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Lichborne: Possible new death knight glyphs and trinkets in patch 5.4
Every week, WoW Insider brings you Lichborne for blood, frost, and unholy death knights. In the post-Cataclysm era, death knights are no longer the new kids on the block. Let's show the other classes how a hero class gets things done. Over the past couple of weeks, Blizzard added a few interesting new items to the patch 5.4 PTR in the forms of new glyphs and possible trinket drops for the Seige of Orgrimmar raid. Now, in both cases, these are pretty tentative. The trinkets don't have proper names yet, and the glyphs are all marked as NYI (Which stands for not yet implemented). This means they may not make it to live servers, or may not make it in the same form. Still, the information's intriguing enough that it's worth taking a look at it. New beglyphings Glyph of Regenerative Magic is looking like a very strong choice that may make it into a lot of glyph slots. If you misfire your Anti-Magic Shell and it doesn't completely absorb all possible damage, this glyph gives you a second chance by reducing the cool down. I can see this being useful on magic-damage-heavy boss fights and PvP for sure.
Lichborne: Patch 5.4 set bonuses and legendary cloaks
Every week, WoW Insider brings you Lichborne for blood, frost, and unholy death knights. In the post-Cataclysm era, death knights are no longer the new kids on the block. Let's show the other classes how a hero class gets things done. While we haven't seen many major death knight class changes for death knights on the patch 5.4 PTR since the last column, we have seen a lot of information on items that we have yet to cover. With that in mind, today we are going to examine the new tier 16 set bonuses for death knights, along with Wrathion's new legendary rewards. Celestial Blessings Rather than weapons (unless Gorehowl gets made into a legendary, which seems possible), we'll be getting legendary cloaks this patch. The final reward from Wrathion's quest line will include cloaks with some very intriguing procs. Flurry of Xuen is a proc that will let DPS do extra damage as weapon damage over time. While the language suggests its channeled, it looks like it won't prevent you from using other abilities. It does, however, require the enemies to be in front of you, so once you have this, you will need to pay more attention to your positioning -- which you should be doing already, to be fair.
Lichborne: Patch 5.4 patch note analysis for death knights
Every week, WoW Insider brings you Lichborne for blood, frost, and unholy death knights. In the post-Cataclysm era, death knights are no longer the new kids on the block. Let's show the other classes how a hero class gets things done. The patch 5.4 PTR has seen its first round of updates, and with those updates has come a handful of death knight changes. We had most of our earth-shattering changes in patch 5.2, so while there's nothing completely major here, there are some welcome surprises and good quality of life changes, mostly focusing on making it easier for tanks, both in general and blood tanks in specific, to keep threat. Today, we'll take a look at the patch 5.4 patch notes as they stand at this writing. As always, this is the PTR, so class balances may change pretty drastically before the final patch goes live.
Lichborne: Addressing ability bloat in death knight skills
Every week, WoW Insider brings you Lichborne for blood, frost, and unholy death knights. In the post-Cataclysm era, death knights are no longer the new kids on the block. Let's show the other classes how a hero class gets things done. Recently on Twitter, Lead systems designer Greg "Ghostcrawler" Street was asked what issues he'd fix if he could immediately wave a wand and make it better. One of the ones he mentioned was ability bloat. Ability bloat is the term used to describe a class needing to press too many buttons simply to perform the basic tasks expected of them in group PvE and PvP content. Ability bloat is certainly something that's been on my mind as well, so this week we'll consider the possibility of ability bloat in death knights and figure out various ways to address it. Much like how talents were pared down for Mists, I wouldn't be surprised to see abilities pared down in major ways for the next expansion, and we might as well start anticipating it.
Lichborne: Reviewing death knight talents for patch 5.4
Every week, WoW Insider brings you Lichborne for blood, frost, and unholy death knights. In the post-Cataclysm era, death knights are no longer the new kids on the block. Let's show the other classes how a hero class gets things done. Lead Systems Designer Greg "Ghostcrawler" Street has indicated that Blizzard is pretty happy with the new Mists of Pandaria talent design, and I have to agree with him. While it does suck to wait 15 levels between new talent choices while leveling a new alt, otherwise the new talent system allows real flexibility and interesting, meaningful choices, arguably more than we had under the 51 or 31 point talent systems, where almost every tier had a clear best choice for whatever role you were playing. That said, there's always room for improvement, and the devs have mentioned they plan to use patch 5.4 as another opportunity to go over talent trees and bolster talents that see less use or otherwise feel underpowered. With that in mind, this week we'll look at the death knight tree and pick out some candidates for a patch 5.4 redesign.
