After 1 week. My thoughts on dual to quad DK pvp

[Shodokan]

Alright, as most of you know I was able to break 2200 last season in 5's and 3's. So this is simply from the perspective of a high rated perspective (this season 2k+ rated) As I have yet to try unholy but have experience playing it at high rating in wrath i'll make some comments on it as well but i'll leave till the end.

What rating can Quad DK+ Healer hit this season
Depending on your luck with queues you can hit 2200... but the road will be long and hard with melee cleaves not really being the norm this season. Along with the removal of hungering cold from effectively being apart of what can make the team great and help with keeping damage off of yourself and your healer reliably it is clear that frost is not the way to go with dks at this time. The ability to silence is something that is great but that as a single measure of CC be it chained or on multiple targets is not enough vs spell cleaves or massive CC teams.

Against melee cleaves you can do very well, especially vs other melee cleaves with dks... our defensive cooldowns are barely any help for reducing damage done, i mean i've been killed through pain suppression so many times in the past week it is not even funny by bullshit like mage/spriest/ele shaman/hunter/hpally

There is a severe lack of mobility for frost dks as well, without a priest as your healer it seems that you cannot get out of many situations that frost mages can throw at you. The two break fears are good but they are NOT enough to make the team super viable without playing very conservatively.

If you can manage to get good queues, and play people you do not play on a weekly basis many times (some of the teams i fought were very use to my tactics with hungering cold... without them you just fall over) then the comp works... as well lets face it... as it stands now it is a gimmick comp with no CC and purely damage to rely on for getting wins.


Dual Wield vs 2 hander
For frost... dual wield is how you have to go now... we win through damage done basically. It sucks that you do near no damage while stacking necrotic strikes but with 359 weps i am doing equal damage to my Tier 2 2h wep sometimes more.

I'll be getting 1h weps if i stay with frost... which I may go unholy and try to figure out ways to do that well.

3v3
3v3 for frost is a joke unless playing dual wield and doing a TSG or DK/Feral/Healer. I need to find a way to play double unholy... but even then kitty cleave and MLD, MPD, MSD will give you quite a bit of problems. (Example: Around 2300 mmr i played against mage/ele shaman/holy paladin.... their entire team was basically oom while my healer was at half mana and in two seconds my healer gets CC'd, i eat a lavaburst + CL + shatter combo and the game is over)

Double unholy might be far more viable, I'm seeing a few teams playing that to 2400+ but we'll see.

Thoughts on the comp
If you want to be high rated don't roll them unless you want lots of headaches along the way. Then again there is no OP boxing team this season. For myself... I'm having multiple teams and possibly going with a multi-spec team instead of quad anything. This team is "viable" but with more and more people playing spell cleaves like in s8 it seems this will be a difficult season to maintain high ratings.

Best of luck to everyone this season.

[Mokoi]

im going with my 5 mage setup. I will show those teams who's boss! TSG? HA I have MMMMM!!!.. yah, im going to coin that term too with my l33t arena teem. i have3200 rating already ! :P

For the Horde!!!


on a related note, good luck shok! thanks for the infoz :)

[MiRai]

I have MMMMM!!!
I expect some artwork from you with this logo:

M⁵

[zenga]

Dual Wield vs 2 hander
For frost... dual wield is how you have to go now... we win through damage done basically. It sucks that you do near no damage while stacking necrotic strikes but with 359 weps i am doing equal damage to my Tier 2 2h wep sometimes more.
.

Picked up Apparatus of Khaz'goroth (http://www.wowhead.com/item=68972) today combined with Ruthless Gladiator's Badge of Victory. (http://www.wowhead.com/item=70400)
and 2 1-handers from honor on my frost dk ... and man that's insane dmg with 1 handers. Apparatus is BoE from firelands, DW def way to go as frost imo.

[Acidburning]

Thanks for the write up.

for the 1handers, just get double of the same sword/axe/mace? Or is there an ideal setup? I have never dual wielded in wow before.

[Koralon]

Against melee cleaves you can do very well, especially vs other melee cleaves with dks... our defensive cooldowns are barely any help for reducing damage done, i mean i've been killed through pain suppression so many times in the past week it is not even funny by bullshit like mage/spriest/ele shaman/hunter/hpally



You lost to a 1 healer team? How? Should have silenced pally killed ele sham in 2 seconds flat. The only team without 2 healers that I lost to so far was a was a 5 hunter team in which my IWT on my slave dks wasnt working some how lol fail.

