Lichborne: Talents for catching up - Blood spec
by Daniel Whitcomb 
Nov 9th 2008 at 10:05PM
Blood
While not as powerful as it once was, Blood is still a solid single-target choice for leveling up, and will provide some extra self-healing that should keep you from spending too much money on bandages and food. A Good solid Blood DPS build will probably look something like this 51/13/7 build.
With this build, you'll actually stick the closest to the traditional, non-talented Death Knight rotation of Icy Touch, Plague Strike, Blood Strike, Blood Strike, Obliterate/Death Strike, although of course replacing Blood Strikes with the more damaging Heart Strikes. You'll want to focus on the Blood tree in this build first, then the Frost, Then the Plague Strike. It may be worth holding back on Dancing Rune Weapon until you can get those non-consuming Obliterates, since that will make your life a lot easier.
One other way to approach this build is to ignore frost altogether, which probably isn't such a bad idea since most of the first 2 talent tiers in Frost are only really amazing for a Frost Build, and dump the points into Unholy, in a build something like this 50/0/21 build. This build doesn't really reach its potential until you can unleash a Hysteria/Gargoyle combination for the burst damage, so it's a little more difficult to level up with, but its worth some consideration. The other thing to remember with both of these blood builds is to watch your Sudden Doom procs. When they come up, use them!
For these builds, you'll probably be throwing out your share of obliterates, so if you're using a good solid hard hitting 2-handed weapon, you may want to consider the Obliterate Glyph. You'll only have 2 diseases up, so chances are that extra 20% off the weapon will overtake the bonus disease damage.
While not as powerful as it once was, Blood is still a solid single-target choice for leveling up, and will provide some extra self-healing that should keep you from spending too much money on bandages and food. A Good solid Blood DPS build will probably look something like this 51/13/7 build.
With this build, you'll actually stick the closest to the traditional, non-talented Death Knight rotation of Icy Touch, Plague Strike, Blood Strike, Blood Strike, Obliterate/Death Strike, although of course replacing Blood Strikes with the more damaging Heart Strikes. You'll want to focus on the Blood tree in this build first, then the Frost, Then the Plague Strike. It may be worth holding back on Dancing Rune Weapon until you can get those non-consuming Obliterates, since that will make your life a lot easier.
One other way to approach this build is to ignore frost altogether, which probably isn't such a bad idea since most of the first 2 talent tiers in Frost are only really amazing for a Frost Build, and dump the points into Unholy, in a build something like this 50/0/21 build. This build doesn't really reach its potential until you can unleash a Hysteria/Gargoyle combination for the burst damage, so it's a little more difficult to level up with, but its worth some consideration. The other thing to remember with both of these blood builds is to watch your Sudden Doom procs. When they come up, use them!
For these builds, you'll probably be throwing out your share of obliterates, so if you're using a good solid hard hitting 2-handed weapon, you may want to consider the Obliterate Glyph. You'll only have 2 diseases up, so chances are that extra 20% off the weapon will overtake the bonus disease damage.
Filed under: Talents, Death Knight, (Death Knight) Lichborne
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
brighthammer Nov 10th 2008 2:13AM
Why does your blood build not have Rune Tap and Imp Rune tap? 20% of your max hp every 30 seconds? looks like an awesome talent.
James Nov 10th 2008 6:02AM
I agree, my blood spec will have rune tap and imp rune tap for leveling, and I'll actually forgo hysteria in the leveling process as well since I don't want to end up taking the chance of killing myself when using it (yes I know it can be clicked off as it is a 'buff'). I think I'll also pass up the Blood worms and see where else I can stick some points.
Al Nov 10th 2008 11:10AM
I really want to go Blood, but for mostly just preference reasons I kind of want to dual wield. Would going deep enough into frost to get nerves of cold steel and still going blood but forsaking 2 hand specialization be a stupid idea? Or would it work ok?
Moki Nov 10th 2008 1:52PM
If you use the linked 51/13/7 build as a basis, there's no reason foregoing two-hand specialization for nerves of cold steel would be a bad idea.
Mist Nov 10th 2008 3:46PM
I'm not sure how blood will work with dual wielding. It's really made for a big 2hander with heart strike and obliterate being the main yellow damage. A big, slow 2hander is much better for those attacks and blood lacks the swing based procs that will help DW catch up.
If you want to do competitive DPS with DW, you'll need 18 points in Unholy for Necrosis and Blood Caked Blade. It is impossible to get 5/5 Blood Gorged, 3/3 Nerves of Steel and 3/3 Blood Caked Blade in the same build. You'll have to make a sacrifice and will end up with lower DPS in the end. It is also very helpful to have 5/5 Icy Talons for 20% haste.
ironone Nov 22nd 2008 2:40PM
://www.worldofwarcraft.com/info/classes/deathknight/talents.html?tal=2305021503133313231000013513052005030000000000000000000200000000000000000000000000000
is my biuld very nice blood/frost build i guess if criting isnt youre fancy u can drop it for somthing else
kabuki Nov 22nd 2008 3:40PM
I went blood and found that once I got into the higher parts of the talent build, I didn't do as well against multiple targets. After playing around with it some, I found a rather nice build with most everything in blood, and the rest in Unholy to allow me to get the ghoul pet. This way my damage mitigation is better, allowing me to use my anti-magic zone to stop casters in their tracks, while also allowing me to rely on my blood abilities to keep me above half way on my health. While not something I'd suggest for a tank, this build is perfect for dealing with solo levelling and PVP to some degree.
Dridstar Dec 17th 2008 5:23PM
I have NO idea why people continue to insist on putting 5 points into Black Ice instead of Toughness to get to Annihilation.
Toughness is synergetic with Bladed Armor. Increase your Armor Value=increase your Attack Power. It's not that difficult of an equation to realize it's full of win.