on the extreme end, theres going to be perceived imbalance.
There will always be a “fastest” choice, and when people are competing at a top 100 level, being fast is major factor.
DH’s have strong AoE snap aggro, mobility, and a debuff that increases their teams DPS.
For these reasons they are the fastest, and at top 100 level, speed is the most important factor.
Blood isnt bad in comparison, its just a little slower(all of the tanks are). Not even slower by alot, but a 1minute difference in a full 19+key is a big difference on leaderboards, and when youre competing, something like that matters.
Whereas for the 99.99% majority of the playerbase, the speed component of DH is pretty much a non-factor.
Blood DK also has poor IO representation, because the spec isnt incentivised to step foot in PvE. All of its BiS comes from PvP.
Most people stop playing once they’re BiS and content no longer benefits them.
This is the case for many BDKs.
They hit 1800, or 2100Rating, and they stop doing content- because it doesnt benefit them.
Which directly impacts IO representation.
Blood is VERY solid.
It just doesnt have much reason to play the game.
That’s like saying fire mages aren’t actually better than arcane mages despite the ~1k IO difference at the top, because arcane mages pack it in after getting BiS.
The reason you don’t see Blood DKs at high rating is not because Blood DKs get their BiS gear and decide to stop playing the game. That’s kind of a ridiculous thing to imply.
Pvp gear is great for many tank specs. Also most tanks/players pushing high rating are already sitting at or close to BiS. They’re not pushing that content for gear, they’re doing it for the challenge and rating.
No one is saying Blood isn’t capable of doing content and getting KSM, but due to various factors such as damage/mobility/mitigation, it is objectively worse than most other tanks and therefore has a lower ceiling. Denying the fact that Blood is comparatively worse (in m+ at least), when its backed up by actual data, is kind of a funny hill to die on.
Blood is capable of getting KSM on +19 with minimal effort.
But there are ALOT of variables that determine how many people of X spec, are on the top. Variables that include, the performance of its other specs, loot incentives, and synergy.
All of these are playing a big role on BDKs representation.
Unholy is a top tier DPS that is highly desired. Most PvE DK’s are playing UH for this reason.
Magic damage dealers are doing bonkers amounts of damage, so a DH debuff is perceived as mandatory on the high end. However, Havoc is crap, which means most DH’s rolled over into VDH, which is now a overpopulated spec, with a highly desirable debuff(because it enhances the S tier DPS).
BDK and other tanks have to compete with this overpopulated, highly desirable debuff. Most of them will just opt not to, and move into their positions where they have less competition in their role. These things into account, along with the loot tables being virtually useless, its a recipe for VDH to dominate representation.
Not because Blood is weak, or VDH is OP, but rather because of a million external factors.
I don’t think thats a great idea - especially when Damage timers are a thing. I know right now in heroic Sludgefist every DPS matters; so reducing overall raid damage because Blood DK is struggling isn’t really a solution is it? Especially when it seems to be mostly a Blood DK issue. I recall when Threat management was a thing - but that was a long time ago and Tanks should not be worrying about Threat management…against other tanks.
I pull 3.4k as Blood on LFR Sludgefist.
Granted its not the most real world place to accurately gauge DPS since i have more freedom to be aggressive, but it seems reasonable to me.
Thats with Flask+food+pot+shadowbolt oil.
its also a short lived execute phase though, which is where my DPS builds up.
So 3.4k is probably accurate enough.
I feel like everyone is just walking into everything with SS+FC and then quickly proceed to feel like “Wtf BDK does no damage?!”
Blood dk has dmg but as a 99% dmg parser im equivalent to a 90ish% parsing VDH. Not worried though about dmg too much as bdks will scale better as we gear up more in s2 and s3. Only a temporary problem.
My only complaint is we have too many globals to get really going (snap aggro, on pull mit, etc). Fixing that alone would be all we really need imo.
Do you really think a few seconds of a tank stopping dps is going to prevent people from killing something? If that is the case then there are far far FAR greater issues in the raid and not just a prot pally sitting idle for 3 seconds for the Dk to get rolling.
Just needs some damage tuning. Buff stuff that will impact m+ and make stuff like blooddrinker do more in raid. It’s a lot closer to good than it was at launch. Damage tuning, please. Tankiness is fine.
I’m thinking the changes to the dancing rune weapon legendary will help us alot, use that at the start of a pull or boss and you get 5 stacks right away and the CD reduction is actually really good for a super strong 2min defensive/offensive CD. Think I’ll be swapping out super strain for that once I have enough soul ash for the rank 4
Can you high-light another tank who has to request raid-DPS go down?
Generally I do not think the DPs is going to break the mold - but it is a odd request and a patch-work solution for a issue our class has. It is like asking every BDK to roll with Vampiric Aura legendary because your raids mist-weaver healers cannot hack it. I generally think forcing everyone else to compensate for your class having issues fulfilling its primary function is probably a good indicator of a issue. People make a good point that we will get much better when we start to scale up (which makes sense - because mitigation does not scale up as fast as damage - BDKs benefit from the fact that their DS tends to scale better due to it being a HP % based on dmg taken or % of Max HP).
I kind of wish we were more tied to our HP pool rather then just a copy of the tank template (the way we have essentially shield block)
I am not saying “Blood DK is horribly broken” but I am seeing threat issues when matching up against other tanks - nothing insurmountable but sometimes very uncomfortable.
