Promyvion

Hey all, I have a question about typical affliction DPS output.

I recently started raiding BT/Hyjal on my warlock after playing a hunter for a couple years, and it seems that my average DPS is lower than what it should be. I'm 41/0/20, and typically put in the tank group for blood pact, so I don't get a totem or any other group-specific buffs. Also, I use Curse of Shadows/Elements, so no Doom or CoA either. My average DPS seems to be around 1000, sometimes higher.

My usual starting DoT rotation is Immolate>>Siphon Life>>Unstable Affliction>>Corruption, then Shadow Bolts until the DoTs need to be refreshed. I have Quartz, so I can see when DoTs are about to expire, and do my best to recast so that they are reapplied as soon after the last damage tick as possible.

My best guess is that I'm screwing up my DoTs somehow, but I don't see how. Any help or advice is appreciated.

Here is my armory: The World of Warcraft Armory
And a WWS from Naj'entus: WWS Loading...

Hmm, Armory doesn't seem to be updating and shows me in PvP gear, here are my stats in case it doesn't update soon:
1219 shadow damage with fel armor
989 fire damage with fel armor
192 hit rating (15.22%)
15.18% crit
I have 3 pieces of T6, 3/3 FSW, and the rest is tier 4-5 level epics, using Quagmirran's Eye and Icon of the Silver Crescent for trinkets.

 

weet

According to shadowpriest.com, the proc is worth 21.27 damage (shadowpriest.com :: View topic - Best Raiding Gear Available)

With the stats I use in the DPS spreadsheet, this would mean Haste ring would come out 0.3 dps higher on personal dps, but with Imp.SB raid contribution, Hyjal Ring is higher by around 3 dps.

So they are effectively the same assuming the 21.27 figure is near accurate (i have a feeling it is probably a little overestimated), and warlocks have a similar rate of offensive spells cast as priests. More info on the proc rate would be the best way to gauge this.

In shorter fights, the Hyjal ring will also tend to have a higher than average uptime which makes it better. But I guess it can also proc at opportune or inopportune times whereas the haste is static, so it is at more mercy of the RNG.

If given the choice I would probably wear 2x RofAK or 1x RofAK and Mana Attuned band (if hit is needed), since I would prefer to have less random stats (crit also being more random) but it really depends on what you can get, and the difference is very small either way. (ie. in my case I have 1 of each ZA/Hyjal/trash ring and currently don't need hit from rings, but will when I got the cape off of council, meaning getting a second trash ring now would only be worth it if no-one else wanted it)

 

• frmorrison

Shadow Priests cast a few more spells than a 21/40 Lock, so I would down estimate the proc at 17.5 +damage (including Life Taps), however for Affliction I would estimate the proc at 22.4 damage.


Anyway the 1.1% extra crit on the Hyjal ring makes the Ring noticeable better for imp SB, so your raid's shadow damage will be higher with Hyjal ring, plus the ring is "free".


Note for trash dps, nothing can beat 2 trash drop rings.

DK - Ashbane Failure is the condiment that gives success its flavor.

 

galzohar

Shadow priests only cast max 1 MB every 7.5 seconds in a normal rotation and SWD every 12 seconds, often a little less due to prioritization of other spells or not wanting to get killed by SWD. Rest of their spells benefit from ISB uptime but do not eat ISB charges as far as I know. Overall the result is shadow priests eat a lot less shadowbolt charges than warlocks, gain a lot due to decent amount of non-ISB-consuming dmg, but "waste" more dmg every time they eat a proc as their ISB-consuming spells aren't as powerful as shadowbolts (but they simply have to use them or their DPS will suck terribly).

 

Katinsha

Your fellow locks outgear you by a fair margin (judging from WWS, Armory shows PvP gear). Not sure if that is your reference point, but I guess you could improve a bit. Casting UA > Corruption as priority, then Siphon Life if it suits you and perhaps Immolate (but first check on Dr. Boom if this spell gives you an actual DPS increase or not) will make sure your most damaging spells go first.

As gear choices go, I would go purely for spell damage. But it is hard judging from only numbers whether you are making gearing errors.

 

Arelenda

I'm not entirely sure who you're responding to in this post, but I can confirm that what you are saying is correct.

