Originally Posted by
ghonosyph
Hey guys ! been a while since i posted on the forums here, as i've been going crazy hard on all my toons getting stuff done.
I play feral druid + 3 dks, but i would like to offer up some insight on spec/advice for a 5 dk setup, as i regularly run heroics with just my 4 guys. They are all frost/blood dual wield(remember you want slow swing speed dps weaps for this to work best) Im pretty sure you can set up a frost /blood spec with a two hander, but if you have the gear for dw, i find it to be much more entertaining. :) when friends heal for me i always laugh when we kill a giant aoe pull and tell them "WELCOME TO MY BLENDER MUHAHAHA! Would you like a frost freezy bloody margarita? =)" lol
Frost/sub blood is the way to go for all your boxing needs. Armory my toons MoocrewA, MoocrewC, and MoocrewD.
the spec i use is a combination of mostly frost and a little bit of blood for rune tap/imp runetap and glyphed. This is your main heal and its rediculous how good it is with just 3 dks, let alone 5.
So you may ask yourself, what kinda rotation is best, what should we do, and how should we do it. First off, Learn how to use the click to move in combination with the interact with target keybind, Best melee boxing tool we could ever ask for imo!
the spec i run uses a couple different tools, the glyphs i use can be found in my armory if you go look at the toons, but for easy reference i use howling blast, rune tap(party heals are ftw with no healer), and frost strike. Howling blast is your big aoe, and letting it apply diseases is a solid bonus as often times you get free procs with rime (which lets u cast howling blast for free) rune tap should be obvious, tie this however you like, since i only have 3 dks, i have it tied to my T key on all 3, thus every 30 seconds i get a 30 % party heal. which works great for healing my druid, or any residual aoe dmg i've taken. This could be setup in a cast sequence so that each dk casts it in a rotation, so you get a heal every 10 seconds or so, but thats personal preference
lastly frost strike = your biggest dmg / rune attack. Making it cheaper is just a plus as after you blow your aoe stuff, you should be spamming the snot out of this attack. more on this below! :)
okay so rotations, i have my bars set up like this
keys - spell tied to them
1 - icy touch
2 - plague strike
3 - blood strike
4 - obliterate
5 - howling blast
Q - pestilence
Shift + Q - Blood boil
Caps lock key - Frost strike
Shift caps - death coil
e - death and decay (i software box so i dont have a good way to drop 5 of these at once so i rarely use it unless im dpsing a whirlwind boss from range ** :) you can place it one at a time from range and it does good dmg. useful for those times you dont wanna be in melee, ie ranged dps)
Z - z is my interact with target key
S - s is my target nearest target key
F - F is my follow focus key(i use a focus based leader system)
shift + F - this is my /target focustarget key (ie my main assist key)
T - this is my rune tap skill (all my dks have this on the same key)
Shift + T is my ghoul summon
Alt + t is my army of the dead summon(this is kinda chaos when you pop it multiple times, but it does an incredible amount of dmg in the time its up lol popping ghoul and army makes for some quick dead bosses)
I have the wow mouse, so i have a couple oddball keybinds attached to my mouse, if you have a 2 button mouse i recommend tying your death grip (in a cast sequence macro, or shift /alt/ctrl modifier macro to one of ur mouse buttons, it helps to have it on tap quick and ready.)
my other main mouse button is hungering cold: more on this spell. It is effectively an aoe crowd controll for everything within range of its ability. I have this tied to each dk on a cast sequence, one dk casts it, then the next, then the next. This helps for a couple reasons, especially on big aoe pulls(like the 4 mob pull ur having trouble with in uk)
Here's a good scenario for you and a small explain of how my normal pull / combat goes.
First off pull, i pull with my diseases, my rotation on all multiple mob situations goes like this:
icy touch, plague strike, pestilence, bloodboil, howling blast.
