5.4 Affliction Tips & Quirks

[Nerghal 1]

Also I'd love some feedback / explanation about the Tier 75 Talents for Affliction.

Elitist jerks says that sacrifice for affliction is still the best choice. Source: http://elitistjerks...._panda_edition/

Yet spotting alot of warlocks with Supremacy and an observer made me curious to find out whether it would be better. With my gear I won about 900 DPS by using Supremacy with the Observer.

I let it depend on the situation. If your pet has to switch a lot between targets I'm saccing, if he can reliably stick to the same mobs for extended periods of time I go for supremacy as I find it gives a bigger increase.

[Sifon 25]

Today I was thinking about keeping 4pc T14 bonus with 4 heroic piece because how I love that set bonus, I made 4pc T14 + helm from Dark Animus(haste-mastery) and 4pc T14 + gloves from Durumu(hit-haste) and full haste build because thats what I'm using at the moment. Results for shocking for me, I was thinking if T15s pull ahead, it would be a minimal amount but I got 142k with T14s and 147k with T15s. If I can get heroic T14s this tuesday I can do some live tests.

By the way, I took gloves as offset to t15 because I stack haste and gloves was the only piece which didn't have hit haste but if there is a better offset piece I would like to try that too.

[Cedrin 3]

I'm not really convinced how well simcraft sims affliction. I mean I'd our snap shoting dots etc does it account for this? I've been seeing guys really stacking heavy haste and using supremacy. One guy on other warlock post had like 12k haste 4k mastery and did 200k on heroic jin'rokh . Interested if anyone else has tried this route on here.

[Sifon 25]

Well that guy is me, Simcraft models Affliction not perfect because DoT Snapshotting is too hard to code in an APL perfectly(you can add lines like if my both trinkets are up cast Sb:SS but it is not perfect). All in haste build was the BiS build if I remember correctly and I'm using it because I like it. Simulations between full haste and mastery = haste is really minimal with haste build is better for me. I think haste build has better burst during cooldowns and better trinket uptime so its a solid choice and gets even better with better gear.

[Cedrin 3]

Ty for the info. I would have given proper credit if I wasn't on phone and could have looked it up easier.

[Tohkra 0]

So assuming I am reading this right.. currently at ilvl 501 I can forgoe ALL the breakpoints, assuming I use pandemic properly or an addon like Affdots, I can throw all that into Mastery? I ask this as I sim quite a bit higher at just below the 4717 breakpoint, but with a 60+% Masyery.... is this hurting or helping matters anym and am I understanding correctly?

[Zagam 1,982]

If you're going to go all-in to one stat, make it Haste, not Mastery.

[Felstorm 1]

Hello there. I have a serious problem with my warlock.

I have been on 90 for about a month. I have played destruction most of the time and found it to be quite efficient in terms of dps / effort required to play, even tough I did not liked the play style that much. I have finally found a group for challenge modes, and found out just how terrible destruction warlock is for that. A hunter in the group was regularly pulling 70k dps, when I stayed on about 30k, max 50k, both trash and bosses. Therefore I have decided to try the other specs, both demo and affli.

I have followed the guides here on Icy Veins, satisfied with the results with destruction. I will not even start on demo, that spec just needs a lot more time to learn how to play properly, I was getting seriously lost playing it (tried it on LFR Horridon for example, all the different adds and stuff made my head hurt and my dps even more) - even tough I will have to get used to it to perform well on any CM at all.

My trouble with affliction is this - I am trying to follow all the priorities, I have Affdots and OmniCC to watch my dots/shards/cds, I do not refresh when I do not have to, I try not to cast Haunt when it's not optimal, I try to use Dark Soul as soon as it's off CD and optimal. Still, I can only pull about 50-60k DPS, even less, on LFR Throne of Thunder. Sadly, I do not have any logs to show, just the latest simulation I did in my current gear (which is not fully reforged, enchanted and gemmed yet as I replaced 3 pieces today). The simulation shows a dps of 79378 for an AVERAGE player. That's still 11k lower then simulations for destruction shown when I was in the OLD gear (about 5 or 6 ilvl change), realistically I managed to do about 80k+ on destro. Of course I do not waste flasks and potions for LFR, but the difference in simulated and real dps is just weird for me.

