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Patch 3.3 PTR Notes
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Post by
178943
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Post by
Nystali
I think so. Death Knights have three completely different feeling trees and its not based upon what weapon they use, but rather what spells/abilities they use. What is inherent about Frost that should make it a DW tree? Just the talents they arbitrarily placed in there? Just because some Manga inspired NPC dual wields?
Yes its not "dead" (well, tanking) and will require a lot to try and get rid of it, but it is in my mind the best all around tanking tree. Lots of aoe threat generation from HB (insta-disease to boot if glyphed), decent single target threat gen, extra avoidance from talents, and a block-like cooldown in addition to making our main cooldown of IBF last longer. None of that says DW to me and I don't want to be forced into DW in order to remain competitive as a tank.
I prefer the frost tree. I even named my DK based upon the fact she was going to be a frost knight ("Frost" turns to "Shari" in nelf language).
All in all, I'm still glad that the DW talents are purely optional for tanking. But again, I'm worried about a trend where someday soon they'll just decide, "I'm tired of trying to make 2H Frost work, lets just scrap it and force them into DW."
Post by
Nystali
Just to further expand on how trees define themselves, look at other classes:
Specs with a forced weapon type based on design of trees:
Fury Warriors - Titans grip allows warriors to dual wield two two-handed weapon with +Str on them (allowing the developers to make all non-tank one-handers have +agi). This is the iconic talent in the tree and therefore they have to use these weapons.
Arms Warriors - This tree is centered around using one two-hander and all the abilities reflect that.
Muti Rogues - Yes they're forced to use daggers but that's because poison tipped daggers is sort of the iconic ability of the tree.
Specs that have options:
Combat Rogues - Not limited to any particular weapon. Can spec for maces, axes, or swords (I think sword might still win out due to the extra swing proc). This is much like the frost tree however, rogues have a choice (unless swords really is that much better than the other types).
All Hunters - They can either DW or use a 2hander, whichever currently gives them the best stat boost.
Frost Tank - Right now this is fairly close to the current state of the tree. 2H tanking is easier to gear for, but DW is viable and will be even more so in 3.3 it appears.
Specs not forced to talent unless they want to maintain viability:
Enh Shaman - I've read that using a two-handed weapon was the norm and still powerful but once they were able to DW players found that it scaled so much better and so now its accepted that enh is a DW spec.
Frost DPS - This spec is already here. While I personally still have a 2h frost spec, its because I generally don't dps. There's nothing in the tree forcing you to spec DW except for the fact that it scales so much better in damage and therefore, if you're frost dps and want to get into a min/maxing raiding guild looking for hard-modes or pug that is being selective, you'd better be DW.
So far, unlike with DW Tanking, there does not seem to be any effort to push 2H frost DPS back up into the mix. At the same time, while they're seeking to improve DW tanking, they're not touching 2H Frost tanking much at all. This is what I mean by the trend I'm seeing.
DW Tanking gets buffed, DW DPS got buffed.
2H Tanking stays neutral (maybe rightly so), 2H DPS falling behind.
Devs are focusing on DW, not on 2H and pretty soon they're gonna say (like with Enh. Shaman), "Yea, if you're frost, you're probably going to want to DW. We're not going to force you, its still an option, but its the better option."
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178943
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159262
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Post by
Eleazer
Nystali,
You make a very good point, and I fully agree with you. There is a slight correction I would like to make though. 2H enhance shaman is a pvp gimmick now. The entire setup from the way SS is setup to the way the bottom half of the talents to the way WF interacts and Maelstorm works are all bent towards DWing. In fact, even the mana regeneration talent is bent to benefit DW. The fact that you can put FT on one to bonus your spell casting even more is another push towards DW for enhance shamans. However in the beginning 2h enhance shaman was no existant in pve raiding because their dps was so gimped shamans could only heal. They were lethal in pvp in vanilla wow, which was crazy. Also, hunters don't DW for end game raiding it's just awful. For hunters it's about maximizing stats which is best done with a 2h staff or polearm.
I agree wholeheartedly with you about 2h frost being shown the door in a subtle fashion, but it's obvious to those of us who watched the same thing happen to enhance shamans and fury warriors. I believe there was such a backlash when they got rid of DW (which in my opinion never should have been an option for Deathknights) that they decided to make the one tree that was broken in their opinion the DW tree.
If you think about it, Frost has been the broken tree from the beginning, we are the only tanking tree that can survive with single disease and be an excellent tank as well. This I believe was something the devs didn't want to see, but the only way they could see to fix that would be to eliminate the 2h frost tanking.
