Maintenance Day Musings - What are Death Knights?

The first of many of my Tuesday editorials is here, and I'm starting the habit of this blogging schedule, plan, theory, thing, with a look back at my roots.

Recently, on a random, somewhat nostalgic whim, and hopped over to a random server where I had parked some cute level 1-6 alts, and rolled a Death Knight. This was born largely out of a desire to see the starting zone again. Back in Wrath, when everyone and their uncle was rolling a Death Knight, there was a good reason for it. The starting zone. At the time, it was the best questing zone in the game (don't try and tell me Northrend was better – it wasn't. At least not in my opinion).

Although a lot of time has gone by, and Cataclysm has been released (with it, all-new starting zones, which are all excellent as well), this zone still stands up. I'll always have a special place in my heart for that starting zone, the place where everything began. I fondly remember when I finally got my druid to 55. I immediately ran up and started a Death Knight (Theloral, my current main). And I was transported to a sort of immersion I'd never really experienced in WoW before – especially having never played anything past Old World (remember, my druid had only just hit 55).

“A hero, that's what you once were.” Those words started me off on one of the coolest quest chains in the history of WoW, or certainly in the time I've been playing (basically since late BC – early Wrath). It was epic, engaging, and one hell of a good time. Playing through as a slave to the Lich King, eventually breaking free... it was everything I'd hoped for the from the zone, and then some. And that zone is, really, what initially hooked me on the class.

The Not-So Humble Beginnings

Back in the day, when DKs were first released, there was a huge uproar in the community. The introduction of a “Hero Class” had totally unbalanced the game. A massive stream of newly created Death Knights flooded the realms, basking in complete, and utterly overpowered facerolling. New DKs didn't have to be “good” at the their class. They had to know how to mash buttons, and how to pwn. The result was that the class got an extremely bad reputation.

The Hero Class didn't mean veteran players were taking in the rewards of all their toils. It didn't mean the best players from BC had converted (though presumably, plenty did). It meant that anyone with the time to level to 55 (yours truly included) could hop into the game, and be almost indestructible.

Blizzard quickly learnt the lesson that WoW's first Hero Class had been, to put it gently – a mistake. It wasn't fair to set one class apart from the others, in terms of in-game power, and making Death Knights stronger than everybody else, was just plain dumb. Soon, DKs were nerfed into the ground (it was sad, but it needed to be done), and those early pioneers of the class were left playing just a normal class, like everyone else. In fact, since that initial wave of being completely OP, Death Knights as a whole have been on the lower end of the spectrum.

Even when I finally hit 80, during the end of Ulduar, I frequently got told by players “Wow, you play a DK. They're OP. You're a noob.” It was a ridiculous statement because, by that point certainly, DKs really weren't OP anymore. I would generally gently point to the paladins sitting in a corner, cackling madly while they facerolled everything and everyone, but that's really a story for another time.

Without our status as a “Hero Class” (the name remained yes, but for all intents and purpose, DKs became just a normal class), many players wondered back their old mains, and the DK populations diminished. They became just as common as any other class, and the die-hard DKs that stuck around may have felt a little bit confused, as to the identity of their class.

Class Identity

Since the dawn of fantasy gaming, there have always been certain understood principles. The big warrior guy in heavy armour protects the little gnome wizard shooting fireballs at the baddies from behind his back. The cleric/priest/whatever heals the big, armoured guy, and keeps everyone alive. Behind the baddie, there's also probably a rogue knifing him in the back, and maybe a couple other general groups of character standing around hitting the bad guy as well. It's a standard concept, and it's always worked in the past. The priest heals, the warrior tanks, the rogue knifes people in the back.

Having an idea of what your class is is extremely important to a game like WoW. Players want to feel unique. They want to be able to do something really cool, that no one else can do, and to stand proudly back and say “Yeah, bitch, I just dropped a totem on your ass. Cause I'm a shaman. Suck it.” They want to be able to turn into bears, cats, and demented sea lions and then rub in the faces of the other lowly non-druids who are always stuck looking the same. They want to be able to stand in the middle of the line of fire of some giant's fist, and take because they're warriors. You get the picture.

Necromancer type classes have been common in fantasy RPGs since the beginning, and most people were thrilled to see them coming to WoW. But after the initial nerf bat hit the class, many players questioned what exactly they were supposed to be doing. What exactly was the point of Death Knights.

The Point

Death Knights might not be the most overpowered class in the game, anymore. We might just be average schmucks off the street, but despite the lack of pure power, DKs are still unique. Sure, popping army of the dead won't wipe a raid of the opposite faction's players. And yeah, maybe the sky doesn't rupture every time we swing our axes.

But, we're still the only class in the game who can reanimate players. We're still the only class in the game who get to bust out ghouls. We're still the only glass in the game to get to use swirling bones as shields. Nobody else can pull a hunter across the map to themselves, then pin him to the ground with some ice, and proceed to beat his face in. And, last time I checked, no one else can summon an undead army just for kicks.

