2v2 Comp DK unholy & Shadow priest Guide WOTLK 335 PVP

We'll be posting detailed information about tips, tricks, gear builds & tactics from both Death Knight & Shadow Priest points of view against any kind of setup you'd engage in 2vs2 arena.

So here we go!

EDIT: I massively edited the guide, should be more clear and less confusing. It probably lost some less important details as well, updated some strategies and fixed mistakes done previously.

I changed format of the guide

Death Knight
is basically DK pov, also the general strategy.


Shadow Priest
SP pov, tips on how to follow along the general strategy, limitations and support possibilities for your DK.




[ D E A T H K N I G H T ]

Talent spec to use:

http://wow335.gamestool.net/deathkni...33101203103151

This is quite standard DK spec but main points are; Toughness (mobility), Reaping (more chains). I specced off from On a Pale Horse because I don't have problem with stuns (kite rogues, IBF stuns when going for kills).

Glyphs: Dark death, Ghoul, Anti-Magic Shell


Gear:

5/5 pvp set

pve offsets: Ahn'Kahar Onyx Neckguard, Ring of Rotting Sinew, Death's Verdict, Sigil of the Vengeful Heart

Rest of gear is pvp. I use pvp ring for resil now after 2v2 changes.

Gem 135 spell pen, get 170 hit rating (you can enchant 20 hit on gloves, allows to get more resil).

I recommend around 1250+ resilience.

http://arena-tournament.com/armory/char/Belzedar

[S H A D O W - P R I E S T]


--------------------------------------------------Talents----------------------------------------------------------------

http://wow335.gamestool.net/priestt....12003102311351

I consider this the best spec for a shadow priest while playing sp/dk,
Getting silent resolve instead of twin discipline points is optional and only a matter of choice!
(Keep in mind you get more damage bonus from twin disciplines on Devouring Plague though, since you're playing with a DK)

--------------------------------------------------Acronyms Used-----------------------------------------------------------

SWP - Shadow Word: Pain
SWD - Shadow Word: Death
PWS - Power Word: Shield
AMZ - Anti-magic zone
C - Corpse Explosion
LoS - Line Of Sight
SC - Shadowcrawl (Shadowfiend ability)
PSH - Psychic Horror
PSC - Psychic Hcream
VT - Vampiric Touch
VE - Vampiric Embrace
MB - Mind Blast
MF - Mind Flay
DOT - Damage over time spells (VT, SW:P, DVP)

-------------------------------------------------Gear Builds, Gemming & Glyphs--------------------------------------------


Firstly, let's talk about the seemingly neverending topic of "witch is better crit or spiret m8"
Yeah, mooncloth VS satin, critical strike VS mana reg and bonus spell power.

Many awesome, great and all-knowing pro priest players prove that using satin gear gives them more power, damage
and the ability to swallow their enemies in a single burst! all this should happen in seconds too!

Who cares if you die 'cause of mana problems when the opposing team survives your "big demeij burst"
You could technically burst just about anyone down with enough luck, but
Sadly, that doesn't always work out.

This is how the average player thinks,
But what most priest players can't seemingly see is that SPs are NOT arcane mages, your critical hits will not give you super damage,
they will just give a bonus 500 or so on dots, even less and 1000-1200 if you're really lucky on a mind blast.

Now, i will prove why mooncloth is better (even for PR (Priest/Rogue) and heroic RLS (Priest/RestoSham/Rogue) even.

- Wearing mooncloth gives you a huge spell power bonus

- Wearing mooncloth gives you a mana regeneration ability and a bonus to that mana reg

- While wearing mooncloth you end up having a bit more resilience

- The word "mooncloth" sounds more awesome than "satin" does, herpa derpa.

- Your healing spells are much more efficient (so is your shield) while wearing mooncloth gear


Using spirit gear for SP/DK is CRUCIAL, you can not play the setup hoping to get a kill in the first minute, although it always is a matter of choice for any player & satin gear may prove itself more than just viable at some points,
it still isn't good enough for SP/DK.

The best race to play this setup with is Human with double solace.

