Arthas Talents

Level	Choices
1	? ? ✓
4	? ✓ ?
7	? ? ✓
10	✓ ?
13	✓ ? ✘︎
16	? ✓ ?
20	? ? ✓ ?

Frost Presence is a good Talent that, once the Quest is completed, allows Arthas to Root enemies with Howling Blast on its path, rather than just at the target point.

After completing the Quest, remember to change your playstyle from aiming right on the enemy Hero to aiming slightly beyond them—not because the former will not work, but because the latter will give you more value as the Ability will cover a bigger area and sometimes even hit more enemies than usual.

If you are playing as main Tank for your team, you should prefer picking this Talent over the rest because the additional range helps you to engage and the additional area covered helps you to peel, unless you really need Rime to survive.

Eternal Hunger is a decent Talent that increases the damage done and Mana restored via Frostmourne Hungers. While the Mana bonus has a cap, the damage does not have a reachable limit.

Pick this Talent only if the enemy Offlaner will easily allow you to stack (for example Rexxar) and you do not need Rime.

Rime is a strong Talent that provides additional survivability when playing against Heroes with slow but heavy-hitting Basic Attacks (such as Leoric) and really bad when playing against Heroes with fast-hitting Basic Attacks (like D.Va).

Deathlord is a situational Talent that allows Arthas to poke enemy Heroes for free from the distance. In particular, this Talent removes the Mana cost of Death Coil when used on an enemy Hero, increases its range, and reduces its cooldown.

While it has low impact during team fights, you may want to pick this Talent to better handle a particular matchup in the offlane (for example to constantly poke Fenix so that Shield Capacitor cannot regenerate his Shield).

Frozen Wastes is a good Talent that reduces the Mana cost of Frozen Tempest when picked and allows its effect to persist on enemy Heroes for a short while when the Quest gets completed.

Pick this Talent when playing against Heroes who have short range and rely on Basic Attacks, especially if they are able to get out from Frozen Tempest by using their mobility (such as Kerrigan with Ravage).

Icy Talons is a situational Talent that provides a powerful Attack Speed buff when fighting against Heroes who cannot get out of Frozen Tempest with ease (such as Artanis).

All that said, you should usually avoid picking this Talent because it is hard to get value from it in most scenarios, especially during team fights.

Immortal Coil is a decent Talent that doubles the healing provided by Death Coil when used on enemies and increases its effectiveness when used on himself.

The synergy with Deathlord should not be a reason to skip the always useful Icebound Fortitude.

Rune Tap is a decent Talent that slightly increases Arthas's survivability while dueling in the offlane by making every third Basic Attack heal him for a percentage of his maximum Health.

The healing via Basic Attacks has synergy with Frostmourne Hungers that resets the cooldown of your next Basic Attack and with Icy Talons that increases your Attack Speed.

The synergy with Icy Talons should not be a reason to skip the always useful Icebound Fortitude.

Icebound Fortitude is a strong Talent that heavily increases Arthas's survivability against most crowd control effects and burst damage, something that is always a threat to Arthas during team fights.

Think twice before not taking this Talent because the lack of it will make Arthas way easier to kill for the enemy team. For this reason, you should always take it when playing as main Tank and almost always when as Offlaner.

In this section we discuss when and why to pick a given Heroic Ability. If you want to read how they work and/or you are looking for some tips on how to use them, check the dedicated section in the Abilities and Strategy page.

Army of the Dead is a strong Heroic Ability that heavily increases Arthas's survivability in team fights.

Pick it in most if not all games, sometimes even against burst damage and/or healing reduction effects because it still helps before and/or after they hit you.

Summon Sindragosa is a situational Heroic Ability that gives some damage and crowd control, something that allows Arthas to engage from the distance and eventually combo with other Heroic Abilities (for example Purification Salvo by Fenix).

Pick when you do not need the additional survivability provided by Army of the Dead and your team wants to play aggressively, especially if your team has a solid lead when reaching Level 10 and you can capitalize on it by getting an early Keep with the combination of a powerful Objective and the enemy Structures being disabled for enough time to take them down or get some kills and then push uncontested.

Shattered Armor is a strong Talent that, by reducing the Armor of enemies Heroes hit by Howling Blast, indirectly increases the damage output of your team, especially if there is a Mage involved (for example Kael'thas).

While it has synergy with Frost Presence at Level 1, it is not a strong requirement and can therefore be picked without it as well.

Biting Cold is a good Talent that causes Frozen Tempest to deal significantly more damage over time, which is especially useful against targets that lack any form of mobility.

Pick this Talent when your team does not really need Shattered Armor because your team does not have enough burst damage to follow up and team fights are lasting long enough to get value from it.

Frost Strike is a weak Talent that adds a Slow effect to Frostmourne Hungers.

We do not recommend this Talent because, while the Slow provided may help you hold enemy Heroes within Frozen Tempest enough time to let it ramp up, you already have the Root from Howling Blast for doing so.

The synergy with other Trait-based Talents should not be a reason to skip the powerful Shattered Armor or Biting Cold.

Embrace Death is a situational Talent that increases the effectiveness of Death Coil when Arthas has low Health.

Pick this Talent when there is a need of burst healing (for example against Greymane with Cursed Bullet).

Remorseless Winter is a strong Talent that allows Arthas to Root enemy Heroes that stay too long inside Frozen Tempest, drastically increasing his crowd control capabilities against low-mobility Heroes (such as Cassia).

Frostmourne Feeds is a decent Talent that increases your burst damage when using Frostmourne Hungers by providing a second charge of Frostmourne Hungers.

If you have a good amount of stacks on Eternal Hunger at Level 1 and you do not need the extra crowd control from Remorseless Winter or the extra healing from Embrace Death, then you may consider going for this Talent to basically double them.

When going for this Talent, it is important to use both charges of Frostmourne Hungers as soon as possible, otherwise it will not start cooling down. For doing so, you can use Basic Attacks on any enemy target, not only enemy Heroes.

Legion of Northrend is a good Talent that drastically increases Arthas's survivability by increasing the amount of healing, the duration, and the number of Ghouls coming from Army of the Dead.

Avoid picking this Talent when the enemy team has healing reduction effects (for example Mortal Wound by Xul).

Absolute Zero is a strong Talent that greatly increases the strength of Summon Sindragosa by adding a relatively long Root before the already powerful Slow effect.

Considering that Summon Sindragosa already has a high range, the additional distance covered is not that useful. That said, sometimes it may help you disable enemy Structures from the distance and/or catch enemy Heroes that want to avoid a team fight at all costs.

Avoid picking this Talent when you need the additional survivability provided by either Legion of Northrend or Anti-Magic Shell.

Death's Advance is a strong Talent that slightly increases Arthas's Movement Speed, making up for his lack of mobility, and empowers both effects provided by Frozen Tempest, further reducing the Movement Speed and Attack Speed of enemy Heroes hit.

The combination of these effects allows you to chase and/or body block enemy Heroes, so pick this Talent when you want to play more aggressive and do not need defensive Talents from this Tier.

Anti-Magic Shell is a situational Talent that allows Arthas to survive burst damage in the form of both Spell Damage and percent-based damage.

Activating this Talent allows to mitigate the huge amount of damage that notable Arthas's counter picks (for example Jaina) can deal to him.