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It has been a long journey through life and death for any DK that once against finds them the hero of the free world. They've not only braved countless battles in life and living death, switched allegiances at least twice but have finally conquered the frozen reaches of Northrend in hopes of slaying their former master. At last the DK is level 80 and now what?
If you're a DK that has recently reached level 80, you've probably asked that question. We will figure out what to do at level 80 so that you can enjoy the immense amount of content that has been put there just for you.
With the talent specs, DK is blessed and cursed in the meantime. For many classes, it is quite clear which talents are best for various situations, be it PvE, PvP, DPS, or Tanking. For Death Knights, each of the three talent trees is fairly equally viable for the above situations. Many talents support both tanking and DPS, and the fact that Death Knights can deal quite a bit of DPS while tanking makes it even more confusing. If you're just looking for a good spec and not a spreadsheet of nothing but math, here are some great ones for every spec, both DPS and Tanking.
Death Knight DPS Specs: Blood - 51/0/20, Frost - 17/51/3 and Unholy - 17/0/54.
Death Knight Tanking Specs: Blood - 52/8/11, Frost - 12/52/7 and Unholy - 11/10/50.
The biggest challenge any freshly level 80 Wow player faces is gearing up. DK isn't exception. We may seem incredibly overpowered as we level up, but once 80 it's a pretty level playing field and we're expected to pull our weight. Before entering into any endgame raids, even a 10-man, it is important to improve our gear considerably beyond the various questions and dungeon blues we've scraped up while leveling. At the very least, most raid groups want you to have level 80 superior-quality gear in every slot. A great way to do this is through purchasing level 80 BoE blues and epics. Most level 80 blues are often under 100g on the AH, and many epics are available for under 400g.
It is extremely helpful for you to have a blacksmith craft gear. For example, the Titansteel Destroyer is a great crafted weapon, on par with many 10-man Naxxramas drops. Other epic and blue items can be crafted by blacksmiths for both tanking and DPS, like the Spiked Titansteel Helm or Tempered Titansteel Treads.
Through heroics and heroics badges is a way to get gear pre-raids. You should try to rid yourself of low level items and greens before even entering heroics, especially if you're going to be tanking. Finding good gear upgrades is often as simple as going to the Armory and using the "Find an Upgrade" feature. The only problem is that this feature often won't differentiate gear for whether you're a tank or DPS, hit or expertise capped or not. For that reason, it is important that you understand DK stats like DPS stats and tank stats.
Strength is the absolute most important stat for any DPS DK. It affects how hard a DK can hit and scales with various talents and buffs. Strength is always more important than AP, even though they appear to be the same thing. It is also important for Death Knights to have the appropriate amount of hit rating. All two-handed melee DPS classes need to have an 8% additional chance to hit before they can't possibly hit their target any more often. In addition, there is a measure of expertise required for the same reason. DK DPS that attack from behind a raid boss need only 26 expertises. Besides Strength and its close companion AP, DPS Death Knights also favor Agility. Nowhere near as good as Strength, Agility provides buff-scaleable critical strike chance.
DK tank stats look a lot like other tank stats, apart from block chance/value. With this, DK is much more damage mitigation than they are avoidance. When looking for gear upgrades, DK tanks need to min/max. The Defense cap for a level 80 DK is 540. Any amount of Defense above that is wasted the DK should never sink below this mark. After maintaining the Defense cap, DK tanks should focus on gear that gives additional Stamina, Armor, Dodge, Parry, and Strength - in that order. Parry has a much worse diminishing return than Dodge. This means that as you gain parry it takes more and more rating to equal 1% of parry. 15 Dodge is going to be much better than 15 Parry.
If you're a DK that has recently reached level 80, you've probably asked that question. We will figure out what to do at level 80 so that you can enjoy the immense amount of content that has been put there just for you.
With the talent specs, DK is blessed and cursed in the meantime. For many classes, it is quite clear which talents are best for various situations, be it PvE, PvP, DPS, or Tanking. For Death Knights, each of the three talent trees is fairly equally viable for the above situations. Many talents support both tanking and DPS, and the fact that Death Knights can deal quite a bit of DPS while tanking makes it even more confusing. If you're just looking for a good spec and not a spreadsheet of nothing but math, here are some great ones for every spec, both DPS and Tanking.
Death Knight DPS Specs: Blood - 51/0/20, Frost - 17/51/3 and Unholy - 17/0/54.
Death Knight Tanking Specs: Blood - 52/8/11, Frost - 12/52/7 and Unholy - 11/10/50.
The biggest challenge any freshly level 80 Wow player faces is gearing up. DK isn't exception. We may seem incredibly overpowered as we level up, but once 80 it's a pretty level playing field and we're expected to pull our weight. Before entering into any endgame raids, even a 10-man, it is important to improve our gear considerably beyond the various questions and dungeon blues we've scraped up while leveling. At the very least, most raid groups want you to have level 80 superior-quality gear in every slot. A great way to do this is through purchasing level 80 BoE blues and epics. Most level 80 blues are often under 100g on the AH, and many epics are available for under 400g.
It is extremely helpful for you to have a blacksmith craft gear. For example, the Titansteel Destroyer is a great crafted weapon, on par with many 10-man Naxxramas drops. Other epic and blue items can be crafted by blacksmiths for both tanking and DPS, like the Spiked Titansteel Helm or Tempered Titansteel Treads.
Through heroics and heroics badges is a way to get gear pre-raids. You should try to rid yourself of low level items and greens before even entering heroics, especially if you're going to be tanking. Finding good gear upgrades is often as simple as going to the Armory and using the "Find an Upgrade" feature. The only problem is that this feature often won't differentiate gear for whether you're a tank or DPS, hit or expertise capped or not. For that reason, it is important that you understand DK stats like DPS stats and tank stats.
Strength is the absolute most important stat for any DPS DK. It affects how hard a DK can hit and scales with various talents and buffs. Strength is always more important than AP, even though they appear to be the same thing. It is also important for Death Knights to have the appropriate amount of hit rating. All two-handed melee DPS classes need to have an 8% additional chance to hit before they can't possibly hit their target any more often. In addition, there is a measure of expertise required for the same reason. DK DPS that attack from behind a raid boss need only 26 expertises. Besides Strength and its close companion AP, DPS Death Knights also favor Agility. Nowhere near as good as Strength, Agility provides buff-scaleable critical strike chance.
DK tank stats look a lot like other tank stats, apart from block chance/value. With this, DK is much more damage mitigation than they are avoidance. When looking for gear upgrades, DK tanks need to min/max. The Defense cap for a level 80 DK is 540. Any amount of Defense above that is wasted the DK should never sink below this mark. After maintaining the Defense cap, DK tanks should focus on gear that gives additional Stamina, Armor, Dodge, Parry, and Strength - in that order. Parry has a much worse diminishing return than Dodge. This means that as you gain parry it takes more and more rating to equal 1% of parry. 15 Dodge is going to be much better than 15 Parry.
