I am a mess, please help. :(

[Nayta 0]

This is really long.... >,>

Hi, my name is Nayta and I am an Affliction Warlock on the Black Hand server.  I have been playing my lock since the first day of Vanilla.  I was destro all the way to WoD and then changed to affliction.  I don't have a good memory, so I not sure how well I played or not, in the past, knowing me there was some struggle, but this is nothing compared to now.  This xpac I have really struggled.  I always think... so, if I get this piece of gear, my DPS will be better, or this relic should help, or set pieces on and on...nothing is working for me. 

As I am right now, with my 4 set piece bonus, my ilvl is 957.  If I wear non set pieces I can get to 960.  Every where I have read says, wear the set pieces so I do.  They are from LFR and normal ABT.  I did get lucky and had a LFR helm drop that forged to a 955, I was excited that day.

 I will add my armoryt at the end.  I made a change today that is not reflecting and I am not wearing the leggo shoes right now, I am wearing the belt and I have a pair of 960 crit/.mastery shoes on.

I think I have a decent set of gear on, my stats right now are 15 crit . 29 haste . 140 mastery. 4 vers.

So far I think every thing looks good.  So what is the problem?  I can only pull 900-1.0 DPS on average.  I have the right talents, I searched multiple places to confirm this.  I do not know how to look up relics, if someone could do that for me?  I have looked every where, and I am sure it was right in front of me somewhere. 

I have dot timers and they only show like 5% not 5.2% for example.  I tried working with Weakaruas  2 and I am having a hard time trying to import a timer set.  I worked with my husband tonight as he has a copy paste addon, but it wont paste into my Weakauras template.  So if I could just rely on how I see my timers, that would be great, I am over it right now.  ><

I copied my rotation from this page, and again searched elsewhere, and I am doing the right thing.  ...at least I hope.

I looked at my Raider IO one day and found a aff lock that I wanted to ask some questions, he told me to get leggos and to practice then logged of on me.  I have asked on FB pages, I have asked people in game...please tell me what I am doing wrong?!  ...nothing, so here I am.

Here are some of the logs I have, I have more if needed.  I am just able to read them to know I am not doing good.  I think one said my DPS was like 939 or something to that effect. 

Which leads me into...I am NOT consistent at all.  If I go into a dungeon, the first boss, I blow all my cool downs, I do 1.2.  Next boss, same thing 900.  On trash I might do 500, and that is with using seed.  If I change my talents for AOE I am better, but of course, my single target DPS gets worse, so I just cannot win.  I run with a ret pally for example,on trash he can do 1.5 and  1.5 on bosses, you can count on him to be consistent in your raid.  I never know what I am going to get until the fight is over.

The pally even told me at one point he thinks I run around too much, which is why I wore the leggo shoes, but I needed to put something better on and did that tonight.

I was in a group for a Heroic Argus.  I got kicked because I was only doing 883k.  I cheated and bought AoTC because I figured there was no other way to get it.

So that is my story.  I am heart broken that I do so bad,  I just need a little help, please.  Thank you so much for taking your time with me.

Nayta

https://worldofwarcraft.com/en-us/character/blackhand/nayta

https://www.warcraftlogs.com/reports/Kbf6whqDcQgmHBPY/

https://www.warcraftlogs.com/reports/74Rvzy8pcXQZjtdC/

https://www.warcraftlogs.com/reports/dMPrFNhGv2cfLjqT/…

https://raider.io/characters/us/blackhand/Nayta  I get a bit of a carry...  >.>

 

 

[Sharknad0 67]

I apologize, as I have not played Affliction since WoD, so I cannot help with the rotation, but you can go to www.checkmywow.com (i believe it is). I forget which one is the best, but there are a few log analyzers out there that tell you what you messed up on and where to improve. I can tell you that your DoTs falling off at all would be massive DPS loss, so it would be important to figure out the timers if you don't have Tidy Plates and/or that one doesn't help enough.

In terms of your gear, you should really go to www.raidbots.com. You do not need to do the full on gear analyzer, which can be daunting if you are not familiar with how to use that part of it it and are not a Patreon. You can just plug in your realm and character name, which is easy but you would have to log in and out with every gear change / simulation.  For your sanity, just download the "SimC" addon, type /simc in chat, copy and paste into "Quick Sim" on Raidbots. Then, change your gear around and repeat until you get the highest DPS number. If there are numbers that are within 10k DPS, and you have a preference on the gear that scored a bit less (typically legos / set-bonuses), go with it. Comfort is worth a very slight loss IMO. If you download the Pawn addon, you can do a "Stat Weights" simulation and import the string into Pawn so you will know how much of an upgrade a piece of gear could be. Just be sure to re-sim and update your string every time you change your gear for accurate upgrade numbers.

