There’s four types of heirloom armor, subdivided by role if necessary:
Cloth 1-80 (for all casters)
Leather 1-80 (for Druids and Rogues)
Leather 1-39/Mail 40-80 (for Hunters and Shamans)
Mail 1-39/Plate 40-80 (for Warriors, Paladins, and Death Knights)
So yeah, be careful.
For my pally, these were mail 1-80. I got them instead of the plate because there is not spellcaster heirloom plate, except for the PvP shoulders. Since they were mail at 80, I’m assuming they will be leather at 1. And since they have +spellpower, I’m gonna guess they’re not for hunters – so it sounds like I’m good.
Yes, since it stayed Mail past 40, you got the Shaman gear. If you send it to a sub-40 Shaman, it will convert to Leather until they learn the Mail skill.
Just crafted my first ICC pattern: Hellfrozen Bonegrinders, the dps plate boots. They replaced the lvl245 pvp boots that I have had for months and months and months.
If any guildie has the mats for these, I will make them for you for free.
Nice! And if anybody’s thinking about buying a pair, I strongly suggest checking mat prices first. You can probably get the mats for thousands of gold less than the cost of the boots themselves on the AH.
Nice Yeti! I don’t need the boots but I did send you some mats for an eternal beltbuckle for Keyne’s ToC belt he picked up the other night.
So, having finally gotten my 4 x T10 bonus on my shadow priest, I find my rotation has simplified itself considerably. Before, I had a priority list that looked something like this:
Vampiric Touch
Devouring Plague
Shadow word: Pain
(all if not already up)
Mind Blast
Shadow word: Death
Mind Flay
The 4xT10 bonus basically increases Mind Flay damage by about 25% - not sure exactly; in any case, I messed around on target dummies and determined my new priority list is:
Vampiric Touch
Devouring Plague
Shadow word: Pain
(all if not already up)
Mind Flay
Or a one-button rotation, as I called it in guild chat. Throwing in the other non-dots dropped my DPS by about 200-300.
(I still need to throw in Mind Blast every so often if not grouped with a Ret Pally, since it gives the raid a mana regen effect. But that’s it - Sw: D is pretty much off the menu now. I also need to look into a respec, as I have 2 or 3 points in the ability that reduces the cooldown on Mind Blast, and I can probably also drop to 4 points in the ability that allows Mind Flay to automatically reset Sw: P.)
Okay, I need some advice from any raiding melee DPSers among us, if you please.
As you might (or might not) remember, I recently swapped mains to my DK tank, and I’m now tanking in our main raid. The tanking thing is going very well–I’m feeling confident and have eliminated most of my little nerves-based issues. I even got a compliment from our tank lead/raid leader last night, and he hardly ever gives compliments. So I’m okay there, I think.
Where I’m not okay is DPS. And I can’t figure out why. I don’t think I’ve ever quite grokked melee DPS. I’ve never played a melee DPSer who was very good. I’m convinced there’s an epiphany out there and as soon as I have it, I’ll have a breakthrough. But it ain’t happening yet. So I’ll consult my “safe spot” where folks won’t laugh at me (much 
) or think I’m an idiot.
So here’s the deal: My gear is quite good, even as DPS. Fully raid buffed, I think my attack power is somewhere in the 7000s. I’m currently an Unholy DK as DPS, though it’s been suggested to me that I might be better off switching to Blood–and I might just do that, since I understand Blood better (I’m a Blood tank).
I think the part I don’t quite grok is the rotation thing. Unholy has a fairly complicated rotation, and I’ve heard that if you don’t stick to it fairly closely, you end up losing a lot of DPS. But if you have to move or switch targets, do you start over? Do you just pick up where you left off? Is it situational? I know I need to keep diseases up at all time, but aside from that, I’m not sure if I should just start things over when I go to a new target.
So, melee DPS whizzes, please talk to me like I’m a slow three-year-old. I suspect that the epiphany I’m seeking is something that might seem so obvious to folks who are used to melee DPS that they might be astounded that I don’t get it. But something needs to change, and I’d appreciate any help you can send my way. I wish I could just tank all the time, but we’ve got 5 tanks in the group (when they all show up) so at least sometimes I’m going to have to pretend I know which end of my axe to put in the mob. 
