World of Warcraft®

Posted in the DK forums, but got no reply - putting out to the masses...... :)

I am a pretty average DK - i try, but i am just average....i dont try to be anything better than that. I left wow for a while and have come back wanting to solo all the content a missed. I used to Raid Kara, Gruul and Mag, but then quit shortly after.

Essentially my question revolves around the difficulty i am having with soloing....specifically VoA - i have seen some videos on Youtube of other DKs powering through VoA and have read that others have it on farm.....well i tried 3 times as blood spec and got absolutely mullered inside 30 seconds - i just dont know what i am doing wrong - or where i can improve.

I have been told that i should be able to solo it with blue level 85 pvp gear, but i am starting to doubt that. As you can see from my armory i have a half decent 2 hander but thats the only half decent piece i have.

Unfortunately even though i am a 525 enchanter, it cost me so much money to get there i cant afford the heavenly shards to get the decent enchants and so i dont have any at the mo - that probably doesnt help much... :)

Do i need to change all my resilience stats to Mastery or Haste - would that be enough?

Is there a rotation that needs to be followed - i essentially spam Death Strike when its available and replen both the diseases, Heart strike if DS is not available and then every now and then i throw in a Rune Strike to get rid of some Runic Power but keep it above 40RP as i have some glyph or talent or something that gives me more health/damage the more RP i have......as you can tell i dont know my class very well :)

ANY help whatsoever would be top banana - even if its just "get your enchants sorted out and change your res to mastery".

If its something else like - "Your gear is totally S*** and you shouldnt be able to solo it with that" then thats good too - i wont even try again.

thanks all. "

No, you can not solo VoA in half blue, half PvP gear.

Gear up first towards a full set of PVE tanking/dps gear and get used to your class and rotations and abilities.

Then you have a chance to solo VoA.

well pvp gear is not useful for pve content. Resilience does nothing for you in pve.

You also do not mention at all your defensive cooldowns. Bone shield, AMS, lichborne+deathcoil self heals, sacrificing your ghould, blood tap, rune tap, dancing rune weapon. All of this needs to be used. Army of the dead should not be ignored either. Diseases are pretty pointless and by using heart strike you are wasting runes that are better spent on death strikes

thanks guys - its good to know that at this stage i wont be able to solo VoA and that i need to gear up as nowhere says roughly what level you need to be with gear - just that its possible! :)

I tend to go into the fight with bone shield and the 3 minute "winter" buff (sorry forget the name)

i used icebound fortitude when i am about half way down health to try and get back to full health sacrifice ghoul for a health fix, army of undead before the "Big" bosses in an instance. I only apply the diseases to get the benefits of the other skills not for damage themselves.

thanks for the tip about HS - i only tended to use that lots, when there was more than 1 add with the boss to kill. but will limit that from now on.

Is it possible to change the res stat of the pvp stuff to haste/mastery? if so what do you think i should go for?

I am in a great guild that i love to be in, but they are quite far ahead in terms of gear, so probably not an option to go on many guild runs unless they are "fun runs" so i tend to buy my stuff at the AH - lol

thanks again for replies

just farm the new new 5mans for ilvl378 pve tank gear and that will be fine. You cant reforge resilience.

VoA is quite hard to solo even for experienced players so you may require some practice. Dont blow you cooldowns randomly, time them with the bosses major damage abilities.

Hi Superbrew,

Here's a few tips as well as some replies to your post.

17/05/2012 15:23Posted by Superbrew

I have been told that i should be able to solo it with blue level 85 pvp gear,

PvP gear is not good in PvE.

17/05/2012 15:23Posted by Superbrew

Do i need to change all my resilience stats to Mastery or Haste - would that be enough?

1) You can't reforge resilience.
2) Aim for as much Mastery, Dodge and Parry as you can get. (In that order, though Dodge and Parry should be as equal as you can get them)

17/05/2012 16:17Posted by Superbrew

I only apply the diseases to get the benefits of the other skills not for damage themselves.

This is something that a lot of people get wrong. While you should be doing all you can to take minimal damage, aim to squeeze as much DPS out of yourself as you can. More DPS = shorter fights = less defense needed overall.
Use Outbreak whenever it's off cooldown in order to apply diseases. Don't use damaging abilities to apply diseases as this wastes runes that could be spent in Death Strike.

17/05/2012 16:17Posted by Superbrew

i used icebound fortitude when i am about half way down health to try and get back to full health sacrifice ghoul for a health fix

Try to keep your defensive cooldowns up all the time, not just when you get to low health; unless you know there is a big attack coming, like a stomp or something.

I don't mean to be rude but your gear is rather lacking. Try to get a set of Justice point/Valor point/dungeon (Hour of Twilight ilvl 378s) gear before attempting again, would be my advice. Get rid of your PvP gear too.

Also, get used to playing your class and you will become much more potent.

Its a gear/enchant/gem issue, really.

Get that fixed out, and youl be soloing stuff np.