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In the Wrath of the Lich King, Blizzard introduces Death Knights as the new hybrid tanking class and offers some unique abilities in PvE and PvP to throw into the class mix.
While Blizzard has clearly stated that Death Knights won't replace Warriors as end-game main tanks, they are certainly viable as a tank, and more efficient at dealing with caster bosses then any of the other tanks with abilities like Anti-Magic Zone and Anti-Magic Shell.
Blizzard made a lot of changes with racial, and while many people say that you should only pick a race based on "looks", racial abilities should be another factor to look at if you are serious about end game play.
We will talk about them from those two aspects like Horde, Alliance. The details are as follows.
Horde: Mana tap and global cool down has been removed from Arcane Torrent spell making it much more viable. A great PVP talent is to allow Death Knights an extra silence in their attack sequence with Strangulate and Mind Freeze and also gives them 15 runic power which can be inserted at crucial points to complete certain combos, almost like how Rogues use energy.
Magic Resistance will make Blood Elfs the best magic tanks in the game for min/maxers. This ability already plays up to the Death Knights advantage in mitigating magic damage and the guilds that will want to use a Death Knight to take on really tough end game magic bosses will definitely want a magic tank who has a +2% chance to mitigate even more magic damage.
Hardiness will let you handle Rogues and Paladins much easier, stacking this with On a Pale Horse (20% talented) and meta. However Death Knights already have a stun immunity Icebound Fortitude that they can cast if in combat with a heavy stun user, but it doesn't break stun so it must be used offensively and it's on a 1 minute cool-down.
Command increases the damage that your summoned Ghoul's do from Army of the Dead, while 5% is not game breaking you do summon about 9 ghouls so buffing all their damage starts to add up.
Axe Specialization (passive) Expertise with Axes and Two-Handed Axes increased by 5. Solidifying orcs as the best melee DPS DK you can pick and disappointed that this ability wasn't buffed since you see a lot of items now having expertise on it.
Alliance: Gift of the Naaru (active) Heals the target 50 + 15/Level over 15 seconds - 40 yards range - 1.5 seconds cast - 3 minutes cool-down. The amount healed is increased based on the caster's Spell Power or Attack Power. This ability does not lose casting time from taking damage.
With the casting time on this, we doubt you would use it in place of another spell a DK could use to steal life and deal damage at the same time. Good for extra survivability when you are rooted or out of LOS, but not that great.
Heroic Presence (passive) Increases chance to hit with all spells and attacks by 1% for you and all party members within 30 yards.
+hit is always welcome for PvE encounters and will help you reach the cap so you can gem for other things. A good PvE DPS racial.
Shadow Resistance (passive) Reduces the chance you will be hit by Shadow spells by 2%.
Same as Undead talent - "Since most of DK's abilities are shadow based and they even get talents that add shadow damage to their attacks, this will make undead/Draenei the best class to fight.
While Blizzard has clearly stated that Death Knights won't replace Warriors as end-game main tanks, they are certainly viable as a tank, and more efficient at dealing with caster bosses then any of the other tanks with abilities like Anti-Magic Zone and Anti-Magic Shell.
Blizzard made a lot of changes with racial, and while many people say that you should only pick a race based on "looks", racial abilities should be another factor to look at if you are serious about end game play.
We will talk about them from those two aspects like Horde, Alliance. The details are as follows.
Horde: Mana tap and global cool down has been removed from Arcane Torrent spell making it much more viable. A great PVP talent is to allow Death Knights an extra silence in their attack sequence with Strangulate and Mind Freeze and also gives them 15 runic power which can be inserted at crucial points to complete certain combos, almost like how Rogues use energy.
Magic Resistance will make Blood Elfs the best magic tanks in the game for min/maxers. This ability already plays up to the Death Knights advantage in mitigating magic damage and the guilds that will want to use a Death Knight to take on really tough end game magic bosses will definitely want a magic tank who has a +2% chance to mitigate even more magic damage.
Hardiness will let you handle Rogues and Paladins much easier, stacking this with On a Pale Horse (20% talented) and meta. However Death Knights already have a stun immunity Icebound Fortitude that they can cast if in combat with a heavy stun user, but it doesn't break stun so it must be used offensively and it's on a 1 minute cool-down.
Command increases the damage that your summoned Ghoul's do from Army of the Dead, while 5% is not game breaking you do summon about 9 ghouls so buffing all their damage starts to add up.
Axe Specialization (passive) Expertise with Axes and Two-Handed Axes increased by 5. Solidifying orcs as the best melee DPS DK you can pick and disappointed that this ability wasn't buffed since you see a lot of items now having expertise on it.
Alliance: Gift of the Naaru (active) Heals the target 50 + 15/Level over 15 seconds - 40 yards range - 1.5 seconds cast - 3 minutes cool-down. The amount healed is increased based on the caster's Spell Power or Attack Power. This ability does not lose casting time from taking damage.
With the casting time on this, we doubt you would use it in place of another spell a DK could use to steal life and deal damage at the same time. Good for extra survivability when you are rooted or out of LOS, but not that great.
Heroic Presence (passive) Increases chance to hit with all spells and attacks by 1% for you and all party members within 30 yards.
+hit is always welcome for PvE encounters and will help you reach the cap so you can gem for other things. A good PvE DPS racial.
Shadow Resistance (passive) Reduces the chance you will be hit by Shadow spells by 2%.
Same as Undead talent - "Since most of DK's abilities are shadow based and they even get talents that add shadow damage to their attacks, this will make undead/Draenei the best class to fight.
