So who's going for deathknight main tank in WOTLK?

Currently, my main account has an epiced out 70 hunter.. and then I have 4 additional accounts where my shaman reside.
I will definitely get them all to level (edit) 80, then level a deathknight on my hunter account.. so that I can have a heavy tank for instances at 80..

EPIC! Your thoughts on this matter? Any idea if there are any synergy openings for deathknight + elemshams?

My current situation is that I often have to search for a tank to do heroics with.. which I absolutely hate. The reason I started multiboxing was to never have to depend on anyone else to do the stuff I want, and now I depend on them to do heroics.. bleh! Really looking forward to pimping out a deathknight with tanking gear.

Also.. any AOE tanking ideas/specs for deathknight?

My 1st set of 80 will be: Shaman, Shaman, Pally, Shaman, Mage.

My 2nd set of 80 will be: Rogue, Priest, Shaman Warrior, and Pally

Maybe the 3rd set of 80 will have a DK.

The DK seems a good choice, most of all because they start out at lvl 55. According to blue posts, all the tanking classes will be viable heroic tanks with the right spec/gear. Since we don't really know how the DK will end up, it's difficult to say, however what makes the paladin shine in tanking for multiboxers is that it doesn't require a lot of micromanagement. I don't know whether this is true for the DK or not, but I'm guessing the answer to the question is closely related to whether it'll require a lot of micromanagement or not.

I understand that Blizzard has the intention to make many DK specs viable for tanking, so hopefully there is one that, while perhaps being sub-optimal, will provide simplistic thread generation and a fair amount of AoE threat.

People are implying that Blizzard is trying to remedy the current lack of 5-man tanks by making most of the DK talent trees viable for tanking.. so there will probably be a blood-oriented tank spec, along with frost- and unholy-oriented ones.

Maybe all it takes is proper tanking gear, and pretty much any DK spec will work as long as you have a fair amount of healing.

I think DK will be the best tank out there. The reason that i say this is because Blizz stated that DK will be a tanking class. With that Blizz will make every attempt to make it the best tank out there. But i do think that it will need a lot of micro managing.

The reason Paladins are the perferred MB tanking class is due to the minialization of micromanagement as has already been stated in this thread. The REASON paladins require so little micromanagement is for one simple reason....Consecration. DKs will have Death & Decay and imho the effectiveness of it in a tanking situtation will largely determine how much micromanagement they require while tanking. Warriors TC is also getting boosted WOTLK so who knows they may not even be such a pita to tank with while MB'ing either.

Not having a single beta key unlike some of the lucky punks in these forums I have not been able to test any of this out on my own :P

I think the deep Unholy tree has the best AoE tanking potential with diseases and death & decay etc.

Also, found a GREAT elemental shaman synergy talent: Ebon Plague [wowhead].

Unless I see something really compelling between now and WotLK, I'm not planning to create any DeathKnights at all until my raiding character and at least one of my teams is level 80.

Then, when the furour has died down, and every man and his dog has one, I'll give it a shot myself.

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Originally Posted by 'Tdog',index.php?page=Thread&postID=103514#post103 514

The reason Paladins are the perferred MB tanking class is due to the minialization of micromanagement as has already been stated in this thread. The REASON paladins require so little micromanagement is for one simple reason....Consecration. DKs will have Death & Decay and imho the effectiveness of it in a tanking situtation will largely determine how much micromanagement they require while tanking. Warriors TC is also getting boosted WOTLK so who knows they may not even be such a pita to tank with while MB'ing either.

Not having a single beta key unlike some of the lucky punks in these forums I have not been able to test any of this out on my own :P

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Death and decay has to be targeted much like blizzard for mages. Dunno how much micromanagement you would actually wanna do ect.

But D&D is not channeled, right?

Blizzard:

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In any case, I have tried to say on a few occasions that the goal is NOT that a DK can be awesome at dps and tanking with any spec. The goal is that not every DK tank needs to use the same tree. To be a MT, a death knight will have to pick up tanking talents -- you probably need 16-20, and possibly even more.