Lichborne: Final notes on patch 5.3 and a legendary shortcut
Every week, WoW Insider brings you Lichborne for blood, frost, and unholy death knights. In the post-Cataclysm era, death knights are no longer the new kids on the block. Let's show the other classes how a hero class gets things done. By the time you read this, patch 5.3 should be on live servers. We've already written a couple columns on what patch 5.3 will mean for death knights, but as always, things change on the PTR. With that in mind, this week we'll take a final look at patch 5.3 for death knights and what you can expect and do once the servers are back up (if they aren't already). I also have a couple notes on completing Wrathion's legendary quest line for death knights.
Lichborne: Patch 5.3 and the death of festerblight
Every week, WoW Insider brings you Lichborne for blood, frost, and unholy death knights. In the post-Cataclysm era, death knights are no longer the new kids on the block. Let's show the other classes how a hero class gets things done. In a recent update on the patch 5.3 PTR, Blizzard applied an update that applied some unexpected changes to the death knight unholy tree, most of them nerfs. Blizzard Death Knight Unholy Festering Strike now deals 175% weapon damage, down from 200%. Scourge Strike now deals 165% weapons damage, up from 135%. Unholy Might now increases the Death Knight's Strength by 10%, down from 15%. source This has, unsurprisingly, left many death knights at a loss. After patch 5.2 seemed to cure unholy's woes and allow it to at least be a viable and fun alternative to frost, these nerfs came as a surprise. Frost is so far still the more damaging death knight DPS spec in patch 5.2, so the idea that unholy is the one that got nerfs was somewhat discouraging. That said, it might not be as bad as you think. It's worth noting that in the long run, the Scourge Strike buff should cancel out the nerfs to Festering Strike and Unholy Might, at least in theory. This brings to mind one question as to what this shifting of damage toward Scourge Strike is actually meant to accomplish. Essentially, the main purpose here appears to be a nerf to festerblight.
Lichborne: Death knight wish list for a new expansion
Every week, WoW Insider brings you Lichborne for blood, frost, and unholy death knights. In the post-Cataclysm era, death knights are no longer the new kids on the block. Let's show the other classes how a hero class gets things done. With BlizzCon officially announced, the question on everyone's lips is whether or not we'll get a new expansion announcement. Myself, I'm pretty sure it's a done deal, which makes this a perfect time to speculate and daydream about the inevitable changes that will come with patch 6.0. Today, we'll dream a bit about what could be coming for death knights. Swelling the armies It's been more or less traditional that we do get a new ability every time the level caps get raised. Whether this tradition will continue or not is admittedly hard to say. A lot of classes are already suffering from "button bloat," and Blizzard may want to shy away from adding new buttons. In addition, not adding new buttons may give them more leeway to adjust other buttons, as well as ensure classes don't get too powerful or infringe on other class' territory.
Lichborne: Patch 5.3 and other news for death knights
Every week, WoW Insider brings you Lichborne for blood, frost, and unholy death knights. In the post-Cataclysm era, death knights are no longer the new kids on the block. Let's show the other classes how a hero class gets things done. With patch 5.2 having, if not solved, at least soothed most of our balance problems, patch 5.3 seems like a relatively quiet patch for death knights. Our class changes are a handful of relatively small fixes. That said, there's still a good amount of content coming. Today, we'll look at patch 5.3 content and what it offers for the death knight. Note that what we're discussing today is primarily PTR content, and thus may not make it live, or will make it live in a slightly different format.
Lichborne: 3 silly little death knight problems
Every week, WoW Insider brings you Lichborne for blood, frost, and unholy death knights. In the post-Cataclysm era, death knights are no longer the new kids on the block. Let's show the other classes how a hero class gets things done. A few weeks back, I wrote a column singing the praises of the patch 5.2 death knight. I definitely stand by that column. Death knights remain a solid, fun class to play this patch. That said, there's always problems. Some of them probably won't ever be solved by patch changes. Today, we're going to look at some of the sillier death knight problems I've been dealing with lately, and see if there's any chance of relief for them. My weapon won't drop This is a problem I've had for ages. It seems like ever since Wrath, my death knight has had to wait a little longer for the weapon I actually want to wield because either it never drops or because someone else generally wins the roll or pays more DKP than me. I, of course, do my best to do a little bit of every spec every patch because I want to be able to report on DK issues first hand, but my first death knight love and my main spec will always be some form of two-handed DPS.
