DK dps

Hello everyone,

Mahaliel here. For starters I would like to touch on something that i have spent a great deal of time researching and testing. Everyone knows what type of gear to get for a DK but hardly anyone seems to know how to use moves in a rotation to maximize dps. This is not a bad thing but something that everyone who is a DK should know about. For example what kind of spec are you using? This will affect your rotation as well as the different moves you will be employing. For today's example we will be using my favorite type of DK dps. Unholy dps is AOE based. It is improved by hit rating crit rating and AP. The talent points you will want to invest in are a hybrid spec.
For our lesson today we will be using the spec i have chosen which is not perfect but it works well with my gear. I put points into the improved Death and Decay. I also put points into vicious strikes. Epidemic is a must. Virulence is good. Outbreak is very important for AoE. I usually max out necrosis to be able to get further down on the unholy chain. Blood caked blade is a good one to max out. Don't forget to max out impurity.. This is the mainstay of a DK who does unholy AoE dps. Even though it is not necessary maxing out magic suppression is better than the other options for a DK and it allows for better raiding in certain circumstances. Desecration is an amazing move not only for its slowing effect but also because any melee in your raid will increase their dps by 5% and the enemies will take 5% more damage. Bone shield also gives you a bonus damage effect and because you are not tanking you will most likely not lose the charges which means a more consistent high damage. Crypt fever is a good thing to put points in as well as it gives you another disease that you put on your enemy which means more damage on AoE moves. Wandering plague is a great way to increase damage during AoE attacks. and Ebon plaguebringer is great too. Rage of rivendare is important because it allows for you to increase your chance of not being dodged or parried. The last thing you want to put points in for Unholy is unholy blight. It is a good way to increase your AoE damage output.

Now I also put points into Glacial rot but that is the only thing i take from the frost spec. The rest of the points i put into blood spec. I max out subversion, butchery, bladed armor, two handed weapon specialization, and to finish it off with dark conviction.

Now that we have covered my talent spec we will cover the move rotation. This will change slightly depending on how many mobs you are attacking.

With 1-2 mobs you use less AoE. you start off with DnD, icy touch, plaguestrike, pestilence. This will use all of your runes. by the time your blood rune comes up use bloodstrike. Only use it once. save your second blood rune. Use Icy touch and plaguestrike once more. Now use pestilence. This means all of your runes except frost and unholy should be used. Now pop obliterate and the mob should be down. During this whole time you should have kept unholy blight up as much as possible.

With 3+ mobs we use a different approach. start off using DnD. Icy touch+ plaguestrike+ pestilence. Don't forget to use unholy blight. When blood rune becomes ready use blood boil. Now use icy touch and plaguestrike with pestilence again. Unholy blight should need to be renewed by this time. Now use blood boil one last time and use obliterate to finish them off.

Boss fights- here we have something that doesn't work so well with bosses. AoE is designed to do maximum crowd damage. However a boss doesn't take as much damage as a bunch of npcs. Here we will have to switch up our moves a bit to accomodate that style of single target fighting.

DnD to start it off. Icy touch and plaguestrike. Here is where it changes up a bit. Use bloodstrike a lot. When your diseases are about to finish up then use obliterate. Then reapply icy touch and plaguestrike. Always keep up unholy blight for the extra dps. Also during this fight you will be gaining a lot of runic power.. As long as you have unholy blight up then you may use death coil liberally.

Your boss fights will differ of course.. but as long as you remember to keep your diseases applied to your targets then you will keep maximum dps possible.

Thanks,
Mahaliel, Muertedehoof