Well, my DK is the same as yours (Blood tank/Unholy DPS), and I do decent DPS on him in relatively dodgy gear, so I’ll see if I can say anything you don’t already know.
Yes, unholy has a fairly tight rotation in that you are rune-limited and really must get every non-disease attack out while your diseases are up to keep things flowing nicely. It is not GCD limited, so there will be GCDs where you have nothing to do (basically when you don’t have enough RP to use a DC).
Your rotation changes depending on whether you have Reaping or not (which determines whether you get Death Runes or not). I do not have it, but it doesn’t change things too entirely much…
The basic rotation without reaping (which I’m sure you know) is: PS, IT, BS, BS, SS, DC, HoW, SS, BS, SS, BS, DC, DC, (DC)
With reaping you basically replace those two BS in the last part with an extra SS.
So yeah, that’s all easy stuff, and likely not much help. What do you do when you move? What do you do if you have to target switch?
Moving is pretty straightforward, but a good rune add-on and timers to show your diseases can help. Basically you want to use every FU combo on SS as soon as possible, but always make sure you’ll have them ready to go when your diseases drop. So if your diseases have enough time that you can SS and get your FU back before they drop, do that.
Maybe a simpler way to think about it is - continue your rotation with the following caveats: (a) if your diseases are about to drop return to the top of the rotation and (b) if you are RP-capped use a DC to drop some before continuing to burn runes.
For target switching, it depends on if the target is near your first one. If so, I like to Pestilence my diseases over, and then jump in right after that part of the rotation. This saves an FU combo for SS. If you can’t do that (the new target is too far away or the first target is dead), then you pretty much have to start at the beginning getting your diseases up.
A few more little tricks that might help, if you’re not already using them:
HoW is your friend - like I said, you are not GCD-capped, and will reasonably often have a spot where all runes are on CD and you don’t have enough RP to DC. In that case use HoW just for the RP gain. If you don’t have the minor glyph for it you’ll need a /cancelaura macro to avoid it not going off do to a “stronger buff present”.
AMS is your friend - many fights you want to use it on CD for the RP gain (BQL, Festergut, anything with constant damage). Many other fights have very easy ways to use it to soak RP (Marrowgar’s fire, Rotface’s slime spray, PP’s volatile ooze and malleable goo). Pop it and spam DC for a bit - always good times. AMS is also godly for things like Shadow Prison (prevents stacks) and Comb/Cons on Halion (keeps the void zone small).
Gargoyle - pretty obvious, but try to use it as often as possible in a fight, and under BL if possible. If you can’t do both, use it twice rather than just once under BL. If you want to use it under BL you have to summon it after BL, not before (i.e. it won’t pick up the buff partway through). Same with pots, trinkets, etc…
Anyways, hopefully there is something in there that is useful… if not, well then it’s just a matter of practice I guess. 
I don’t have Reaping. I don’t remember why, but I do remember that I clearly decided based on the available information that I should use the build without it. So I’m good there.
Yep, that’s the one I’m using.
I use RuneWatch and a timer that shows me how long my cooldowns have. I don’t remember having trouble getting my diseases up, though I often don’t have BS available when I want to use it.
Just as an example, the only fight I had to DPS on last night was Marrowgar. My DPS started out as crap because I swapped from my tank spec and forgot to click Blood Presence, so I was DPSing with no presence up. Then I completely forgot about the gargoyle. sigh Once I got into a rotation, I kept having trouble when the spikes came up, trying to swap to those and get some DPS on them before they were down. I think I ended the fight slightly above the tanks.
I know a lot of this is just practice–my mage was abysmal for awhile when he first swapped from Arcane to Fire, and now he’s routinely quite high in the DPS charts. I should probably go along on some heroics with guildies and practice there so I can get the rotations down. It’s weird–I get the tank stuff now. I get what everything does and how it interacts. With DPS, I’m not there yet.
I know that AMS prevents Shadow Prison stacks (I use it to get back into position as a tank when the DPS knocks me around) but are you saying it acts like a dispel for Comb/Cons? I’ve never DPSed that fight–we’re trying to do it in hard mode and I usually end up on add duty. If so, that’s a really good thing to know.
