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Frost Death Knight in Shadowlands - DPS Strengths, Best Covenants, Soulbinds and Legendaries
Shadowlands
Publié
17/11/2020 à 15:43
par
Bicepspump
Shadowlands launches on November 23rd / 24th and all classes will be getting new toys to play with -- from Covenant abilities, to Conduits and returning Legendary effects! This article, written by Bicepspump, will provide details on the current state of Frost DK in Shadowlands, to help you to prepare for the upcoming expansion!
This article is a follow-up on the previous
article
about the Frost Death Knight on the Shadowlands Beta. I'll discuss the changes we'll see from Pre-Patch to the Shadowlands, talk about coventants, soulbinds and legendaries, as well as covering an array of interesting topics related to the gameplay of Frost DKs in Shadowlands.
As always, shoutout to the Acherus community for providing an endless amount of constructive discussion.
About the Author
This guide is written by Khazak, a Death Knight player since 5.4. Besides writing guides, I am active in
Acherus, the Death Knight class Discord
, and a maintainer on SimulationCraft, contributing code implementations and APLs for Frost Death Knights. I raid in Agency on Zul'jin-US and sometimes stream raids on
Twitch
. I am always happy to take questions or comments about the guide through Discord.
I made a video covering the content of this article as well. Do have a watch if you fancy.
Check out all our Shadowlands Launch Opinion articles by our Class Writers and members of the community! Click on any of the colored specs below to see what articles we've released so far.
These guides were meant to give you a preview of what's to come in the expansion, but don't worry -- our full Shadowlands Class Guides will be updated soon!
Blood Death Knight
Arcane Mage
Assassination Rogue
Frost Death Knight
Fire Mage
Outlaw Rogue
Unholy Death Knight
Frost Mage
Subtlety Rogue
Havoc Demon Hunter
Brewmaster Monk
Elemental Shaman
Vengeance Demon Hunter
Mistweaver Monk
Enhancement Shaman
Balance Druid
Windwalker Monk
Restoration Shaman
Feral Druid
Holy Paladin
Affliction Warlock
Guardian Druid
Protection Paladin
Demonology Warlock
Restoration Druid
Retribution Paladin
Destruction Warlock
Beast Mastery Hunter
Discipline Priest
Arms Warrior
Marksmanship Hunter
Holy Priest
Fury Warrior
Survival Hunter
Shadow Priest
Protection Warrior
Class Changes and Talents
The majority of the core changes between BFA and Shadowlands are already present in the Pre-Patch. However, we do gain new spells as we level up, as well as losing both Azerite Essences and Azerite Traits. Furthermore, covenants will partially affect the talent we choose. Let's take a look at the impact of these gains and losses.
Notable Changes in Beta Cycle
Let's take a look at a couple of significant changes that have come throughout the beta cycle, related to the new systems we encounter in Shadowlands.
Dû de la mort
- Instead of gaining the strength based off the ability doing damage, it's now from your
Anéantissement
hitting enemies. Duration of the buff was also nerfed. However, the ability also got a huge buff through an
Anéantissement
cleave effect.
Anéantissement
hits one additional target when you're standing in your
Dû de la mort
.
Entrave d’indignité
- Was changed from spreading on its own (small probability) to an active spread with rune-consuming abilities. The spell is decent in AoE where we can effectively spread it on multiple targets.
Covenant Abilities and Conduits Impact on Talent Choices
Only a few Covenant abilities and conduits actually affect our talent picks. Let's take a look at which ones those are!
Dû de la mort
- Specific synergy with
Oblitération
in AoE scenarios. You pop your
Pilier de givre
, follow up with
Dû de la mort
and then weave in multiple
Anéantissement
s buffed with
Machine à tuer
for massive damage. We get both the cleave and the strength gain!
Brume écrasante
- Great synergy with
Souffle de Sindragosa
. The Runic Power generation is massive for increasing the duration of your
Souffle de Sindragosa
, specifically when we can leverage multiple mobs for more RP.
Coup d’éradication
and
Frénésie débridée
- These conduits have anti-synergy with
Souffle de Sindragosa
due to
Frappe de givre
being less emphasised. This means that they are
less
of an upgrade when speccing into this talent. They still increase your damage, but less so compared to other builds.
Permagivre
- Strong synergy with
Tempête grandissante
since they both buff
Hiver impitoyable
.
Level-Up Abilities
Anéantissement amélioré
(level 52) - 20% to
Anéantissement amélioré
is significant to builds that rely heavily on your overall damage output from
Anéantissement amélioré
. This buff helps
Oblitération
builds and thefore also the viability of 2H builds.
