Unholy Death Knight DPS Rotation, Cooldowns, and Abilities — The War Within (11.1.7)

• Army of the Dead Talented and Raise Abomination not talented
• Raise Abomination Talented

1. Use Army of the Dead as you run towards the boss.
2. Use Festering Strike
3. Use Death and Decay
4. Use Apocalypse
5. Use Raise Abomination.
6. Use Dark Transformation + Potion
7. Use Scourge Strike 3 times( Death Coil with any Sudden Doom procs)
8. Use Unholy Assault + Racial + Trinket

• Army of the Dead Talented and Raise Abomination not talented
• Raise Abomination Talented
• Summon Gargoyle talented

1. Use Army of the Dead as you run towards the boss.
2. Use Raise Abomination as you reach the boss.
3. Use Dark Transformation + Potion
4. Use Festering Strike.
5. Use Death and Decay.
6. Use Summon Gargoyle + Dark Transformation + Potion
7. Use Death Coil exactly 3 times.
8. Use Unholy Assault + Trinket + Racial
9. Use Apocalypse

• Any of Plaguebringer/ Ebon Fever/ Superstrain Talented
• Clawing Shadows Talented
• Rider of the Apocalypse

1. Cast Soul Reaper if the target is below 35%.
2. Use Scourge Strike/ Clawing Shadows if the target has Chains of Ice on it.
3. Cast Outbreak to maintain Virulent Plague on the target.
4. Use Vampiric Strike when it procs.
5. Use Death Coil when you have 80+ Runic Power or a Sudden Doom proc or your Death Rot debuff is about to run out.
6. Use Scourge Strike if your Plaguebringer buff is about to run out.
7. Use Festering Strike to apply Festering Wounds on the target. Do this if the target has 2 or fewer Festering Wounds.
8. Use Scourge Strike when there is at least 1 Festering Wound on the target.
9. Use Clawing Shadows when there is at least 1 Festering Wound on the target.
10. Use Death Coil.

Now, we will take this priority list and put it into a wordier description!

• Cast Soul Reaper whenever you can make the secondary effect trigger. In execute, Soul Reaper is your highest priority, and you should save Runes so that you can use it as much as possible! It is, however, not worth casting Soul Reaper if the target dies before the explosion!
• Ensure Virulent Plague uptime. If you have not taken any talent that buffs Virulent Plague ( Plaguebringer, Ebon Fever or Superstrain), only apply Virulent Plague if you can get 15 seconds worth of the DoT. If you have taken Unholy Blight but no other disease-talent, only use Dark Transformation to apply the DoT (this is only relevant for specific Rider of the Apocalypse builds).
• Use Death Coil to avoid capping Runic Power or to spend your procs of Sudden Doom. Sudden Doom is a very powerful proc, and you do not want to waste any. If you have Harbinger of Doom talented, you can allow yourself to stack up two charges before you spend them. However, most of the time, you simply use them as soon as possible to avoid any potential waste. We also do not want to overcap Runic Power (generating Runic Power when we are at 100), so we use Death Coil to avoid this. Finally, Death Rot can sometimes be at risk of falling off (10 seconds duration), and we need to prioritise Death Coil to avoid this.
• Use Festering Strike to build up Festering Wounds on the target. We want to aim for between 2 and 5 wounds at all times to allow for Infected Claws to generate wounds without overcapping us, and for procs of Sudden Doom to come without us hitting 0. This means that we hit Festering Strike when we reach 2 or fewer Festering Wounds on the target!
• Use Scourge Strike/ Clawing Shadows to burst your wounds. This is used in sync with Festering Strike to keep your wound count at a healthy level. You go up to 4-5 and then use Scourge Strike/ Clawing Shadows to drop down to 2 again. You use Scourge Strike as a high-priority to keep up your Plaguebringer buff as well if you are running that talent! Finally, if you are running Rider of the Apocalypse, you use Scourge Strike/ Clawing Shadows at a high priority if your Trollbane has Chains of Ice on the target to burst it ASAP. This is higher priority than managing your Festering Wounds so it is fine to burst Chains even at 0 Wounds. This is also true when running San'layn and you get a Vampiric Strike proc. It is very high priority and you do not care about Festering Wounds on the target.
• Use Death Coil as your filler spell when you have nothing else to do!

When you want to deal AoE damage in your Single Target build, it is all about leveraging Death and Decay/ Defile. In conjunction the Cleaving Strikes talent, this creates nice Cleave windows where you leverage your Scourge Strike/ Clawing Shadows to deal AoE damage. Simply put, whenever you want to do AoE, pop down Death and Decay/ Defile and spam Scourge Strike/ Clawing Shadows. Do not worry about your Festering Wounds; ignoring them is actually only a small Single Target priority loss. Furthermore, you use Epidemic at 6+ targets to spend your Runic power. This does change slightly depending on other talents (like Reaping and Frenzied Bloodthirst) but it is a good general rule.

