1x Pal/4x Dk Vs 1xDru/4xSham - theorycrafting breakdown - let's talk some stuff

Having a bit of a dilemma here while leveling up my Shaman and would like some input.

I picked up a Druid for tanking dungeons and healing for PvP to go along with 4x enhancement Shaman. At 84 I queue'd up for a random bg and got AV last night. I did ok... something felt off. I think it was that it's a different playstyle because you have to run into the thick of it and in AV, it's just a giant cluster. It also didn't help that apparently people twink out characters even in the 80-84 bracket.. I mean holy shit just level to 90.
/rant

So for dungeon running the Druid/Shaman work very well, the offheals on the enhance seem to be enough to handle any dungeon with ease. I imagine a holy paladin with 1 dk tank and 3 dps dk is much the same. So they both win for dungeons, I'd probably put the pal/dk combo on a higher tier simply because it's the holy trinity setup. Pure healer / Pure tank / 3 dps.

For PvP the Shamans have a lot of their sleeves. Basically you can round robin it so the group has fear immunity for 30 seconds or more, and movement immunity for 30 seconds or more. Along with the ability to 1 shot every 3 min. This goes extremely well in arenas but as 5's from what I have read is not very active, it is a limited scene.

The DK's get many self fear breaks, a great group anti magic zone you can round robin. A much higher tier AoE ability, the Shamans is almost non existent. Can pull players towards you instead, or pull them out of the group.

I am really simplifying everything here and will probably break this down even further but just wanted others to chime in. I think these two combo's are the main players in the current form of the game.

It boils down to me - Enhancement better for Arenas. DK's better for everything else, and everything else is.. a lot.

I've been dominating in BGs with four enhancement shamans, even against the twinks. The enhancement have so much survivability that they have performed better than any other team I've ever played (I have not played DKs).

For PvE, unfortunately for some fights you need a magic dispel which means one shaman going resto for those specific boss fights. Otherwise, they haven't had any issues for me so far (early in MoP content to date). My pally team was better for PvE because pallies have even more passive healing, but either team can do just fine for PvE.

I dont know if DKs or shamans will be better for arena, but enhancement is the only spec we have seen so far that can global a toon. Personally, I think enhancement will be better for BGs, though DKs will be strong.

Thanks Owltoid, that's given me new hope. I think it is just the gear gap at the moment.

I should mention I'm running a Druid tank with the team. The Druid has only recently started doing BGs with the shaman, but that's just because of the 85-89 bracket I'm doing AV for leveling. I've made the decision to just run 4 in BGs (other than leveling) as I feel 5 is too many toons at once. Obviously for 40 man BGs it doesn't matter, but 4 toons is the absolute max for 10 mans, and I would argue that for 15 mans 5 toons in one spot is too much.

Not that it matters, but 4 enhancement shamans is the first time I could actually win in WSG. I could carry the flag and stay alive with massive healing support from my toons, or I could assault their flag carrier with some ease once popping cooldowns. Really the only class I have trouble with is resto Druids, but I think it's because I'm not effectively using purge. Once I get ascendance I will likely save it for those pesky druids.

More rambling: originally I thought I'd run my Druid as resto with the shamans. However, so far I haven't needed healing support in BGs. Arena will be different, and I may try to heal my own toons, but I'm guessing I'd be more successful with a solo healer.

I agree as well 5 characters in some bg's feels a little cramped when you can see it hurts the overall team. Easiest example is AB. The others you can get away with it more or less.

I'll stick it out though with this comp and get them to 90 at the least and re-evaluate from there. I do have a set of 4 dk's and 1 paladin mixed across a couple servers that would cost an arm and a leg to put on my current server, but it is there.

Damn iPhone.

4 toons BGs. Go enhancement
5 toons BGs, either.
4 toons arena. Go enhancement
5 toons arena, probably DKs and pally, but hasn't been proven yet.

raidwide freedom/fearbreak/stormlash/bloodlust/healing tide is much more worth in bgs than everything dks have

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Originally Posted by Kruschpakx4

raidwide freedom/fearbreak/stormlash/bloodlust/healing tide is much more worth in bgs than everything dks have

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But what compensates for howling blast? O.o lol

Here i go, I run 8dks and 2 heals or 7 and 3, but i run with our 15 boxer who runs 9 shamans (all enhance) and 6 heals. There hasnt been 1 bg that he has scored more killing blows than me in. I average 25-30 kb's on each of my characters per game, talking AV and Ioc of course. Death grip is still probably the best thing about the death knight as well as howling blast. So long as you got some heals you can do well in bgs because your killing stuff so fast with obliterate criting for around 100-120k even on fully gear opponents. Gorefiends grasp+remorsless winter (5 sec stun on all target within melee range) or desecrated ground (second pvp trinket). choose your poison. I love the Death knights. i have 7 shamans at 87 and i love off heals and support but the lack of Aoe is plain annoying. Arena i see the enhance slightly ahead only because of the near 100% guarantee of an insta-gib with ascendance.

