Warlock 6.0 Transition Guide

[Arios016 7]

Crunch time for my guild, had a bad case of roster boss and now trying to finish the teir before 6.0 hits. all signs pointing that we will get Garrosh down tonight though (we were one malice 4 soak away last week)

[Zagam 1,982]

Good luck.  We observed many things that felt wrong during the raid last night, likely attributed to the PTR patch.  Hopefully you don't endure the same.

[Berlinia 168]

Zagam try Arcane Mage at least for one reset during 6.0 it's too damn amazing.

[Zagam 1,982]

My Mage was Arcane for a while, but I went Frost so I could fall asleep while DPSing.  I'm pretty solid at both specs and never tried Fire.  We have one Mage in our group, so we'll see how it all pans out.  We just desperately need a Spriest/Boomy/Ele.

[Arios016 7]

Aaaand we got it, Thank you guys here for all the help throughout this teir! looking forward to WOD and hopefully I  will actually be able to contribute something to these amazing forums rather then just be a lurker :D

[Lockybalboa 618]

[Janglybits 1]

Aaaand we got it, Thank you guys here for all the help throughout this teir! looking forward to WOD and hopefully I  will actually be able to contribute something to these amazing forums rather then just be a lurker

I'm hoping that will be the case for my guild tonight, or next week.  Changing from 10 to 25 meant flushing a lot of our progression down the toilet.  It's painful to think of how much churn we went through to arrive with the group we have now.

[Liquidsteel 279]

You should have cleared 10H before 25 imo and gotten at least 15 people familiar with the fight. Our transition to 25H was pprety seamless, killed 13 the first night then spent 2 1/2 nights on Garrosh.

[Stunlocked 8]

I apologize if I missed a comment about this already - but it appears that Drain Soul doing more damage in the execute phase is now a "Draenor perk".  Wouldn't that mean we no longer have that at level 90?  If so, that seems like a substantial nerf to Affliction.  

[Lockybalboa 618]

Aff is going to be total trash in the 6.0 pre patch, total trash.

[Zagam 1,982]

Here are some 6.0 numbers I'm seeing while playing around with Simcraft for T16H builds (588 ilvl)

 

Affliction - initial Simcraft profile = 18272 DPS with Haste > Crit = Mastery build.  By modifying to Haste > Mastery > Crit, I got 18509 DPS.

 

Demonology - initial Simcraft profile = 17710 DPS with Haste > Crit > Mastery build.  Simcraft model also had ToC > Meta:Soul Fire, so I changed that and gained 330 DPS to 18040.  Further modifying by dropping some Haste and Crit to get some Mastery got me to 18217 DPS.  I swapped from Simcraft Grimoire of Service for Grimoire of Synergy for another 250 DPS for a total of 18467.  Haste > Mastery > Crit.

 

Destruction - initial Simcraft profile = 18179 DPS with Mastery > Crit > Haste build.  I was unable to gain DPS by modifying profile.

 

Still working on things, but right now, all 3 specs look to be decent in 6.0.  Modifying Simcraft models to see what I can push out in terms of stats.  Remember, all of this stuff is based off of Patchwerk models.  Movement, cleaving, adds, and other hokuspokus shit will affect DPS.

[juribe 1]

I was wondering why people were saying Aff would be trash tier in 6.0. Every test I've personally done and seen others do, Aff was right in the mix with the other Warlock specs, and that was before the most recent buffs. 

[Zagam 1,982]

I was wondering why people were saying Aff would be trash tier in 6.0. Every test I've personally done and seen others do, Aff was right in the mix with the other Warlock specs, and that was before the most recent buffs. 

It is going to be trash - but the comparisons calling it trash, myself included, are doing it from a subjective and comparitive view, not an objective view across all specs.  It's now BALANCED - which is going to shock a lot of people out of the HOLY SHIT PURPLE IS AT THE TOP OF MY RECOUNT SKADA MUST REROLL PURPLE.  Soul Shards are at a premium, which is the major complaint about the spec at level 90.  They did the following:

 

• Reduced Soul Shard acquisition on mob death from 4 to 1.
• Reduced Nightfall proc from 10% to 6% (you get a Draenor perk of 5%+ additional which makes it 1% better than pre-nerf)
• Put a cost on Soul Swap (don't use Soul Swap anymore)

 

Those changes alone DRASTICALLY change the way Affliction is played.  With no more snapshotting, it's just DoT, DoT, DoT, DoTs everywhere except manually casting each one.  Affdots will be removed from your addons and it'll be replaced with mob trackers showing time remaining and letting you know when it's safe to reapply. 

[Zagam 1,982]

Just to reiterate some other points why it'll be garbage - before, Affliction would be great with 2 or 3 targets - just reapply DoTs to one and Soul Swap to the rest.  Now you're spending 3 more globals on each mob you want DoTs on for any sustainable DPS.  If you go to 3 targets, you're coming close to doing nothing but recasting DoTs and MAYBE getting a Haunt or Drain Soul in somewhere.  The Soul Swap nerf was more significant than just the Soul Shard change - the cost of globals every time you want to apply DoTs will accumulate.  Affliction might hold up to Destruction in ST, as the above sims show, but when you add targets, Fire and Brimstone and Shadowflame will easily take over.

[Hurtlocker 11]

Does the bug persist on Garry that if you get mind controlled your command demon goes away?  I've not played demo on that fight since reg Garry.  

[Liquidsteel 279]

Was working fine for me this week!

[Zagam 1,982]

With ElvUI, it continues to be a problem.  I had to resort to clicking the button on my pet action bar instead of using T which is my normal Felstorm bind.

[Hurtlocker 11]

Boo, I use ElvUI as well.

[Liquidsteel 279]

I use ElvUi.

 

It worked fine for me on Friday. I got MC'd and he neither 1) went on passive or 2) lost the ability to use felstorm.

 

I checked by stream and after being MC'd I used felstorm without resummoning.

[Zagam 1,982]

Hmm, maybe it's one of my other addons interfering.

[Liquidsteel 279]

I did have issues for months with this though whenever I played Affliction or Demonology on him (pet goes passive and Command Demon requires a resummon).

 

Last week was the first time I noticed it didn't occur.

[gervaise 0]

As mentioned - and I agree - Affliction was already in dire straits. The solution, imo, is to play a Shadow Priest!

[Lockybalboa 618]

As mentioned - and I agree - Affliction was already in dire straits. The solution, imo, is to play a Shadow Priest!

 

Mind Spike spam WoD Spriest is cool.

[draggit 0]

If demo is a viable "thing" in 6.0 and WoD then ill definitely be playing my lock still. destro is too repedative, and aff was never my strong suit.

[EvilOverlord 1]

With the generalization of Pandemic to all classes, is Shadowflame now also affected by it?

"All periodic effects" are supposed to be affected so...