This priority does not include any cooldowns. Instead, that is something we cover further down in this guide. Any cooldown will come at the top of the priority list!

With the San'layn Hero Talents, your rotation is significantly impacted during your Dark Transformation windows. Scourge Strike and Death Coil gain a significant amount of value, both from the raw extra damage by being transformed into Vampiric Strike, the extra damage coming from Infliction of Sorrow and Frenzied Bloodthirst + Season 2 tier set. Stacking and maintaining Essence of the Blood Queen brings even further value. Due to this, we drop all spells but Scourge Strike and Death Coil (still using Festering Scythe in Single Target in M+ build):

• Festering Scythe talented

1. Use Death Coil.
2. Use Festering Scythe when you get a proc.
3. Use Vampiric Strike.

Before we equip the Season 2 tier set, Vampiric Strike has slightly higher priority compared to Death Coil.

This rotation ends up being very spammy, as we only press two buttons for the entire duration of Dark Transformation! Once our Dark Transformation finishes, we use one Scourge Strike to "burst" our big DoT, reapply our Diseases, and continue with the core rotation. During this time, we will also do something called "vamp fishing," where we aim to extend our Essence of the Blood Queen buff to the next window. You can find more info about this in the next section.

When Summon Gargoyle cooldown is active, our priority changes. Any Runic Power we spend buffs the minion we summon, and the idea is to leverage this as much as possible. Using Death Coil, therefore, ends up being much higher on our priority list! Essentially, you use Death Coil as soon as you can, either by going above 30 Runic Power or getting a proc of Sudden Doom (and being above 20 Runic Power). We also try to push our Festering Wounds down to 0 to get as much value as possible from Festermight.

• Soul Reaper Talented
• Plaguebringer Talented
• Clawing Shadows Talented

1. Cast Soul Reaper if the target is below 35%.
2. Use Death Coil when you have 30+ Runic Power or 20 Runic Power and a Sudden Doom proc
3. Cast Outbreak to maintain Virulent Plague on the target.
4. Use Scourge Strike to maintain your Plaguebringer buff.
5. Use Festering Strike to apply Festering Wounds on the target. Do this if the target has 0 Festering Wounds.
6. Use Scourge Strike when there are at least 1 Festering Wound on the target.
7. Use Clawing Shadows when there is at least 1 Festering Wound on the target.

When playing with the San'layn Hero Talents, the maintenance of the Essence of the Blood Queen buff is an important aspect to master. We quickly stack this buff 7 times during our Dark Transformation windows (due to unlimited Vampiric Strikes) and then aim to extend it to our next Dark Transformation window (where we can easily maintain it again). Dark Transformation itself lasts around 20-35 seconds so we only really need to gain a single proc inbetween uses to bridge the 10-25 seconds gap!

The two important changes in priority comes from Death and Decay and Death Coil. We want to use Death and Decay to benefit from Blood-Soaked Ground as much as possible, as well as prioritising Death Coil as much as possible. This will maximise the chance of getting a proc before the buff runs out! Once we get a proc, we simply use the Vampiric Strike that it triggers, extending the buff to our next Dark Transformation window. At this point, you will be reverting to the standard rotation.

Unholy's AoE rotation is all about high Plaguebringer uptime, lots of Festering Wound generation and bursting, as well as lots of Epidemic spamming. The idea is to ensure your DoTs are doing as much damage as possible, generating a ton of Wounds in AoE, and spending the Runic Power you generate on Epidemic.

Important to note here is that San'layn uses Death Coil as the primary Runic Power spender in AoE. With the 11.1 tier set and Dark Transformation active, you use Death Coil at up to 7 targets. Outside of Dark Transformation, this drops down a bit but you essentially always use Death Coil unless it is a huge pack.

As we approach a given pack, we execute essentially the same opener every single time, just skipping parts of it if we do not have the cooldowns ready. This is what it looks like:

• Vile Contagion Talented
• Apocalypse Talented
• Festering Scythe Talented
• San'layn Talented
• Raise Abomination Talented