Death Knights are tanks. We're melee dps. We're PvPers, and we're badass. Can lots of other classes say that? Yes, and especially so in a world where class homogenization is becoming more and more part of the game. But no one else can say it the same way we can.

We're Death Knights. We control zombies, and we smash face. We take hits, and wear a lot of skulls as fashion statements. And can mister tree-hugging druid over there say the same thing?

I don't think so.

4.0.6 Updates - While I was gone...

I'm back. Yes, I realize that that probably comes as a surprise to some of my readers. I left essentially without any prior notice, and didn't upload for over a month. There were no updates, and to be honest, I haven't even been checking site traffic, or reading comments, like a good blogger should. The reason? Life got extremely busy, and I've barely had the time to log into WoW lately, let alone blog about it. I'm not going to mince words here – life is more important than WoW for me, and although I hope I won't make another disappearance, if blogging starts to interfere with my job, or my friends, or whatever, those things are always going to come first. Sorry if that bothers you, but frankly if you have an issue with that, you should probably seek out another blog to follow.

Anyways, to business. A lot has changed since I was more or less forced into a leave, and I'd like to get you all up to date as quick as I can, so I can start getting into the real content again. But before I get into DK related items, I've got a quick list of blog-related housekeeping to get through.

First, I'm imposing a rough schedule on this blog. When it was created, it was with the intention that I would post when I felt like it, about what I felt like posting about. Format, and regular-content be damned. I write several columns in my “real life”, so I get more than enough deadlines without imposing them on a hobby. But, honestly, that clearly isn't working for me. I need a format, and a schedule to keep me writing. Otherwise I get lazy, and this blog is never going to become what I'd like it to be.

Basically, my schedule will be, generally a post Tuesdays (something to tide you over for patch day), Thursdays, and a weekend post. This is going to vary a bit, but at least I can promise 1-2 posts per week with my current schedule outside of this blog. That means no more random absences, if it can at all be helped (if it can't... see above).

Tuesdays will be editorial posts – musings and thoughts about the game, PvP, and the class in general. Thursdays are going to be my PvP-related content days, with posts about battlegrounds, arenas and whatnot. The weekend posts are going to be a mixed bag. For the time being, it'll be class-related posts (specs, rotations, abilities etc. - the works), because those generally take the longest for me to write, and weekends are when I have the most time. But if there's not a whole lot of class news to discuss, weekends may turn into a mix of content. We'll see how it all pans out.

SO – for the time being, Tuesdays = editorials, Thursdays = PvP content, and weekends (Saturday evening, or more likely Sundays) = Class content. Sound alright? Good. Moving on.

What you missed

Alright, so essentially, what you've missed since I took off in January was patch 4.0.6. Unless you've been living under a rock, you've probably noticed the changes, but let me run through the ones that effect DK PvPers the most, since as I've said before, reliable news on DK PvP is horribly difficult to find these days. First off, DK changes. And there are a lot, so bear with me.

Class Changes - General

“Death Coil damage has been reduced by roughly 10%.” This obviously is a pretty big nerf to UH, whether you PvP or not. Not a whole lot I can say here, since sadly, it's live and there's really nothing we can do about it.

“Icebound Fortitude now breaks stuns when used, in addition to providing immunity to them.” HALELUJAH. It's about time, IBF was extremely situational without this feature, and was really only useful if you knew that a feral or rogue was going to jump you soon. This means we've got another way to get out of stuns (besides trinketing that is) and if you haven't been using this before – you should be now.

“Necrotic Strike's absorption effect is now reduced by the target's resilience. In addition, its debuff duration has been reduced to 10 seconds, down from 15.” It makes me sad, but stacking necrotic strike was really just too good. A few well-played, co-ordinated Death Knights in a BG could wreak absolute havoc on healers, with NS stacking practically infinitely. Time will tell how good this ability now is, especially with resilience affecting it. This change does seem to contradict blizzard's previous statements that they wanted resilience to be a flat damage reduction, and nothing else, though.

“The spell hit bonus previously given by Virulence (Unholy) has been rolled into the Runic Focus passive effect that all death knights possess.” What can I say? It's a bit of a buff, I guess, easily to hit the spell-pen cap if you aren't running UH, I guess. I'll take it.

Blood

Okay, so good news is that this spec has been buffed in general. Blood PvP is more viable than ever before, and I'll definitely be doing some testing to see how it stacks against other specs in terms of damage output (obviously it is much harder to kill, though). I'll skip the obvious buffs, since anyone can check the patch notes and see what got simply increased, and try to explain the more complicated changes.

“Crimson Scourge has been redesigned slightly. Instead of a 50/100% chance to make the next Blood Boil free when Plague Strike is used on a target with Blood Plague, the talent now gives a 5/10% chance to provide a free Blood Boil when the death knight lands any melee attack on a Blood Plagued target.” Obvious question – is this a buff or a nerf? That's really hard to say. I'll have to run some numbers to sort that out, I'll keep you posted.

