Nas

While on the subject of specs, I thought I would throw in the following hypothetical situation to see if any mathematically inclined members of the community would be interested in simulating it:

What if a 0/21/40 Destruction nuke build Warlock had both [Ashtongue Talisman of Shadows] and the 4-piece Tier 5 bonus [Hood of the Corruptor]. Would the Warlock notice a DPS boost by speccing 1/21/39 (A point out of SnF, and into Imp. Corruption) and incorporating Corruption into their 'rotation'?

 

Arelenda

To summarize:

for nukes: (Shadow Bolt, Soul Fire, etc)

Spellpower is "locked in" at START of the cast.
Multipliers are "locked in" at the COMPLETION of cast.
If it's a projectile, it'll start traveling at that point.


for dots and channeled spells: (Drain Life, Corruption, UA, etc)

Spellpower is "locked" in at START of cast.
Multiplier is recalculated at every tic.

I'm assuming crit bonuses (frost mages vs frozen targets) are also "locked in" at completion of cast, but am unable to test this.

(this information is WRONG, see below)

 

Arelenda

I'll assume no internal cooldown.

Assuming you get your corruption to tic every 3s, it'll proc every 15s on average. That means it's up 1/3 of the time, roughly, so gives you 220/3=76 spellpower on average. That's about equal to the [Icon of the Silver Crescent], which has 43+155/6=70spellpower on average. So it's not a great upgrade.



Math for 1/21/39 vs 0/21/40:

Assuming 1300 spell power, 25% crit chance

You're losing 4% of your spellpower on each bolt, which is 2,67% less damage per bolt. (1300*1,06+575 vs 1300*1,02+575 or 1950 vs 1900)

You'll be casting roughly one corruption per 6 shadow bolts. Corruption is 2334 damage (900+1300*0,94 plus 10% set bonus)

The original rotation would get 6.6 shadow bolts off. In theory a bit more damage, but there are a few factors: lower range on corruption, no threat reduction, two additional debuff slots (assuming the T6 set bonus leaves a debuff), and no ISB. I'd say debatable.

 

Nas

I imagined it would be a close call, yeah. I think I'll give it a shot and compare WWS's once I obtain the exalted BT trinket, while I do not anticipate earthshattering DPS gains, I am still curious about how it would pan out.

 

Byram

After all the discussion I've read about how armor does not have diminishing returns in terms of the character's lifespan (though the % reduction does), I'm curious as to how CoR doesn't work in the opposite way (i.e.- each point of armor reduction has an equal effect to shortening the mob's lifespan, though, as has been calculated, the %reduction in armor is reduced with diminishing returns)?

Thanks

 

Krathis

Something to note is the four piece tier five bonus is calculated before spell damage. On average it produced a gain of about six damage per tic per shadow bolt applied. Assuming a fully debuffed mob you may push that number as high as 9 or 10 or roughly a 3 dps gain on the last five tics of corruption. Granted it does keep stacking but still the numbers are less then impressive.

Assuming a non-optimal casting rotation of one shadow bolt applied every three seconds (due to lag, movement, or whatever... but mostly just because I don't feel up to breaking down anything more complicated at the moment) here's some numbers.

second tic +10 damage
third tic +20 damage
fourth tic +30 damage
fifth tic +40 damage
sixth tic +50 damage

150 extra damage over eighteen seconds or about eight more dps then without the set bonus. Even if we double that number to 16 to account for DS and ISB (and to give the option some leniency in it's favor) it doesn't make up for the 20 dps loss the 0/21/40 warlock has in Arlenda's example from moving that point out of S & F. Keep in mind too that Arlenda's numbers are calculated assuming no other debuffs on the mob, 1300 spell power 0/21/40 warlocks see closer to 3k point shadow bolts on average in a raid environment.

Unless your dps would go up by moving one point into corruption to begin with (which is very possible for 0/21/40 'locks with lower crit ratings) I wouldn't spec just for the tier five bonus.

The set bonus does not add a debuff but rather amps up the damage of your corruption (when you attempt to reapply a corruption before your amped one falls off you'll get a message much like with amplified curse of agony, 'a more powerful spell is already active'.)

 

Trickykid

Unless the buff stacks, the uptime is slightly lower than this due to 20% of the buffs removing 2 seconds of the previous buff.

Seconds of buff time per tick of corruption = (0.2*0.8*5+0.2*0.2*3)

So uptime = (0.2*0.8*5+0.2*0.2*3)/3 = 30.67%

This brings average spellpower to 67.47 which drops it lower than the Icon for single targets.

As pointed out in other threads, the benefit goes up if you're corrupting multiple targets.