1. Raise Abomination.
2. Defile to deal AoE damage and enable cleave.
3. Use Abomination Limb.
4. Dark Transformation (applies Virulent Plague via Unholy Blight. Outbreak if Dark Transformation is not ready).
5. Dark Transformation (applies Virulent Plague via Unholy Blight. Outbreak if neither Raise Abomination or Dark Transformation was used.
6. Use Unholy Assault + Festering Strike (2x Festering Strike if you do not have Unholy Assault ready).
7. Use Vile Contagion
8. Use Unholy Assault after 3 Vampiric Strikes.
9. Use Festering Scythe whenever you get a proc.
10. Use Apocalypse to generate Runes, especially good when you get Festering Scythe procs.
11. Spam Vampiric Strike/ Scourge Strike to burst your Festering Wounds
12. Spam Scourge Strike to burst your Festering Wounds
13. Use Defile when your Cleaving Strikes buff runs out.
14. Use Epidemic if you get a proc of Sudden Doom, or if you cannot use more Scourge Strike to burst Wounds.
15. Use Death Coil if you get a proc of Sudden Doom, or if you cannot use more Scourge Strike to burst Wounds.
16. Continue with Scourge Strike spam, Epidemic spam, maintain Cleaving Strikes with Defile/ Death and Decay and maintain your DoTs with Outbreak.
17. Continue with Scourge Strike/ Vampiric Strike spam, Death Coil spam, maintain Cleaving Strikes with Defile/ Death and Decay and maintain your DoTs with Outbreak.

The Unholy AoE rotation essentially has a "opener" phase followed by a "burst" phase. In the opener phase, we use all our cooldowns as we enter the pack. The exact details of this varies quite a lot between builds where some builds have to set up Festering Wounds for Vile Contagion whereas others simply do Defile -> Dark Transformation. After this stage, we enter the burst phase:

• We maintain permanent Cleaving Strikes by using Defile whenever it runs out.
• We refresh our DoTs with Outbreak when they fall off.
• We spam Scourge Strike/ Clawing Shadows/ Vampiric Strike as much as possible.
• We weave in Epidemic/ Death Coil when we get procs of Sudden Doom or we cannot use Scourge Strike/ Clawing Shadows/ Vampiric Strike.
• We use procs of Festering Scythe when we get them.

The burst phase lasts until the pack is dead, and we then start the next pack with an opener phase.

You might notice the lack of standard Festering Strikes in this rotation! As a general rule, we almost never press it in our Mythic+ rotation. It is only ever if we need to set up Festering Wounds for Vile Contagion. Since Defile uptime is so high, we just end up spamming Scourge Strike and Epidemic/ Death Coil all the time.

For raids, we always combine our cooldowns as much as possible. This works out nicely as they all align on a 45-second cycle. A cooldown plan for a 4-minute boss fight would look like the following:

• 00:00 — Army of the Dead/ Raise Abomination, Dark Transformation, Summon Gargoyle, Unholy Assault, Apocalypse
• 00:45 — Dark Transformation, Apocalypse
• 01:30 — Dark Transformation, Apocalypse, Unholy Assault, Raise Abomination
• 02:15 — Dark Transformation, Apocalypse
• 03:00 — Army of the Dead/ Raise Abomination, Dark Transformation, Summon Gargoyle, Unholy Assault, Apocalypse
• 03:45 — Dark Transformation, Apocalypse

Due to everything aligning perfectly like this, it is crucial that you use your cooldowns as soon as they come up. Any delay means that your 1.5 and 3-minute burst window will be delayed, potentially making you miss out on a ton of value.

In Mythic+, the name of the game is cooldown efficiency. It is so easy to lose out on a ton of value by holding your cooldowns "for that one big pack that comes soon." As a general rule, use your cooldowns as much as possible. It is by far the easiest way to improve your DPS in Mythic+!

Dark Transformation transforms your ghoul for 15 seconds, causing its Claw ability to cleave all enemies near your pet.

You should use this ability on cooldown. If you have talented into Commander of the Dead, always ensure you time Dark Transformation with Summon Gargoyle, Army of the Dead and Apocalypse.

For Mythic+, it is important to use this cooldown early in a pull, allowing lots of time to apply Festering Wounds that you can then burst in your Death and Decay window. It will generally be the first cooldown you press.

Unholy Blight an extra effect to the cooldown, applying Virulent Plague and Unholy Blight on all enemies around your pet for 6 seconds. Great way of applying DoTs to M+ pulls or maintaining your disease on boss targets. With builds that do not require much on Diseases, Dark Transformation is your only way of applying them!

This cooldown significantly changes your rotation when running San'layn, make sure to read up in the above rotation section to understand how!

Unholy Assault instantly applies 4 Festering Wounds to your target, deals some moderate damage, and provides 20% damage buff for 20 seconds.

Unholy Assault is a strong damage buff as well as a very efficient way of applying Festering Wounds. It should be used on cooldown in single-target, timed with your other cooldowns to leverage the damage buff. In AoE, it should be used early in a pull to boost your initial burst window. It is also used to help stack up 6 Festering Wounds on a single target when one plays Vile Contagion. Vile Contagion is then used as a follow-up cooldown to quickly spread up to 42 Festering Wounds!

