Heya guys!!  So it’s time for an update as things have changed.  Funny how things change so much on a Test realm eh (PTR)?  Heh, 

So I am revamping all of my spec info atm, and trying to break into PvP and Tank specs as well.  I’d like to have about 10-14 specs that are 3.2 viable up and ready to go for Tuesday of next week.  I’ve got a feeling 3.2 is going live soon.  They’re not pushing boss tests much anymore…

So in the spirit of giving you guys toys, here is the preliminary DW info for Tuesday (barring future changes).

Dual Wield 3.2 Builds

The clear leader for 3.2 appears to be Frost DW with the new changes.  However the Unholy DW build seems to be within a 5% range, leaving it a viable option.  Unholy DW will suffer significantly however in any encounter that you cannot keep at least a 70% uptime on your ghoul.

DW Frost Oblit/Pest Build – 0/53/18

Rotations

IT – PS – BS - Pest – OB – RP  //  OB – OB – OB – RP (Set up rotation)

OB - BS - Pest – OB – RP  //  OB – OB – OB – RP (Future rotations once diseases are applied)

Priority System:  Diseases (FF > BP) > OB > BS > FS.  It is important to understand that Rune abilities always take priority over RP abilities.  Always keeps the 2SR in mind however, as you will want to fire off FS/HB Rime procs between GCD’s when possible.  Don’t just RP dump at the end of a rotation.

Howling Blast/Rime Procs:  Attempt to use these with KM procs whenever possible due to HB having a lower crit % chance than FS.  Do not push back a rotation however to do this.  If you have spare GCD’s then it is ok to delay a Rime proc.  Otherwise use KM on FS’s.

Note:  This rotation/spec will not proc IIT due to Pest refreshing the diseases.  If you need to be buffing the raid you can take a personal DPS loss (but a raid DPS increase) by ignoring Pest, and subbing in a new glyph.  A basic rotation of IT – PS – BS - BS – OB – RP  //  OB – OB – OB – RP will work fine. 

The secondary glyph choice is relatively unimportant, so you could leave it the same or take something like Howling Blast.  It won’t impact your dps much by swapping this glyph honestly.

Runeforge:  FC/RI

Weapon Speeds:  Slow/Slow

Presence:  Blood

DW Unholy Oblit Build – 0/18/53

Rotations

PS – IT –  BS – BS – OB – RP  //  OB – OB – OB – RP

Priority System:  Diseases (BP > FF) > OB > BS > DC.  It is important to understand that Rune abilities always take priority over RP abilities.  Always keeps the 2SR in mind however, as you will want to fire off DC’s between GCD’s when possible.  Don’t just RP dump at the end of a rotation.

Runeforge:  FC/FC

Weapon Speeds:  Slow/Slow

Presence:  Blood

-Suffer Well Brothers and Sisters.

Tags: PTR, Specs

Heya guys!!  So it’s time to finally get into Unholy DPS and specs for the 3.2 release!!  Yay!!    Heh.

Right, so basically Unholy is shaping up to be pretty similar to where it stands now.  But, things will be changing on PTR still.  ATM, on PTR, an Obliterate Unholy build will actually come out ahead of a Scourge Strike Unholy build.

This is basically due to itemization and Armor Penetration.  Once you exceed 20% ApR, OB builds begin to pull ahead.  And considering you can already do that with T8 itemization, the gap will increase with T9 itemization.

There is a similar discussion going on for DKs about at what point they can stop using Scourge Strike and just use Obliterate instead. That would be bad, because an Obliterate-based Unholy build is a lot less fun or distinct to play. A similar thing happened the last time we tried to buff Devastate. Fury warriors said “Yummy,” and gave up a big chunk of the Fury tree in order to get it.  (Link)

So what does this mean to you guys?  Basically if things stay as they are currently on the PTR, Obliterate will replace Scourge Strike.  This goes directly against the conceptual design of Death Knights however, as Blizzard wants them to have one “signature strike” per tree.

While it’s possible things could hit Live as they are, leaving Blizz to do a minor patch or hotfix to correct things, it seems far more likely that you’ll see another PTR release that shakes things up.  Where and how is the big question though.

The main reason SS was nerfed was to compensate for PvP burst problems.  If you thought SS hits hard now in PvP, wait till the newer tiers of weapons come out.  While it’s only a mild problem atm, as gear scales it would (and will) get out of hand. 

