Mists of Pandaria Classic Frost Death Knight Rotation and Cooldowns

If you have not already, we recommend reading the Spells Summary page first. Knowing how each spell and ability works in detail will greatly increase your understanding of the topics discussed on this page.

Frost Death Knight in Mists of Pandaria works off of a priority system that aims to deal as much damage as possible with a constantly changing list of rules to follow in order to make most effective use of your next global cooldown. This guide assumes you are dual-wielding and playing the Master Frost version of the spec which puts a much larger emphasis on Mastery and how it increases the damage done by our abilities like Soul Reaper.

As mentioned above, the goal of this priority order is to maximize the value of each of our Runes by utilizing powerful procs like Killing Machine to increase the damage of our abilities. While following this do remember that your Blood Runes will be Death Runes in Mists of Pandaria thanks to Blood of the North.

The priority order is as follows:

1. Make sure you are in Frost Presence;
2. Cast Army of the Dead before the pull;
3. Make sure to prepot your Potion of Mogu Power;
4. Cast Pillar of Frost;
5. If Raise Dead is available make sure to use it;
6. If you have 11 or more stacks of Blood Tap and a Rune inactive, use it to refresh your Rune;
7. If the target is below 35%, cast Soul Reaper;
8. With a Killing Machine proc or 89 Runic Power or more cast Frost Strike;
9. With a Killing Machine proc and both Blood Plague and Frost Fever active cast Obliterate;
10. If you have both Frost or both Death Runes available, cast Howling Blast. This will be your primary way of applying Frost Fever;
11. If Blood Plague is not active on the target use Outbreak to reapply it, if Outbreak is in cooldown use Plague Strike;
12. With a Rime proc cast Howling Blast;
13. If you have 40 Runic Power or more cast Frost Strike;
14. Cast Obliterate;
15. Cast Howling Blast;
16. Cast Blood Tap assuming a Rune is inactive;
17. Cast Horn of Winter to generate Runic Power;
18. Use Empower Rune Weapon to refresh all of your Runes and gain 25 Runic Power.

It is important to note that while Plague Leech will be our default talent choice but there is a bit of nuance on how it is optimally used. Ideally you will cast Plague Leech as your diseases are about to expire and two of your Runes are inactive. Placing this in your priority list can be a bit difficult as we will be constantly refreshing out Frost Fever with Howling Blast but your goal should be to cast this to get an extra cast of a hard hitting ability like Obliterate.

Your AoE rotation follows a similar list of priorities as what is recommended for single target with some slight changes, we will be casting as many Howling Blasts as possible so do not worry about casting Soul Reaper unless there is an incredibly high priority target in the group you are AoEing. With Howling Blast applying Frost Fever to all the targets it hits this devalues Pestilence a bit as it will only be spreading one disease and our Blood Runes will already be Death Runes thanks to Blood of the North and should ideally be spent on Howling Blasts. Your Unholy Runes should be spent on Plague Strike to apply Blood Plague to as many targets as possible, but only when Death and Decay is already down and on cooldown.

Frost Death Knight damage can be bolstered considerably if used correctly so its important to understand how each of your cooldowns functions and how to best utilize them. A well timed Pillar of Frost can be the difference between cleaving down that group of enemies or being overrun.

Empower Rune Weapon instantly refreshes all of your Runes and grants you 25 Runic Power. The ability to instantly reset all of your Runes can be a make or break difference if you find yourself challenged with a tight DPS check. This should ideally be used rotationally in any situation where you find yourself without any Runic Power or Runes meaning you do not have a damaging ability to press.

Pillar of Frost increases your Strength by 20% and makes you immune to knockbacks and similar effects. Pillar of Frost is a massive damage increase and scales incredibly with your gear, the more Strength you have the more effective this cooldown will be so as we progress through the expansion this will only become more powerful. This should ideally be used every minute as soon as the cooldown is finished but make sure to pair it with any other procs you may have if possible and that you will be able to remain active on your target for its entire 20 second duration.

Raise Dead summons a ghoul to fight by your side for 1 minute. This is a great way to deal some additional damage and should be used on cooldown as it is a single global cooldown for a minute of passive damage to your target. Do note that this ghouls stat update dynamically so there is no need to wait for any kind of procs or any on uses to increase your stats before pressing this.

Army of the Dead summons a large group of ghouls to help deal with your enemies. This should ideally be cast pre-pull or in any situation where you are unable to hit your current target. It is important to note that these ghouls update dynamically so you do not need to worry about waiting for a Rune of the Fallen Crusader proc or anything like that to cast this ability. This can also be used as a defensive cooldown in an emergency as it will grant you damage reduction equal to your Dodge + Parry chance.