-----++++++++ ALL YELLOW GEMS SHOULD BE +20 RESILIENCE +++++++++---

Everything else should be normal SP gems (Spell penetration) + spell power, haste rating.

You'll end up with 1250~ resilience like this as human and you'll have a huge spell power + mana regen bonus from the double solace.

You'll be sitting on 650~ haste, that should be enough too!

Use only 2-3% hit rating.

You can also use spell pen offhand, and gem resil/spell pen, this way you'll land on 1350 resilience as human.

http://arena-tournament.com/armory/char/Devalduz <---

Glyphs


1) Glyph of Psychic Scream

2) Glyph of Dispersion

3) Glyph of Fade

Glyph of Fade decreases the cooldown on your fade ability by NINE (9) seconds, meaning that you can fade out of sticky situations every 15 seconds
With your death knight spreading chains and desecration everywhere, this will let you avoid at least two times more damage than 5% inner fire bonus
could've ever mitigated from your ass.

Using the fade ability smart makes your enemies cry, it's fun!

Glyph of Psychic Scream is for longer fears, longer cooldown isn't issue since as SP/DK you can easily turtle long enough.

+ Use spell power + Stun reduction gem as meta.

Acronyms:

D&D = Death and Decay
AMS = Anti-Magic Shell
AMZ = Anti-Magic Zone
PS = Plague Strike or Psychic Horror, contextual (I try to avoid using this one)
SS = Plague Strike
chains/CoI = Chains of Ice
Gargoyle = Summon Gargoyle
CE = Corpse Explosion
Shield = Power Word: Shield
los, LoS = Kiting opponents Line of Sight to prevent casts
grip = Death Grip
SWP - Shadow Word: Pain
SWD - Shadow Word: Death
PWS - Power Word: Shield
C - Corpse Explosion
LoS - Line Of Sight
SC - Shadowcrawl (Shadowfiend ability)
PSH - Psychic Horror
PSC - Psychic Hcream
VT - Vampiric Touch
VE - Vampiric Embrace
MB - Mind Blast
MF - Mind Flay
DOT - Damage over time spells (VT, SW:P, DVP)


Disc Priest/Rogue

1/10

Death Knight

DK should rush in, dismount, send pet & blood boil rogue out also get combat with disc quickly (with D&D so Spriest can buff DK for combat.

Spriest should follow behind and maintain 20-30y distance from DK and get combat with Mass Dispel.

If they open DK spriest should Psychic Horror the rogue so DK can avoid kidney shot (kite, AMS or IBF)

If they go for spriest, DK should grip rogue asap so he can't get poisons and kidney shot on spriest. Then slow down the rogue and silence disc to prevent dispels. Plague Strike spam on cloak (use ERW if necessary) to slow rogue.
After rogue has cloaked and Pain Suppression has been used, it's easy to burst rogue with silences on disc priest.

- Early gargoyle for pressure. (spriest dispels shackles)
- Keep gripping rogue AT LEAST 20-30 yards away from spriest
- You only need CloS on cd to burst rogue since disc priest can't Pain Suppress during silences.

If the rogue tries to train DK down, he should use AMS, escape artist and Gnaw for kiting rogue. Also AMZ if kiting isn't possible at time.
Instead of trying to melee rogue, DK should focus on just kiting him.

If you force disc/rogue to pillar, they lose. Just keep gripping rogue away from pillar or swap to disc with grip while chaining rogue.


Shadow Priest

- Always give PW:Shield to your DK first as soon as the game starts, ladies come first!

- Stay behind the pillar, do a mass dispel or two while trying not to kite your DK for the potential grip
(If the rogue opens on you instead of the DK)

- Keep your cool even if you're on very low hp (fading out means regaining HP fully, do not use POM or renew while being tunneled by the rogue, just damage him) trinket the first kidney,
jump off and disarm the rogue while silencing the priest
at the same time - this gives you a good chance to force cloak from the rogue, after that your death knight can easily kite him around
while you run away from him (using fade) and heal back to full hp.

- Priest switches are also viable, whenever the priest uses pain supression on the rogue, your DK should run to the rogue,
grip the priest for a double fear and a good switch may win you the game. Fear Ward or Silence the disc first to avoid fear yourself.