“If Death Strike is used while a Blood Shield is already active, the new absorb will stack with the old one instead of replacing it.” This means moar absorbs. Pretty easy to understand. Basically, you can DS with basic impunity in blood spec, and it should be a main part of your rotation, if it wasn't already.

“Scarlet Fever now applies via Blood Plague, rather than Blood Boil.” This appears to be a move by blizzard towards more single-target oriented dps? Again, I'll have to test this out.

“Will of the Necropolis no longer refunds a Blood Rune when it resets Rune Tap's cooldown. Instead it makes the next Rune Tap free while Will of the Necropolis is active.” This isn't really a buff or a nerf. It could mean more Blood Tap, but it doesn't seem to really be a position to change the number of times Rune Tap is available all that much.

Frost

There weren't many changes to frost, essentially we got a root tacked onto our Chains of Ice, which is awesome. Before you jump for joy, do realize that it's nothing like the CoI of old, it just means a slight improvement over a pure slow. At the same time though, don't underestimate this change, a root is a root, and I love it. It gives CoI some great applications it hasn't really had since it became a slow, which I'll talk about in a future post. All in all, though, no really major changes to frost. It's still as viable as ever before.

“Chilblains now also causes Chains of Ice to root the target for 1.5/3 seconds." See above.

“Howling Blast now deals 40% less damage to all targets other than the primary target of the spell.” A nerf to HB's AoE capabilities, probably made to prevent a return of the Frost AoE Spec of Doom. Not a huge deal, just means less AoE output. I can live with it.

“Hungering Cold now has a PvP duration of 8 seconds.” THANK YOU BLIZZARD. It was absolutely not fair that HC lasted so much less time than fear, entangling roots and other PvP CC staples. It wasn't much, and yes HC is an amazing CC. But it needed to be standardized, and I like the change, especially since in terms of “real” CC, HC is basically all frost has.

“Might of the Frozen Wastes now also increases all melee damage by 4/8/12% while wielding a two-handed weapon.” Making 2h frost more viable. I'd say 1h will probably still come out on top, but since I run a 2h (at least till I have conquest to burn on the 1 handers), I won't scoff at a buff to my dps.

Unholy

Sadly, the previous it spec of the season has been nerfed significantly. This is probably a change meant to make other specs more viable, but it's always sad when a major spec gets hit so hard. I won't go over all the flat nerfs (and most of the changes to the spec are just that), since you've probably read the patch notes anyways, and if you haven't noticed the lower numbers, the patch notes are available here.

“Blightcaller (Mastery) has been redesigned and renamed Dreadblade. It increases all Shadow damage by 2.5% per point of mastery.” To be honest this change confuses me a bit. It is a buff to mastery for UH DKs and also a move towards less AoE-oriented dps. But what at first seemed to me a desire to make Mastery as important as haste to the UH DK didn't really pan out that way at all. Haste is still the stat to stack for UH DKs and there isn't really much reason to go out of your way to pick up mastery, except for when it's already included on gear, since haste is pretty much universally better.

“Death's Advance (new talent): While both Unholy Runes are depleted, movement-impairing effects cannot reduce the death knight below 50/75% of normal movement speed.” This is a great new talent, and is definitely worth speccing into (I'll have a new UH spec including a change to DA as soon as I can manage it). But the change from the originally planned 100% possible bonus, is saddening. Your UH runes won't both be up very often, but popping Empower Rune Weapon definitely has the potential to make you a bit harder to catch. Time will tell how useful this talent proves to be.  
EDIT:  I missread this, the talent actually got changed back to 75/100%, meaning although you can still be rooted, you can't be slowed below normal run speed with you both your UH runes up.  ERW definitely has the potential to make UH DKs much more mobile.  /cheer for awesome talent!

“Desecration is now also triggered by Necrotic Strike.” Although Necrotic Strike itself was nerfed, this is still nice, as you once your diseases are up, you should still be using NS against healers as much as possible.

“Runic Corruption procs while the aura is already active now add 3 seconds to the existing aura duration, instead of simply refreshing/overwriting the existing aura.” This seems to be a nerf, since overwriting the buff obviously makes it last longer than adding 3 seconds.

“Sudden Doom is now triggered only from main-hand auto attacks, and is normalized according to weapon speed rather than having a fixed percentage chance.” I'm not 100% whether this means more Sudden Doom or not right now. In keeping with the general theme of UH though, it appears to mean less – another nerf..

“Virulence has been redesigned. It now grants 10/20/30% additional disease damage.” This is because of the packaging of the old effect of this talent into Runic Focus (see above). It's probably meant to make up for the removal of disease damage from our mastery.

Glyphs

“Glyph of Dark Succor (new glyph) raises the minimum healing done by Death Strike from 7% to 15% of maximum health, but only while in Unholy or Frost Presence.” This give us another significant heal to use in Frost and UH, making both those specs a little more durable in PvP. Although DS costs the same as OB or SS, it's still worth using when short on health, despite the obvious reduction in damage by using it to replace your main big hit.

