On Sun, 9 Jan 2011 00:39:55 -0600, "Shiflet" <rshiflet@charter.net>
wrote:
>You're overlooking some of the largest sources of damage available to a DK.
>Every DK spec has a runic power dump skill to enhance their damage(or
>threat). Frost DKs use it for Frost Strike, which is their second hardest
>hitting ability, behind Obliterate. Unholy DKs use it for Death Coil, which
>typically makes up a very large part of Unholy DPS. And Blood DKs use it for
>Rune Strike, a hard hitting attack that generates extra threat, that cannot
>be dodged, blocked, or parried. Runic power is also used to power certain
>longer cooldown abilities, things one usually uses on longer fights, or
>things one pops in an emergency. For Unholy DKs, runic power is used to
>summon their Gargoyle. It can only be summoned every 3 minutes, but it stays
>around for 30 seconds and puts out a large amoung of damage in that time
>frame. Blood DKs use it to summon their Dancing Rune Weapon, which has a 1
>minute cooldown but which increases both their damage and their parry
>chance(and their threat generation, if glyphed) while it's active. Frost DKs
>can use it on Hungering Cold, a large AoE snare, but they can glyph to
>remove the runic power cost of that ability and so many of them do. There's
>a few other things that use it too, Icebound Fortitude costs runic power and
>it's a very good cooldown for tank DKs, though all specs can use it. There
>may be some other things I'm forgetting...
In blood, you basically use it for threat (rune strike and dancing
rune weapon), spell interrupts (mind freeze) and self healing (if you
subspec in frost: lichborne+death coil, even if the incoming nerf will
reduce the healing effect).
Icebound Fortitude can be glyphed to consume no runic power.