- keep your distance from the rogue (DO NOT GET TOO CLOSE OR YOU'LL GET BLINDED) and avoid potential fear runs from the enemy priest
it will be much likely impossible for the rogue to reach you for the blind, even if he does, it's very easy to SW death it after him taking 10
seconds to literally crawl to you

- After initial dots, dispel rogue first then disc priest and try to keep dots ticking on disc priest also, if he forgets to heal himself, DK can grip him and finish him off.




Shadow Priest / Rogue

2/10

Death Knight

DK should rush in, dismount, send pet & blood boil rogue out and start on spriest. Spam strangulate to avoid horror & Silence and follow up with Gnaw while using ERW and Gargoyle. If rogue still hasn't opened, use IBF.

If rogue opens on spriest, he should start soloing him and move towards DK.

Then DK should grip rogue off from spriest and plague strike & chain him.

If spriest is somewhat low without dispersion, finish him off.
If rogue has used cloak you can kill him quite fast or peel him from spriest with chains.

If sp rogue tries to kill DK it's just matter of killing rogue faster, use silences on spriest and use grip to interrupt dps or heals.

You can LoS sp & kite rogue around pillar while your spriest murders rogue.

After sp/rogue goes defensive, don't follow them, instead DK grips sp or rogue into open.

- Use swordshattering weapon until they have used disarms.
- Strangulate/silence sp at end of dispersion to prevent shield&heals.
- Break vanishes with blood boil

Shadow Priest

- Avoid getting sapped with by letting your DK charge in for combat, give him a buff right after he engages the enemy priest.

- After initial dots, dispel the rogue as soon as possible, this'll enable you to dispel PW:shields instantly.

- Do not disarm a rogue after a grip, otherwise he'll just trinket it and kick your ass

- If the rogue decides to go for you, let him - tank the damage and do not ever disperse before your enemy does, your DK should be able to kill opponent shadow priest much faster. (If you get dotted by their sp and rogue trains you, dispersing early will be necessary)

- Shield + fear ward yourself, Mind control the rogue to peel him off the death knight, the priest will most likely start running towards you
Make the rogue hit him for the wound poison, move the rogue closer to you, cancel mind control,
fear and switch to the priest with unhealable damage





Discipline Priest/Mage
3/10

Death Knight

Start on mage with dispels on DK, if mage uses his cds right away just retreat to pillar and turtle moment.
After that you proceed to go on mage again.

Grip Dpriest into open so that sp can get dots up without getting interrupted.
If this isn't possible, still grip Dpriest into open but sp silences mage to cast VT (optionally he doesn't use VT much and just uses instants at first when starts juking VT).

Early strangulate with gargoyle and you'll still have gnaw, horror and interrupt after so Dpriest should die. While you train Dpriest, DK should use AMZ and IBF to miligate damage. Also DK can use Death Strike to keep himself up.

You can also use only AMS&Silence to get Pain Suppression used, then turtle and burst disc priest.
This is more safe tactic, as disc has no way to survive your offensive cooldowns.

- In general, never grip mage, even after blink (there are exceptions)
- Dispel DK a lot to keep him mobile
- Focus Mind Freeze polymorphs especially if mage uses counterspell

If you can't get on Dpriest or get peeled off, retreat to pillar or swap to mage if DK can get into melee range.

- Don't let Dpriest drink, stop him with pet or D&D
- LoS mage damage when sp is cc'd or otherwise keep yourself alive (death strike).

It's also possible to just train mage while DK spams Death strike and uses AMS if priest is CC'd

When Priest/Mage doesn't have cds you can easily train them to death.

Shadow Priest

- Dispel both the priest and the mage with dispels while avoiding fears and freezes

- Instead of trying to spam dispel yourself to kite mage damage, spam damage on him or the disc priest to force them defensive

- Mind blast the mage instead of casting VT, will force him to use his blocks and other CDs much earlier





Shadow Priest/Mage
4/10

Death Knight

Unlike Dpriest, don't use grip on spriest just to switch, you'd just get kited with dispersion/fade.

