D.I.S.C. Belt Effects Revisited Post-Buffs – A New Champion Emerges in Patch 11.1.7

Patch 11.1.7: Legacy of Arathor OverviewGuide to Overcharged Delves

Titan D.I.S.C Breakdown – Round 2

The Durable Information Securing Container is going to be available in a few short days, and Blizzard has just hotfixed some further tuning to these effects. Let’s see exactly what’s changed.

Durable Information Securing Container

Minimum Item level increased to 691
Maximum Item level increased to 701

In the previous article, I had mistakenly inferred the maximum item level as 700 due to typical upgrade track math. This was incorrect, as in-game, it only went up to 694, but has now been adjusted to 701. With this change, it will now take 4 weeks to upgrade to maximum item level.

Charged Bolts

Charged Bolts damage increased by 141%
Charged Bolts now ticks immediately on application

The tuning to Charged Bolts is quite frankly insane. The MASSIVE buff to its damage, and increasing its number of ticks from 5 per proc to 6 per proc, end up buffing the damage done by this effect by about 2.9x compared to previously. On its own, the damage buff would probably make this one of the best choices for effects, but increasing its tick count at the same time easily makes this the best effect for almost all specs, in almost all scenarios.

With Blizzard’s stated goals of these buffs to make this effect competitive with the other effects present, they overshot the mark drastically, making this effect just blatantly too powerful compared to the other options. Now, is this effect too strong? Or are the others too weak? In my honest opinion, this effect is likely overturned. Would much rather see this effect average in the 2% DPS range, while many specilizations at the moment are clocking it in at over 3%.

Verdict: S Tier

Cauterizing Bolts

Cauterizing Bolts healing increased by 32%
Cauterizing Bolts now ticks immediately on application

While similar in concept to the Charged Bolts buffs, these are a bit less substantial. But, the changes do allow for this effect to generally keep up in healing potential when compared to the stat effects. All in all, making this effect quite solid for players looking for some extra passive healing during progression when healing matters. For reclears, stats will likely end up better due to allowing for better damage potential without hindering healing potential much.

Verdict: A Tier

Critical Chain

Critical Chain Critical Strike rating increased by 43%
Critical Chain’s Proc rate no longer increases with Haste

Critical Chain saw both a buff and a nerf simultaneously. It will give more stats, but proc less often. With it still having a 20-second internal cooldown on this effect, the impact of that will significantly reduce its uptime compared to what you’d normally expect from a 1.5rppm effect with a 20s duration. All in all, this is a minor buff to the effect, but it’s still far from good, nor even competitive with alternative options unless your specialization really likes crit, and dislikes all other stats.

With an average uptime of about 36.5% and an average of 5 stacks, at 1014.08 critical strike rating per stack, you can expect this effect to give an average of 1851 critical strike rating at 701 item level. A 684 item level belt would provide 1826 passive stats, making this effect just barely better than a 684 belt. The only reason this effect is clearly an upgrade rather than a sidegrade at that item level comes from the increased primary stat the belt provides. With Blizzard’s stated goal of making this more competitive with the other effects, I’d say they have failed pretty miserably with Critical Chain.

Verdict: C Tier

Spark Burst

Spark Burst Haste rating increased by 45%

Significant buffs to this effect, without any nerfs around its proc rate, unlike the other stat effects, make it a compelling option.

At 701 item level, this effect provides 5635 haste rating, with a proc rate of 1.5rppm and a 20-second duration, we can expect this effect to average about 42.4% uptime. Overall, this would average out to 2389 haste rating provided by this effect, making it a reasonable upgrade over a 684 item level belt before even considering the primary stat increase. A comparable 701 item level basic belt would provide 1943 total secondary stats. This is about where I would expect most of the stat effects to land, just a bit better than an equal item level counterpart.

Verdict: A Tier

Static Charge

Static Charge Internal Cooldown reduced to 0.75s
Static Charge’s Proc rate no longer scales with Haste

This is overall just a blanket nerf to this effect. With no buffs to the stats provided, faster periods between decrementing stacks, and a reduced proc rate, just absolutely murdered this effect.

