Frost DK Build

Classes Death Knight
1

Hi there,

So, I just got back for a while and decided I’d pick up Frost DK again. I played Unholy in Battle of Dazar’Alor but that was the most serious that I’ve played in BFA.

I’ve never liked that Frost is DW now, and so that’s why I focused mainly on Unholy, but coming back I decided I wanted to give Frost a chance. Historically, it’s always been the easier of the two to get in to and since I was returning and looking to jump into PvP and farm mythic+ keys, I decided I wouldn’t complicate things.

So, as I’ve been questing in Naz’jatar and Mechagon, and around Zandalar and Kul’Tiras, even in some LFR and a few mythic dungeons I’ve had people ask me about my build; they say things like, “you seem very strong” or “I can’t do as well on my DK” so I figured I’d spill the beans.

Going into it I knew there were talents I didn’t really want to use, even if sims and guides say they’re the best. Min/maxing is only really necessary if you’re doing top level content, which I’m surely not getting into and I’ve found that you’ll often get more value if you play what you’re comfortable with anyhow.
So I decided to run with Icy Talons. I don’t always remember to use Chains of Ice with Cold Heart, and I’m using a lot of Frost Strikes anyway, so why not? It follows the theme of keeping it simple too and works brilliantly well with Frozen Pulse.

Since I’m never hurting for runic power, I decided Horn of Winter was better. Two on-demand runes and extra runic power every 30 seconds is great; you can’t go wrong.

I chose Frozen Pulse because, even though I like Frostscythe, there comes a time in this game where you need to be up against a certain number of targets for cleave abilities to beat out single target, and I’m never 100% clear on when those are. Frostscythe is pretty simple to use though, but in keeping with my theme of keeping things simple, Frozen Pulse provides a passive element to my cleave and aoe, and it means that I can play a single target rotation while still cleaving.

Gathering Storm I chose again because passive, but it forces me to pay closer attention to what abilities I use and when. It also helped me map out my opening “rotation” so as to get the most out of Remorseless Winter. I know there are addons like Hekili that can help with that, but I like to figure things out on my own, even if it’s somewhat sub-optimal; again, I’m not doing top tier content so it doesn’t really matter as long as I’m not completely useless.

Lastly, I knew Breath of Sindragosa, as much I do love the talent, wasn’t one I wanted to use. So I chose Icecap. Apart from having my offensive cooldown back more often, I chose it because of how it affects my stat weights which links me neatly to my next paragraph.

My build was chosen specifically because I, personally, prefer big hits farely often, which make critical strike and haste important to me. Now there are certain Azerite traits to my gear that literally force me into a Crit+Haste main stat build which, I must say, suits me down to the ground.

Now, my auto attacks critical hits proc Killing Machine so Icy Talons synergizes really well there with a high crit and haste build, but with the addition of Killer Frost (Azerite Trait), it means Frost Strike criticals proc Killing Machine as well.
This is important because now I’m trying to get as many Obliterate critical hits as you can while Pillar of Frost is active via Killing Machine, and that’s because when it falls off, thanks to Icy Citadel (Azerite trait) I get a lot of strength which lasts longer when I get Obliterate/Frostscythe critical hits while under Pillar of Frost.

So that explains criticals, but what about Haste and why Icy Talons? Well, it’s pretty simple. Since I’m basically using my runes on KM-Obliterates, I’m using my Frost Strikes to proc Icy Talons as well, and haste also means faster auto-attacks, meaning that with three stacks of Icy Talons my auto-attacks are happening 15% faster which, in turn, means that if I have 2 runes or less available, I get Frozen Pulses on my auto-attacks.

So that’s how it pretty much comes together. It sounds more complicated than it is or else I’ve just not explained it very well, but it IS 4am so I’ll ammend if needed.

Feel free to ask questions, but be nice and share info if you have ways of improving this.

1 Like
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I think it’s really nice that you’ve gone and tested a new build that works well for you. I have a couple of inputs when it comes to optimising Icecap builds for M+ specifically.

I’d run Cold Heart, Murderous Efficiency, Frostscythe and Gathering Storm. Cold Heart is an on-demand nuke that is great for single target and priority damage.

It’s a bit misleading but your KM procs actually do not synergise with Icy Talons. KM procs comes form an RPPM (Real Procs Per Minute) system that only scales with haste and crit (procs = 4.5 x haste x crit). So it doesn’t really scale with auto attack speed unless your crit is really really low (so that you aren’t even getting enough crit autos per minute to reach the RPPM).

