DK 4.01 DPS. Frost or Unholy?

[Adryl]

I was actually surprised with the results I got. Pre-patch I was Frost dual-wield and shunned Blood and Unholy altogether. However when 4.01 hit my frost dps went down the tubes (lost 1.5k dps). However I picked up Unholy and was cranking out 5k+ dps easy with mediocre gear while still dual wielding (I have yet to get a decent 2-hander to drop). Just wondering what your thoughts and opinions are on the DK dps changes and such.

[Teranoid]

I noticed the same thing. I dual specced DW frost and Unholy and the dps differential on the target dummies were night and day. With frost I was DW Tankards (yay free weapons) and my dps was abysmal yet going unholy and tossing on my Marrowstrike netted me almost 2k dps more.

I don't know if its because I'm still used to the old rune mechanics or what but Frost just felt so off to me but the numbers spoke for themselves

[ulushnar]

Consider who does the Unholy (and now it seems, the Frost) threads on EJ did a comparison of the specs here. In his sim, Frost came out about ahead of Unholy by about 1%, but that was in BiS gear. I think Unholy might have the edge at lower gear levels.

[Gracerath]

Unholy is really really good right now. Dark transformation is amazing. The ghoul is a dps machine. Unfortunately I haven't played with a frost DK yet so I'm unfamiliar with what sort of numbers they'd put out in an average raid setting.

I love the 1 second GCD's but the new priority / rotation is difficult for me to get used to after a year of the same old boring rotation.

[Adryl]

Where it boiled down to me was in pre patch frost dps, I'd stick to unholy pres (the speed of the rune cd was nice), hammer mobs with blood, plague, icy touch, then round it off with frost strikes and when runes were off cd start Obliterating. After patch, I felt like a fish outta water. Nothing clicked for me. Went to unholy (keep in mind Dw both specs) and it felt natural.

[Skye1013]

Has anyone tried the frost 2h spec? I'm curious where that sits in relation to the others (if it's in that EJ link, I apologize, I can't access it at work).

[Gracerath]

2h frost simmed to be competative with all the other specs. When I say competative, generally all the traditional specs are within ~1k dps of eachother. (Not including DW Unholy, which may work decently now, but by 85 it will be poop). When we're talking 12-14kdps, a margin of 1k seems all right to me.

I can't remember exactly but I believe DW frost was top followed by 2h UH and then 2h Frost, all within a reasonable amount of dps from eachother.

(The info is on EJ. I can't access it at work either but I did read it earlier today and it was still pretty fresh in my mind. Also the person keeping up the frost and unholy threads, Consider, keeps a blog that has a lot of useful insight as well).

[Adryl]

2h frost simmed to be competative with all the other specs. When I say competative, generally all the traditional specs are within ~1k dps of eachother. (Not including DW Unholy, which may work decently now, but by 85 it will be poop). When we're talking 12-14kdps, a margin of 1k seems all right to me.

I can't remember exactly but I believe DW frost was top followed by 2h UH and then 2h Frost, all within a reasonable amount of dps from eachother.

(The info is on EJ. I can't access it at work either but I did read it earlier today and it was still pretty fresh in my mind. Also the person keeping up the frost and unholy threads, Consider, keeps a blog that has a lot of useful insight as well).

I'll have to look into the blog there. I appreciate the resource. However, what makes u think 85 dw uh will be bad? I honestly cannot see the 81-85 spells (dam work) but I do not recall anything that seemed ground breaking.

[Gracerath]

Math fails me and it is explained somewhere either on EJ or Consider's blog but it basically falls down to scaling. Unholy is a strike spammy build, somewhat similar to how blood dps played. A majority of your damage is scourge strike followed by pet damage. Since you are using scourge strike so often, it just scales and does better damage with 2h weapons.

(Apologies for the non-mathy answers. The work firewall is my arch enemy)

[ulushnar]

Math fails me and it is explained somewhere either on EJ or Consider's blog but it basically falls down to scaling. Unholy is a strike spammy build, somewhat similar to how blood dps played. A majority of your damage is scourge strike followed by pet damage. Since you are using scourge strike so often, it just scales and does better damage with 2h weapons.

(Apologies for the non-mathy answers. The work firewall is my arch enemy)

It wasn't far off that iirc, but another big factor in Unholy DW's viability was the old Necrosis talent. Earlier in Beta, DW Unholy was basically ahead of 2H for that reason. Once they dumped Necrosis, DW just couldn't keep up anymore.

[Skye1013]

Math fails me and it is explained somewhere either on EJ or Consider's blog but it basically falls down to scaling. Unholy is a strike spammy build, somewhat similar to how blood dps played. A majority of your damage is scourge strike followed by pet damage. Since you are using scourge strike so often, it just scales and does better damage with 2h weapons.

(Apologies for the non-mathy answers. The work firewall is my arch enemy)

It wasn't far off that iirc, but another big factor in Unholy DW's viability was the old Necrosis talent. Earlier in Beta, DW Unholy was basically ahead of 2H for that reason. Once they dumped Necrosis, DW just couldn't keep up anymore.

I definitely miss the "free" damage of BCB and Necrosis

[Adryl]

Yeah I really need to start playing more to get a decent 2h to test this with. I noticed in my runs in the non-icc heroics, I can barely due 3-4k due to the mobs being killed to quickly (even the bosses are dropping in mere seconds). Back in PoS I was doing 6k. Was it a stealth nerf or that it's just the differences between icc 5 mans and the old 5 mans?

[Tar-Leim]

Not sure where these DW concerns are comeing from 4.0.1 Live, my DK in garbage gear 4.8k gs No teir bonuses of any kind. I'm running 6k (number pulled from a VoA25 Run) I was laughing at a PuG leader in an ICC who said my GS was too low when I first messaged him (belittled him into letting in me by explaining that I'd tanked the place prebuff at 4.6k) then I was beating him by a couple places on the DPS charts.

[Shoju]

I'm DW DPS spec on my DK now, and I was hitting high 6k low 7k on target dummies, and in an H:VH run, and I still had an AGI back and Ring.

I now have 2t9 /2t10 reforged to meet the exp cap, and I'm still above yellow hit cap. I now have

251 LDW head
226 str neck
251 t10 shoulders
264 JP cloak
232 t9 chest
245 crafted bracers
251 t10 gloves
264 JP belt
232 T9 pants
219 boots (H:ToC)
245 str ring
258 honored str ring
DMC:G
219 FL +hit trinket
251 lootship cleaver
232 +hit mace (H:HoR)
245 sigil

I wouldn't call it "great" gear, but I'm pretty sure that as I get more comfortable with the rotation, I will take my high 6k dps and turn it into 8k pretty easy.

I have seen a lot of DW DK's DWing tank weapons to DPS. I'm a little confused by this, are the stats enough to make up for the fast speeds?

[ulushnar]

I have seen a lot of DW DK's DWing tank weapons to DPS. I'm a little confused by this, are the stats enough to make up for the fast speeds?

Probably not, but then again, they may be the best weapons they have if they were Frost tanks before 4.01.