At this point your runes are on cooldown. If you have tauren like me, this is where i would cast warstomp in cast sequence 2 times. From this point all your diseases are on everything, and you have a bunch of runic power(likely 40 or more, which is what you want. Right here is where you blow HUNGERING COLD, This point in the rotation everything has now been frozen in place. let your diseases tick a few times and your runes should now just be coming back up so you can blow the second part of your aoe rotation. I would also use this time if possible to blow potions if you've taken dmg too much and to use any racial talents that are useful. all my dks have herbalism, and use that heal at this point lol
when hungering cold fades, your diseases should still be up, here's your next cast sequence -
howling blast, blood boil, blood boil, death strike(normally for dps situations you would use obliterate, but the heal is going to be useful because you'll have both diseases up to buffer the heal)
You've just done a shit load of aoe dmg again, its time to blow hungering cold again on your next dk. Hungering cold applies frost fever, so thats one disease you dont have to worry about. let hungering cold tick here and cast blood tap quickly while your runes are on cooldown then cast rune tap to heal up the dmg you've taken(blood tap refreshes a blood rune and turns it into a death rune, this is handy because once a minute you can blow it and pop the heal(rune tap) as an emergency when its up
If things aren't dead by now then i'd be surprised, with your dks swinging like crazy with melee attacks from your main target.
At this point if stuff still isnt dead, its still aoe cc'd, still taking disease dmg, and in just a few seconds your runes will come up again, and you're ready to blow smore burst dmg. the rotation here gets tricky cuz you've already got frost fever on everything due to howling blast and hungering cold.
From here you should just concentrate on dpsing down single target stuff. Cast plague strike, then pestilence then howling blast, blood boil, frost strike with your remaining runic power, let your runes come back up, when they do re apply diseases then obliterate(or deathstrike if you're low on health and rune tap is down) then blood strike/bloodboil if more than one target is around.
many times, perhaps EVERY pull, can be done like this. Zap ur diseases on the main target(which should nearly kill it) spread them with pestilence, then aoe as much as you can then BOOM AOE CC, wait for ur runes to come up while everythings cc'd still, blow shit up again with your aoes and then BOOM AOE CC again. Repeat till mobs are dead! :)
Now for single target stuff its pretty simple(most bosses this rotation is EASY to follow, and simple to maintain.
icy touch, plague strike, blood strike, blood strike, obliterate rune power dump(what this means is dump all ur runic power with your main runic power attack, in this instance it will be frost strike)
when ur runes come back up you'll have a couple blood runes turned death. Cast obliterate twice then reapply your diseases. (if you're taking too much dmg, use death strikes instead of obliterate, it still does good dmg and heals for a bit which helps a ton. Keep in mind rune tap uses up a blood rune, and in any point in ANY of your rotations, blood strike or blood boil can be replaced with a rune tap heal. Or in emergency cases, blood tap/rune tap (you can macro this to one key too btw) will save ur butt! :)
One of my favorite things to do is blow up bosses with major burst dmg, using army, ghoul, and empower rune weapon to do insane amounts of dps in short order.
for that type of pull i would cast my ghoul, then cast army of the dead, then horn of winter on ALL 5(this gives 10 extra rune power) then i would pull the boss. From here, cast your diseases, icy touch plague strike, then blood strike, IMMEDIATELY pop empower rune weapon(i use this on shift U across all my toons, it refreshes your runes instantly) and blow obliterate obliterate and 2 blood strikes. From here just spam frost strike till your dks dont have rune power up, then reapply diseases and deathstrike spam/runetap for heals and cast obliterate and blood strikes till you're runes go down then cast frost strikes fast as u can. REMEMBER keep those diseases up too, thats soooo important as it buffs your dmg and your healing strikes!.
This should give you guys a few ideas on how to pull/dps as frost /blood, and some tips that i've found to help out a ton when dpsing with dks in a multibox environment. :) if you have any questions, pm me, or visit moocrew on azgalor server horde side and i'll chat with you! :D
Good luck guys, keep pewpewing! :D
