Unable to destroy Sam Deathwalker (yet)

[Spin]

I guess you didn't actually check the points I put :-) this is a respec and there is a very good reason to take those 10 points in blood and 5 in frost... Let see if you can figure it out :-)

Admittedly I didn't look very closely at your build, so I will conceed I didn't see you were specifically boosting DnD via AP--even though you wrote that. I was a bit harried at work.

Butchery is for the runic power, I assume to launch the gargolye? I'm guessing that you chose to put the 3 points in Subversion for the crit strike on bloodstrike and Obliterate, but I'm not a big fan of Bladed armor--even if you are getting 148 AP from it. Though since you are specfically synergizing for DnD, it makes sense now. Frost is for the armor boost. The armor isn't going to be much help vs spells, but it's to boost bladed armor, hence AP, hence DnD.

BTW, you are human... why use an axe? Don't humans get +5 expertise with swords? Not that 5 expertise is gonna matter all that much in the present, but eventually it will cut down on dodges and parries on the pally. Prot pallies can be a real bitch to kill considering that they can cleanse themself and they have a lot of dodge/parry mitigation. Well, assumign they are specc'd properly that is.

irrelevant - the reason I have that axe is it's the best AP item I have - expertise is irrelevant when fighting toons several level lower

My question is not irrelevant--I asked why. I was looking at it from a long term perspective(ie that you would be fighting Sam at level 62 for quite a long time) rather than a Build-specific perspective(ie that the axe has AP for DnD). I was going to point out that Sam might be several levels lower now, BUT eventually he will level---and then I read his plan for leveling 6 mages. I'll conceed your point here.

Anyway, we need to look the fact we(well you) are facing 25 shammies and a pally. Shammies do Nature and Fire damage, Pallies do Holy damage, so we need ways to mitigate both. We need to be able to kill many quickly and eliminate/mitigate incoming damage. Right now you have a 15-20ish level difference and the fact that there isn't a lot of low level +hit gear. We also need to consider that we have to be on top of the target to do the maximum amount of damage which means that we have to deal with PBAoEs(Player Based AoEs).

the pally is irrelevant; he could hit me for 1/2h and not kill me...

Again, I was going to point out when he reaches a higher level... but of course, that might take a bit with the 6 mages....

I'm looking some stuff and crosschecking a few things. I'll have a real build at some point, but tentatively I have:
http://www.wowhead.com/?talent=jZbxZfMhIxck0xqocou

Make sure that you are plague striking and then DnDing. PS + desecration will add 5% damage plus its a snare. Icy touch then pestilence to spread DK herpes through his ranks. Make sure that you have the DnD Glyph that adds +damage--too bad it isn't an AoE fear anymore, otherwise you'd be lol'ing him. Don't worry about the speed boost talents, you have the epic ground which travels faster than anything else in azeroth. I need to work Reaping into the build and there are few other key points that I missed.

Thats all for now.

if not putting the 10+5 I have in blood/frost - then a deep unholy to get Unholy blight would be a must - your spec doesn't have it - I used to have a deep unholy but coming in contact to apply desecrate, etc... is a risky proposition and maximizing DnD is better (which is my build)

I was looking at the attack differently so I started building based on using diseases in addition to DnD for damage.

Admittedly, I've only played a 32/39 DW unholy DK and a Blood DPS Spec DK. The animation for unholy blight is incredibly annoying to me, so I didn't read what it did too carefully--like I mentioned, the build was tenative and I was still looking b/c I was unhappy with my first go. My spec was built with the idea of charging in, spreading the diseases, dropping a DnD and then fading. Since 40ish shammies don't have much in the way of health(and Sam seems to not be healing through it and no way to dispell it.), I was thinking that Blood Boil would be a good use of randomly exploding members of his team. Also, Descrations 5% damage + Ebon plague's 13% increase to spell damage are nice DnD/ Disease/ Bloodboil boosters. The snare would also keep the herd stuck in DnD for a bit longer as well.

On a pale horse is also a sam special : I spend considerable amount of time running around searching for him
Likewise once on foot, any speed advantage is vital -

Ok, I can see the reasoning behind that. I didn't bother with the speed talents b/c I thought that perhaps you were scouting for him in a different fashion. IMO, I get there when I get there and I'd rather use those 4 points to squeeze more damage. Also, I didn't realize that On a Pale horse is a 20% stun duration reducer. If you are using the build to stay at range and to hit and fade, then I see why you want them.

so I think you're wrong on all counts so far :-) keep trying though :-)

Not wrong, just looking at the situation through different glasses. Anyway, I *think* that I understand what you are doing--its foreign to how I would use a death knight, but I find it interesting. You are using hit and run tactics and harassing with DnD?

Regardless, I am viewing this thread as a very nice learning experience.

More screenshots imo. Maybe I'll jump into the fray at some point myself!

