Death Knight Macros & Hotkey Setup

[Vociferate]

So I have joined the FOTM and rolled 4 Death Knights and a priest.

First melee team, and well... First Death Knight as well...

I have a basic understanding of the class, but still unsure of how to fully play them with a specific rotation outside of rolling my face across the keyboard.

I'll be running 1 Blood & 3 Frost DK's, but I just don't know where to start with writing the macros. I was wondering if any of you DK players can shed some light about how you have your team setup as far as macro's go.

I have Deathgrip, Mind Freeze and Strangulate all setup on the G4 G5 G6 keys as round robin with focus macros.

The racials are hotkeyed to their respecitve F5-F9 with Shift Modifier's.

I have Death Coil and Blood Boil on proc hotkeys, but I still have a pretty poor rotation...

Any suggestions or enlightenment?

[Ualaa]

If you're running instances, one Blood is a decent choice.
If you're questing or doing pvp, run them all as Frost.

For Blood, I ran with a very simple castsequence:
#show
/castsequence reset=combat Heart Strike, Obliterate
/cast Runic Strike

And had Death Strike on its own key.



Frost stuff:

Mind Freeze is off of the GCD.
Talented it is rune free, so limited only by its cooldown.

Make a mapped key, with four steps.
Each step sends the keybind for Mind Freeze to one DK.
Set the box, so it cannot advance to the next step for 2.5 seconds.

Then use a Do Mapped Key action, to tie this new mapped key to your default DPS.
It will auto fire off, approximately every 2.5 seconds, as long as you spam your key.



With Frost, you want to Howling Blast a ton.
And Frost Strike as the runic power dump.

Blood Runes = Blood Strike.
Unholy Runes = Necrotic Strike (at 83+) and Plague Strike (until 83rd).

My DPS is set up similar to Mosg2's from the DK Manifesto.
On Key down, each DK receives the Howling Blast keybind.
On Key up, each DK receives the six keybinds, so it is rather random which goes off, out of: 1x Howling Blast, 2x Frost Strike, 1x Blood Strike, 1x Unholy Move, and 1x Hungering Cold.

You can Blood Tap as an opener, which gets you a Death Rune.
And then go Howling Blast x3, instead of x2.

Glyph Howling Blast and talent Frost Fever to snare.
Probably easier to check out the DK Manifesto thread.

[JackBurton]

I posted about how i deal with Normal Instance Trash scenarios
http://www.dual-boxing.com/showthread.php?t=33087&page=33

[Vociferate]

Cheers Jack, good advice.

I have been reading and watching what I can with Mosg2's Manifesto. Great shit there, that's for sure.

[thedreameater]

If you're running instances, one Blood is a decent choice.
If you're questing or doing pvp, run them all as Frost.

For Blood, I ran with a very simple castsequence:
#show
/castsequence reset=combat Heart Strike, Obliterate
/cast Runic Strike

And had Death Strike on its own key.



Frost stuff:

Mind Freeze is off of the GCD.
Talented it is rune free, so limited only by its cooldown.

Make a mapped key, with four steps.
Each step sends the keybind for Mind Freeze to one DK.
Set the box, so it cannot advance to the next step for 2.5 seconds.

Then use a Do Mapped Key action, to tie this new mapped key to your default DPS.
It will auto fire off, approximately every 2.5 seconds, as long as you spam your key.



With Frost, you want to Howling Blast a ton.
And Frost Strike as the runic power dump.

Blood Runes = Blood Strike.
Unholy Runes = Necrotic Strike (at 83+) and Plague Strike (until 83rd).

My DPS is set up similar to Mosg2's from the DK Manifesto.
On Key down, each DK receives the Howling Blast keybind.
On Key up, each DK receives the six keybinds, so it is rather random which goes off, out of: 1x Howling Blast, 2x Frost Strike, 1x Blood Strike, 1x Unholy Move, and 1x Hungering Cold.

You can Blood Tap as an opener, which gets you a Death Rune.
And then go Howling Blast x3, instead of x2.

Glyph Howling Blast and talent Frost Fever to snare.
Probably easier to check out the DK Manifesto thread.

I'm gonna use your Blood cast sequence macro to level through instances, rotating taunts. Think I'll need a 5th toon or are some instances doable with 4 and rotating taunts?

The DPS keys you set up:
- You set up something in ISBoxer to send Howling Blast to the DKs on key down and on Key up it sends... all 6 of those other abilities simultaneously or randomly... sorry, I don't get it. :(

You've got Blood Tap as a separate button, correct? In addition to that, I'll need Mind Freeze, Hungering Cold, and AMS on round robin, right?

What about Plague / Necrotic Strike? Is that a single hit button or part of a cast sequence?

Thanks!

[Toonarmy]

Your mind freeze tie in is EXACTLY what I was looking for Ualaa.



Then use a Do Mapped Key action, to tie this new mapped key to your default DPS.


I have to admit, though, that I am a bit lost on how to use the Do Mapped Key action part. Any chance you could explain this part? Or throw up a screen shot? Thanks.

Toonarmy.

[Ualaa]

My Mind Freeze is its own mapped key.
It has four steps, because I have four DK's.

On each step, it sends my warcraft keybind for Mind Freeze to one DK only.
I check the box, "Do Not Advance For" and set it to 2.5 seconds.
Which means no matter how often I spam this mapped key (or another mapped key calls it), it sticks on each step for 2.5 seconds before advancing to the next step.



I then include (in my main DPS/Spammed mapped key) an action for:
- Do Mapped Key, the Mind Freeze mapped key.

So when I spam my main DPS key, it attempts to do the Mind Freeze on every press.
However, after the first press (Step 1) it cannot advance to Step 2 (DK #2) for 2.5 seconds.
Once at least 2.5 seconds have passed, the next push of my main key also attempts the Mind Freeze mapped key, via the Do Mapped Key action, and this time the Mind Freeze mapped key can fire off.
It is still in response to a key stroke and not automated in any way.

Because the Mind Freeze is runic power and rune free, plus off of the GCD, anytime it is called the spell is instant cast.

[Toonarmy]

I then include (in my main DPS/Spammed mapped key) an action for:
- Do Mapped Key, the Mind Freeze mapped key.

So when I spam my main DPS key, it attempts to do the Mind Freeze on every press.
However, after the first press (Step 1) it cannot advance to Step 2 (DK #2) for 2.5 seconds.
Once at least 2.5 seconds have passed, the next push of my main key also attempts the Mind Freeze mapped key, via the Do Mapped Key action, and this time the Mind Freeze mapped key can fire off.
It is still in response to a key stroke and not automated in any way.

Because the Mind Freeze is runic power and rune free, plus off of the GCD, anytime it is called the spell is instant cast.

Awesome. Thanks so much.

Toonarmy