Hmm. Cripple will be reworked. I'm sure the silence/pacify effect isn't intended to the last the whole effect, just the movement-impairing part. There is no cooldown listed, so it would be a spammable silence/interrupt which no class has. It will probably should be qualified as a curse so it can't be combined with coex and cot, but wouldn't it be nice if it's physical so rogues can't CoS out of it?

Not sure what damage multiplier you can pick up going down the arcane tree, but remember to get Chaos Bolt means foresaking Demonic Sacrifice...a 15% hit. The only talent that would help it's damage is emberstorm. It still isn't worth it for PvE. As mentioned before...nothing can really help the 51 pt destruction (or Affliction) talent in PvE as long as DS exists as a 21pt talent without being ridiculously OP in PvP.

One thing I've noticed from the spell files...I haven't seen a new rank of Life Tap. Makes me wonder if lifetap is going to a fixed heath cost, or they think spell damage provides all the scaling needed.

Fire is the only way to go for destruction, which makes me kind of sad as I liked the shadow aspect of the class, separate and distinct from mages. Shadowbolt will remain the primary nuke of Affliction and Demonology perhaps. Demonology is intrigueing, but it needs more work to make demons viable and worth healing/managing in raids. Last time when TBC was in Beta Affliction kept getting nerfed, and Demo and Destro kept getting buffed. Still holding out hope Demo has a major rework with moves DS either higher or lower in the tree, and allows the other trees to be more creative.

I hope they start trying to get the fire/shadow thing to work, I think if they made very powerful talents deep in destruction that allowed for fire and shadow to synergize, where if you took the deeper talents it'd be a greater DPS rotation than just spamming straight fire or shadow, with deep talents that could boost your abilities to use shadow and fire together, it could outweigh DS, I just ahte DS because it kinda makes for a bastardization of the class, I mean, I raid 0/21/40, and I don't use dots, don't use pets, just spam a single nuke, it's just a defiling of the class concepts, and I love the warlock class.

Or they could just nerf DS. It's a strange ability to have in the demo tree.
Why do our 21s tend to dominate PvE (DS, Ruin) and our 31s, 41s, and 51s have never been THAT great in PvE, the only really good ones were UA and Felguard for PvE. SL, Dark Pact (was okay, unecessary), Conflag, Shadowfury, Decimate, Demon Form, Atrocity (Seems okay in PvE, but bad on bosses)

The only multiplier that affects Arcane spells is Arcane Instability (+3%).

I can see Arcane Barrage finding a home in both PvP (damage on the move, always good) and PvE as a filler between AB casts. Chaos Bolt is useful for the former, but for the latter, its cost seems too high.

ETA: The point of my above post was not to say that one of the spells is superior to the other, but rather to observe that they've given two trees an instant-cast nuke on a short cooldown as a 51-point talent, while still making them very different in both effect and apparent intended role.

I'm definitely worried about it not scaling well as an instant cast, but at the same time, it's on such a short CD and it penetrates everything, so if they gave it a scaling talent, considering it's high base damage it might be a little overpowering.


I like that Shadowfury pretty much IS a grenade though now. Can be cast while moving, so the .5 second cast is a non-issue, and in fact I think this is even better now, it means you get just as much use out of your stun now, but can be used like an instant, you just have to remember it takes .5 seconds to go into effect.

51 Affliction really is quite simple. They could easily make a talent good for both PvE and PvP that remains balanced. I've said it before and I'll say it again.

Curse Mastery: Allows two curses to be active per target.

They could tack on any extra benefits or disadvantages to it as needed, but at the core allowing 2 curses per target fits Affliction quite well thematically, offers versatility & fixes the fact that the Affliction tree really boosts up CoA a lot, but in raiding Affliction is dedicated to being the CoS bitch and can't *use* CoA.

This really is a simple decision to make...

Maybe if there are 3 warlocks you would be allowed to use CoA. There are 10 classes, or 2.5 of each class in a raid on average. Chances are if you can cast two curses, they are going to want it to be CoE/CoS/CoR so they can bring a higher dps mage or rogue..maybe a deathknight (you didn't really expect to be the highest dps class in the game ad infinitum, did you?). So no...curses make 3 locks desirable if not necessary, Curse Mastery would make 2 warlocks deep affliction all you ever need, and no warlock would get to raid as demo or destro.