So they can’t just increase SS’s damage to stop Unholy from swapping into OB builds.  I’m curious to see their approach to fix this problem, but as of yet it is unresolved.

Unholy Live

12/0/59 - This is basically your best “cookie cutter” Unholy build with T7 itemization going into T8.

0/10/61 - This is your best “cookie cutter” Unholy build with T8 itemization.

You have several options with these specs.  You can always shift some points out of Unholy in the 0/10/61 build into Blood for Subversion if you have to (threat cap issues), or generally move stuff based off of your personal needs. 

For example if you do a ton of AoE and use Death and Decay frequently, you may find Morbidity 3/3 to be a necessity in 12/0/59 build.  But really, its down to player style and need.  Some people also love and hate Ghoul Frenzy.  Shifting a few points for personal playstyle isn’t a bad thing.  Always remember that.

Unholy 3.2 PTR

7/10/54 – If threat is an issue, this should prove to be the answer.  Almost the same dps as the next spec, but without the threat problem.

0/10/61 – This is the more likely “cookie cutter” spec for 3.2 as things stand.

It’s interesting to note how Morbidity pulls out of being a lackluster talent in 3.2 PTR.  Due to the new mechanics behind Unholy Blight (10 second DoT on target hit by a DC, dealing 20% of the dmg of the DC), Morbidity goes from being “ok” to “good” in a heartbeat.

The two builds should play pretty equally, though I think there is some room for maneuvering.  ATM Necrosis and Imp UP would be the most likely place to pull a few points from for side purchases, but YMMV.  Don’t forget to keep GF in mind as well.

Unholy’s AoE damage is going to suffer, but not as much as some might cry.  If you want to see something really interesting, do a full raid run with Recount running and check out the meters at boss fights, and then again at Overall.  For example:

3.1 Live DC for Yogg-Saron and Iron Council

3.1 Live UB for Yogg-Saron and Iron Council

Now this example is in *NO WAY* a perfect example of how UB will play out on Live 3.2 release.  But it gives you an idea of how it will work, and also how you can figure out how this will impact your personal character.  These are multiple attempts on both bosses, with 0 trash mobs involved.

Death Coil

This did 2,427,651 damage with 500 uses.  We’re not going to take out misses or resists because we want to see the “real average”.

Now this means that on average DC hit for 4,855 damage.

Unholy Blight

This did 1,822,191 damage with a count of 5320 ticks.  UB has 20 ticks per use, so that means that it was used roughly 266 times.

On average, UB did 6,850 damage per use.  Now that’s not accurate for ST damage mind you, because there were times where 1 UB hit more than one target.  But we’re dealing with “napkin” math atm.  Nothing 100% accurate.  But because we’re looking at “Overall” data, this will still be somewhat sound.

Unholy Blight 3.2

Applies a DoT to the target (that stacks with further UB applications) that does 20% of the DC damage.  Keep in mind this talent does not double dip from talent bonuses.  For example, if you have Black Ice, BI already increased the damage for DC.  So there is no further modification to UB.  UB does exactly 20% of the DC that landed.  No more, no less.

Assuming that the DoT caused by UB in 3.2 gets every single tick off before a mob dies, this means that UB will hit 500 times.  Why?  Because I did DC 500 times.

So DC did an average of 4855 damage, which means UB will do 971 damage on average.  Since DC hit 500 times, it will do 485,500 damage overall on the same run I did before.

So out of the 30.7 million damage I did overall, I would instead have done 29.4 million damage.  This means that the 3.2 UB change would have made me do 96% of the overall damage that I did before.  Keep in mind that only takes into account UB changes.  It does not cover gear scaling, BS buff’s, disease buffs, SS nerf, etc…

To explain how UB stacks, the numbers are the seconds and assume UB ticks for 1000 damage:

1. DC cast
2. UB tick 1000
3. UB tick 1000
4. DC cast, UB tick 1000
5. UB tick 2000
6. UB tick 2000
7. UB tick 2000
8. UB tick 2000
9. DC cast, UB tick 2000
10. UB tick 3000
11. UB tick 3000
12. UB tick 2000
13. UB tick 2000
14. UB tick 2000
15. UB tick 1000
16. UB tick 1000
17. UB tick 1000
18. UB tick 1000
19. UB tick 1000
20. 0 UB ticks

The DoT damage simply includes all current UB DoT ticks into one number.  As the previous DoT’s from DC fall off, the DoT tick reduces down to whatever is left on the mob.  Which means that you could see some pretty cool numbers with the improved disease damage.