“Glyph of Death's Embrace no longer refunds Runic Power when self-healing via Lichborne.” This means self-healing with Lichborne won't heal you as much as it used to (exact number escapes my mind at the moment, sadly). I think the addition of Dark Succor makes up for this, but I'm not sure if it will mean more or less healing overall, yet.

PvP Changes

The pretty enormous list of DK class changes aside, there were also some changes to PvP that I want to quickly run through.

First – “PvP trinkets will now clear disarm and silence effects.” This is a pretty big change. It means that not matter what is wrong with your character, basically, the trinket is a way out of it. Disarm especially will probably notice a serious reduction is effectiveness (Yeah, warriors, I'm laughing all the way to the Conquest Vendor). What this means is that you should adjust your attitude regarding when to pop your trinket. It shouldn't just be to get out of slows, take into account the possibility of silences and disarms as well.

Also, in our case, this means strangulate can be stopped with a trinket pop. This means that when hitting a healer, especially, you should consider that they'll probably pop their trinket to get out of strangulate, especially if it was used at a crucial time. Be ready with a quick mind-freeze, though, or ghoul stun (if you're running UH) if they do trinket, and all will be well. Forcing the enemy player to trinket is never a bad thing.

“Bloodlust, Heroism, Time Warp and Ancient Hysteria can no longer be cast while in Arenas.” Thank you, again, blizzard. This was not consistent with the theory by blizzard that big spells (read: Army of the Dead, etc.) should not be castable in arenas, and it makes classes with access to these buffs more balanced in arenas. Of course – none of these were my buffs, so I'm not likely to complain, am I?

Also, in Gilneas - “The time it takes to capture a flag has been reduced to 5 seconds, down from 8.” This means faster capture times, and potentially more grabbing by enemy players (already a potent strategy in Gilneas). For the hundredth time, people, fight on the bloody flag.

Strand of the Ancients was also reworked to account for the ridiculous zerg-fest it had become since Cataclysm dropped. I haven't had a chance to test it out yet, but it seems much more reasonable.

First and foremost, the demolishers no longer have two extra seats. This means only the driver can be in the vehicle, and that the days of having CCers calmly slow every defender into oblivion from inside the demo are finally, mercifully gone. Also, damage from the cannons has been increased 200%, along with a 50% increase to their speed, making the cannons viable in Strand once again. Teleporters have also been reworked, so that they essentially put you where you need to be (by the gate that needs defending), rather than simply dropping you behind the gate. It could take a bit of getting used you, but the battleground should be much more balanced now.

Finally, Blizzard has made an effort to fix Tol Barad, which up until this patch had been hideously broken. Attackers will get a 200% bonus capture rate on their last cap to win, and defenders will get a 200% capture rate when holding all 3 bases, making it harder to take the initial base. This does make it a little easier for attackers to win, and although I haven't had a chance to get into Tol Barad since the patch, it should make it much more reasonable. Again, I'll keep you posted.

Conclusion

Well, this has been one ridiculously long mega-post, but that essentially catches you all up on what you missed while I was gone. Expect some relatively stable scheduling for posts in the future, and some more consistent content. Also, expect copious amounts of awesome. Anyways, that does it for me for now.

Until next time,

Practice Safe Death!

~Onike

2h Frost PvP - Keeping it Cool

Lame, clichéd title?  Yes, but I just didn't have the creativity today for something wittier.  Before I dive into content here, I also want to apologize for the lack of posts lately.  The holidays have been pretty busy on my end, and an additional mountain of RL insanity has taken me out of the game for the better part of three weeks.  But I'm back, and with me comes the next installment of my comprehensive DK spec list for PvP.

Unlike the pre-cataclysm mini season, we're now into a much more stable, complete Rated PvP Season, namely Season 9.  This means gone are the days when spamming Howling Blast was a viable way to play frost.  We're back to a proper rotation, and seriously thinking about what you're doing.  With that in mind, let me help you re-learn frost.

The Spec

The basic spec is something along the lines of 7/32/2 which combines the raw dps spec, courtesy of Elitist Jerks.  You lose On a Pale Horse, which while being a nice talent for mobility just can't be squeezed in with the mandatory PvP talents:  Lichborne, Endless Winter, and Chillblains.

I've also dropped Chill of the Grave, in order to have some points left to put into the Unholy tree.  This change is debatable.  You could probably drop another raw dps talent for CotG, but personally I feel like RP generation is less important than raw dps in PvP where you'll be switching targets all the time, and probably not standing still and nuking as much as in PvE.  Also, now that you'll be using OB instead of FS again for Killing Machine procs (more on that below), RP is not as important a res source as it was before Season 9.

As with the 2h UH spec, you'll get the free interrupt with mind freeze, and the potential self heal with Lichborne.

Glyphs

Elitsist Jerks, in their frost dps section recommend the use of:

Prime

• [Glyph of Frost Strike]
• [Glyph of Howling Blast]
• [Glyph of Obliterate] | [Glyph of Icy Touch], for AoE.

