Is BDK really that bad to play?

Classes Death Knight
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I see a lot of topics complaining and asking for reworks of the Blood Death Knight (BDK), this worries me and got me pondering. Is BDK really that bad to play?

I ask because BDK feels awesome to play, in my opinion at least. I love the whole feel of the spec. Though, there could be some more rune generation thrown in to speed it up overall. The gameplay loop is just so very satisfying to complete and hone towards greater hights of mastery.

I love - the more you get hit, the more damage you do - the more damage you take, the more easily you can keep yourself up. You are rewarded to push yourself past pulling small and ‘safe’, as it is a lot safer to pull a bit too much than less. This reward loop is what keeps the spec exhilarating and fresh. You want to find that perfect balance, to do the dance of your HPS vs DTPS, you want to find out how far you can go. It is a masterwork of tank gameplay design. It makes other tanks look bland and subpar. Is this what many do want - to have BDK become another static DTPS mitigater, like the rest?

I understand that Death and Decay is not enjoyed by all, yet I find it refreshing to play around the ability. All from it giving offensive power, defensive and even kiting potential is all big positive factors in my eyes. Yet - I do multiclass, so I can understand why some people who main BDK and only BDK find it exhausting and stiffeling. There is only one way to play and DD is a core part of it to do it right.

Even as I see many say so, threat per second is of no issue for BDK, in all honesty, the burst TPS of the spec is immense with shatterbones. Start off with a DRW shatter, bloodboil inside DD and you are set for the fight. BDK basically got the better thorns. So even when a full burst class like Evoker blasts, it is so very easy on a BDK to reliably keep things still locked onto you - especially when the HPS kicks in.

Now, one could argue that BDK does too low damage at the current state. This is also partly true by what I have seen. But I am not completely sold it is a true DPS issue, more a TPS issue, when your co-tank can rip threat off of you while tanking together. This if an actual issue must be addressed. Yet, on the other side of the coin - I can’t see how BDK could get the benefit of being a completely selfsustaining tank and bringing mid-top tier DPS of all the tanks. If BDK is the best tank for your self-sustained option and you basically play as an immortal, is it then fair also to ask to be pushing out the other tanks on the DPS meters?

So while I do not want to say BDK should not get a minor rework, I truly and wholeheartedly hope that the core gameplay loop stays the same.

That all mentioned, I truly can’t wait to read your opinions and takes on BDK, both bad and hopefully some good. We will probably all agree that some DPS increases is still needed, even after the 8% aura buff, to help with the ST TPS issues in a co-tank setting. Yet, do we need more and if so - what can do you want to see gained, and then at what cost?

I do love my little BDK after all, so I hope to see it get even better and played by more in the future :dracthyr_uwu:

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Yesterday i was waiting my whole day in que and getting decline in LFG in keys 23-24 range just cuz im playing Bdk the problem is that this class brings nothing to the group you have literly no Utility and no buffs and in high fort keys your so squishy and you can get oneshot so fast and then the other problem is DMG we are lacking overall dmg by like 30% compare to other tanks and the worst part is our ST which is disaster we are doing something like 50% less dmg than a Vdh st which is really important in keys you can argue that tanks like prot pala have low dps aswell but their huge utility makes it up for them and they also bring 3% dmg reduction to the group which is huge.
Bdk also have many useless talents that you dont even bother to looking at and you also have some talents that you are forced to Take but it doesnt work at all such as crimson scourge this talent is not working at all since we are forced to play with double DND talent and when our DND is never on coldown this talent doesnt work and the funiest part is that we have some other talents such as relish in blood or perseverance of ebone blade which work when you proc crimson scourge which means they also never work for you there are alot more problems to this talent system which i cant mention all here cuz then you are faced with a wall of texts
long story short the whole system of our talent tree is just flaws and also our class tuning is omega low our ability dmgs are so low that 8% dmg buff is like 5% our overall dmg since 20 to 30% of our dmg is just trinkets and finger and such damages and we have no utility like Prot paladin or any kind of buffs like druid or other class to makes up for it Basicly by playing Bdk you neglecting your team so hard
even if you like this design when you have to wait your whole day in LFG to get an invite cuz Devs think due to US having deathgrip we dont deserve any kind of utility or group buff or DMG its not fun.
on top of that for the second expansion in a row our cheatdeath talent is bug and not working sometimes purgetory is buged since SL or maybe legion i dont know its so cring
the only fix i see rightnow is to buff the dmg so heavy or rework the whole talent tree which second one is the right choice but i doubt blizzard care anymore.