So, what do you propose I can do to improve myself? Both in affli and in demo (even tough the demo problems are probably just connected to my general clumsiness with all the stuff to watch out for and keybinds which I sometimes get lost in). Is it just the gear which separates me from better dps? Any tips for Challenge modes in particular?

Here is a link to my armory (as I said, not all gear is properly set up yet, waiting till I finish this weeks LFR):

http://eu.battle.net...Felstorm/simple

And the latest Simcraft results:

http://www.mediafire...3hc0h742sm3imdl

Any help will be very welcome.

[Zagam 1,982]

Confused on what you want help with: Challenge Modes or LFR?

For Challenge Modes, I did most of them as Affliction and did one as Demonology. Given the opportunity to do them over, Destruction would likely be my choice. If you're doing 30k-50k DPS on trash, you're not utilizing Rain of Fire + Fire and Brimstone: Immolate and Shadowburn properly. For Demonology, you need to make sure you optimize your Shadowflame/Hand of Guldan, Felstorm, and Metamorphosis AoE pushes on trash. For Affliction, Soulburn: Seed of Corruption should be the first thing you do on any trash pull. For bosses, just do your single target rotation. Hunters will always out DPS you consistently because Improved Serpent Sting and Multishot is really powerful at 463 ilvl. You can, however, beat Hunters at that item level single target and with big AoE pushes.

For LFR, sims factor in Flask, 275 food, and double potting. This will make a signficant difference. The best way to push your DPS up is to properly follow the DPS priority rotation. Aff is about micro managing your DoTs to make sure they're always running at maximum performance. Demonology is about knowing what to do in certain situations (Meta weaving, using Grim of Service vs Grim of Sacrifice, etc) and Destruction is about your Ember management and using Chaos Bolt at the right time. Between the guides in the forums and the guides Icy-Veins writes, you should be able to get your DPS to a level you're happy with.

[Vilthrim 1]

I'm running into similar problems with Affliction, but I think it's probably related to the rotation and the management of DoTs and when to refresh them properly. I was really used to the Destro rotation: simple and effective, only had to keep an eye on the trinket procs. Now with Aff, its a diferent story...to know when to refresh your dots is really confusing to me.

To keep track of the dots I'm using Affdots and I have one question, if Haunt should be kept at 60% uptime when should I use it, after the opener? Since in Affdots it shows the haunt icon at green, which means "use it".

Regarding the haste breakpoints, I'm ilvl 483 and my haste breakpoint should be 4717(476-489 ilvl). Should I reduce more Haste -> Mastery or should I keep haste very high?

In the 1st post of this tread you mention that Agony should be top priority when refreshing your dots, but it's, as far as I can tell, the last dot to expire, being UA 1st followed by Corruption. Do you mean that the Agony stacks 'decay' over time while the dot is expiring?

Sorry if these question are really basic, but i've looked for answers in the class guide, but no dice, the guide's really nice but doens't have what I looked for.

Tyvm

[Zagam 1,982]

A good time to keep Haunt up is when Affdots shows a number below 100. That means that your current DoTs are more powerful than your spell power right now, so you're handling empowered DoTs. Haunt would increase this. You want Haunt up 100% during Bloodlust, Dark Soul, and any time that DPS buffs are present, such as the water pool on Jin'rokh.

Haste breakpoints aren't really important. Stack Haste and good things will happen. Just avoid Crit.

Agony is the ultimate priority in refreshing. That doesn't mean it is done first. It means you NEVER EVER EVER let Agony fall off from its 10 stack. UA is 2nd in priority with Corruption being last. This doesn't give you an order to refresh. It's just if Agony is about to fall off, stop whatever you were doing and refresh it, even if Affdots indicates a major loss. Restarting from a 1 stack of Agony is a huge DPS loss.

