wow Death Knight Changes and Explanations in War Within Alpha: May 29th

[Staff 1,488]

Blood is in focus with this week's Alpha build, as the talent tree gets plenty of changes and some talents become baseline abilities. There's also reductions to high investment nodes so you won't need to put quite so many points in, as well as plenty of tuning changes for all three specs and Hero trees.

DK (Source)

Greetings, Death Knights.

In today’s new Alpha build, we have updates to the Blood talent tree and new talents for the not-yet-implemented talents for both Frost and Unholy.

Our focus for Blood updates were heavily focused on the tree layout, updating existing talents to have more synergy with Blood’s kit, reducing the amount of 2-point talents, and moving a couple talents baseline (like Crimson Scourge and Death’s Carress). One major pain point we’ve heard expressed with Blood is how much friction there is to pick up Gorefiend’s Grasp in content where you may need it. In response to that we’ve updated the tree to have Gorefiend’s in a much more accessible location. While we generally like the accessibility it has in the new tree, we’ve been testing it internally and have realized that its new location has made it a bit difficult to avoid in scenarios where you might need the AoE grip. We will update the pathing again to make it still accessible but a bit more optional.

The other big point of contention for Blood is just how many talents you had to “buy in” to have a functioning baseline as a tank. We hope the combination of the reduced 2-point nodes, new pathing, and baseline abilities that there will now be more variety in your builds and flexibility when tackling different content.

We look forward to hearing your feedback. We will have some further updates to the pathing, especially as it pertains to Gorefiends as well as two new talents that are not yet implemented.

And here are the exact tuning changes from the development notes:

Tuning (Source)

• Deathbringer
  • Wave of Souls damage increased by 50%.
  • Exterminate second scythe damage increased by 50%.
• Rider of the Apocalypse
  • Mograine’s Heart Strike damage increased by 250%.
  • Trollbane’s Obliterate damage increased by 33%.
  • Trollbane’s Obliterate cast frequency increased by 100%.
  • Nazgrim’s Scourge Strike damage increased by 100%.
  • Nazgrim’s Scourge Strike cast frequency increased by 100%.
  • Whitemane’s Death Coil damage increased by 100%.
• San’layn
  • Incite Terror has been updated – Vampiric Strike, Heart Strike and Scourge Strike cause your targets to take 1% increased Shadow damage, up to 5% for 15 seconds. Vampiric Strike benefits 300% more from this effect.
• Blood
  • Many talents have moved locations or have had their pathing updated.
  • New Talent: Bone Collector – When you would pull an enemy, generate 1 charge of Bone Shield.
  • New Talent: Ossified Vitriol – When you lose a Bone Shield charge the damage of your next Marrowrend is increased by 15%, stacking up to 75%.
  • Tightening Grasp now Silences enemies for 3 seconds when they are pulled and no longer increases the damage enemies take from you when they are pulled by Gorefriends Grasp.
  • Blooddrinker now reduces the damage the enemy deals to you by 20% while channeling and for an additional 5 seconds after a channeling it fully. Now also generates 20 additional Runic Power over its duration.
  • Consumption now also causes your Blood Plague damage to occur 50% more quickly for 8 seconds and generates 2 Runes.
  • Bonestorm no longer costs Runic Power. Costs up to 10 Bone Shield Charges and lasts 1 second for each charge consumed. Generates 1 Bone Shield charge every 1 second while active.
  • Reinforced Bones now also lets Bone Shield stack 2 additional times.
  • Heartbreaker’s Runic Power per target hit increased to 2 (was 1). Now a 1 point talent (was 2).
  • Perseverance of the Ebonblade’s Versatility bonus increased to 6%, up from 4%. Now a 1 point talent (was 2).
  • Shattering Bone now a 1 point talent (was 2).
  • Red Thirst reduces the cooldown on Vampiric Blood by 2 seconds (was 1 second). Now a 1 point talent (was 2).
  • Crimson Scourge now learned at level 21.
  • Death’s Caress now learned at level 23.
• Frost
  • New Talent: Hyperpyrexia – Your Runic Power spending abilities have a chance to additionally deal 30% of the damage dealt over 4 seconds.
• Unholy
  • New Talent: Festering Scythe – Every 20 Festering Wound you burst empowers Festering Strike to become Festering Scythe for 12 seconds. Festering Scythe: Sweep through all enemies within 14 yards in front of you, dealing Shadow damage and infecting them with 2-3 Festering Wounds.
  • New Talent: Decomposition – Virulent Plague has a chance to abruptly flare up, dealing 50/100% of the damage it dealt to the target over the last 4 seconds. When this effect triggers, the duration of your active minions are increased by 1 second, up to 3 seconds. 2-point talent.
  • Infected Claws moved to the node after Ghoulish Frenzy.