Pacte sacrificiel
(level 54) - A completely new ability that enables us to explode the ghoul we summon through
Réanimation morbide
. This is both AoE damage as well as a useful heal. For pure single target, we want to use this ability just before the ghoul dies on its own (it doesn't matter too much if you do this, not using the ability is pretty much neutral dps). You can use it earlier if you need to heal to stay alive! For AoE, again use it at the end of the duration as default, or trigger it early if you can hit more enemies doing so!
Renforcer l’arme runique
(level 56) - A rather odd rank 2 since it just desyncs with everything in our kit. Both
Pilier de givre
and
Souffle de Sindragosa
come off CD every 2 minutes. You'd definitely hold
Renforcer l'arme runique
for
Souffle de Sindragosa
and probably for
Pilier de givre
as well. I'd ideally like to see the haste portion be buffed instead.
Fauche-Givre
(level 58) - Now this is a huge rank 2 ability. Making your
Anéantissement amélioré
s do frost damage when they consume procs of
Machine à tuer
significantly
increases their potential. We bypass the ~30% reduction on physical attacks due to armour, as well as gaining ~50%+ damage due to our mastery
Maîtrise : Cœur gelé
. The result is roughly a 200% increase on the crit coming from
Machine à tuer
compared to a regular crit. This is a significant buff to
Oblitération
since the value of
Machine à tuer
procs is so much higher. It's also great for 2H since it makes the
Oblitération
build viable.
Oblitération
DW is within 1% of
Souffle de Sindragosa
DW on pure single target.
Oblitération
2H is within 4% of
Souffle de Sindragosa
DW on pure single target.
These are still early numbers but it's very promising for 2H builds as well as
Oblitération
.
Impact of Azerite Traits and Essences loss
The impact of losing Azerite and Essences depends heavily on build for the Frost Death Knight.
Chape de glace
loses a
tremendous
amount of power since it derives the majority of its damage increase from Azerite Traits.
Souffle de Sindragosa
also suffers slightly due to a resource loss.
Souvenir des rêves lucides
- Losing Lucid minor is most significant for
Souffle de Sindragosa
since it was pumping up its duration.
Citadelle glacée
and
Indignation de dragonnet de givre
- The majority of the power of
Chape de glace
comes from gaining more value off these two Azerite traits. Losing them is a huge nerf to
Chape de glace
, essentially removing its competitiveness completely in Shadowlands.
Raid Build
Here's a go-to raid talent build:
Swap out
Onde gelée
for
Avalanche
if you're wielding a 2H weapon.
Swap out
Onde gelée
for
Avalanche
if you're wielding a 2H weapon.
Covenant Abilities
There are 4 pairs of covenant class abilities and covenant signature abilities to take a look at.
Kyrian
Entrave d’indignité
(Class ability) - A hasted DoT that lasts for 14 seconds. Using direct abilities that cost runes on the target with the DoT has a chance (50%) to spread the DoT with its
remaining
duration to another target (it's a bit weird atm and isn't exactly remaining duration, close enough though). Can't jump to targets that already have the DoT. The ability works best in single target but also scales well in AoE. In AoE scenarios, your
Faux de givre
and
Rafale hurlante
can
proc the spread on targets that aren't your main targets. However, the spread mechanic has an internal GCD of 1 second. This means that only a single spread can happen each GCD. The probability of spreading increases with the number of targets you hit with the DoT though.
1 Target -> 50%
2 Targets -> 75%
3 Targets -> 87.5%
4 Targets -> 93.75%
As you can see, the more targets that have the DoT, the faster it spreads. The spread can quickly ramp up to all targets if you get lucky spreads in the beginning.
Prolifération
(Conduit) - Increases damage by 20% and duration with 3 seconds. Solid conduit that provides a longer duration to spread the DoT in AoE.
Invocation de régisseur
(Signature ability) - A nice utility ability that provides both a heal as well as a cleanse. Good defensive option.
Necrolord
Membre abominable
(Class ability) - A 2-minute AoE cooldown. Hits a total of 13 times (direct initial hit) and is hard-capped at 5 targets. The targets that are pulled also receive a damage tick. First time hooking a target provides a proc of
Frimas
. It's currently unclear how the proc gain works as it doesn't seem like the hook needs to be successful. The grip-portion isn't that powerful in PvE sadly. We'd pick this ability for AoE scenarios, ideally when there are adds or bick packs that show up every 2 minutes and where there aren't more than 5 mobs turning up to the party.
