[BETA] Demonology Warlock Discussion

[Deleted]

Except Warlocks really don't have a lot of uniqueness to them. Shadow has been turned more into Affliction over time, and Insanity doesn't seem to have changed that all that much. Destruction is now as reliant on RNG as Fire to pull numbers, except RNG no longer actually changes the Warlock rotation, you just get bigger or smaller numbers from the same rotation. Demonology is the only "unique" spec Warlocks have, and Blizzard has already started toning down the unique aspect of it and worse, started shunting more damage into Doom, apparently oblivious to the fact that Doom is a massively uninteresting spell despite talent synergy trying to make it interesting.

Shadow is still about channeling so beside both using shadow magics and dots i dont see similarities on both identities, in fact it looks more of a TBC/vanilla-esque flavour than anything else

Destro has never been as rng as fire, even with OMGRNGMASTERY, if you dont recognize that you never played fire (you could argue that BRF double IB was easier but still much more rng than destro)

About demo, well i honestly cant think of any more iconic dot than Doom for the warlock class, and since demo is the only spec having it i really cant see your point, considering they didnt really prune any iconic ability beside Meta and its spells

[Nadiru]

About demo, well i honestly cant think of any more iconic dot than Doom for the warlock class, and since demo is the only spec having it i really cant see your point, considering they didnt really prune any iconic ability beside Meta and its spells

The thing which was iconic about Doom was the fact that it could get a Doomguard to show up, which hasn't been true for the spell in a long, long time. I could see making Doom a big part of the spec if Blizzard brought that aspect of it back and then integrated it into the whole Demon army thing they're shooting for, but they haven't yet, and so all we have is a Talent and a couple of Artifact Traits which read "Your big DPET DoT is even more DPET."

[Gaidax]

The iconic thing about Doom was not Doomguard, it was a fact that it was a huge delayed nuke. Glad to see it is retained.

[Baconeggcheese]

That said, Destruction's mastery does change it to be much more variable on the DPS meters.

How?

Again I can see swings of 100% to 160% on a single spell from multistrike alone, yet alone factoring in how trinket proc RNG eclipses any level of RNG present in a spec.

We also have 0 clue if there is or isn't a bell curve on the mastery and how steep it is if there is.

It makes it less visually impactful

Visual impact =/= uniqueness.

And concern about visual impactfulness on simply a 3rd guardian sitting in the clusterfuck that is melee is confusing.

it lessens the class fantasy which Blizzard is pushing to see it get nerfed in a way that makes it put fewer demons out on the field.

How?

If Demonology is supposed to be this sort of lord summoner of demons who kills people through buffing a billion imps, some big dogs, and a Felguard (and it certainly seems like this is the case,) it seems like a waste for Blizzard to reduce what I guess I'm going to call "demon generation."

Clearly it isn't supposed to be a "billion imps" and "some big dogs", it's supposed to be a handful of imps and a couple dogs. It seems like you've created head canon and are now basing your opinion of the changes on that fantasy that you have in your head as opposed to what's on the server.

[Kirroth]

The iconic thing about Doom was not Doomguard, it was a fact that it was a huge delayed nuke. Glad to see it is retained.

Yeah, I think I had my Doom spawn a Doomguard all of like once. Big nuke on a big delay is what I actually experienced. There were even a couple fights where that was useful, like Razorscale.

[avahle]

How?

Again I can see swings of 100% to 160% on a single spell from multistrike alone, yet alone factoring in how trinket proc RNG eclipses any level of RNG present in a spec.

Destro has to deal with these on top of their mastery. Any new RNG element you introduce increases the RNGness exponentially. All specs have to deal with RNG due to crit/multi/trinket procs etc. Destro needs to deal with their mastery on top of that.
While I won't complain about it till we reach the numbers tuning phase because as you said that is when we will know how Blizz is planning to handle the RNGness, it's simply a fact that Destro has one extra RNG element on top of things common to other specs.

[Baconeggcheese]

Destro has one extra RNG element on top of things common to other specs.

It has an rng element on top of that (as do other specs) but nadiru's argument is destro is "as reliant on rng as fire to pull numbers" which has no basis I can find.

Having an RNG element is not the same as being reliant on it.

[avahle]

It has an rng element on top of that (as do other specs) but nadiru's argument is destro is "as reliant on rng as fire to pull numbers" which has no basis I can find.

Having an RNG element is not the same as being reliant on it.

I wouldn't go as far as destro is reliant on it yet(depends on tuning). but we certainly are affected by it.

Edit: I am more unhappy with the RNG resource generation we are getting and it's binary nature. I loved burning embers as a resource so much.

[Sharamuren]

"About demo, well i honestly cant think of any more iconic dot than Doom for the warlock class, and since demo is the only spec having it i really cant see your point, considering they didnt really prune any iconic ability beside Meta and its spells"

Do you consider Doom "the more iconic DOT" for warlocks? do you mean even more so than Corruption or Agony? or what do you mean by Iconic, i mean Doom was the least used DoT in Vanilla, TBC and even WoTLK and i mean even less so than a multitude of Curse debuffs we used to have like CoS,CoE,CoW, etc.

[Kirroth]

Edit: I am more unhappy with the RNG resource generation we are getting and it's binary nature. I loved burning embers as a resource so much.

The thing you have to remember is that a Soul Shard doesn't have equal value for each spec. A SS for Demo is worth 36% SP from HoG and one Wild Imp. A SS for Destro is worth half a Chaos Bolt, and a Chaos Bolt is 720% SP plus Crit multiplier plus Mastery roll. It's night and day between those two.