Ideally DK runs to spriest the pops AMS and uses gargoyle asap. (Preferably wait for them to run to your side first, if mage is camping middle). Sp should be forced to disperse at end of AMS or soon after it.

Your sp should be using just instant dots and given time, fakecast CS to get VT up.

After AMS is over, DK uses IBf to prolong Deep Freeze & maybe strangulate sp and depending on incoming damage, AMZ
When spriest disperses, grip him at end of it before he can outrange or LoS and Gnaw him to stop moving even during dispersion and follow up with Horror and silence/Strangulate. This is also roughly when you'll get Deep Freezed, trinket it.

- Use Swordshattering weapon at start
- AMS mage novas in general
- spriest should be spam dispelling you

Shadow Priest
Tactic: Pressure the priest for dispersion with instants and dispel spam while kiting the mage around pillars with desecration,
Avoid getting polymorphed with SWD and force blink from the mage as much as you can, fade out of freezes and just run around the pillars,
Disarm the priest after dispersion = dead meat.

- Send your pet on the priest to make him disperse faster

- You'll not be using fear on the priest so use psychic scream on mage to interrupt polymorph while using SW:death to cause more damage and an earlier dispersion on the priest.

- Get a SW:pain on the mage's pet and refresh it by just casting mind flay at it and instant cancel, the mage will not be able to
freeze your DK off the priest twice or catch you in a deep freeze anymore.

- Don't ever waste dispersion in a deep freeze if you have fade ready, fade out after the freeze, just fear the mage off and heal up to full HP slowly while you continue to kite





Paladin/Warrior
5/10

Death Knight
Always fight at pillar. Keep warrior dispelled and get rid of freedoms.
When warrior is out of paladin's LoS, always chain him since he can get dispelled, otherwise just Plague Strike.

When warrior is stuck in chains, spriest can move around pillar and dot up paladin, use gargoyle on him and silence & grip him. Then Gnaw him and if necessary, strangulate to force Divine Shield.

Don't bother trying to dispel Divine Shield.

Keep kiting for warrior and wait for Silence and gnaw before going back on paladin. Use ERW and corpse explosion for burst also strangulate (if you still have it) paladin after silence.


You can always go hard on warrior behind pillar to force him defensive so you can wait for cds and if he's taking a lot of dmg/dropping low, grip & fear paladin and keep killing warrior.
Just make sure you don't use too many cds going on warrior if paladin/warrior has cooldowns ready.
Going on warrior is necessary vs higher rated teams as otherwise paladin just outranges everything.

- In general sp has to disarm/disperse bladestorms, but if possible, grip it away.
- If paladin is playing at pillar, fear him without using grip. If warrior is buffed up/almost full hp and no dots, swap to paladin.
- Silence paladin fast once you go on him to prevent using cds and dispelling (procs Sacred Cleansing).

Shadow Priest

- Do NOT disarm the bladestorm if you're on high HP, send your pet in and burst the warrior down to force cancel and intervene or even shield wall, silence the paladin afterwards and disarm the warrior for mind control on the shield wall, then burst him down for an easy kill

- Don't ever use any DOTs on the warrior if you know it's gonna get dispelled, sacred cleansing is kinda bugged on AT and 70% of your spells will miss (They should really fix that!)

- Save dispersion for stuns, save fade for hamstring procs

- Warriors hit really hard on AT, so don't ever leave shadowform while being tunneled, just start casting VT instead of healing to
force reflect and to lower the warrior's damage on self if your fade is on CD

- Stay close to your dk if possible for a grip+fear.


Druid/Warrior
1/10

Both dk and sp can deadzone kite warrior a lot since he can't get dispelled. Only things you have to worry about are spamstring procs and Bladestorm.

Kill the warrior.

Play around pillar and once warrior has dots on, grip&fear druid and dispel hots from warrior. If druid trinkets late or not at all, Silence to force Shield Wall.

DO NOT GRIP FEAR DRUID BEFORE DOTS!

When trinket and Shield Wall are down, warrior is easy to kill with grip&fear on Druid while using Gargoyle and cds that you still might have.


