DK Tank BIS gear uses

Hello forum posters, quick question.

I've been gearing my DK tank and been having a blast so far. Like a good tank, I've been collecting different armor set; EHP, expertise, and avoidance - as pointed out in almost all tank guides, there is no single BIS gear list for tanks and I want to be as prepared as possible. However, despite looking in the forums and old elitest jerk archives, I'm having trouble finding a good list of where to use these tank sets! Some sets are more obvious i.e. expertise gear on sindy, but I was wondering if anyone could help me out with which bosses require which gear, and why. Any help would be much appreciated, thanks!

(The BIS gear lists I've been using as a guide here https://web.archive.org/web/20101107...dgame_tanking/ )

When they say "There is no single BiS gear list for tanks" what they really mean is "There is no single EH BiS list for tanks" as there are some variations that allow you to restructure your gear but it's always EH. The reason you're having trouble finding where to use your avoidance set is because the right answer is nowhere. All you need is an EH set with an expertise variation for dragons. That's really about it, everything else is mostly just occasionally switching trinkets on some fights like using Unidentifiable Organ while tanking the two princes or full armor as Blood Queen MT.

After reading discussion done at a paladin tanking thread ( http://forum.warmane.com/showthread.php?t=389474&page=2 ) , and reading this post,
im wondering a bit more which combinations of gears would be the most beneficial for DK Tank,to use on bosses inside icc &halion ( like armor on massive melle fights, or adding some resistance rings from onyxia raid for heavy magical fight ( like tanking Kele), or which gear combination to use lets say at PP(for last phase as dk off tank,maybe add some onyxia ring for that?).
And the second question would be Where to use Avoidance set outside icc and Halion (DamnOriginal pretty much answered this one above but i would like to know some more details for raids/bosses outside icc like ulduar,naxx, maybe mini-bosses of Ruby Sanctum ect).
And a third distant question that comes in mind after the two first one is ,lets say ; specific items like Last word and their use on Dk tank(dual wield ofc) ,like mentioned on this paladin thread ( http://forum.warmane.com/showthread....50#post2949150 ).
I did read DamnOriginal discussion for Band of the Twin Valkyr here as well ( http://forum.warmane.com/showthread.php?t=389474) ,where i was pleased to understand its real benefits,and now again i wonder for other similar items like that if there is any trick to use from boss- to- boss.

Like I said, you only really need two EHP sets. One with pure EHP and one with expertise.

Pure EHP:

Head: Sanctified Scourgelord Faceguard
Neck: Bile-Encrusted Medallion
Shoulders: Sanctified Scourgelord Pauldrons
Back: Sentinel's Winter Cloak
Chest: Sanctified Scourgelord Chestguard
Wrists: Gargoyle Spit Bracers
Weapon: Cryptmaker
Sigil: Whatever
Hands: Sanctified Scourgelord Handguards
Waist: Verdigris Chain Belt
Legs: Pillars of Might
Boots: Treads of Impending Resurrection
Ring 1: Devium's Eternally Cold Ring
Ring 2: Loop of the Twin Val'kyr/Signified Ring of Binding
Trinket 1:Sindragosa's Flawless Fang
Trinket 2:Corroded Skeleton Key/Juggernaut's Vitality

For expertise cap you add: http://wotlk.cavernoftime.com/item=50718, http://wotlk.cavernoftime.com/item=50968, http://wotlk.cavernoftime.com/item=51308, http://wotlk.cavernoftime.com/item=50625]Grinning, http://wotlk.cavernoftime.com/item=50404 and http://wotlk.cavernoftime.com/item=50730

You can fiddle with gems, food buffs and racials but the general idea is you're swapping between an all purpose EHP set and an expertise variation for Sindragosa/Halion while maintaining your hit cap. Second thing you'll be swapping are trinkets and there's not many bosses where you'd prefer something other than double stamina. http://wotlk.cavernoftime.com/item=50344 is a pretty good switch on Saurfang, Dreamwalker, princes, Blood Queen MT or LK OT. http://wotlk.cavernoftime.com/item=54591is is also an acceptable swap on Blood Queen as MT.

As for when to swap from http://wotlk.cavernoftime.com/item=47955 to http://wotlk.cavernoftime.com/item=49489, it's all a matter of how much spell damage there is in the fight. On fights like Marrowgar, Saurfang, Gunship, Festergut, Rotface, where the magic damage is either insignificant or easily avoidable, you're better off with http://wotlk.cavernoftime.com/item=47955. But if it's a good mix of physical and magical damage like Lady, Professor, Dreamwalker, Princes, Blood Queen, Sindragosa, LK, you'll want to use http://wotlk.cavernoftime.com/item=49489 for the extra resist.