Étreinte brutale
(Conduit) - Flat damage increase. Solid dps gain in AoE.
Chair recomposée
(Signature ability) - A nice shield that unfortunately requires a long channel. Can be useful in raids when channeled during downtime. Useful in Mythic + since the channel can be done before engaging a pack.
Night Fae
Dû de la mort
(Class ability) - Replaces your
Mort et décomposition
, effectively adding an effect that causes targets damaged by your
Anéantissement
to deal 1% less damage to you, stacking up to 8 times. You also gain 1% strength per target hit, also stacking up to 8 times (the buff lasts for 12 seconds). Your
Anéantissement
s also cleave to one additional target when you're standing in your
Dû de la mort
. This cleave is really powerful in cleave and specifically works really well with
Oblitération
. You pop your
Pilier de givre
, follow up with
Dû de la mort
and then weave in multiple
Anéantissement
s buffed with
Machine à tuer
for massive damage.
Sol flétrissant
(Conduit) - Extra damage to
Mort et décomposition
doesn't look too appealing honestly. Possibly a solid choice for AoE scenarios.
Forme d’âme
(Signature ability) - A teleport and a speed boost is great for us slow death knights. When you're transformed into a Vulpin you cannot use any spells or abilities but it's still very useful to move around quickly. You can even teleport multiple times in the 12 second window!
Venthyr
Brume écrasante
(Class ability) - An AoE with both a small increase in survivability as well as runic power generation. The spell ticks a total of 9 times (there's an instant initial tick). Every tick itself can generate a maximum of 15 runic power, making 135 the maximum generation possible. For a single target, you would generate 27 runic power. This is mainly an AoE ability that generates a ridiculous amount of runic power, as well as dealing heavy damage in big AoE. It synergises extremely well with
Souffle de Sindragosa
due to the Runic Power generation. It's okay for single target (37 total Runic Power for a single rune) but truly shines in AoE. When we can leverage the increased Runic Power gain from multiple target we'll be able to significantly extend our
Souffle de Sindragosa
window.
Obscurité impénétrable
(Conduit) - A small increase in dodge chance as well as a buff to the ability itself. Looks like a solid conduit since the ability already does good damage.
Porte des ombres
(Signature spell) - A teleport that unfortunately requires channeling time. Can be useful in raiding environment when running a long distance. Also good for Mythic + for potential skips.
Covenant Choice
The covenant choice for the Frost Death Knight depends heavily on what build you want to focus on. There's therefore two tabs in this section, one for
Oblitération
and one for
Souffle de Sindragosa
.
Choosing a Covenant for
Oblitération
is tricky. On the one hand, we have
Kyrian
that has a solid single target ability as well as a great soulbind. On the other hand, we have
Night Fae
which provides juicy cleave with
Dû de la mort
. I do think, more often than not, prioritising single target throughput is more important. I would thefore choose
Kyrian
as my covenant.
If I were to pick a covenant today, I'd pick
Venthyr
. The initial soulbind spells are appealing (both Mistblade and Theotar) and the covenant ability synergises so well with
Souffle de Sindragosa
. There are simply too many situations where you'll be able to leverage the increased Runic Power gain!
Here
is a guide to all death knight covenant abilities!
Conduits
There are 4 frost specific potency conduits to consider. The potency conduits associated with our covenant abilities are discussed in the section above. I do not think the potency conduits for the covenant class abilities will outperform any of our class-specific conduits. This list below is in general priority. I'd pick
Permagivre
as my priority and follow up with
Froidure accélérée
.
Permagivre
- The best potency conduit by a large margin. It's best on both AoE and single target, essentially making it the go-to pick for any build. Also synergises really well with
Tempête grandissante
, making us more likely to pick up this talent as well.
Froidure accélérée
- Second best conduit for all builds. The important aspect of it comes through the
haste increase
. The cooldown reduction just makes us hold it for longer before we line it up with our cooldowns... Works well in single and AoE which is a good benefit!
Frénésie débridée
- Third slot for all builds. Doesn't synergise that well with
Souffle de Sindragosa
but neither does
Coup d’éradication
. Mostly a single target conduit but can be useful in AoE in the few scenarios you press
Frappe de givre
.
Coup d’éradication
- Least amount of single target damage and no scaling in AoE, this potency is lackluster in all areas.
There are also some interesting endurance and finesse conduits:
Drain d’esprit
- Only non-potency conduit that provides a dps increase. Really nice to have a reward for successful interrupting.
