Death knight

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This article concerns content exclusive to Wrath of the Lich King. This information is subject to change at any time. (Note this tag should only be placed on major WotLK articles.)

This article is about the hero class in World of Warcraft: Wrath of the Lich King. For other uses see Death knight (disambiguation).

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The Death Knight is a classic unit/class which first appeared in Warcraft II and Warcraft III. It was later adapted as a prestige class within the Warcraft RPG (Alliance & Horde Compendium and Dark Factions). It will be the first hero class in World of Warcraft, set to be introduced in the new expansion, World of Warcraft: Wrath of the Lich King. Currently it is the only planned hero class to be introduced in World of Warcraft: Wrath of the Lich King.

Contents 1 Talents 2 Lore 2.1 Shadows of Justice 2.2 Champions of the Lich King 3 Hero class overview 3.1 Unlocking your death knight 3.2 The Rune System 3.3 Character's role 3.4 Runeforging 4 Concept artwork 5 See also 6 References 7 External links

Talents

Main article: Death knight talents

Death Knight talents are split into 3 categories:

• Blood: This tree primarily amplifies the Death Knight's melee spells, weapons, and abilities.
• Frost: Primarily tanking talents & spells which enhance the Death Knight's defense and threat generation.
• Unholy: Talents that enhance summoned minions and diseases.

Lore

Shadows of Justice

From official Death Knight Lore.^[1]

Orgrim Doomhammer's first act as warchief of the Horde was to crush the orc warlocks of the Shadow Council. He grudgingly spared the council's former master, Gul'dan, in exchange for the warlock's servitude; in turn Gul'dan promised to create a host of powerful new warriors to serve the Horde. After experimenting at length with the souls of the recently slain council members, Gul'dan successfully instilled the spirit of the necrolyte Teron Gorefiend into the corpse of a fallen knight of Stormwind. Thus, the first terrifying death knight was born. Gul'dan transformed other council members as well, creating unholy warriors who sowed chaos and fear throughout the land of Azeroth during the Second War.

Following Gul'dan's desertion and death, part of the Horde, including the death knights, retreated through the Dark Portal to Draenor. Most of the surviving death knights disappeared after Draenor's destruction, with the exception of Teron Gorefiend, whose restless and embittered form resides now in the Black Temple of Outland.

Champions of the Lich King

From official Death Knight Lore.^[1]

Years after the destruction of Draenor, the immensely powerful Lich King created a new breed of death knights: malevolent, rune-wielding warriors of the Scourge. The first and greatest of these was Prince Arthas Menethil, once a mighty paladin of the Silver Hand, who sacrificed his soul to claim the runeblade Frostmourne in a desperate bid to save his people.

Unlike Gul'dan's death knights, modern death knights consist mainly of paladins who lost their faith and pledged their souls to the Lich King in exchange for the promise of immortality. Death knights who fall in battle are soon raised again to continue in their master's service.

In the years since Arthas shattered the Frozen Throne and merged with the Lich King, the power and fury of the death knights has only grown. Now these unrelenting crusaders of the damned eagerly await the Lich King's command to unleash their fury on Azeroth once again.

Hero class overview

At this time, the criteria for creating a Death Knight will be the existence of a level 55+ character^[2] on the player's account. Once that criteria is met, the player can create one Death Knight per realm.^[3]

The death knight combines martial prowess with dark, necromantic energies. Players might be familiar with the death knight from previously released Warcraft games -- most recently, in the campaigns for Warcraft III: Reign of Chaos and the Warcraft III: The Frozen Throne expansion, the former paladin Arthas became a death knight and wrought havoc across Azeroth before fusing with the spirit of Ner'zhul to become the Lich King. It is important to note that these particular Death Knights are based upon those created by the Lich King in Warcraft III, not those of Orcish origin as seen in WarCraft II.

Unlocking your death knight

Main article: Starting a death knight

The death knight is the first hero class in World of Warcraft. This is a second and separate character from your original character and can be created as soon as one of the existing characters in your account reaches level 55. After making a death knight, you will not lose the access to any of your existing characters. The death knight will start at level 55 in Acherus: The Ebon Hold over the Eastern Plaguelands, with multiple spells and abilities ready to use, and a set of uncommon gear. When you leave Ebon Hold you will have a full set of rare gear ready for Outland. Through the death knight-specific quests in this necropolis and the surrounding areas, the character learns to master the power of the death knight and learns to use this new power for the will of the Lich King. Quests will take them outside the necropolis and into an area within the Scarlet Enclave.

Accounts will be limited to one death knight per realm and can make them on any server, even servers where you have no characters. PvP servers are still limited by faction (i.e. if you have an Alliance character on a PvP server, you cannot make a Horde death knight on that PvP server).

The Rune System

The death knight uses a unique rune-based resource system to govern his spells and abilities. Three rune types: blood, frost, and unholy, each with an attached color and symbol. As they use their abilities, the runes will be exhausted. After a period of time (10 seconds, for now) the runes will refresh.^[4] The Death Knight will be able to use spells to turn a rune into a Death Rune, which can be used as a Blood/Frost/Unholy rune. In addition, whenever the Death Knight uses a rune ability against a foe, it will build up a certain amount of Runic Power. This Runic Power is only used by few abilities.^[5] Certain abilities (such as Dancing Rune Blade) will completely drain all the Runic Power that has been accumulated. The more power stored, the more effective the ability. Most abilities that use Runic Power use a set amount, like Death Coil.

Death knights will not be able to reallocate the number and type of runes - they're fixed to 2 runes of each type.^[6] Runeforging will still be available, but it will only provide permanent weapon enchants. The enchants work just like the permanent weapon enchants provided by Enchanting, but are self-only and are supposed to be better for the death knight than the Enchanting ones.

The original player frame for deathknights shown from Blizzcon has changed as feedback showed it was not ideal for displaying rune power for players.

Character's role

In general, the death knight can be considered a hybrid class that combines damage dealing and tanking. They will wear plate armor, and be able to dual wield or use two-handed blade weapons (and maces, as revealed recently)^[4]. Like druids, they will tank without shields. Their tanking mechanics will most likely be high armor as indicated by Frost Presence, and by having a high chance to parry.^[7][8] Blizzard has said that their tanking niche will be caster-type enemies.^[9] A common assumption among fans is that Hero Classes will be overpowered, however Blizzard has stated on announcing the Death Knight that they will be of similar strength and value to existing classes. Like other classes they will have their own unique abilities, a few of which can be seen at the Death Knight abilities article.

Runeforging

Main article: Runeforging

Death Knights will have a unique enchant-like system called Runeforging^[10]. Death Knights will learn Runeforging in the start area, after a few quests. Runeforging is just like enchanting. When near a Runeforge you will be able to click a spell in your spell book, just like enchanting, and then choose an "enchant" to perform on the weapon. Runeforging will overwrite enchants.

Concept artwork

Death Knight concept art

Death Knight concept art

Death Knight art by Raneman

Death Knight art by Raneman

See also

• Death knight abilities
• Death knight organizations
• Death knight races
• List of death knights

References

External links

Offical Wrath of the Lich King site Death Knight Class Information

Offical Wrath of the Lich King site Death Knight Interview (Design Team: Q&A)

Offical Wrath of the Lich King site Death Knight Lore (Shadows of Justice, Champions of the Lich King)

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