Frost Death Knight PvP Stat Priority, Gear, and Trinkets (The War Within Pre-Patch)
Choosing your gear carefully is important for your Frost Death Knight in PvP. We give you a stat priority to help you choose items with the right stats, followed by advice on how to choose the rest of your gear and your trinkets.
This page is part of our Frost Death Knight PvP Guide.
Stat Priority for Frost Death Knights in PvP
The stat priority for Frost Death Knights in PvP is as follows:
- Versatility
- Mastery
- Haste
- Critical Strike
Versatility is the best stat by far. Versatility, in PvP, has the highest contribution to output while also heavily increasing survivability through healing and damage mitigation. No other stat can compete with Versatility in value in PvP.
Mastery and Haste are both very valuable stats, and a combination of both
should be used. Mastery drastically improves output to important abilities
like Chill Streak and
Obliterate during
Killing Machine
while Haste improves your ability to use your important burst windows by
increasing resource generation and reducing the global cooldown.
Critical Strike is purely an output stat and does not do as much for our
class as the other stats. Furthermore, during Pillar of Frost using the
talent
Obliteration, all of our
Obliterate presses will
already crit, making the stat much less worthwhile during those windows.
Gear Recommendations
General Guidelines
As for gearing, there are no pieces you truly need to target for slots
like legs or boots; you are just looking for the proper stats on them, which
will come from honor, conquest, professions, and the weekly cache.
Due to the introduction of Spark of Dreams, you are able
to craft Versatility and Mastery in every slot, allowing for maximum
burst potential. Embellishments can vary. For more sustain, you can play
Verdant Conduit on the Chest and Belt. A more defensive option
is the
Flourishing Dream Helm. It is recommended that wrists, rings,
and legs be crafted with Versatility and Mastery.
Recommended Trinkets
Draconic Gladiator's Emblem can be an option if you need to play
particularly defensive against a comp you have not been able to survive against
(probably Rogue/Hunter comps). Death Knights scale very well with increased
health effects because their heals are based on a percentage of your
maximum health.
Draconic Gladiator's Insignia of Alacrity is a viable option.
The trinket provides a main stat proc along with static Haste. Early on,
there will be low haste values, so this trinket will prove to be useful.
Draconic Gladiator's Badge of Ferocity is best used with your damage cooldowns.
Badge has a higher value later into the season and is generally used over Insignia.
Gems and Enchants
Fill every gem socket you have with Zen Neltharite.
These are the best Frost Death Knight enchants by slot:
- Wrist:
Enchant Bracer - Devotion of Leech or
Enchant Bracer - Devotion of Leech
- Cloak:
Enchant Cloak - Regenerative Leech or
Enchant Cloak - Homebound Speed
- Chest:
Enchant Chest - Sustained Strength
- Legs:
Fierce Armor Kit
- Rings:
Enchant Ring - Devotion of Mastery
- Neck:
Tiered Medallion Setting
- Boots:
Enchant Boots - Watcher's Loam
Death Knights get a special weapon enchant called Runeforges. Runeforging
is done by using your Death Gate to get back to Acherus, the Ebon Hold.
Rune of the Fallen Crusader,
Rune of Razorice,
Rune of Sanguination and
Rune of Spellwarding all have value
in a PvP setting. Fallen Crusader and Razorice are the standard
output-increasing Runeforges.
Changelog
- 23 Jul. 2024: Reviewed for War Within Prepatch.
- 07 May 2024: Reviewed for 10.2.7.
- 22 Apr. 2024: Reviewed for Season 4.
- 19 Mar. 2024: Reviewed for Patch 10.2.6.
- 15 Jan. 2024: Reviewed for Patch 10.2.5.
- 06 Nov. 2023: Updated for Patch 10.2.0.
- 01 Sep. 2023: Updated for Patch 10.1.7.
- 10 Jul. 2023: Updated for Patch 10.1.5.
- 05 May 2023: Updated for Patch 10.1.
- 21 Mar. 2023: Reviewed for Patch 10.0.7.
- 30 Jan. 2023: Reviewed for Patch 10.0.5.
- 11 Dec. 2022: Updated for Dragonflight Season 1.
- 22 Nov. 2022: Updated for Dragonflight pre-patch.
- 31 Jul. 2022: Reviewed for Shadowlands Season 4.
- 31 May 2022: Reviewed for Patch 9.2.5.
- 02 Mar. 2022: Page updated for Patch 9.2.
- 11 Dec. 2021: Reviewed for Patch 9.1.5.
- 02 Jul. 2021: Updated for Patch 9.1.
- 20 Mar. 2021: Reviewed for Patch 9.0.5.
- 05 Dec. 2020: Updated for Shadowlands Season 1.
- 12 Nov. 2020: Updates made by new writer.
- 14 Oct. 2020: Updated for Shadowlands pre-patch.
Other PvP Guides
Keator is a Rank 1 Death Knight and has been playing Death Knight since Wrath. After having raided in US Top 50 guilds for multiple expansions, he decided to dive into PvP where he found his passion. He also streams occasionally on Twitch.
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