Shaman/Warrior

As usual, start with chain kiting warrior. Get fear on shaman (dk and pet should be stomping totems).
If he doesn't have Earth Shield, use gargoyle and Gnaw him before fear breaks, Silence and if he's taking enough damage, strangulate and finish him with horror.

- Make shaman use Earth Shield on warrior
- Early gnaw after either fear or Death Grip prevents grounding totem and Wind Shear.

If you fail to kill Shaman, turtle around pillars for cooldowns and repeat.

Also if Shaman keeps Earth Shield on himself, you can kill warrior similar to Druid/Warrior.

So just play it around Earth Shield

- Only shield your DK when the shammy is feared, otherwise the shield will get purged and your DK will die

- While kiting the warrior do not spam heals on your DK, ehal him up with 2-3 flash heals after the MS effect is off of him (note that warriors
will not be able to keep MS on your DK all the time, since they get easily kited)

- Fake wind shears and keep VT ticking on both targets.




Druid/Warlock

Death Knight

Start with pillarhumping. Wait for warlock to use Shadowfury (Destruction) or Howl of Terror (Affliction), after that try to get double fear.

Do not use cds on first go on the druid since warlock will trinket the fear.

Repeat grip fear after shadowfury and you got real chance to kill druid.

You can also get on druid if Fear is on DR and spriest cant get feared.

- Try to save AMS for kill attempts
- Possible to zerg druid during Silence&Strangulate that he cant use barkskin and burst him.

You just might be able to kill Warlock if you can avoid full fears, fear druid and use cds to burst warlock.

- If warlock can teleport to otherside of arena don't even think about killing him.
-- Keep warlock slowed at pillar also by Desecration all times, keep chains up as well

Shadow Priest

Make sure you get double/triple (on the pet) fears
Position yourself close to the enemy at all times for potential fear+burst combos
All you need to do is spam damage after the fear and burst cds off of the enemy team until they have none left and die.
Shaman/Warlock

Start with pillarhumping. Wait for warlock to use Shadowfury (Destruction) or Howl of Terror (Affliction), after that try to get double fear by killing tremor totem either with cast or pet, then Death Grip shaman. If you grip fear shaman before tremor is down, you risk breaking it too early.
While you do this, DK has to be ready to Mind Freeze the Fear from warlock when spriest is exposed.
Now you can go for kill on the rShaman if he doesn't have earth shield.

Another tactic (simple but less effective and more risky)

Death Grip shaman into open, gnaw, silence, strangulate, horror and train him to death or force a lot of cooldowns.
Then repeat with Silence & gnaw at least.

- Use AMS as you go on shaman to avoid getting CC'd, if warlock isn't feared. (Note, shaman might drop tremor to break it prematurely)
- When you use Gargoyle, it's possible to kill rShaman 100-0 with silences/gnaw/horror when he doesn't have Earth Shield.
- Kill pets when they follow sp, and dot them in general. You can go on rShaman when warlock goes to summon.
Warlock is possible to kill if he's affliction and you get full fear on shaman without Earth Shield on Warlock.
- Keep warlock slowed at pillar also by Desecration all times, keep chains up as well




Feral/Rogue
Hardcounter

Death Knight

They will always sap DK and try to cyclone him after.

Priest should take 30yard range from DK and be somewhat close to pillar.

In Blade's edge arena spriest can be on top of pillar while DK is down to grip rogue.

Spriest should Silence feral when there's 2-3 seconds left on sap or when he gets predatory strikes proc (instant cast) to prevent cyclone on DK
- If DK gets cycloned for any reason you lose.

After sap DK has to use AMS and after it strangulate feral.

Spriest can trinket cheap shot/ pounce to fear (rogue trinkets) into horror and put 2 dots on feral if possible.

Now DK should be able to grip & chain rogue. He will Cloak of shadows so be ready to plague strike it. Slow down the rogue and use ERW& gargoyle on him.

After cloak of shadows spriest should get Devouring Plague on him at least.

If possible, slow down the feral to maybe keep spriest alive. Otherwise just make sure rogue dies.

Since spriest will die always DK has to 1v1 feral or finish them in 1v2.

