Blizz wants more Frost and Blood, working on EP fix
by Eliah Hecht 
Feb 4th 2009 at 7:00PM
This is a slightly esoteric Death Knight issue, so those of you not yet converted might want to just move along. It is also an issue close to my own heart, as I am pretty enamored of my Unholy DPS DK. What am I talking about? Ebon Plague stacking, of course. The other two main DK diseases, Blood Plague and Frost Fever, stack just fine, but if you've got two UH DKs with the talent in your raid, only one of them at a time gets to have EP applied to the target. This lowers the DPS of any DKs that don't have it applied, since so many of our skills do damage based on the number of diseases we have applied to the target. Most sources estimate the DPS loss as not very high, but it's still annoying as heck.
Ghostcrawler has finally addressed this problem, and says they plan on fixing it by making EP count as a third disease for everyone that's talented for it, regardless of who cast it (if I'm reading correctly). But he does note that this fix is not top-priority, saying "our priority right now is making sure more DKs spec Frost or Blood, not how to reward groups that bring multiple Unholy DKs," going on to say that they nevertheless will fix this bug.
According to Armory Musings (thanks to the Scarlet Mathematician for pointing me to that site), Unholy does account for almost half of all Death Knights, so it makes sense that Blizz would be trying to up the market share of the other specs some. Still, I love the Unholy play style, so I hope they fix EP sooner rather than later.
Filed under: Bugs, Death Knight
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 2)
Macbook Feb 4th 2009 7:10PM
DKs are still OP
Macbook, http://Moonkin.info
Phelony Feb 4th 2009 7:26PM
DKs are only OP if the player behind them has a brain. All classes are OP with the IQ buff.
Kassu Feb 4th 2009 7:27PM
Oooh, shussh, you.
90% of the DKs I have ever met, ever, are compltely oblivious tards.
I play a DK as a main and most of the other DKs I group with do ~1400 dps in full epics while I dish out 2k dps in a mix on quest, rep and some heroic gear.
A good DK is powerful. Most DKs aren't. How does that translate to OP?
Dahra Feb 6th 2009 11:34AM
@ Kassu
Your words betray you my friend. If you can do 2k DPS in quest greens (I assume, I could be wrong), you are most definitely OP. Now, the fact that a lot of people playing your class don't have the IQ of a rock makes DK's seem less OP, but that doesn't change the facts; DK's need some tuning down. Its the same with hunters, just because the majority of people who play the class are bad, doesn't mean that the good players are exempt from a nerf. Besides, if you get nerfed, you could improve the average IQ of people who play the class.
Sentient Feb 4th 2009 10:11PM
I have to agree with Kassu and Phelony. 90% of DKs are complete and utter 'tards. Children who roll DKs because they're convinced they're "ZOMG OP!!" and their epeen swells simply at the thought of a class called Death Knight. Which is a shame because this means I'm starting to develop I real prejudice.
Any class played by an individual who understands its mechanics and has the intelligence and skill to become adept at the class can become what appears to be OP. Unfortunately for Death Knights even if the class was inherently OP most of them are played by kids with Velcro shoe laces and as such almost appear underpowered in the hands of most of their players.
Muse Feb 4th 2009 11:01PM
I wish people would play a Priest and THEN try to claim that every class can be OP with the right player.
Zarfay Feb 5th 2009 2:54AM
"Children who roll DKs because they're convinced they're "ZOMG OP!!" and their epeen swells simply at the thought of a class called Death Knight."
I know I'm probably going to get attacked for this... But I generally see that with rogues.
Sharkhunt Feb 5th 2009 9:39AM
@Muse
Our Shadow priest is consistently near the top of the damage meters in both trash and single target encounters when he is able to DPS the entire fight.
Macbook Feb 5th 2009 10:46AM
@ Muse - Priests are fine. Shadow does pretty good damage when geared properly, holy tops our healing meters by a long shot in our guild, and disc is great for PvP.
Macbook, http://Moonkin.info
Elinya Feb 16th 2009 5:08AM
@ Kassu
True shit right there. Although people can improve...
In my suckass guild as the best geared DK, and best DPSing for that matter, I managed to slam some logic, mathcraft and skills into a fellow DK. Now as a one-button macromashing skillmaster he's doing just about the same DPS as me. [2h frost vs. Unholy] is bloody unfair, me, sitting there with my broken rotations and need to have 110% focus compared to a macromasher, I really don't see the point in having a extremely simple spec for the benefit of retards.
Make classes require IQ, active minds and focus.
Twowolves Feb 4th 2009 7:22PM
After leveling hunters and locks, I've had my fill of pet classes. I'm very happy with my Blood DK.
Albert Feb 4th 2009 7:29PM
FROST KNIGHTS UNITE!
Roflpanda Feb 4th 2009 11:33PM
\M/ POWERFIST... frostfist?
Le sigh Feb 4th 2009 7:51PM
I played my DK unholy to ~60 then read that Blood had nearly 0 downtime. I'm by no means a pro but I have to admit blood really has made the game fly by.
So as my DK sits at 75 gathering dust, I approve of Blood spec for leveling. However this article is about endgame DPS (as 90% of all the articles are) so I'm not able to comment on that.
Eliah Hecht Feb 4th 2009 7:45PM
As a point of interest, I leveled as Blood to 63 or so and Unholy after that, and had zero downtime in either spec. I seriously hate downtime, so I was certainly glad to find that out :)
newg Feb 4th 2009 7:47PM
When reading about deathknights in beta, and when I finally got around to rolling one, my main thought was 'Sweet, here comes the unholy disease machine'
what has actually happened is that I've fallen completely in love with frost, IMO it's the most solid tree, and is a HELL of a lot of fun to play, anyone who has spread frost fever and fired off a guaranteed crit howling blast knows what i'm talking about..
BOOM HEADSHOT :P
notsuh Feb 4th 2009 10:09PM
that's almost the same exact thing I did. Went, "oooo! diseases!" at first...but in practice, I'm almost the antithesis of the DK stereotype (dual wielding and shooting out frost spells as my preferred form of damage).
The "BOOM HEADSHOT!" effect of howling blast in a battleground is incredibly awesome, though. I queue up in AV just so I can do that every once in a while XD
enKrypt Feb 8th 2009 3:11AM
I'm a raiding Blood DK and I love my spec. I've tried Unholy and it's not for me.
I can definitely agree with the person who said most DKs are bad though.
Darxide Feb 4th 2009 8:26PM
"Blizz wants more Frost and Blood"
sounds like something my girlfriend would say in bed
omenscourge Feb 4th 2009 8:33PM
The EP fix is long overdue for unholy DK's. That said, I have had fun with Blood and with Frost as well and am looking forward to Dual-Specs to shake things up even more.
http://omenscourge.blogspot.com