Hello, I'm Gresan of Neltharion | Jyx of Frostwolf
Or on Retail as Kemii of Tarren Mill EU | Nadejha of Sylvanas EU
I'm writing this for the sole reason, I see too many *****s trying to play Frost DK in PvE and doing it horribly wrong, it's like people have read a Mists of Pandaria Guide and just when meh this will do. You know, running around in frost presence, or stacking crit.
OK so I'm going to get you kicked off with 3 Specs, 2 of which are amazing and 1 which isn't the most amazing, but if you don't wanna play Unholy and have a 2h Weapon you can use.
Everything is neatly in spoilers as per spec, and this has been reviewed by Shiina, a fellow HC Raider and DK master, and one of Retail's Highest Ranked* DKs Moudi of Ravencrest EU.
DW Masterfrost (Highest DPS Frost spec)
Spoiler:Show Spec:
Can be found here
That extra Talent point you're free to throw wherever, the best place it is in Butchery, however the 1 RP per 5s is hardly anything special, you could put it in Icy Reach if there is a lot of encounters where you do spend a bit of time away from bosses (Morchock, Hagara).
Other than for obvious reasons the frost talents, we take the 3/3 in Bladed Armor as it's a straight up AP boost which scales with gear. Unholy we take 3/3 in Virulence so our diseases do 30% more damage, and then 3/3 in Epidemic so we have to not waste as much time refreshing Blood Plague.
Glyphs:
Prime:
Howling Blast
Frost Strike
Obliterate
Major:
AMS
Minor:
Blood Tap
Horn of Winter
Stat Priority:
Hit 5%* > Strength = Mastery > Haste > Crit > Expertise**
Strength comes as standard on gear, but for Gems, reforges and enchants we're going Mastery over everything.
* Hit rating is bugged on Molten for PvE, bosses cannot be missed above player lvl cap, which is 5%, it will be fixed in the future and when it does this will be updated to take that fix into account.
** Expertise is bugged on Molten for PvE, bosses cannot Dodge or Parry, it will be fixed in the future and when it does this will be updated to take that fix into account.
Gear:
Gems:
You have the freedom here to pick up most socket bonus, those to ignore are Crit/Haste. In those gem pure Mastery.
Red: [Skillful Lava Coral]
Yellow: [Fractured Lightstone]
Blue: [Sensei's Elven Peridot]
Enchants:
Helm: Wildhammer/Dragonmaw Rep (Strength+Mastery)
Shoulder: Therazane Rep (Strength+Crit)
Chest: 20 Stats
Cloak: 65 Crit / Swordguard (Tailoring)
Bracers: 50 Strength
Gloves: 65 Mastery
Legs: Strength + Crit
Boots: 50 Mastery
Main-Hand Weapon: Rune of Razorice
Off-Hand Weapon: Rune of Fallen Crusader
Presences:
Unholy Presence, always. Rune regen, Haste and GCD reduction are vital for ALL frost specs. There should never be a time when you switch to Frost, even with Heroism/BL active, it's not worth the GCDs and RP wasted to switch presence.
Priority System:
OK so Masterfrost is harder to pick up. Don't get me wrong I never played Masterfrost till I went and played Mists and it's exactly the same there as it is in 4.3.4, Masterfrost made my brain hurt for like 2-3 raid till I got into the flow of everything. Spend too much time as DW Oblit in Cata and 2H is 5.3
As DW MasterFrost you ONLY use Oblit to remove an UH rune so you can proc Runic Empowerment.
Rotation (AKA Dummies' guide to them colourful circle thingies)
Frost Strike if Killing Machine is proc’ed, or if RP is 90 or higher
Howling Blast with both frost or both death off cooldown
Plague Strike if one Unholy Rune is off cooldown and blood plague is down/nearly down
Howling Blast if Rime proc’ed
Frost Strike if RP is 70 or higher
Obliterate when 1 or more Unholy Runes are off cooldown and killing machine is down
Howling Blast
Horn of Winter
Blood Tap
So Typically.
Starting with FFUUDD
Use 1U on Plague Strike > FFU-DD + 12 RP
Use 1F on Howling Blast > F-U-DD + 24 RP
Use 1 FU on Obliterate > ---DD + 48 RP
Use 2D on 2x Howling > ------ + 72 RP
Flush Runic with Frost Strike to proc Runic Empowerment
Runic Gains shown are from being specced into 2/2 Improved Frost Presence.
If you are left with a U rune and there is a long wait on a Frost rune for Oblit and your Blood Plague is far from falling off, use Death and Decay OR Blood Tap and then use Oblit. Remember Death and Decay earns you 10 Runic, as well as Horn of Winter
Rinse and repeat.
