will be the end of it. Just as much as I don't want to see "this idea is bad" I also don't want to see posts of "I like this idea", they ultimately contribute nothing. I don't need an ego rub. What I want is a creative discussion. If that can't be had, then let the thread die.

[Proletaria]

Rune-tap is not good. The fact frost has nothing similar is a blessing to the frost tree which is already bloated to the point of halarity with DW talents and odd gimmicks for pvp. 99% of content proves RT a wasted blood rune that I would rather use for threat or vampiric blood. That being said, i've spec'd it before, and I could always spec it again if need be for just 1 encounter. But you could say the same thing about acclimation.

Frost generally isn't any weaker than blood except for (obviously) places where the armor cooldown is nullified by heavy magic rather than physical damage. The tradeoff is: stam, selfhealing, and wotn for 2% mitigation on fp, 3% avoidance, and a cooldown that actually mitigates.

I'm not saying it's a good trade in a lot of places, but I don't see a buff to frost as what deathknights need. Plain and simple we either need more EH to make up for lack of block, or we need a block mechanic (and an AP debuff wouldn't hurt either). Not one that is restricted to a tree, but one for all tank dks.

[Chamenas]

I don't need a lesson in the differences between Frost and Blood trees or whether or not you like Rune Tap or find it useful (that's your opinion). This isn't a theory crafting thread and I'm not making any attempts to prove anything so I would prefer if other people did not as well.

Try to keep with the discussion, not make your own points that are only going to bring arguments to this thread.

[Proletaria]

I don't need a lesson in the differences between Frost and Blood trees or whether or not you like Rune Tap or find it useful (that's your opinion). This isn't a theory crafting thread and I'm not making any attempts to prove anything so I would prefer if other people did not as well.

Try to keep with the discussion, not make your own points that are only going to bring arguments to this thread.

Rune tap is useful on about the same number of encounters as acclimation. That isn't an opinion.

If you think dropping both of your blood runes like hot-potatoes on cooldowns is a good idea then I don't know what to tell ya. And let's not forget fully talented rune-tap is 4 talent points.

[Chamenas]

You're still trying to maintain an argument which has no relevance to the discussion I'm trying to create. Please stop.

[Proletaria]

How you think it's irrelavent to your thread is beyond me. If there is a problem with a class that has three tanking trees and you propose that one tree get the fix, it becomes very relavent to say: that is something all the tanking specs would value and there is no evidence to support the idea that just one tree ought to get it over the others.

I'm not sure what kind of feedback you're looking for here. Maybe some "atta boy" good ideas, possibly a few "wow that is OP and here is why" posts, and a smattering of "well this is how i play frost tank," here and there? Honestly, I read your entire post a few times over and i'm still not understanding what your intent was. You describe to us your personal saga of dk tanking. You explained what you thought would be reasonable changes to the frost spec in particular. You then proceed to say something to the effect of 'well, blood has rune-tap (which i'll assume you meant to be some kind of amazing tanking talent) so here are the changes I think would make frost a better tanking talent tree.'

You also mentioned mark of blood. Do you know just how bad that talent is? Theorycraft that one to your heart's content, it is not worth the 1 talent investment on any encounter, period. It was an amazing pvp talent at one time, but it has long since been forgotten, and for good reason.

Let me break it down for you, because you obviously missed the point of my posts here:

1. Frost is fine, frost is good, and frost at certain encounters surpasses blood.

2. Blood AND frost have their share of throw-away talents for the general purpose of tanking.

3. The class as a whole could use this block mechanism you're describing.

I never had the intention of such a lengthy tirade here, but honestly you've got a real mess of a post and you seem to be completely abrasive to any responses that don't fit your pre-determined set of conclusions. I find it pretty ironic you mentioned "non-dks would hate your ideas," and here I am: a deathknight tank since wotlk beta, telling you that I don't think you thought this one through.

Had i said "well all that is bunk because i play frost and im just fine," would it have been relavent to the thread? I pointed out a critical point in your reasoning and told you why the very crux of your argument did not make logical sense. This is relavent. You may feel free to defend you talking points or you can just ignore them and move on, but don't respond that it is "irrelavent," because that is far from the truth.