World of Warcraft®

Every website I've been to seems to say something different and my DK is about to hit 85 so I guess I better ask here before he does.

I plan to try out tanking on my DK, I thought Stoneskin Gargoyle would be the obvious runeforge to use. However a lot of websites seem to suggest using Swordshattering instead.

Considering I'll only just be 85 which should I be using? Is it gear dependant or is it absolute?

It's pretty much Swordshattering > Stoneskin due to the whole 4% Parry (That ignores any Diminishing returns from Parry Rating) is better than 4% Armour (Blood Shield negates a lot of Physical Damage) and 2% Stamina (Avoidance is usually better than Health due to the fact that when an attack is avoided it won't need to be healed, whereas when an attack is absorbed with more health, the healers still need to spend mana to heal it back up)

I remember a while back there where people arguing for and against both runeforges (Certain encounters dealt large amounts of unavoidable damage which people needed extra health for, at the moment there are no such encounters that I can think of (Maybe Ultraxion HC?) since you will get enough health from gear anyways)

Basically Armour is not very noticable, and 4% Parry (Note: This is not a 4% Parry Rating increase, this is your parry % going up by 4, which would equate to a large amount of Parry Rating, especially since it ignores the Diminishing Returns)

I'm not sure if there are people still stacking health over avoidance (Again people used to do that, in order to get bigger base healing from Death Strike) but I've always been a Avoidance > Health guy (Since I find it a lot easier, also it's nice being told by healers that I'm easy to heal)

While progressing through Dragon Soul HC you will find stamina stacking more useful,but on low level content you can go with what you want.Swordshattering is good on normal mode+lfr but if you are stacking stamina go for stoneskin gargoyle.

Use SSG. Easy. SS is useless now as it imbalances your Parry and Dodge far too much, it was much better last tier when DKs were very low on armour compared to other tanks. The maths used to show SS ahead, but since 4.3 and the armour buff maths points to SSG, with SSG you will have more armour than a shield tank.

Having used both on all heroic fights I feel more comfortable with SSG because its a lot more consistent, you're not hoping for the RNG of a parry/dodge. It's constant damage mitigation.

30/04/2012 18:16Posted by Itenyá

SS is useless now as it imbalances your Parry and Dodge far too much

The imbalance of Parry/Dodge is only for Diminishing Returns on Parry/Dodge Rating (The more you have of one the less it gives, meaning equal ratings will give more than if one was way ahead)

Fortunatly Swordshattering ignores that and just flat out gives you 4% parry chance, by ignoring Diminishing returns (It is not affected by, nor does it affect diminishing returns)

Yes, but it's to an extent where the amount of parry you have isn't necessary. Stamina far outweighs avoidance on every fight.

stamina far outweighs avoidance not just by maths, but by the shear amount of bosses that use magic damage as primary forms of damage.

Once you go above 4000 mastery your stamina becomes one of the avoidance boosters trough higher absorbs as well self heals. And then bosses like faceless ones that hit like noodles, but you get to solo tank things. Stamina will outweigh both extra mastery as well the parry.

Now on fights like hagara parry is better, but since you may have high mastery, then stamina in turn will provide higher absorb shields for assault and again, stamina brings its value.

Anyway to sum it up : more mastery you have, better becomes stamina. And thereby no one can tell you which forge is better since no one is inspecting you or takes look of content or your raid team. YOU decide which is better for your gear.

Once you go above 4000 mastery your stamina becomes one of the avoidance boosters trough higher absorbs as well self heals. And then bosses like faceless ones that hit like noodles, but you get to solo tank things. Stamina will outweigh both extra mastery as well the parry.

Now on fights like hagara parry is better, but since you may have high mastery, then stamina in turn will provide higher absorb shields for assault and again, stamina brings its value.

Anyway to sum it up : more mastery you have, better becomes stamina. And thereby no one can tell you which forge is better since no one is inspecting you or takes look of content or your raid team. YOU decide which is better for your gear.

dude really get your fact correct before you write something.

hagara you can not avoid focus assualt you can only lower dmg by cd's

you just started soloing stuff m8 ? only 2 fights you needed 2 tanks for where ultraxion and ship (normal) and morchok, ultraxion, ship and spine ^^. specially as dk you can solo tank so much.

the amount of mastery doesn;t matter. mastery always out weight stamina on calculations.
1 mastery = 1.1 stamina.
yes ppl go for full stamina end game but why? cause of a higher hp pull you can have a higher vengeance witch increase your dmg.

back to the topic.

i would say on start of gearing up you should use sword shattering. cause 4% avoidance is helping alot on the dmg taken you take whit the gear you have.

stay whit sword shattering if you go stack full mastery. as soon as you go for full stamina ( full ds normale gear atleast) you take Stoneskin Gargoyle.

I thought for a while how to respond to this aggressive post. I just then decided to use a quote instead :

“The true secret of giving advice is, after you have honestly given it, to be perfectly indifferent whether it is taken or not, and never persist in trying to set people right.”
-Hannah Whitall Smith