Pets

All pets now receive 40% of their master’s resilience and 100% of their master’s spell penetration. In addition, if a player is at their appropriate spell hit chance or hit chance maximum, their pet will be at the maximum for spell hit chance, hit chance, and expertise. If they are below the maximum, their pet will be proportionately below those maximums.

Now, I’m not sure yet what in the hell this means.  Ideally with raid buffs you should reach the spell hit cap, but sometimes you fall short by a few %.  Considering that a DK should be melee hit capped and expertise capped however, I’m not sure if those numbers will come into play. 

Ghouls don’t have spells, so since we’re melee capped (but possibly not spell hit say in a 10man) would the ghoul be expertise and melee hit capped?  As soon as I figure out how this works you’ll know.  But the upside however is that our ghouls will be getting less dodges (expertise).  So that is a huge boost.

So Recapping…

Basically our AoE damage is going to go down some.  The improved disease damage will compensate some, but not completely.  The SS nerf is going to hurt but improved diseases, UB, and BS should help compensate some as well.  Also, expect some kind of change coming down the pipe.  Blizzard won’t allow OB to become the “signature strike” for Unholy, replacing Scourge Strike.

All in all 3.2 isn’t too bad for us, short of losing AoE damage.  It’ll be interesting to see how things pan out in the Live release with BISI gear, etc.

-Suffer Well Brothers and Sisters.

Tags: PTR, Specs

Heya guys!!  So, it’s time to finally talk about Dual Wielding specs for 3.2.  Oddly enough (at least for some), this is going to include both Frost and Unholy discussion.  Keep in mind with all posts about specs before a PTR release goes Live, that it’s impossible to perfectly predict the outcome. 

But I’m not going to keep you guessing about the future of Frost.  It does appear that the future of 2H Frost is dead, RIP.  Why?  Well the nerfs to Frost Strike have been abusive at best, and when combined with the scaling benefits of DW…well there’s just not much potential left for 2H.

Dual Wield Live

0/17/54 - Considered to be the best “cookie cutter” Dual Wield build currently available in 3.1 Live.

Basically this runs in Unholy Presence, and focuses on the maximum amount of GCD’s used possible for massive Runic Power (RP) generation for Death Coil’s.  While it is competitive, it does not top the charts by any stretch of the word.  This is basically for DW die hards only.

Frost Live

17/51/3 - Considered to be the best “cookie cutter” Frost build currently available in 3.1 Live.

Frost basically focuses on only using Frost Fever and ignoring Blood Plague.  This method relies heavily upon Rime procs, Glyph of Howling Blast, and Obliterate.  While there is also the “IT Machine Gun” spec which relies heavily upon UP and Glyph of Icy Touch.

There are some variations (for IT Machine Gun for example) which requires point shifts to talents like Death Rune Mastery, but that’s another post for another time.  When all is said and done, outside of Yogg-Saron and Hodir, Frost 2H has been a largely sub-par spec performing nowhere near as well as Unholy or Blood.

Frost and Dual Wield 3.2 PTR

As I said before, Frost 2H is basically dead.  Frost Strike has been severly nerfed due to primarily PvP reasons.  3.2 Frost Strike can now be dodged, parried, or blocked.  Also, the weapon damage bonus was reduced to 55%, down from 60%. 

Combined with the changes for DW like Threat of Thassarian (3/3 talent, req 35 points in Frost, 100% chance to deal damage with your off hand), better scaling damage from DW’ing over 2H, and more…RIP 2H.

Now here is the upside however.  Something is going to give, and Blizzard will eventually make future changes.  Why you ask?  Because of Unholy.

There are basically 2 big kids on the block for 3.2 DW:

Unholy DW

0/17/54 - 3.2 DW Unholy

The only question that comes in for DW Unholy is whether one of the Glyphs needs to be dropped so you can work in the new Glyph of Unholy Blight.  Since this spec so heavily relies upon Deathcoil damage, the new UB is a big deal.  Due to the UB bugs on PTR, and lack of raid testing, the current status is inconclusive.

