You can definitely save a blood dk who messes up, but you need to be paying attention. It may also be class specific. As a priest I can PW:L them or use Holy Word: Serenity to get them back up quickly especially if they are below 35% hp. Here is what to do at each phase of a DK’s life/rp as a holy priest.
DK has health and runic power: keep renew and PoM on them.
DK has over 45 runic power but no health: keep renew and PoM on them.
DK has health but under 45 runic power: keep renew and PoM on them. Prepare to PW:L if they get smacked before they get runic power.
DK has no health and under 45 runic power: PW:L and be prepared to Holy Word: Serenity if their life drops again before they get 45 runic power or PW:L doesn’t heal them as much as you want.
Death Strike can’t be used to heal if the DK has no runic power, it costs 45 runic power. If the DK has runic power, they should be able to heal themselves through anything that doesn’t 1-shot them. Keeping small heals on them will help them not waste death strikes to heal small amounts of damage and prevents mistakes like using their runic power on small damage just before a damage spike.
up until this tier and since after legion bears were the redheaded stepchild of tanking that no one wanted to acknowledge.
now they’re good and everyone is suddenly concerned about bear utility. please. we have no more utility than we had before, we just aren’t garbage tier as we have been in the past.
Another update after all the nerfs which we all knew was not going to upset group comps, but boy do people love reminding me that they occured…
Reminder that the only way to avoid 3/4 of my consumable buffs rotting looking for group, just buff the dps of non bear tanks. That way everyone will see that any tank with appropriate gear/enchs/gems/io will do.
The below table is just last night; groups who declined me and waited around for bear tanks long enough that I could document as much data as I could before they filled:
You could fix BDK with tuning. Imho, they’re one of the most fun tanks right off the bat, it’s just that they don’t have enough DR for the damage of m+. It doesn’t matter that you can do heal 400k hps if you get globaled.
But that lack of dispel and group buff is a lot to overcome.
There is nothing to hide here, healing dk is a nightmare no matter is you are good dk or bad and you don’t need to heal bear+bear heals the group from just pressing their buttons.
The only time healers should be worried about the BDk is when he has no runic power. Beyond that, in the current state of tanks, BDks should be able to handle themselves. I love healing good BDks, Renewing Mist + EnvM on pull and then basically ignore them.
If your response is directed at me I don’t know what you’re talking about. I never said bears weren’t the best right now and I never said BDk couldn’t mess up and die instantly. I said I love healing BDk bc good ones require very little healing at all and that if a healer understands how BDk works they won’t panic over the HP bar. There is no mental gymnastics there.
I think the whole topic is frustrating for BDK, warr/monk maybe; and even an old chill dude like me is getting frustrated and seeing red where there is none.
My take is, BDK has the tools albeit some taken away since SL, but BDK clearly need more dps as a priority, no one can debate.
And the best defense is a good offense- more DPS means mobs die faster, means knowing I need fewer defensives. And means I’m getting invites to groups instead of being redheaded step-child because group members want someone they assume has high dps, all other metrics aside.
Meta tank in m+ has always been the highest dps tank first and foremost.
BDKs running in and dying means no DRW or even rune tap hehe.
(I saw a bear run in and die first pull 22 Underrot, I presume he was in wrong form )
I absolutely agree, and it’s not just tanks. A lot of specs need massive buffs to their DPS output. I really don’t understand why blizzard is so adverse to handing out buffs.