Major

• [Individual's Choice]
• [Individual's Choice]
• [Individual’s Choice]

Minor

• [Glyph of Path of Frost]
• [Glyph of Blood Tap]
• [Glyph of Horn of Winter]

I agree with these glyphs, since their benifits all apply to PvP as well.  However, I'd also recommend using [Glyph of Anti-Magic Shell] for one of your major glyphs, as the AMS makes you essentially immune to many of the major threats in PvP, and extending it is pretty much a must in this case.

The "Rotation"

As I said in my 2h UH write up, there isn't really a rotation anymore.  Everything we do in terms of damage is based on a mildly complicated priority rotation.  But once you've got it figured out, it's really not all that complicated.  Don't worry too much about memorizing the exact details of this, as it only applies to situations where you're able to deal the maximum dps.

The priority system from EJ, slightly modified to account for interrupts and the like in PvP is as follows:

Diseases >INTERRUPTS*> Ob if both Frost/Unholy pairs and/or both Death runes are up, or if KM is procced > Dark Simulacrum (vs. casters only)>
BS if both Blood Runes are up > FS if RP capped > Rime > Ob > BS > FS > HoW.
*Interrupts take precedence over pretty much everything in PvP, if someone is casting a big spell that is either gonna do a lot of healing (in the case of healers) or a lot of damage, interrupt it as often as you can!

It should also be noted that in the case of 2h frost, you'll be using UH presence, not frost presence.  If you're into detailed explanations and whatnot, it's because of Might of the Frozen Wastes, a talent which means that making faster attacks in UP is much more valuable than it would ordinarily be.

Basically, the system here is actually much simpler than it's UH counterpart (one of the reasons I like this spec... I'm lazy!).  Get your diseases up, Frost Strike when you've got lots of RP (especially when you're capped... duh), Obliterate when you've got two Death Runes, or both Frost/Unholy up, and blood strike if blood runes are up.  Besides that just follow the procs (KM= OB, and Rime = HB).  Simple enough, really.

Conclusion and the joys of Hungering Cold

In general, frost is a much more viable spec than it has been in the past for PvP.  Although still slightly in the shadow of its UH counterpart, frost is absolutely a viable spec.  I've done a write up for the 2h spec first, because many DKs will already be running the "best" spec, 2h UH, and this does not require a new set of weapons.  However, it's probably worth noting that technically DW frost does better damage than 2h.  Not an extreme amount, but enough to make it worth grabbing 1 handers, if you're planning to go frost for your main spec, and still haven't picked up that sexy Conquest Weapon yet.

Now, it's no secret that frost is my favourite spec.  I adore frost, so admittedly, some of my constant assurances of it's overall viability might be attributed to that.  BUT, it is also way more practical to play frost now than it was in Season 8, and plenty of us die-hardsDKs I know that continually run frost) love to PvP frost is largely it's cornerstone ability, Hungering Cold.

Hungering Cold is a godsend, it's one of the best all-around CCs in the game, capable of totally freezing a huge group of people in place.  Although that silly mage hungering cold knock-off might freeze people in blocs of ice, it also creates a giant rune on the ground before activating, giving people plenty of warning to move.  HC has no such downside, it can come from anywhere, at any time, and can be used in almost any situation.  Learning to use HC to your maximum advantage is one of things that will make frost that much better, and isn't something I can really teach in a little conclusion here.

At any rate, I've rambled long enough.  There is your one-stop-shop for everything 2h Frost.  Still to come, DW Frost, Blood and DW UH.  Stay tuned, and until next time,

Practice safe Death!

~Onike

The Complete 2h Unholy Tool Kit

Season 9 is here, and with it serious PvP is back in style.  I won't say I don't miss the lax attitude of the last couple months, but the fact of the matter is, if you want to seriously PvP in this season, now is the time to work at getting geared and ready to go.  The best time to get into PvP is at the start of a season, when the gear playing field is level.

With that in my, I'm taking a bit of a break from my informal Cataclysm leveling guide to walk you through pretty much ever current viable PvP spec, so that you can choose how you'd like to be playing this season.  I'm starting this off with 2 handed Unholy, because it has slightly higher dps than the other DK specs, and also has the most general utility.  Although frost and blood as a LOT more viable than they were last season, at least for the time being, Unholy is back to being the "it" spec.  A bit a shame?  Maybe, but that's just how it is.

The Spec

The basic spec, packing the best combination of dps and PvP utility (more or less, I haven't gone miles into the theorycrafting) is 0/8/33.  You aren't give a whole lot of choice with your Unholy talents, and in the frost tree there is absolutely no choice at all, because you need to pick up Lichborne, and Endless Winter.

So now you've seen the basic talent rundown, but what exactly is this spec packing?  Well dps rotation aside (we'll talk about that in a sec), it's got the standard Strangulate silence (which isn't a talent, so every DK spec features), a free mind freeze every 10 seconds and the additional ghoul stun.  This means, that if you need to lock down a caster, you can interrupt a cast with DG, chains of ice, strangulate, mind freeze, ghoul stun, mind freeze again, then drop dark simulacrum.  They won't know what hit them.

