DK Visuals & Animations Megapost

Classes Death Knight
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This thread is primarily to express ideas to visually enhance abilities we currently have. A lot of the suggestions in this thread are largely my opinions, and make use of assets that are already in game.

The Death Knight is a class that lives and dies by the rune blade. As such, they should be primarily utilizing their weapons for necromancy, frost magic, and blood magic. The standard racial cast animation is being used for most of our castable spells, at least for our summoning and omni spells. With the newer animations added in recent expansions, I think this would be an opportune time to take a second look at DKs visually. Clicking on the images will have further insight on my opinions.

:crossed_swords: GENERAL :crossed_swords:

  • Lichborne: Think its time to retire the old Lich face and make use of the newer Lich appearance to represent Lichborne being active.

  • Anti-Magic Shell: This spell could use a bit of a touch up in visuals. It’s a really old spell effect thats as old as the game itself.

  • Death’s Advance: The spell effect for this ability could use a visual touch up. Perhaps some decayed foot prints?

  • Wraith Walk: Using the priest floating animations would enhance this spell visually.

When Wraith Walk was turned into a talent, we lost glyph customization options for this ability, meaning we are unable to use glyph of the Unholy Wraith, Blood Wraith, and Wraith Walker. Please consider allowing the class trainer to change the color of the Death Knight’s wraith form, similar to what was done for the Gargoyle talent in BFA.

  • Runeforging: Having the death knight hold their weapon in front of the rune forge to engrave runes onto it would look cool. Having them hold their weapon aloft using the appropriate Artifact animation after the process is done would be the cherry on top.

Raise Dead: There are a great abundance of undead models currently in WoW, which makes it a shame that DKs dont have access to even the basic ghoul model. For the ghouls, theres a number of ghoul types in the game that would make great additions.

  • The Standard Ghoul: Your run of the mill ghoul, that is only really seen via Army of the Dead. I think the glyph or recipe could be available via Ebon Blade reputation.

  • Maldraxxus Ghouls: There are a number of different ghoul models of this type of ghoul, so I think it should pull out a random ghoul model of this type, as well as changing the ‘Raise Dead’ animation into something of a Necrolord spell effect to raise them given their origin. The glyph could be obtainable via Necrolord reputation.

  • Drust Ghouls: The models for these ghouls are wonderfully horrendous, and would make a great addition to the ghouls we should be able to summon. This glyph/recipe could be obtainable via the Order of Embers reputation, and whatever the horde equivalent would be.

  • Rune of the Fallen Crusader: The proc effect could use an update to fit better with Death Knights thematically. Updating the spell effect and icon would be ideal.

:skull: UNHOLY :skull:

  • Unholy Assault: I like that Death Knights use the old Unholy Presence spell effect, but they also need to have some glow effect during the duration of the spell. Would be cool to get the old classic Unholy Frenzy spell effect back for this. Having an effect for the weapon impact to the floor would also make it look better.

I also feel this ability should either have a unique weapon trail effect, or just use an altered effect from Condemn. (Maybe subtle little wail put in there too.)

  • Summon Undead Spells and Omni Cast Spells: Death knights should to make use of the PalSpellCast1H animation for more than just blood spec. We should use the power of our rune blades to summon and control our undead minions, rather than casting with our bare hands. The blade is the Death Knight’s power, and it should be conveyed as such for our abilities.

PalSpellCast1H for Death Knights

The occasional off cast with our off hand for spells like Mind Freeze and Unholy Blight isnt bad. Our more powerful abilities should make use of our weapon more often though.

  • Army of the Dead: This ability would look better if the death knight used the ArtMainLoop animation for the duration of the cast instead of the standard cast animation.

  • Clawing Shadows: The effect on the weapon works, but this ability needs a projectile of some kind. A shadow blade, or even a shadowy version of our weapon using the same weapon swing as our characters would serve to add some flair to this ability. We just need something to show the connection of our attack to our target.

Imgur

  • Epidemic: This ability should use the PalSpellCast1H animation and use the weapon glow effect that we see from Deathcoil.

  • Dark Transformation: Dark Transformation needs to have more cosmetic options. I was really hoping to have this model as a glyph or trainer toggle using this model. It fits the silhouette, and looks cool. This should be obtainable via Necrolords rep. Glyph of Skeleton should also have it’s own unique Dark Transformation form.

  • Outbreak: Outbreak should make use of the Cast Curse Left animation. Idea is the Death Knight casts minor spells from their non-dominant hand, and should not sheathe their weapon.