[Moorea]

Yes in short I use that DK as ranged AOE caster :-) If blizz allowed creation of level 55 mage on any realm, I would probably have used that to solo kill Sam instead of DK :-)

The first 5 points in blood are mostly just to get to the next 5 to get AP ; it stacks with the frost toughness -> more armor -> bladed armor -> more ap -> impurity -> more spell power - but yes while picking the first 5, runic power gen and some crit is better than parry

And yes I think the pale horse; in addition to helping scan zones faster (what else could I use to find sam than /target and running around - beside asking in /1 if anyone saw him that is...) also helps for the fire nova and thunderstomp stuns (at least I guess it does - I haven't timed it...)


ps: my other dks are BE for shadow meld (surprise graveyard ganking) and nature resist (lightning bolt) - and on all 3 I took the nature resist back amongst the 3 choices - there is a lot of method in my madness :-)

[Sam DeathWalker]

I dont see a need for horses now, gw is good enough. I just kill as I go ... so on my way to wherever I am going I pick up herbs, minerals and kills mobs ... So mounted dosnet really benifit me a lot as when I cast Im off the mount...

As I am always killing Im thinking to just enchant my boots with some speed benifit (its not a lot I know). Im makeing 100g a day now from AH ... how much more will I be makeing when I am getting better materials and higher level items?

One thing it seeems to me that although it seems resonable the fact is I level faster now then I did at the lower levels. Yes technically you have to kill more mobs per level as you get higher, true enough. But your ability to kill mobs (at least with 26 guys) goes up just as fast or faster then the amount you have to kill extra. I have zero mana downtime now, that wasnt the case at the low levels, I can heal and kill aoe style, which wasnt the case either, its almost impossible to die with even 10-15 mobs pull. I have more flight paths and because I am home at sath I get places way faster then I used to. Fewer people can attack me as I get higher. I have less problems with gold.

I'v gotten up to 2000 exp at level 45 in a single 10 mob kill.. and able to kill another 7 about 1 minute later. Like I say I pulling about 60K exp per hour on 4 guys at the same time.

Maybe for your style of play higher levels are slower, but for my style of pbaoeing everything I come accross, with 26 toons, its better for me.

I have over 10 guys at 45 now, I think 46 is going to allow me to heal through stuff.

[glo]

Yes in short I use that DK as ranged AOE caster :-) If blizz allowed creation of level 55 mage on any realm, I would probably have used that to solo kill Sam instead of DK :-)

The first 5 points in blood are mostly just to get to the next 5 to get AP ; it stacks with the frost toughness -> more armor -> bladed armor -> more ap -> impurity -> more spell power - but yes while picking the first 5, runic power gen and some crit is better than parry

And yes I think the pale horse; in addition to helping scan zones faster (what else could I use to find sam than /target and running around - beside asking in /1 if anyone saw him that is...) also helps for the fire nova and thunderstomp stuns (at least I guess it does - I haven't timed it...)


ps: my other dks are BE for shadow meld (surprise graveyard ganking) and nature resist (lightning bolt) - and on all 3 I took the nature resist back amongst the 3 choices - there is a lot of method in my madness :-)

Dk get more reliable aoe in 3.1

Blood Boil does aoe damage and added damage for diseases on the ptr.

[RobinGBrown]

I have the zehvra mounts on all. I have 500gold to spend and make 100g or so each day just selling stuff I get from killz.

100g a day on crappy lvl 40ish drops ? Either you're managing to farm a lot more than I give you credit for or you're lying about where you get gold from.

[Sam DeathWalker]

I kill a LOT of mobs, how many mobs do you need to kill before you get a purple to drop? I loot everything, and I sell everything, consumables like that cheese lol. Plus I make things with my 200ish skills in all trades and use/sell or disenchant those and sell the disenchant stuff. And as I grow out of a trade skill Ill sell the lower level stuffs, like a dust that is to low for me.

If I was buying gold I would have like 50,000 not 500.

Some guy paid me 140 gold for 7 maps to this:

http://www.wowhead.com/?item=9265#contains:0-14+1

He wanted at pattern or recipe, which is so valuable?

[Lokked]

Pre-50 mobs, I believe epic world drops (the 2 or 3 that there are) have a 1 in 10,000 chance from normal mobs and maybe 3 times as much from instance mobs.

In bringing 3 chars to 60 pre-BC, I received 1 BoE Epic from a lvl 55 mob in WPL.

[Moorea]

Now sam has 5 mages and he still doesn't quest... they'd be way past level 20 by now if he was questing, but he is just killing random mobs, very slowly, and dying a lot (if you can imagine that it's possible for 5 man to die - it is for sam...) he only is level 11...

[Sam DeathWalker]

Once the 4 are 17 Ill raf grant them to level 44ish. That'll be the end of all my left over raf level grants, and Ill have 4 mages to go with my crew. Two more will be a raf pair that I'll instance boost later.

kInda doing an interesting trick. Because I have 5 accounts feeding my main account I am putting the 4 mages on the main account. So what Im doing is grouping the mage from the main account with 4 others and then keeping the main account mage but just using the 4 others to grant levels to the mages on the main account, and then will delete the 4 others (they will be at level 17 so no loss). Then when I have 4 level 17's on the main account Ill use the level 44 shaman (who have not granted anything since level 22), on the 5 linked accounts, to grant all their rafs to the 4 level 17 mages taking them all the way to 44ish!

At level 10ish I kill like 4 mobs every minute (or faster) for about 320 exp X 5 toons per minute. I really dont see questing as doing any better. Its only been like one day of real time and Im at level 11 already.

[Zub]

not to burst your bubble, but playing a toon alone (not boxing) from start to level 10 takes about 1,5-2hour max.
2(or 5) toons with triple xp should take about 45-50 minutes to ding 10. add at most another half hour if you don't know your way around at all.

at lower levels it takes 3 quests to ding with triple xp