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UNHOLY DK FUNDAMENTALS COURSE
UNHOLY DK PLAYSTYLE
Welcome to our Unholy Death Knight damage course for The War Within, which is designed to provide you with all of the fundamental knowledge that you need to dominate in the arena.
Now, in this first introductory video, we're going to be delving into the intricacies of Unholy Death Knight gameplay, and we're also going to discuss what you can expect from the spec in The War Within, as well as its general playstyle.
So, to start with, Unholy Death Knights typically fit into the Brawler archetype, applying constant pressure in combat to overwhelm the enemy team. But unlike other Brawlers, they aren't as durable as they may seem.
This is because of heavy nerfs to almost every single defensive talent that DKs have, turning them from what was once a massive tank in the start of the expansion into something much more vulnerable, similar to Death Knights in Dragonflight.
Now, because of these PvP modifiers on talents like Gnoll Magma, Death Knights are far squishier than they want to be into casters and melees alike, making them have to dance around with chains of ice and line of sight frequently to stay alive.
Now, although we'll be primarily in melee range throughout our games, a lot of our damage is going to be coming from our diseases and death coils, acting more like a big, brawling affliction warlock rather than a high-hitting warrior.
Now, that's not to say we're all sustained, though, as we can deal some disgusting burst. We're not going to be able to do much damage to our enemies, but we're going to be able to do a lot of damage to our allies, and we're going to be able to do a lot of damage to our allies.
So, maximizing damage is a huge part of unholy gameplay. However, it's not just that simple.
You're going to win games up to a point just topping the meters, sure. But to really reach that next level of gameplay, you're going to need to be using your crowd controls.
And, uh, well, boy do we have a lot of them. Two death grips.
Two stuns. An AoE blind means that you can easily set up windows for your team as well as shut down the enemy's offensive goes, preventing them from getting any momentum at all.
Lastly, and for some, most importantly, unholy death knight would be absolutely nothing if it weren't for its ghoul pet, enabling those additional stuns and kicks as well as a bulk of the death knight's damage. For pet management, it's going to result in far less pressure than you should have.
So, if you haven't added a ghoul pet, you're going to need to add a ghoul pet. If you have an appetite for min-maxing minions, massive sustained damage, and crazy amounts of control, unholy death knight may just be the class for you.
Join us in our next video as we outline the goals of unholy death knight, giving you a strong basis of how to play it optimally in the arena.
UNHOLY DK GOALS
Welcome back! In this next segment we're going to jump right in and give you the goals of Unholy Death Knight which you should be looking to follow at all times to reach success.
So starting off at our first goal we have one that's a little bit on the nose but simply put it's to deal as much sustained damage as possible.
As an Unholy Death Knight our crowd control windows are very far spread apart with our main CC of Blinding Sleet and Asphyxiate being 45 second cooldowns and often leaving us reliant on our teammates following up with crowd controls of their own to make them effective.
Now because of this a lot of our win conditions are based around dealing as much damage as possible to eventually just completely overwhelm the enemy team and if you're hearing this and wondering how do you deal damage well then have no fear as we are going to go over our sustained priority in this video.
However, for now just know that it's all about maximizing your disease uptime on as many targets as possible while also just making sure that we're bursting festering wounds with our death coils on multiple targets at once.
So for our second goal we're going to need to be using our crowd control effectively to assist our damage and create deadly kill windows and to do this we're going to want to try and be as disruptive as possible to generate progress.
Pressure which we can do in pretty creative ways like Vigarista death gripping the enemy priest out of their dome so they take more damage and then again off the pillar so they can't line a side on Vigar's team's cooldowns.
Or you can go for the more obvious play like just death charging over to the healer for an Asphyxiate. Whatever you do though just make sure you do it with a purpose as our crowd controls are a pretty long cooldown so you shouldn't waste them without having the damage to back it up.
Next up for our third goal you're going to have to use your mobility and your anti-mobility properly. Death Knights as you may well know are probably one of the most immobile classes in the entire game right next to Red Paladins.
Now for this reason we're going to have to use what little mobility we have combined with death grip and chains of ice to enable us to have uptime.
Now to do this well we're going to want to be having high chains of ice and we're going to want to be having high chains of ice and we're going to want to have high chains of ice and we're going to want to have high chains on our www and testing this with a こりゃorsk With as it's going to allow us to grip them after their teleport or their gateway.
Now as for our mobility tools we're also going to want to make sure that we use them when our opponents are looking to kite so we can enable ourselves to have that misunderstand. So that's one of first of all 11 cam jump skills.
We can do much OK as well. And then of course we're going to want to make sure to fullyatter these evolutions as well ascos of an anti-mobility tool.