Its literally just stopping damage for a couple of seconds. Its not like they have to kiss your feet and give you a back rub. And any tank that isnt Prot Pally would have trouble against a prot pally.
Also, you have a pretty poor mentality of group play. You SHOULD be helping people in your group. Why should you have to stop dps to drop an AMZ, why should you have to stop dps to stun a target, or to grip something that would put it in a better position. From your mentality you shouldnt have to do any of that because you are being forced to compensate for another class not being able to do something.
Prot pally tuning is way off, just like a lot of other classes that people have been complaining about.
To which the response is “Then why not get another prot pally” As for group play - I actually use Vampiric Aura (see my profile) because of the fact our healers have a tough time healing; your painting it as if I do not want to meet my responsibilities as a tank which is something that rubs me the wrong way. The issue is that when your telling the raid “guys my class cannot hold threat so I need the other tank to stop DPS” that is when issues with MY class start hindering other peoples roles; I think there is a realistic middle ground/expectation - when we are talking about core function (threat) I think its a sign that something is pretty off. As for Prot pally I cannot speak for the other tanks - but yeah its a rough ride to keep threat off them so maybe its Prot - Pally being broken instead. I do think that DK’s will be fine later - but that is a later thing and I would rather not be of the mindset “yeah don’t worry it sucks now” as I think that’s a lazy answer to the issue.
BTW how are you finding Frost? Have you tried the 2 handing yet as I know you were a pretty hardcore DW fan and am curious about your feedback about it.
I tank next to a Pally, and I have not had many issues where they pulled off me after the initial pull. My fix was just let them start every pull. Once we were both set up I have not had any real issues I can think of.
I do have to make sure I’m not over using marrowrend, as it will kill my dps / threat if I do.
I see you are progressing nicely through H CN, so I assume you know all the basic stuff but still check your logs and make sure there is nothing you have accidently been doing that’s nerfing your threat. I agree that Pallies and DH are both a bit over tuned though.
And the response to that is why dont you just get all of the best healing spec and the top dps spec for your raid. Not even the best guilds in the world are stacking that much of the same class. Not to mention if you dont have a dps dk for their utility, you would most likely want a blood dk for the same utility and some guilds would abuse the utility that blood dk would bring with its multiple grips and how much easier they could make fights.
Also, if your raid group knows that you would have threat issues against the other tank, where are your hunters and rogues? They arent transferring threat to you? Why not? They have the tools there or do they have the same mentality that they shouldnt have to help another class out because its a hinderance?
Threat also hasnt really been a core focus of tanks since… cata? When did they increase all tanks threat by 400%? The only thing you did in cata was stop dps as the tank that was swapped from because of how vengeance worked.
I just see a bunch of people in here typing hundreds and hundreds of words to desperately try and rationalize why a super mediocre spec is super mediocre, with busted talents and boring legendaries.
“As long as you’re not top 100, you should be satisfied with mediocre, inconsequential talents and abilities that you never pick and don’t want on your bars”
Okay then?
Top 100 lists will ALWAYS be conflated with the most min-maxed for SPEED specs.
Right now boomkins and mages are destroying M+. Making the DH debuff super valuable. But Havoc is bad, so every DH has gone vengeance.
Now you have a overpopulated tank spec with a highly desirable debuff for the S tier DPSrs. Perfect fit.
If it wasn’t for havoc being so bad, we’d be seeing Prot pallies on top of the rankings simply because they do the most damage, which translates to the fastest clear. The damage gained on your boomkin+mage through the DH debuff, is more than the difference in Prot pal and vdh damage- therefore the min-max top 100 speed racers have chosen VDH.
Unless you’re in the top 100 you don’t really need to be concerned with min-maxing speed. You just need to be concerned with actually timing the dungeon.
Only the idiots.
The rest of us understand that the speed racer top 100 meta doesn’t really apply to us.
I’m not trying to break any records lol.
I still know for a fact i could do a +19 just as well as a VDH does, i just might finish 30seconds to 1minute slower than he does.
One of BDKs big values for M+ is the Battle res. But boomkins are so meta that if ppl are min maxing a group they’ll use a Boomkin for their BR, this way it free’s up the tank slot for more aggressive bonuses. In this case the DH debuff that makes mobs take increased magic damage which further increases the value of Boomkins and Mages.
People are far more likely to switch to a different dps spec than completely change their roles. It is more likely that many other tanks rerolled to Vengeance because it’s at the top.
The meta always trickles down so yes the perception does matter and it will affect you. I’ve seen many pugs reject Blood DKs because of this. You can call them idiots but on some level they’re right and you’re still not going to get an invite.
There is nothing wrong with having multiple BRs in a group. DH isn’t at the top just because of their debuff. You’re trying to justify your point based on one thing and failing to look at the complete kits for tanks. The debuff doesn’t matter if your tank is getting squished. That’s why you’re going to see warriors shoot up with 9.0.5 and leave Blood as the only contender for the worst tank.
Maybe actually do it and then people can take your opinions more seriously. Unless you have another DK, I only see a successful 14 HoA for you and no raid progression.
If i can pick a tank to time my key why the hell would i pick BDK? Compared to other tanks, its slow, tends to struggle with threat, can’t perma kite, does less dmg, takes more dmg, harder to heal. Does a brez compensate? no. end of the story.