Death knight build samples
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This article contains builds submitted by individual WoWWiki editors. Their accuracy is not guaranteed, so read them with caution. For those who want to contribute their own builds here, please add a new subsection under the corresponding section. Please also feel free to add comments to others' builds.
Due to the extensive changes in patch 3.1.0 all builds not up to date by April 22 to the new patch level will be deleted.
Contents |
Blood
Talents in this tree focus on increased damage and health return.
All builds older than patch 3.1 will be deleted on April 22.
Insane Solo PvE Build (55/10/6)
| Purpose | PvE / Solo |
| Talent Link(s) | Wowhead |
| Tested patch | 3.1.1 |
Insane DPS + Insane Survivability : With this build you will be able to level extremely fast with next to 0 deaths! you will need 3 macros : first [F]: /castrandom Blood Strike, Heart Strike second [S]: /castrandom Icy Touch, Obliterate last [L]: /castrandom Death Strike, Plague Strike rotation is : S - F - F - L - S - L - F Spam death coil whenever it is up - pestilence every now and then.
Bloody-Mess PvE Build (71/0/0)
| Purpose | PvE / Solo |
| Talent Link(s) | Wowhead |
| Tested patch | 3.1.0 |
I HAVE UPDATED THIS BUILD TO THE NEWEST PATCH. This will be different from what was posted before slightly. This build is something I built up to as I leveled. I studied what I used as a Blood spec and tried to make my next move help me get to the talents I wanted and needed. So this will not be the highest DPS out there. This is for someone who wants survivability, the ability to solo most world elites that aren't World Boss'. I found that I was the last to die in all raids due to the self healing that I could use. My DPS with good buffs and bad gear was getting in the 1000 to 1100's range. But again with REALLY GOOD BUFFS. I could see a little tweaking and the new patch would make this a pretty decent tank spec, although I have never tried to tank with this... I think this with the correct tanking gear could do wonders. I of course have DPS gear. Good Luck!!!
Vampiric Knight (46/5/20)
| Purpose | PvE/PvP, Multi-target tank |
| Talent Link(s) | Wowhead |
| Tested patch | 3.1.1 |
This is a great build for grinding, PvP, 5-mans, and probably raiding. Typically, I can run into a crowd of 6-8 mobs my same level, disease up one, spread it to the rest with pestilence, then mash them with Heart Strikes and Blood Boils, and Death Strike when life becomes critical. Switch targets and re-Pestilence once the diseases are almost up, if you haven't already killed all of them. Definitely use Imp. Blood Presence as the damage boost and leech is critical for multiple targets. If you hit 50% life, pop Vampiric Blood, Hysteria, and maybe a Mark of Blood, and watch as your enemies melt in front of you. If you remember to keep Horn of Winter on, (depending on your gear of course) you will be critting for between 2500 and 4000 from the mid-70s, and nearly twice that with epic loot at 80. Enjoy!
Blood + master of Ghouls (44/0/27)
| Purpose | PvE/ Soloing/ Grinding |
| Talent Link(s) | Wowhead |
| Tested patch | 3.1.1 |
This is a build that conserves all of the best parts of blood but allows you to still get master of ghouls and unholy blight. I use this to max out my DPS because you can get an extra amount of pet damage plus the damage you can get from blood spec.
Blood w/ Deathstrike raid (51/2/18)
| Purpose | Raiding/ Soloing/ Grinding |
| Talent Link(s) | Wowhead |
| Tested patch | 3.1.1 |
A fairly simple build that scales well with gear, likely outperforming the above build for well geared players.
Rotation: plague strike - icy touch - heart strike *2 - Deathstrike - death coils (or dancing rune weapon if availible)
Deathstrike - heart strike *4 -death coils
Some players prefer to take the icy touch glyph and replace the second deathstrike with plague strike and icy touch. This allows epademic to be dropped for ravenous dead. To maximise dps, dancing rune weapon should be used on cooldown when you have 130 runic power and you should use hysteria on yourself on cooldown (unless you have decimate flesh or any other type of debuff where this will likely kill you!)
Blood Tanking (56/5/10)
| Purpose | Tank |
| Talent Link(s) | Wowhead |
| Tested patch | 3.1.1 |
A blood-based tanking build. There is some flexibility in distribution for the points in bloodworms and spell deflection. I can't find any definitive information on how much the worms were buffed recently - it may make more sense have imp. blood presence or other talents. I have no issue with runic power - in fact I am usually finding myself topped off, as your only runic power dump is death coil. This build can handle single target tanking very well, but is probably one of the weaker AOE tanking builds. Blood boil is your friend here. Initial mob pickup is DnD -> deathgrip a caster -> IT -> PS -> Pestilence -> Blood Tap -> blood boil. Keep your diseases up with pestilence, and keep cycling between heart strike and death strike for the self-heals and death runes. Pop Vampiric Embrace at 50% health, then hit your rune tap -> Death strike combo and you're up to full in a hurry. One of the primary uses of a ghoul is to fire Death Pact for a very quick 40% heal. Drop mark of blood on bosses - and you have some strong staying power.
