Since we are going to get nerfed next expansion..

[Deleted]

The way he's grossly oversimplifying it, no I don't think it's poor reading comprehension. When did that become a meme anyway?

i dont think im grossly oversimplifying it, i think im currently pretty spot on as to how its going to be imo, atleast as long blizz doesnt add another mechanic to afflic. all you essentially have to do is refresh your dots so that they are always benefitting from pandemic(yay! im the dot maintenence guy!) and then you'll only really have to react to procs(non-nightfall procs) to get your haunt up to benefit from supercharged dots atleast thats how im understanding the way its going to be.

[Jessicka]

i dont think im grossly oversimplifying it, i think im currently pretty spot on as to how its going to be imo, atleast as long blizz doesnt add another mechanic to afflic. all you essentially have to do is refresh your dots so that they are always benefitting from pandemic(yay! im the dot maintenence guy!) and then you'll only really have to react to procs(non-nightfall procs) to get your haunt up to benefit from supercharged dots atleast thats how im understanding the way its going to be.

But we already know from the peak at the level 90 talents that they are looking at ways to add to or change up the rotation for those looking for that.

[Baconeggcheese]

They're obviously going to have to do something, affliction without snapshots will not be viable in its current state.

Soulburn: haunt is not exactly exciting in that regard, its a simple damage bump with an extra debuff to maintain. The idea of that debuff requiring 2 shards is... ugh.

Aff was always the easiest spec to play but I definitely get where people are coming from with it being completely mindless without snapshots. Hopefully they come up with something a little more interesting.

[Huntingbear_grimbatol]

the single target dps loss for doing aoe is way, way, way too low for destruction atm... Expect to see your spells cleaving ability get shafted or nerfed significantly, other than that the survival warlocks have constantly is a bit too strong. Constantly 20% more health than your average dpser, constantly building up shields on yourself as well as insanely strong mobility. Damage-wise a lot of warlock damage is "padding" through cleaving and multidotting, multidotting is already getting a bit "nerfed" so minor adjustments to cooldowns and utility/survivability isn't unreasonable to expect imo.

Same can be said for a lot of other classes/specs though, don't worry. Warlocks will still be top 3 dps with one of their specs (if not more) and will still bring portals, healthstones and insane cd damage.

[Grizelda]

There's a single target dps loss for doing aoe?

[Deleted]

Same can be said for a lot of other classes/specs though, don't worry. Warlocks will still be top 3 dps with one of their specs (if not more) and will still bring portals, healthstones and insane cd damage.

i always worry when ppl say things like this, as playing a warlock has always been a rollercoaster ride of buffs and nerfs, the line between perfectly balanced and horribly underpowered/overpowered is very very small for locks.

[Spiffums]

Lock have gotten nerfed every patch since the 1st one.......you get used to it.

[Jessicka]

They're obviously going to have to do something, affliction without snapshots will not be viable in its current state.

Not all that much, Affliction has been nerfed a few times to accommodate the snapshotting that obviously couldn't reasonably modeled when generating the numbers. Those nerfs to DoTs/Haunt would just need to be reversed.

Soulburn: haunt is not exactly exciting in that regard, its a simple damage bump with an extra debuff to maintain. The idea of that debuff requiring 2 shards is... ugh.

I don't feel it's a compelling answer either, and hope that talent doesn't make it live in any way shape or form for any of the three specs. Some people do claim to have enjoyed Improved Soul Fire though, so it is an entirely realistic design and it is a talent and so entirely optional.

Aff was always the easiest spec to play but I definitely get where people are coming from with it being completely mindless without snapshots. Hopefully they come up with something a little more interesting.

I don't agree it'll be mindless at all. Cataclysm's incarnation of the spec toward the end of the expansion was, for me, pretty dull but was and still is widely credited with being smooth and well designed rotation that when multi-targetting a very engaging spec. I think the same can be said of Destruction these days; so perhaps it could benefit from something else - but that something else should be toward the more advanced switching and multi-targetting play that really separates good players from bad while leaving the single target play in the 'easy to learn' end of that 'difficult to master' continuum (I just wish Elemental Shaman followed that model).

[Deleted]

I'd like to see harder hitting dots and the removal of soul swap in its current state. I like the instant burst that soulburn provides, but having it on no cooldown for mass swapping feels like it will limit us once the balance pass comes around.

I enjoy multi dotting but soulswap, switch target, soulswap doesn't feel as fun, in my own opinion.

[Baconeggcheese]

I'd really like them to remove malefic grasp before anything else as I feel that's one of the biggest limiting things to how powerful our dots can be.

