I'm at the mercy of you, Tankspot!

[Seraphix]

I honestly, just want to be doing the best dps I can, as soon as possible! With what I have, I can do about 5k dps with Hysteria, DRW, and trinkets up, and it falls to about 4.5k sustained.

http://www.wowarmory.com/character-s...or&cn=Seraphix

Whatever needs to happen, I'm down!

[Kazeyonoma]

Moved to HALP! Read the sticky on DPS'ing as a DK for starters btw.

[Seraphix]

From reading through the stickies and such, would it be better to spec into Unholy and gem pure Str until I get a better set of gear?

[Tinytankz]

Perhaps unholy DPS does well for starters (somewhat simpler from what i understand)

I play a prot/fury warrior but i can give you some general melee DPS pointers.
Your still on the low end of gear, neck trinket bracers back (lesser extent belt) so now is not the time to even look at raid DPS.
ArP and You
Do not gem ArP unless you meet one of these requirements.
1. You have a trinket that proc's ArP
http://www.wowhead.com/item=50198
http://www.wowhead.com/item=45931
http://www.wowhead.com/item=40256
When you meet this requirement you will gem only enough ArP so that when the item procs you sit at 100% then you will pop hysteria and other CD's during the proc's up-time.
2. Your gear can sustain levels of ArP meeting or exceeding ~85%
The exact point ArP outweighs strength is different per character and class but the point is below 85% in the majority of cases.

So in the mean time Gem strength it is a much nicer amount of DMG than you will see with ArP right now


Hit and Expertise
263 aka 8% for hit if you have a talent that knocks it down great do some subtraction and figure it out.

26 is how much expertise you need. anything less and your getting dodged, plain and simple
Gear you can get for expertise may be hard but a few i know that aren't to bad are
http://www.wowhead.com/item=45550
http://www.wowhead.com/item=50306

specifics of your rotation and such wil have to be handled by someone else hope i could help.

[Seraphix]

So as far as Arp, I should stick with gemming Str until I higher level of gear? And in terms of rotation, Im doing the accepted blood rotation of:

PS>IS>HS>HS>DS>Runic Dump
DS>HSx4 Runic Dump

I'll work on getting that belt and ring, and replacing the lacking pieces of gear in my set.

[Tinytankz]

ArP leave it be until you get a needle encrusted scorpion ( you don't seem like your raiding alot of old content) then come back and ask how you do it.

[Seraphix]

"ArP leave it be until you get a needle encrusted scorpion ( you don't seem like your raiding alot of old content) then come back and ask how you do it."

I'm a bit confused by this. By old content you mean Ulduar, ToC, etc?

I'll mass farm heroics and try and get NES and BoV and come back and see what's up!

[Tinytankz]

"ArP leave it be until you get a needle encrusted scorpion ( you don't seem like your raiding alot of old content) then come back and ask how you do it."

I'm a bit confused by this. By old content you mean Ulduar, ToC, etc?

I'll mass farm heroics and try and get NES and BoV and come back and see what's up!

I mean the content that drops other trinkets proc'ing ArP

[Destruyen]

naxx and ulduar are the only other places that drop arp proccing trinkets...which i assume he means when he says older content.

[timtim89]

dont gem armpen till ur around 750 i do believe and currently unholy is the best raiding spec but u can pull off it with blood to

[Selene]

AFAIK of only with Blood do you really want gem for ArPen for DKs.
Unholy is big on disease damage.

[Seraphix]

So as Unholy Id be wanting to gem pure strength because of the bonus to the ghoul dps and the AP increase to disease dot damage?

[Selene]

So as Unholy Id be wanting to gem pure strength because of the bonus to the ghoul dps and the AP increase to disease dot damage?

Yes, might want to look over at Elitist Jerks in their forums, they do have a Thread for Unholy DPS. I would link, but looks like their forum might be down or something atm.

[Seraphix]

I went ahead and specced Unholy, and gemmed for Str and Str/Haste at the advice of my guildies, and found my dps has almost doubled!

Honestly one of the best decisions Ive made thus far. I also went ahead and powerleveled Herb/Alch so I can always have a flask running, and provide a bit more raid utility for my guild

[Schmevan]

I believe all 3 specs are viable and the dps difference between them is minimal and different on different encounters, frost-high single target damage, unholy-high damage over time, for instance you still do a lot of damage on fights when you have to run out on sindragosa, similar to an affliction lock, blood-high burst damage on fights with a lot of target switching, I've seen blood dks outdo both other specs on fights such as blood council and professor putricide, although unholy isn't far behind, frost struggles on these fights due to issues with keep razorice stacks and how much damage obliterate gets from having both diseases on a target