DPS changes
– Death Coil, Frost Strike, Death and Decay damage increased.
– Strikes that scale with diseases changed so that the weapon damage, not just the flat damage, scales with the disease.
– Double rune abilities damage increased: Obliterate, Howling Blast, Scourge Strike, Death Strike.
– Unholy Blight no longer causes Blood Plague, but had its cooldown removed.
– Several attack power coefficients increased.
– Bloody Strikes and Scent of Blood swapped places.
– Bladed Armor now turns armor into Strength (which then is turned into Parry).
– Master of Ghouls’ Ghoul now lasts until killed or similarly dismissed.
– Ravenous Dead no longer affects Ghoul duration, but grants your rotting little buddy 60% more of your Str and Sta. (Stam goes from 30% of yours to ~50% of yours. Strength goes from 100% to 160%.)
Tanking changes
– Frost Presence now grants 10% total health in addition to its current bonuses.
– Blood Gorged, Rage of Rivendare and Tundra Stalker all grant 1/2/3/4/5 expertise.
– Veteran of the Third War increased to 6/6/6 Str / Sta / Exp to match warriors.
– Will of the Necropolis no longer grants expertise and now lowers Anti-Magic Shell cooldown.
– Pestilence has no target limit. (It still has a radius limit.) Pesilence glyph now increases area.
– Death and Decay no longer has a cower component, but a glyph can add that back.
– Frigid Dreadplate now has a 100% chance for 2/4/6% miss but only on the DK.
Rewards for the selfless buffer
– Abom’s Might now grants 2% Strength at all times.
– Improved Icy Talons now grants 2% haste at all times.
– Ebon Plaguebringer now grants 3% crit at all times.
Runeforge changes
– Lichbane now does 2% weapon damage as Fire, and double damage to undead.
– Swordbreaking and Swordshattering add disarm duration reduction.
– Spellbreaking and Spellshattering add silence duration reduction.
– Cinderglacier reduced to 2 charges.
No doubt many awesome small tweaks I am forgetting.
These changes all get my seal of approval. I'm a bit disappointed Unholy Blight won't cause Blood Plague, but the Pestilence change should still allow for easy spreading of diseases.
Changing strikes bonus damage to scale with weapon damage I think is a good change as well. Right now the bonus damage per disease on strikes is almost insignificant: only 33 at 80 on Blood Strike, for example. I understand Blizzard's intention for the class to be that a Death Knight should have Blood Plague and Frost Fever up at all times, and the current paltry bonus of 33 flat damage isn't exactly enticing.
Even though I'm Unholy spec, I've never really been that interested in having my ghoul function as a classic "pet". I'm already button mashing to keep up with my runes, my perception is that a self-controlled ghoul would just be annoying. However, in the interest of giving you the story I'll probably try it out when these changes go live.
And an intersting take on tanking from Ghostcrawler:
Our intent is for you to tank with two-handed dps weapons.
There is a mentality that says tanks should ignore dps and threat and just focus on mitigation. But bosses do have enrage timers. You can find some really smart warrior theorycrafters out there who say you should go for threat on your weapon and mitigation on your armor.
We don’t to itemize DK two-handed tanking weapons for the reasons you mention. I have posted on the druid boards several times that I would love to get away from Feral Attack Power staves too.
Because we want dual-wielding to be viable for DKs, we aren’t going to specifically prohibit you from tanking with two tanking swords. You will have to stack expertise to make up for boss parry attacks, and hit of course, which might mean you lose enough stats right there. I don’t honestly know without doing the math.
Now if we find that all DKs dual-wield to tank, we’ll do something about it, such as make the parry rune enchants only work on two-handers to compensate for the lack of mitigation on two-handed weapons. That’s not meant to be a threat. We just don’t want every DK tank to DW (or every DK dps).
Changing strikes bonus damage to scale with weapon damage I think is a good change as well. Right now the bonus damage per disease on strikes is almost insignificant: only 33 at 80 on Blood Strike, for example. I understand Blizzard's intention for the class to be that a Death Knight should have Blood Plague and Frost Fever up at all times, and the current paltry bonus of 33 flat damage isn't exactly enticing.
Even though I'm Unholy spec, I've never really been that interested in having my ghoul function as a classic "pet". I'm already button mashing to keep up with my runes, my perception is that a self-controlled ghoul would just be annoying. However, in the interest of giving you the story I'll probably try it out when these changes go live.
And an intersting take on tanking from Ghostcrawler:
Our intent is for you to tank with two-handed dps weapons.
There is a mentality that says tanks should ignore dps and threat and just focus on mitigation. But bosses do have enrage timers. You can find some really smart warrior theorycrafters out there who say you should go for threat on your weapon and mitigation on your armor.
We don’t to itemize DK two-handed tanking weapons for the reasons you mention. I have posted on the druid boards several times that I would love to get away from Feral Attack Power staves too.
Because we want dual-wielding to be viable for DKs, we aren’t going to specifically prohibit you from tanking with two tanking swords. You will have to stack expertise to make up for boss parry attacks, and hit of course, which might mean you lose enough stats right there. I don’t honestly know without doing the math.
Now if we find that all DKs dual-wield to tank, we’ll do something about it, such as make the parry rune enchants only work on two-handers to compensate for the lack of mitigation on two-handed weapons. That’s not meant to be a threat. We just don’t want every DK tank to DW (or every DK dps).
The mathematical reasons for not dual wielding while tanking have always been obvious: more attacks from you means more parrying by the mob, which means more damage on you.
However, given Blizzard's spirit of making every play-style at least somewhat viable I think it's kind of disappointing that they don't really want to facilitate dual wielding in any way.
My suggetion: a 1 point talent in the 3rd tier of Frost, Nerves of Cold Steel as a prerequisite: "Your offhand attacks can no longer be parried."
This, in practice, should have no affect on raid DPS because you're behind your target, it's a sheerly tanking ability that puts your parried rate in line with every other tanking class even while dual wielding. Think about it, Blizzard!
- Andtaxes
However, given Blizzard's spirit of making every play-style at least somewhat viable I think it's kind of disappointing that they don't really want to facilitate dual wielding in any way.
My suggetion: a 1 point talent in the 3rd tier of Frost, Nerves of Cold Steel as a prerequisite: "Your offhand attacks can no longer be parried."
This, in practice, should have no affect on raid DPS because you're behind your target, it's a sheerly tanking ability that puts your parried rate in line with every other tanking class even while dual wielding. Think about it, Blizzard!
- Andtaxes
No comments:
Post a Comment