Affliction Warlocks and Haste for PvP

[Vorality]

I'm currently evaluating the best possible stat priority for my friends affliction warlock for PvP. I'm looking at a lot of top rated warlocks and they, of course, put all possible stats into haste. If a piece of gear already has haste, and they are hit capped, then they go into mastery.

My question is, with a haste break point at 9778, why do top rated warlocks have 11k+ haste? Shouldn't they substitute the "unnecessary" haste into mastery? What exactly is the reason for this? Is there something more that haste does that would completely over rule the damage you WOULD gain if you put more into mastery?

TL;DR is 1200 or so haste stronger than 1200 or so mastery?

[Einarr]

Well, the haste furthermore increases the speed of other casted abilities, plus if they are playing with someone else with a haste buff or use their dark soul, their breakpoints might hit higher caps

[Nicola]

It really depends on the comp you play with, play against and what you prefer yourself.
Damage wise: mastery > haste without haste buff, haste > mastery with haste buff. The difference in damage is not really noticeable unless you are getting trained really hard. Haste will offer less damage when being camped however you'll be able to trow out fears quicker.

[meekus]

It really depends on the comp you play with, play against and what you prefer yourself.
Damage wise: mastery > haste without haste buff, haste > mastery with haste buff. The difference in damage is not really noticeable unless you are getting trained really hard. Haste will offer less damage when being camped however you'll be able to trow out fears quicker.

Care to elaborate here? Shouldn't mastery always be better damage wise, unless you're relatively close to a breakpoint (with or without +5% buff)?

Anyways, I prefer haste over mastery myself. Tried both and the difference in damage doesn't seem that big. But the gameplay just feels so much more fluent with more globals and faster casts for fears, UAs and even gateways or pet summons.

[Nicola]

Care to elaborate here? Shouldn't mastery always be better damage wise, unless you're relatively close to a breakpoint (with or without +5% buff)?

With the 5% haste buff you can reach additional thresholds you wouldn't reach otherwise and it makes the haste bonus of Dark Soul slightly stronger. The difference in damage is small enough for it not to matter and it all depends whether you want faster casts or some extra damage when being trained.