If you are rune starved you are not doing it correctly and doing one of the following wrong...
Using DEATH runes on an Oblit, not waiting for your UH Rune to come off CD and wasting a precious Death Rune.
or
Not understanding that Runic Empowerment only procs FULLY depleted runes. Therefore you want to keep your runes on CD as much as possible. In Order to get the most out of your random rune proc.
Raid Prep:
Being prepared to raid is important.
Flask: Titanic Strength (300 Str) or Potion of the Master (225 Mastery)
Food: Lavascale Minestrone (90 Mastery + 90 Stam)
Pots: Golemblood (1200 Str)
Remember to Prepot on the pull, and then again at the start of Heroism/BL.
DW Oblit Frost (Easiest DPS Spec)
Spoiler:Show Spec:
Can be found here
That extra Talent point you're free to throw wherever, the best place it is in Butchery, however the 1 RP per 5s is hardly anything special, you could put it in Icy Reach if there is a lot of encounters where you do spend a bit of time away from bosses (Morchock, Hagara).
Other than for obvious reasons the frost talents, we take the 3/3 in Bladed Armor as it's a straight up AP boost which scales with gear. Unholy we take 3/3 in Virulence so our diseases do 30% more damage, and then 3/3 in Epidemic so we have to not waste as much time refreshing Blood Plague.
Glyphs:
Prime:
Howling Blast
Frost Strike
Obliterate
Major:
AMS
Minor:
Blood Tap
Horn of Winter
Stat Priority:
Things change here a bit, nothing major but still changes.
Hit 5%* > Strength > Haste > Mastery > Crit > Expertise**
Strength over everything, gems, enchants, everything to be strength. Then out main secondary stat is Haste, more KM procs, more rune regen which is vital for the obliterate playstyle. Then Mastery for the nice damage from Howling Blast and Frost Strikes.
* Hit rating is bugged on Molten for PvE, bosses cannot be missed above player lvl cap, which is 5%, it will be fixed in the future and when it does this will be updated to take that fix into account.
** Expertise is bugged on Molten for PvE, bosses cannot Dodge or Parry, it will be fixed in the future and when it does this will be updated to take that fix into account.
Gear:
Gems:
Unless the socket bonus is strength will you take the socket bonus, even then if the gain is only +10/20 Strength you're not going to bother and just gem pure strength.
Red: [Bold Queen's Garnet]
Yellow: [Fierce Lava Coral]
Blue: [Etched Shadow Spinel]
Enchants:
Helm: Wildhammer/Dragonmaw Rep (Strength+Mastery)
Shoulder: Therazane Rep (Strength+Crit)
Chest: 20 Stats
Cloak: 65 Crit / Swordguard (Tailoring)
Bracers: 50 Strength
Gloves: 50 Strength
Legs: Strength + Crit
Boots: 50 Haste
Main-Hand Weapon: Rune of Razorice
Off-Hand Weapon: Rune of Fallen Crusader
Presences
Unholy Presence, always. Rune regen, Haste and GCD reduction are vital for ALL frost specs. There should never be a time when you switch to Frost, even with Heroism/BL active, it's not worth the GCDs and RP wasted to switch presence.
Priority System:
With all your runes you are going to be using Obliterate, however there is a priority system, for which runes you use, what on and when.
Diseased should be maintained at all times.
Howling Blast with Rime to refresh Frost Fever
Obliterate with Killing Machine.
Frost Strike with 0 Frost Runes or to dump RP. Never let your RP cap out!
Obliterate with 2 Death, Frost, or Unholy Runes.
When you FS Dump watch out for Runic Empowerment procs, if you get two then use it on an oblit straight away.
If you have downtime, all runes on CD and lacking RP, use Horn of Winter. Gives runic power and also refreshed your Str+Agi buff.
DW Oblit Frost is an incredibly easy priority system, and should you mess up there is always a rune to do something, whether it be to refresh Blood Plague with Plague Strike, or to Howling Blast, if you have a spare UH Rune and you just refreshed your diseases you can even throw down a D&D.
Raid Prep:
Being prepared to raid is important.
Flask: Titanic Strength (300 Str)
Food: Beer-Basted Crocolisk (90 Str + 90 Stam)
Pots: Golemblood (1200 Str)
Remember to Prepot on the pull, and then again at the start of Heroism/BL.
2H Frost (For derps who can't play UH)
Spoiler:Show 2h Frost plays like DW Oblit, just with a 2H.
Spec:
Can be found here
That extra Talent point you're free to throw wherever, the best place it is in Butchery, however the 1 RP per 5s is hardly anything special, you could put it in Icy Reach if there is a lot of encounters where you do spend a bit of time away from bosses (Morchock, Hagara).