Frost DW

3/51/17 – 3.2 DW Frost

Frost is a lil hinky however.  It doesn’t perform anymore like it did as a 2H spec.  First off your melee white damage will be significantly higher, which also means that Necrosis and Blood-caked Blade will be higher as well.  But then your special ability damage will be lower as well.

Frost Strike: Originally this was using two separate tables for the MH and OH weapon for hit/miss/crit.  So you could miss with your OH weapon, but hit with the MH weapon.  Last I heard this was fixed supposedly, but I cannot confirm that.  Also, only the MH strike uses a Killing Machine proc, meaning most of the benefit from KM is gone as it only applies to about half of a FS.

Outside of that this is a standard IT -> PS -> OB -> BS -> BS // OB -> OB -> OB rotation.  Not sure if the new disease buffs for dmg and Blood Strike will justify using 2 diseases or not, so we’ll see if this degenerates back into a HB single disease rotation.

BCB Normalization

An interesting side note is that BCB is no longer normalized.  Long story short on this is that instead of multiplying the base damage numbers by 2.4 (regardless of the weapon’s speed), BCB now multiplies the base damage by the weapon’s speed. 

What does that mean to you?  Fast weapons are no longer PWN for any Necrosis/BCB DW build.  Slow/Slow is now the desired weapon combinations for DW.

The DPS Winner

It’s Unholy DW actually.  Which is retarded.  DW Unholy is sub-par to Unholy 2H.  DW Frost is sub-par to DW Unholy.  2H Frost is sub-par to DW Frost.  So that means that both variations of Frost are not remotely on par to where they should be. 

While having DW Frost and Unholy being close in DPS is not too much of an issue, having DW Frost being equal to a tree not specialized in DW, and sub-par to 2H Unholy and 2H Blood is an issue.  The big question is whether Blizzard has noticed this detail.  If not, it is possible it will go Live and not be altered until 3.2.1 release.

End Story

ATM, Frost DW seems to be slightly under Unholy DW which means its basically sub-par for PvE dps balance.  Because it’s so difficult to actually test this in a raid environment on PTR, there’s no way to verify the theories or prove anything to Blizzard.  So this info could be wrong. 

But if it’s not, it means that unless they change something soon DW Frost won’t really be offering all that much until 3.2.1 release at earliest.  Worst case scenario is that there will be 2 viable DW specs available that don’t suck so much that you can’t get a raid spot with them.  But they won’t be top end 25man hard-mode content specs if things stay as they are.

-Suffer Well Brothers and Sisters.

Tags: PTR, Specs

Heya guys!!  So, it’s time to delve into 3.2 specs and right now we’re taking a peek at potenital Blood specs.  Keep in mind with all posts about specs before a PTR release goes Live, that it’s impossible to perfectly predict the outcome. 

So much has already changed on the PTR that well, there is no telling what the Live 3.2 release will hold.  We’ve already seen major changes to Dancing Rune Weapon and Summon Gargoyle, bonus damage for Blood Strike with diseases (+50% reduced down recently to 25%) and talents, and much more.

What is interesting is that there was the possibility of ignoring DRW originally for a deeper Unholy build for the best possible build available.  ATM those hopes have been dashed, but we will see…

Blood Live

51/0/20 – Considered to be the best “cookie cutter” Blood build currently available.

51/2/18 – Considered to be the second best “cookie cutter” Blood build, it’s DRW is much stronger for burst scenarios.

There are several variants of both of these builds which would allow you to shift points to bring alternative combinations of talents resulting in any of the following:

1. Blood-Caked Blade
2. Night of the Dead
3. Vampiric Blood
4. Improved Blood Presence
5. Morbidity

But that generally comes down to both player style, raid needs, and preference.  Outside of those 5 listed talents however, most other talents would be a waste to consider investing into.

Blood PTR

If you’ve not been following the PTR too much they’ve made some changes that shook things up quite a bit, and then “fixed it”, heh.  Originally Blood Strike was going to recieve a +50% dmg bonus from diseases, which when combined with talents and the Glyph of Blood Strike was going to make it better than Heart Strike for single target (ST) dps.

