5.2 Warlock Changes

[Zagam 1,982]

As new things pop out in the PTR and patch notes, I'll be logging changes and deciding if things need to be remodeled.

PTR: 02/12/2013

Grimoire of Sacrifice has had its values change. They are as follows:

Affliction: Buffs Malefic Grasp, Haunt, Drain Soul, and Fel Flame damage by 50% 45%.

Destruction: Buffs Incinerate, Chaos Bolt, Conflagrate, and Fel Flame damage by 25% 20%.

Affliction

- Seed of Corruption's AoE explosion deals damage to all targets in 15 10 yards.

Destruction

- Fire and Brimstone-applied spells deal damage to all targets within 15 10 yards of your target.

Fel Armor no longer gives armor. Instead, it provides 10% damage reduction.

Dark Intent now provides 10% spell power and 10% stamina. Blood Pact has been removed.

Sacrificing a Succubus will now give the player Backlash instead of Seduction.

Blood Fear has been replaced by Blood Horror. Blood Horror costs 5% of your max HP, lasts 60 seconds, has a 30 second CD, and has 1 charge. This charge is used upon receiving a melee attack and causes Horrify for 4 seconds.

Soul Leech now provides an absorption effect instead of providing a healing effect.

Sacrificial Pact now consumes 50% 25% of a demon's maximum HP.

Kil'Jaeden's Cunning no longer has an on-use effect.

Archimonde's Vengenace no longer has a visual effect.

Glyph of Burning Embers and Glyph of Soul Shards have been removed and implemented as baseline passive effects.

Glyph of Ember Tap increases healing received by Ember Tap by 33% but does this healing over 10 seconds.

Dispelling Unstable Affliction will now always cause a critical strike and its backlast effect's damage has been increased 15%.

Chaos Wave has a new visual.

Not much to think about here other than the slight nerf to Affliction and the slightly larger nerf to Destruction. The reduction in AoE area will have a multiplicative effect with Mannoroth's Fury.

[Chobani 6]

Has there been any theorycrafting by anyone on the PTR for how Demo is looking in comparison to Aff with the sac nerf? A lot of the fights from what I've seen in LFR look pretty Demo-friendly mechanic wise. Lots of aoe and burn phases.

[Stunlocked 8]

Has there been any theorycrafting by anyone on the PTR for how Demo is looking in comparison to Aff with the sac nerf? A lot of the fights from what I've seen in LFR look pretty Demo-friendly mechanic wise. Lots of aoe and burn phases.

I have no idea what's been theorycrated, but IMO it's still too early to tell. If you read Ghostcrawler's comments on the PTR forum, he said that they first were spending time changing mechanics for classes (and Warlocks had very little change in that regard), and then once that was settled they'd focus on numbers. They have just started that part of it, so we'll see what numbers change. I'd expect that Destro is still probably due some buffs, and Affliction will probably still get some nerfs.