:ice_cube: FROST :ice_cube:

  • Chill Streak: This spell visually looks more like something a mage would cast instead of a death knight. Having the death knight summon something like a Frost Wraith in the form of a skull would be more fitting. I recommend the cast animation use the Cast Sweep Left or the Attack Thrown animations while flagging it to keep the weapon in the Death Knight’s hands.

  • Fatal Fixation (Or just Obliterate in general): Having more of a variety in weapon swing animations would be preferred.
  • Frost Strike: <Edit> When you use Frost Strike while dual wielding, if you listen closely, youll hear the sound of two strikes, while the character only swings the one blade in an arc. This animation would be the best fit for this ability when DWing.
  • Remorseless Winter: This should use the PalSpellCast1H animation for the initial cast, with the same frost effect radiating from our weapon that’s used for Howling Blast.

An animation was added in Shadowlands for Mawsworn Anduin, labeled
CustomSpell06-08. This spell would be perfect for Death Knights to use in some way. My vote would be for Remorseless Winter.

  • Cold Heart: This talent should enhance the visuals of Chains of Ice in some way, especially since the chains don’t show when using it on un-slowable enemies. The Icy Touch spell animation still holds up, and would look cool (ha) paired with the Chains of Ice animation.
  • Obliterate: There needs to be some system in place for a lot of our abilities to recognize when we’re dual-wielding or using a two-handed weapon via special ability animations.

CombatExecute is a better fit for Obliterate when DWing.

Imgur
The weapons clip into each other during the CombatAbility2HBig02 animation when DWing.

Dual wielding needs to make use of the CombatExecute animation, because the 2hBig02 animation just clips both weapons together. If Frost Strike can have different animations for DW and 2H, then the same can be done for Obliterate.

  • Raise Dead (Frost): It’s my opinion that Frost Death Knights should raise armed skeletons as a base instead of ghouls. I think it fits better thematically. Either that or just add more glyphs to change it’s appearance…

  • Vilebrood’s Fury (Frostwyrm’s Fury glyph or Class Trainer toggle): This is just a suggestion to have a glyph that can change the frostwyrm used for Frostwyrm’s Fury into the DK class hall mount model. A better solution would be to have the class trainer toggle this change, similar to the Summon Gargoyle ability.

  • Glacial Advance: The effect of Glacial Advance is extremely underwhelming. Redesigning the ice to be larger and more spiked would be ideal.

  • Enduring Strength: A simple glow and frost effect on the character would make this buff a little cooler, with the added benefit of being able to track the buff on the character visually.

Imgur

  • Shattering Blade: Having an extra effect and an ice-crackling sound effect would make this talent a bit more visually appealing. Having it use the spell effect used from the Torghast Anima ability, Frostchipper, would be sufficient.

Imgur

:drop_of_blood: BLOOD :drop_of_blood:

  • Blood Drinker: Having the blood/life essence being absorbed into the blade itself using the DKCast1HFront animation would thematically fit a Death Knight’s style. This method is probably easier to implement since all races have access to this animation.

  • Bloodworms: Having some cosmetic options for blood worms, much like our ghouls, are desired.

  • Bone Shield: This spell effect is definitiely showing it’s age. Having better variety of HQ bones would be a nice visual upgrade.
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So much yes to all suggestions regarding using the runic weapon. I look stupid sheathing only to quickly swap to my weapon. Lets give us some flavor

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I love all of these suggestions.

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Agreed. These are very good suggestions.

Also, please allow unholy a wide range of options to choose from in terms of the visuals of their pet. I wouldn’t mind Unholy so much if I could make my pet a Skeleton and customize the armor/lack of armor graphics on it (Same applies to the empowered form. It would be neat if my empowered “ghoul” could be a giant hulking Skeleton)

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Thats the only thing that keeps me from using ‘glyph of skeleton’ really. Dark transformation ruins my skellilad with all thos fleshy bits. They either need to make the glyph of skeleton effect dark transformation as well or make it a seperate glyph. There’s a lack of ‘Hulking Skeleton’ models outside of the Marrowgar model and the new one in the Necrolord area based on Marrowgar’s model, but I really do hope they add more glyphs for UNholy minions.

Would be neat to have a glyph that turns our army of the dead to only skeletons as well.

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Can SS not have a Golf swing animation PLZ!!!

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They should add a glyph for Frostscythe that turns it into Frostmourne.

They could also do one to use the old howling blast animation.