Thanks for the advice! No real epiphanies in there (except maybe the part about AMS and Comb/Cons), but at least it’s nice to know I’m on the right track. I’m not doing much wrong per se…just not doing it well yet.
I’m an Enhancement Shaman, which has a similar problem to Unholy DK’s–that is, our rotation is fiendishly complex and switches gears based on when debuffs wear off on the target. Generally, I just pick up where I left off, but that’s going to be class based–unlike a DK, my limiting factor is almost always GCD.
To give you an idea, I literally gained 1000 dps just from a bit of regemming according to Rawr’s suggestions and tweaking my rotation in maybe two places.
If you’re just starting as DPS, my suggestion is to not get complacent on heroics–I used to think I was king shit of turd mountain with my amazing 2800-3200 dps. Spend a lot of time with the practice dummy. Use Rawr, figure out what your theoretical max DPS is, and push to see how close you can get to that on a dummy. (right now, for example, Rawr tells me I have a theoretical 8200 dps with raid buffs–by myself, no raid buffs, hitting the dummy, I can crank 5800-6200.)
Ultimately it’s like anything else–you need to practice. Unlike tanking, the best practice is by sitting solo on a training dummy and going nuts until your rotation is brick solid in your head.
Well, for that fight the only thing I do for the spikes is Pestilence. My diseases will put up the 13% spell damage buff and they die before anything else. If you want you can throw out a Blood Boil in place of BS. I wouldn’t bother switching targets for the spikes (other than during Bonestorm if you’re doing HM), unless they are going down really slowly. Edit: You could always throw down a DnD also, but I’m not sure the rune loss is worth it, tbh. Other melee classes with serious aoe/cleave abilities are better here, IMO
I’ve DPS’ed without a presence so many times I lost count… not nearly as embarrassing as pulling without Frost Presence though. “WTF, why is everyone pulling off me… taunt… WTF, why am I dead?”
IIRC, the comb/cons mechanic is that it is applied and starts stacking, and creates a void zone when dispelled the size of which is determined by the number of stacks. AMS prevents the stacks, and thus decreases the damage (perhaps) and the size of the void zone.
Really sounds like it’s just a practice issue, and getting comfortable with the timing of everything. Eventually it becomes a nice groove where you always know subconsciously what runes are up or coming up and when your diseases are falling off, etc.
Just re-roll as an affliction warlock. They’re super easy and have better healing.
Are you sure that you’re focusing on the right stats for your spec? E.g., IIRC, ArP isn’t that great for Unholy DKs because you’re focused so much on disease damage, which ignores armor. I’m sure you’ve researched that already, but just in case.
ISTR hearing that Unholy DPS is the worst right now, so yeah, respeccing might be good. And being in a spec you’re more comfortable with the abilities of can be very helpful. FWIW, I think our top DK DPS right now is DW Frost (if Daed’s around, he can probably either verify that or correct me).
It’s my understanding that DKs are really GCD-locked right now–because of the ways you’re juggling CDs on your abilities and runes, if you drop one, it throws everything off.
This is why it’s important to understand the reasoning behind your rotation. Are you using ability A first (a) because it procs a buff that increases your damage; (b) because it procs a debuffs that increases your damage; © because you need to convert its rune type to something more useful; or (d) something else? If it’s a or b and the buff/debuff is up already, there’s no need to start over. If it’s c and the runes are converted, there’s no need to start over. If it’s a or b and the buff/debuff isn’t up, it may be worth it to start over if it’s a big enough difference in DPS, or it might be a bigger loss to break out of the structure of your rotation.
DPSing as a Fury Warrior, by contrast, my rotation is entirely a function of cooldown length on abilities, so I just pick up wherever I left off if I’m switching targets fast enough, start over if I’ve been off any target long enough to reset everything, or just fill the gaps with what I can if there’s a particularly odd interval.
Are there other DPS DKs in your guild? Best thing you can do is probably talk to them about how they gear/gem/chant, how they spec, what rotations they use, and how they deal with any fight that isn’t just “sit there and hit one target for four minutes.”