[schmearcampain 0]

I'm running into similar problems with Affliction, but I think it's probably related to the rotation and the management of DoTs and when to refresh them properly. I was really used to the Destro rotation: simple and effective, only had to keep an eye on the trinket procs. Now with Aff, its a diferent story...to know when to refresh your dots is really confusing to me.

To keep track of the dots I'm using Affdots and I have one question, if Haunt should be kept at 60% uptime when should I use it, after the opener? Since in Affdots it shows the haunt icon at green, which means "use it".

Regarding the haste breakpoints, I'm ilvl 483 and my haste breakpoint should be 4717(476-489 ilvl). Should I reduce more Haste -> Mastery or should I keep haste very high?

In the 1st post of this tread you mention that Agony should be top priority when refreshing your dots, but it's, as far as I can tell, the last dot to expire, being UA 1st followed by Corruption. Do you mean that the Agony stacks 'decay' over time while the dot is expiring?

Sorry if these question are really basic, but i've looked for answers in the class guide, but no dice, the guide's really nice but doens't have what I looked for.

Tyvm

The ideal time to use haunt is when you have empowered dots. I.e. dots that are stronger than your base dot. Trinket proc, dark soul, heroism/bloodlust, execution phase etc etc. the more powerful the dots are, the bigger the benefit of having that +30% haunt buff.

Now, that's in an ideal world. In reality, I don't hoard shards so that I have a ton of them waiting for a proc. you have to try and guess how many more shards you might get in the near future. Say you have an opportunity to drop a SS:SoC on a group during an otherwise single target boss fight. If I know that's on the horizon, I'm haunting the boss whenever I have a shard. Why not? +30% is still +30%. Are there adds you can DS to death and get 4 shards pretty easily? Haunt away. It's only on fights like Jin'Rokh where I know I'll have a big 40% buff for a specific period that I'll really hoard shards and gimp myself otherwise. Even then, I'm tempted to haunt before the buff simply because I may get fixated by the lightning ball during the puddle phase and not be able to DPS properly.

At ilvl 483, I recall having a pretty hard time getting to that first 4717 breakpoint, but that was back when affliction ruled all. With affliction the way it is now, I'd reforge out of mastery to get at least to that point.

Agony doesn't degrade as time goes by. Agony builds stacks, up to 10, where it will do it's most damage. The problem is, if you let it drop off, it starts back to 1 stack, so NEVER let Agony drop. If it's empowered at the time, don't refresh it until the last second.

[Cruzan 71]

Hey,

So i experimented with Unerring and Aff last night as was pretty underwhelmed. Granted its the LFR trinket, but it didn't feel very great. I'm sure I havent got enough trials in with it yet to see its max potential, but I was wondering if anyone else has dabbled with Unerring/Affliction?

[Zagam 1,982]

LFR Unerring has a horrid proc rate...about 20% less than the normal version. LFR Unerring is likely not a good choice for any spec except Demonology. You're going to want Breath and Wush for Affliction. Unerring doesn't proc enough and could conflict with other buffs for Affliction DoTs.

[Bearlolz 0]

At what ilvl will affli > destro ?

[JvChequer 43]

It's not about Ilvl only, but when you get 2 RPPM trinkets + LMG, affli with 522-525 (with LMG) overpass Destro.

[jabujabu 0]

what about the shadopan assault trinket compared to breath / wushoolay LFR at around 500-510 ilvl? simcraft is showing that even relic of yulon puts out more dps than wushoolay LFR, which feels odd to me.

[Vaelyn 6]

Simcraft does not properly calculate wush because you'd reapply dots when at 10 stacks. This makes it much better in real world than Simcraft would suggest.

[obleak 10]

I have normal version Breath of the Hydra and Wush. I've got my 4 set and 523 ilevel and i'm seeing some crazy things with affliction.. i've not played much do to some real life issues, but i think affliction will do well now with most fights.. you'll still find destro/demo pull ahead in some multi target fights like primordius, ji-kun ect...

I'm a little depressed with the 4 set bonus, but i guess we really had a great one last tier.