Os endurcis
- Best defensive endurance option. Really nice to attach an extra damage reduction to
Changeliche
, transforming the spell into a proper extra defensive cooldown.
Protection renforcée
- Bigger and longer
Zone anti-magie
can be very useful in a raid setting!
You can read more about our conduits on the
death knight conduit page
Soulbinds
I've already mentioned the soulbinds when discussing the best Covenant. They are a significant factor when choosing your covenants since the abilities you gain from them provide significant dps boosts. To provide some context, it's really difficult to compare the soulbinds due to them differing on so many points. Some soulbinds have an initial ability that is a dps boost, some don't. The Renown level required to gain potency conduits is different across the different soulbinds, something that is crucial since it determines when you can receive dps upgrades from them. Finally, some soulbinds have their final dps spell behind a non-potency conduit, meaning you need to choose to either have two potencies, or one potency and the dps spell.
Here are my recommended soulbins for the Covenants I mentioned above.
I recommend choosing the
Pelagos
soulbind.
The path is pretty straightforward. We aim for double potency, picking them up in our priority. We choose the finesse path in the penultimate node to pick up
Drain d’esprit
for the potential dps increase.
I recommend choosing the
Nadjia
soulbind.
First part of the three is just about getting that first potency conduit. In the lower portion, we prioritise
Mise au point des préparatifs
since a second potency conduit isn't that valuable for
Souffle de Sindragosa
.
Legendaries
Legendary Powers
Shadowlands brings with it a number of legendary powers for us to use. A couple of the effects have been seen before but we also get lots of completely fresh ones.
Picking a Legendary
For Raids, I'd choose
Faveur de Koltira
. It's the best single target throughput legendary, working well with both
Souffle de Sindragosa
and
Oblitération
.
For Mythic +, I'd pick up
Froid mordant
. It's the best AoE legendary which also does solid damage in AoE. The free
Frimas
is great as you engage AoE packs!
General Powers
Caresse de la mort
- A purely defensive legendary which makes
Carapace anti-magie
much more potent. Can see potential niche use when there are magic abilities that must be soaked, and a normal
Carapace anti-magie
can't get the job done. It has a tiny offensive perk since it can allow for a greater amount of Runic Power generation.
Poigne de l’éternité
- Providing a small utility increase through the decreased cooldown and an extra subsequent grip. This legendary will probably not see use in any end-game PVE situation for us. If you want lots of grips, you bring a Blood DK.
Peuromones
- A significant damage increase connected to your
Mort et décomposition
makes the ability worthwhile to use in single target. A good legendary to pick up if you want something that works on all the DK specs.
Souche résistante
- This legendary provides us with both
Peste virulente
and
Peste de sang
, both giving some damage (the extra DoTs are nerfed compared to their vanilla version) as a perk through
Peste de sang
. It heals you for all the damage it deals! Small note, the part of
Peste virulente
the explodes on death is actually
not nerfed
in damage. It's therefore a bit more powerful that it probably should be. Generally a solid AoE legendary that also works well across specs!
Frost Specific
Zéro absolu
- An old Legion legendary has returned. A 50% cooldown reduction on
Fureur du wyrm de givre
can play into very specific fights where it allows you to harvest the insane AoE burst of the ability. If a fight has adds showing up every 90 seconds, with very high priority, this legendary might be the play. The stun is a nice addition which has value mostly in M+.
Froid mordant
- Inspired from
Tempête gelée
with a % damage gain instead of a flat one, this legendary has a lot of potential in AoE. The free
Frimas
has great potential since it sends off your burst with high damage and free DoT application. I think this will be the go-to legendary for Mythic + due to the big AoE gain.
Faveur de Koltira
- Another legendary power based off an old Legion legendary. It has great synergy with builds based off of
Anéantissement
. Both because it increases
Anéantissement
damage, but also because it generates lots of runes throughout a fight, resulting in more
Anéantissement
s. It also synergises really well with
Souffle de Sindragosa
. You generally use
Anéantissement
lots in your
Souffle de Sindragosa
windows. The extra runes here will
significantly
increase the duration of
Souffle de Sindragosa
! This legendary is the best single target legendary for all builds at the moment.
Rage du champion gelé
- This Legendary is essentially the T19 set-bonus of Nighthold baked into one. If you remember the durations of
Souffle de Sindragosa
from those days, you should already know what this legendary synergises with. It's a significant boost to your duration of
Souffle de Sindragosa
! This legendary is a strong contender to
Faveur de Koltira
when it comes to breath duration increase. However, it falls a bit short of
Faveur de Koltira
. It's still a great pick though!