 

Stran

Najentus is not the best fight to gauge you on as the shield interfears with dot up-time, which is the key analysis for affliction locks. You had 64 ticks of corr when dividing the duration of the fight by 3 yields 84 ticks. That means you had 76% corruption uptime, which would normaly be low. The shield does account for some of this but not this much.

Keep in mind DPS is not the important stat, damage done is. As far as I know WWS still calculates DPS by dividing damage by DPS Time, as affliction your DPS time should be near 100%, where as other classes see slightly lower dps times.

 

Lianya

A couple of questions.

We are about to do Leotheras and I'm going to be one of the ones getting the FR gear to tank him. I'm planning to repec Demo (this weekend), but before I changed up I wanted to ask a couple of things.

1. In the cookie-cutter specs, I see 1 point put in to Improved Corruption, but I'm not sure why this is done. I'm guessing something to do with the GCD? I tried searching the thread but wasn't able to find an answer. If I missed it, I apologize.

2. Other than for Leotheras, when I'm doing normal DPS, What is a good spell rotation? I've been Affliction almost the entire time I've been end-game raiding BC content. Would I bother to throw Corruption up anymore? Should it be something like "Curse --> Corruption --> Immolate --> Shadow bolt"?

I was considering something like this, which is a tad different than the listed specs, but wasn't sure if it was a good or bad idea, and if I was missing out on some stuff by not taking the other suggested talents.

Proposed spec

Also, if there is anything I should know about Leo that you think is interesting, please let me know. I've read up on the fight and I think I know what to do, but personal experience can always be a better teacher.

Thanks a bunch. So far, these forums have been an amazing source of info and have really helped me to change my play style / gear choices.

 

Stran

The 1 point in Imp Corruption is to make the cast time 1.6 seconds. This makes it almost on par with instant coruption, which has a 1.5 sec GCD. You just can not cast it on the run.

I have had better track record with 6/44/11 just FYI, but see what suits you better :P

As for the Leo fight ...

Buff the pet. make sure you have some hit gear, need solid hit for building threat. Spam searing pain.

When Leo becomes unbanished, immediately throw a COD on him. It will hit him just as he transitions to demon phase, building some solid agro. Keep Salv off obviously! Reapply doom during DEMON phase, at about 14 seconds left of it. this will cause it to hit at the beginning of next demon phase. Don't get hit by whirlwinds. When he splits, your threat won't need as much work, feel free to move a bit if needed to avoid whirlwind. Can also throw some dots on human Leo to help.

Pet does not get hit by the ae so can keep him following you at all times. if using SL, make sure healers know :P

Thats about it, good luck

 

Lianya

Oh, awesome about the Pet and AoE. I didn't know he wouldn't get hit. I was planning on parking him in a corner somewhere. It will be easier for healing if he's next to me. (Just have to watch the whirlwind like you said)

 

Bogeywoman

Your spec looks pretty good for Leo. I wouldn't bother with going to ruin in destro, though, at your current gear level. Your crit level is not super high, and you will be spamming searing pain so you won't be getting interrupted or pushed back very much.

Here's how I tanked Leo:

WorldofWarcraft.com -> Info -> Classes -> Warlock -> Talent Calculator

Get in a group with a shaman or a paladin whose job it is to keep you and your pet alive. Also have a tree and a priest help out especially near the end of the demon phase when you have a lot of debuffs stacked on you. Put on about 10k worth of hp gear.

Park the felpuppy in a corner about 25 yards away from you. Soulstone yourself and have any other warlocks have one ready to resoulstone you in the event of your demise. Notify the healers that it will need hots during your tanking phase. At the pull, open with curse of doom -- it will land during his demon phase if you cast it every time he turns into a human. When there's a few seconds to go before demon, try to time a shadowbolt to land right as he goes into demon phase and then start spamming searing pain. At around 10k aggro you are probably uncatchable in dps by anyone else in your guild, so let them know to come in. Don't stop spamming searing pain.

If your pet dies, instant resummon, put it on stay, and move to get it safe from the explosions. Let people know what's going on. If you die, you're going to lose aggro, so all healers need to switch to the new 'tank' until you're back up.

Repeat putting curse of doom on him every time he turns into a human.