I enjoy destro a lot, but the ability to "survive" and still do great dps is easier with affliction imo.. I think destro has some great survivability, but i feel like i really have to focus and kill my dps a little to do so while a touch less MG to move faster in a situation doesn't hurt it as much.

Enjoy fellow demons!

http://www.wow-heroes.com/character/us/Illidan/Obleak/

[Frido 2]

Zagam, first of all I want to thank you and everyone at Icy Veins for the excellent guides, forums and other content you publish. There is a lot of WoW stuff on the web but you guys consistently post the most valuable content as far as I am concerned. I've been actively using your site for over a year and while I have never posted I use the site every week and greatly appreciate all that you guys do!

When I switched from mage main to aff lock main during DS and early Pandaria I learned to play my new class from you. I know there have been several nerfs to aff and perhaps it is not the best spec right now for raiding but I love aff and I feel I could be doing better at it. I've also seen that aff supposedly scales better with gear than the other specs so I've been figuring that as my ilvl rises I will get better but I'm not satisfied with my DPS. I am super survivable, that part of the spec is just awesome. But I want to do more DPS. I've seen you recommend keeping mastery and haste approximately equal for a while now, but I've also seen Icy Veins partnered with Ask Mr. Robot and I have figured I could safely use Mr. Robot on my toon. But Mr. Robot has me putting way, way more into Mastery than into Haste. Right now I am sitting at 5,203 Haste and 10,745 Mastery in ilvl 520 gear. I don't have a log to show but here is my armory:

http://us.battle.net.../Fridojr/simple

I know the fact that my weapon is only 502 restrains my DPS but I feel I could do better even so. I use Affdots for the visual info and Drainsouler for the audio notices and those have really helped me a lot. I use the macros you recommend and the procedures for empowering and refreshing my DOT's. I'm not perfect but I do follow the rotation and guides here and check frequently for updates so I don't think I am doing anything major wrong.

My most simple question is should I either discontinue the use of Mr. Robot or change his stat weights to reflect your advice to keep Haste and Mastery approximately equal? Or is the advice Mr. Robot is giving me to have roughly 2:1 mastery to haste the best advice for me because of my particular gear, the low weapon or whatever? I love the convenience of Mr. Robot so if there is a way I could keep using him, perhaps with different weights, that would be great. Thanks in advance for any light you are able to shed.

Oh, in case this helps, I think this is same for everybody but the stat weights Mr. Robot shows for me are 4.53 Int; 3.71 SP; 3.00 Spell Hit; 2.82 Mastery; 2.57 Haste and 1.78 Crit

[Cruzan 71]

Hi Frido,

There is a pretty nice trick to make Mr. Robot equate mastery and haste for you. You do this by using the soft cap box for haste in the stat weights menu. So lets say you want 8200 haste since that is roughly where mastery and haste would be equal for you. There is a calculator for Mr. Robot HERE but I don't see where there is an option for goblins.

The formula is really simple though:

(Target Haste Rating/425/100 +1)*1.0605 -1 = ___ *Note* 1.0605 comes from the 1% racial and the 5% raid haste.

For you this will be .265

Toss this value in to the soft cap box. Next, set Haste's stat weight higher than Mastery, 2.9 is fine. Set the soft cap weight to the original weight value, 2.57 and you're good to go. A little bit of work involved, but its pretty handy imo.

I can't comment on when you should start stacking haste as oppose to keep H and M equal, but you should be fine doing this for now since you only have one RPPM trink.

Edited April 22, 2013 by Cruzan

[Frido 2]

Hi Frido,

There is a pretty nice trick to make Mr. Robot equate mastery and haste for you.

Thanks Cruzan, this is a more elegant solution for the HOW to get Mr. Robot to equate Haste and Mastery for my toon than I would have come up with on my own. So thanks a lot. But I am still unsure if that is what I should do, or just stick with what Mr. Robot recommends? I just keep thinking to myself "Well, Icy Veins and Mr. Robot are partners, they work together, and so what Mr. Robot recommends should be the best! Why change the stat weights for my toon from what they recommend is best for everyone?" That's the block I keep running into.