They’ve recently done a few things however to nerf the potential of Blood Strike.  Not only did they reduce the disease bonus damage (50% down to 25%), but they also reverted the talent Blood Strikes.  Bloody Strikes now increases the damage of Blood Strike by 5/10/15% (down from 15/30/45%), while the bonus damage to Heart Strike and Blood Boil unchanged.

Now a side factor here to future Blood builds is the new Unholy Blight.  While it is currently an AoE on Live, it will actually be a 10 second DoT that will be a % of your Death Coil.  Now as Blood does a great deal of DC damage, this is very appealing at first.  Especially when the Glyph of Unholy Blight will now be adding a % damage to the effect.  However they recently nerfed the base effect of UB at 30% (or maybe 40%, I forget) of your DC damage to 20%.

In addition to this recent additional nerf to UB there is a new change to DRW (Live it has like a 11 second max duration) allowing it to last a set 12 seconds with RP left over.  Basically it works like this:

• Live DRW: Costs all of your RP.  If at 100 RP it will last for 11 seconds w/o glyph.
• PTR DRW: Costs 60 RP and lasts 12 seconds w/o glyph.

Basically a new build pouring deeper into Unholy for UB (and ignoring DRW) was coming to light.  But with the most recent UB and DRW changes this seems unlikely.  Lastly the original upset with Blood Strike is now no longer an issue.  So long story short.  Not much is changing for Blood.  >.<

Seems kind of a dissapointment almost considering it was shaping up into some interesting directions.  But if things stand as they are, expect Blood to come into 3.2 unscathed, for better or worse.  If anything it’s going to see a bit of a buff to DRW.

51/0/20 – Should remain top dog.

51/2/18 – Should remain…second dog?  (sounds wrong for some reason)

Coming Soon:  Unholy, Frost, and Dual Wield specs!!

-Suffer Well Brothers and Sisters.

Tags: PTR, Specs

Heya guys!!  So there’s a lot going on here on the SJ side.  This internet website stuff has been delayed slightly as I’ve been getting back into the PvP swing of things.  I’ve also been doing a lot of work prepping my toon for some last minute tweaks.  Being 100% Ulduar ready and all.  SK is going for Server Firsts.  Not sure if we will pull it off, but we will give it a damn good try.

As you may have noticed, the post under this has the basis of a lot of new specs for 3.1 release.  And as you may also have noticed I’ve dropped a ton of specs on you guys so far from each tree.  As I’ve said a TON of times before, PTR is 100% too unreliable to ever give you a truly solid view of what Live will be until it’s opening.  That’s just the way the cookie crumbles.

The specs that I’ve listed below are however what I feel will be the basis of the top end specs of 3.1 when it releases.  I’ve been doing a lot of behind the scenes work prepping specs for 3.1, and in the end I think you guys will be very happy with the finished products.  And not only will I have PvE dps specs ready, but tanking and PvP ones as well.  Now, I cannot promise the same absolute guarantee on PvP/Tank specs, but they will be damn close and at least solid I promise.

Rotations for PvE are always simple.  Follow the PvE dps ones, and only work in Runestrike during the rotaton instead of traditional RP dumps.  Glyphs may not be gimme’s as well.  Some things are still up for debate.  PvE DW specs are dead in the water as well.  I’ve seen work on a few of them, including a DW Unholy spec relying upon DnD.  But ultimately these will all perform either better with a 2H weapon, or are significantly subpar to the new 2H specs.

Blizzard has made a point of nerfing the crap out of IT spam builds, DW builds, and Disease-less specs.  And they’ve done a pretty solid job of it.  /sigh  The best thing is to move on and deal with what you’ve got.  Well, unless you are a tester yourself and willing to go through the tedium and tirades while trying to make your case and point on the WoW Forums.  But that’s a question of whether you’re willing to fight against the machine, or simply work with what is given to you.  I can’t make that decision for you.

There are a great deal of specs available/possible for 3.1, but what you have to remember is that I only try to bother with the top end specs.  I’m not going to sit here and tell you guys 20 different variations on Frost PvE specs.  I’ve got better things to do with my time, and quite frankly there is better content I can share with all of you.  I’ve seen people wonder about that Disease-less Frost spec for example.  It will be viable.  It will work.  I raided with it, and it was kind of fun honestly.  But it’s not going to net the dps of the Frost spec I will give you.  See where I’m going?