The reason we delay Unholy Assault when running San'layn is to overlap it with our highest burst phase. Sanlayn very much ramps over the duration of your Dark Transformation with buffs such as Essence of the Blood Queen stacking up and your Virulent Plague increasing in duration (increasing Infliction of Sorrow damage).

Defile/ Death and Decay is primarily an AoE cooldown and is used to enable Scourge Strike/ Clawing Shadows cleave via Cleaving Strikes. You also use it in Single Target in specific scenarios. Just before your Summon Gargoyle (if you run this talent) to benefit from the haste buff via Unholy Ground, in the opener with San'layn talented as well as in your normal rotation when fishing for procs of Vampiric Strike to extend your Essence of the Blood Queen buff.

With Defile (in dungeons), you use it on bosses with your 45-second cooldown window. It deals solid damage and you gain the 5% buff from Unholy Ground. For San'layn, this means that we use it just before our Dark Transformation window, and then just after it finishes (for the fishing bit).

Apocalypse summons 4 members of the Army of the Dead and bursts up to 4 Festering Wounds. It also generates 2 Runes on use.

The number of wounds consumed by Apocalypse really does not matter, you get 4 minions anyway which is the important part. In AoE, we use it slightly differently ín most cases. It here acts as a Rune generator and is used when you get Festering Scythe procs to help your Rune econmy stay healthy.

It sits on the same 45-second schedule as Dark Transformation, resulting in you using these cooldowns together most of the time.

Raise Abomination (replaces Army of the Dead) summons an Abomination that fights your target for 30 seconds. It also applies a Festering Wound every time it auto-attacks and infects all targets around it with your diseases. Use it once you reach the boss (after Apocalypse in Single Target) and then on cooldown, aligning with all your other CDs. It will start attacking instantly, so there is no need to worry about summoning animation like with Army of the Dead.

Soul Reaper initially strikes the target for ~70% of a naked Scourge Strike. After 5 seconds, if the target is below 35% health, it hits against 3.5 Scourge Strikes worth of damage. It is crucial as an Unholy Death Knight to trigger as many of these extra hits as possible. Use Soul Reaper whenever your target will reach 35% HP within the next 5 seconds. This means using it at ~36% Raid Boss HP. For adds, it generally means using it earlier. Timing it properly is very rewarding!

San'layn significantly disrupts how many Soul Reapers you actually use during a fight. It drops it from the priority during Dark Transformation which ends up being more than 50% of the encounter.

To help you better understand how to play the Unholy specialization, we will explain some concepts in more detail below.

Abomination Limb provides you with an extra limb for 12 seconds, pulling targets towards you every second and dealing damage around you.

Abomination Limb should be used on cooldown to gain the most benefit from its damage. Do save it if there are add waves that you can time it with, especially if gripping these adds helps your group to kill them!

For pure Single Target, use it after your first set of cooldowns has finished.

Summon Gargoyle calls down a Gargoyle to hit your target for 25 seconds. Every 1 Runic Power spent when this cooldown is active increases its damage by 1%. It also generates 50 Runic Power on use.

Once you have activated Summon Gargoyle, your highest priority, above all, will be pressing Death Coil to ramp up its damage. Ideally, you should be full on Runic Power already as you press the cooldown (remember that it provides 50 Runic Power, so you only need to aim for a maximum minus 50). You also want to ensure that you leverage all your other cooldowns that synergize with Summon Gargoyle when you use it. This includes Dark Transformation with Commander of the Dead and Unholy Assault. In reality, you will get these big 3-minute burst windows where you use Summon Gargoyle and Army of the Dead/ Raise Abomination in combination with everything else!

Vile Contagion spreads the Festering Wounds of your primary target to up to 7 nearby enemies.

Vile Contagion is a huge AoE DPS cooldown that helps to set up an AoE pull for a big burst window. Either follows a double Festering Strike or Unholy Assault + Festering Strike for a 3 GCD 48 Festering Wounds infection. You then follow up with Death and Decay/ Defile, and Scourge Strike/ Clawing Shadows spam.

Army of the Dead summons several ghouls to fight at your side for 30 seconds. It is a major cooldown that will end up being a significant part of our overall damage in any situation.

Use Army of the Dead as you run into any engagement, allowing the ghouls to spawn (they spawn over 4 seconds and are stunned an additional 4 seconds before starting combat). Ensure to time it with any other cooldown that increases its damage, such as Dark Transformation with Commander of the Dead and Unholy Assault. Always use Army of the Dead at least 5 seconds before using any other cooldown to buff it (except Dark Transformation, which can be used immediately).

Make sure to leverage this cooldown as much as possible in Mythic+. Even if it is primarily a Single Target burst CD, it also gives AoE via the Death Knight Unholy 10.2 Class Set 2pc set bonus!