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Originally Posted by 'magwo',index.php?page=Thread&postID=103562#post10 3562

But D&D is not channeled, right?

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Correct, D&D is not channeled.

When TBC first came out druids were the absolute best tanks due to high threat generation. Then a few weeks later Blizzard bug fixed them. People started noticing how crazy good Paladin tanks were, but not right away (Paladin tanks needed some gear, they couldn't just walk into Ramparts with the pre-TBC stuff).

The point is, its impossible to say now who will be the best for level 80 heroics, and we will not know until a few weeks/months after WOTLK is out. Maybe that 1 single 100 badge level 80 item will make one class way better. Maybe the right combo of talent and profession will make another better.

And as pointed out, the best for heroics is not necessarily the same as the best for multiboxers. We want something with high threat and little micromanagement - warriors can make awesome tanks, but they are far from ideal for multiboxers due to the micromanagement required.

Me personally, I have a 70 paladin, 70 warrior, leveling a druid, and then gonna level a DK when wotlk is out. That way, no matter who the best is, I'll be ready :)

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Originally Posted by 'puppychow',index.php?page=Thread&postID=103586#po st103586

Maybe that 1 single 100 badge level 80 item will make one class way better. Maybe the right combo of talent and profession will make another better.

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My beat is on the priest.

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Originally Posted by 'puppychow',index.php?page=Thread&postID=103586#po st103586

Me personally, I have a 70 paladin, 70 warrior, leveling a druid, and then gonna level a DK when wotlk is out. That way, no matter who the best is, I'll be ready :)

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You don't have a priest :P


All kidding aside you never know a lock might be a good tank too? With there morph ability. I can see this being key in a raid (like how you need a lock now to kill illian), but blizz already said that they will not make an instance where you have to have this class. Well i bet you can do illian without a lock, but it just makes it easier. I can see a 10 man where room is limited, but with a 25 man, chances are that you have every class in that mix.

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Originally Posted by 'puppychow',index.php?page=Thread&postID=103586#po st103586

When TBC first came out druids were the absolute best tanks due to high threat generation. Then a few weeks later Blizzard bug fixed them. People started noticing how crazy good Paladin tanks were, but not right away (Paladin tanks needed some gear, they couldn't just walk into Ramparts with the pre-TBC stuff).

The point is, its impossible to say now who will be the best for level 80 heroics, and we will not know until a few weeks/months after WOTLK is out. Maybe that 1 single 100 badge level 80 item will make one class way better. Maybe the right combo of talent and profession will make another better.

And as pointed out, the best for heroics is not necessarily the same as the best for multiboxers. We want something with high threat and little micromanagement - warriors can make awesome tanks, but they are far from ideal for multiboxers due to the micromanagement required.

Me personally, I have a 70 paladin, 70 warrior, leveling a druid, and then gonna level a DK when wotlk is out. That way, no matter who the best is, I'll be ready :)

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Yes, but WOTLK is in beta.. and we can already draw tons of conclusions about general threat mechanics and aggro management with deathknights. They are not going to completely remake DK talent trees, so the current trees are well suited for contemplating how to best use your upcoming DK as a multiboxer.

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Originally Posted by 'magwo',index.php?page=Thread&postID=103597#post10 3597

Yes, but WOTLK is in beta.. and we can already draw tons of conclusions about general threat mechanics and aggro management with deathknights. They are not going to completely remake DK talent trees, so the current trees are well suited for contemplating how to best use your upcoming DK as a multiboxer.

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Even if the tree doesn't get changed from beta to release, they will be changed the first month. Just hopefully non of the talents in the tree make a huge difference. Don't forget that the other classes had have some major changes sense the original release of WoW, would it be safe to say that only 50% or less of the original talents remain? Those classes are been around for some time now, and dk is new so the first couple of months you will see nerfs and buffs like crazy. I think it was when they introduced the new talent tree before BC came out. It seemed like every week i got a free respec.