No, this is not correct. Debuff cap stress and better warlock DPS from the Destro and Demo trees would make the likely setup:
1 affliction warlock (CoE and CoS)
1 Destro (or Demo if its DPS is better) warlock (CoR)
1 Caster, Warlock or Mage (as long as Warlock dps +CoD = Mage Dps).....Most mages believe this is fine btw, its the warlock dps + utility curse = mage dps that causes complaints and warlock stacking beyond 3 warlocks.

Given that, with 10 classes and 25-man raid setup, we're going to get basically 2.5 raid slots. That is exactly what raid balance should be.

Debuff slots is a problem as it stands, with WotLK looming more powers and abilities it can only mean more debuffs will be required. The slot requirement from two for either type of Destruction spec to 7-8 debuffs for Affli running this new revolutionary talent (2*curses, Corr, SL, UA, ISB and possibly Immolate) is really significant.

I still maintain the widely-agreed-on Curse Of Magic will be superior. The PvP-related changes indicate that a move towards a possible CoT/CoEx or CoA/CoEx combo will be a little contrary to convention. Not to mention CoM solves the "there's not enough nature/holy debuffs" issue.

You honestly think a single warlock being able to keep CoT and CoEx up on multiple targets is PvP balance? Hell, you think its balanced even in PvE? There's a reason that limitation is in place, and that really solves nothing.

Suggestive, I'm not sure you're referring to me, but if you are you either are interpreting me wrongly or are being sarky, I suspect.
By "The PvP-related changes indicate that a move towards a possible CoT/CoEx or CoA/CoEx combo will be a little contrary to convention" I meant:

Recent changes to ballance locks in PvP, to me, say that power is trying to be removed from the Lock class, in PvP. At least with respect to CC. Giving the possibility of dual-cursing one target goes against this trend. Thus it is unlikely that a PvE-oriented change will be implemented that is technically a step-backwards in terms of where PvP is going.

Oh no i wasn't referring to you, sorry. It was directed at the original suggestion, i hadn't even noticed your post.

In short, you're asking for another DoT?

Essentially, yes. It would be nice to use other curse together, but as you pointed out, CoT+CoEx is quite the nasty combo. Maybe OP, maybe not (in the level 80 game) And, yes, another DoT would be fun in the raid game. I'm always for anything that ups the complexity of gameplay (Yes, I realize this argument took place in the previous pages)

You know, a while back Manly made a bold suggestion. Roll CoE, CoS and CoD into one. That way Affli would get a sizeable chunk of increase in output compared to 0/21/40, you'd gain Malediction to everything (and also Mal would grant +n% to CoD, where n is how much ballance you want to introduce). It'd have no effect on PvP as the CoD effect would be ignored, it'd mean that even as a one-warlock group you could get plenty of buff without sacrificing DPS, and would solve the three-locks-per-raid issue...

That man, too ahead of his time.

Bringing back the option to be a dot (and pet) class would rock my world. If I wanted to cast fire nukes all raid, I'd have made a Mage.

I simply don't get why:

-Affliction doesn't get a deep tree selfcast buff along the lines of "your Spell crit and Spell haste values are reduced to zero, you gain +dmg in Ratio <X> to the crit and haste removed". Bam, with correct numbers Affliction gets the same value out of gear as Destro. Gear Homogenization, and returns to the idea that dotters give up burst for consistent, wear-you-down damage.

-Change Syphon Soul, or add another channeled spell that nets Shadowbolt-like dps. Balancing mana cost would be the hard part; if you make it normal dot costs, then the forum trolls would whine about locks getting a 25k damage spell that costs 400mana; but too expensive and every time you only get 1-2 ticks off before you had to move would rape your mana pool. The inability to crit should factor into mana-balancing however.

With the latest change to ISB making it not effect periodic damage I am really starting to agree with you. They've added so much to remove some of afflictions pain points already (extra sb crit for mobs < 20% because refreshing DoTs at that point is a waste, a haste proc so we can cast more shadow bolts, and reducing the amount corruption needs to be cast), they fix pain points but do pull away from the affliction game play style.

I kinda wish they'd push affliction away from the SB spamming, but it seems it's the only thing they can scale well.

The new 51 pointer cripple pisses me off though, because as it is I would be spending too many points in affliction to be able to get a 21 point from another tree, leaving me with a fairly useless looking spell (for raiding at least). That said it appears to be so overpowered for PvP that I imagine it's gonna change alot before release so no point in crying. (I wanted an aoe corruption)

30 second buff would make it pretty useless and no longer worth a shard. I'd rather see it's effects nerfed and dropped to an 11pt talent, or moved into the destruction tree as it's 31pt talent. Make conflagrate trainable, it was never that great to begin with.