Blood Dps (51/2/18)
| Purpose | Dps |
| Talent Link(s) | Wowhead |
| Tested patch | 3.1.1 |
Rotation= IT,PS,HS,HS,DS,DC,HS,HS,HS til cant anymore than repeat when needed renew diseases repeat I made macro /castseqeuence reset=target Icy Touch,Plague Strike for diseases Pestilence on mobs and Rune Weapon when needed on bosses use Hysteria. On lvl 75 dummy with a lvl 75 dk i got =1323 dps with no Hysteria or Rune Weapon over 1 min
Blood Raid DPS (51/0/20)
| Purpose | PvE Solo/Raid DPS |
| Talent Link(s) | Wowhead |
| Tested patch | 3.2.2 |
Rotation = IT, PS, HS, HS or Pestilence (depending on number of mobs), DS, DC, HSx4, Pestilence to refresh diseases, DS to get more death runes This build can make quick work of your enemies from Heart Strike spam caused by using Pestilence to keep your diseases up, allowing more Death Strikes to make Death Runes.
Frost
Talents in this tree focus on spells and control, such as Frost Presence. Frost is a tree built for critical burst damage. This can be seen in the tree's talents.
Deep Frost Tank (13/51/7)
| Purpose | Tanking |
| Talent Link(s) | Blizzard |
| Tested patch | 3.2.0 |
This build should be able to maintain a very respectable amount of threat on single targets as well as groups. An auto-crit Howling Blast is worth a TON of threat in most any situation.
Rotation= Icy Touch, Plague Strike (to get diseases going), Blood Strike, Howling Blast, then Frost Strike to dump runic power. Make sure you're hitting Rune Strike every time it comes up...it's only 20 RP and generates a lot of threat to a single target. Blood boil is a good aggro generator when you're waiting for cooldown on Howling Blast. In situations where you need to generate a large amount of initial threat, drop Death & Decay and pull the first target into the D&D circle with Death Grip.
This macro for Howling Blast auto-casts Deathchill whenever it is up to guarantee a crit:
"#showtooltip Howling Blast
/cast Deathchill
/cast Howling Blast"
Sanctity's PvP Build (18/53/0)
| Purpose | PvP / Solo |
| Talent Link(s) | Blizzard |
| Tested patch | 3.1.0 |
Build that uses primarily Howling Blast Obliterate and Frost Strike. Oblit gains 24% extra crit on top of what your own crit is making this even in high resil pvp gear (lets say 10% crit reduction) a 30-40% critical chance high dmging attack. Since the only two spells you could use your KM and Deathchill are HB and FS theese too get insanely high overall crit rate. Great burst dmg can be achieved through Rime procks coupled with KM.
This Build could be altered if you do not like Acclimation or swap out Icy Reach for Runic Power Mastery or Chill of the grave for more FSs. Some might even go into Unholy for Stun Reduction, Disease Lenghth and Lower CD on Grip.
Positives: High Controlled Burst dmg. (you can choose to sue Oblits and Save your KM procks for an opportune moment) Moderate survivability (Reduce dmg effects, 10% higher health, Rune Tap, Acclimation and Toughness) Moderate CC (50% AoE slow, Hungering cold)
Negatives: Vulnerable to Dispells (You'll hate dispellers and will need to use Icy Touch to get to them lowering your dmg) Downtime mid combat (Original build will have about 2-3 seconds of having no Runes or RP in which your dmg will be misserable however that can be fixed with glyphs/talents at expence of dmg)
P.S. - Yes this build only uses frost fever disease due to the fact 2/3 of your attacks dont rely on it, and the boost to the 1/3 is not substancial enough to make a difference
Frost / blood hybrid (32/32/7)
| Purpose | Tanking / questing |
| Talent Link(s) | Blizzard |
| Tested patch | 3.1.0 |
This is a tanking build made to utilise Improved Frost Presence and Improved Blood Presence for damage reduction and increased healing, with the improvement to spell deflection the talent now becomes worth while along with veteran of the thrid war and bloody strikes. At the cost of some dodge and morbidity extra points can be put into frost to gain Unbreakable Armor (making this far more useful against multiple enemys) or blood for hysteria and sudden doom. There is also freedom lower down to switch talents about as you prefer like runetap and blackice. This build works fine as a single target boss tanking build and has been used to tank Sartharion with 3 drakes up. Aggro is sufficient against multiple targets with the extra blood boil damage and d&d however if you find yourself taking multiple it maybe be worth gettings deathrune mastery to gain death runes for extra blood boil when required.
Simple rotation with no reapering IT - PS - BS - BS - OB -DC -DC AOE tanking D&D - ps - IT -pest - - - - BB - OB - BB - OB
Strengths: Good mitigation, healing increase, easy to play, easily features Improved Icy Talons increasing melee dps in raids massively.