At the maximum item level of 701, this effect provides 371.44 Versatility rating per stack. With an average of 10 stacks and an average uptime of about 38.5% on a specialization with a GCD of about 0.9 seconds, we can expect this effect to provide 1430 versatility rating on average. This is just blatantly worse than an equal item level belt, and doesn’t even come close to a 684 item level belt. If it were not for the increased primary stat budget a 701 item level belt has, this effect wouldn’t even be an upgrade over a 684 belt for any specialization.

Verdict: F Tier

Electric Current

Electric Current Mastery rating increased by 8%

This effect received the smallest buff of the bunch, just a minor bump to the rating it provides.

At the maximum item level of 701, this effect provides 339 Mastery rating. With an average stack count of 6 stacks, we can expect this effect to provide 2034 average Mastery Rating. This is slightly higher than a 701 item level belt without these effects, making this solidly okay unless your specialization dislikes mastery.

Verdict: B Tier

Charged Touch

Charged Touch Healing increased by 15%

Overall, the buffs to this effect are minor, though it was already quite good before; it’s still solidly good now. Generally ends up slightly worse than Cauterizing Bolts in healing potential, though, leaving this effect in an awkward spot where it doesn’t really have much of a niche to shine in.

Verdict: B Tier

Energy Shield

Energy Shield Shield value increased by 15%

With such a minor buff to the shield value, not a whole lot changes with this effect. Still likely won’t be a primary choice for tank players, as raw stats are still likely to just give more defensive and offensive value. For purely offensive value, there’s the clear choice in Charged Bolts, even with its 33% reduced effectiveness for tank players. Leaving this effect with no real use case.

Verdict: C Tier

Charged Crystal

Charged Crystal Damage increased by 40%

Being only slightly better than Charged Bolts previously, and receiving a significantly smaller buff to its value, this effect ends up reasonably competitive with the better stat effects. But, when compared to Charged Bolts, it falls flat on its face, having no niche, no place you would ever want to utilize this effect.

Verdict: B Tier

Simulations

While this doesn’t cover every specialization, it should provide a wide enough spread to get a general idea of the power of each effect.

All simulations were run with a 701 item level D.I.S.C
Baseline results (denoted by the – in the percentage column) are utilizing a 684 basic belt

Single Target

AoE (5 targets, 5 minutes)

Single Target
Shattering Blade

Breath of Sindragosa

Mythic+ (Cinderbrew +18)
Shattering Blade

Breath of Sindragosa

Single Target

Mythic+ (Cinderbrew +18)

Single Target

AoE (5 targets, 5 minutes)

Single Target

AoE (8 targets, 1 minute)

M+ (DungeonSlice)

Titan Disc Tier List

Conclusion

To quote Blizzard’s stated intentions of these changes:

I’d say, in general, they entirely missed this mark. The tuning ended up just all over the place, with stat effects providing wildly different amounts of stats on average compared to an equal item level belt. Even just comparing the stat values between the effects themselves, we see up to a 67% difference in average rating between the worst and best. On top of this, the damage-only options, Charged Bolts and Charged Crystal, aren’t even remotely comparable anymore; Charged Bolts just always wins. I’m genuinely not sure what went wrong with this tuning pass, but more work needs to be done for the intention of these changes, “to make the different effects more competitive with each other for more players,” to be achieved.

All in all, the effects are slightly better than last week (except Static Charge, rest in peace). Making the belt a more compelling option for most players, though the effects are still incredibly bland and run of the mill, at least players might notice a power increase week to week.

About the Author
Taeznak is a long time Unholy player, theorycrafter and moderator on the Death Knight Discord server, Acherus. I also help maintain Simulationcraft, supporting both Death Knights as a whole, as well as implementing many of the special effect items you run sims for. If you have any questions about the guide or the content, feel free to reach out to me on discord.