Lichborne: Survivability for the DPS death knight
Every week, WoW Insider brings you Lichborne for blood, frost, and unholy death knights. In the post-Cataclysm era, death knights are no longer the new kids on the block. Let's show the other classes how a hero class gets things done. Death knights have long been notorious for their insane survivability since they were first introduced. Over the years, a lot of it has been nerfed, but a lot remains. While blood knight survivability feels somewhat obvious, it's a little harder to see what unholy and frost death knights have going for them. Today, we're going to examine how DPS death knights can use their skills to stay alive when the heat is on. Anti-Magic Shell Anti-Magic Shell remains one of the most versatile and underrated tools in our arsenal. By absorbing most of the magical damage from a massive magical attack, it allows us to stay in position longer than other classes, and save ourselves from own mistakes in some cases.
Lichborne: Why patch 5.2 is a great time to be a death knight
Every week, WoW Insider brings you Lichborne for blood, frost, and unholy death knights. In the post-Cataclysm era, death knights are no longer the new kids on the block. Let's show the other classes how a hero class gets things done. With patch 5.2 in full swing, we've had time to take stock of the changes, not just in terms of new content, but in terms of the buffs and nerfs our classes received. I'm just going to come out and say it. As a class, death knights feel about the best they've been since the Wrath era. There's a lot of great stuff to be excited about, so let's go down the list. Unholy is fun again Unholy has, as a spec, been sort of on the outside since Cataclysm. Blizzard's revamp, which put unholy on a different rune spending scheme from the other specs and pulled it even further away from weapon damage and toward special ability damage, created a unique melee spec, but the complications and weaknesses that came with that spec were a bit much for many people, and with frost generally beating it in both DPS and simplicity, the spec gained a reputation for being played only by the most hard headed diehards. Patch 5.2 came along and bought with it a much needed unholy revamp. The addition of Frost Fever to Plague Strike alone has helped make unholy's rotation smoother and more intuitive, as well as made target switching feel at least a little less punishing. AoE is still a little more awkward, but with Icy Touch on Reaping, you can at least get through that first setup and get to the main AoE rotation a lot more smoothly.
Lichborne: More death knight loot from patch 5.2's Throne of Thunder
Every week, WoW Insider brings you Lichborne for blood, frost, and unholy death knights. In the post-Cataclysm era, death knights are no longer the new kids on the block. Let's show the other classes how a hero class gets things done. We continue our loot preview this week by delving into the Forgotten Depths and Halls of Flesh-Shaping in the Throne of Thunder. The same disclaimers apply as did last week. Since this is based on PTR information, drops can change. In addition, this preview focuses on normal gear, so your gearing priorities may change if you get Thunderforged gear or heroic gear. With that in mind, lets dig in and see what the next six bosses of Patch 5.2's Throne of Thunder raid have to offer.
Lichborne: Switching death knight specs for patch 5.2
Every week, WoW Insider brings you Lichborne for blood, frost, and unholy death knights. In the post-Cataclysm era, death knights are no longer the new kids on the block. Let's show the other classes how a hero class gets things done. When a new patch comes, especially one with some major class changes like patch 5.2, it becomes a good time to reflect on your play style and priorities. Does your spec serve those priorities? With a new patch coming, it's a good time to experiment with new stuff. You can do it pretty easily on the PTR, and when the patch goes live, the game's got some fresh new content, so it's as good excuse as any to jump into a new spec and get used to it while killing trolls for all these new quests. You'll also be getting new gear, so changing up gearing priorities becomes easier. Today, we'll take a quick look at all the death knight specs, with some of their pros and cons, so you can make a solid judgment call as to whether to switch and try something new, or stick with the familiar. This isn't meant to a complete guide to playing each spec, just a quick overview so you can decide if the play style and responsibilities of the spec are right for you.
Lichborne: Tier 15 set bonuses and other death knight changes for patch 5.2
Every week, WoW Insider brings you Lichborne for blood, frost, and unholy death knights. In the post-Cataclysm era, death knights are no longer the new kids on the block. Let's show the other classes how a hero class gets things done. In the weeks since the patch 5.2 PTR has been up, death knight changes have held pretty steady. The announced unholy changes have stayed in place, and so far seem to be working out much as expected, making the spec a little easier to handle and overall promising to put unholy in a better place once patch 5.2 comes out. That said, there have been a few other tweaks added, as well as the revealing of the tier 15 raid gear set bonuses. Today, we'll dig into these changes and see how they're stacking up. Tier 15 death knight DPS bonuses Death Knight T15 DPS 2P Bonus Your attacks have a chance to raise the spirit of a fallen Zandalari as your Death Knight minion for 15 sec. Death Knight T15 DPS 4P Bonus Your Soul Reaper ability now deals additional Shadow Damage to targets below 45% instead of below 35%. Additionally, Killing Machine now also increases the critical strike chance of Soul Reaper. I'm going to be honest, I'm a little bit in love with the current 2 piece DPS bonus, if only for the flavor. A few columns back, I mentioned that one of my wildest dream updates for death knights would be a Wild Imps style ghoul summoning, and the 2 piece tier 15 bonus is sort of probably the closest we'll come to that. We'll need more solid parses to see if stacks up damage bonus wise, but in flavor, I'm pretty excited for it. The biggest issue here may be if the summoned pets end up dying prematurely to mobs before they can do their damage.
