WotLK <icecrown> DK gems

[kingmilan]

Hello warmane community!
I was gearing a frost DK DPS (pve) and it's around 5kgs now and almost ready for ICC. I read a guide which instructed to gem Fractured Cardinal Ruby (armor penetration) instead of Bold one (strength), and I saw every single frost DK with str gem.
I'm a little confused and looking forward for a little guidance
Thanks.

[trm90]

For now strength is the way to go, Arp gets better later when you get more Arp to further buff your obliterate(top damaging skill when you get geared) and melee.

Arp buffs your Melee,Obliterate,Blood strike and necrosis(through melee)
Str buffs all your abilities through AP and synergizes well with unbreakable armor

Obliterate now is your 3rd damaging skill most likely, melee->FS->Obliterate or even FS->melee->Obliterate
So when you're low on Arp and can't even reach the cap it's a big loss in Str which is not worth it because arp performs better as you have more. good explanation here: http://www.donorbashed.com/2013/01/a...ing-explained/

So go for Str untill you get at least 800 passive armor (most say 600 but IMO at that point you won't notice a significant increase)

and as for your confusion as on why most dks run full str even at bis it's mostly due to ignorance, FS used to double dip pre Icecrown making it very attractive and competitive vs arp but even then it was questionable, but now with Icecorwn it's no longer a question. Arp>Str @ bis.

So go for str for now and more importantly make sure you're hit(5% 163.87)/exp(22 is fine due to exp bugged atm) capped

[taralej]

And about the "every single DK" business - most DKs, just like most players in general, are just bad. Str is a brainless gearing strategy, for which you do not balance any sort of stats, you just dump everything into strength. ArP requires some playing around with gear & gemming and thus - thinking. Thinking =/= fun.

[mEOnGG]

For now strength is the way to go, Arp gets better later when you get more Arp to further buff your obliterate(top damaging skill when you get geared) and melee.

Arp buffs your Melee,Obliterate,Blood strike and necrosis(through melee)
Str buffs all your abilities through AP and synergizes well with unbreakable armor

Obliterate now is your 3rd damaging skill most likely, melee->FS->Obliterate or even FS->melee->Obliterate
So when you're low on Arp and can't even reach the cap it's a big loss in Str which is not worth it because arp performs better as you have more. good explanation here: http://www.donorbashed.com/2013/01/a...ing-explained/

So go for Str untill you get at least 800 passive armor (most say 600 but IMO at that point you won't notice a significant increase)

and as for your confusion as on why most dks run full str even at bis it's mostly due to ignorance, FS used to double dip pre Icecrown making it very attractive and competitive vs arp but even then it was questionable, but now with Icecorwn it's no longer a question. Arp>Str @ bis.

So go for str for now and more importantly make sure you're hit(5% 163.87)/exp(22 is fine due to exp bugged atm) capped

The only thing in this I disagree with is the point at which ArP is supposed to outperform strength. While the given value, 800 is almost true for hunters, it does not hold true for DKs, just because DK != hunter. For a frost DK, I believe the point comes when you have almost 1000 to even more amount of passive ArP from gear, whereas for blood it is almost around 500 ArP where gemming ArP becomes better than gemming Strength. I know some DKs who even in full BiS gear as frost tend to run with full strength gems and perform well but personally I prefer to switch to ArP at the value that I mentioned, around 1000 passively from gear, which is usually only possible if you manage to acquire both DBW and STS.

[verminslayer]

gemming str if you arent arp capped is a dps loss on this core, on the old core the double dipping made going full str without arp viable even though it performed weaker.

[Beanlord]

If you can reach your minimum hit cap (5% from gear+gems +3% from talents) as well as your expertise cap (idk whether it's finally fixed at 26 or not) while hitting the 1,400 arp mark, then go for arp. If you can't then go for strenght.

[kingmilan]

The only thing in this I disagree with is the point at which ArP is supposed to outperform strength. While the given value, 800 is almost true for hunters, it does not hold true for DKs, just because DK != hunter. For a frost DK, I believe the point comes when you have almost 1000 to even more amount of passive ArP from gear, whereas for blood it is almost around 500 ArP where gemming ArP becomes better than gemming Strength. I know some DKs who even in full BiS gear as frost tend to run with full strength gems and perform well but personally I prefer to switch to ArP at the value that I mentioned, around 1000 passively from gear, which is usually only possible if you manage to acquire both DBW and STS.

I have STS and dbw (normal) and DWing two axes cuz I'm orc and now fixed up on expertise.
BTW ty guys for ur time to help me I guess I'm gonna go with and get ARP gems