Blood Death Knight Tank Gear and Best in Slot — The War Within (11.0.7)

Welcome to our Gear and BiS Page for Blood Death Knight for The War Within Season 1. Check this page to learn everything you need to know about gearing a Blood Death Knight, including the BiS Gear from all sources, Raiding, and Mythic+, information on the best Trinkets, Tier Sets, and much more.

We only provide a "Best in Slot" list as a mandatory requirement stemming from certain guilds and players thinking they absolutely need to blindly chase that one item in that one slot and nothing else will do. Sometimes, it is raid leaders enforcing a very strict "BiS list" for loot council without any nuance; other times, it is players themselves enforcing it on themselves.

Blood Death Knight gearing is very simple: you prioritize item level above everything else on everything except trinkets, as anything 6 item levels or more is virtually guaranteed to be an upgrade.

If you have a choice on the same item level, the alternative will not, in generic circumstances, make a difference defensively. As such, we recommend just simming the choice and going with whatever helps you do more damage.

There are exceptions to this rule and encounter-specific situations where a stat is massively devalued. Whenever an encounter features a difference (such as a boss not having a parryable auto-attack or dealing pure magical damage) and is deadly enough to warrant recommending small gearing changes, we will highlight it in the encounter guides as an exception, not a rule.

Similarly, at the absolute cutting-edge Mythic+ key levels, a slightly more fine-tuned approach towards secondaries and key-specific trade-offs on secondary stats may occur. This is extremely rare, and very often, even these players eschew or illogically favor choices that prove to be major mistakes just by cursory log analysis.

We have covered some of the caveats in a more detailed fashion on the following page:

Throughout this page, we regularly refer to the importance of simming yourself on Raidbots, as it is an indispensable aspect of optimizing your character.

While we do offer generic sim charts for Trinkets, this should not be a replacement for simming. These charts are generated in isolation, without including a second trinket. As a result, this can mess with - to name just a few:

• Cases where you have two on-use trinkets and the order in which they are used
• Cases where trinket cooldowns clash at specific points
• Cases where a certain trinket drastically impacts your rotation when it comes off cooldown

If you are new to simming and Raidbots, check out our detailed guide below.

3.

BiS Gear for Blood Death Knight

Overall BiS List for Season 1 Nerub-ar Palace Gear BiS List Mythic+ Gear BiS List

This list contains the Best in Slot Gear from any source in Season 1 of The War Within. It is there as a reference to what is currently the highest performing gear available to players.

Slot	Item	Source/Note
Weapon	Anub'arash's Colossal Mandible (639)	Silken Court in Mythic Nerub-ar Palace
Helm	Soaring Behemoth's Greathelm (639)	The Dawnbreaker
Neck	Silken Advisor's Favor (639)	Silken Court in Mythic Nerub-ar Palace
Shoulder	Exhumed Centurion's Spikes (639)	Tier Set: Catalyst / Vault / Raid
Cloak	Wings of Shattered Sorrow (639)	Rasha'nan in Mythic Nerub-ar Palace
Chest	Exhumed Centurion's Breastplate (639)	Tier Set: Catalyst / Vault / Raid
Bracers	Everforged Vambraces (636)	Crafted
Gloves	Exhumed Centurion's Gauntlets (639)	Tier Set: Catalyst / Vault / Raid
Belt	Everforged Greatbelt (636)	Crafted
Legs	Exhumed Centurion's Chausses (639)	Tier Set: Catalyst / Vault / Raid
Boots	Shattershell Greaves (639)	Silken Court in Mythic Nerub-ar Palace
Ring #1	Seal of the Poisoned Pact (639)	Queen Ansurek in Mythic Nerub-ar Palace
Ring #2	Cyrce's Circlet	Siren Isle
Trinket #1	Ara-Kara Sacbrood (639)	Ara-Kara, City of Echoes
Trinket #2	Spare Meat Hook (639)	The Necrotic Wake

This list serves as a "My raid leader needs me to provide a wishlist, here is the wishlist" item list. If you were to assemble the best gear set from Nerub-ara Palace specifically, and no other source, this is what you would wear.

Slot	Item	Source/Note
Weapon	Anub'arash's Colossal Mandible (639)	Silken Court in Mythic Nerub-ar Palace
Helm	Visor of the Ascended Captain (639)	Sikran in Mythic Nerub-ar Palace
Neck	Silken Advisor's Favor (639)	Silken Court in Mythic Nerub-ar Palace
Shoulder	Exhumed Centurion's Spikes (639)	Tier Set: Catalyst / Vault / Raid
Cloak	Wings of Shattered Sorrow (639)	Rasha'nan in Mythic Nerub-ar Palace
Chest	Exhumed Centurion's Breastplate (639)	Tier Set: Catalyst / Vault / Raid
Bracers	Ravaged Lamplighter's Manacles (639)	Rasha'nan in Mythic Nerub-ar Palace
Gloves	Exhumed Centurion's Gauntlets (639)	Tier Set: Catalyst / Vault / Raid
Belt	Greatbelt of the Hungerer (639)	Ulgrax the Devourer in Mythic Nerub-ar Palace
Legs	Exhumed Centurion's Chausses (639)	Tier Set: Catalyst / Vault / Raid
Boots	Shattershell Greaves (639)	Silken Court in Mythic Nerub-ar Palace
Ring #1	Seal of the Poisoned Pact (639)	Queen Ansurek in Mythic Nerub-ar Palace
Ring #2	Writhing Ringworm (639)	Broodtwister Ovi'nax in Mythic Nerub-ar Palace
Trinket #1	Skyterror's Corrosive Organ (639)	Silken Court in Mythic Nerub-ar Palace
Trinket #2	Sikran's Endless Arsenal (639)	Sikran in Mythic Nerub-ar Palace

This list contains the best items available per slot from Mythic+. It is there to provide you with a quick list of easily farmable gear if you need something in a specific slot.