At 15%, you will be tanking the demon for the remainder of the fight. Have your dedicated healers spread out so they don't all get rended by the human form whirlwind. You have a very high probability of death during this phase due to the stacked debuffs, so the rest of the raid needs to stay calm and safe but get the fight over with as rapidly as possible. Spam searing pain for a little while, but -- here's the trick -- start dpsing the human form once you get a reasonable level of aggro, with dots and shadowbolts, to help bring him down. You may very well get rended and get full debuff stacks so the healers need to be very responsive to your needs. Fortunately you can get aggro back after soulstoning without much trouble if you fall down in this phase.

1/5 corruption is for people who figure that the first point provides the most benefit, as it improves casting time to where it fits in to a global cooldown. In practice it's dubious as to whether you cast corruption when it has a casting time. Since Imp Life Tap is a truly excellent talent for DPS, and since there aren't a lot of builds where you have 1 point floating that can't be better used on, e.g., Demonic Tactics or a Felguard, 1/5 corruption is situational at best.

The spell rotation for the listed spec is to keep the curse up, keep immolate and corruption up, and otherwise pew pew with the shadowbolts.

 

Bogeywoman

This is false; pet can resist the aoe, but I've strayed too close to my pet and had it die.

 

Stran

No, this is false. I have had the pet next to me for over 15 kills, not once did he die to anything except no heals due to SL or Whirlwind.

Just reviewed all of my guilds WWS parses, not once did my pet receive damage from Leothras that was not physical damage. Save for the first 3 kills when I thought pets got AEd as well, I have always had my pet on follow.

 

Stran

Something to note, to combat high level of the stack, when he begins his script, you have 10 seconds before the demon pops out (if he was in demon phase when script begins). Soulstoned paladin can Divine Intervention you, which will drop your debuffs. Promptly click it off and get ready to tank the demon.

 

Bogeywoman

I may have been carrying over my thinking from back before the patch where pets stopped taking as much aoe damage, but I'm sure a felhunter has died on me of the aoe at some point in the past on Leo. I'll withdraw my "false" for now.

 

Arelenda

If you spend 5 points it becomes instant, but because of the global cooldown you can't cast anything else for 1.5 seconds anyway. Just spending one point makes it 1.6s casting time, meaning that in standard "stand and nuke" fights you get almost the same benefit for just one talent point. I haven't gone with this myself, using the exact spec listed with a succubus, when I tried demonology with a succubus and a very specialised "only good at Leo" spec for learning the fight. Spending the point on corruption instead of crit depends on taste more than anything.


That sounds about right, although whether immolate and corruption are worth it depends on your gear and raid composition. Make sure they do more damage per casting time than shadowbolt before including them in your cast rotation. Judging by your progression, I'm guessing they are.


I strongly recommend not using a succubus for demo unless you have T5 2piece and/or the trinket. She dies a LOT. Using a felguard will be a lot less complicated, especially if you're not going to be this spec forever.

About Leotheras:

He alternates between 45 seconds human phase and 60 seconds demon phase. The first human phase is an exception, it lasts 60 seconds (counting from when he unbanishes)


Warlock dps on Leo:
During human phase: whirlwind every 12 seconds, with 15 seconds cooldown on it (I think, I might be a few seconds off here, it's been a long while since I tanked Leo)
- when he breaks or resets aggro you want to start applying dots (corr/CoA/immolate in that order). This is both so you don't draw aggro by nuking before the tank has aggro, and because it will allow them to run out before the 27+ second cycle finishes.

During demon phase: apply dots at the start, refresh them once. SB as filler.


Warlock tanking at Leo:
focus on 365 FR (70 aura, 70 demonology, so 225 FR on gear is capped). Everything else in stamina. 14000+ health is recommended. Spellpower is useful but should not be priority. You can easily compensate for it with consumables.

Soulstones on the tanking warlock are a tremendous help. Due to the nature of the fight, if you die near the end of demon phase this allows the raid to recover, since you'll be ready by next phase. It was not uncommon for me to die once of twice on successful kills if Leo got lucky with no-resist streaks. Note that due to the stacking debuff, random people swallowing one or two bolts tend to live. Also, you are most likely to die near the end of the demon phase.

