Okey, so I enjoy playing most classes/specs in pvp.
I have that multiclass disease.
So I decided to play some Unholy Dk and I believe that was the worst PvP experience I’ve had in a loooong time.
I tried a few solo shuffle lobbies around 2200-2400 MMR ( I dropped to 1800 )
What is wrong with this class/spec .
It felt like I took so much damage, I tried kiting and avoiding damage but it didn’t really matter.
Because dks barely got any “meaningful” kiting mobility ( I think because they should be able to take damage when being a low mobility plate class ) I was so wrong.
Everyone just targeted me instantly and my healer worked hard to try to keep me alive.
Even when players attacked me without cooldown it felt like they had cooldowns when I was on this class.
And what’s up with Unholy DMG?
I noticed I could do some nice damage with all my offensive cooldowns rolling for a few seconds ( if all my horsemen attacked the same target )
But without cooldowns I believe I just tickled people and barely could not get them under 70% HP alone.
But on my WW monk,Spriest,Feral,Warrior, Mage and shaman ( I can mention more )
I did way more damage and I could survive way better.
Alot of the other classes even had better spread pressure and single target at the same time compared to DK.
And ofc all of them just felt way more tanky.
Did dks get alot of nerfs or do they just scale really bad with stats?
Sorry for the wall of text, but I got shocked how it felt going to DK from playing any other class.
Dmg wise unholy isnt bad. With right clawing shadowas build and right secondary stats it can perform well. But major problem is survivability indd , we only have ibf which is good as stun breaker but duration is only 8 sec with long cooldown,
With changes to bloodforged armor we got at least something against physical dmg dealers but funny part is we used to be anti caster what we arent anymore as AMS due to our huge stamina nerf and hidden pvp nerf to it ( only 75% effective in pvp combat) it only absorbs around 2 mil without dampening so a single frostfire bolt can shatter it. Its only good for cc avoidance
As a full time DK only player i couldnt describe our issues better. They keep giving us BACK the nerfs they already did in the past, so no buffs actually but past time nerfs they are keep rolling back… I mean wtf. As @Xeraty mentioned we supposed to be Anti caster melee and instead of that we are the target from every spec in the game. I mean i am target with a lock teamate a LOCK man!!! Also the dmg proflie is so bad… Spread dmg to all targets that has NO impact at all. Not to mention the HUGE nerf noone seems to mention the asphyxiate to Strangulate thingy!!! I mean this is humongus nerf to the spec cause u had a tool to survive and to set up a kill. Its like Blizz hates DKs i mean really hate us… I wont go to what we need they should already know…
So i tried abit more unholy after my post and I can also agree with you, the damage is pretty okey.
The burst is nice with offensive CDs ( sometimes really good tbh ) I could burst someone down in seconds a few times and substain dmg is “decent” but it seems a little low when you compare it to most other melee DPS classes.
For some reason it feels like the main ghoul pet takes more DMG than other classes pets, for example Demo or BM.
It dies way more compared to other pets.
But one thing I could not solve/figure out is how I would survive after my CDs.
Every other melee just tears me to pieces.
Feels like it don’t matter if I use ibf or bloodforged armor, they just punch right through it.
If Blizzard would fix DK’s survability, it l would actually be a good start and Dk’s would do way better compared to now.
And that ams absorb could be a little higher, as you said.
They just destroy it with 1 spell most of the times.
I’m not the greatest DK, so don’t take my words like they are 100% true.
But this is how I felt when playing
It just feels like unholy dks damage profile is outdated and does not fit into this meta.
I can be wrong
Against physical dmg dealers keep bloodforged armor up (means using death strike every 4 sec) that 25% physical dmg reducion from it is effective.
Also take on note your horsemans giving you 2.5%% dmg (tooltip says 5% but its nerfed in pvp) redirect each is means your abom is not just a great burst cd but alsogiving defensive as it always summons 4 of them too. so during your burst you get ganked CDs for defense Lichborne might be enough (15% dmg reducion if talented, dont waste death coil healing on yourself it only heals 500k) and keep Icebound Fortidue to emergency scenarios (if your healer is cced or if you get stunned and smoke bombed etc scenarios)
Hardest to live against is Retri pala in my opinion, their burst cds are up for almost eternity, and they do only holy dmg, your only good defense vs them is AMZ which is 2 min cd and you must stay in it sadly.
FDk dont feel better. People play arround your go. When You use PoF everyone can just kite because You can’t move. 3sec sindi stun is not enough… + any disarm and its GG
Lol! U wont survive ma dude trust me We cant survive even with cds… Sometimes u might not die but u will still loose cause u drained ur healer to keep u up. Then the other team swaps to anyone and they kill your teamate…
Frost is even worst imo. Meme spec that if they know how to counter it and respect the goes then u are just a dead man walking. It works in low ratings but with just a bit good players u cant do anything…
i read all your post and it seem in all your points are corect defence and now we got 1 cc les than DF. the damage profile is not so good. for example death rot is stacking debuff 1% shadow damage up to 10% to the target per death coil so we need 10. fdk get trolled hard this season. When you are doing changes you have to do for better not for the worse version.
We cant survive even with cds… Sometimes u might not die but u will still loose cause u drained ur healer to keep u up. Then the other team swaps to anyone and they kill your teamate…