For those DW diehard holdouts I will give you one gem of hope.  DW was “awful” at the inception of DK’s until someone finally figured out how to use DK talent synergies to make it work.  It could happen again.  It’s not likely though, which is actually the true gem of hope you should wish for.  If DW fails entirely, Blizzard promised to do something to make it viable.  And even considered offering to make one tree the “DW” tree.  Also a lot of the newer changes to Strikes and talents are set up very well to be shifted to including the MH and OH for Strike damage.  There is hope.

Cancer

For those longer term readers you may remember me talking about this before.  I did not forget.  I just planned.  A friend of mine that I met in game has an amazing daughter.  Her name is Eleanor.  She is 5 years old and sweet as can be.  I’ve listened to her ramble on before telling her mom about all kinds of things.  And it breaks my heart just thinking about everything that their family is suffering through.

Eleanor has cancer.  And it’s the bad kind in it’s last phase.  They’ve been forced to resort the last and final treatment, killing all of her bone cells with Chemo entirely.  It’s a bad bad bad thing for a child to have to go through.

I will be holding a raffle for 10,000g for any server that you play on, so long as it is a US server.  I apologize to my EU cousins, but I don’t have gold on EU servers to offer as a prize.    If we collect at least $5,000 in donations I will increase the prize to 20,000g.  If we collect at least $10,000 I will get you 20,000g and also 1 years worth of paid subscription to WoW with game cards.  And if we break $20k…well I’ll be giving thanks and figuring out some kind of a bonus if that could actually happen.  Possibly runner up prizes, etc…

This is a donation only.  And it’s to a good cause.  The prizes are only a free raffle you’ll be entered into.  And this will be done through PayPal.  I’ve put this off because I am hoping for maximum exposure.  And since people come back to WoW at major patch releases, and the minor patches always bump my hit count from around 6k to closer to 10k people a day…I’ve decided to hold back on this until 3.1 so I can hopefully help out lil Eleanor as much as possible.  The finalized details will be forthcoming with the 3.1 release. 

-Suffer Well Brothers and Sisters.

Tags: Coming Soon, PTR

Heya guys!!  This is a down and dirty post.  It ain’t pretty, but it’s got some good stuff.

Blood

50/0/21

DS – IT – PS - HS – HS – UB – DC(x #)

DS – HS x4 – DC(x #)

Long story short, DRW has been so nerfed into the ground because of it’s PvP burst potential, that it just doesn’t beat out UB.  *shrug*  It’s like back in the day when Blood skipped DRW for Gargoyle, but now this.  Blood is top end dps still, and probably the best “learning curve” raid spec as it provides a butt ton of self healing.  A few points can be shifted possibly, but this is pretty much the premise of new Blood.  Spend DC’s as able.  You DS first to get Abom’s Might up instantly for the raid.

Frost

3/51/17

IT – PS - OB – BS – BS - FSx2

OBx3 - FSx2

The disease damage modifiers are far too important now to ignore BP.  And since Rime now procs OB instead of IT, OB is the new ZOMG BUTTON SMASH!!!  Subbing out an OB for a HB (with glyph) will end up being a net dps loss sadly.  Again while a few points can be shifted, this is the basic premise of new Frost.  IT spam is dead.  Rime procs should always be used on the 2nd half of the rotation.  As to the first half, which is GCD starved…  Well that’s more of a question as to OB vs HB damage on Live with full raid buffs and T8 gear.  Also, T7 will be dead for Frost.  It’s not to say that it doesn’t work with some of the older specs which will still be used.  But the newer one wins for now.

Unholy

12/0/59

IT – PS - BS – BS – SS - UB – DC(x #)

SS x3 – DC(x #)

Unholy plays pretty much the exact same as before, with just more dps talent bloat in the Unholy tree itself.  Now I know you’re wondering about some kind of a 10 Frost build to get Black Ice.  That will come into play with full T8+ gear, which at that point itemization scaling will probably lend itself to a 0/10/61 build of some kind, possibly shifting 3 points into Subversion if truly needed.

PvP

Frost Ghoul

0/45/26

Now this spec is probably not correct yet, but it shows you the premise of the build.  It’s basically an inverse Shadowfrost spec, but has some potential still even with the IT nerfs.