So let's look at Destro's SS generation. They get a guarantied Chaos Bolt's worth of SS every 24s thanks to Conflag. That's the spec's fixed baseline. On top of that they can proc bonus Chaos Bolts from Immo. It's just a non-standard proc, where it's giving resources instead of giving a buff or resetting a cooldown, and you have to get two procs to get a full extra Chaos Bolt. Also it's not a fixed proc chance but one that will improve with both Crit and Haste, so as your gear improves you'll be casting more Chaos Bolts as well as bigger Chaos Bolts.

Compare that to Demo and it's an entirely different picture. Demo SS are cheap and reliable because they're weak and required for rotational cooldowns. While Destro hoards its few SS for powerful effects, Demo gains and spends them quickly like they were Combo Points. You can talent into some RNG bonus shards, but at the core you need to be able to reliably plan to having 2 SS when Call Dreadstalkers comes up, so the baseline generation is fixed. Demo's SS may have the same name and UI look, but their mechanical role is entirely different.

[avahle]

The thing you have to remember is that a Soul Shard doesn't have equal value for each spec. A SS for Demo is worth 36% SP from HoG and one Wild Imp. A SS for Destro is worth half a Chaos Bolt, and a Chaos Bolt is 720% SP plus Crit multiplier plus Mastery roll. It's night and day between those two.

So let's look at Destro's SS generation. They get a guarantied Chaos Bolt's worth of SS every 24s thanks to Conflag. That's the spec's fixed baseline. On top of that they can proc bonus Chaos Bolts from Immo. It's just a non-standard proc, where it's giving resources instead of giving a buff or resetting a cooldown, and you have to get two procs to get a full extra Chaos Bolt. Also it's not a fixed proc chance but one that will improve with both Crit and Haste, so as your gear improves you'll be casting more Chaos Bolts as well as bigger Chaos Bolts.

Compare that to Demo and it's an entirely different picture. Demo SS are cheap and reliable because they're weak and required for rotational cooldowns. While Destro hoards its few SS for powerful effects, Demo gains and spends them quickly like they were Combo Points. You can talent into some RNG bonus shards, but at the core you need to be able to reliably plan to having 2 SS when Call Dreadstalkers comes up, so the baseline generation is fixed. Demo's SS may have the same name and UI look, but their mechanical role is entirely different.

All true and all nothing to do with what I said I was more comparing destro's ss with destro's burning embers we have on live now than to other specs ss in alpha.

I just feel like the non binary nature of embers allows us to more smoothly build up resource and the 4 embers with CB costing one each allowed us to store burst potential for atleast 4 chaos bolts. It felt nice. I know the numbers are going to be adjusted to make the less number of CB we will be casting comparatively now to hit harder, but I just like how it feels on live.

[Kirroth]

Ah, I was confused because this is the Demo thread, so I assumed you had to be comparing the two. In that case, I'll continue this discussion over in the Destro thread where it belongs.

[Deleted]

"About demo, well i honestly cant think of any more iconic dot than Doom for the warlock class, and since demo is the only spec having it i really cant see your point, considering they didnt really prune any iconic ability beside Meta and its spells"

Do you consider Doom "the more iconic DOT" for warlocks? do you mean even more so than Corruption or Agony? or what do you mean by Iconic, i mean Doom was the least used DoT in Vanilla, TBC and even WoTLK and i mean even less so than a multitude of Curse debuffs we used to have like CoS,CoE,CoW, etc.

Corruption is far from iconic, its just a plain dot with no unique mechanics, the fact you associate corruption with warlocks is simply because it has been there since the beginning and it was shared/used with every spec ever since. You could make an argument for Agony too, but it was the only dot with a unique scaling mechanic but it wasnt shared actually by all the specs, in fact it was just iconic for affliction

Doom has always been a dot with 1 delayed nuke tick (beside mop), there are no other dots like that and it has been associated with Demo since wotlk where they made Banes mutually exclusives

[Kithelle]

I have one little tiny question to ask that someone may or may not even be able to answer...with demon bolt...I notice it has a tiny little shaodwy orb and fiery orb swirling around when casting...does that fiery orb at least turn green if you have the green fire quest completed?

[Kirroth]

I have one little tiny question to ask that someone may or may not even be able to answer...with demon bolt...I notice it has a tiny little shaodwy orb and fiery orb swirling around when casting...does that fiery orb at least turn green if you have the green fire quest completed?

No. Some people dislike this fact, but I think purple and green would clash horribly so I'm happy with it.

[Kithelle]

No. Some people dislike this fact, but I think purple and green would clash horribly so I'm happy with it.

Green and purple as some of my favorite colors

Just seems lame that now basically only one spec gets any effects from that quest other than a new mount skin.

[Kirroth]

Green and purple as some of my favorite colors

Mine too, but I'm fully aware that combining them haphazardly ends up with something like Barney. With all the black elements to Demonbolt's visual, I think the dark purple and orange red go best together.

It is a bit of a shame, but the quest will be two expacs old come Legion, so it's not the worst thing in the world for it to be less essential. Plus there's always Burning Rush! That still turns green no matter what spec you are.

[Baconeggcheese]

Green + purple is a really common color combination even if they weren't warlocks 2 most iconic colors, fel fire being green, and shadow magic being purple... We have a set that is that color combo... there's plenty of plants / animals that are that combo...

Personally when I think green and purple the first character that comes to mind is the joker, not barney. But maybe I had a different childhood than you.

It's honestly just lazy that they haven't added demonbolt to the spell list yet.

[Kirroth]

Personally when I think green and purple the first character that comes to mind is the joker, not barney. But maybe I had a different childhood than you.

Actually, the first thing that comes to mind for me is the Hulk. Second is the 80s Lex Luthor power armor. I just thought Barney was the best overlap of "looks garish" and "people know WTF I'm talking about."

[Kithelle]

When I think green and purple I think of Devastator!