Spam Searing pain for threat. Use Curse of doom for initial aggro. It's incredibly good for it. Apply it when he unbanishes (first phase = 60 seconds), and during every demon phase with 13 seconds on the clock until human phase (13s + 45s human phase = 58 seconds, with a two second margin).

I bet you will forget COD the first few times you do this, as refreshing the CoD while watching your health bounce up and down like a yoyo is usually the last thing on your mind. Still it is definitely worth it, as 9k damage the first 2 seconds extra tends to give you a wide margin, allowing dps to go nearly all out from the start.

Have the raid time their dps so he goes below 15% at the START of the demon phase. It is definitely worth holding dps to do it, as it will ensure two things:

a. no inner demons will be up.
b. it allows Leo to be hit during the emote, allowing for 5 seconds of threat free dps. He's not targeteable if he does the emote in human phase. Do make sure people hold dps right after emote and get away because he can WW right off the bat. His WW can still be on cooldown from human phase, but even then, have people run off and let the tank get solid aggro.


At the last 15%:

Things tend to get hectic as you're tanking the demon. Make sure you do NOT get Mending, Lifebloom final tics, or Earth Shield at this stage. Leotheras resets aggro after each WW, and you can very easily get aggro on him if those things proc on the wrong time. Tanking both Leotheras and his demon at the same time is not advisable, unless you're Chuck Norris.

Apply a CoD and dots on the demon. If you die and get ressed/use SS, you can easily get him back that way. You won't have buffs, but you won't have debuffs either, buying your raid extra time.

And obviously, use searing totem. It's godly in this fight.


Alternate strategy:
If you have two warlocks with high FR, you can have a spare tank, which tends to make the fight less random. You can also do a "hand off" mid demon phase, allowing the debuffs to be spread between both tanks. This will make healing the demon damage a breeze. It requires two very aware warlocks and really good communication, though. And a warlock able to kill a demon even in FR gear (affliction locks in gimped gear might have issues).

All of these are just guidelines, of course. There are plenty of ways to do Leotheras and win.

 

Lianya

Thanks so much for taking the time to write that. It's an awesome post and I will share it with my guild. It makes things a lot easier to understand the mechanics of the fight from a Warlocks perspective.

Thanks a ton.

 

genobi

Just a couple of observations on the leo fight. When our guild first began learning the fight i also specced demo (felguard) to help learn it. After a number of kills some of the things i noticed are: My healers actually had an easier time focusing on me and *just* me. Meaning that when i was specced destruction or affliction the healers said they had an easier time healing me since they could focus more on myself and not worry about a pet. The badge fr gear is loaded with stam and honestly i would forego trying to keep hit cap or anything for the fight and just put on pvp gear for more stam. If you do the fight in this manner then you can place yourself as the mt imp person and then a warrior in that party can also give you commanding shout which really boosts up your hp quick in combination with heavy stam gear and bloodpact.

Snap threat is pretty easy as mentioned if you can remind yourself to cod at the proper time. If not it will definitely be ok since searing pain does the job and without salv on you noone will catch you threat-wise even if your hit/crit rating is in the tubes from the fr gear.

A paladin healing you is fantastic for two reasons; first, they can use blessing of light to up the heal average on you from them, and secondly (i did not see this mentioned previously and obviously i am blind since i notice now it was mentioned 3 posts up =( ) they can di you to remove the chaos blast debuff. If your group pushes into leo's monologue too quickly and your debuff stack is too high make sure you have a paladin ss'ed and they di you then pop back up for the last bit. You will need to remove it quickly and get ready to pick up the demon but i think it is far smoother than dying and losing all of your buffs.

I cannot stress enough the use of searing totems in this fight(as mentioned by Arelenda). Every shaman, every spec, needs to be dropping them in the WW phases. Searing totems save lives!

The only other thing to tell your group is make sure to watch the ww timer and not throw a big nuke right at the end of it, if people can stay calm its a pretty smooth fight once you work out the details.