Our ability to crochet points still out here which makes the goal goes anywhere. Now as for our mobility tools we're also going to to play verify the sheep Estadoslar, we're able to still pull our unit was use it when our opponent depends more on how or if you can can transport theju conversation with a investment.
You don't have it. to have more pressure. And in particular instances like versus classes with knockbacks, we can look to pre-use Death's Advance to immune their knockbacks like Vigorista does here, rendering the enemy shaman's thunderstorm useless.
Now, coming in at number four, we need to avoid overextending and instead play goalkeeper for our healer. Now, while we do have decent survivability, we're still easily taken down by burst damage, especially during dampening or after being hit by a stun and silence combo.
So instead of chasing enemies, which can leave our healer vulnerable to CC and endangering ourselves to swaps, we should instead hit the closest target and maximize our damage output. Otherwise, you're gonna get stuck in no man's land and absolutely just die.
So finally, our last goal is to protect your teammates. Between the most obvious case of anti-magic zone, negating caster's damage, we can also prevent a ton of pressure though through our death grips and chains of ice snare.
Now that we've got the play style and goals out of the way though, let's dive into how we deal damage as an unholy death knight. So stay tuned as in our next video, we're gonna be outlining your sustained damage priority.
UNHOLY DK DAMAGE PRIORITY: RIDER OF THE APOCALYSE
Welcome back! Now that you have a broader understanding of both the playstyle and the goals of an unholy death knight in the arena, the next step is learning how to deal damage effectively with the Rider of the Apocalypse Hero Tree.
Now for this, we're going to start with a clear-cut damage priority, not including any cooldowns, serving as the cornerstone of this entire course. Now, to be crystal clear on that, this is not a rotation, but rather a priority list that you can follow throughout your game.
Your highest priority is going to be clawing shadows, but only under two conditions. When your target is below 35%, you have Rotten Touch active, and Trollbane summoned, clawing shadows becomes your highest priority.
Wounds becomes optional in this situation because you already have three powerful damage modifiers working in your favor to help close out the game. And of course, if you're about to finish the target off, there's no need to prioritize maintaining your dots.
Our second priority is Alchemist. Outbreak applies all of our dots all at once, but there's a catch to this.
Don't waste your Rune on Outbreak if Apocalypse will be off cooldown within the next 10 seconds. That's because Apocalypse now triggers Dark Transformation and automatically applies your diseases to all nearby targets.
After Outbreak, we have Death Coil, either with a Sudden Doom proc or you're about to overcap on Runic Power. A good rule to follow is if you have 70-75 Runic Power that you want to use at least once a turn.
Next up is Clawing Shadows, which you use when Rotten Touch and Wounds are on the target. You want to maintain around 3-4 Wounds so that you can chain your Clawings without having to fester in between.
Next up is Festering Strike, which is how you apply Wounds. Generally, you want to keep a pool of 3-4 Wounds and then dump them during your burst.
So whenever you have 2 or fewer Wounds, you want to use Festering Strike to build them back up. Then comes Clawing Shadows, which you use when you have 3-4 Wounds.
Now this is without any buffs active, so you're dumping Wounds, but usually you'll have some kind of buff to boost it. We then have Soul Reaper.
This is if and only if you think the target will be 35% in the next 5 seconds. It's lower in priority because it can be dispelled.
If the target gets healed back up, it ends up doing nothing. What you'll notice is that Plaguebringer hasn't been mentioned at all, and that is totally intentional.
Since Clawing Shadows is woven so frequently into the game, it's not always the case that it's not mentioned. Since Clawing Shadows is woven so frequently into the game, it's not always the case that it's not mentioned.
Since Clawing Shadows is woven so frequently into the game, it's not always the case that it's not mentioned. Since Clawing Shadows is woven so frequently into the game, it's not always the case that it's not mentioned.
Since Clawing Shadows is woven so frequently into the game, it's not always the case that it's not mentioned. Since Clawing Shadows is woven so frequently into the game, it's not always the case that it's not mentioned.
Since Clawing Shadows is woven so frequently into the game, it's not always the case that it's not mentioned. Since Clawing Shadows is woven so frequently into the game, it's not always the case that it's not mentioned.
Since Clawing Shadows is woven so frequently into the game, it's not always the case that it's not mentioned. Since Clawing Shadows is woven so frequently into the game, it's not always the case that it's not mentioned.
UNHOLY DK BURST SEQUENCE: RIDER OF THE APOCALYSE
This is the video that you have been waiting for, as in this next section of our Unholy Death Knight course, we're going to be breaking down the exact sequence you want to be following in order to set up the highest burst damage possible.
Now, the great thing about Unholy is that you do not need to prep anything before you burst. First and foremost, you want to drop Abomination or Legion of Souls depending on which one of them you're playing.