The spec is also packing Lichborne, one of my favourite frost talents, which makes you immune to those pesky stuns and gives you the ability to heal yourself with Death Coil.  The macro for that is:   

#showtooltip Lichborne
/cast !Lichborne;
/cast [target=player] Death Coil 

(Courtesy of arena junkies).

Let's talk glyphs

You don't have a ton of choice when it comes to your prime and major glyphs.  This list comes from Elitist Jerks, for optimal dps, and I'd say it's pretty solid for PvP as well.

Prime:
[Glyph of the Ghoul] 
(as a side note, the mouseover for this won't work properly.  Please ignore wowhead's lack of a glyph of the ghoul atm, and just go with the name.  I'll fix that soon as I can.)
[Glyph of Scourge Strike] | [Glyph of Death and Decay], for AoE/DW (Yes I know thsi post doesn't discuss DW.  More on that in a future post).
[Glyph of Death Coil] | [Glyph of Icy Touch], for AoE.

Major
[Glyph of Anti-Magic Shell]
[Glyph of Pestilence]
[Glyph of Blood Boil]

The minor glyphs in EJ are left up to your personal choice, and I'd agree with that.  They aren't going to affect your dps too much, so I wouldn't worry overly about it, take whatever floats your boat.

The Rotation

Okay.  So as I've already stated in a few past posts, the days of set DK rotations are behind us, in their place is a world of priority systems.  Now if you've PvPed before, you're probably already familiar with the concept.  PvP has never really had a set rotation, it's all about reaction to your situation.  Sure, if a friendly rogue has your target stunlocked, you may as well open up your pure dps rotation, but that's not gonna happen very often.

But, for purely academic purposes, and so that you have a rough understanding of the raid rotation, here's the priority system, once again courtesy of EJ:

Diseases > Dark Transformation > DnD*/SS if both Unholy and/or all Death runes are up > FeS if both pairs of Blood and Frost runes are up >
DC if SD, 100 RP, will overcap RP with anything else or if RC isn’t up > DnD/SS > FeS > DC > HoW.

HOWEVER, this is the raid priority system.  Yours will have to be different because of PvP.  Therefore, with that in mind, I've altered the system a little bit to account for PvP.

Diseases>Dark Transformation>INTERRUPTS*>Dark Simulacrum (vs. casters only)>DnD/SS if both UH and/or Death runes are up>FeS if both pairs of blood and frost are up>Necrotic Strike if one unholy or death rune is up>DC if Sudden Doom procs, or if you're at 130 RP, or about to ovecap>DnD/SS>FeS>DC>HoW.

 *Interrupts take precedence over everything if you are fighting a caster, especially a healer, and they're casting a spell.

Okay, so that probably seems really complicated.  Let me make it much simpler.  This PvP rotation is basically the same as the raid one with a few things in mind.

First, when a caster is casting, if you CAN, you SHOULD interrupt them.  Always.

Second, when you have your diseases up and have one unholy rune up, or one death rune, you should always necrotic strike as much as possible, unless it is impossible for that target to be healed.  In most cases, they'll have self-heals or the possibility of a healer jumping in to save them, so stacking necrotic strike as much as you can just makes sense.

Besides that, the dpsPvP is all about rolling with the punches and being ready for anything.  The benefit to knowing the rotation is just understanding how to dps.

 

Conclusion, and some thoughts on Ghoul Control

So, before I wrap this up, I want to run through a few basics EVERY Unholy DK should be aware of.  First, your ghoul is important, if it's dead and your raise dead is off CD, you should be bringing it back.  Second, you should have leap and gnaw keybound, not set automatically.  Got an ally running away?  Leap and stun.  Need an on-the-fly interrupt for that big heal, but have mind freeze and strangulate on CD?  Gnaw it up!  

Don't let the computer decide when to interrupt!  That's your job as the player.  I only leave Claw on automatic (since he should be using it every CD), and turn of huddle entirely, it's a complete waste of a GCD, when aggrro is meaningless in PvP.  Learning to use your ghoul effectively is one of the best things you can do as an Unholy PvPer.

Anyways, to wrap this up, Unholy is a very strong spec in the early days of Season 9.  2h UH packs the most utility, and according to most theorycrafters, the most dps.  If you're into min-maxing, this is probably the spec for you.  If you don't like unholy, never fear.  There's two other trees, and even a DW variation on UH and frost to come, so don't fret.  The difference between specs isn't too enormous, so you've definitely got options.

Until next time, Practice safe Death!

~Onike

Cataclysm Leveling: Deepholm (82-83)

My informal leveling guide/review returns with the next installment of brilliance.  Today I'm going to be going over the second zone I leveled through in Cataclysm- Deepholm.

Deepholm, unlike Vash'jir cannot be separated into a series of smaller zones, it's one, big zone.  It can, however, be broken up into the pieces of the plot which the zone takes you through.

The Elements are Angry

 
You're called to the zone by Thrall, who wants Alliance and Horde to work together to heal the world, which was damaged when Deathwing busted out of Deepholm.  That's right, this zone takes you right into the Earth Plane.  Deepholm is the area where Deathwing hid out while he was licking his wounds.