Best relics can be found here at icy-veins. Look at the relic section for the ilvl equivalent of the affix.

Hope someone can point out the rotation woes for you if the analyzer sites don't help. GL

Edited April 9, 2018 by Sharknad0

[Sharknad0 67]

Just a FYI, doing a sim on your character with talents and gear the way you most recently logged out, you should average 1,373,153 DPS on a single target fight. It did not include your crucible traits without the SimC addon, so it will probably be like 1.4 mil. This is "Patchwerk", meaning it is no movement, you just get to sit there and free cast like a target dummy. If you were to do a higher movement fight, your numbers are going to dip. If you add another target with Havoc, your numbers will go way up. If you are getting 1 mill though, you are probably just missing some minor things.

And I would not worry about comparing dungeon bosses unless you are talking decent mythic+. They die too quickly and Affliction needs time to ramp.

Edited April 9, 2018 by Sharknad0

[Nayta 0]

I did the sim, and found the same thing, 1.3.  So I tried really hard to get a solid rotation on a dummy for about half an hour.  1.0 mil.

So now I ask, is the a Spell Rotation for Dummies that someone could list for me.  I am confused as to when I should Reap especially. 

Edited April 10, 2018 by Nayta

[Nayta 0]

I downloaded Weakauras 2 and have timers set up for Corr, Agony and SL.  I am not sure how to correctly add UA and when to Reap when I Drain Soul.  I am getting there I think...hope.

[JJ77 20]

16 hours ago, Sharknad0 said:

If you add another target with Havoc, your numbers will go way up

Sorry to be picky, I think Havoc is destro only. (I hope it is otherwise I've been doing Affliction wrong :I )

Nayta I'm not qualified to look at your logs or offer any specific help but felt the misery in your post! It might be an idea to take a step back and try and grasp some fun from the game. I'm sure you are better than you think you are. Best of luck, hope you find a solution.

 

[spikeysquad 50]

Hi Nayta,

It's pretty hard knowing where to start. First off read the Affy section here: http://lockonestopshop.com/#!/Home

Unless you changed it then sims include Blood Lust/Hero, food, 2 pots, rune and a flask so it is normal to be a little under though Affy RNG is a thing.

On a Malefic Grasp (MG) fight so Garothi etc your UA dumps are actually really tidy and pretty evenly spaced so good job.  Reap use looks decent as well on the whole though there are 4 big gaps in the log I am focusing on so remember to use it every cycle.

Your main issue is yes too much moving/lack of drain uptime and especially not draining all UA ticks off. As soon as you are casting your last UA already be hitting Reap (it's off the global cooldown) and get ready to jump straight into drain. Then keep draining (don't let a drain finish, cast again before it does) until you refresh DoTs. 

Don't move unless you really have to (yes do mechanics, otherwise stay still unless you are refreshing DoTs and then you can re-position), think about where you need to go to on a fight so you perhaps can utilise a gateway and/or your circle to get there. 

Keep up DoTs slightly better but this quite minor. Not a biggie but Agony-Siphon Life-Corruption makes slightly more sense in terms of DoT lengths. 

Remember to use Soul Harvest. On the log I was looking at your forgot it in both your opener and in execute (which is pretty important if you use Netherlord or DE). 

So I don't want to get too much into your gear as then people focus on that rather than the rotation which they have a lot more control over. Have you done a top gear sim on Raidbots? To find the best combo of your gear for both single and multi-target fights. Also sim out the different leggo combinations (assuming you have more). 

Though you may think boots are helping you they are just a plaster/band-aid and you will gain a lot more from dropping them and working on positioning and minimising your movement. ABC: Always Be Casting. Generally the boots sim quite poorly as well as they don't have a lot of stats. 

So that should be enough in addition to the LOSS site for you to focus on at the moment. However, be aware that if you want to excel with Affy you need to change up your talents on most bosses and for dungeons etc. Then when you do change talents you also need to change your gameplay to match them. Changing from MG to Writhe in Agony on some fights also puts less focus on having to drain which is an issue for you at the moment. 

It doesn't say what talents you took for your dungeon runs but you play like you are still specced into MG and that is not a good choice for dungeons either.

Also check out the M+ guide on the linked site and you could also come along to the Warlock Discord if you have some time. Can be helpful just to watch and/or get some extra advice in the Ask-For-Help channel. Mostly though go read, go understand, practice and you will get there.

