Talents: Unholy

To wrap up the series of talent posts we're going to look at what the Unholy tree has to offer for us Bloody Tanks. Unholy seems to be the preferred tree for many Blood DKs to go into for the extra talents, and there's some sweet deals to be had here.

Tier 1
We start off with Unholy Command, an old favorite of mine I had to do away with when I changed into Lichborne and Endless Winter. Death Grip is useful on casters that do not want to come into range, or when you accidentally lose threat on a mob and it starts heading towards a DPS. Or in any situation where you need an extra taunt (The four crocs during Lockmaw in the Lost City of the Tol'vir being on the healer for example), the lower cooldown makes Death Grip available sooner. Definitely not a bad talent to take.

Next up is Virulence, increasing your disease damage by 10% per talent point. If you are religious about applying diseases, and spreading them on trash packs, this talent will be worth your while. The extra damage translates into more threat, keeping you far ahead of the DPS.

Last in the first Unholy tier is Epidemic, which increases the duration of our diseases. Again, if you're tanking with diseases (which you should be doing on the boss regardless), having them last an extra 12 seconds is nothing to sneeze at. This will allow an extra Death Strike rather than having to re-apply your diseases.

Tier 2
There are three options in the second tier of Unholy, but only one of them is really worthwhile for Blood tanking. Morbidity increases the damage of your Death Coil and Death and Decay. Death and Decay is something you should use on every pull with more than one mob as it provides some really good AOE threat . Death Coil is great when you are at range and have some spare Runic Power. I try and shoot a few Death Coils towards the Invoked Flaming Spirits during Drahga Shadowburner in Grim Batol.

Desecration creates a circle under the target of your Plague Strike, slowing them by 50%. While it has its uses, it's not worth spending talent points on for tanking. Being a melee class, I like to be in the thick of it, rather than have mobs chase me slowly; I can't build much threat when I'm ranged.

Last in this tier is Resilient Infection, which gives you free Runes if your diseases are dispelled. Which for instancing should be almost never, so don't waste your points here.

And that concludes my look at the Bloody Tank talent options. As you can see there is quite a bit of play in where to spend your points. Do you want to have your interrupts always available? Or do you want your diseases to last longer? Or maybe spend all your talents in the Blood tree to get the optional items from there.

Good luck spending your points, and leave a comment if you have any questions and I will address them.