Also they made a further nerf to the viability of 2h frost tanking by buffing IT Glyph. One of the huge bonuses of 2h Frost tanking was the ability to use a single disease rotation. With the recent changes to IT glyph, I see the switch to IT glyph to further boost the threat generation.
@Rauhnor - To 2h dps as frost is to be a failure as a dps. It is so far behind DW dps that to do it is basically giving everyone else in your party the finger. Unholy is the only tree that can do viable dps either way, though with the recent change to SS I think 2h is back to in front of dw.
Post by
356172
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Post by
Nystali
Warriors hit with their weapons. Each tree uses a different type of weapon set. When you spec into a specific DPS tree, you're speccing in order to either use one two hander, or to DW. That the design of the class from beginning. The devs ultimately decided to go with Titan's Grip in the fury tree to make it easier for them to itemize weapons. Why have to worry about sticking +str one handers for a single dps spec? (The irony is that they then go about letting DKs use one-handers to DW). This is completely different from how the DK trees work.
The DK trees are all about a different subset of spells. Melee based for Blood, Frost Based for Frost, and Unholy based for Unholy. That's the difference in the trees. Not that one uses strictly 2H and another DWs. That's what my problem is in specifically designing one tree to be radically different from the original concept of a DK (wielding big 2handed rune blades) with no real basis for why its that way. Why should frost be DW? It might make sense that a more melee based tree would be more for DWing.
2Handed rune blades are the iconic image of the class. Not some DW Manga drawn DK.
Post by
356172
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Post by
Aris
Another great tank change that hasnt been listed yet.
"Hunters
*
Misdirection: Redesigned. Instead of having finite charges, it now begins a 4-second timer when the hunter using Misdirection performs a threat-generating attack, during which all threat generated by the hunter goes to the friendly target. In addition,
multiple hunters can now misdirect threat to the same friendly target simultaneously
."
Also, now that its looking like frost will be a DW only talent tree, lets talk about the best tanking 1h'ers.
My personal favorite right now is this:
Raging Deathbringer
Not only does it have great top end damage, but its pretty easy to get. No stats, but honestly the stats on your typical dps 1her arnt the best for DK's anyhow. The proc rate seems to be around 2% with no ICD, and the shadow bolt it procs is effected by the frost talent
Black Ice
.
All in all, it looks like a good synergy with frost DW tanking. And even if you cant do 25man ony, downing her in 10man is do-able by just about any group to get the lesser version of it.
As for DW Tanking spec, i think i'll be going with this:
8/55/8
With 3/3 SoB, i shouldnt have any issue with runic power. Runestrike should proc more often now that i will be hitting autoattacks faster, so i felt glyph'ing it would finally be worth it.
Should give better single target threat gen than 2H frost, still maintain the same great aoe threat gen as 2H frost, and still has all the same mitigation as 2H frost. So basically its 2H frost with better single target threat gen because of how ToT scales.
Post by
142889
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Post by
356172
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Post by
Aris
Heres a question, who is actually going to be frost DW dps and frost DW tanking for their 2 specs? You'd need 4x 1handers.
If frost DW tanking ends up being better than 2h frost, which it looks like it will be, then i suspect we'll see a lot of tanks' off spec switching to blood or unholy just for this one fact.
Post by
142889
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Post by
Aris
The fact is, Blizz designs classes to be played certain ways.
They also design classes to obtain a set % of users for specific class/talent combinations. If a certain combination is underplayed, it gets buffed. If a certain combination is overplayed it gets nerfed. It has absolutely nothing to do with making things fair or balanced.
Right now they have a certain % of DK tanks they think should be DW Frost, and its not there yet, so DW Frost gets a buff. If at the end of next month they have too high a % of the population playing that class/spec combination, then it'll likely get nerfed.
I think if any aspect of DK DW that needs nerfed its ToT, so that it scales more evenly with 2H equivalents. Something like your offhand deals 75% weapon damage, or 50% instead of the full weapon damage of your offhand.
Post by
Nystali
That might have been how it should have first been implemented, Aris. Unfortunately, if they were to pull it back to that, it would be a nerf to DW dps and still doesn't help 2H Frost catch up 2H blood.
To fmatt:
Again, right now DW Frost Tanking is catching up to 2H Frost tanking. That's ok. Allow for people to make a reasonable choice based on how they want to play, and allow both ways to still be successful in an end-game settings. The problem is that DW Frost DPS is leaving 2H Frost in the dust and they don't seem to care. If they continue moving in that direction, 2H frost tanking is not far behind.
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378676
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288980
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345177
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