Ask Lyren section

Ok, so I rolled a DK, for a fuck around project, went Frost till 60 because I liked the talent tree, then out of frustration respec'd Blood. Oh man is Blood over powered, I can take on 5-8 mobs and end the fight with 75%, no down time. What the fuck? When I play the same exact levels with my Mage everything takes me double the time, oh and I have to sit and drink a lot. (My DK is 60 and my mage is 61). The difference between them when playing them back to back is crazy. Its like im a ret tank healer all in one.

Anyway, Lyren, can you help me? What fuck is the DK bar with all the rune circles on it under my health? I dont totally get it. Also if im going to level this DK for DPS and not to tank, what kind of stats should I be looking for in my gear? Attack power?

Thanks

As far as I know Pant, this is pretty much the best leveling blood spec right now, it gives almost no downtime and high burst dps. The ability rotation is Plauge Strike --> Icy Touch --> Obliterate --> Heart Strike --> Heart Strike --> Repeat, placing Mark of Blood down and using Rune Tap to replace the Heart Strikes when needed.

Thank you, that helps. How do you enjoy playing him?

Also in the 60s he seems way over powered, does it even out later when you get to Northrend?

*shrug* My DK is 58 right now. L2look at poster name Pant.

Edit. And I guess I should look at the thread title before posting. >.>

The main reason why you feel so overpowered at lvl 60 is because you basically start outlands completely twinked. I am sure the OP feeling dies down a bit as you gain levels and still don't have gear replacements. However the fact that Blood DK's have no downtime should not go away, it is the way they are built. Their runes are the driving force of the DK's and they refresh quite quickly. Their secondary "pool" (unlike most if not all other classes) is not a necessity for them to function, as in if you suddenly find yourself with 0 runic power you are not shut down.

Now to explain the DK bar. It has 6 runes in it. 2 Blood(red), 2 Unholy(green) and 2 Frost(blue) runes. Many of your skills have a cost in runes (ex. Obliterate costs 1 Unholy and 1 Frost rune). When you use that skill it puts the corresponding runes on cooldown. So lets say you used Obliterate you would have 2 Blood, 1 Unholy and 1 Frost rune left to use for your next attack. I am not sure the exact length of the cooldown on the runes but its somewhere around 8-10 seconds or so.

Now (if you specced into it) you will see that sometimes some of your runes turn into skulls. These are Death Runes and they can be used as a Blood, Unholy or Frost rune. So back to Obliterate, lets say your current rune situation is 1 Blood 1 Unholy 0 Frost and 1 Death. You would still be able to cast Obliterate as it would use the Unholy and Death runes as the Death rune would take the place of the Frost. Once you use a Death rune it will convert back to the type of rune it originally was.

As for stats I believe you its your typical melee dps stats. Looking at Elitist Jerks it appears a general system would be:
"Hit>Str>Expertise>Crit Rating>Armor Pen>AP" This changes as your gear changes of course but it is a general guideline.

Hopefully that answers your question. I know its a bit lengthy but you didn't really say what you don't understand about it so I pretty much explained everything lol. I know you just said it was a fuck around toon but drop by here if you really want to understand the ins and outs of the class (dps only)
http://elitistjerks.com/f47/t36638-death_knight_pve_dps/

that hit the spot! thank you, it totally makes sense. so happy I asked you.
Thanks Lyren!

www.wowwiki/ask_lyren

LMAO Ive been away from the boards for a bit. Seems like all your questions have been answered. The thing Ive noticed between the 3 specs is that with blood you pretty much always have runes avilable and full health. My rotation is typically Icy touch pull, plague strike, pestilence, death and decay, then i mix in some blood strikes and death strikes. INo matter what spec you get into, make sure you pick up EPIDEMIC from the unholy tree. Its going to be interesting to see where the DKs fit into raid situations. I doubt they will be as OP on the dps meters as they are grinding.

I keep hearing a nerf is coming soon. I am going to spend time getting my DK up as high as I can before the next patch. (At the same time im excited about having some Pally changes like actually having a ranged taunt - not just RD.)

Hey, didnt you move or something?

Just so everyone knows Lyrens real secret to lvling a dk, it's having a healer fly around and babysit him so when he dies he never has to ghost run.

hahaha Aka=Lyren's soulstone