1 Like
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So at the top 0.1% level there is the issue of DPS not being competitive, as you are left behind being unable to keep up with the top DPS tank specs value generation in time saved. In addition, at that level a BDK will no longer be able to start its gameplay loop because it dies too fast. Now that are indeed huge problems.

As talents seem to be lacking and some are bugged (bugs should of course be fixed) - what strengths can be worked on to make BDK a viable yet unique tank. I believe we both agree we don’t want to see BDK become a warrior clone - so maybe something like a buff to Will of the Necropolis to stop the 100 to 0’s?

As you still play BDK, even as you are hamstring yourself on your progress, surely there got to be something positive about BDK driving that action.

Luckily at lower levels, so 17-21 range, due to lack of tanks and you are not knife-fighting the opposition I find it easy to get into keys. So it is not a problem for the majority, yet still something that should be addressed. Even if the problems mentioned are not core flaws, it is still a serious issues for certain.

4

This has been my main since WotLK, and I’ve been tanking since Legion. Overall it’s still my favorite tank, but it’s not without issues, some of which Blizzard never fixes.

  • No build variations. Talent tree is very restricted. You have too many mandatory picks to function. I can’t remeber the last time I changed anything in my spec tree. Once you have everything you need, there aren’t any points left to make any meaningful choices.
  • Bad damage. For the keys I am doing it’s less impactful in terms of timing the run or not, but because damage is generally low I have threat issues with bursty specs like ret, devoker, ww, etc. If threat modifiers were much higher, the low damage wouldn’t bother me as much.
  • While it’s nice to have CR and AMZ, it doesn’t have the same impact as dispels, off-heals, etc that other tanks provide.
  • BDK is too squishy against physical damage. Fortified weeks are very stressful to play, especially during the start of a pull if you don’t have DrW ready. Having to pop vampiric blood + another defensive CD to not proc purgatory in the opener feels pretty bad.

Since I have no interest in doing keys above +20, these issues have less impact and I can compensate to some extent with gear. But if I was pushing high keys I probably wouldn’t play BDK, even if some players manage to pull it off.

2 Likes
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I see a lot of BDKs in general say they struggle with threat, yet I personally do not have any problems after DD, shatter, BB, even Vs Fury 700k burst. I am quite undergeared, being 428 atm, playing with 440+ fury warriors (some with OF burst build). Once the HPS kicks in, there is no way to lose threat again.

So is it basically the openers where you dont get time to do DD-Shatter-BB, or DD-BB-BB(drw) not causing enough TPS that are the main stops?

Of course, on ST, BDK with its 30-50k ST vs prot pally 70-90k is just brutal on the threat front. God forbid a prot warrior critting his shieldcharge into shieldslam. So there I can feel the problem. Especially since you wont have enough shatters to make up for the TPS from DPS difference.

So do you mind coming with examples where you lose threat in a bit more detail, then maybe a solution to the problem in question based on your experience?

The overall DPS issue is actually quite the drawback. When VDH can pull almost trippel the DPS it really starts to make a difference. I am not sure we can’t get more utility, as the HPS in itself are freeing globals for the healer to do anything but touching you. It is quite hard to put a value on though.

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It’s pretty much always the opener. Too many globals needed to set up the damage, and also relying on DPSers to actually wait a few seconds. Standard is as soon as DnD hits the ground and mobs start to move towards me, people start popping off. If I don’t have DrW ready to quickly stack up bone shield, it causes a ripple effect where I am forced to either let people die, or spend several GCDs on death grips and blood boil to gain back some control, while not generating any runic power or bone shield charges, which usually ends up with a purgatory proc…

You could argue it’s just as much of a DPS mentality problem, but at the same time Blizzard design many specs to frontload all their damage. Since most of them can’t or won’t adapt, I think it’s time Blizzard takes a look at thread modifiers. Something as simple as the first time you attack an enemy, your threat against them is increased by X% for 5 seconds. This would prevent the Legion playstyle where it was impossible to lose aggro even after 10-15 seconds of kiting.

1 Like
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