Hybrid Death Knight 79 BIS Gearing Guide by Tyntyn (ank)

[ankertest]

1. Introduction

First of all, it's not a guide aka "How to play" it's the guide aka "How to build". Hybrid DK is one of those specs that dont die (most of the time) even 1v2/X and deal consistently medium amount of damage, easily competing with other classes in BGs, still bringing some utility to your group, being tank and pressure machine.

2. Race

Human - best alliance
Tauren - best horde
Orc - viable horde choice
I dont look at any other race bcz they are basically bad for "minmaxing" and dont provide any of the stats you should look for in this build.

3. BIS Gear/talents/glyphs/stats

https://eightyupgrades.com/set/3tdrHWE9DLWZvsRrKNchkR

4. Professions

First one and MAIN one is Jewelcrafting (BIS), gives you double trinket with a lot of stats plus 3 "big" gems.
Second one is Engineering (second BIS IMO), basically bcz of gogles which is BIS, also for rocket chant on gloves (extra burst damage).
Instead of Engineering you can get BS for 2 gem slots, but you lose gogles, BS itself gives you more stamina than Engineering but less other stats, you still can balance stats, whatever you want.


5. Just some solo BG screenshots

8. Little "just to notice list"

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CLICK

i've managed to get bis gear i've listed in the guide, here is final result View attachment 21805 <- frost presence + flask of stoneblood, tauren, 332 resilience, nothing else buffed



the build itself is healing machine and does have some resilience (332 in my case), you can extend your life for a long time and make some space for your team, that's a huge deal really
just for notice, UNBUFFED healing numbers usually are:
DS, 2 casts in a row every 6-8sec, or 4 casts in a row every 5 min - 4.6k healing each
Rune Tap, every 30sec - 6.2k healing
Fallen Crusader proc - 930 healing

View attachment 21806 <- isle of conquest as example, 277k healed during bossfight, boss dmg scaled to lvl 80, so it was kinda tough to survive without extra healer (but possible as proved)

CLICK

View attachment 21825 <- if you give up on JC, you lose 63 stam in total just bcz of dragon's eye gems

View attachment 21826
View attachment 21827 <- on both in total 245 stam
So giving up on JC is not a thing, not for this build, idk how @Outofspace got that JC gives less stam than anything else...
---
There is 3 reasons why im using double JC trinket
1) Way more stam than any other option
2) I dont care that much about stuns and other CC, in my case im using stun reduction meta gem View attachment 21828 plus View attachment 21829 (this talent is great for bgs and fits this build) you can even chose an orc and forget about the stuns these stun reductions stacks btw
3) The whole idea of this build is just stam stacking, that's all, if you give up on anything that is not optimal for stam stacking or doesnt gives you the same amount of survivability, then the whole idea of this will be pointless.
Just for example what im trying to say, i can use runeforging chant on weapon that gives me 2% more health, BUT i chose fallen crusader bcz it gives me way way more of anything, healing proc (which is noticible) and most importantly sweet strenght proc, not to mention that it's just best enchant in the game in general for DK.

 

[Outofspace]

What is the deal with the ss of 39k hp? Even your build there only shows 29k hp, but considering this standard build with your talent points only goes to 25k hp, I'm not sure what exactly you're actually aiming for unbuffed.

 

[Desodelete]

I guess he's 29k unbuffed and with buffs and the 15% from battle standard that he mentioned it bumps all the way to 40k.

How high hp gets with battle standard seems irrelevant.

 

[Warglave]

I dunno.... i seem to recall stam-stackers being much harder to heal than resilience stackers... maybe those slots would be better filled with yellow if this is all about PvP. The more resilience you have the more effective any heal you get actually is.

Saying that effective health is far more desirable than flat health in PvP. Hell, in PvE too, I think...

 

[ankertest]

I'm not sure what exactly you're actually aiming for unbuffed

i've managed to get bis gear i've listed in the guide, here is final result

<- frost presence + flask of stoneblood, tauren, 332 resilience, nothing else buffed

I dunno.... i seem to recall stam-stackers being much harder to heal than resilience stackers...

well, it depends, but you are right in general
in this case tho, the build itself is healing machine and does have some resilience (332 in my case), you can extend your life for a long time and make some space for your team, that's a huge deal really
just for notice, UNBUFFED healing numbers usually are:
DS, 2 casts in a row every 6-8sec, or 4 casts in a row every 5 min - 4.6k healing each
Rune Tap, every 30sec - 6.2k healing
Fallen Crusader proc - 930 healing

<- isle of conquest as example, 277k healed during bossfight, boss dmg scaled to lvl 80, so it was kinda tough to survive without extra healer (but possible as proved)

 

[Outofspace]

Thanks for the clarification. Are you playing on a pserver?

 

[ankertest]

Are you playing on a pserver?

not atm, i've played before on a bunch of different servers on 79-80 since 2012 till 2020, but 90% of my accounts are sold, now im just roaming on retail, rarely getting on to pserver, trying to figure out do i want to play wotlk again or don't since it might be downgraded to cataclysm at some point...

