Destruction Warlock Guide for The War Within

Welcome to the War Within expansion preview for Destruction Warlock, a resource page where to find changes, Hero talent trees and some initial assessment on the state of the spec.

The purpose of this page is to offer an up-to-date overview of how Destruction Warlock is changing in the forthcoming The War Within expansion, as such it is not to be treated as a guide or a replacement, since the current state of tuning is not representative of what the final product will be.

Destruction Warlock received a whole talent restructure alongside some changes that altered the Class Tree.

Below are the most notable changes:

• Demonic Circle is no longer baseline;
• Demonic Tactics is a new output node;
• Soul Link has been consolidated as a 2 points node, removing Profane Bargain;
• Inquisitor's Gaze and Summon Soulkeeper node has been replaced by Soul Conduit at 1 point of effectiveness;
• likewise Grim Feast has been replaced by a much more appealing node in Pact of Gluttony.

The introduction of Pact of Gluttony specifically has created a new issue in only 1 or 2 floating point to spare after acquiring all 3 capstones and output/stamina/health nodes, with a triage situation occurring with the following nodes: Shadowfury, Demonic Circle, Fiendish Stride, Amplify Curse and Banish.

As a result the updated class tree pathing has created a restrictive feel, of not being able to talent into several utilities due how taxing the "core" of the tree is, which coupled with the lack of party wide non-exclusive auras or utility is going to be detrimental in Mythic+ dungeons.

Moving on the Destruction side, the whole tree has been overhauled, with the intention of creating a pathing well-rounded and able to tackle most situations, progressing from a first gate almost devoid of choices towards the third gate which holds most of the options comparatively.

See below a list of the most transformative changes:

• Pandemonium and Cry Havoc have been removed;
• by reducing the amount of points in the first gate Cataclysm/ Inferno node is more accessible;
• Inferno has been reworked to provide a flat shard cost reduction instead of scaling with the number of targets;
• A new talent Indiscriminate Flames now empower spells Backdrafted;
• a new talent Summoner's Embrace is now sharing the choice node with Grimoire of Sacrifice;
• Channel Demonfire has been moved to the second gate, with a single point Raging Demonfire and a brand new Demonfire Mastery supplementing nodes;
• Emberstorm is a new addition that reduces Incinerate cast time by 20%;
• Shadowburn has received new supporting nodes such as Blistering Atrophy and Fiendish Cruelty;
• Grand Warlock's Design has been removed, since Summon Infernal is now a 2 minutes cooldown baseline;
• Summon Infernal has been moved to the middle of the second gate and the following talent Crashing Chaos now shares a choice node with Rain of Chaos;
• Soul Fire has been moved as the third capstone, with the new Decimation node;
• Dimensional Rift now has 2 new supporting nodes in Dimension Ripper and Unstable Rifts;
• Several 2 point nodes such as Burn to Ashes, Power Overwhelming, are now a single point nodes;
• Improved Chaos Bolt is a new talent that reduces cast time by half a second, alongside a 10% damage increase;
• Chaos Incarnate has been reworked to a slightly weaker version;
• Avatar of Destruction has also been reworked to summon an Overfiend that casts Chaos Bolts for its duration.

Overall the Destruction tree design feels more consolidated and focused, more cohesive in its intention of augmenting fewer but more meaningful rotational abilities, and in a way simplify the interactions with the new Hero Trees.

The rotation is much more engaging, with Decimation turning Soul Fire in a exciting proc. Thanks to multiple ways to sustain Immolate, opting for Internal Combustion does not feel as restrictive, especially with the ability to talent into Channel Demonfire, Cataclysm and Decimation.

Talenting into Internal Combustion is less restrictive than before, since Cataclysm, Decimation and Channel Demonfire all help with Immolate upkeep.

Hero Talents are perhaps the most notable addition to The War Within, with each spec having access to 2 out of the 3 available for the class. Destruction Warlock in this case can opt between Diabolist and Soul Harvester Hero Talent Trees.

The Diabolist Hero tree is themed around a sequence of Greater Demons that offer temporary effects such as damage amplification, shard generation or a high damage AoE ability before cycling toward the next one.

The playstyle as such, is influenced by this cadence while not being an intereference in the rotation at the same time. What changes the most is the damage profile instead, with Gloom of Nathreza directly buffing shard spenders, and higher burst capabilities thanks to Ruination or particularly in Infernal windows thanks to Abyssal Dominion.

Regarding defensive options and utility, Soul-Etched Circles offers a niche use case while Annihilan's Bellow drasticly increases the frequency of use of Howl of Terror. Infernal Vitality and Infernal Bulwark also ties a sustain element to Unending Resolve which is definitely more enticing than what other Hero Tree currently seem to offer, albeit overall not great.

The Hellcaller Hero tree is themed around Shadowflame and a new Damage over Time effect replacing Immolate in the case of Destruction. As the center piece of the tree Wither offers instant cast with no facing requirements quality-of-life changes, higher Flashpoint uptime and it is the base upon which setup burst window every minute through Malevolence. Its unique mechanic is its ability to become acute, providing additional damage.

The Playstyle itself is not very transformative, after the most recent redesign of Seeds of Their Demise, with just overall a passive damage increase.

Regarding defensive options and utility, Warlock hero trees are somewhat light in that department, with the option to either consolidate the benefit of both Curse of Weakness and Curse of Tongues in the new Curse of the Satyr or the ability to automatically curse every enemy in 30 yards during Unending Resolve with a very sporadic uptime. The other node is vastly undertuned with both Zevrim's Resilience and Illhoof's Design providing basically intangible benefit, if not being even detrimental in the case of the latter.

Season 1 Tier Set Bonuses for Destruction Warlock in The War Within are the following:.

• Warlock Destruction Season 1 2pc — Incinerate critical strike chance increased by 20%. Conflagrate critical strike chance increased by 25%.
• Warlock Destruction Season 1 4pc — When Conflagrate critically strikes, your Fire damage is increased by 5% for 6 sec.

2 pieces set bonus offers increased shard generation and has distinct synergy with Decimation, Conflagration of Chaos and Diabolic Embers.

Due how important is Backdraft for Chaos Bolt and Soul Fire, the 4 pieces set bonus will often times directly increase the value of Destruction spenders and high damaging spells in single target, while providing a passive increase during heavy Rain of Fire usage.

How Good is the Destruction Warlock Tier Bonus in The War Within?

If tuned following the general goal of providing between 10 to 15% increase with the 2 and 4 pieces together, Destruction tier set has a wide practicality, and should perform well in any situation, no matter the difficulty. The added crit chance offers more consistency when triggering procs and also provides increased shard generation which offset the lack of secondaries stats in the first tier of an expansion.

Strengths

• Faster cooldown loops
• Dynamic and exciting gameplay with Decimation
• Easier access to Cataclysm or Inferno
• New tree offers different playstyles and better Damage funnel capabilities

Weaknesses

• Shadowburn undertuned and struggling to find its own identity
• Havoc is less relevant due to pathing and worse supporting talent options, with Mayhem suffering even more
• Mobility is still a very tangible issue
• High target count AoE has been toned down substantially as per Inferno rework intention
• Warlock utility in dungeons is still lacking, outside of niche such as Gateway skip, and amplify curse
• Warlock class tree rework is somewhat more restrictive post rework