But yeah I think 2200 should be quite easy I'm 23-12 including the 3 games i was lagging in on tuesday with my brothers priest who hit 85 a week ago so like half the games we played he had half questing gear and still has some lol, an I know we haven't just gotten lucky getting easy teams because I often see our opponents with 2200 set gear.

I'm using the 359 2h weapons currently wasn't active enough to try for the 2200 ones last season but I'll have to check out the dual wield before i decide which new season weapon to buy, now that everyone is saying its more damage.

BTW: what runeforging are you guys using on your 2 weapons? Razorice and fallen crusader?

[Shodokan]

You lost to a 1 healer team? How? Should have silenced pally killed ele sham in 2 seconds flat. The only team without 2 healers that I lost to so far was a was a 5 hunter team in which my IWT on my slave dks wasnt working some how lol fail.

But yeah I think 2200 should be quite easy I'm 23-12 including the 3 games i was lagging in on tuesday with my brothers priest who hit 85 a week ago so like half the games we played he had half questing gear and still has some lol, an I know we haven't just gotten lucky getting easy teams because I often see our opponents with 2200 set gear.

I'm using the 359 2h weapons currently wasn't active enough to try for the 2200 ones last season but I'll have to check out the dual wield before i decide which new season weapon to buy, now that everyone is saying its more damage.

BTW: what runeforging are you guys using on your 2 weapons? Razorice and fallen crusader?

Simple....

They were 2500 mmr.... their strat was... CC the fuck out of my healer + one of my dks, kite me through RoF, aura mastery after first silence... and burst me down in less than 3 seconds.

I played them 3 times, only beat them once and that was when their paladin fucked up his bubble + aura mastery to keep the shaman up. If i went on the shammy or priest the other did spot heals on one another, meanwhile i was getting controlled by mage + healer is CC'd so i can't get out of mage control. Scatter shot + silencing shot+ RoF + spriest and mage burst is RETARDED. They have a bunch of silences and many ways to CC, kite me and root me in place. They were all in 2200 gear as well. A coordinated team with a mage that can CC your healer will beat you hands down every time if their mage has half a brain + the other people do their job well enough.

Any high burst high control team is going to just poop on you since your main defenses vs them are on a 45 second cooldown and only for like 6 seconds.

FC/RI FC main hand.


I'm NOT giving up on this team though.

[Koralon]

They were 2500 mmr.... their strat was... CC the fuck out of my healer + one of my dks, kite me through RoF, aura mastery after first silence... and burst me down in less than 3 seconds.


Yeah i guess if the paladin is fast like that with the BoP it would suck. Almost all 1 healer teams have been with paladins for me, I would go on him for about 2 seconds just to scare the shit out of him, then switch to the dps with the least amount of cds, mostly ele shamans or melee dps, then the paladin is busy healing himself and not focused enough to get the BoP off in time or spam heals on that dps, and I can get from the healer to the dps that I'm killing SO FAST with darkflight + unholy Pres, its almost an instant switch most times, 2 seconds on pally ~1 second to get to the dps 2 seconds to kill that dps while the pally is at like 30% hp scrambling.

Edit: sometimes i would even kill the paladin not even trying to lol, probably was a bad team tho.

But yeah FROST MAGES are our worst enemies in arenas atm, Double ring of frosts... so lame, I cry a little inside every time the doors open and I see a water elemental. :p

[Koralon]

Tried Dualwielding with a Obliterate spec, non-oblit spec (howling blast frost strike spam) ........




SUCKS. Don't waste time buying the weapons imo.:D

[TeamGrizzly]

Swapped 2 DK's to DW specs without annihilation. Removed obliterate from cast bar and changed to Icy Touch glyph. On test dummies, initial burst of the 2 DKs DW is consistently higher than the 2 DKs using 2H.

With nerves of cold steel, my hit is now over 8%. Should be able to do even better after restat to strength or resilence.

[Koralon]

Swapped 2 DK's to DW specs without annihilation. Removed obliterate from cast bar and changed to Icy Touch glyph. On test dummies, initial burst of the 2 DKs DW is consistently higher than the 2 DKs using 2H.

