It’s currently dominant for all specs outside of AoE for BoS frost builds, which prefer Venthyr.
Is it not a problem that the biggest edgelord class is going to be mechanically pushed to play Night Fae? Death’s Due is doing absurd damage, and the Vulpine Form is absurdly good utility on a class whos’ dps specs are already top tier at durability and sustain with multiple CC breaks, while lacking mobility.
Abomination Limb needs seperate PvP and PvE scaling, because it’s not doing NEARLY enough damage on single target or AoE in PvE situations, while the utility is absolutely insane for PvP. Blood Mist seems to just suck compared to Death’s Due, unless you have multiple targets. Fleshcrafting seems pretty iffy on DK, because of how powerful a reactive Death Strike is for mitigating incoming damage.
Shackle the Unworthy is… A spell that you can cast? It’s awful. The gameplay is awful, the spell is awful, and the Phial just makes us more durable and more CC immune, which is kind of a wash.
Night Fae seem WAY out of line, and don’t seem thematically fitting for a DK whatsoever. The Cov balance seems very bad, and Night Fae just seem like the most solid generalist pick, which rubs me the wrong way. There are niche situations where you would want the others, but those are the minority of encounters. You’ll ALWAYS get value out of flat STR and an extra mobility spell, but the others just aren’t tuned, and none of the other cov spells or cov class spells come close to what Night Fae is offering.
24 Likes
Every class is facing the same problem. Gated covenant abilities was always a terrible concept and Blizzard are too stubborn to admit it.
Venthyr feels thematic from a Blood perspective and Necrolord is the obvious choice lore wise. The fact Night Fae is so powerful is kinda annoying I agree.
26 Likes
What annoys me is that Kyrian isn’t even in the conversation. Shackle the Unworthy is so unbelievably lame, they could have gone crazy with the undeath v angelic redemption theme, especially now that every spec gets pets.
Have it so you sacrifice your pet & an angel comes to collect their soul, but when it comes you shackle the angel and tether it to your pet, giving it new utility & combat spells for 20-30 seconds. An Arcane DoT is pathetic.
7 Likes
That is a pretty cool idea. But, it might get a little repetitive and lose its appeal after awhile. You have to push that button thousands of times between now and the next expansion.
Like the concept and agree everything just feels like something off a talent tree. Kyrian’s abilities are actually pretty good its just the whole covenant does not ooze DeathKnight.
I agree, I think Kyrian is getting slept on.
literally everybody is sleeping on the Soulbind and Conduit system right now. The discussion is only on the spells, which I think is a huge huge mistake. IIRC Kyrian have a versatility amp somewhere in their tree, which will make them instant contenders for the optimal PvP covenant.
The abilities are the discussion, but the passive trees are just as large, and have just as much disparity as the abilities, if not more in some cases.
4 Likes
I refuse to do any more night elf content. I won’t join the night elf ardenweald covenant. Screw that. Blizzard’s overamping night elves like they did orcs. Every expansion has a minimum of one brand new night elf zone with forced night elf content that you must do and cannot skip.
13 Likes
Yea I mean if you want to shoot yourself in the foot with throughput, yeah, be my guest. That’s the problem.
Night Fae really shouldn’t even be an option for DKs. DKs are a force of entropy and draw power from Maldraxus, as part of the Scourge on a magical level. Rebirth has absolutely nothing to do with the Death Knight fantasy, and we already have direct lore ties to Maldraxus.
3 Likes
Every class is facing the same problem. Gated covenant abilities was always a terrible concept and Blizzard are too stubborn to admit it.
This. 100% this.
Perhaps not every class, as I don’t follow all of them, but those which I am have extremely clear winners.
In some situations, it’s a case of an ability being either a clear winner or dead button depending on your spec.
We keep hearing they’re going to be balanced, but many of the issues aren’t a case of number tuning, they’re mechanically flawed in that some simply deal X damage/healing while others actually interact with your abilities.
I completely agree. I’ve been dusting off this old DK alt in preparation for SL as I am super excited about 2H Frost and I’ve always enjoyed Blood, and Soulshape just seems too good mechanically. It shores up exactly what DK needs for everyday QoL, and the signature just happens to be strong and easy. I appreciate that Venthyr is an “alright” fallback as it really plays well with Blood DK’s vibe, but I’m really disappointed in Necrolord.
To zoom out a bit, I’m actually not a fan of the entire “covenant choice” mechanic at all, even if they decoupled all abilities/soulbinds. I don’t want to have to run 3 alts or abandon 3 covenants to see the whole story. Why can’t I just enjoy the entire expansion’s content on one character?
3 Likes
I’m on the acceptance stage of the whole thing. I thought to myself. “I don’t even like placing DND manually so being able to turn into a fox for a speed boost and blinks may look dumb but it’s actually pretty handy” And “I really like the bursting wounds play style anyhow in AoE, getting a buffed DND is just going to make it more fun!”
The shield general ability the necrolords have will never be good anyhow when you can get it from the Venthyr tree that includes it in the teleport. Necro’s soulbinds are just garbage in general too. Sucks but whatever, the slappy arm looks like crap visually as well. I was expecting a fleshy meat slapper, not some weird ghostly green thing.
Blizzard only really had to make two covenants good for DKs.
The others could all largely suck and I am pretty sure very few DK would actually care.
Sometimes I wonder if Blizzard devs even understand their classes sometimes.
10 Likes
Funny, i thought covenants werent based on looks or what race you were, but what you did in life and your personality. So how exactly is any one covenant a Night Elf covenant or DK covenant or warrior covenant. There arent enough covenants to actually cover all classes in that regard.
5 Likes
I think the team is putting too much faith in balancing through the soulbind system.
Ya nightfae or venthyr could have the best dps option for ability but if they start doing knee jerk reaction buffs to soulbinds to compensate we could easily see another come out on top.
…first few weeks will be… Interesting?
1 Like
It’s not like Swarming Mists is bad, the short CD and great RP generation are great for all specs in a multi-target situation, it’s just Death’s Due is absurdly strong.
There are some specs where some of their covenant abilities aren’t even worth the global.
I’d expect they’ll nerf the strength gained from Death’s Due since it’ll also mean DKs will scale at a faster pace than other classes with gear.
Yes, we have to be fairy death knights to be strong sadly.
I have already accepted it and say my troll used to be a flower salesman till Ghunn happened, then died in the seige of Zuldazar.
also I feel convenants should reflect a DK character before becoming a death knight more, this lifestyle is forced on us, our destination in death should be who we were prior to DK. Our willful actions can still change it, but I feel that they could fit all The convenants to a degree
3 Likes
theres still time for them to “pull the rip cord” on covs.
i suspect they very well may.
1 Like
I’ve sacrificed everything. What have YOU given?
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There haven’t been hardly any tuning passes yet, so everything is out of whack. Death’s Due will see a nerf. Other tweaks to covenants will bring them in line enough. As long as the difference is less than 10%, no one is gonna notice the difference in PuGs and such.
I’m thinking I’ll be maining DK in SL and I refuse to pick Night Fae. I’ll most likely go Necrolord, everyone will meme me and everyone else who does, and then 2 weeks later they’ll buff/nerf some things and Necrolords will be all set up and all the fairy knights can come to forums and cry that they just pick FotM and Blizzard isn’t accommodating their insanity.
Just pick what you like and build your character as best you can anyways and no one is going to notice a real difference.
2 Likes
Thats not a problem, you just swap. Its further changes that might put them back into the spotlight thats the issue, then you have to jump through hoops.
Our lives, and we still sense your heart beating.
10 Likes