Note that you should still have AMZ, IBF, lichborne (self healing) and death pact for 1v1/2
- Use death pact and lichborne while you dont have wound poison
- In 1v2 focus on killing rogue befote he has CloS again.

Avoid full kidney shot in 1v2 at any cost because you will die during it no matter what % hp you are at.

Shadow Priest

Tactic: Scenario ---> DK gets sapped, both the feral and rogue open on you ---> trinket the feral's stun, fear both targets,
silence the feral instantly after he gets instant cyclone, disarm the rogue at that point and try to do maximum damage on the druid, while
throwing a single SW:pain on the rogue, it is crucial that you use your pet on the druid and disperse as soon as the rogue kidneys,
your DK should keep you in the anti-magic zone while doing this as well to absorb envenom damage, doing all this means you ARE going to die,
you're supposed to die, but after you do the rogue will have wasted cloak and the feral will be low on mana, so your DK SHOULD be able to
solo them without any problems if he manages to avoid a kidney shot. (Note that this is a direct counter for DK/SP, if the feral/rogue is good
your chances are highly limited)




Discipline Priest/Hunter

Death Knight

Start by pillarhumping. It's possible to Death Grip disc priest, dot him up and use gargoyle and just train him down since hunter can't do anything else than scatter/trap and spam damage.

Very safe tactic is:

Play at pillar, dot up hunter pet and kill it with silence, then dot up hunter and get Silence/fear on disc.

- Always stay close to pillar, hunter can kill you very easily.


After Pain Suppression has been used, killing disc priest is easy.

- Plague strike on pet, snakes and priest to kite hunter around pillar with Desecration.
- Spriest should be fearing constantly when playing defensive (with Silence on hunter if necessary).

Shadow Priest

Tactic: Don't go in the open, lure the priest near a pillar and just follow him around while trying to kite the hunter,
getting a lot of double fears is crucial, silence the priest after a fear while the hunter is in CC and burst pain sup out of him,
then in the next fear you should be able to chain silence the priest and destroy the hunter (or the priest, depends on his current HP)
by just dots, not even deterrance can hold the damage off.

Tips & Tricks:

- If your SWD is on cooldown and you see there's a trap coming your way, just hug the ghoul and he'll eat it most of the times

- If your partner is trapped there's surely a silencing shot heading directly towards your face, so do not go in the open to dispel it off,
or it's very possible to get silenced, feared and then bursted down to death while your partner sits there catching a cold & raging for dispels





Restoration Druid/Hunter

Keep doing double fears with Death Grip.

Kill hunter pet to prevent Masters Call and pet sac.

Both druid and hunter are good kill targets.

- Get barkskin on cd before bursting
- if druid uses barkskin and other cds, kill him before he gets barkskin back.

Watch for Deterrence. If Deterrence is on cd, hunter is easy to kill.

This is much like Druid/warrior.



Discipline Priest/Feral

Easy version of disc/rogue.

As first thing you can just grip feral off from spriest asap. This delays application of bleeds and prevents feral getting those necessary combo points.

Feral will usually leap back but since it's latency bugged, you can gnaw feral for VT and dispelling and also just chain&PS spam while spriest spams abolish disease.

Feral should be kited around pillar or if you are in open, spriest stays always within DKs range to dispel roots.

Focus on miligating feral damage during Berserk and after Barkskin has been used, it's very easy to kill feral with strangulate on disc priest.

- Silence can be used on feral to prevent instant cyclones
- Use Psychic Horror on feral during Berserk to get to kite him and delay damage.
- DK should use AMS when Predatory Strikes procs (feral instant cast) to avoid cyclones.
- Kiting feral around pillar is easier due constant Desecration around it + disc priest can't dispel chains as easily.
- Avoid having your Dispersion cycloned by moving around pillar when feral can't instant cyclone.
- Spam Abolish Disease to remove Feral snare

Spam dispel feral to get rid of Predator's Swiftness and instant cc.

Mage/Rogue
DK should rush in, send pet and try to blood boil rogue out.

Then D&D on mage (especially if he tries to go invisible).

Use AMS to avoid frost novas, then ERW&Gargoyle. Mage should have to Ice Block. Spriest should try to mass dispel that.

