In looking ahead to WotLK, and the 10 talent points that will come with it, I find myself intrigued as to the potential specs that will become available. I'm really curious as to what new talents will show up deep in the new trees, and how powerful they're going to be.

Since we have no idea what those will be, though, and have no way to gauge them, I'd like to see what kind of alternative builds people can come up with for leveling in Northrend, just from existing talents.

For instance, a 41/0/20 spec (or any similar to the one linked) will be able to have UA/Ruin at level 71, leaving a solid 9 pts to place anywhere you fancy. Sadly, there's nothing else that's really interesting within reach in the Destro tree, so the options will exist for early Demo talents or for high end Aff talents.

A version of the 0/21/40 (or variants) can put 10 pts straight into Unholy Power & Master Demonologist, which opens up some more possibilities. Have an imp out in the early going of a fight for instance, to lessen initial threat, then pop out and sac a succubus for a nice boost in damage later on in the fight...just as one example.

A Felguard spec (or variants) could see full Shadow Mastery (as well as Siphon Life) at level 80. And what Affliction lock wouldn't mind having a Felguard running around, creating havoc?

I'd like to see what other people can come up with...I'm likely going to at least be leveling UA/Ruin because Affliction is just too much fun, but perhaps someone can come up with a viable hybrid with all three trees involved, or find a way to make other proposed (and trashed upon) specs much more viable.

Please, keep discussion to only current and existing talents. There's no way to tell how the trees will change, what new talents will come out, and speculation of those is better left elsewhere...this is just to get peoples' minds moving.

Dots are horrible for leveling unless you plan on dotting everything and running away.. That leaves you pretty open the get ganked imo.. Only options really are felguard and destro with a sacrificed voidwalker/felhunter barring new talents that are good for leveling.

Felguard with ruin is probably the fastest for killing, and destro with sacced mp5/hp5 pet best for downtime.

Is it early? Sure it is. Is it too early? Eh, I don't think so. With confirmation that the expac is in Alpha, info is going to start coming out at us, hopefully, in short order.

It's entirely likely that the existing trees will get an update. With new talents, changes to existing talents, and so on, there's of course no way to know for sure until the new trees are revealed in all their glory. But I think the flavor of the individual trees will stay the same, and I don't foresee too much in the shifting around of where most talents are. I highly doubt that UA, for instance, will become a 21 pt talent. For the same reason, I don't think that Imp'd Shadow Bolt will see its place moved around either. Is Ruin likely to move? I would think so, given how cheap it will be to get...but that's pure speculation.

But for most specs, does it really matter if some of the filler talents get shuffled a bit? Not really. So long as S&F and Demonic Sacrifice combined cost 61 pts to max out, it won't matter if Imp'd Searing Pain get reduced to a 1 pt talent or not, or Imp'd Imp, VW, and Succubus all get combined to a single 5 pt talent. Warlocks are far more versatile than some other classes, and the addition of new points to spend isn't going to change that in the least.

Depends on your server type, I'd say. I presume you're on a PvP server, where leveling (if I understand correctly) is an entirely different beast than playing on a PvE server. I had no problems in dotting things up, fearing them, dotting more up, etc, until they all fell over dead. With life returns from Siphon Life, Drain Life, Death Coil, and FSW (which may end up still being viable as grinding gear, with the HP returns), dot & kill does have its place, I'd say.

I dont see why you would do a 20 second dot when you can just kill level 70 mobs in 3 seconds with two shadowbolts..

Or are you theorycrafting for a lower gear level then full sunwell? =p

What?

Leveling as affliction is damn near easier than leveling felguard. In fact, I would say it IS easier, and yes, I play on a PVP server. "Dotting everything and running away", try dotting everything and HOTing. By the time the fear wears off 5,6 mobs are dead. Lifetap back up, bandage, repeat. As someone above said, yes you can 2 shadowbolt a mob dead in 3 seconds (nice amount of haste I guess), but its pretty bad for efficiency, which you seem to think is alright with a sac. It's not really.

If you want to be even more efficient, as the mobs are feared you can lifetap and drain or pickup Imp. Drain Soul. This should limit your downtime more.

Destro with a sacced VW isn't terrible for efficiency as long as you are able to kill the mobs quickly. There is some regen time while moving to your next target and if your gear is good enough you won't get hit by melee mobs and will only be hit by 1 cast of ranged mobs. This is of course only speaking from experiences farming and doing dailies at current level and with Full BT/Hyjal gear.

I disagree, and would argue that affliction is the bad gear leveling spec (along with demo). Mana is near infnite with a sacced vw. Full sunwell destruction could probably get to level 75+ before a melee mob even hit them once. I've been affliction, i've tried the whole pull everything SL it all and collect loot, and found it to be significantly slower, more dangerous, and more health/mana intensive (you get hit by mobs a lot more, and dots are higher mana cost). I would definitely argue that affliction is by far the worst leveling spec.

What gear level were you trying that at? you are comparing it to being Destruction at Sunwell level. Going by personal experience, I changed from Affliction to Destruction at beginning Tier 5 level, and although it is becoming easier (still sucks for shard farming), I still can't farm as efficiently as I could by having my imp out and dotting everything in sight. Dark Pact is a major benefit to having no downtime

Around your gear level was the last time I was affliction, and even then I found destruction to be better especially on same level mobs. Add in about 100dmg 150 haste 100 crit and +6% dmg to shadowbolt on top of that and things die in 2-3 bolts and you can get 3-5 bolts off before things get to you. Downtime is decreased by so much when mobs don't hit you and you don't have to drainlife.

If you made me pick a spec with current talents it'd probably be a felguard spec with picking ruin at 71. But since 51 point talents could have tremendous potential I think it's almost safe to assume the ultimate leveling spec will include one of these new 51 point talents and therefore you can't really speculate much until we see those talents. Anyway remember that a leveling spec starts at 70 not 80, therefore it should get the majority of its power at the earlier levels and not at 80 where it gets replaced anyway. Kinda reminds of of back in the days of Diablo 2 where everyone planned their skills based on a lvl99 where it actually doesn't matter how effective your leveling skills are at 99 becuase by that point you're done leveling I mean if a spec is nice at 70 and gets better at ~71-73 it could be nice, but if a spec gets most of its power at ~76-79 then it's not a very good leveling spec, as by the time you get its full power you're already done leveling and respec anyway.

While I agree it is mostly irrelevant to discuss this without knowledge of the up to 51 pt talents, I think certain people are wrongly estimating a couple of things. While currently i prefer farming as destro simply because I don't have to think as much and we overgear 65-70 non elites but a large margin, it is alot different when this is not the case.

The ability to move while killing mobs, killing mobs with 3 hasted gcds and dragging mobs as they die on top of you really is a big factor in comparing downtime and kill speed. Questing is alot different from grinding for cash at level cap and the ability to multi pull 3+ mobs while moving and having them all die at your feet is very significant when going from mob hub to next one. Talk of taking more damage is largely irrellevant when you are not pulling mobs non-stop as along as the extra hp deficit isn't enough to stop one from dying until you move along to the next area. Destruction also takes alot more damage/takes longer when you are forced to pull multiple higher level mobs.

Ultimately as it stands I think affliction based, felguard based and destro based builds will all level fine it would more come down to personal preference as well as the relative mob hp levels.