The 2/2 in On a Pale Horse, you can put in Endless Winter if you find you have to kick a lot, it's just there because we need 10 points in T1/2, I guess that 30% reduction to slows and 20% mounted might help, somewhere.
Other than for obvious reasons the frost talents, we take the 3/3 in Bladed Armor as it's a straight up AP boost which scales with gear. Unholy we take 3/3 in Virulence so our diseases do 30% more damage, and then 3/3 in Epidemic so we have to not waste as much time refreshing Blood Plague.
Glyphs:
Prime:
Howling Blast
Frost Strike
Obliterate
Major:
AMS
Minor:
Blood Tap
Horn of Winter
Stat Priority:
Things change here a bit, nothing major but still changes.
Hit 5%* > Strength > Haste > Mastery > Crit > Expertise**
Strength over everything, gems, enchants, everything to be strength. Then out main secondary stat is Haste, more KM procs, more rune regen which is vital for the obliterate playstyle. Then Mastery for the nice damage from Howling Blast and Frost Strikes.
* Hit rating is bugged on Molten for PvE, bosses cannot be missed above player lvl cap, which is 5%, it will be fixed in the future and when it does this will be updated to take that fix into account.
** Expertise is bugged on Molten for PvE, bosses cannot Dodge or Parry, it will be fixed in the future and when it does this will be updated to take that fix into account.
Gear:
Gems:
Unless the socket bonus is strength will you take the socket bonus, even then if the gain is only +10/20 Strength your not going to bother and just gem pure strength.
Red: [Bold Queen's Garnet]
Yellow: [Fierce Lava Coral]
Blue: [Etched Shadow Spinel]
Enchants:
Helm: Wildhammer/Dragonmaw Rep (Strength+Mastery)
Shoulder: Therazane Rep (Strength+Crit)
Chest: 20 Stats
Cloak: 65 Crit / Swordguard (Tailoring)
Bracers: 65 Haste
Gloves: 50 Strength
Legs: Strength + Crit
Boots: 50 Haste
Weapon: Rune of Fallen Crusader
Presences:
Unholy Presence, always. Rune regen, Haste and GCD reduction are vital for ALL frost specs. There should never be a time when you switch to Frost, even with Heroism/BL active, it's not worth the GCDs and RP wasted to switch presence.
Priority System:
With all your runes you are going to be using Obliterate, however there is a priority system, for which runes you use, what on and when.
Diseased should be maintained at all times.
Howling Blast with Rime to refresh Frost Fever
Obliterate with Killing Machine.
Frost Strike with 0 Frost Runes or to dump RP. Never let your RP cap out!
Obliterate with 2 Death, Frost, or Unholy Runes.
When you FS Dump watch out for Runic Empowerment procs, if you get two use it on an oblit straight away.
If you have downtime, all runes on CD and lacking RP, use Horn of Winter. Gives runic power and also refreshed your Str+Agi buff.
2H Frost is an incredibly easy priority system, and should you mess up there is always a rune to do something, whether it be to refresh Blood Plague with Plague Strike, or to Howling Blast, if you have a spare UH Rune and you just refreshed your diseases you can even throw down a D&D.
Raid Prep:
Being prepared to raid is important.
Flask: Titanic Strength (300 Str)
Food: Beer-Basted Crocolisk (90 Str + 90 Stam)
Pots: Golemblood (1200 Str)
Remember to Prepot on the pull, and then again at the start of Heroism/BL.
BIS List:
Helm: Necrotic Boneplate Helmet (Tier)
Neck: Necklace of Black Dragon's Teeth (Valor)
Shoulders: Backbreaker Spaulders (DS)
Back: Dreamcrusher Drape (Valor)
Chest: Necrotic Boneplate Breastplate (Tier)
Wrist: Rockhide Bracers (DS)
Hands: Necrotic Boneplate Gauntlets (Tier)
Waist: Runescriven Demon Collar (DS)
Legs: Necrotic Boneplate Greaves (Tier)
Feet: Treads of Crushed Flesh (DS)
Ring 1: Breathstealer Band (DS)
Ring 2: Curled Twilight Claw (DS)
Trinkets: Apparatus of Khaz'goroth, Eye of Unmaking
Relic: Gutripper Shard (Valor)
Weapons:-
1H Masterfrost: No'Kaled, the Elements of Death x2
1H Oblit Frost: Hand Of Morchok x2
2H: Ataraxis, Cudgel of the Warmaster
* - According to Statistics from WoWProgress and World of Logs.
Spoiler:Show
My other guides
Cataclysm:
Frost DK PvP 4.3
Frost DK PvE 4.3
Enhancement Shaman PvE 4.3
MOP:
Frost DK PvE 5.4
Unholy DK PvP 5.4