As far as using pets in raids, the Felguard is the only pet that has the health and talents (Avoidance) to allow it hold up in any raid encounter. The imp and Succy have such low health they would keel over to the first aoe. The VW and felhunter do pitiful damage. Keep in mind hunter pets can have 6-7k health. The Felhunter has 4k. The imp 2k. The VW--5k? The Succy 3k. You will only be able to raid with a non-phase shifted pet if you are deep demo.

I'm not sure what Blizzard intends for the destruction tree. The problems with Destruction in PvE is that it is too simple and probably does about 5-10% too much damage. The problems in PvP is that it has no mobility, no escapes, and few time-buying skills. On the PvE side, looking at these talents I definitely sense an attempt to 'hold the line' on dps when you really analyze them in comparison to other class's tree. Molten Core looks like a damage boon to fire destruction, but it probably will only proc on Shadow DoTs or shadow bolt, and the math is going to work out that with DS you would be a fool to switch elements and lose 15% of your damage potential. Kindling Soul and Eternal Flames are the only real damage gains for PvE, neither look anywhere as good as Emberstorm or SnF. Ironically, EF makes playing with fire as simple as playing with shadow is now. On the PvP side, other than 1 second added to Shadowfury (should have ALWAYS been a 3 second stun) and conflagrate added to pyroclasm, we gained a little bit of burst and the ability to shoot through shields. I'll admit I'll laugh out loud when I kill ice blocked mages, bubbled pallies, or CoS rogues. But there really isn't any survivability in destro...just abilities to try to burn down the other before they burn down you.

So don't make it use a shard. Exactly... destro PvE is doing 10% too much damage, this will be your fun talent like deathwish, being great in combination with heroism, destro pot and trinket usage.

Make imps immune to AoE would solve quite alot seeing the new buffs it brings, and at the same time will not make it OP in PvP.

There are numerous easy survivability talents you can implement for your demons. I've tried playing lock in PvE and destro was the most boring thing I've ever played.

Umm.. to summon a pet takes 6 sec, with Master Summoner. You would get 1 pet as instant cast with the Fel Domination talent, but the rest would take 6 sec, +1000 mana and another GCD to do the Sacing again. Even if you skip the Shard its not viable imop.



Pets will die from AoE, happly follow you though Fire (air burst anyone), despawn if your to far away (air burst anyone), and get Cleaved/mulitshotted/etc even though they are supposed to be standing behind the boss.

Oh and they also get targeted by some direct damage here and there too. Its exciting to play with one, but I wish the excitement was a bit better balanced by some extra utility - ie they have to be on the edge of OP to make up for their down time.

This could work really well, if the Sacrifice itself was also temporary -- as with Demon Form, the Demon despawns when you Sacrifice, and automatically respawns afterward. Give it a 3-5 minute cooldown and it's basically a Warlock version of Arcane Power. You trade 30 seconds of Demon utility/damage for 30 seconds of burst DPS.

This also gives you something like the opposite of the advantage Frost mages enjoy with their temporary Water Elemental; one of the reasons the pet is so good is that you can fit it in between Boss damage actions, and when it dies, no biggie, you pull out another one later. This idea behind DS would allow for you to despawn it in anticipation of a boss AOE, and then it would respawn later. To be useful for this purpose the timing might need to be fiddled with -- like 10 seconds with a 90-second cooldown or some such thing. But conceptually, it could work both to give you a burst-damage cooldown and to help make demons more likely to survive a raid environment.

Regarding the two curse talent suggestion, a simple idea ito help out Affliction's struggling DPS problems would be is a deep talent that allows you to cast Curse of Doom in addition to whichever other curse you use. This has no impact on PvP whatsoever as it can't be cast on players and would give what, a 15-20k hit every 60 seconds? Assuming, of course they finally grant it the benefit from Shadow Mastery that it fully deserves given Touch of Shadow provides does - has there ever been an explanation as to why an Affliction shadow damage talent doesn't work with an Affliction spell while a Demonology one does?

They could roll Fel Domination and Demonic Sacrifice together: Your next pet spell within 30 seconds is instant. Your current pet dies, and you gain XXX for 30 seconds or until you summon a pet.