In legion they had different color death grips but never made it live cuz of some weird delay bug. Those would be cool.

A glyph that always puts your 1h weapon on your back would be nice too.

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I think the weapon swing itself works, but spammable abilities needs variation to it’s swings. Clearly, this is able to be done given how Mongoose Bite has the character using it go through a combo of different weapon swing animations.

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Exactly what i’m talkin big guy^^

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I hate blood boil. I loath blood boils animation. I would love it if blood boil caused some kind of bleeding animation from the mobs it hits. Instead of her raising her sword in the air like a female version of He-Man who is expecting some kind of lightning strike to hit the sword…

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I would love it if they allowed us to choose skeleton models and be able to apply transmog to a few of the slots, and even add a weapon. Or better yet, maybe a “living armor” pet that floats with you that you can customize the armor/weapon on. If only …

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Agreed! Especially about wraith walk. I wish it made us look more like a wailing spirit with ghostly trails behind us. Or maybe graphics of other spirits, since we’re technically stepping into the shadowlands with this skills.

I also really, really wish obliterate was more than literally just both hands swinging at the same time (at least for NE females this is the case) it looks stupid and ineffective. I’d much rather a straight downward strike followed by an offhand thrust forward.

It’d be cool too if the animations themselves were items/achievements we could earn, kind of like finisher animations in Destiny 2. Doesn’t affect the gameplay, but looks cool as hell.

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I quite like the animation of death coil at least when used at range, since you can see the animation. Though I would not mind if when used in close range like melee range, that it would change to something more like we infuse the blade in a pulsing miasma of necrotic energy an strike the target. Would give some visual uniqueness to the ability, and also allow us to know the ability actually was used when used in close range.

Clawing shadows I think would be interesting if it was something more like either a single or pair of shadowy skeleton arms appear at the target an slash them. I could even go for a reskin of blade of justice making it be that we conjure a runic blade to strike the target up thru the ground, though not sure how it would look or feel for dks to use.

I do wish our control undead spell had a talent or glyph that made the controlled undead permanent pet. Though for casting both I would not mind if we drove our rune-weapon into the ground the runes on it flashing, and maybe a glow enveloping the target. It would be something interesting an different, but harken back to how The Lich king raised sindragosa actually. You could use the same idea for army really, it would suit both well.

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I want to glyph Timmy into one of those pig-headed Frankenstein abominations running around Drustvar.

Those things are freaky.

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I’m actually kinda dissatisfied with blood animations. I mean a spell says send out bloody tendrils when they’re just slim red projectile that isn’t even attached to you. After seeing a TON of blood themed abilities in BFA I want them to actually have some epic moves!

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  1. Anti Magic Shell. It looks awful as it is. I’d like it to look like an actual barrier against magical energy, rather than the cheap easter egg halves spinning around you that cut through your character. Something similar to the Paladin Divine Shield animation would be nice, if you made it an unholy green kind of colour.

  2. Marrowrend/Bone Shield. I’d like it if you were surrounded by more gore and bone, moving in a more erratic pattern and increasing in intensity depending depending on how many charges you have. Something akin to the current Bonestorm spell effect would be nice. The current spell with 4 identical femurs dancing around you regardless of how many charges are up, coupled with the weirdly purple spell effect, is possibly the goofiest looking spell in the game.

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I’ve made a topic of this on the Beta forums. With the expansion coming out in two months, dont think anything will come of this topic for release, but maybe developers will notice for the next patch? For those who care about how cool we look when we do our DK thing, share your feedback on this topic if youve got Beta access.

https://us.forums.blizzard.com/en/wow/t/dk-visuals-animations-suggestions/620279

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My only problem with DK animations is Remorseless Winter. I hate having my character covered in graphics 24/7. I could deal with it better if it was like a 1 minute cooldown and we weren’t then forced into taking Gathering Storm because the rest of that tier sucks.

And don’t get me started on Breath of Sindragosa…

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I agree that we could use some touch-ups and generally agree with what you have outlined.

Wraith Walk’s current animation was a placeholder in Legion beta, if I’m remembering right. They never bothered to replace it.

Clawing Shadows…I always felt that Ret’s Blade of Justice felt more like a DK ability. They can easily give it a shadowy rune weapon model and use it for Clawing Shadows, which would be much more thematic for a DK.

Cold Heart should chuck one of those giant icicles that Bolvar was throwing around in the SL cinematic, albeit with more success.

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I would like Remorseless Winters animation to be more representative of the area its actually covering.

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