When Mage attempts to polymorph you, use Lichborne.

If Mage is eating a lot of damage and rogue still hasn't opened, use IBF to avoid Cheap Shot and kidney.

If rogue opens on Spriest, grip him off and chains&PS him.

If mage is still in open after Ice Block, he's easy to kill. Otherwise swap on rogue and kill him.

If rogue goes on DK from start, he should be always killed.

- Remember to strangulate Mage.
- Lichborne is usable in Counterspell and Deep Freeze.
- Get chains on CloS to prevent restealth

If Mage gets Invisibility off, try to run around to avoid Sap, then Lichborne when there's less than 10 seconds left on Invisibility and send pet on Mage asap.

- Invis is 20 second duration.

Doesn't really matter what spriest does, if DK does as I wrote on this guide you shouldn't be able to lose lolol.

Prot/Ret & Rshaman

Since you can't dispel freedom most of the times from the paladin, kiting against this setup is relatively hard, but not impossible
Almost all of the DK's grips have to be used in a defensive posture, this is the only setup you don't kite around pillars against
The priest should constantly be trying to get into the center of the arena (excluding Ruins, of course, run in the open area if you're fighting on ruins), while dealing damage to the paladin to force him back, getting tremors down and getting double fears is the only way to position yourself offensively and start bursting down the target without earth shield until they're out of CDs and die.

Death Knight

- Switch between targets, constantly!

- Never try to burst a target down with Earth Shield on.

- Make sure your priest's safety is guaranteed, grip and peel

- Stomping tremors is essential, sacrificing damage output for CC and mitigation is well worth it against the setup

Shadow Priest

- Don't try to dispel freedoms/sacred on a target with ES on, it's worthless and drains your time/mana

- Make sure you keep your DK topped off on hp at all times and do not shield randomly because of purges, use PW:S smart only when the paladin goes offensive

- The point is to get double fears and burst stuff down with everything you have, meaning that you have to save your silence/disarm/pet in order to score a kill, you need to avoid using these abilities for defense and always try to dominate after fears instead of trying to outlast the enemy

- Do not EVER overextend on a target on low Hp that has CDs left to survive, you will not be able to reset while the enemy team will potentially be able to fully recover.

[ - DK TEAMS - ]

So what if you've been working? Time to demoralize, first of all you have to outplay opposite DK team massively.

First priority is to turtle dk's cooldowns as he's going to use gargoyle in first 30 seconds pretty much.

Use grip first on DK (preferably after freedom is on cd). Sp should disarm DK as soon as he uses empower rune weapon.

Chains of ice DK as soon as he LoSes paladin, they sure like to do that.

After Paladin/DK team has used HoJ, freedom and gargoyle is on cd, and priest seems quite fine on health start consider taking offensive actions. Grip paladin into double fear.

The DK usually Lichbornes on first double fear, so just keep playing defensively.

On second double fear you might get DK trinket, but not paladin, or other way around. If DK trinkets, gnaw him into silence with burst to get paladin use trinket or force more cooldowns at least.

If paladin trinkets but not DK you can do it other way around to make DK trinket or force divine shield.

Depending on situtation you might have to just quickly get on paladin with dots + silence, gnaw, horror (while gargoyle) to get divine shield on cd. Then SP disperses as he just had to tank dk for moment.

Non-paladin/DK teams are significantly easier as you can almost endlessly kite the DK due no dispel or freedom, but roughly same tactics apply to them, make sure sp stays alive.

Oh and remember to drop AMZ on SP, makes huge difference and I almost never see DKs doing that. fear paladin and keep killing warrior.
Just make sure you don't use too many cds going on warrior if paladin/warrior has cooldowns ready.
Going on warrior is necessary vs higher rated teams as otherwise paladin just outranges everything.

- In general sp has to disarm/disperse bladestorms, but if possible, grip it away.
- If paladin is playing at pillar, fear him without using grip. If warrior is buffed up/almost full hp and no dots, swap to paladin.
- Silence paladin fast once you go on him to prevent using cds and dispelling (procs Sacred Cleansing).

Posted 2 days ago by Ricky Permanenz