More Death Knight FAQs

Korrath from the WoW forums made a great informational post regarding more FAQs for the Death Knight class. Lots of great info here, particularly regarding individual skills and spells (some still receiving lots of changes on the beta) and how they can be most effectively used.

Also, make sure to check out part 1 for more Death Knight FAQs.

Q: Why doesn’t Bladed Armor work with Frost Presence?

A: Frost Presence has a 30-second pulse that it uses to periodically check armor changes. Wait a little bit and it will kick in.

Q: Why does Summon Gargoyle suck?

A: It doesn’t, but it isn’t very useful when soloing and questing. The gargoyle has a fairly short cast time for its gargoyle strike; the spell hits about as hard as Death Coil, and happens every couple of seconds. It’s terrific for extended DPS in instances and groups since you have a steady influx of runic power and don’t have much down time. While you are questing, half the time is spent killing and the other half is spent running, which makes the gargoyle less useful.

Q: What’s a death rune?

A: A death rune is a rune that can be used as either unholy, frost or blood. It has lower priority than your other runes, meaning that if you have a Frost rune and a Death Rune available and cast Icy Touch, it will choose your Frost Rune first.

Q: Why does Corpse Explosion suck?

A: It needs love, and will hopefully get it soon. Currently, it isn’t worth using unless there are 6 or more targets in the area to explode.

Q: How is Dual Wielding?

A: Works for some builds, it probably won’t get much better than it currently is due to how attack power scales with white damage and yellow damage. There are a lot of divided thoughts on this. Do what you like.

Q: What’s the best spec for (tanking/DPS/PvP)?

A: Play the game, try things out, discuss. This is beta and this is a brand new class, there isn’t four years of back theorycraft and empirical testing for this class. There isn’t four seasons of previous arena history to base conjecture off of. There are a multitude of specs for blood, frost and unholy tanks, DPS and PvP, and the talent trees change every single patch.

Get out there and try it. That’s what the beta is for.

Q: I don’t know what to do, I just copied a premade DK and I’m all confused!

A: Try creating a new death knight, and do all of the starting quests. It’s an excellent method of trying things out, without all the skills overwhelming you.

Q: I’m still all confused!

A: Read more, post less. (like part 1 of my Death Knight FAQ!)

Q: Why did Blizzard make _______ suck?

A: Blizzard’s designers have budgets for everything. Sometimes they need to rein in the power in order to make things fit into the budget. It’s a sort of behind-the-scenes method of homogenizing all of the classes, in order to ensure that some semblance of balance exists.

Q: Balance? HA! This class sucks, this game sucks, the designers suck, yadda yadda

A: Yet you still give them money each month… Read more, post less.

Q: I just made a Death Knight and I don’t have any talent points! Where are they?

A: You initially start out with 0 talent points and as you complete quests in the starting area you are awarded them along with money/items. By the time you finish the Scarlet Enclave you will have the correct amount of talent points for your level.

Q: Necrosis is only doing 1 damage, is it bugged?

A: Nothing is wrong! Don’t panic, it’s just how necrosis works. Necrosis is based on the damage you do with your weapon. So if you hit a target dummy (it only has 1 hp) necrosis considers that a 1 damage attack and only hits for 1 damage as a result.

Q: Hey, I need mods, what are good ones?

A: Jaime keeps a thread with DK-Centric mods here:
http://forums.worldofwarcraft.com/thread.html?topicId=10529923372&sid=2000&pageNo=1
Q: I am STUCK on a HORSE! How do I turn it in?

A: Press 1.

Q: Aren’t we supposed to be overpowered? We are a hero class!

A: Death Knight as a “hero” class is in reference to the player and not the character. As far as game mechanics go, the Death Knight is just any other class in the game, albeit a new one. The “hero” qualification means that the class is more complex (not more powerful) than “standard” and you are beginning play later in the leveling curve. You have 25 levels to learn the inner workings of your class to play on a competitive level, every other class has already had 70 levels to learn. This requires a player comfortable with such a handicap placed upon them.

Q: Some guy totally made his ghoul explode, but my ghoul pet bar doesn’t have explode, what gives?

A: In order to make your ghoul explode, you need both the Master of Ghouls talent and Corpse Explosion. That will enable you to make your poor, innocent ghoul who implicitly trusts and loves you unconditionally, explode.

Q: Corpse dust sucks!!! It is too expensive and I hate it, will it ever go away?

A: No. Deal with it.

FAQ credits: Sunny, Ratri, Rabinahau

General Information:

Special Melee Attack hit cap: 9% (Strikes)
Two-hander melee hit cap vs. a boss: 9%
Dual wield melee hit cap vs. a boss: 28%
Spell hit cap vs. a boss: 17%

Hit rating for 1%:
Melee: 32.79
Spell: 26.23

This means that if you get 9% hit to ensure all of your melee attacks land you will still need 5.75% more hit or 151 more hit rating to reach the spell hit cap. If you are 2H capped and have Virulence, and a 3% hit debuff on the boss (Such as Misery or Imp. Faerie Fire) you will be spell hit capped as well.

Our melee attacks and spells have a critical damage bonus of 100%.

Hit rating does NOT increase the amount of critical strikes you will have on a target. It reduces the number of times that you will miss the boss.

It takes 45.91 critical strike rating to generate 1% melee or spell critical strike. The reason that hit is such a good stat until capped is because it is so much cheaper to hit 1% hit rating wise than 1% crit. Once you hit the two hander hit cap hit is no longer worth gemming or enchanting.

Haste rating does not reduce our GCD. Our GCD is only affected by Unholy Presence.

Our abilities scale with AP. Spell damage does nothing for us.

Druid Focus Macros

If you’re a druid and not using focus macros then you’re not not playing at your maximum potential. Focus macros are the easiest way to quickly improve your play, both from PvP and PvE perspectives. If you aren’t already up on focus macros I strongly encourage you go ahead and read my fundamentals for focus macros guide, this will teach you how to setup and use focus macros.

Additionally, make sure you check out my druid macro guide for non-focus druid macros.

Crowd Control Druid Macros

Focus Cyclone Macro

/cast [target=focus] Cyclone

Focus Root Macro

/cast [target=focus] Entangling Roots

Focus Feral Charge Macro

/cast [target=focus] Feral Charge

Focus Hibernate Macro

/cast [target=focus] Hibernate

In my opinion the above 4 macros are absolutely crucial for all druids, particularly PvP druids. These will allow you to efficiently crowd control and / or heal multiple targets since without having to worry about constant target switching. At the very minimum you should be using the focus cyclone macro or arena / pvp purposes.

Modifier Crowd Control Macros

Focus Cyclone Macro + Modifier

/cast [target=focus, modifier:shift] Cyclone; Cyclone

Focus Root Macro + Modifier

/cast [target=focus, modifier:shift] Entangling Roots; Entangling Roots

Focus Feral Charge Macro + Modifier

/cast [target=focus, modifier:shift] Feral Charge; Feral Charge

Focus Hibernate Macro + Modifier

/cast [target=focus, modifier:shift] Hibernate; Hibernate

I prefer this second set of focus cc macros above the first. These will allow you use the focus version of the spell with a regular button press, or a standard target=target spell with a shift modifier. Note: you can change the “shift” to control or alt, or any combination of these three.

Healing Druid Macros

Nature’s Swiftness Focus Macros

/cast Nature’s Swiftness
/stopcasting
/cast [target=focus] Healing Touch