ME is great for high crit builds and rune-heavy builds in M+. You don’t have an AoE RP spender so RP is devalued in AoE. Furthermore, you’re usually GCD-capped meaning that you don’t really have time to press anything but your AoE abilities. ME fits nicely with high crit and gives you lots of extra runes to use.

Frostscythe is pretty much mandatory in M+ due to the insane damage it deals. It might look somewhat weak when you press it but it’s actually insane. With razorice on your mainhand weapon it will stack up the debuff on all target meaning 15% increased damage (pretty much all AoE is frost dmg). It also scales more heavily with crit meaning that a high crit build gives it great value. Finally, it only needs to proc on one of its hits (all hits proc individually) to trigger the CDR form Icecap. This means overlapping PoF buffs with enough targets. All this combined makes it a must have for any build in M+.

For Azerite traits you pick Frostwhelp indignation due to the increased value form the lower cd of PoF. Gives you lots of extra mastery and adds a big damage element to your PoF.

You go crit haste and mastery on this build with crit being the best stat.

Hope all of this is useful and feel free to ask me any questions.

1 Like
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did not knew this

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hmm, might try this out for fun, need to check my bank for palace 1H axes, sounds fun

azurite gear might suck as i only colected blood/unh on last tier

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Actually… by your own explanation, it does synergise with Icy talons, you just need a lower crit value to utilise the centre path as many of it’s talents do not care about crit, especially obliteration which makes crit slightly obsolete for any build with it in…

It’s part of why i hate the frost talent tree, just about everything contradicts something else quite badly inside of it.

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I’m talking sub 10% crit, something you rarely ever see with just regular gear.

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Thats how frost dk would traditionally do their stats, basically no crit and that is what the centre path replicates, badly, but still.

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this build was actualy fun, scythe with icecap and whelps is indeed good

just needed care to not ninja pull

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Ninja pulls cost me a 3 chest on +8 xD

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just adding that using the pvp essence to get chill streak is god sent. easily 180k per cast on 2+ mob packs on a 45sec CD.

as for low essences i tried several but dont see as much impact between these 3: ancient flame, lucid dreams and life blood
i been using the first 2

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If you want stupidly high aoe damage then frozen tempest and echoing howl with their respective support in talents, avalanche and gathering storm will net you unreasonably high aoe dps when using… obliteration and murderous efficiency.

The reason for this is you get constantly fed runes during pillar and can maintain a remorseless winter all the way into another cast of the ability which will refresh at 100% damage increased and not reset your stacks.

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Is recommend running frostscythe instead of avalanche. It’s simply too good for AoE scenarios.

Avalanche doesn’t synergise with echoing howl either.

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frostscythe will not consume runes fast enough for that particular build, it is one that purely focuses on the rime proc and remorseless winter buffing.

what you gain in frostscythe immediately you will lose later on with the remorseless winter timer and strength.

Avalanche and echoing howl do actually synergise well together because they both increase the damage of the same ability compressing your damage into a shorter frame but naturally the 2nd blast won’t do its own avalanche.

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My point was that one doesn’t increase the effectiveness of the other, thus not synergising.

I’m not convinced about the feasibility of extending remorseless in normal situations. It’s usually only done with bloodlust in my experience. Don’t forget to think about the 15% frost damage increase u got through razorice with frostscythe. It also deals a ton of DMG in AoE.

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Don’t worry, i know what you meant which is why i highlighted it, but that doesn’t mean it does not synergise outright for the reason i stated.

Also, I wouldnt think too highly of razorice/frostscythe tho, i mean what you gain is balanced off by the increased duration and damage on remorseless and topped off with the avalanche bonus on every howling blast but the problem with frostscythe is that it only really starts to add up if everything crits so if you can get above 45% crit chance then i think it would likely have a good shot of pulling ahead but then this would be made up with other stats on the other build which doesn’t need to rely on crit since the chances to do its things are already very high or guaranteed.

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What do you mean with this? Each target hit by forstscythe will have an independent chance to crit. You get enough trials to quickly get a significant average of crits on a pack. Frostscythe does a ton of damage and increases all your DMG with 15%. Trust me, everyone runs it since its simply too good to not pick.

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what i mean is that not all of the targets will be crit so the frost scythe will lose alot of damage, especially when wonky kills happen coz it kept critting the same target and not critting another target.

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given emissaries will go away, the number of packs being pulled at the same time will increase, RW and scyth do not cap on targets like fury and thus might be seen more.

currenty running with 25% crit, 20% haste, 50% mastery (plus traits to increase haste and crit on procs), scyth crits alot even without KM and steady reduces Pilar CD.

RW is even my top single target dmg with 3xazurite traits, was thinking in more haste to try to get the sweet resets but might need an on-use haste trinket like the one from mekatorque

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