Best Possible DK Soloing Spec?

[Doherty]

Here's the spec, along with glyphs:

http://www.wowhead.com/talent#j0EMqI...x0zZ0xh:iLpzV0

Taking Lichborne while improving Death Coil's throughput and efficiency seemed like a valuable choice. To access Lichborne, I took Improved Icy Touch for the reduction to damage intake, but also Runic Power Mastery to increase the amount of Death Coil's I could chain cast. This would allow you to chain cast a maximum of 5 Death Coils, which easily fits into Lichborne's duration.

Due to the Lichborne self healing method, I thought about the Runic Power talents Butchery and Scent of Blood. After a little bit I decided I'd pass on them, because as Blood I don't use Runic Power offensively other than Rune Strikes. Expending 20 Runic Power every time I swing my slow two hander is easy to counteract.

For the rest of the Blood tree, I focused on maximizing my healing and minimizing damage intake. Talents that increase damage alone (at least in the tooltip) you could be more flexible with. I'm not too concerned with my own damage when I'm soloing. I tried to take what I thought would give the best all around damage increase, as this contributes some to healing through Improved Blood Presence, but not very much.

If you have any suggestions I'd really like to hear them!

[Kurtosis]

You're trying to hit a moving target, which changes with both your gear and the content you're trying to solo. You need enough mitigation/avoidance that your self-healing can keep up with your dmg, enough self-healing to keep up with your dmg, and enough dps to beat enrage timers.

On fights with a long enrage timer you can trade dmg for more self-healing or mitigation/avoidance. On fights with shorter rage timers, you have to make the opposite tradeoff.

Check out Raegwyn, currently the most well-known solo'ing DK. He just fraps'd himself soloing Sarth 10, along with his spec for that fight.

[Doherty]

Thanks for your reply, Kurtosis. I agree, there is certainly a balance of survivability and damage output that you must be in range of per encounter when soloing. It's fun figuring out how to adjust for different encounters when you find that your original approach to that balance failed. In regards to my spec, I think it would have very strong healing, moderate mitigation, and low damage output.

For now my soloing plans are for pre WotLK content. I most frequently solo Heroic Magister's Terrace in hopes for the mount, and it's engaging enough to keep me trying after 50+ unsuccesful runs. While the first boss is boring (without pulling him along with trash), all the others are interesting and unique. My favorite boss is probably Vexallus. The damage a single attack can do on that fight is insane, but it can also get pretty hairy if you don't want to clear your debuff.

Do you solo? If so, what's fun for you?

I have a question about Raegwyn's Sartharion 10 Man video. The Scent of Blood buff icon seems to indicate at certain points that it has 2 or 3 charges, but when he shows his talents at the end there is only 1 point invested. I thought a single point spent meant that if it proc'd you'd get the buff until your next melee swing, and if it proc'd again before the buff was consumed, it would simply be refreshed. It doesn't seem right that it's stacking.

[Loremaster Roht]

I have a question about Raegwyn's Sartharion 10 Man video. The Scent of Blood buff icon seems to indicate at certain points that it has 2 or 3 charges, but when he shows his talents at the end there is only 1 point invested. I thought a single point spent meant that if it proc'd you'd get the buff until your next melee swing, and if it proc'd again before the buff was consumed, it would simply be refreshed. It doesn't seem right that it's stacking.

The Scent for Blood talent actually does provide a stacking buff, based on experience on my own DK. It seems to be a maximum of three charges, so investing three points in it provides you the full stacks of the talent from a single proc. With one point, it has to proc three times to gain a full stack and each melee auto-attack consumes a single charge. A tad off-topic for a moment I suppose, but I'd say you need only one talent point for any build due to how it works. It's a lesser version of the ancient version of Imp. Shield Block (first point provided an added an extra charge and increased the duration, next two only increased the duration). More points may guarantee more uptime, but that's generally not a concern unless you're using a frost tank build (uses Frost Strike more often than a Blood tank would use Death Coil) as you'll have ample runic power for rune strikes from a single point invested in the talent. This is particularly true when you're using a slow swinging 2h weapon, as you won't be consuming charges quickly.


Back to the topic, Raegwynn does seem to have a great soloing build that uses a mixture of Blood and Unholy talents, aimed towards max self-healing by the looks of it.
It's definitely one of the odder specs out there, but presumably it works very well towards it's intended task. It's definitely worth looking up and trying out.

I'm thinking of giving it a crack myself, after what could be called a rather ugly first attempt at soloing the Molten Core yesterday on my DK. Gehennas and Geddon both kicked my ass, so it looks like it's back to the drawing board.


UPDATE -- I'm currently using a modified version of Raegwynn's spec right now, dropping a point out of Abom's might for Bone Shield and changing the glyph of Rune Strike for Bone shield again. Also swapped out Glyph of Pesilence for Glyph of Blood tap, which is moreso being too cheap to change that detail.

I just soloed Halls of Lightning.

Only on normal, but I'm still just starting out. It wasn't perfect nor the smoothest, but that should come with time. Oddly enough the first boss gave me the most trouble, though that was probably the fact he and his adds had the buff that gives them something like +30% damage. Still a little tinkering and gearing required, along with some practice. Either way, his spec works quite good. It's pretty much Death Strike spam w/ three diseases up and a couple extra healing tools (Mark of Blood and Rune Tap), so you just have to wear the enemies down slowly but surely.

[Doherty]

Hmm, I wouldn't say it was aimed at buffing healing, Roht, but I could be missing something. I think the only healing buff Raegwyn gets for going so far into Unholy is an extra Death Strike (every other Rune set) from Reaping. Though, if Impurity increases the amount Death Strike heals for I suppose that could be valuable.

Please don't interpret my words as bashing Raegwyn. It's clear that he knows very well what he's doing. I alternatively think that his spec's strongpoints lie in reduced magic damage taken and more damage potential. I think healing is my spec's strongest capability.

Thanks for clarifying the Scent of Blood mechanic for stacking.

[Bosk]

Ragewyn has made some detailed posts on the wow-europe DK forums regarding exactly why he spec's particular ways.

He usually stops being so helpful when some idiot starts flaming him over his spec, and he tells them to go solo something with their spec and come back and report on their success

[Doherty]

Thanks for pointing that out, Bosk. I think I'll go search for his posts.

I hope my posts here don't seem aimed at flaming him. I just think the specs have different strengths.

[Kurtosis]

I solo'd all the 5man quests on the way to 80, but all I've solo'd at 80 is ZG. I went into MC once shortly after I hit 80, and it took me like 10m to kill a single trash rock elemental, so I quit. Now my 2 raiding mains take up all my time, so I haven't solo'd much besides ZG.

I like it though, and try to keep up with it (perhaps for when I get tired of raiding ICC), and like watching people like Raegwyn who really deconstruct how to best do it and then fraps their successes.

[Bosk]

Thanks for pointing that out, Bosk. I think I'll go search for his posts.

I hope my posts here don't seem aimed at flaming him. I just think the specs have different strengths.

Nah, he is a really cool guy, but as you know the official forums are infested with whiners and haters.