This is for PVE.
I’m new to UH DK and I’m wondering how much I should micromanage my pet. I’ve got the keybinds, but it seems I’ll lose dps if I’m using globals to use pet abilities. I can see the dark transformation stun, interrupt, and possibly dmg reduction in huddle being useful. I’m seeking the experience of those more seasoned than me. Is it useful to waste globals on these abilities because UH DK seems pretty GCD-intensive once you get rolling?
For minimum management, you only need button for Dark Transform. Put others in autocast. You also need to have ress pet whenever it dies (rarely), no need to heal it, no need to use huddle either (as in PvE, your pet will resist 90% AoE damage)
I guess it depends on whether you are focusing on PvE or PvP actually. While a certain amount of Pet management is helpful especially if used correctly they provide some useful utility such as the stuns can functions as another interrupt on the right encounters etc.
However, it is in PvP that Pet Management is much more important due to needing to not only protect your pet in certain circumstances but, also the ability to snap change to another target and use a stun etc, or change to another target if the current one is immune or no longer a valid target for one reason or another.
Overall the best way to do all this is to create macros for your pet and it’s abilities under various situations. Some Examples that might be helpful are:
Leap with Shift Mod for Target Focus Instead or the second option to use
#showtooltip Leap
/cast [mod:shift @focus, harm, exists, nodead] Leap;
/cast [nomod] Leap;
/petautocaston Claw
or the at mouseover variant
#showtooltip Leap
/cast [@mouseover,exists,harm][@target,exists,harm] Leap;
/petautocaston Claw
Dark Transformation Macro that checks if you have a pet and summons one if you don’t
#showtooltip
/cast [nopet] raise dead; [@pet] !dark transformation
/petautocaston Claw
Gnaw Macro that has shift key modifier to target focus otherwise it is your target
#showtooltip Gnaw
/cast [@focus,harm,exists,nodead] Gnaw;
/cast Gnaw;
Death Coil Macro has a shift key modifier to cast it at your pet which heals it
#showtooltip
/cast [nomod] [mod:shift, @pet,exists] Death Coil;
Pet Move to the cursor point to ensure you have range between the pet and target as Shambling Rush needs to be at minimum of 5 yards to work if transformed
#showtooltip PetMoveTo
/petautocastoff Claw
/petpassive
/petmoveto [@cursor];
Pet Dismiss Macro and resummon you will need this at various times for many reasons
/script PetDismiss()
/cast [nopet] Raise Dead
Pet Control Key Depending on if you have a modifier key pressed or not it does something different
/petfollow [nomod]
/petstay [mod:ctrl]
/petmoveto [mod:alt]
Control Undead Which Dismisses Ghoul if you have it so Control Undead Works. Obviously need to be spec’d into Control Undead Talent
#showtooltip Control Undead
/target [@mouseover, exists, nodead][@pet,exists, nodead]
/run PetDismiss()
/cast Control Undead
/petassist
It is also very important to remember the difference between what abilities are for the standard ghoul and what they become after transformation as they work differently and provide potentially a different utility or ability to use.
Dark Transformation (empower raised Ghoul abilities for 30 sec:
Claw to 
Sweeping Claws (deal 50% more damage and damage 2 more targets),
Gnaw to 
Monstrous Blow (deal 25% more damage and stun target for 1 more sec),
Leap to 
Shambling Rush (interrupt spell casting and root target for 2 sec),
Huddle to 
Putrid Bulwark (remove the action restriction to allow action during the duration))
There is a lot more than this and some even more complex but as a general starting point these should give you a nice assist
Thank you for all these great macros. I’ll be stealing several. I also edited the original post to show my focus is PVE.
I like binding pet attack because its off the gcd and sometimes you want your pet to attack something specific. I’d also bind leap because you can quickly get your pets onto the target. dont worry about binding his energy spender, claw or w/e its called.
I have pet attack macro’d into my common attacks. Is that no longer optimal?
I’ve keyboard the stun and the leap and have learned to use them. I’m curious if huddle is worth a keybind for PVE at all. It seems a waste of a GCD.
you can. its probably fine, just sometimes you want to control who your pet attacks.
And you can add huddle and Dt all into your raise dead macro: #showtooltip
/cast [nopet] Raise Dead;
/castsequence reset=5 Dark Transformation, Huddle
That makes sense. I’ll likely do that because huddle felt like a waste of pet energy and/or my GCDs.
For /petattack, yes you still need to macro it into at least one of your attack skill to control it, tell it which one you prefer to be your main target
For Huddle, as I mentioned earlier, you won’t need huddle as your pet rarely die, and even if it dies you wil have re-summon button available almost immediately (CD only 0.5 min)
Why? Re-summon your pet took it 3-5 sec to be ready to attack, huddle make your pet useless in 10 sec
Your pet can’t be that stupid and die every 30 sec, can it?
I would actually expand on this concept further and it is something that was subtly included in my previous post with the various macros I mentioned. However, I didn’t explain or elaborate on its relevance and reason that it was included within the macro. It actually comes back to something that you highlighted in your post when you mentioned the following:
If you expand on this concept more and actually rephrase it to the following:
Sometimes you want to control whether your pet is attacking or not and even whether it is using its energy spender or not.