Playstyle Issues
With the changes, covenants and legendaries out of the way, let's talk about how Frost actually plays on the beta! Overall, I think Frost is looking really promising in Shadowlands. There are lots of new talents that will see play in different scenarios, lots of diversity between builds and plenty of new things to think about!
2H vs DW balancing
This topic is only partially related to playstyle but I still feel like we need to discuss it. 2H viability is a major concern for lots of people that are looking forward to playing 2H. As I previously mentioned, the gap is really close on pure single target. However, as soon as we enter a scenario with many targets,
Souffle de Sindragosa
will start to pull ahead (and therefore DW).
Generally, DW scales better in AoE compared to 2H. The reason for this is that the benefit of 2H is purely in single target. 2H bridges the gap through the increased damage on
Anéantissement amélioré
, a single target ability. As soon as we enter AoE scenarios, the gap widens (DW benefits aren't purely single target) but the bridge doesn't grow longer. I would love to see
Puissance des terres gelées
extended to also affect
Faux de givre
. This would help bridge the gap in AoE as well, making builds with 2H weapons more viable in all content.
This would also help another issue that 2H builds have.
Anéantissement
competes heavily with
Faux de givre
on procs of
Fauche-Givre
.
Faux de givre
deals 56% attack power per target on a proc of
Fauche-Givre
.
Anéantissement
deals 207% AP in the same scenario. This means that
Anéantissement
is worth almost 4 hits of
Faux de givre
! The gain from using
Faux de givre
in AoE isn't that large, marginalising the talent. Furthermore, for 2H you're probably not running
Trancheglace
in AoE, removing the need to spread it through
Faux de givre
. 30% damage increase on
Faux de givre
would help lots in AoE with this. I wouldn't mind if the % increase wasn't as large for
Faux de givre
as for
Anéantissement
, for balancing purposes.
Renforcer l'arme runique
Desync
Renforcer l'arme runique
has a base 2 minute cooldown, something that aligns very well with every second
Pilier de givre
and every
Souffle de Sindragosa
(if you choose to pick this talent). Shadowlands brings two effects that lower the cooldown of
Renforcer l'arme runique
, effectively desyncing it from our normal burst cooldowns.
Renforcer l’arme runique
- 15 seconds off the cooldown makes it 1 minute 45 seconds. Really doesn't give any power at all since you most likely hold it to gain the haste and Runic Power. Mostly the haste in
Oblitération
's case.
Froidure accélérée
- 10% off the cooldown, making the ability 1 minut 34.5 seconds. Again, we'd most likely hold this for our cooldown windows, making the cooldown reduction insignificant. There is a possibility of using it on cooldown for builds that don't run
Souffle de Sindragosa
. It still feels bad to not sync it with anything though.
I feel like the previous idea was to create synergy between the cooldown reduction and
Pilier de givre
, when
Pilier de givre
was 45 seconds cooldown. You could then achieve a line-up every ~1 min 30 seconds if picking up
Froidure accélérée
. With
Pilier de givre
now at 60 seconds, this doesn't work anymore.
I feel like they should rethink the cooldown reduction effects on
Renforcer l'arme runique
and instead explore alternative ways to buff it. Potentially with a flat damage buff or a frost damage buff.
The Withering of
Chape de glace
As I previously mentioned,
Chape de glace
is significantly nerfed once we enter Shadowlands. Losing Azerite traits is like losing more than half the value gained from this talent. This effectively makes it underperform both
Oblitération
and
Souffle de Sindragosa
in all content.
I thought it was quite nice that
Chape de glace
became a solid pick at the end of BFA. Talent diversity is always a good thing imo! I think
Chape de glace
should inherit the
Indignation de dragonnet de givre
effect, making it a possible option for heavy AoE!
Conclusion
Frost is looking really promising for Shadowlands! We gain so much from level 50 to 60, increasing the power of
Oblitération
and 2H build significantly. They've been really lackluster in the pre-patch so it will be interesting to see them gain power in shadowlands.
Frost excels in cleave scenarios where we can utilise
Souffle de Sindragosa
or
Oblitération
with
Dû de la mort
cleave. We also have excellent AoE burst with
Fureur du wyrm de givre
.
Our weaknesses are often prolonged single target fights, as well as spread cleave. We also have mobility issues. We can choose covenants that give us great extra mobility though!
I hope everyone reading this article shares my excitement of jumping into shadowlands and trying out your favourite class. I also look forward to all the interactions and minmaxing possibilites that we've yet to think about, let's stay tuned for more!
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