With nerves of cold steel, my hit is now over 8%. Should be able to do even better after restat to strength or resilence.

Sadly Dummies are different than Players, I noticed a significant loss of burst in pvp, i usually kill things in 2 seconds, with DW it was taking forever 5-10 seconds, tried 3 different dualwield specs... all failed miserably when I queued up for WSG, even with razorice stacked to full from all DKs it was still taking longer to kill ppl...

On Dummies you're just sitting there meleeing away, which almost never happens in PVP.

EDIT: Here is why 2h is better for multiboxing pvp... Even with us spamming IWT we still face away from the opponent quite often, while dual-wielding you could miss out on/delay 2 swings for a decent amount of time which gimps dual-wields dps. Where as when using a 2hander your swing timer is a lot longer, and hardly miss out on any white hits.

Stick with 2handers if you're pvping.

[Mercbeast]

Sadly Dummies are different than Players, I noticed a significant loss of burst in pvp, i usually kill things in 2 seconds, with DW it was taking forever 5-10 seconds, tried 3 different dualwield specs... all failed miserably when I queued up for WSG, even with razorice stacked to full from all DKs it was still taking longer to kill ppl...

On Dummies you're just sitting there meleeing away, which almost never happens in PVP.

EDIT: Here is why 2h is better for multiboxing pvp... Even with us spamming IWT we still face away from the opponent quite often, while dual-wielding you could miss out on/delay 2 swings for a decent amount of time which gimps dual-wields dps. Where as when using a 2hander your swing timer is a lot longer, and hardly miss out on any white hits.

Stick with 2handers if you're pvping.

Exception to this IMO is if you can roll with Khaz trinkets. Then 30-40k frost strikes make everything moot!

[Toned]

I have 2 Obsidium Cleavers on my Main Dk, and working on getting Khaz trink... Redonkulous DPS lol.... If only I farmed more gold at start of Cata! I could roll 8 cleavers + 4 Khaz trinks.

[Fat Tire]

I have 2 Obsidium Cleavers on my Main Dk, and working on getting Khaz trink... Redonkulous DPS lol.... If only I farmed more gold at start of Cata! I could roll 8 cleavers + 4 Khaz trinks.


Seriously, I have 3 khaz trinkets one on my ret,war,dk. I mostly lose to feral/mage/healer comps atm. Everything else is...

http://img404.imageshack.us/img404/2998/tunnelvision.jpg

[Multibocks]

To think I sold two of those for 15k each. :(



Edit: do the charges stack faster than the 359 trinket? I have that one (turns you into dragonkin) on my warrior and I noticed it takes a while to build charges, even with 1 handers.

[Fat Tire]

To think I sold two of those for 15k each. :(



Edit: do the charges stack faster than the 359 trinket? I have that one (turns you into dragonkin) on my warrior and I noticed it takes a while to build charges, even with 1 handers.

The Khaz trinket stacks very fast, its worth the gold. That dragon trinket took forever to stack,. worthless

[zenga]

There is no internal cooldown afaik with khaz trinket. Seriously this trinket is way too OP, it wouldn't surprise me if there is a nerf coming soon. On the other hand it probably balances out the legendary caster weapon to a certain extend.

[Zzc2]

Do you still go Khaz trinket even if you're not a human dk?

[Littleburst]

Do you still go Khaz trinket even if you're not a human dk?

I don't see a reaason why you couldn't go for PVP trink + Khaz. So, that would be a yes.

[Shodokan]

Tried Dualwielding with a Obliterate spec, non-oblit spec (howling blast frost strike spam) ........




SUCKS. Don't waste time buying the weapons imo.:D

Everything minus melee swings hit harder (necrotic excluded) with t1 DW vs t2 2H. It is NOT worse especially with the amount of extra crit frost strikes you get and the increased damage of howling blast (i have 15 mastery, opposed to 12.23)

Considering the priority i use is HB > FS > NS > FS it helps A LOT for damage.

I'm considering going human.

[Toned]

Everything minus melee swings hit harder (necrotic excluded) with t1 DW vs t2 2H. It is NOT worse especially with the amount of extra crit frost strikes you get and the increased damage of howling blast (i have 15 mastery, opposed to 12.23)

Considering the priority i use is HB > FS > NS > FS it helps A LOT for damage.

