Khaosgurl's Blood DK Guide

Hello! I have decided to write this guide to hopefully it will help Blood DK's that are trying to get the hang of the changes.

Disclaimer: I don't pretend that this is the best way to do anything. This is just the way I have found to be a fairly good tank. I want this to be simple enough so that all players could use it with decent results.

I am assuming you know that to tank as a blood DK you must have the blood specialization and always use blood presence, that out of the way I will get to the meat of the information.

Stat Priority:
Having more trouble staying alive then keeping aggro? Use this
Survivability: Stamina > Mastery > Parry > Dodge > Melee Hit (7.5%) > Expertise (7.5%) > Haste

Having more trouble keeping aggro then staying alive? Use this

Threat: Stamina > Mastery > Melee Hit (7.5%) > Expertise (7.5%) > Parry > Dodge > Haste

Personally I don't have threat problems as a DK so I have always gone with the survive stat priority. If you have threat problems I strongly suggest you go to the threat stat order as I have seen that help a lot of people.

Talents:

Blizzards changes have made talents a lot more fun. Generally speaking there isn't "must have talents" for tanking but there are some that are very nice to have.
For me I prefer the following:

56 talent in "Rolling Boil" as it saves time as you no longer need Pestilence and Blood Boil generates more threat.

60, I encourage "Death Pact" let me assure you that little heal will save you many times if you learn to work it in when heals seems to be having trouble or you accidentally sat in the fire.

90, Gorefiend's Grasp, not only does it look cool but it helps a great deal in gathering up adds.

Major Glyphs preferences:

Dancing Rune Weapon (generates 100% more threat at the loss of 25% damage dealt), Death Grip(increases its range by 5 yards) and Death and Decay(reduces enemies movement speed by 50%)

But truly for glyphing, have fun! There is a lot of freedom with the new system use it to explore new options.

Rotation

Before fight and as often as you can use Bone Shield it is a big help do your best to keep it up at all times. Use "Dark Command or Death Grip" to get aggro or taunt off another player with aggro.

My priority on a boss/mob goes as follows (as I am speced to spread diseases through Blood Boil): Death and Decay, Outbreak, Blood Boil, Rune Strike, and Death Strike (Blizzards beautiful gift of threat to DK's). Hit Death Strike as often as you can. Depending on how hard you are being hit and how much trouble you are having with aggro. If you really don't need it to keep from dying/wiping the group let it go up until the little number on it is at least a 3 or a 4 as that improves its abilities.

If you don't spec in Blood Boil this rotation may work better for you:  Death and Decay, Outbreak, Pestilence, Blood Boil or Heart Stroke, Rune Strike, and Death Strike.

Use "Gorefiend's Grasp" when you need to drag adds to you especially helpful if your Death and Decay is on CD.

Use Heart Strike more if you wish to do more damage. Use Blood Boil to refresh diseases and spread them also better for gathering a lot of adds.

Helpful CD's to ALWAYS have on your bar and use frequently and correctly. They will make the healer beg you to run with them more.

Rune Tap, very frequently. With only a 30 sec CD this should be used quite often on mobs as well as bosses.
Anti-Magic Shell use all the time short CD=use frequently

Vampiric Blood, use anytime you fall below 75% health. As it has a 1 minute CD it should be used frequently on more difficult mobs and bosses.

Icebound Fortitude, As this has a 3 minute CD I encourage you to use the CD sparingly. Pretty much I hit this when I think my group will wipe if I can't get healed up. Anytime you see the healer almost out of mana or you are about to eat a bunch of damage because you (stood in crap/didn't run to the safety bubble in time or whatever else) use it. Use on very challenging mobs and bosses. I would defiantly wait to pull a boss until this is off CD.

Raise Dead and Death Pact, I suggest saving them for the time you hit Icebound Fortitude but as they have a 2 minuted CD they can be used more often.

When it comes to gems and enchants I follow Noxxic as best I can: www.noxxic.com/wow/pve/death-k… I suggest looking at the socket bonus unless it is something like mastery, dodge or parry I honestly wouldn't worry or even try to gem so as to get it.

Reforging:
I do need to use this more...I am a terrible procrastinator when it comes to reforging. ><

Simple rules:

1.  If it doesn't have mastery reforge it on there. Depending on which stat priority you are following reforge off the lowest on the list and put mastery on there instead.

2. If you are following the threat stats next on everything reforge on hit and expertise until 7.5.

Helpful addons:
In all fairness I avoid addons like the plague (hahaha bad death knight joke I know...) but I do suggest having Deadly Boss Mod and also Flare Up if you find the need to mark spots for others frequently. But in honesty they aren't a must there are many tanking addons such as threat meters or auto tautning once if you lose aggro if you feel you need them do more research and find the once you like I prefer a simplistic approach to tanking.

If you would like to see how I have applied most of this to my character check her out on the armory here: us.battle.net/wow/en/character…;
Any other questions comment/note me. (Notes will usually be answered faster.)

I hope you have enjoyed this guide and find it useful. I hope to add a Frost DK one very soon.

Aka'Magosh my friends,

-Khaosgurl

Arthas Darion Mograine is the hottest NPC ever accept it and your life will be better.