Death Knights Tanking FAQ

General:

Q: OK, I made a new 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: 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: Check http://forums.worldofwarcraft.com/thread.html?topicId=12454666357&postId=124533958286&sid=1#2

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: Hey, I need mods, what are good ones?
A: I'll post as soon as i get all the links.

Q: IT, BS, QWAP? What the hell are you people talking about?!
A: Check http://forums.worldofwarcraft.com/thread.html?topicId=12454666357&postId=124533958286&sid=1#4

Q: Why do people knock haste for DKs?
A: Haste isn't useless, but it isn't as useful as other stats we could be getting. Haste will increase our swing speed, meaning our autoattack (white) damage will go up. This will benefit certain talents like Killing Machine, Blood-Caked Blade and Necrosis, which do better with more attacks. However, it will not affect things like Blood Plague, Icy Touch, Scourge Strike, Obliterate, Unholy Blight, Howling Blast, Frost Strike, Heart Strike, etc. which make up the larger portion of our damage.
Haste also does not affect the global cooldown for us, or our rune refresh rate. Since most DK autoattack damage seems to come in at around 20-30%, haste would not really have as much of a solid benefit as a stat that takes all of our abilities into account (Attack Power, Hit rating, etc.)

Bugs?

Q: Why doesn't Bladed Armor work with Frost Presence?
A: Bladed Armor has a 30-second pulse that it uses to periodically check armor changes. Wait a little bit and it will kick in.

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.

Edit: stupid notepad broke some sentences =\

Frequently Asked Questions - Abilities and Specs

Abilities:

Q: What is a rotation?
A: A rotation is an ability sequence that uses a full set of runes.

The most basic rotation is:
Icy Touch -> Plague Strike -> Blood Strike -> Blood Strike -> Obliterate

All six runes are used up, and you wait for the runes to cooldown so you can begin the rotation again.

Some sequences require two or more rotations to complete, an example for Unholy:

Icy Touch -> Plague Strike -> Scourge Strike -> Blood Boil/Pestilence -> Blood Boil -> Scourge Strike -> Scourge Strike -> Scourge Strike

The first rotation allows 2 death runes to be formed for the second rotation which enables the Unholy Death Knight to use Scourge Strike three times in a row.

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: I got some talents that seem the same as abilities that I started with! What's up with that?
A: The way the Death Knight talent trees work is that you will gain abilities that are improvements over other abilities that you start with. These are meant to replace the starting abilities completely. For the Blood tree you gain Heart Strike which replaces Blood Strike. Frost gains Howling Blast which replaces Obliterate and Frost Strike which replaces Death Coil. Unholy gains Scourge Strike which replaces Obliterate and Unholy Blight which, some can argue, replaces Death Coil.

Q: I've decided I want to tank! Um, how do I do it?
A: Check the Tanking further

Q: What presences do I want to use and when?
A: Generally speaking you'll want to be in Blood for PVE DPS, Frost for PVE tanking, and Unholy for PVP: the run speed lets you stay on your targets better, and the lower GCD lets you unload more attacks on them in the limited time you are in melee range. Your spec does not affect these, Blood, Unholy, and Frost Death Knights should all still tank in Frost and PVP in Unholy.

Q: Can DK's use maces?
A: Yes. You will need to train them. Yes, you will start with just 1 weapon skill.

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: 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: Corpse dust sucks!!! It is too expensive and I hate it, will it ever go away?
A: No. Deal with it.

Specs:

Q: Okay! I'm ready to rock this puppy out, what are some good specs to try out?
A: Check Specs further.


FAQ credits: Sunny, Ratri, Rabinahau, Barkek, Villaness