Unholy

0/17/54

Now this spec also probably has some changes that need to be done, and the Glyphs are *largely* up for debate.  But this is again the most likely spec possible.  Considering that all PS/SS’s will proc a snare, and CoI will proc FF, this spec has a lot of potential combined with a great deal of ignoring armor.

Blood

Where’s the Blood version?  Not bothering.  Blood is primarily physical guys.  And as such, doesn’t stack up to these 2 specs.  Can you do one?  Sure.  But it’s not gonna be what you see breaking the 2k+ ratings consistently.

Tanking

Frost

10/54/7

This again, is up for some possible changes.  But basically this is looking to be the premire Frost tanking spec for 3.1 release.  There are some modifications that could be done, but again this is the premise.

Blood

44/23/4

This is basically the Blood counterpart.

Unholy

5/6/60

Unholy is basically your AoE tank.  It’s not really as attractive as the other two specs, but it should have better threat generation, better AoE threat generation, and the capacity to DPS as this spec as well.

-Suffer Well Brothers and Sisters.

Tags: PTR, Specs

Heya guys!!  So we were going to be doing the 20man Naxx 25 this evening to get people their achievements.  Basically everyone is at the point where all we need really is The Immortal (as far as difficulty) to gain Heroic: Glory of the Raider.  So we’re covering the last few bases in the hopes we can manage The Immortal before 3.1 releases to try to get the 310% speed mount.  *crosses fingers*  BUT!!!  PTR testing was re-released, yay!!  Ulduar that is!!

So we get everything worked out and form 2 different 10 mans because apparently there is an issue with the Heroic version of Ulduar atm.  We reform up, get people online, and then we get everyone in the raid.  Woot!!  Fun time!!  Then we begin to notice emotes and “/say” messages from the people in our guild in the *other* raid group…  *blink* *blink* *blink*  WTF Willus!??!

Next thing we know we get a message from Blizzard telling us they are having instance problems.   Duh…  And that Udluar will be deadlocked for 30 minutes so go grab a sandwhich.  *blink*  /looks down at his sammich laying in front of him

/CHECK!!!  Sammich in hand!! 

To which I then heal in Vent, “Hey SJ already has a sandwhich!!”  Heh.  I had told them I was grabbing a coke and a sammich earlier while they were working out the raid groups, so it just had me busted up laughing.  Sorry, but that’s my dorky moment for the evening!!  Heh.

So here is the Blue post on PTR Ulduar testing for those of us in the US:

Here’s the current schedule for Ulduar PTR testing this week:

On the North American test realms:

Flame Leviathan (Normal, i.e. 10 Player Mode ONLY) – Tuesday Night, March 3 at 4PM PST (or after the PTR servers come back up) through tomorrow. We want a lot of testing on this, but take note that the Heroic version of this fight should NOT be tested at this time. Players should only form 10 player raids to test this. The Heroic/25 Player version is not properly tuned.
Ignis the Furnace Master – Wednesday night, March 4, starting at 7pm EST/4pm PST.
Hodir - Thursday night, March 5, starting at 7pm EST/4pm PST

So it looks like raiding this week will be delayed, and PTR raid testing will be in!!  Who knows, I may just sit down and take some notes and tell you guys some tidbits from the PTR?!?!  Who’s down? 

-Suffer Well Brothers and Sisters

Tags: PTR

Heya guys!!  This is a short one, but a much needed post.  I’ve not gone in depth about the 3.1 changes as of yet for a very good reason.  The sheer scope of changes that they have implemented are crazy.  Some of the decisions that Blizz has made are quite honestly a bit out of depth, and lack good sense.  What am I talking about?  OK.  Let’s just look at 2 examples alone.  Death Strike the ability, and Dual Wield specs overall.

Death Strike

In the current PTR implementation DS is hitting *ALMOST* as hard a Obliterate hits on Live atm with diseases up.  It crits for the 8-9k on average.  And the healing?  Don’t get me started.  There are multiple, reliable, reports of DS crits healing a DK for 10-15k health without use of special cooldowns.  Now think about that for a minute.  You can work out a spec that will DS twice a rotation if you so choose.  What does that mean in PvP alone?  Forget tanking and PvE dps just for a second.  Do you really want to fight a target that twice per 10 seconds will self heal for anywhere between 4k to 12k health guaranteed?  No, it’s ludicrous.  This will not make it live.

