T7 is murdering me

Every time I get a T7 upgrade I end up having to make silly replacements that cut my def rating in half, despite the relative gain in mitigation and stats. After winning the gloves I had to regem entirely, and pretty soon I'll have to ditch any stamina gemming at all to stay above the line of uncrit. Anyone else having troubles with this?
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Submit to freedom or be destroyed.

Yes and no, whenever I get a purple upgrade it seems that the Defense rating is lower than the blue item I prior to it. However the purple items have Sockets in them normally so its a simple fix for me to just gem them for defense and I am good. I do see how it would be easy to get items that would drop your defense rating too low however. I think I just lucked out for the most part when I got my upgrades... that and the JC BoP gems are easy to swap out to fix my defense when I need it.
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Kensuness 80 DK

Blizz doesnt want Tankadins to look like power rangers so they made the crafted pure defense gear have great amounts of defense and than they made the T7 have better overall stats at the sac of defense. Stam isnt our main issue anymore its def
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Hinata of Crit Happens - 80 - Arygos

This is why I always try to pre-gear for what my set upgrades will be.

Really though, blizz has set it up so that certian peices will boot you up to the def cap real quick but you lose out on a good chunk of mitagation. At the start of WotLK raiding you don't have it all like we did back with badge gear and stuff in BC. It's a trade off, and you won't have the godlike tankign stats we did last time untill much much later if even that.

Really though, you need to look at the epic tank gear as a full set incluting non-t7 slots. Once you have everything you're defence sits pretty good to where you can simply choose a couple slots to enchant for defence then gem for stam in the rest if you so wish.

The defense trinket and defense enchants (head, shoulders, chest, shield) go a LONG way towards hitting the minimum.
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Belloc

I feel the pain also...

Got T7 Shoulders last night as well as the gloves from Faerlina. The T7 was fine with +3 defense over Pauldrons of the Colossus, but...

Daunting Handguards: 71def + 16def gem = 87 Def
Gauntlets of the Master: 38def + 16def gem = 54 Def

That was a huge ding to my defense, bring back down to exactly 540. I am only a few badge away from T7 Chest, but the defense loss from Breastplate of the Solemn Council is going to drop me below 540, with gemming two 16def gems in T7...

T7 Chest: 38def + x2 16def gem + 22def enchant = 92
Breastplate of the Solemn Council: 76def + 22def enchant = 98

I think it will all become a non-issue if I can get my hands on a WotLK Def trinket like Seal of the Pantheon. That will create a nice cushion in the defense department.

Note: Blacksmithing is worth every piece of copper; I wouldn't know what to do without the extra sockets
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When an unstoppable force meets an immovable object...

Keep in mind DKs have it far worse on defense capping.
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80 DW DK Successful PuG Raid Leader Sehiam

I've been having this issue just lately. I picked up the necklace and belt from Naxx that are a lot of block-related stats. They're an overall upgrade, but my defense dropped. I'll probably pick up the chest soon, so that's another drop for overall better stats.

I think in a way this could be slightly positive in that it makes our gemming interesting. We can't just gem all stamina anymore.
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No really, I'm not addicted.

I've been pretty much gemmin T7 to go with the socket bonus's. Crossing my fingers for the naxx def trinket, cap is gettin tight.
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yeah, i don't envy DK's right now.. there are a lot of misc non-set drops with shield block or block value... and as much as I love those items, I sympathize with the dk cause. Still, minus one slot isnt that big a deal, it just makes the balancing act that much harder.

I think you will be lucky if they remember to consistently design enough gear without block for you DKs.
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