This is going to summon our Riders. Next, you'll use Unholy Frenzy.
Into Apocalypse. This will automatically trigger Dark Transformation.
After that, you'll alternate between Clawing Shadows and Death Coil depending on if you're going to overcap on Runic Power or get a Sudden Doom proc. Now, we don't have to worry about applying Wounds because Abomination and Legion of Souls automatically apply Wounds.
UNHOLY DK OPENER
Unholy has two clear objectives in the opener. Deal as much damage as possible, and force as many cooldowns as possible.
The opener is especially important for Unholy, since the spec thrives on high, consistent damage over time. If the enemy team can simply rotate and trade cooldowns, Unholy struggles to close out the game.
You're gonna notice that the death knight immediately starts by running toward the enemy team instead of waiting for the enemy to push in. Again, we thrive on momentum, and getting into the fight early allows us to start dealing damage quickly and begin cycling through your offensive cooldowns.
As the death knight walks toward the druid, they use chains of ice. Chains should be used immediately to help you get uptime and to make it harder for the enemy team to connect.
The death knight also uses outbreak to get some initial dots. Now, normally this isn't necessary in the opener, since dark transformation automatically spreads your diseases.
However, in situations where it's difficult to connect, casting outbreak can definitely help. Once the death knight connects to the balanced druid, they immediately use grip to pull in the healer.
The goal before opening is to bring in as many people as possible, which is important to creating that strong initial pressure that sets the pace of the match. In this case, the healer responds with ancient of lore as they're pulled in, but the death knight still commits abomination.
This is honestly a slight misplay. If the death knight had held abomination until after, ancient of lore, it would have nearly guaranteed the win.
Without their major cooldown, the healer would have struggled to keep their team alive. At this point, the death knight focuses on dealing as much damage as possible to the balanced druid, forcing bark skin.
Once abomination is used, your main goal is to maximize your damage during that window, and that is exactly what happens here. So jumping ahead just a bit, we can see that because abomination lasted so long, they even force ironbark during that same go.
So even though the opener wasn't necessarily perfect, the death knight still manages to get a significant amount of cooldowns from the enemy team. What you're gonna notice throughout this entire opener though is how aggressively that death knight plays, and that's exactly how you want to approach your games.
If you're constantly kiting, lining of sight, or hiding, you're just giving the enemy control and setting yourself up to lose.
UNHOLY DK WIN CONDITION
Now, building on what we've covered so far, this final video is going to walk you through your win condition, giving you the tools and the confidence you need to climb the ladder with ease. Unholy Death Knight actually has two main win conditions, and they're not exactly what most people expect.
Sure, you've got plenty of rot and dot damage, and yes, you can pad the meters all day. But that's not what actually wins games.
Your first real win condition is your riders. Thanks to the Apocalypse Now talent, when you pop Abomination or Legion of Souls, you summon all your riders at once.
And for Unholy, these riders hit incredibly hard. It's borderline unhealable when timed correctly.
What makes Unholy so scary during this window is that you're stacking every damage modifier you have into one massive unhealable push. You've got Unholy Frenzy boosting all damage by 20%, Ghoulish Frenzy adding another 5%, and your riders.
This brings even more. Extra damage, crit chance, strength buffs, and a bunch of other bonuses.
The entire idea is to line everything up so your damage spikes to a point where the enemy team just simply cannot heal through it, and that's exactly how you secure the win. Our second win condition is mana.
All that pad damage we talked about earlier might not get you a random kill, but it is going to drain the healer's mana bar and drain it fast. Unholy is excellent at padding the meters, and over time, healers simply just can't keep up, especially if you're paired with another Mortal Strike class.
Necrotic Wounds and MS effects, they stack, and that constant pressure is going to eventually run them out of mana. How well you can pad really depends on what you're fighting, though.
Into cleaves, padding is easy. You can use Desecrate and constantly cleave.
Plus, Outbreak is going to spread to multiple players since they're stacked together. Into caster comps, it's going to be a little bit more annoying.
You're going to need to manually dot each and every target, and you won't have many chances to cleave outside of AoE stunts. You can still win on mana in those matchups, it just takes a little bit more effort and precision on your part.
Now, you might be wondering, though, about those Apocalypse burst windows every 45 seconds. While they do pump a bit, especially with our tier sets summoning white main, it's usually not enough to score a kill on its own.
Those windows really shine if your teammate has offensive cooldowns ready, the enemy healer is tapped on mana, or you already have your riders out, and you're ready to go. or you already have your riders out, and you're ready to go. or you already have your riders out, and you're ready to go. or you already have your riders out, and you're ready to go. or you already have your riders out, and you're ready to go. or you already have your riders out, and you're ready to go.