Frost Death Knight Best Covenants, Soulbinds, and Conduits — Shadowlands 9.0.2

This page assumes that you are already familiar with Covenants, Soulbinds, and Conduits. If that is not the case, we have a number of pages that can help you get up to speed:

• Covenants Guide, which explains what Covenants are, what perks they bring, and how you can join one;
• Death Knight Covenant Abilities, which lists all the abilities that Death Knights gain by joining each Covenant;
• How To Change Covenant?, which tells you how you can switch Covenant (rejoining a former Covenant will require you to perform a number of tasks to regain their trusts);
• General Soulbind Guide, which explains what Soulbinds are and how you can pledge yourself to them to open up their Soulbind tree;
• Death Knight Conduits, which lists all of the Conduits available to Death Knights.

The recommendations below are meant to maximize your performance for Castle Nathria, Mythic+ and Torghast. This page's recommendations are subject to change, so make sure to keep yourself updated.

You can be very successful in all forms of content as any Covenant. In this section we will go over the recommended builds using the recommended Covenant for Frost Death Knights.

Focus	Covenant	Soulbind	Advised Tree
Raiding	Night Fae	Niya	Frost Death Knight Night Fae Raiding Tree
Mythic+	Venthyr	Nadjia the Mistblade	Frost Death Knight Night Fae Mythic+ Tree
Torghast	Kyrian	Pelagos	Frost Death Knight Night Fae Torghast Tree

Night Fae/Niya is the best all-around option for Dual Wield Breath of Sindragosa and Obliteration. All other Covenants are very close options and definitely viable for all forms of content.

Make sure you remember that switching Covenants is not free, switching Covenants after you have already chosen one leaves you at the same level of progress with that Covenant. In order to return to a Covenant you previously left it takes two quests with at least a full week in between the two quests.

This is a brief overview of the Conduits for each different category and the role that they play. This list is organized in order from strongest to weakest, however some Conduits gain value in certain scenarios.

• Best Potency Conduits: Everfrost (All-Rounder), Accelerated Cold (All-Rounder), Unleashed Frenzy (Single-Target), Eradicating Blow (Single-Target)
• Best Finesse Conduits: Spirit Drain (Offensive Option), Fleeting Wind (Movement Option), Chilled Resilience (Defensive Option)
• Best Endurance Conduits: Reinforced Shell (Raid CD), Hardened Bones (Strong Defensive)

Everfrost and Accelerated Cold is the best combination for both single-target and AoE scenarios by a decent margin for both Obliteration and Breath of Sindragosa.

Reinforced Shell is without a doubt the best option for anything involving a group or other players. It increases the benefits of Anti-Magic Zone, making it an even more powerful Raid Cooldown. Hardened Bones is the best personal defensive option.

These Conduits are for utility and mobility purposes, meaning they do not directly impact your DPS, so we recommend picking whatever suits the situation that you are in the most.

Kyrian is the best Covenant for Frost Death Knights, providing the best single-target DPS by a fairly substantial margin. It falls behind for AoE scenarios.

Necrolord is a strong Covenant for Frost Death Knights, providing competitive single-target DPS that is comparable to Kyrian, while also providing significantly more AoE DPS. This Covenant may end up being the best all-round option, depending on the content you are doing. Since this Covenant is the best option for Unholy Death Knights as well, this is a great Covenant to use if you plan on swapping specs.

Night Fae is the most competitive Covenant for Frost Death Knights. It provides fantastic single-target and AoE damage. This goes for both Breath of Sindragosa and Obliteration.

Venthyr is a very competitive option to Night Fae with the either the Theotar or Nadjia Soulbinds. Swarming Mist is incredibly powerful in Mythic+ with the Breath of Sindragosa build allowing you to easily keep Breath of Sindragosa up in AoE scenarios.

These Soulbinds are always subject to change, but we will keep updating so you can have an accurate ranking of your options. These rankings are without the maxed tree, since that will not be unlocked until months into Shadowlands. This page is for maximizing your performance in Castle Nathria and Mythic+.

• Pelagos is the best choice for single-target by a large margin, thanks to Combat Meditation and Let Go of the Past, while still being a solid option for AoE.
• Kleia is weaker than Pelagos and is only comparable at all with a maxed tree. Kleia is approximately 5% weaker than Pelagos for single-target and much lower in AoE.
• Forgelite Prime Mikanikos is currently one of the weakest options for all Covenants, so you would be better off using Pelagos in the same Covenant.

• Emeni is currently the strongest Necrolord option and is very competitive with Pelagos for single-target, making it a very viable choice for both single-target and AoE encounters.
• Bonesmith Heirmir is slightly below Emeni for both single-target and AoE making it an all around weaker option.
• Plague Deviser Marileth is the weakest Soulbind option overall and should not be taken when the other 2 are available.

• Korayn is middle of the pack and not nearly as strong as Niya.
• Niya is one of the strongest Covenants for Frost Death Knights currently providing you with a good amount of Mastery each time you use Death's Due.
• Dreamweaver is the weakest option out of the Night Fae Covenant tree.

• Nadjia the Mistblade is a very powerful Covenant for single-target and even stronger for AoE.
• Theotar the Mad Duke is 1% below Nadjia and does see some play.
• General Draven is about 1% behind Theotar in both single-target and AoE, making it just simply a weaker choice.