5.2 Nerf?

[Toffees 5]

Is there any good news for us warlocks? Most other classes seemed to be getting buffs, but we loose an awesome solo farming ability plus 5% of our dmg output

• Soul Leech now provides an absorption shield instead of healing.
• Grimoire of Sacrifice now increases the damage of abilities by 20% (was 25%) for Destruction, and 45% (was 50%) for Affliction.

[Gravyspasm 70]

but we lose an awesome solo farming ability

awesome is a bit strong, don't you think? I never used it personally, but then again, when i solo, i do so in destro, and generally don't pull slow enough where the slow trickle from leech will pay out.

[NightShade 14]

I am demonology on my 73 and as a warlock I have had it SO easy as it is. . . Send voidwalker out and cast spell. . . wild imps cast, target dies, rinse and repeat. Leveling my mage was much harder as I had to deal with pulling from as far a range as I could and even then would sometimes take damage. Groups. . . doable but have to bandage or eat afterwards and that slows it down. For a squishy with a pet that can tank I don't think solo abilities are really relevant to blizzard's way of thinking, there was something off in pvp or pve/raiding that they wanted to fix. 5% is a mild nerf imho and nothing is final till the patch releases, even then they can hotfix and adjust.

[JvChequer 43]

Not a great nerf, actually i was expecting a greater nerf than only 5% on sacrifice.

The shield could be better than healing in raids, plus, the self-heal provide by talent was the worst in our package.

[Stunlocked 8]

The writing has been on the wall for Grimoire of Sacrifice for a while. They don't want a talent to be so much better that it's mandatory.

As for Soul Leech, making the Soul Shard and Burning Embers sglyph baseline frees up a glyph spot to provide another self-heal.

[Nivloc 2]

I'm just wondering if it's going to make Sacrifice the talent of choice still. I mean it's going to be a dps loss for sure, maybe now we can have a different talent choice other than sacrifice. I wouldn't mind mixing it up now if say for example supremacy proved to be better.

[JvChequer 43]

I'm just wondering if it's going to make Sacrifice the talent of choice still. I mean it's going to be a dps loss for sure, maybe now we can have a different talent choice other than sacrifice. I wouldn't mind mixing it up now if say for example supremacy proved to be better.

For sure?

Not at all, even with 5% nerf, I really believe Gosac still be the choice JUST IN single target fights.

[Zagam 1,982]

The absorption shield will be way better for PvE. Too often does the healing component get overlaid into overhealing. This will make raiding damage mitigation much better but will be a slight nerf to leveling/questing grinding.

The 5% damage reduction to Grim of Sac is NOT a flat out 5% damage reduction. It will only be to the following:

1) Malefic Grasp (minor damage anyways)

2) Drain Soul (minor overall effect)

3) Fel Flame (shouldn't be using)

4) Haunt (this one hurts a bit)

If my math comes up right, I calculated it to be about a 2.1% overall DPS nerf which really isn't significant. Losing 2k out of 100k isn't going to make or break you at all. Also remember that Grimoire of Sacrifice isn't JUST about the DPS buff...you also gain 20% HP if used with Soul Link and an AMAZING passive health regeneration of 2% every 5 seconds. This isn't going away, so Sacrifice will still be VERY viable, if not a necessity with all the extra bonuses.

Please also remember that these are VERY early notes/changes. Things will be changing all the way into 5.2 implementation. They have a lot of things to rework, and just keep in mind that we are getting our own quest chain for green fire and having some of our 'mandatory' glyphs being worked into our class as passive abilities (Burning Embers and Soul Shard glyphs). Not everything coming is bad...Warlocks will still be in a good place if played well.

[Stunlocked 8]

Ghostcrawler recently commented on the grimoires via Twitter. Of course since it's Twitter he didn't say much. And as Zagram said it's real early in the cycle so further changes are probably in the works.

https://twitter.com/...23686777389057.

He said "warlocks are supposed to use pets, and all pets are supposed to be viable", and if that's not the case then that Sacrifice is probably too good or Supremacy isn't good enough. And he also said that they plan on buffing Supremacy in 5.2.

I think it's important to keep in mind that this tier is a bit of an outlier - they don't want any talent to have a big difference between other talents. Ideally all three should be close. Or at least two of them should be close (like Demonology is with Supremacy/Service).

Honestly, I wouldn't be suprised if they adjust things even further so that Sacrifice is actually slightly worse than the others in terms of theoretical DPS - with the logic being that that the health regeneration, stamina boost, and lack of pet management you get wit Sacrifice should be offset by slightly lower DPS. There's plenty of time to make adjustments to other places if they feel warlock damage is too low.

Edited January 3, 2013 by Stunlocked

[Zagam 1,982]

I like the fact of not managing a pet on target switching fights, to be honest. Not pet twisting is fantastic, so I can't argue. My problem is their method of balance. Nerfing Sacrifice for Affliction was called for, but nerfing Destruction was not. If they only buff Supremacy, Demonology will have the issue Affliction has now of having to choose Supremacy over Service as it will be a clear cut optimal choice much like Sacrifice is for Affliction now.

The thing that ticks me off about all of this is they made the Imp pet atrocious and still count that against us in our buff count. When asked why Dark Intent didn't give spell haste, GC commented that we already bring Stamina. Anyone who uses an Imp is holding your raid group back, and it's not like you can sacrifice him and keep the stamina buff.

Who knows what is coming, but from the feel of it, Demonology may take back the top DPS reign it had in Dragon Soul. If they only buff Supremacy, nerf Sacrifice, and streamline other abilities, watch Affliction tumble down a bit, Demonology bump up, and Destruction stay as the bottom dweller of Warlocks yet again because of PvP centered nerfs. Sad that I can essentially predict what will happen...I'll only be pleasantly surprised if I'm wrong.

[Stunlocked 8]

The stamina buff comment was interesting. I always assu

med that the reason Dark Intent 'only' provided the spellpower buff was because we provided Curse of Elements - the stamina buff never entered my mind (and I can't remember ever raiding without a priest or a warrior in the group).

Hopefully Destruction gets some love. I want to play a spec that uses the green fire!

[Nivloc 2]

For sure?

Not at all, even with 5% nerf, I really believe Gosac still be the choice JUST IN single target fights.

Sorry, by for sure I meant that it's definitely a nerf from what we have now. Not compared to the other choices.

[Corvo21 0]

I Don't really think,that this is a NERF.

Normaly u just got the healing, if u took damage.

But the Shield stacks and this is amazing!