The main plot of the zone focuses around the need to heal the World Pillar, which is exactly what it sounds like:  a giant pillar in Deepholm which supports the entire world.  It's been broken into three pieces, which, as you can imagine is a bit of a problem for... the world. 

The Earthen Ring tasks you with the fairly clear job of reassembling the shattered World Pillar, which takes you all across Deepholm, and through another one of Cataclysm's great zones.

The First Two Pieces

When the Elementals say "oops"

 The first piece of the World Pillar takes you up against the raging Elementals of the area, and follows a pretty clear storyline.  You fight off the bad Elementals, save the piece of the Pillar, and do some quests.  Now I'm not saying this part of the zone is "bad" at all.  It's as good as any of the leveling we've seen in Cataclysm so far.  It's just lacking interesting twists and story which made Vash'jir so good.

However, it's during your quest for the second piece where things really start to get interesting.  In a surprising twist of fate, it turns out the Elementals aren't the bad guys here.  The Twilight Cultists are.  Now we knew the Twilight Cult was bad, but we didn't know they were in Deepholm.  Turns out, they're the ones that got Deathwing ready for his big, dramatic return.  And the reason the Elementals are attacking the Earthen Ring people, is because they've been pissed off by the Cult.

From there, fairly obviously, your job is to work out a somewhat diplomatic solution with the Elementals while looking for the second piece, which is with the Earthmother, the Elemental in charge.  You work for the Lords (their official name escapes me for some reason... Stone Lords, or something like that), in order to prove yourself to the Earthmother.  It's not the most original plot ever devised, but it's interesting and engaging and just as fun as Vash'jir was.  In other words- awesome.

Deepholm

I never thought I'd say this, but I love this dwarf. A lot.

The thing that makes leveling in Cataclysm is the little bits of awesome thrown in between the main plot points.  While hunting around for the second piece, you're sent to investigate an alliance airship, which reportedly attacked the Horde (unless you play alliance.  I have no idea what happens if you play alliance... sorry).  Turns out the Twilight Cult poisoned the supply of food and water on the ship, which killed of the crew.  While there, you meet the dwarf featured in the image above.

And it is a TON of fun.  During your somewhat predictable journey through the ship looking for the Cultist in charge, you eventually capture the bad guy by grabbing him with a GRYPHON.  No, that bird is not just for show.  The dwarf dangles the ogre in charge over a spinning propeller to get her information, it's a random piece of badassery that you just don't except.  I was predicting the ogre to fling himself overboard rather then give us what we want... or something.  But no, this dwarf chick basically beats the information out him.  Which wasn't expected at ALL.  But was really awesome.

My point?  Blizzard can throw in some wild cards that really makes their world seem alive.  Expect the unexpected.  The only guarantee in Cataclysm seems to be an awesome game.

The Third Piece

The World Pillar, reformed.

The third piece of the World Pillar is found with the Twilight Cult, and some very nasty dragons.  The result is a battle of epic proportions between the Earthen Ring allied with the Elementals and the Twilight Cult.  Your job during the war is essentially to take out the main figures of the Cult, which is actually very interesting.  Each "boss" is an elite, but is soloable.  They aren't tough because they hit so hard, or have so much health, that a player alone could never take them out.  They're difficult because of unique mechanics. 

Although Blizzard probably could have made these "Solo Bosses" a little bit tougher and gotten away with it, what they've succeeded in doing here is challenging players with solo content.  In other words, encounters designs based around one player, instead of a group or raid.  This is something we haven't seen a lot of before, and was good fun, and certainly lived up to my now high expectations of Cataclysm.

Epic?  Yes.

Deepholm was a great zone, all in all.  It didn't surprise me in the way Vash'jir did, because I expected awesome, and I got awesome.  But it was amazing.  I won't spoil the ending for you, but the battle with the Twilight Cult is a whole lot of fun, and continues to impress upon me how fantastic Cataclysm really is, in terms of leveling content.  Will the endgame be as epic?  Only time will tell, but based on what we've seen....

Yes.  It will. 

Cataclysm Leveling: Vash'jir (80-82)

So there I was.  At the release of Cataclysm.  Wetting my little gamer pants at the prospect of the fantastic wonders in store for me.  Now, because I wasn't in the beta, I actually made a serious effort to avoid all spoilers related to Cataclysm.  As a result, I had absolutely no idea what I was doing when the expansion popped.

I did have a rough inkling that I wanted to head to Mount Hyjal, because I wasn't huge on the idea of a zone totally underwater.  After all, who wants to swim everywhere?  That's just silly.  However, after being unable to find "The Big Board" in Orgrimmar which a guildy kindly informed me was the path to Hyjal, I decided to go to the other way, after all a conveniently timed vision of Thrall as I entered Orgrimmar directed me to Vash'jir.  And there would be less people there.  So why not give it a shot?