Ill take 4 dks and a healer in a random bg and post my results. I 10 boxed the Temple map (idk remember the name but its the one with the 4 orbs) and was winning right till the end when they smartened up and just kited me but 10 v 10 i win simply because of the absurd damage and no escape because of death grip and chilblains. i cant see it being too terribly different with a 5 man team.

Might as well be talking about two different games with 10 or 15 boxing versus 4 or 5. Also, killing blows isn't the point of BGs. I'm sure most of us already have Bloodthirsty. Being kited around as a 10 boxer is exactly the reason to not have that many toons controlled by one person in BGs. Even if you're unkillable it doesn't help when you need to control multiple nodes.

I guess I just don't see the point in PvP with 10 or more. I'm always amazed at those who solo raid, but in PvP if you can't kill everything around due to sheer brute force and over healing with 10 or more toons then you have issues. A 4 or 5 man team is often outnumbered and that's where the multiboxing skill makes or breaks the fight. I don't understand how you can't see it being terribly different between 5 boxing and 10 boxing.

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Originally Posted by Ellay

It boils down to me - Enhancement better for Arenas. DK's better for everything else, and everything else is.. a lot.

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Yes... everything is quite a lot now. You have more BGs than ever, WG and TB at 90, daily quest hubs in MoP with constant action, constant world pvp in some areas (deepholm, blasted lands, probably others).

I am thoroughly enjoying my DKs at 90. Their uptime is near constant and although I don't have an instant kill, obliterate hits pretty hard and is not on a long cooldown. Pulling your enemies to you is always going to be better than chasing them even with a speed buff and immunity. I have 2 Asphyxiate (stun version of strangulate on a 1 minute CD) across the team to deal with troublemakers, and an nice aoe cc on a 1 minute (Gorefriend's Graspx1 + Remorseless Winterx4).

I don't know about burst on enhancement outside of Ascendance on a 3 minute cooldown. Compared to DKs it looks pretty mediocre. Self heals are nice but when you have to chase everyone down, and you're squishy, uptime is going to suffer.

For a 5 man team with healer most people seem to run paladin, whether they are best I don't know, but I get the impression not everyone evaluated the alternatives. I asked around and what I hear a lot is "they're all in plate" or "they can all be the same race". Oh, hammer/fist of justice is another one I hear a lot. If I want to stun and gib someone I can use asphyxiate :/

I don't have one at 90 so I'm going to try resto shaman or druid. I'm not quite setup to go over 5 box but I like the idea of 5x DK + 2-4x resto shaman. Windwalk totem, passive healing totems, and chain heal / ascendance / etc. would be extremely useful. I'll probably only use this in larger settings though - WG/TB, 40 man BGs, and world pvp.

I prefer to use a Pally as a healer because you can do pretty well just standing there with the pally dealing out those epic heals. You've got superb defensive cooldowns and most of your spells have a cast time, so you can sit there and cast while your melee dps tear stuff apart. I often top the healing charts in bgs, but thats probably cause ive got aoe healing going on 9 dks constantly. I did pally/x4 enh in early cata with reasonable success. Have you considered driving your shamans with a pally ellay?

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Originally Posted by EaTCarbS

I prefer to use a Pally as a healer because you can do pretty well just standing there with the pally dealing out those epic heals. You've got superb defensive cooldowns and most of your spells have a cast time, so you can sit there and cast while your melee dps tear stuff apart.

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I like the large punch heals a paladin has, but how does hard casting and long cast times benefit a multiboxing team? You have resto shaman somewhere in the middle, also with some hard hitting heals with a cast time, some instants, and a lot of cooldowns. Then resto druids with mostly instants, aoe healing, a lot of mobility, and incarnation (tree).

I guess instead of just wondering, I can try out the latter two right away as they're geared and ready to go. First thoughts are shaman will need peels (not a problem with DKs as the DPS though), and resto druids may lack big enough heals to prevent death on a target that's being focused. But I guess I'll find out.

For PvE, pretty much either composition is going to be fine in 5-man content.
I don't know how well the Enhance works, as I've not played that composition... and I haven't done much PvE (aside from Leveling and Playing the AH) in the last 2-3 years...

If there is not an enrage mechanic, 4x Blood with 1x Heals can do anything and it is rather trivial.
At least as far as pull size, number of mobs on you, etc.
If you need to control a vehicle or whatever, that's going to make class choice and class abilities irrelevant.
Last expansion, I'd think more people ran 4x Blood then 1x Blood and 3x Frost/Unholy, along with their healer... at least that was the impression, from those who are active on the forums.

I'd imagine 4x Shaman and a Tank is going to be fine as well.
You could spec one of the Shaman as Resto, and suddenly you have a Holy Trinity too.



For PvP...

I don't know that much about Enhance...
I do know that 5-box anything else, generally (almost every time) loses very quickly to boxed DK teams... but your metrics against another boxer is less important than how you do against non-boxed opposition that you encounter ~200x more often.