 

[Outofspace]

Right on. Have you thought about Alchemy instead of JC? Even LW provides more stamina than JC, and you could use drums. With Alchemy though you get endless potions, endless flask and one of the best trinkets. For me who isn't going to buy flasks that often and can sometimes run out of potions, that's a combo I can't turn down.

 

[ankertest]

Alchemy instead of JC? Even LW provides more stamina than JC

How tho?
Without JC you lose 308 stam, you cant replenish that amount in any other way

 

[Warglave]

Is that math accounting for https://www.wowhead.com/wotlk/item=40767/sonic-booster ? Cuz it seems more like 100 or so... Also, does https://www.wowhead.com/wotlk/item=36767/solid-dragons-eye give 51 stam or 63? Wowhead says one and other places say the other.

Even 100 is a lot tho, but even as tauren I'd think youd want to avoid double-trinket. At least sometimes...

edit- oh, ok... the other site was combining all three for the total bonus of 63 stam. Got it.

So the JC trinkets are 129 stam each? And the boosters are 81? So that's 48 per trinket and 63 total for the gems... minus any stam bonus from another profession? Did I get that wrong somehow?

Still not sold on stam-stacking either, but whatever... It's good info.

edit2- lol, I hate draenei and I'm not a fan of stamstack....... but pretty sure I'm gonna roll one cuz I'm lazy on profs.

 

[ankertest]

So the JC trinkets are 129 stam each? And the boosters are 81? So that's 48 per trinket and 63 total for the gems... minus any stam bonus from another profession? Did I get that wrong somehow?

<- if you give up on JC, you lose 63 stam in total just bcz of dragon's eye gems

<- on both in total 245 stam
So giving up on JC is not a thing, not for this build, idk how @Outofspace got that JC gives less stam than anything else...
---
There is 3 reasons why im using double JC trinket
1) Way more stam than any other option
2) I dont care that much about stuns and other CC, in my case im using stun reduction meta gem

plus

(this talent is great for bgs and fits this build) you can even chose an orc and forget about the stuns these stun reductions stacks btw
3) The whole idea of this build is just stam stacking, that's all, if you give up on anything that is not optimal for stam stacking or doesnt gives you the same amount of survivability, then the whole idea of this will be pointless.
Just for example what im trying to say, i can use runeforging chant on weapon that gives me 2% more health, BUT i chose fallen crusader bcz it gives me way way more of anything, healing proc (which is noticible) and most importantly sweet strength proc, not to mention that it's just best enchant in the game in general for DKs.

 

[Warglave]

I dont care that much about stuns and other CC, in my case im using stun reduction meta gem

 

[Nitehawk]

thanx for the guide yo

 

[thefatgoblin]

awesome stuff, i did a build like that back in private servers with full stam gems, you receive lot of damage but the healing is so op that doesn't matter

today I'm more towards to lower level twinks for high resilience dmg reduction (that puts more difficulty in the bracket and you get rewarded with more sustain) as DK without JC I'm getting around 11% / 23% / 21% resilience damage reduction and blood dps build, shit is fun and does a ton of dmg

 

[Warglave]

blood dps build

I tried unholy and just found it lacking (for leveling) compared to blood... assuming it gets better in PvP but seems like padded damage not so much meaningful damage. Or it could just be that blood is so brain-dead easy it just suits me.

edit- definitely leaning toward a blood-based hybrid version at least to start. Not gonna last long anyway, so toying around.

 

[Selaya]

bdk in general is very , the pvp version is even worse so

also, if you're using the powerful meta at the very least do the earthstorm one, that gives 15%; the earthsiege's only 10% and should thus be considered useless

 

[ankertest]

thanx for the guide yo

awesome stuff

thanks

p.s. updated some screenshots and corrected text

 

[orchunter]

Very interesting write-up. That's pretty cool you were able to get Apolyon, the Soul-Render.

I've tried full stam builds in the past; this build certainly seems to maximize it. The way % healing withs with a lot of DK skills makes it pretty appealing. Maybe I'll build another set. Right now I'm trying more a of hybrid build with more Resil pieces and Str gemming. Here are my current stats

Particularly, I've been having a ton of fun using a 47/0/23 Blood/Unholy Blight build.

A couple of items you should consider is Shard of Contempt from MGT H, and a Swift Zulian Tiger (the tiger you can solo as DK without too much trouble) The shard has crazy up-time, its a great trinket.

With cross-realm queuing now available, maybe we'll see more 79 communities. I've seen some twinks on Whitemane, but that's about it. I'm on Grobbulus NA

 

[mspeal92]

Why do all these 79 dks run around with blood subspec, frost subspec is clearly bis at 80, what is difference one level lower?

 

[ankertest]

Why do all these 79 dks run around with blood subspec, frost subspec is clearly bis at 80, what is difference one level lower?

depends on their gear and their goals, other than that it's just matter of preference, you can always ask them first to have their point of view why they are doing this

p.s. unholy w/ frost subspec is absolutely viable on 79, especially it's shines with a healer in your grp (like any other melee class)