Slot	Item	Source/Note
Weapon	Dismembered Submersible Claw (639)	Siege of Boralus
Helm	Soaring Behemoth's Greathelm (639)	The Dawnbreaker
Neck	Trailspinner Pendant (639)	Mists of Tirna Scithe
Shoulder	Earthshape Pauldrons (639)	Grim Batol
Cloak	Swarmcaller's Shroud (639)	Ara-Kara, City of Echoes
Chest	Dark Priest's Carapace (639)	The Dawnbreaker
Bracers	Bracers of Umbral Mending (639)	Grim Batol
Gloves	Machinist's Searing Handguards (639)	The Stonevault
Belt	Cannoneer's Toolbelt (639)	Siege of Boralus
Legs	Legplates of Broken Trust (639)	The Stonevault
Boots	Ichor-Stained Sollerets (639)	City of Threads
Ring #1	Band of the Roving Scalawag (639)	Siege of Boralus
Ring #2	Ritual Commander's Ring (639)	The Necrotic Wake
Trinket #1	Ara-Kara Sacbrood (639)	Ara-Kara, City of Echoes
Trinket #2	Spare Meat Hook (639)	The Necrotic Wake

Patch 11.0.7 brings with it Cyrce's Circlet, a brand new customizable ring that is eerily reminiscent of the Onyx Annulet. Completing activities on Siren Isle allows you to acquire and upgrade unique gems that slot into the ring, granting you unusual and interesting procs while in combat.

While there are a total of 12 gems - four per type - the overwhelming majority of them are relatively lackluster, and some of them barely function for non-healing specializations.

The state of Cyrce's Circlet and its gems as of Patch 11.0.7 launch, unfortunately, is mired with bugs, late-release hotfixes and issues. Currently, all of the direct damage citrine tooltips make it seem like they should be reduced by 33% for tank specializations, but their actual damage (and healing) is not affected by this. This makes some gems 33% better than intended, and will likely be fixed when the patch fully goes live to the player base.

With this in mind, the ring is currently BiS; when they nerf this, it will return to its original state of being a catch-up sidegrade for alts.

If you do decide to use Cyrce's Circlet, we recommend the following gems as a default recommendation, but we strongly recommend simming the combinations for yourself to verify these.

For raid, you will want the following gems:

• Thunder: Thunderlord's Crackling Citrine
• Sea: Undersea Overseer's Citrine
• Wind: Legendary Skipper's Citrine

For Mythic+, you will want the following gems:

• Thunder: Thunderlord's Crackling Citrine
• Sea: Undersea Overseer's Citrine
• Wind: Legendary Skipper's Citrine

We specifically advise caution when using Thunderlord's Crackling Citrine for Mythic+ as it can ninjapull enemies that are in combat as part of roleplay events, such as the start of the Stonevault. If you decide that this is too much of a problem and wish to forsake this ring altogether, the entire ring becomes a downgrade.

For more information on how to get the ring, as well as acquiring all of the different gems that you can possibly socket into it, check out our Cyrce's Circlet guide below!

Embellishments have largely not received tuning yet, and as such, we expect that some of them will end up receiving some hasty hotfixes when Nerub-ar Palace launches. We strongly recommend not crafting with any Sparks just yet.

Should you wish to discard this advice, we recommend crafting the following:

• Everforged Vambraces with Elemental Focusing Lens
• Everforged Greatbelt with Elemental Focusing Lens

In order to activate this embellishment, you will need at least one Colored (i.e. non Diamond) gem slotted in a gem slot anywhere on your gear.

Whilst a Missive can allow you to target certain secondary stats, Blood Death Knights tend to not see a large amount of difference between all of the different options. If you absolutely want to gauge this delta, use Raidbots to simulate all of the different combinations; they will all typically fall within 0.1-0.2% of each other. As such, we recommend not bothering until significantly later in the season, when re-crafting will be cheaper.

With the launch of Season 1, Blood Death Knights will be able to gain the bonuses from Exhumed Centurion's Relics:

• Death Knight Blood Season 1 2pc — While you have one or more Bone Shield charges, the damage you take is reduced by 2.0%. Losing a Bone Shield charge has a chance to reduce the damage you take by an additional 1.0%, up to 3.0% for 6 sec.
• Death Knight Blood Season 1 4pc — Your damage is increased by 1% per active Bone Shield charge. Taking damage while below 6 Bone Shield charges has a chance to generate 1-2 Bone Shield charges.

You should prioritize the slots you have the worst items in; the absolute best gear set uses Shoulders, Chest, Gloves and Legs to activate the 4-piece set bonus, but the difference between using the Headpiece or not could boil down to simply not getting a Myth-track headpiece from any other source.

Obtaining gear from rated PvP can be a powerful boost to your item level early in the season.

All of these items have Versatility on them.

If you are wanting to obtain PvP gear, we would advise doing Solo Shuffle as Frost.

Completing end-game activities in The War Within will reward you with Harbinger Crests and Valorstones. Once you have upgraded a slot to a certain item level, upgrading other items of that slot to that item level is free.

We recommend upgrading with the following priority list:

• Upgrade your lowest item level slots or use a Raidbots Droptimiser sim to evaluate what to upgrade next.
• Finally, upgrade your weapon. The reason for this being last is that Weapons are the most expensive to upgrade, and you should focus on trying to farm a higher item level weapon and gain more overall value from your upgrades.