 

Vlar

That may be true, but not including mention of the increased threat production will be a limiting factor if a warlock is trying to inform the raid leader that CoR is beneficial. Since this is supposed to be informative to raiding warlocks, I do not see why all such information would not be included.

 

Trickykid

I never said it shouldn't be included, I think it should as it's definitely another component of CoR usage. I was just noting the exceptions to considering it a flat "raid dps" increase.

 

Arelenda

Included now.

 

• frmorrison

You misspelled Sacrifice.


To the 1/21/39 people that are using 4 Tier 5 and Ashtongue trinket, it is better dps on paper, but then you have more aggro, less range, and are more affected by spell pushback on Corruption, plus you will use more mana (370 mana in 2 seconds vs 399 mana in 2.5 seconds or 185 mana per second vs 159.6 mana per second), and imp SB will up less.

Not worth it unless you really want to use the Ashtongue trinket.

 

Trickykid

In the stat section, I would include intellect as it converts directly to critical strike chance. I think a lot of locks are so stat-averse we forget that. With kings (and gnome racial) this can add a decent amount of weight to some items.

 

Soul

This doesn't seem right. Every indication I have seen is that the damage a nuke does is determined once the spell leaves your hands. Otherwise, it would be optimal to cast your biggest, baddest nuke when your Icon of the Silver Crescent is about to run out. The same thing applies to DoTs: the base damage from spellpower is only applied at the end of cast.

A good way to demonstrate this for nukes is to go to Dr. Boom and dump Searing Pain on him using the Icon of the Silver Crescent. How many spells benefit from the increased damage after the buff fades? It will almost always be zero (lag being a factor here). If spellpower locked in at the start of cast, then you would almost always get one cast benefiting from Spell Power after the buff fades (you start casting Searing Pain. Spell Power fades from you. Your Searing Pain hits Dr. Boom for xxx damage).

The only thing locked in at start of cast is spell haste modifiers... that's why putting a Curse of Tongues on someone midcast has no effect on when that spell finishes.

 

Arelenda

Testing proves:

for nukes: (Shadow Bolt, Soul Fire, etc)
Spellpower AND Multiplier are measured at the COMPLETION of cast.

If it's a projectile, it'll start traveling at completion of cast.

Examples:
- if ISB drops off after you cast a shadow bolt but before it has reached its target, you'll still get 20% bonus.
- if Immolate drops off while Incinerate is traveling, the extra damage will still be added.

for dots (Corruption, UA, etc)
Spellpower "locked in" at completion of cast.
Multiplier reevaluated per tic

for channeled spells: (Drain Life, Hellfire)
Spellpower is "locked" at START of cast.
Multiplier is recalculated at every tic.

I'm assuming crit bonuses (frost mages vs frozen targets) are also "locked in" at completion of cast, but am unable to test this.

Haste is always counted at the start of the cast.

(updated for 2.4)

 

Arelenda

ShadowSeer updated to reflect this. It won't affect data much, though.

 

tdurden

I was wondering if a felguard raiding warlock could post not only which fights work well with the spec (as it's been done before), but also some info/guideline of which boss abilities a felguard could be targeted with, and which ones wont target it.

For example, will mark of kaz'rogal affect the felguard? I've never raided with * 41 * but it seems to me that it might be quite hard to optimize it.

Basing this on hunter pets, i reckon that they can't be targeted with Azgalor doom, Teron doom, Mother fatal attraction etc, so are we looking at a "specific target" immunity for the felguard, opposed to getting all kinds of aoe effects (like mark of kaz'rogal)?

 

Jaeydn

I've been raiding with a FG for the last week and I'm very happy with it. So far out of everything in BT/Hyjal the only fights I've trouble trying to keep him alive on are Kaz'rogal, Archimonde, and Council. Initially I was specced 6/44/11, but last night I specced 1/44/15 (still deciding where I want to put my last point) and liked it a bit more (moreso for personal reason like my computer's performance and things seem to go a bit smoother spellcasting wise with the non instant corruption, vs casting an instant one and getting *that spell isn't ready yet* when trying to cast my next spell).

For Kaz'rogal my pet seemed to be affected with the mark like other mana users, but mana feed negated that easily enough. Same for RoS, he goes oom as well, but either he was avoiding the damage from the 2nd Essence, or was completely unaffected by it. For the 3rd Essence he was taking some damage from the aura, but he resisted quited a bit since I think raid buffed and with Void Star Talisman he was at 200ish resists, and stayed alive for the fights duration.
For Archimonde the FG can will still be hit by any aoe and can be cursed as well. On Teron he can not be doomed, and still takes damage from random aoe.
Mother, he can't not be fatally attracted.