Onike's Disclaimer:  This is NOT a "real" leveling guide.  It's just a rough outline of the zone, and my initial thoughts on Cataclysm questing.  If you want a step-by-step for the 80-85 zones, look elsewhere. 

Vash'jir

 Vash'jir is actually really easy to find your way into.  Just get into Orgrimmar, and after witnessing Thrall's message to you from the Maelstrom (more on that later), you receive a quest which will lead you to a member of the Earthen Ring, who sends you off to a boat bound for Vash'jir.

Before you leave...

Train your professions!  This is really important.  Don't be like me, and forget that to get to 525 skill, you actually need to visit a trainer.  Especially if you're packing mining, which is  now worth experience (presumably herbalism is as well... but I don't have an herbalist, so I can't be 100% sure).  That way as you're travelling around, you don't have to worry about getting skill ups for your effort.  First Aid is also handy to carry around, especially if your class is lacking in self-heals.

Level 80s, bound for Vash'jir

Kelp'thar Forest

After an exceedingly awesome cut scene, you'll find yourself at the bottom of the ocean.  Now this is the part where I want to stress something.  You know those old quests that would have you swim to the bottom of lakes and kill mobs, etc. etc.?  And how boring they were?  Vash'jir is nothing like this.  You get a zone wide buff which allows you to breathe under water, and swim faster, and about halfway through the first zone, you're given a seahorse mount to swim around on.  The seahorse increases your swim speed by a ridiculous 450% while in Vash'jir, and it makes it so that you often forget you're actually under water.

A wake-up call

If you're like me, and used to being all epic-ed out at level 80, running about 2-shotting mobs on your dailies, you're in for a wake-up call.  Mobs hit hard now.  Really hard.  You'll find yourself frequently stopping to rest, and actually blowing cooldowns on pulls of more than one mob.  In fact, I'd advise against pulling more than one mob, if you can avoid it.  They've got around twice as much health as Northrend mobs, and a few fights with even the entry-level 80s, will take you down pretty low on health.


Also, a friendly warning.  If you use a lot of AoE spells (read: Howling Blast) regularly in your rotation, make sure you're not in range of other mobs, which it's all too easy to accidentally pull.  In Vash'jir, there are a huge number of non-agressive wildlife mobs, which hit as hard as the aggressive ones, and it's easy to pull them by mistake, turning a simple fight into a very difficult one.

Release the Kraken.

Quest Progression

It's not a term you're probably used to hearing.  But the way zones in Cataclysm are structured, it really feels as though you're progressing through a story.  Vash'jir has a plot, and so do all the zones which follow.  I HIGHLY recommend reading quest text, at the very least for the main quests.  You'll feel like you're really a part of the story, and it makes leveling way less of a drag than it has been in years past.

Anyways, after pushing your way through the Kelp'thar forest you'll eventually be told (literally- there's a lot less guess work in terms of where to go next than we're used to), to go to the Shimmering Expanse.

The Shimmering Expanse

Not quite Atlantis.  But close.

The Shimmering Expanse is the second zone in Vash'jir, and a lot more fun than the Kelp'thar forest.  If you felt like you were getting bored in Kelp'thar, of the same-old quests, Shimmering Expanse really pushes the story along.  This was especially true for me, since I was dealing with huge crowds in Kelp'thar and having to compete for every inch of questing.  Shimmering Expanse introduces a lot more phasing to cut population problems down.

In general, this zone is GOOD.  Not amazing, but a lonnnggg way from the grind that vanilla content was.  I think it was about halfway through this zone that I stopped counting the experience points until I leveled and finally started really enjoying the process.

The Abyssal Depths

When a goblin says "surface", he means it.  Now where's my parachute?

This zone is awesome.  It's a lot of fun.  About a quarter of the way through the zone, I dinged 82, which means I could have easily dropped out of Vash'jir and headed off to Deepholm.  My friends who were in the thick of their Realm First <Class> achievements races, while I was poking around in Vash'jirVash'jir out to the very end, baring dungeon quests, since I didn't want to tank and couldn't stomach the 30 minute dps queue.

Trust me, if you stick it out to The Abyssal Depths, if you aren't already in love with the zone, you will be.

Final Thoughts on Vash'jir

Although a lot of people will probably go into Vash'jir just because it's less crowded, if they actually allow themselves to get caught up in the story, like I did, I guarantee it's worth what some min-maxers are already dubbing "the long way from 80-82".  It's absolutely, 100% worth it.  So grab a bathing suit, and go swimming.  You'll have a blast.

Vash'jir aside, leveling in Cataclysm is a whole 'nother animal than vanilla, BC, or even Wrath content.  If you though leveling in Wrath was fun (and I honestly didn't- I found it got old very quickly), you will LOVE Cataclysm content.  And if you hated leveling in Wrath... you'll LOVE Cataclysm content.  It's amazing all around, and from what I've been told by my min-maxing friends, the content only gets better from here. 

It's kind of like being a little kid at Christmas.  You want to play with everything at once, take it all in in a few seconds.  But don't worry, those quests aren't going anywhere.  So enjoy the ride.  Trust me, it's not hard.