On top of that, the fact I have not started using World of Logs or keeping logs also leaves me feeling that I will not be certain if what I did made me better or not. I got 2 new pieces of gear today, belt from 489 to 522 and chest from 496 to 522 so if there is a change it will be hard to know what to attribute it to. I could try and do sessions on the dummy but I often feel those are largely dependent on the luck of procs to get more haunt uptime and don't necessarily measure well what I am seeking to measure. I definitely appreciate you trying to help! I guess I am hoping someone can tell me WHY Mr. Robot's advice differs from what is actually best, I think what's holding me up is reluctance to go against doctor's orders as it were... All the best, Frido.

[Zagam 1,982]

The best way to see what you're doing is not from your stats but your playstyle and execution of your spell priority. I cannot see that without logs. I know I've preached that secondary stats shouldn't be the focus, but they always seem to come to the top in terms of what people care about. There are all sorts of proof out there that secondary stats don't mean as much as people think. For example, there are two logs of Demonology Warlocks that are at 166.5k and one at 165.9k, a difference of 600 DPS. One of them has over 10,000 Haste while the other has over 10,000 Mastery. The secondary stats are so close that you can prioritize the style of how you want to play. These stats can be optimized per fight, but it's very tedious and not quite worth it to reforge constantly per fight. Exception is if you are not clearing normals anymore and progressing linearly in heroic fights and plan on spending some time. In that case, for example, you'd stack the living hell out of Mastery as Destruction on Heroic Horridon with the multitudes of Shadowburn possibilities as well as the extra embers for Chaos Bolt. This is how you squeeze out an extra 1-5%, but it's hardly economical or sensible to constantly be switching stats. There are individual cases for each spec on each fight, and you must think about what the fight contains and how best you can manipulate what happens in your favor to really reach heights that the truly elite player reaches.

Askmrrobot derives their stat weights and uses a formula to populate the best gemming and reforging option for THAT particular spec. However, it is not customizable for you at your particular stat level and gear level. It is a general formula that is good for the average of all players but may not be optimal for you specifically at that point. However, the difference in what you pick from what AMR states isn't that great, and AMR is good for those who just want the quick and easy way to generate some stats. I promise you that the stat weight for your play against your secondary stats would look like this:

Haste: 2.5

Mastery: 2.4

Crit: 1.9

Proper rotation/cooldown usage: 15.5

This is a dramatization, but hopefully this drives down the point. My final point is to remember that each individual parse will have some RNG, timing randomness, and other variables that will never create the same type of parse. Comparing your numbers to someone else isn't fair because they may have had a different situation in their raid comp. For example, a Demonology Warlock on Tortos will parse MUCH higher in a raid where all the other DPS lack quick, bursty AoE to slap on the bats. However, in a raid where the DPS comp is a Demo Warlock, Frost DK, Survival Hunter, Unholy DK, or Elemental Shaman, the Warlock won't get to push the high numbers at a sustained level. Try only to compare yourself to your previous week's output. Focus more on finding ways to increase uptimes, utilize procs better, and avoid unnecessary damage better, and I assure you, you will find vast improvements in your play.

[Vaelyn 6]

Zagam summed it up nicely, but if you really insist on knowing how to optimally reforge haste and mastery I'd go for this, approximately:

ilevel < 500: mastery > haste

ilevel 500-522 and 0/1 RPPM trinket, no legendary metagem: mastery = haste

ilevel > 522 and 1/2 RPPM trinkets and legendary metagem: haste > mastery

[JvChequer 43]

Zagam, my fellow.

Could u give-me any tips to Lei Shen Normal Mode? My guild finally get it, and we'll try today this big MF.

My comp is:

Tanks: Dk and Warrior

Healers: Shaman, Priest Disc and Druid

DPS: Mage Fire, Lock affli (me), Pally, Enhanc Shaman and Hunter Survival.

Any tips for the fight and mainly in Inter-phase destribution of players?

Edited April 22, 2013 by JvChequer