Lichborne: 2012 predictions for death knights and how they actually shook out
Every week, WoW Insider brings you Lichborne for blood, frost, and unholy death knights. In the post-Cataclysm era, death knights are no longer the new kids on the block. Let's show the other classes how a hero class gets things done. As it was for, to some extent, all classes, 2012 was a busy time for the death knights, as one expansion ended and another began. As the news of Mists of Pandaria began pouring in, I started making some predictions. As the Mists beta progressed, I started mentioning things that I felt, or that the death knight community felt, needed to change or would change. This week, I figured it might be interesting to look back on some of those old articles and see what exactly happened, and how far off the mark I was (or wasn't).
Lichborne: 3 popular death knight requests that won't (or shouldn't) be fulfilled
Every week, WoW Insider brings you Lichborne for blood, frost, and unholy death knights. In the post-Cataclysm era, death knights are no longer the new kids on the block. Let's show the other classes how a hero class gets things done. Death knight complaints and requests can change with patches, dealing with current issues or balance problems, but there are other death knight requests that come up time and time again, and will probably be asked about until the day they finally shut down the servers for good. This week, we're going to look at three requests that probably will be around that long, just because it seems very unlikely Blizzard will ever fulfill them. The power of the hero class The "hero class" moniker has a long and storied history. It comes from Warcraft III, where hero units like paladins and death knights towered over the rest. By design, you only had a few of these every game, and they had more powerful skills that allowed them to dominate the battlefield when deployed. When WoW came around, rumors of the hero classes spread throughout beta, but in the end, Blizzard went away from the model. Paladins, a hero class in WCIII, were made a regular class, for example, while other hero class mechanics, such as the Far Seer's Chain Lightning, went to regular classes.
Lichborne: What I learned about death knights by playing my alts
Every week, WoW Insider brings you Lichborne for blood, frost, and unholy death knights. In the post-Cataclysm era, death knights are no longer the new kids on the block. Let's show the other classes how a hero class gets things done. I love my death knight. He will probably be my main for as long as I play WoW. That said, sometimes you want a change of pace. Sometimes, you've finished all the dailies, ground all the factions to exalted, and run every heroic dungeon and raid on a single character until your eyes are bleeding. Sometimes you want something else. And for that, we have alts. Of course, alts don't mean you've completely abandoned your death knight. Sometimes, alts teach you something about your death knight. In my case, most of my alts were created before the death knight, since he didn't come along until Wrath. That means that a lot of what I learned playing them has informed how I play my death knight from day one. This week, I'm taking a look at my stable of alts and seeing what lessons they've taught or reinforced for me about my death knights. Keep your diseases up I've been playing a warlock alt since the vanilla era, sticking mostly to affliction, although demonology's been proving pretty fun so far in Mists. My priest I don't play quite as much, but I still like taking shadow out for a spin every once in a while.
Lichborne: What do I do at level 90? And 2 other burning death knight questions
Every week, WoW Insider brings you Lichborne for blood, frost, and unholy death knights. In the post-Cataclysm era, death knights are no longer the new kids on the block. Let's show the other classes how a hero class gets things done. Reading a guide is all well and good, but sometimes, even after you read, you still have questions or need clarification. This week, I've taken 3 questions I see death knights ask a lot at various places around the web, and provide some advice and clarification. Why don't tanks need so much hit and expertise? If you've been reading the column, you've probably noticed that I have de-emphasized hit and expertise when discussing blood death knight tank gear and strategy. This is for a very good reason. Certainly, active tanking is the rule of the day in Mists, which means in theory that tanks should want hit and expertise so their abilities land. In theory, if your Death Strike doesn't land, you don't get the healing or the blood shield, right?
Lichborne: Heart of Fear gear for death knights
Every week, WoW Insider brings you Lichborne for blood, frost, and unholy death knights. In the post-Cataclysm era, death knights are no longer the new kids on the block. Let's show the other classes how a hero class gets things done. Heart of Fear, which will open up this week, is the next step up from Mogu'shan Vaults. As a result, the ilevels are a bit higher and the gear just a bit more desirable. We'll be checking out the loot on a boss by boss basis, in order to give you a better idea about which bosses to spend your Elder Charms of Good Fortune on. As with last week, our analysis will be based primarily on normal gear drops. If you are raiding LFR or heroic tiers, your gear choices may vary a bit based on item levels.