I don’t use Power Auras, and I can’t remember if you do, but if you do, you could make an aura for that.
Heroics will help you with the basic rotation, but the hardest part about DPSing in a raid is keeping your damage high while moving, avoiding AOE, and/or switching targets. That’s not really something you can replicate in a Heroic, unfortunately.
Yeah, to some extent I have, but I never worried that much about it because I almost literally never DPSed before I joined the main raid. The queues were too long for heroics (tank instaqueues are way too tempting to skip) and in the alt raid I was the main tank, so I never had to DPS. Now I actually have to pay attention to my off spec.
You’re now the second person I’ve heard say Unholy is the worst. I wonder when that happened–it seems like up until very recently (and not just before 3.3.5 came out) everybody was raving about it. I have no desire to go DW frost. I just don’t like the playstyle at all, and…Shadowmourne, dammit! No way am I going to get rid of that for a couple of one-handers. I’m thinking Blood might be the way to go. My gear is really better for it, I think.
Yeah, that’s exactly what I need to do, and what I mean by “epiphany.” I think sometimes I try really hard to make these things way more complicated than they actually are.
We only have one, and he’s Unholy. He’s given me some advice (which is essentially identical to what jas09 said) so I’ve no doubt I’m on the right track. Like I said, though, I’m really thinking hard about swapping to Blood. Even if it isn’t potentially as high as Unholy (and apparently that isn’t even true anymore), nobody expects me to be topping the charts as a tank. I’ll settle for a nice respectable middle-of-the-pack showing.
I do, but not for presences. I don’t forget them very often–only when I have to swap fast, and that happens only rarely.
I dont’ think Unholy is the worst - in fact most sites that accumulate top parses show them as the highest-damage DPS DK spec. Obviously what gear you have access to and what buffs you might be missing will play part. And your skill and comfort with the rotation will have a bigger impact than the differences inherent in the spec.
Cite: http://www.stratfu.com/kamigami/H_Festergut.html Other fights linked there as well.
Caveat: this is top parses, and likely BiS gear across the board and/or groups focusing on maximizing that players DPS. Getting a reading on average (or even off-spec) damage is harder to do. In the end, it’s better just to play what you like unless it’s completely under-powered (Arms Warrior, BM Hunter).
If you haven’t researched recently, go do it again. Check up on the EJ threads for DK DPS and see what everything’s at and what your best stats/specs/rotations are.
Oh yes, that’s right, you already have your Shadowmourne, don’t you? I’m guessing it’s gemmed for tanking, though at least as a DK you can pretty easily swap the rune on it versus swapping enchants. (IMO Death Gate out + summon back in between tanking and DPSing fights would be 100% worth it.)
Since you’re running the addon anyway, I think it would be *absolutely *worth the presumably short amount of time it would take to set up an aura for yourself that only shows when you’re not in any presence.
Even that’s going to be situational–with the current mechanics, for someone at a lower level of gear, for example, Arms will actually out-perform Fury. I think the tipping point is somewhere around Uld25-level gear.
Sounds to me like you are trying to stick to your rotation too rigidly. Part of this is probably lack of practice. You simply aren’t used to it enough for it to be second nature. There will always be disruptions to your rotation, from movements, target switches, etc. Part of being a good dps is knowing how to anticipate and recover from such situations to minimize dps loss.
Like Shot From Guns said knowing why you do each step in the rotation is key. You need to keep your diseases up, use scourge strike as much as you can, and use up your blood runes and runic powers with blood strike and death coil. The ultimate goal is to try to get the most damage out of your three resources: runes, runic power, and time. The standard rotation is simply the optimal way of doing this when you have nothing else to worry about. Once you realize this you can think about how to handle different situations.
I actually have Strength gems in it, so swapping out the runeforge wouldn’t be all that tough (though it’s kind of a pain to do it when I’m only going to be DPSing for one fight and then back to tank.)
That’s a good thought, actually. I was thinking more along the lines of having different auras for different presences, which seems kind of annoying. But since I’d never want to be without any presence, having some big thing flashing in my face wouldn’t be bad at all.