I wouldn't really consider http://wotlk.cavernoftime.com/item=50708 on a DK when they have access to http://wotlk.cavernoftime.com/item=50603, a big, fat hit stick that allows them to get more out of their EHP set. Maybe on a paladin but even then its benefits are highly conditional and not very clear.

Outside ICC it's pretty much more of the same. The only time you'll want to wear avoidance offpieces with extra stamina instead of armor is when you're fighting pure spell damage bosses where armor is useless and those don't really exist outside of Keleseth. Only thing that comes to mind are 2 of the spell spamming horsemen in Naxx and those aren't gonna be tanked by the tanks anyway.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by DamnOriginal

Maybe on a paladin but even then its benefits are highly conditional and not very clear.

---

It's not highly conditional at all? LW is the go-to choice unless you've some particular need of extra hit/expertise via BVB/mithrios.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Rifokelt

It's not highly conditional at all? LW is the go-to choice unless you've some particular need of extra hit/expertise via BVB/mithrios.

---

Its effect is by its very nature conditional because in order to be compared to EHP, multiple conditions have to be met first, like the tank suddenly not getting sufficient healing for whatever reason but getting just enough passive healing bonus from the proc to survive the next hit in a very specific time frame. You can see this in DarkenedHue's thread. In order for you not to get sufficient healing, it means your healers screwed up and in heroic raiding, you're going to die when that happens, Last Word or not. You shouldn't gear around those situations because the only thing that will realistically save you is a well placed cooldown, being a paladin or lucky avoidance RNG.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by DamnOriginal

Its effect is by its very nature conditional because in order to be compared to EHP, multiple conditions have to be met first, like the tank suddenly not getting sufficient healing for whatever reason but getting just enough passive healing bonus from the proc to survive the next hit in a very specific time frame. You can see this in DarkenedHue's thread. In order for you not to get sufficient healing, it means your healers screwed up and in heroic raiding, you're going to die when that happens, Last Word or not. You shouldn't gear around those situations because the only thing that will realistically save you is a well placed cooldown, being a paladin or lucky avoidance RNG.

---

The conditional estimate DarkenedHue came up with is a very small one. If we take it for granted, in practice it always is, then LW is theoretically a net gain over mithrios when it comes to survivability.

Avoidance has its uses when you take a lot of small hits or cant use armor (minibos in rs) and in content that you highly overgear as well. (if you are geared for LoD, you can tank icc10n/toc25n and anything lower in avoidance focused gear to take less dmg/help undergeared healer - if you can survive 4-5 hits in a row I would say its better. Good dks are not that spiky and stressfull to heal, since death strike.) If you overgear content a lot you can use dps pieces to improve dmg as well - depends what your group needs.

For kele its best to go frost talent acclimation. Secod best might be a few pieces of tbc shadow resist gear -you loose a lot of stamina, but gain guaranteed damage reduction. (I am saying might, because I dont remember the math anymore - I tryed it a few times and it worked, but I had insanely good healer so it didnt matter.)

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by jendah

For kele its best to go frost talent acclimation. Secod best might be a few pieces of tbc shadow resist gear -you loose a lot of stamina, but gain guaranteed damage reduction. (I am saying might, because I dont remember the math anymore - I tryed it a few times and it worked, but I had insanely good healer so it didnt matter.)

---

Empowered Shadow Lance is not resistable so going frost doesn't ammount to much. Unholy-Blood hybrid would be the go-to if a dk wants to reduce keleseth's damage the most passively.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Rifokelt

The conditional estimate DarkenedHue came up with is a very small one. If we take it for granted, in practice it always is, then LW is theoretically a net gain over mithrios when it comes to survivability.

---

It can theoretically provide more survivability under certain conditions, that's true but it can also provide less. I would never take insufficient healing for granted. When that happens in heroic raiding things are going to go bad for the tanks very fast without active intervention in the way of cooldowns or just plain being lucky with avoidance. The chances of a tank with Last Word to actually avoid death due to the proc don't strike me much higher than relying on the extra avoidance you'd get from Mithrios, in both cases if the stars align just right, you'll live so why not just pick the weapon that also has extra stamina on it?

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by jendah

Avoidance has its uses when you take a lot of small hits or cant use armor (minibos in rs) and in content that you highly overgear as well. (if you are geared for LoD, you can tank icc10n/toc25n and anything lower in avoidance focused gear to take less dmg/help undergeared healer - if you can survive 4-5 hits in a row I would say its better. Good dks are not that spiky and stressfull to heal, since death strike.) If you overgear content a lot you can use dps pieces to improve dmg as well - depends what your group needs.