The second part of that statement is the reason that the following line is used in some of the macros that I mentioned previously.
Now why would you need to disable and stop your pet from using its energy spender? The answer is actually quite simple it is because in some cases you need to maintain the energy pool to get maximum benefit out of abilities you want to use in various windows. Such as Dark Transformation windows to maximize opportunistic burst etc.
While it was subtle it is a key point that is often overlooked or not utilised efficiently to provide the best value and performance gains by a large percentage of Death Knight Players.
This response was just unnecessary and not informative. Thanks for the elaborate gibberish.
Perhaps because the overall benefit from the micromanagement needed for this isnt worth the hassle?
Clearly you aren’t able to follow the clear basis and reasons why the information I provided was very relevant and informative.
The difference between using an ability with your pet having a full energy bar vs an empty one when it comes to the damage throughput potential is significant. A pet that is transformed with no energy means it needs to generate enough energy to use Sweeping Claws (Claw Replacement) even once. While if the pet is transformed and has a full energy bar it is able to use Sweeping Claws two times straight away, with the third being utilised in the same time that it would take the pet with zero energy to regain enough energy to use Sweeping Claws one and a half times.
The initial front loading is a factor and if you’re incapable of understanding why that isn’t my concern or problem. It doesn’t however, preclude the fact that what I posted is relevant and informative to those that are actually able to comprehend the fundamental concept and principal.
Just to make it a little easier for your understanding the Macro I have where the autocast of claw is turned off, in is one that moves the pet away to a location point enabling you to ensure your pet has the required range gap so it can actually use Shambling Rush upon transformation. The second part is that you add in to your macro for Dark Transformation to enable the autocast back on upon transformation. Allowing you to have the pet utilize Shambling Rush to stun/interrupt the target on transformation and front load damage with a full energy bar which does make a massive difference during burst windows.
If you still don’t understand the logic of this it isn’t a case of a problem or issue from what I have explained but, clearly something that is too complex for some to comprehend.
Show proof of any substantive damage increase from playing this way, because it hasn’t actually been a thing or worthwhile in quite some time. Any new player reading your “subtle” key point will do nothing but tank their dps by doing this. And without proof to the contrary, your dps isn’t being improved with this gibberish.
Okay the basis of the Autoclaw ON/OFF does depend very much on your gameplay. It is definitely not something you would do in PvE situations where there is a small number of targets but as the number of targets increases that relationship changes. It is a key part of the strategy that is utilised by higher end MDI players due to the size of the various pulls in each of their dungeon runs. The sheer amount of mobs and the additional burst is all that matters and their whole runs are built around it.
It also is something that is used in by PvP players for arena etc. as the benefits gained through micromanaging your pets use of abilities can very much alter the aspect of the outcome versus a player who isn’t micromanaging the pet in the same way.
I will admit that it isn’t designed to work in situations where there is much smaller pulls or a single target situations and if it is used under these circumstances it can attribute to a loss of DPS. However, the talent setup you have for a mass pull AOE damage builds, PvP Arena builds, vs single target or lower threshold aoe are different and use different talents etc. Due to the difference in these talent setups it does allow for the player to very easily change their entire macro setups based on what the given situation requires.
To say it hasn’t been a thing isn’t an accurate statement either it is something that does separate higher performing players as they are able to utilize things like this more effectively than the average player as they understand when it provides the best value and performance throughput etc.
If you’re a player that never PvP’s in higher end arena or makes use of massive pulls in Mythic+ etc. then it isn’t going to be something that you would actually do. However, if that situation changes or you decide to go down either of these routes it is actually beneficial to understand this concept and how to get the best benefits out of it.
So,
(1) you have no proof.
(2) are now telling a new player to do something that will only see benefit in keys that 1% of the playerbase do and will actually only see benefit if said group is doing extremely large pulls around the DKs cooldowns.
(3) bring in pvp after the OP clearly said this is for pve.
By the by, it still hasn’t been a thing for quite awhile because DK hasn’t been run in any recent MDIs and isn’t a meta pick for keys where you pull in a manner that would see any benefit.
Now, politely, quit giving new players horrid advice.
So is it your opinion I’d be good with pet attack macro’d into my main DPS abilities and only dedicating a keybind to leap and the stun?
I’m still on the fence on whether I want to cast huddle in PVE because it seems like a waste of energy for the pet.
Yes, as any time you forget to have your pet attacking will be far more of a dps loss than any amount of micro-managing the pet will gain you. When you become extremely comfortable with the spec, you can worry about managing the pet more. Even then, it’s only going to show any gains if you’re doing megapulls in dungeons around cds, which isn’t happening in most cases. Ignore huddle in PvE, your pet isn’t going to die from attacks.
PvP is a different story, and as you’ve already said this is for PvE I have nothing more to add.
I have a /petattack macro set and binds set for leap / gnaw and that’s where I draw the line with the absurd amount of binds needed for pets. I hate pet management and rather play frost than UH because of it. I just need to get used to UH more this season for PvP since it’s so good.
I mentioned before
Even in PvP, people rarely focus pet anyway, so Huddle can be ignored completely, due to the fact you can just resummon pet every 30 sec. DK’s pet is not companion like hunter’s pet