- Author: Nevermore
- Date: July 6, 2022
- Expansion: WotLK Classic
When it comes to the Frost Death Knight talent builds, we can consider that there is only one standard build that is subjectable to a large number of variations depending on your personal preference. The standard build that we will present you with, is optimized in order to favor increased damage over runic power generation, having in mind that is most suited for BiS scenarios.
Talent Builds
The standard build offers several key strong talents that will be essential for high-end raiding, providing both powerful utility with the Improved Icy Tallons talent and serious damage in the form of Blood-Caked Blade, Necrosis, Howling Blast, and Unbreakable Armor. This build does not require any points in Subversion as by the time you reach high-end raiding your tanks will generate threat consistently. The standard build also benefits from full points spent on Black Ice increasing your overall Shadow and Frost damage by 10%. Considering that this build is specially tailored for characters that benefit from high-end equipment that possess high attack speed, taking full points into Black Ice will severely empower Necrosis!
This build is a variation of the standard build explicitly tailored for early dungeons and low-tier raids, providing you with bonuses such as Subversion to increase your overall critical strike chance and reduce your threat generation. This build does not benefit from Blood-Caked Blade as a tradeoff while also having points attributed in a different manner in the Frost Tree. You will not want to spend full points in Black Ice, favoring Killing Machine and Chill of the Grave instead for increased Runic Power generation and increased frequency of critical strikes due to Killing Machine. The rest of the build presents itself exactly like the standard build.
This build is another variation of the standard build, granting you access to increased damage from Frost Strike while also empowering your overall attack power through the Bladed Armor talent. However, it does suffer from decreased DoT duration and normal Runic Power generation as it does not have any points spent in Epidemic and Chill of the Grave.
This build is another variation of the standard build, designed to offer you both the early stage bonuses such as Subversion and Chill of the Grave while also providing you with tools better suited for the later stages of the expansion such as Blood-Caked Blade and Necrosis. As a result of gaining those bonuses, you will be forced to spend fewer points on Subversion and Killing Machine. The rest of the build works exactly like the standard build.
Notable Talents
Glyphs
Major Glyphs
These are some recommended combinations of glyphs, suited for specific types of PvE content:
- Dungeons: Glyph of Disease / Glyph of Obliterate / Glyph of Howling Blast
- AoE-centric right fights: Glyph of Disease / Glyph of Icy Touch / Glyph of Howling Blast
- Single-target raid fights: Glyph of Disease / Glyph of Obliterate / Glyph of Frost Strike
- High-End Raids: Glyph of Disease / Glyph of Obliterate / Glyph of Icy Touch
Minor Glyphs
About the Author
Early talents don’t seem right, hope that isn’t some private server build.
Your auto-attacks are not dealing that much damage compared to Obliterate or FS before ICC, there is no reason to boost it through Unholy talents.
Increasing the disease time from “Epidemic” is a noob trap, if you are doing your rotation correctly they will not run out, but you can drop 1 point in there if you are new to the FDK and want to grant yourself some room for a mistake.
However, its a considerably better to go 13 in Blood and maybe 5 in Unholy, FS should be your top damage dealing spell, so having extra runic power from Butchery is great, while Bladed Armor allows you to drink +2000 armor pots instead of haste ones – the damage increase is nearly the same, but they should cost much less which is very ice
Basics do top dmg mostly or a little less then ur obliterate btw
Yes, but in ICC, because of the armorpen boost. In Naxx and Ulduar its very far from your main source of damage.
I’m sorry, but the more I look at it the more I dislike it – only 2 points in Black Ice is again, what you do with armorpen build, because this talent has 0 synergy with arp, but it boosts your Obl and FS, which is what you need early on.
I don’t want to go too hard, but I would need to know what is your source or where did you test it to understand why do you recommend this build, because using this build with Necrosis and BCB over so much needed early crit and AP from bladed armor will cripple most newbie DKs who will follow this guide.
Lemme get your build lol
Here you go: https://www.warcrafttavern.com/wotlk/tools/talent-calculator/deathknight?t=B000116666677788888aaaddddffiiikllmmmssstttuxyyyEEEEEIdA11100444449999C111
If previously this was just theorycrafting, I am out-dpsing my peers in raid considerably enough to know that build is affecting it
I have tested this build on the Beta with the starter gear and the damage difference is around 300-400 DPS depending on the procs themselves. I have also tested with a full BiS Naxx character, the damage itself is once again dependent on the procs themselves. You could argue that both builds are viable and functional. Necrosis will not do as much damage as it would in the later phases of the expansion, to that I fully agree.
The attack power difference between the two builds with BiS gear will be around 250-300 in the first phase. Given the difference between Bladed Armor and Ravenous Dead. On your build, you will also have to reset the timer of the diseases faster.
Indeed the damage difference between 5 points in Black Ice and only 2 points can be considerable, however, you will have lesser Frost Strike frequency with your build since you will not generate as much Runic Power.
The whole point for my initial build was to generate more Runic Power at the cost of increased damage. I will add this suggested build to the guide as it also proves quite effective!
Thank you very much for the input, I always appreciate all the feedback received and always implement anything that is useful for every player!
hey ive just started using this unholy subspec and i really like it, nice guide!