Good luck. 

[Roflmauzer 0]

Love the mention of getting help from hubby. My wife mains Affliction, so I can relate.

It's great that you uploaded your logs. Makes it pretty obvious where you're going wrong.

Your logs suggest that you're letting your Agony drop off too often and you're not using Unstable Affliction and Reap Souls effectively. Pump multiple UA when you have shards to spare, and only Reap Souls when you pump multiple UA or have 5 or more Reap stacks. 

When Agony drops off, that's a big deal. It's a much bigger deal than skipping a couple of seconds of Drain Soul to move.

When you misuse Reap Souls that's a big deal. The UA/RS/Drain Soul  combo is massive.

When you don't take Soul Conduit, it's a big deal. You get fewer Unstable Afflictions out per Reap Souls. That might be the entire story behind why your Unstable Affliction is so underwhelming. Siphon Life might give you an edge in PvP, but I reckon it's a PvE garbage talent.

Good luck!

[spikeysquad 50]

1 hour ago, Roflmauzer said:

Love the mention of getting help from hubby. My wife mains Affliction, so I can relate.

It's great that you uploaded your logs. Makes it pretty obvious where you're going wrong.

Your logs suggest that you're letting your Agony drop off too often and you're not using Unstable Affliction and Reap Souls effectively. Pump multiple UA when you have shards to spare, and only Reap Souls when you pump multiple UA or have 5 or more Reap stacks. 

When Agony drops off, that's a big deal. It's a much bigger deal than skipping a couple of seconds of Drain Soul to move.

When you misuse Reap Souls that's a big deal. The UA/RS/Drain Soul  combo is massive.

When you don't take Soul Conduit, it's a big deal. You get fewer Unstable Afflictions out per Reap Souls. That might be the entire story behind why your Unstable Affliction is so underwhelming. Siphon Life might give you an edge in PvP, but I reckon it's a PvE garbage talent.

Good luck!

Some good stuff here as yes people do not understand that Reap is approximately a 40-50% damage buff though I would like to comment on a couple of things.

What's your definition of multiple? As 2 UAs is where you can drain all ticks and hence it is usually the ideal number to dump (o course if you have a lot of shards or need to burst something that's a different matter).

Just to be clear if you get to anywhere near 5 souls on let's say Garothi/Varim (non-mythic) a very high majority of the time something has gone quite wrong (or you have been exceptionally exceptionally lucky).

What is your reasoning for Siphon Life being a bad talent? Log stats and rankings suggest it is very strong on the fights we use it on and then overall (so also the multi-target fights) then the next used talent is actually Death's Embrace and not Soul Conduit (SC). In addition, the OP has issues draining all UA ticks and SC would only exacerbate this issue.

https://www.warcraftlogs.com/statistics/17#boss=2076&class=Warlock&spec=Affliction&combatantinfo=Talents&difficulty=4 Change boss/percentile/ difficulty to suit. 

https://www.warcraftlogs.com/rankings/17#difficulty=4&class=Warlock&spec=Affliction Not that only the top 10 matter much but you can again see that even super lucky SC RNG is not achieving a good result either.

[Minosia 0]

Hey Nayta, lose the Siphon Life talent and go for soul conduit and stay on top of your soul shards don't let them get to 5, having 2 DOTS to maintain plus UAs is much easier you lose a lot of DPS from Siphon. That will give you more DPS definitely for single target and multitarget. I don't like soul harvest, go for sow the seeds specially in dungeons. I rarely use soul harvest. I read the specs and the builds here at Icy Veins but i kind of wanted to see the stuff that worked for me. I tried the build you have and it really isn't "there" with the DPS.

I see you have power cord, try only UA on 2 targets MAX not more...

 

[spikeysquad 50]

Again what is wrong with Siphon Life? 

I can understand that perhaps people do not like it or perhaps struggle to keep a third DoT up (not that it should be that much harder with Malefic Grasp). However, until you can provide some evidence beyond your own personal findings I don't think you can state that it is a DPS loss or should recommend to people to drop it. Perhaps it has been worse for you and it is fine to say that but it that is not the general case by a long shot as shown by the above links.

Sow The Seeds (StS) has one possible decent use in Antorus and that is on Eonar. Even then you may be better going a priority damage spec depending on the group. Dropping Soul Harvest for Seeds is definitely a DPS loss when you can not get the full use from it (at least 3 stacked targets for the majority of the fight so no Antoran High Command does not count). Ensure that you have been extending Soul Harvest when you can without losing a use and try to make full use of it when it is up. 