---

This always struck me as an odd argument. If the damage is so low you can take 5 hits, it really doesn't matter what you're wearing. Some extra avoidance will theoretically make you take less overall damage over the course of the fight but that damage will still come at unexpected times and in proportionally bigger hits than if you were wearing armor. What if wearing armor in this case turns 5 hits into 6? Is that extra 5-10% avoidance going to do more to reduce overall damage? Maybe, maybe not. DKs don't have block so they can't really turn their avoidance into damage reduction outside ICC and they can't reach any kind of consistency with hard avoidance even if they heavily sacrifice their EH to do it, which would defeat the whole point of trying to become easier to heal anyway. From the perspective of an undergeared healer, I don't think a few extra percent of avoidance are anywhere near as noticeable as a constant decrease to the damage of each hit.

I don't consider DKs more spiky than paladins or warriors either but that's not because of Death Strike since it really doesn't do anything for spikiness. The DK chassis is just really good. Second highest health with top damage reduction, there's really nothing to complain about. The only downsides that may contribute to this feeling of spikiness is lack of block mechanics and AP reduction debuff, the latter of which is usually not provided in uncoordinated groups. What Death Strike does is what Last Word wishes it could do i.e giving you a consistent way of surviving a hit that would otherwise kill you.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Rifokelt

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by jendah

For kele its best to go frost talent acclimation. Secod best might be a few pieces of tbc shadow resist gear -you loose a lot of stamina, but gain guaranteed damage reduction. (I am saying might, because I dont remember the math anymore - I tryed it a few times and it worked, but I had insanely good healer so it didnt matter.)

---

Empowered Shadow Lance is not resistable so going frost doesn't ammount to much. Unholy-Blood hybrid would be the go-to if a dk wants to reduce keleseth's damage the most passively.

---

It wouldn't make much sense even if you could resist it considering the only threat there are the empowered casts and you use cooldowns for those. What cooldown does Frost get? Unbreakable Armor.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by DamnOriginal

It can theoretically provide more survivability under certain conditions, that's true but it can also provide less. I would never take insufficient healing for granted. When that happens in heroic raiding things are going to go bad for the tanks very fast without active intervention in the way of cooldowns or just plain being lucky with avoidance. The chances of a tank with Last Word to actually avoid death due to the proc don't strike me much higher than relying on the extra avoidance you'd get from Mithrios, in both cases if the stars align just right, you'll live so why not just pick the weapon that also has extra stamina on it?

---

I'm not taking insufficient healing for granted. I'm taking the bare minimum of healing needed for LW to be a net gain and in practice that is almost always there. The extra healing you receive, whether 1 hit away from death or otherwise, will have value so long as it's not overhealing (sometimes even as overhealing if an Anyr user is present or Divine Aegis from a disc comes into play) as it will increase your current EH. It is very similar to how when one stacks armor and stamina any passive healing can get one above the treshold of a lethal pricisely because of that extra damage reduction. There's no requirement for you to have insufficient healing just as there's no requirement for Ardent/Wotn to be considered passive HP modifiers. I'm not sure I managed to describe this in an understandable manner. It is also sort of similar to how Blood Draining can be considered pseudo-ehp.

Thanks DamnOriginal,Rifokelt,Jendah for answers ,things got more clarified after reading these posts.
Last question regarding this thread , is about parry-haste thingy.Its supposed to be active for all dragons (ex,Halion,Sindragosa,ect) and Lady right?

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Edvinrama1

Thanks DamnOriginal,Rifokelt,Jendah for answers ,things got more clarified after reading these posts.
Last question regarding this thread , is about parry-haste thingy.Its supposed to be active for all dragons (ex,Halion,Sindragosa,ect) and Lady right?

---

Keep in mind that we were going kind of off track with LW since we were talking abouts its use on paladins. As for parry-haste yeah, that's pmuch it.

Hit is capped with T10 Gloves (69), Ashen Ring (55), BPC Cloak (44) and Helm or Legs from 25m hc ICC (85) with the use of 1 Vivid gem (10hit15stamina).
As for Expertise, you can chose to cap it with Glorenzelg and Couple of 10exp15stam gems (or Expertise Food), or T10 Legs with which u could use Bryntroll where even 20-26 expertise would probably be more than enough.
As for other items its prety much simple:
Armor Neck (Rotface), Ring (VDW), Wrist (DBS), Belt (EoF), T10 4/5, and 2x Stamina Trinkets (Sindra and ToC champion event).

From my pov this is the best optimal build for all bosses and a nice build to tank LK 25m hc aswell.
It should provide u with most aggro, self healing and avoidance in combination with high HP and Armor value.

When it comes to Gloren vs Bryntroll, its all up to you and your race tbh.
I would def go for Gloren as Human for example, and Bryntroll as Orc duo to extra expertise via Sword/Axe specialisation racial.
If u decide to go Dwarf, i guess double Mylthrios with T10 Helm and Marrow Legs is the best choice there.

As for other races the choice is urs, where i would go for EoF Sentinel Cloak as a Draenei duo to extra 1%hit from Racial and get like 239 hit from gear.

@Rifokelt - yea i got that part.
and thanks to Gnimo as well for explanation.