I'm pretty excited about the idea of a DK/4 Ele Shaman set.
When I rolled into TBC, I brought my shaman over instead of my warrior because I figured they were more self-sufficient (and I only had one Beta key). I got bored of playing my solo Resto shaman in Northrendville, so I switched to my horde shaman who was level 65ish. I had SO much fun running Ramparts and Blood Furnace with 4 DKs, day after day, and it was worth switching to resto for a while so I could keep Spirit Link on them.
But to answer what people are talking about, they have this mad crazy parallel of that stupid Consecration thing Pallies do: Desecration.
Granted, it's a 5-point talent, but once you see it activate (the ground cracks and turns blood red, and dozens of skeletal arms come out and start groping everything) you'll see it provides a great benefit for your tank and your team. It requires a little set-up and planning ahead. Combine with D&D's "High amount of threat" and the fact they can just Death Grip any stray aggro back to them without moving, and you've got something that's more likeable than a pawadin consakwayshun.
-Brandubh McBooty

MT DK frost

4 DK blood for dps and healing

its a plan don't how it will work

As I understand it so far, the Death Knight starting area is instanced somehow - meaning we might not be able to bring in a higher toon to powerlevel them.

So my current plan is to make four Death Knights (all dps to level with) on my four accounts, and run them as a team through that starting area. They ought to level pretty quickly.

Edit: As far as using one as my main tank - when the DK matches my Paladin, I'll then figure out which I like tanking better on. (E.g. Which is easiest to control mobs in instances with while multiboxing them.)

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Originally Posted by 'Tdog',index.php?page=Thread&postID=103514#post103 514

The reason Paladins are the perferred MB tanking class is due to the minialization of micromanagement as has already been stated in this thread. The REASON paladins require so little micromanagement is for one simple reason....Consecration.

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Well, consecration is a biggie, but being able to front-load threat with a full mana pool is a big advantage over a warrior or druid, especially with trigger happy party members. Since spell damage boosts most threat sources significantly and stacks with righeous fury, and it's available on virtually every piece of gear, threat management is simple. Also, since holy damage cannot be mitigated by anything short of magic immunity/buff/debuffs, it's the best source of dealing damage/threat.
Just look at the list of protection paladin benefits:
Threat Multiplier: Righeous Fury with talent improvement (+90% threat from holy damage).
Global threat Increaser: Avenging Wrath (+30% increased damage for 20s every 3 min)
Single target threat increaser: Judgement of the Crusader
Single target thread stacker: Seal of Vengeance + Reckoning
AoE returned damage: Retribution Aura
AoE skill: Consecration
Passive block returned damage: Blessing of Sanctuary, Shield Spike (physical dmg)
Semi-active block returned damage: Holy Shield
The fact that nearly all of these stack, many are enhanced by +spell damage, and all can be used at the same time with relatively little work makes a paladin tank worth playing. They're all great reasons for playing a paladin tank as a multiboxer. How much better of an opener can you get than Ret Aura, Righteous Fury, Blessing of Sanctuary, Seal of Crusader, Avenging Wrath, Avenger's Shield, Judgement of Crusader, Consecration, Seal of Vengeance, Holy Shield to open an attack on a group of mobs or just a boss? From the time Avenging Wrath is cast to Holy Shield, around 5 seconds will have passed with a massive amount of threat already on the targeted and surrounding mobs. You'll still have 15 more seconds (about 1.5 consecrations) of Avenging Wrath to continue building massive threat.. sometimes, it seems unbalanced. :)

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Originally Posted by 'Kulzor',index.php?page=Thread&postID=103658#post1 03658

As I understand it so far, the Death Knight starting area is instanced somehow - meaning we might not be able to bring in a higher toon to powerlevel them.

So my current plan is to make four Death Knights (all dps to level with) on my four accounts, and run them as a team through that starting area. They ought to level pretty quickly.

Edit: As far as using one as my main tank - when the DK matches my Paladin, I'll then figure out which I like tanking better on. (E.g. Which is easiest to control mobs in instances with while multiboxing them.)

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Yes, the DK starting zone is instanced because it takes place in the past before EPL was completely overrun. You MUST complete the events there to move on.