Dual Wield Specs

The nerf bat hit DW hard.  Not just hard…but MEGA FRICKIN’ HARD!!!  They went overboard, big time.  Not only did they seperate away all of the driving talents that make DW what it is, but they also went and nerfed several of the DW talents that yielded so much extra for DW itself.  Most of the DW specs being discussed and tested atm simply do the same, or more damage, when you use a 2H weapon with them.  Will this be the final tally?  Probably not.  But even if so, Blizzard did post that they will correct the issue if they went to overboard.  And they also opened up discussion to the possibility of making one tree favor DW specifically, and then balancing that tree to make DW viable and equal to the rest.  But for this moment, it’s not doing too well.

Examples like these, and others like how the initial Plague Strike changes had it hitting as hard as a Scourge Strike (though it is physical while SS ignores armor), are simply stupid.  They can’t see the light of day.  They won’t.  So it isn’t that I am ignoring you guys, or hiding the truth of 3.1 from you.  It’s more along the lines that it just simply cannot go live as it is for DK’s.  Some things need drastic attention.  And some things have already gotten it.  Such as the PS Glyph that was part of the issue has already been nerfed.

I spent about…5 hours just reading up on DK’s yesterday.  I’ve also spent a few hours raiding on PTR as Unholy, and I also tried out a new “Shadowfrost” PvP spec yesterday as well.  Well, new to me.  But it’s been around for a few months now I think.  Quite effective.  I’ll be doing a post on it too.  When things settle down some, you’ll hear more from me on 3.1 guys.  Atm I am very hesitant to raise alarm bells because I think after the dust settles the 3.1 release will look different that the 3.1 PTR.

-Suffer Well Brothers and Sisters

Tags: PTR

Heya guys!!  Very quick passing by glance?!?!  WTF does that mean?  It means I have nachos in the works, and nachos > you guys!!

I’ve been doing a lot of reading about DK’s recently and for the most part I’m abivalent about most of what is going on.  Some of the changes are awesome, and some of them stink.  But 3.1 is basically the overhaul to DK’s.  The biggest problem Blizzard will be left hanging with atm, is the severity of nerfs they have piled on to Obliterate to deal with the disease-less specs with the improvements to Death Strike, are now making DS a viable alternative to OB.

All in all not only is this distasteful, making me feel all snobby and crotchity.  “What do you mean I should be Death Striking?!?  Obliterate sounds FAR cooler damnit!!”  But the balance beast is raising it’s weary head, as some Blood DK’s are doing such ridiculous self healing now that it will trivialize their survivability as both tanks and pvp’ers.  WTG Blizz for thinking ahead!!  In the end these bonuses towards DS will hopefully not go through, or we’ll hear more outcries from the tank and pvp community about how OP DK’s are.  And when enough people cry about us, then we will shortly be crying as well.  Trust me.

Unholy is  bit awkward atm (the spec, not the playstyle).  I can’t figure out where to shave points from now, or even whether the new UA talent is even worth it.  But as far as playstyle it’s even better with longer duration diseases!!  How hot is that?!?!  Frost is also going through a great deal of growing pains atm as well.  A lot of Frost Knights are going for perma-ghoul from Unholy, but it’s survivability in a lot of fights will be nil without NotD.  Not to mention they are now struggling with whether they need UP or BP and whether to fight for Impurity or Tundra Stalker.

Some might think that this is a good thing if player’s have to question what to use.  But just remember this is a “testing phase”.  Once enough tests are done, spreadsheets are fixed, and raids are completed…  There will be the tried and true answers yet again detailing what does best and why.

And for those DW blokes out there…  /sigh  I will not torture you any longer.  DW is alive and well, no matter what nay sayers have been crying.  Trust SJ, I’ve not lead you wrong yet.  I’ve not been doing the reading yet, but I’ve seen enough to see quite well that DW is alive and possible.  It just will not likely have a 1-2kdps lead over other specs like it once did.  *shrug*  When I have more, you will get it.

But for now?  NACHOS!!!  I am feeling much better finally for those wondering, even though I slept for close to 20 hours last night.  But I’ve got a full work week ahead of me and plenty of time to get back to a normal pace.  I hope you guys are doing well.

-Suffer Well Brothers and Sisters

Tags: PTR