Weaknesses: Reduced aggro and dps particularly on multiple targets compared to other tanking builds since it is without frost strike, howling blast or tundra stalker. Build is also physical damage heavy and tanking gear tends to have very little armor penetration rating and death knights have no armor reduction moves so without warriors or rogues in a raid aggro reduction is significant.
Nosferatmoo's frost tank build (12/53/6)
| Purpose | Tanking |
| Talent Link(s) | Blizzard |
| Tested patch | 3.1.0 |
This tanking build gives +5 to expertise with Tundra Stalker, a 3% chance to hit reduction with Frigid Dreadplate, a 2% damage reduction with Improved Frost Presence, and adds Unbreakable Armor to you emergency mitigation buttons.
Sample Rotations:
For elite mobs of four or more the suggested rotation is Death and Decay, pop Deathchill then Howling Blast, Blood Boil, Icy Touch, Plague Strike, Pestilence, Blood Boil, Howling Blast. I typically do not bust another DnD after the first one and continue with IT, PS, Pest, BB, HB. It is suggested to macro deathchill and howling blast together. Three mobs or less an IT, PS, Pest, BB, HB rotation is safe to start the encounter with.
For bosses or single targets the suggested rotation is icy touch, plague strike, blood strike, blood strike, obliterate, with frost strikes until your first frost rune is off cooldown. It suggested to macro rune strike with another ability such as blood strike for simplicity.
Extras:
hungering cold: Though typically a PvP talent it does add a bit of crowd control while tanking multiple mobs or similar situations. Keep in mind that any damage outside of disease ticks will break the effect.
rime: chosen over killing machine for its +15% crit chance on IT and Oblit and free HB proc.
improve icy talons: procs a 20% haste increase party or raid wide. Does not stack with any other haste increase buffs, so if the player regularly runs with another class that provides a similar buff it is suggested that this talent point is placed elsewhere.
WhiteReaver's Frost DW DPS Build (3/53/15)
| Purpose | Frost DPS |
| Talent Link(s) | Blizzard |
| Tested patch | 3.2.0 |
A good little dual-wield spec which, when using Glyph of Disease, allows you to refresh your diseases with a single Pestilence. This combined with the increased disease duration allows you to use your two death runes for an obliterate and still refresh afterwards with a single blood rune, allowing for long chains of Obliterate spam. This setup obviously can be tweaked for 2h with a little shifting about.
Example rotation: Plague > Touch > Blood St. > Pestilence > Howling > Obliterate > Obliterate > Obliterate
Use Blood St. > Pestilence whenever diseases are about to expire (theres loads of time) and replace an obliterate with Howling any time it comes off cooldown, in the event of a Freezing Fog proc it is reccommended that you use all runes beforehand as the disease refreshing can be a little tight on time using this method. Frost Strikes should be used as RP dumps when runes are on CD and Freezing Fog is not active.
Unholy
Talents in this tree have a variety of functions including summons, diseases, and PvP-focused abilities, such as Unholy Presence.
Straight forward Unholy dps build with 2 variations,
Sanctity's UH dps Build Blood (16/0/55)
| Purpose | Unholy DPS |
| Talent Link(s) | Blizzard |
| Tested patch | 3.1.0 |
Blood gives ap boost/crit boost
Sanctity's UH dps Build Frost (3/13/55)
| Purpose | Unholy DPS |
| Talent Link(s) | Blizzard |
| Tested patch | 3.1.0 |
Frost gives 10% flat shadow dmg, IT dmg
UH tank (10/8/53)
| Purpose | Guess from the name |
| Talent Link(s) | Blizzard |
| Tested patch | 3.1.1 |
Easiest instance tanking build. Unholy blight is great for picking up adds spawning in fights with random aggro and general aoe aggro.
This is my own personal PvP build, its based on Diseases and the Runic Power regeneration from Butchery, which is why i didnt spec Dirge. This build has the healing of Rune Tap and Improved Rune Tap while you gain + Attack power from Bladed Armor and your spells will benefit more due to Impurity.
Costas84's Unholy PvP Build (18/0/53)
| Purpose | Battleground PvP |
| Talent Link(s) | Blizzard |
| Tested patch | 3.1.3 |
I am sure that you will do great with my build :) You can start off by using Plague Strike then Icy Touch to apply the diseases.
Unholystam Build (23/5/43)
| Purpose | Tank |
| Talent Link(s) | Blizzard |
| Tested patch | 3.1.0 |
rotation: D&D>IT>PS>Pest>BT>BB>UB keep D&D and UB up as much as possible and if needed death strike if your healer is the suck mine heals for 4.5k
3Specc Build (19/26/26)
| Purpose | PvP |
| Talent Link(s) | Blizzard |
| Tested patch | 3.2.2 |
This is my own PvP build which focuses mainly on not being attacked with capped dodge and Rune tap and pull of maximum damage with all crit talents.
Unholy Destruction (24/2/45)
| Purpose | PvP/PvE |
| Talent Link(s) | Blizzard |
| Tested patch | 3.2.2 |
This build allows for awesome survivability and high reaching DPS in both PvP and PvE/Raid situations. Includes recommended glyphs as well.