I agree that in some dungeons depending on the affixes, group, how the tank pulls and so on StS can be an extremely strong talent. I purposely barely touched on the M+ stuff with Nayta yet but the 2 dungeons they linked were NL and HoV and I personally much prefer a DoT build there (non-teeming) because of how many smaller packs and single target there is as well.  

In HoV can be argued that StS is better for the first two big packs and then you can always die and swap after the Wolf. Upper Kara, CoS, DHT, EoA and MoS can also be very good DoT build dungeons again depending on multiple factors so no I disagree that Seeds is always the way. I can respect though that some people are not so good with multidotting and yes StS would be better for them most of the time.

Edited April 12, 2018 by spikeysquad

[Nayta 0]

Thank you everyone!  So I have a quick question now.

When I do my rotation, I put up my DoTs.  Cast 2 UAs, reap and soul until my dots get to 30%.  I refresh the dots and  recast UA.  Now I am not supposed to let UA drop?  When I am doing my rotation and lets say I have 3 shards, do I just dump them all into UA?  Oh and if I have say 2 stacks of Reap, do I use it or wait until I get 3-4 stacks?

I got rid of the boots, talked with a lock in game for a bit, he changed my gear for me.  So I am running with those changes.

Edited April 15, 2018 by Nayta

[spikeysquad 50]

On 4/15/2018 at 11:53 PM, Nayta said:

Thank you everyone!  So I have a quick question now.

When I do my rotation, I put up my DoTs.  Cast 2 UAs, reap and soul until my dots get to 30%.  I refresh the dots and  recast UA.  Now I am not supposed to let UA drop?  When I am doing my rotation and lets say I have 3 shards, do I just dump them all into UA?  Oh and if I have say 2 stacks of Reap, do I use it or wait until I get 3-4 stacks?

I got rid of the boots, talked with a lock in game for a bit, he changed my gear for me.  So I am running with those changes.

With MG you don't think about UA uptime or 4 set uptime etc. If you play correctly with clean drain cycles that will take care of itself and that is something you are good at.

What you do need to focus on is draining all UA ticks and having as many of them as possible during Reap. 

If you let Reap stack up and then have a 20+ second one during that time you will have to refresh DoTs, UA will only be up a short length and it is more likely that you will have to move. Hence you usually lose drain uptime during the Reap (and possible Rend Soul procs) therefore Reap usually every cycle works far better.

As to how many you dump it depends. If I am sitting on 3 and I am quite certain I can dump again after next refresh I will usually only dump 2. If from timings I think I may have to move then to say soak on Garothi I will dump all 3.

Like I said before 2 is the best number for UAs (unless you are running high). 3 is ok too but you normally don't want to get into a situation where you dump 3 and next time only have 1 to dump and so on. That is something that you will have to feel out with your legendaries and haste.  

Simming is a really useful tool to help with gear decisions and it's really easy now days with the addition of Raidbots. Not sure if you joined the Warlock Discord but in resources they have a link that explains how to sim your character. If you do use that, download the second linked addon SimulationCraft rather than the Permut one.

[Battlejuice 0]

Hi Nayta!

 

You have gotten some really good and some not really good advice.

 

First thing to think on - Affliction is REALLY kind of like playing 2 different specs.  You should have one build/gear set for single target fights and one build/gear set for multi target fights.  (Or - many more!  I have 9 or 10 gear sets for specific encounters in Ant vs mythics etc).

 

Single target it pretty easy.  Use a SIM (Ask Mr Robot) to equip your best single target gear.   Straight single target I take Malefic grasp, contagion, Soul harvest.   I use soul of the netherlord leggo so I can take both Siphon Life and Deaths Embrace.  I DO find Siphon life QUITE valuable.  I pre-pot with  prolonged power, cast agony, corruption, siphon life, 2 UA's and drain soul.  (I also have Harvest macro'd in with my Drain soul.  I lose almost NOTHING over not doing it manually and it saves a lot of headache and one less thing to think about!)  I use soul Harvest right before drain life on CD - UNLESS adds are going to spawn to drop agony on - because each target with agony increases duration of soul harvest.  SO, if there is an add phase early in the fight, I save it for that.  And REPEAT.  A HUGE consideration is NOT MOVING - movement drops your dps like crazy.  Learn the fights and where to stand etc so you can minimize movement.  IE - Garothi - I drop a Demonic Gateway in the middle, then  portal to the right edge.  I stand still in the middle and cast UNLESS I get Decimation.   If I do, I can take my portal to the edge to dro it, then instantly hit my gateway back to return and lose minimal DPS.  Also - watch timers.   If it is about to switch to one of his drives, make sure Agony is refreshed so it doesnt drop while you cannot target him (and on this fight I save Soul Harvest for the drives - I can have Agony on Garothi, then drop it on BOTH drives, and soul harvest with agony on 3 targets so I get the most of the buff.  I also couple this with my second potion for further buff).   Another HUGE consideration - what can you survive?   Yes, mechanics are cool - but - I have learned I do not have ot go backwards for eradication.  I can stand in it.  Much like I can stand in green swirlies on Kin Garoth etc - when you learn what you CAN survive, and manage your life as a resource, you dont have to move as much.  I ONLY move for mechanics that will either kill me, wipe the raid or do raid wide damage.  I can survive most mechanics by draining life.  So I stay still.