The Pally/4x DKs...

You have Obliterate, which hits really hard if the target has diseases on them (which you can apply with Outbreak).
You can spread your diseases with Blood Boil (and the Tier 1 Talent).

You have Howling Blast, which is 30 yard range.
It applies Frost Fever to everyone within 10 yards of the primary target.
With Chillblains, anyone with Frost Fever is snared.
Howling Blast doesn't hit a 90, nearly as hard as it hit 85s (in relation to their health)... but it still is AoE/Melee Cleave, which is huge to have and an immense issue if your composition doesn't have it.
I had my Howling Blast set to round-robin Chains of Ice (on one DK) and Howling Blast on the others... that way, even if one was dead, the kill target was basically constantly rooted.

Death Grip basically makes your team permanently immune to every Snare/Root effect in the game... as whether you move or not, the target comes to you.
With four Death Grips, and the glyph that refreshes the ability when you kill something that offers experience or honor, you basically have unlimited uses.

Icy Touch, with the glyph is purge; so both compositions have this.

The DKs have a lot of defensive cooldowns.
- Anti-Magic Shell makes you immune to anything that gives a debuff icon, for the 5 seconds it is up.
- Pillar of Frost makes you immune to knockback effects.
- Lichborne makes you immune (and breaks you out of) Fear/Charm/Sleep effects.
- Icebound Fortitude makes you immune to Stuns (and can break you out of them).
- Combined with a Trinket, that is two breaks of many effects which quickly brings into play Diminishing Returns.

At 90th, Desecrated Ground is an 8 second/2min CD immunity to Loss of Control effects too.
But you can also take the AoE stun, which with multiple DKs is applied much faster.

If you glyph your Pillar of Frost, it roots you but makes you immune to all 'Loss of Control Effects', for the duration.
You can macro it.... /cast PoF and /Cancelaura PoF... which is an extra trinket on a 1 min timer.
If you do, you are giving up the bonus STR from PoF.

That is a very nice compilation of what I figured DK's brought to the table. It seems the nice things about them have improved so much since 80.

For Obliterate does it have to be that specific DK's diseases up to gain the bonus or when you apply it or on 4x DK they won't be able to dispel them fast enough?

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Originally Posted by djensen2010

But what compensates for howling blast? O.o lol

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why do you need a compensation for howling blast in the first place? if you got 4 dks you cant really oneshot groups of people with howling blast so I'd rather have focus damage because sooner or later you will face some healers

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Originally Posted by djensen2010

Arena i see the enhance slightly ahead only because of the near 100% guarantee of an insta-gib with ascendance.

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and because dks die within 5 seconds after ams expires in 5s (most like because chaos wave), sooner if melee cleave

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Originally Posted by Ellay

For Obliterate does it have to be that specific DK's diseases up to gain the bonus or when you apply it or on 4x DK they won't be able to dispel them fast enough?

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It's per DK so you apply them all with outbreak, or make it simply and pop unholy blight which will AoE apply both diseases every second. You get an additional 12.5% damage per disease. The big thing is killing machine procs which guarantees a crit, but there's not much you can do about that since it's a random proc. A few DKS will usually have it up.

Outside of your very few offensive (burst) abilities to increase damage... your damage is consistent and normally not enough to force healers to oom in the time it takes them to kill you after you've AMS'd. In 5's you basically need to AMS offensively a majority of the time or to avoid ring of frost (which is instant now so that isn't really all that possible). As multiple dks in arena if they have a single frost mage and any other burst class you can be killed before your paladin can trinket/bubble to heal you.

With shaman you get an instantgib and possibly a second instant gib if you aren't CC'd fast enough or they do it at the wrong time in which case you win.

Dk's in general right now aren't all that strong and require specific compositions to do well. They are not a class that can be stacked to become more effective right now. Dk's for the group get nothing other than silence + grip + AOE freeze which you can easily get out of.

Shaman get grounding totem for anti-cc (need ams/lichborne for this), get anti-fear (lichborne) that can be done round-robin which makes fears useless, AOE damage increase, AOE freedom, Heals, Two forms of CC (stun, hex).

DK burst being on 1 sec GCD per ability can be a big deal since oblit hits so hard... but if they get bop'd and have a bunch of things on them even glyphed it will be hard to get it off (unlike shaman with double purge).

Shaman have more survivability as a GROUP, on an individual basis because of pet sac you have more on the dk (but you will die in 5 seconds anyway).

If you plan on doing bgs either works, dks are stronger IMO because of the cleave damage but the increase in damage to that skill over time will not be proportional to the amount of health you will see in later seasons where as enhance shaman's 1 shot really isn't going to change.

Shaman are also one of the only offhealers that make a difference now because of the glyph for maelstrom weapon.


Like i've said before and will continue to say... if you want to do really well in arena play a multi-class comp with control, burst and play with other people... if you want to play yourself with no one to help then do bgs on dks+hpal IMO.