I'd also agree we don't need both soulburn > soulswap AND the current iteration of soulswap being spammable. I'd be happy with one or the other but would rather not have to maintain 3 dots entirely independently as that really limits potential whenever we have to kill anything in a hurry since it gives us our ramp back. Don't entirely mind the ramp but it puts us in a bad place on a lot of fights.

[Zerach8]

What makes locks strong is the outrages scaling with trinkets along with the fact we can pool our resources and use them with those procs.
No other class gets so much burst from a trinket as warlocks (snapshot dots, 3mil+ chaos bolt in the opener etc.) Removing dots snapshotting fixes outrageous affliction burst, Chaos bolt scaling could be toned down (my lock is at 46213 SP,20.02%crit and 122.83% mastery self buffed and chaos bolt hits for 684k, in the opener i would be at 99823 SP,78.31%crit and 122.83% mastery, again, self buffed with trinket procs, food and flask, no pot and chaos bolt starts hitting for 2.8milion and u can still add more dmg in raid with Banner,crit and mastery buff which gets it up to 3.3mil as my highest Chaos bolt ever in the opener, twas on Siegecrafter so no dmg increase on boss or anything, better geared lock can reach even higher numbers). This is getting solved partly by reducing the chance to stack one secondary stat to insane amounts in WoD (like mastery with locks) but the scaling should also be toned down (maybe Chaos bolt only benefiting 50% from crit instead of 100%, would be quite significant nerf to total dmg...in my case, 10% less dmg only self buffed and 39% nerf in the opener)

TLDR:Only real problem are the trinkets (as always this expansion) and scaling with crit. Our resources dont offer any significant dps boost themselves, but when u build them up and pair them with procs, they become too strong.

[Jessicka]

I'd really like them to remove malefic grasp before anything else as I feel that's one of the biggest limiting things to how powerful our dots can be.

I'd also agree we don't need both soulburn > soulswap AND the current iteration of soulswap being spammable. I'd be happy with one or the other but would rather not have to maintain 3 dots entirely independently as that really limits potential whenever we have to kill anything in a hurry since it gives us our ramp back. Don't entirely mind the ramp but it puts us in a bad place on a lot of fights.

With MG I think there's probably room now to get Searing Pain back for those quick nuke moments; I think Haunt was supposed to fill that as it does hit pretty hard, but it is terribly expensive with the Shard cost to use it that way. And I agree that we don't need both SB:SS and normal SS, one or the other is fine.

[Stefanus]

Developers stated that CCs are getting nerfed overall for every class, on that behalf for warlocks I think howl of terror is going out for us, since we were at some point during mop forced to choose between it and mortal coil in a skill tree, and now with it returning as a baseline spell there isn't any obstacles for them removing it without messing with a talent tree...
The other thing which isn't going away, but will get nerfed probably is soul burn+soulswap. I see this returning to a state in which was during cata, where you had to apply dots first (hardcasting) and then afterwards soulswap (only if you have a major glyph on, which would force us going for that glyph and wasting a glyph slot)...

[Xandy]

I agree the despawn range of the Gateways makes them borderline useless, and by borderline I mean completely. Also I would really, really like to see Demonology shine next expac.

[Baconeggcheese]

I agree the despawn range of the Gateways makes them borderline useless, and by borderline I mean completely. Also I would really, really like to see Demonology shine next expac.

Kinda like how it dominated t15 and the start of t16 which is why they nerfed it to shit?

[Squirtlelol]

They are trying to nerf damage and CC, not necessarily removing every ability everyone has, they just want people to stop randomly getting 1 shotted in pvp or CC'ed for a minute straight and not be able to do anything. They want to give players enough time to react and outplay the other team instead of getting lucky with a random CC chain or a random 1 shot.

[Xandy]

Kinda like how it dominated t15 and the start of t16 which is why they nerfed it to shit?

IIRC (I didn't really play Demo this expac) that was due to broken mechanics from UVLS not the actual spec itself?

[Last Starfighter]

Can you hear the whispers?
The whispers in your head?

Warlocks aren't crazy.

[Baconeggcheese]

Synergy, not broken mechanics.

And it wasn't just uvls, otherwise they would have only nerfed uvls instead of nerfing hellfire by 20%, imps by 30%, chaos wave by 33%, doom by 25% on top of the uvls nerf over the course of both tiers.

[Last Starfighter]

Did you even read what he said?




So what he's saying is:

Maintain dots (gives arbitrary refresh time)
HEY MY TRINKET PROC'D! BETTER CAST A HAUNT ON THAT PROC!
proceed to MG.

Or are you assuming "haunt on a proc" means "haunt every time nightfall procs" which would be a silly silly assumption and poor reading comprehension.

No, he's talking about a trinket proc, or some other proc/buff. You're assuming.