 

Multi Dot gets trickier because it depends how many ads there are and how close to each other they stay and how quickly they go down.  In general I use Writhe in Agony, Absolute Corruption and Siphon Life or (more often)  Deaths Embrace or both depending on what legendaries I am using.    I have the luxury of having every single leggo.   I think the only good time to use sow the seeds is 1.  Mythics and 2.  Eonar - and you have to be quick with them.   Also - think about which pet to use - I use my infernal for his AOE damage on fights with a lot of adds.  With multi-dot you have to change your focus to keeping up your main 2-3 dots and buffing them by keeping one UA up somewhere.  For example, on Coven -  I drop agony, and corruption on both sisters (once)  - then UA on one, UA the other then drain (which is also my harvest).  I rotate back and forth doing this until there are adds - then I drop agony and corruption on them all and soul harvest and return to the sisters.   Strategy will change depending on the fight but the #1 is NOT TO DROP AGONY from the sisters.   

 

I have developed a gear set and talent selections for EACH BOSS in Antorus - to maximize my dps in each fight.  

 

I used this:

https://www.warcraftlogs.com/rankings/17#boss=2070&difficulty=4&class=Warlock&spec=Affliction

 

I looked at EACH FIGHT and saw what talents the TOP affliction warlocks were taking and what leggos they were using.  Then, I used that info to figure out WHY - the strategy.   Then, for each fight I took the talents the top locks took and the leggos they used, then ran a "best in bags" sim for each fight.  

 

I am still always changing gear/strats to suit my own game play and try to out do myself - but I am solid on all of the fights.  Around 2 mil single and up to 3 mil multi.   You can look me up - Battlejuice NerZul.

 

I am not the best, but I am pretty dammmmm good.  8)  

 

https://raider.io/characters/us/nerzhul/Battlejuice

 

Id focus on getting GREAT single target first, then work on multi - that way it is less overwhelming.  ALSO - Mastery food is BETTER for us than a Feast and Pot pro power better than deadly grace.

 

Anyhow - hope this helps.  LMK if I can help with anything else or answer questions.

 

 

[spikeysquad 50]

14 hours ago, Battlejuice said:

Snip

Lots of good stuff here too. 

Like you already mentioned SH macroed into Drain is not ideal if you are waiting for a add spawn. Do you just not drain while waiting? Also when you use Netherlord or spec DE you will not get the full bonus from it either. Or perhaps go to snipe a dying add and proc it when you aren't doing that much damage. 

Of course macro-ing it is better than not using at all. 

Assuming you are not using Contagion/bracers on those MT fights then there is no point to spreading UAs, make it easy on yourself. 
Yeah looking at log rankings and stats can be very useful though be aware that all not top logs use the best talents for the fight (and especially not for progress). On Aggramar and Argus in particular a lot of people tend to use pad talents.

[Valks 2,375]

On 25/04/2018 at 6:08 PM, spikeysquad said:

Yeah looking at log rankings and stats can be very useful though be aware that all not top logs use the best talents for the fight (and especially not for progress). On Aggramar and Argus in particular a lot of people tend to use pad talents.

Also on this, I can't stress enough - for every class I look into, there are always rule-breaking CN/KR/RU players. I don't mean that as in cheating, I mean that as in they break the mould for what is good and what isn't. 

The top parse for Feral made absolutely 0 sense for a while because the person using it basically just had insane RNG on procs that pushed his sub-par talent choice far higher than it should have been. 

Also on your topics of progress talents and parse talents: Arms Warrior being higher than Fury on Felhounds makes 0 sense unless you know that you can stack them for a full 2-minute kill with insane gear and have perfect cleave for Arms. On progress, Fury will definitely be better. 

Just gotta make sure to use your brain when looking at the parse charts or you're going to go very wrong on your choices.