But so far, any fight that is basically melee friendly the FG is amazing. Aside from the bosses that I listed he was very easy to keep alive and I didn't have to worry about him much, but on the others I was better off using an imp or saccing something as I would have to resummon the pet several times and it wasn't worth it to have him out. Hope that helps some.

 

tdurden

I admit that im quite bad at understanding other people's roles in raid environment, so this might be inaccurate.

Judging by your post and my experience as affliction lock only i'd reckon that:

- Najentus: can't be used. Apparently the damage is so much that even 2p t5 can't make it.

- Supremus: as i said i fail at understanding it here, might be good

- Akama: surely amazing

- Teron: surely amazing

- Bloodboil: i reckon hearing something about fel acid that melee needed to pay attention to, but all in all i reckon it works well here too (i suppose that it cant be the target of fel rage yeah?)

- Ros: can it be fixated? phase 2 might work well but i might need a fel puppy. p3 should be good.

- Mother: should be quite good here, unless the shadow rez gear nerfs it to ridiculous. Might despawn if you get ported and need to run too far from it?

- Illidari: what is the problem here that jaeydn reported i'm not so sure

- Illidan: p1 should be good (can't get parasytes right?). p2 is definitely harder to manage. p3 is as p1 but the flames, which i reckon it won't be able to get. p4 shows my lack of knowledge in this, having used just an imp in the past year. is the felguard threat separate or added to the warlock? actually he can't melee him, but i'd like to know how pet threat works anyway

- Winterchill: i guess that it works alright here

- Anatheron: same as before

- Kaz'rogal: not so sure, i guess that with void star talisman etc he will resist quite some marks, but with 1 point in feed im not so sure it's easy to not let it go oom without extra lifetaps (lowering ur dps)

- Azgalor: supposedly quite good in here too. Extra avoidance against rain of fire is nice.

- Archimonde: how does air burst work with it? Can it be directly targeted by it? Will it go in the air if someone in range is air bursted? If so, when it will die from the landing no soul charge will be placed on archimonde right? What about the aoe fear+doomfires? Avoidance works giving it a chance to resist the fear or not (i guess not)?

Thanks for the answers, might be good for a lock approaching the demo way.

 

Jaeydn

Najentus, surprisingly I didn't have any trouble keeping the pet up. Usually he would catch a chain heal right after Tidal Shield, or avoid the burst completely.

On Council, I dps on Gathios the Shatterer, and while the pet would sometimes eat a consecrate tick, the combination that plus either blizzard or flamestrike hitting me or the pet would prove to be too much damage and he would die. I mentioned before that my computer is kind of bad so I deal with bad FPS and an internet connection that freezes up every few moments so my reaction time is sometimes too slow to move the pet out of harm. So you might have better luck on that boss than I did, also what you do in the fight might be different.

Mother, I did get ported but both times it wasn't really far so I didn't have an incident of the pet despawning, nor when I got tossed in the air. *I was extremely surprised at my performance on this fight, since normally me and the other affliction lock in the raid place low on top 10/11 for damage. The added resists from the pet allowed me to use a regular dps piece instead of SR, and I resisted a ton of damage overall. Particularly the mana drains, and ended up placing #1.

Supremus, I didn't get to see the FG in action long enough since I died early, but it does well enough just have to manuver it around fires.

Archimonde, he can't be air bursted that I saw, but the fires chewed him up really fast, same with Azgalor. I'd try to move him as soon as I saw the Rain of Fire over the melee but I could barely pull him back to me in time.

Illidan, phase one with him is still basically tank and spank and I don't really have to worry too much about him. Phase two, I keep him next to me unless I see a good opening for him to dps an elemental. Phase three I move him in and out to to dps the boss when he is no danger of being in a fire (I didn't risk sending him in at all on the warlock tank part).

Some of the fights that I wasn't able to successfully keep my pet alive I'll try again next week without using soul link. That would have probably helped a lot since I would tend to take damage after my pet had and vice versa. Then I can weigh wether or not it's worth it keep the non soul linked FG out, or just sac a succy/fg or keep out an imp (dps wise).

I'm still pretty new to this myself, as you said, I've been raiding with either a passive pet or a sacced one for the better part of 2 years. One 2.3 goes live some aspects of raiding demo will be even easier with pets automatically moving to get behind a boss, it was really nice when I had him on PTR when we did ZA.

 

tdurden

The 2.3 change surely makes it even better yeah. I guess i'll try it a bit on the ptr too, my main fear is that micromanaging it well < the dps loss.

