Best Race for a Death Knight (PvE and PvP)

Death Knights are the new hybrid tanking class introduced by Blizzard in Wrath of the Lich King and offer some unique abilities in PvE and PvP to throw into the class mix.

While Blizzard has clearly stated that Death Knights will not replace Warriors as end-game main tanks, they are certainly viable as a tank, and more efficient at dealing with caster bosses then any of the other tanks with abilities like Anti-Magic Zone and Anti-Magic Shell.

Blizzard made a lot of changes with racials, and while many people say that you should only pick a race based on "looks", racial abilities should be another factor to look at if you are serious about end game play.

Horde

Blood Elf

- Arcane Torrent - Silences all enemies within 8 yards for 2 sec and restores 15 Runic Power

Mana tap and global cool down has been removed from this spell making it much more viable. A great pvp talent to allow death knights an extra silence in their attack sequence with Strangulate and Mind Freeze and also gives them 15 runic power which can be inserted at crucial points to complete certain combos, almost like how rogues use energy.

- Magic Resistance (passive) Reduces the chance you will be hit by spells by 2%.

This ability will make Blood Elfs the best magic tanks in the game for min/maxers. This ability already plays up to the death knights advantage in mitigating magic damage and the guilds that will want to use a death knight to take on really tough end game magic bosses will definitely want a magic tank who has a +2% chance to mitigate even more magic damage.

Orc

- Blood Fury (instant - 2 min cooldown) - Increases attack power by (Level*4)+2 per character level (322 at 80). Lasts 15 sec.

They removed the -50% healing debuff from this racial which is HUGE! Orcs will be the highest DPS melee of any DK's out there and this makes them even more leathal when they get their death grip on you.

- Hardiness (passive) - Duration of Stun effects reduced by an additional 15%.

This will let you handle rogues and paladins much easier, stacking this with On a Pale Horse (20% talented) and meta gems (+15%) will give you (ex. 8 second stun - 20% = 6.4 - 15% = 5.44 - 15% = 4.26 stun). However death knights already have a stun immunity Icebound Fortitude that they can cast if in combat with a heavy stun user, but it doesn't break stun so it must be used offensively and it's on a 1 minute cooldown.

- Command (passive) - Damage dealt by Death Knight, Hunter and Warlock pets increased by 5%.

This ability increases the damage that your summoned Ghoul's do from Army of the Dead, while 5% is not game breaking you do summon about 9 ghouls so buffing all their damage starts to add up.

- Axe Specialization (passive) Expertise with Axes and Two-Handed Axes increased by 5.

solidifying orcs as the best melee dps DK you can pick, disappointed that this ability wasn't buffed since you see a lot of items now having +expertise on it.