I'm considering going human.

I'm experimenting with a priority of FS > HB > NS... Frost strikes hit like a fucking truck.

I also would love to go Human ><

[Fat Tire]

Gotta love blizzard-

Now arena max conquest cap is now 10% lower than RBG cap as such a 2400 rbg player will get 3000 cap while a 3000 rated arena player will only get 2700.

ymmv Its not a huge deal but I have a feeling if this doesnt force more players into rbgs that more "draconian" measures will be used.

[Koralon]

I don't see a reaason why you couldn't go for PVP trink + Khaz. So, that would be a yes.

The 1800 Str on use pvp trinket >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> Khaz trinket, in arenas at least, 90% of wins are because you get a kill in the first 20 seconds, and having 7200 more str across your DKs is much better for bursting something down rather than a trinket that gains stacks with melee and only has a little more base str than the alchemy trinket lol...:rolleyes:

[Koralon]

but holy shit was I wrong about dualwield, I am so sorry for doubting you guys i tried it again ... rape Idk if I was lagging the first time i tried it or what but yeah its great ;)

[Toned]

KM procs are beast

[Koralon]

KM procs are beast

Yes they are. That reminds me I still have to reforge all my new gear out of crit and into mastery when I get on next.

Question: what hit rating are you guys going for? trying for anymore now that you're dual wielding?

[Toned]

just get it so you have 0% miss chance on lvl 85s... pretty sure it's 5% ... too tired to look at toon.

[Shodokan]

Gotta love blizzard-

Now arena max conquest cap is now 10% lower than RBG cap as such a 2400 rbg player will get 3000 cap while a 3000 rated arena player will only get 2700.

ymmv Its not a huge deal but I have a feeling if this doesnt force more players into rbgs that more "draconian" measures will be used.

where is this info? thought it was 30% more. Also 3k rated arena player getting 2700 is too low as i'm at 2338 and only sitting at 2086 rating from last week. 2200 use to give 2600... friend told me he has just over 2500 cap for his 2200 rating... so he is either lying or cap changes never went through for arena and only 30% more for rated bgs happened.

[Multibocks]

but holy shit was I wrong about dualwield, I am so sorry for doubting you guys i tried it again ... rape Idk if I was lagging the first time i tried it or what but yeah its great ;)


This makes me sad, I really like using 2hers. Especially when you swap to blood spec and roll instances. Not sure duel wield will work as well in an instance with blood talents.

[Koralon]

This makes me sad, I really like using 2hers. Especially when you swap to blood spec and roll instances. Not sure duel wield will work as well in an instance with blood talents.

nope :( your Special attacks will hit for way less because it won't copy the attack to your off hand, i believe

[Shodokan]

Dual wield does higher DPS in PVE as well.

[Mercbeast]

Dual wield does higher DPS in PVE as well.

When I last ran blood spec's for instances back in Jan/Feb, DW was vastly superior to 2h for one simple reason. It upped the number of worms your DK spam was generating which resulted in pretty silly self healing on top of everything else!

[Multibocks]

So why do pve DKs use 2hers?

[Mercbeast]

So why do pve DKs use 2hers?

It is a different dynamic. Sort of a fundamental concept of multiboxing. What works best for a single account often isn't best for the multiboxing setup. So...

I imagine 2h generates more threat.

This is a moot point when you run 4 blood DK's. You are 1, not trying to hold agro over DPS. 2, you are generating more self healing through more worm procs.

[Multibocks]

Interesting I will have to try this out!

[Mercbeast]

Interesting I will have to try this out!

It was quite silly when I ran it. I was doing instances without any outside healing :)

[Multibocks]

Heroic instances?

[TeamGrizzly]

Yes they are. That reminds me I still have to reforge all my new gear out of crit and into mastery when I get on next.

Question: what hit rating are you guys going for? trying for anymore now that you're dual wielding?

It is still 5% hit for PvP but you automatically gets 3% from with Nerves of Cold Steel alone.

[Lyonheart]

Heroic instances?

I was wondering this as well. I have tried using a paly healer..it works well, but from 60-70 a healer just slows me down. 5 blood DKs + the right glyphs make a healer unnecessary. When does this stop being true?

[zenga]

. When does this stop being true?

when they remove dk's from the game in 4.3

nah, cata dyngeons are harder