Heya guys!!  So 3.0.8 hit today, and everyone is scrambling to see what did and didn’t change.  How will this affect your spec, your rotation, yadda, yadda, yadda…  Have no fear, SJ IS HERE!!!  Heh.

Unholy is pretty much left unscathed as far as the Spec/Rotation aspect of things.  While the dps potential has been hit some, more or less the spec plays the same.  So for the long timers here, there are no suprises coming forth.

I do have to say, I feel bad for my Gargoyle.  Poor lil bugger.  *sniffle*  They clipped his poor widdle wings!!  Damn you Blizzard!!  Big ‘ol meanie!!

17/0/54

This is your traditional Unholy Spec that I’ve been talking about and using for good lord who only knows now.  It packs a mean punch, and can dish out some tremendous damage as you can see here when I unloaded 5700 DPS on Patchwerk before 3.0.8 release.

Now we’re seeing some changes with 3.0.8 so will this be achievable again?  Not sure.  Sadly I won’t be able to give you an accurate in game example until next week.  Due to real life obligations and my brand new kitten I’m getting *excited*, I will be missing raiding this week.  /sigh

But lets talk about the spec some eh?

Before anyone goes off crying…

“This isn’t the best spec because of blah, blah, blah, blah, blah…”

OMFG just shut up.  I’m not interested.  I actually take the time to test these specs on the PTR (or in Live), or find another player I trust who has done so.  I read up on EJ, search around for WWS/WMO results, etc…  I don’t just pick specs out of my arse and go, “Hey this one smells good!!”

Are there alternatives that may suit certain raid compositions better?  Sure.  Maybe.  But if you’re looking for the best Unholy DPS possible, this is your boy here.  And no, this is not comparative against Frost, Blood, or DW.  This is UNHOLY.  That’s all.  /rant off

So I’m not sure when WoW Head will get around to updating their links, but you’ll have to possibly do some guesswork or read inbetween the lines a little bit if I don’t represent changes as well before WoW Head gets the links corrected.

Oh wait…the spec.  I was going to talk about “that“…

Summon Gargoyle

Heh, ok so the biggest nerf came to our widdle Gargoyle.  *sniffle*  He got his wings chopped off.  But he’s still a mean lil bugger!!  First off, weird rule number one about the Gargoyle.  He does not function like a pet.  We’re not sure how far this extends (read: ripple effect), but we will tell you what this means for sure.

This puppy is affected by your current status at the time of summoning only.  Not by how you are at any other given time.  So in an ideal world you will wait for a Heroism to be cast and to then get some kind of an AP buff from Fallen Crusader, a trinket, or another source.  Doing so will result in the most dps from your Gargoyle.  We’re still not 100% sure about whether or not Night of the Dead’s new -70% AoE damage buff will apply to your Gargoyle or to Army of the Dead.  But as soon as I find out, you will too.

Desecration

Next lets talk about Desecration.  One of the biggest mistakes an Unholy Knight will ever make in talent selection sadly.  Initially this talent is very attractive.  When wouldn’t +5% to your overall damage not sound good.  But what is good in theory is actually quite awful in execution.

An Unholy DK will use the Glyph of Scourge Strike, which means that for the majority of the time you will find yourself able to skip using IT or PS entirely.  In addition to that the vast majority of encounters in LK require a great deal of movement.  Outside of Loatheb and Patchwerk, most of the time you will rarely find yourself in the same location for long.  Which means that the majority of the time you will not be standing in a Desecration patch gaining a DPS boost.  The end result?  Desecration stinks.  Sadly…

Unholy Aura

So what’s the other biggest misconception about Unholy?  Glad you asked.  Unholy Aura.  This is the only “unique” buff that DK’s bring to the table for a raid, and is quite arguable the best possible buff in game after Replenishment.  Why?  Easy.

As I noted with Desecration, the vast majority of fights in LK require a great deal of movement.  So the quicker that you get to where you are going, the more healing and damage gets done as well.  If 10 people were doing 4k dps on average and spent 30 seconds in a given fight running, what would happen if they got this buff?