I honestly don't think that its going to matter come expansion what tanking class you are. I've read a number of blue posts that says they will still all have unique abilities, but they are leveling the playing field for all tanks.

Warriors, Druids, and DKs will have equal AoE abilities to Consecrate
Paladins, Druids, and DKs will have oh shit buttons equal to Last Stand
Druids armor on items is getting greatly reduced to make their armor more in line with the other tanks.

They don't want to make 1 tank required.. such as , why use anything else if you have a prot Paladin for Hyjal. Or why use anything but a druid on a hard hitting mob like Tidewalker.

Be interesting to see how they handle it, but what I've heard that I do not agree with is how a DK doesn't have to choose a specific talent tree to be a tank. They can cherry pick from any of the trees and do just fine as a tank which baffles me. So their Blood line, tanks as well as Frost or Unholy? doesn't matter? Just weird... :thumbdown:

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Originally Posted by 'TheBigBB',index.php?page=Thread&postID=103697#pos t103697

Yes, the DK starting zone is instanced because it takes place in the past before EPL was completely overrun. You MUST complete the events there to move on.

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I think that they did this so on PvP servers people cannot camp there the day of the release with there lvl 70 and take out the toons as soon as they spawn. Or a lvl 80 after a month.

Oh, you don't need to PL them through that starting area. (Nor can you enter as it takes place in the past) It's a really fun and fast-paced quest line, and a lot of it isn't grinding or killing as much as pure fun quests.
Sure they start at 55, but before they're even allowed out into the real world they're 57.999 at the lowest. (kinda a pain when you leave the starter area, enter a zone, and DING from discovery experience)
Yeah if you wanna run 4 or 5 at the same time I could see that as feasible. I only remember one or two collection quests.
If you've got a mage with TP: Shatt or a warlock set up you could probably make a few thousand gold a day just charging 10g per port (and they'll have the 10g as a result of their starter quests too, and probably gladly hand it over)

Pala > DK

I've got a 72 DK in the beta.

They're not ideal for AOE tanking. Better than wars/druids, worse than pallies.

They're more DPS than tankadins, but squishier.

I think they do better on short boss fights though. And definitely better against caster bosses.

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Originally Posted by 'Morx',index.php?page=Thread&postID=103709#post103 709

Be interesting to see how they handle it, but what I've heard that I do not agree with is how a DK doesn't have to choose a specific talent tree to be a tank. They can cherry pick from any of the trees and do just fine as a tank which baffles me. So their Blood line, tanks as well as Frost or Unholy? doesn't matter? Just weird... :thumbdown:

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What Blizz means is that they can tank 5-mans easily enough as any spec, just like they want ret palys and arms wars (fury too, but it'll be harder) to do the same.

For raids you'll have to spec tank to get anywhere as a tank, but they don't want either of the 4 class tanks to be required to progress.

That makes sense, and I guess it is a good thing. I kind of liked the fact that warriors couldn't do it all, and either could pallies, and either could druids. With them all being the same, whats stopping a guild from running Warriors only?

I see some false, but very ingrained stigma's regarding what a class can or rather, can not do arising from this.

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Originally Posted by 'magwo',index.php?page=Thread&postID=103445#post10 3445

Currently, my main account has an epiced out 70 hunter.. and then I have 4 additional accounts where my shaman reside.
I will definitely get them all to level (edit) 80, then level a deathknight on my hunter account.. so that I can have a heavy tank for instances at 80..

EPIC! Your thoughts on this matter? Any idea if there are any synergy openings for deathknight + elemshams?

My current situation is that I often have to search for a tank to do heroics with.. which I absolutely hate. The reason I started multiboxing was to never have to depend on anyone else to do the stuff I want, and now I depend on them to do heroics.. bleh! Really looking forward to pimping out a deathknight with tanking gear.

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Ill probably make an all DK team just to annoy all the people who will be crying about DKs.

I might just use a warrior tank come WOTLK because they're getting an AOE bleed skill which should help them keep aggro.