 

galzohar

Make sure you know how many chrages you take before you can get 2-shot with unlucky resists (if I remember correctly for non-SL dmg 100-200 (take max of 200) + 1650*charges). Once you're 1 charge below the "possible 2-shot" level have ALL healers (possibly except one if inner demon people still need healing alhtough by that point they often don't, and obviously exluding healers still killing their demons) cast-cancel big heals on the warlock. The chaos blast is very fast and at that point taking 2 in a row without a heal in between will get you killed. Keeping lifebloom up can guarantee some buffer at that point, however 1 charge higher and it's just not enough. If you keep getting a bit unlucky, you will get closer and closer to the "1-shot" point. Make sure no priest shields you at any point, as when you get to the point where the next hit will 1-shot you you will want that PWS to be available and should usually prevent that 1-shot (although you should verify calculating with your HP that a shield is enough). If that 1 hit as well before the phase ended, use a fire pot (and battlemaster trinket if the fire pot will not make you survive it for sure) to be able to survive 1 more hit. If you take another hit after that, well, SS/BR, nothing you could've done (except DI which has the same effect as just SSing/BRing the warlock assuming people know to buff him back up).

Make sure your warlock has as much HP as possible. Imp buff, commanding shout and full raid buffs (food at least and flask if your guild is willing to invest in easier learning of the fight). More HP will mean more debuffs before you get 1-shot, which reduces the chance you will actually get to that point within a demon phase. SL spec gives an incerdible HP buffer for the "1-shot" factor however once the fight is on farm (heck, we learned the fight with aff lock tanking, was messy but we did it) you probably won't have that.

Make sure your warlock has maxed FR (preferably using aura so you can get more HP and MD felhunter if specced, again for even more HP)! This will greatly reduce the chance for the debuff to actually stack high enough, although healers should be aware that although you avoid 75% of the attacks, you can still take 2 in a row and the attack speed seems to be 2 seconds, maybe even a bit faster than that, which is faster than most big heals, so once the debuff is stacked enough you need multiple healers spam-canceling big heals (or even not cancel at all if mana is not an issue and debuff is stacked high enough, as no matter how good of a healer you are, the warlock has more chance to survive if they don't cast-cancel, as even optimal human reaction time leaves a long time (generally well over 0.2s) after you decide to cancel the heal until you actually cancel, which is a timeframe in which the lock can get hit. When the debuff is high, play it safe and burn mana (if you can afford it, which you usually can as this is otherwise NOT a healing intensive fight at all).

 

clavarnway

Nightmare Seed and the pvp click-heal trinket both help if you get within 1 shot range on the blasts.

http://sigs.guildlaunch.net/sig.php/1424974uXyta.png

 

Spline

For the last 15% of Leo, I've become fond of chain sacrificing Voidwalkers for the 5000 hp improved bubble. Once, I've seen 4 stacks of Chaos Blast fall off this way.

 

Arelenda

Stacks can fall off at any time if you resist enough spells in a row. I don't see how the bubble helps with this. They just absorb damage as far as I know.

 

galzohar

Yep if you get really lucky you can have debuffs fall off due to a lot of resists in a row. This is however pretty rare as they have quite a decently long duration that gets refreshed with every hit.

 

Spline

Try it! See how many chaos blast stacks you gain while bubbled. So far, I haven't gained any! Well, I did gain a stack when he one-shotted my bubble...

 

Yellowss

Hey fellow warlocks!

I am a pretty dedicated pve player and I need your help in connection to a main-character shift, which I am considering. My plan is simply in words, but complicated in practice. I want to lvl my warlock alt to 70 and gear him as fast and easy as possible, so I can continue raiding on him. The spec and gear that I am considering is THIS.
This demands a hell lot of materials, but those should be quite easy to get. Second the gear needs 25+41+25=91 badges and revered whit shatar. (plus max lvl enchanting/tailoring)
Note: First I am aware that several pvp weapons are better, but honor/arenapoints demands quite a lot work too. Second the gloves I have listed are just random aka I think I just have to hope for lucky drops in kara.(or am I wrong/do you see any better choice?)

My questions to you now are:

• Do you se any easier(or still easy but better) gear choices than those I have listed?
• Are my gear and spec appropriate in connection?
• Do you think this gear is “acceptable” for a guild whit 3bosses down in hyjal and 6 in bt? (rember that i will get some raid gear relative fast and leaded the raid on the last bt bosses, which i know very well)