 

Jaeydn

Overall unless it's one of the pet unfriendly fights you rarely have to worry at the FG. Turn on auto cleave and let him run wild. 2pc T5 takes care of him nicely(which I hope they add something like that set bonus to the demo tree) cause I really don't like being chained to those items to retain a spec, but as I am really liking the build I guess I have no choice. =)

 

• frmorrison

For Naj, the pet does have a 50% to not get hit. If you don't want to roll the dice, you have a few options. You can run without Soul Link or you can do a pet dismiss when the shield is up and then start recasting the FG (so he keeps his buffs) so he comes back with full health. My guild wants me to have the imp out, so I never got to try either option.

For Archimonde, I think it would be best to sac a Succy or run with phased imp (not sure if you would soul link the imp), doomfires are killer. In addition, if your pet is hitting Arch and you get Air bursted, you need to do a /petfollow so he doesn't despawn.


For General Demo pet info, make sure he gets buffed especially the imp (just unphase him and then rephase, it helps that the imp gets the buffs you get).

 

Cohren

What's everyone's thoughts on ForteWarlock? I like it a lot better for DoT timers than DoTimer(Use of /stopcasting macros don't mess up the bars). The other features are quite helpful imo, though I only use the Shard tracker, SS tracker and summoning assistant. I also like the macro for using Ritual of Souls, it will say which healthstone your summoning(2080,2200 etc..). Adds a lot of functionality to Warlocks without jamming your macro page full of things. All of my guilds warlocks now use this mod.

One of the major functions is that regardless of who applies Imp SB to the target, you get the DoT timer with the charges remaining.

If a lot of other people agree maybe it should be added to the addon's section.

 

Melkor

I agree about ForteWarlock, the summoning assistant alone is worth the download. I haven't had any experience with the timers though, at present im still using DoTimer to handle that. Though I may have another look at that since you've found it as useful, especially the ISB debuff tracking.

 

Gumibear

If you happen to have very high stamina, you can leave your Felguard sitting in the back and it will be ok. It needs to have a bit over 9k HP and 3/3 Demonic Resilience to be safe though.

Just pull the Felguard out when he switches to the walking around phase and it will be fine. The blue trails of fire don't do anything to the Felguard. It's immune to them.

My Felguard has never gotten Fel Rage. I'm pretty sure it cannot target pets. You need to be careful that the Felguard is always behind the boss because of the wide arc of Bloodboil's abilities.

Pets cannot be fixated by Essence of Suffering. It can get Soul Drain, but we clump together near the boss and use Mass Dispel to get rid of the debuff on anyone it hits. For Essence of Desire, usually an Affliction Warlock uses a Felhunter, and back when we would get to 0 mana for a bit before it died, I would Fel Domination a Felhunter before I went OOM because it would still have a normal mana bar to continue dispelling Rune Shield.

Not an issue if you have a Void Star Talisman. Its SR will cap, and the Felguard's DPS doesn't suffer too much since so much of its DPS comes from buffs compared to gear.

You have to deal with the possibilities of Flamestrike, Blizzard, and Consecrate. The aoes are rather strong, and it's difficult to path the pet in such a way that it's not going to run through one of those while dodging another. The best thing I've found to do is put the pet on stay in a remote corner to minimize the chance it runs away from a Consecrate into a worse AoE, and just Intercept it back to Gathios once the tank moves him out of the Consecrate.

Pets cannot get parasites. They are not targetted for flames, but can get flames from being too near someone else. In phase 2, it's difficult to allow it to attack, but it does not get hit by the fireballs Illidan throws and I have never seen it targetted for a Barrage. It does get hit by the demon phase fireballs that hit the whole raid though, so you have to be careful it's not taking splash damage. The Felguard's aggro is seperate from yours, which helps to make Demonology one of the lowest threat specs.

Just have to pull it out of Death and Decay quickly.

We position Anatheron facing the casters, so that he never swarms both casters and melee at the same time. I'll position the Felguard back with the melee and it rarely ever takes damage aside from Soul Link.

Felguards never get the mark, so you don't need to worry about this.

I put mine on stay and use it to help out people killing the Doomguards. It will die quickly if it's close to Azgalor.

The pet cannot be targetted for Air Burst. It will take some damage from being close to someone else who is Air Bursted, but it cannot be thrown back. Pets do not give off Soul Charges. Doomfire is not an issue unless the pet gets feared into it because of the distance at which Doomfires spawn. If the pet gets feared, your best bet is just to use DS. The Felguard DS is actually a bit better than Succubus DS for this fight because of the amount of time you'll be able to run around and let the regen tick rather than having to Life Tap.