Rough napkin math would show that they spent roughly 25 seconds running instead of 30 seconds.  At 10 people doing 4k DPS each, that would mean that the raid did an extra 200,000 damage that was impossible to do before (which for some Achievements, faster kills and better dps is paramount).  In addition to this how much extra healing just got done?  Keeping more raid members alive and the tank/tanks at a safer HP margin is always a good thing.

You cannot put an exact value on UA, however it is hands down one of the most beneficial raid buffs in WoW, and any Unholy DK who does not spec into UA when you are missing it needs a quick /groupkick.

If you are curious about other aspects to the Unholy spec itself you are welcome to ask, but honestly most discussion and commentary about Unholy is deep within this site in various other posts.  So instead of covering old ground, we’re moving on…

Rotations

Believe it or not, there isn’t exactly a solid rotation for Unholy.  There is a basic premise, but you will find it changes on you quickly in execution.

PS -> IT -> BS -> BS -> SS

SS -> SS -> SS

Once you have 40 RP you activate Unholy Blight and refresh this every 20 seconds so long as you can stay within range of the boss for 20 seconds.  If movement will cause you to be out of range for an extended period of time cast Death Coil instead.  You will find that your rotation will get thrown off when the Glyph of Scourge Strike procs, allowing you to sustain SS’s repeatively sometimes.

Basically you SS until you need to refresh your diseases.  Right before they drop off (when possible) apply a new IT/PS to get them going again.  BS normally, and SS when Death Runes are up.  Otherwise fire off Death Coils when runes are on CD.  If you will ever hit the RP cap, immediately spend your RP on a DC unless you have a Gargoyle up.  Hitting the RP cap with a Gargoyle out is ok at times.  You do not want to lose it because you hit 0 RP.

Unholy is all about a “Priority List” to firing off attacks:

1. Summon Gargoyle: Always save enough RP to keep this alive.  Do not waste RP on DC/UB if it means your Gargoyle might die due to RP starvation.
2. If your RP will go over 100 by firing off a new attack, immediately fire off a DC or UB instead of RP capping.  This is the only time you should ever wait before using a Rune that came off of CD.
3. Fire off an attack when Runes are off of CD as soon as possible, keeping rule 2 in mind.
4. Refresh diseases with a new IT/PS if needed because your SS Glyph did not proc.
5. Never refresh a UB until it wears off.  You lose a ton of damage by refreshing it early.

AoE Rotations

IT -> PS -> Pest -> DnD -> UB

SS -> BB -> BB -> SS

If your tanks have really solid agro, or you run into AoE late you can DnD first so long as you won’t take agro.  Also if you picked up Corpse Explosion blow your RP on that when you can.

Glyphs

You may have noticed that I chose the Glyph of Blood Strike in this spec.  The reason is fairly simple really.  Frostfire Bolt applies a debuff on the boss that makes it count as being snared, which means that you will be getting the +20% damage bonus on every BS that you use.  Considering how RNG can cause you to sometimes almost never cast IT, this makes Glyph of Blood Strike the best choice possible.

If you do not have a FF Mage in your raid then you can change this Glyph out.  The most common choice is the Glyph of Icy Touch, though due to how rarely you will actually cast IT on a boss you could choose something else if you wanted.  The upside to this Glyph however is that you can be firing off IT and BB at range when not near a boss allowing you to gain RP to fire off DC’s for more DPS or to sustain a Gargoyle if in trouble.

And…

So yeah…that’s it.  Heh.  Hope you enjoyed it!!  I’ve decided to wait a few days on the DW specs because I have not actually tried them myself since I don’t have 1H weapons to test the results with myself.  Once I see some solid reports on DW, I’ll have a post up for you.  As to Blood I’d expect to have something up by Thursday about it.

Gonna knock out some BISI this week too, and hopefully get to some Tank/PvP oriented posts for 3.0.8 towards the end of this week or next week at some point.  As always if you need to contact me feel free at:

Skeleton.Jack@hotmail.com

-Suffer Well Brothers and Sisters.

Tags: Rotations, Specs