State of warlock tankiness in PvP.

[wholol]

Anyone ever wondered why warlocks , who were designed to be the "tanky dark casters", don't really feel tanky at all?

I'm speaking purely pvp here, so let's forget raids etc, but the only tanky lock spec atm is demo.
Aff and destro both have a hard time surviving pretty much anywhere ( Wpvp, arenas , bgs ), if we compare things to our counterpart cousin specs like shadow priests and fire mages, both of which are more durable than affliction/ destruction respectively.

And it makes me wonder why warlocks who were labeled the fantasy theme of "durable immobile dark caster" ends up simply being the immobile dark caster for 2 out of 3 specs.

So I've been wondering, why isn't soul link shared for all specs ? it's not like it affects our lore or class fantasy to say the least, i mean look at previous expansions, plus demo will still have the better soul link traits to make it more durable, but at least we wouldn't feel so squishy playing aff/destro anymore.

It simply does not make much sense to me why blizzard doesn't hold true to their given class fantasies.

[Harsesis]

As an aff lock in PvP I feel unkillable most of the time. So much self healing.

[sheggaro]

As an aff lock in PvP I feel unkillable most of the time. So much self healing.

Random battlegrounds, such joyful times.

[alexchaos]

In wpvp I get one shot by most melees. Like literally they jump on me and I die.
In instaced pvp arena/bg I feel much more tanky although I don't feel tankier than any other casters who all have spells to avoid really close death. (ice block/disperssion)
Also you either choose CC or teleport which sucks cause we have no interrupt to start with.

[Sunlighthell]

As an aff lock in PvP I feel unkillable most of the time. So much self healing.

When you encounter fury warrior (usually paired with ret or dh) in 3s come back here.

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In wpvp I get one shot by most melees. Like literally they jump on me and I die.
In instaced pvp arena/bg I feel much more tanky although I don't feel tankier than any other casters who all have spells to avoid really close death. (ice block/disperssion)
Also you either choose CC or teleport which sucks cause we have no interrupt to start with.

This bother me the most. We forced to choose cc or escape. Defence or mobility. While for example druids can have everything baseline + talents which improve those traits with 0 negatives.

[Drakile]

I felt really tanky in the beginning of the expansion, before they moved demon skin and sacrifice to the same bar. Also before they nerfed drain life, and then they recently cut the duration for the fel lord in half. A lot of the times it feel like we start strong in an expansion then throughout the life of that expansion we just have all of our fun toys and useful abilities taken away or nerfed

[Liarparadox]

Yeah in randoms locks feel pretty tanky. In wpvp melee can blow us up in a single lock down. Seems like two extremes, though I admit I haven't done much in pvp this xpac.

[wholol]

It just feels like we've always been tankier than this , having soul link and all, I wonder why they didn't keep it for all specs.

[Elise the Seeker]

We were way more tankier than in Legion imo. Cataclysm, Wotlk most specifically. Where killing us took a while.
Demo had it's extreme armor in meta form and affliction has beautiful self healing.
In Mop/WoD, we had Embertap, while although we weren't that tanky, we could survive a lot longer through embertap.

[Deleted]

did you watch the first cup in NA for blizzcon this weekend?

Every dampening setup has a demo lock in it, because they are virtually unkillable

[wholol]

did you watch the first cup in NA for blizzcon this weekend?

Every dampening setup has a demo lock in it, because they are virtually unkillable

Good thing we're not talking about demo then, if you read through more than 1 post you would've noticed we're talking about aff/destro mostly.

[Deleted]

Good thing we're not talking about demo then, if you read through more than 1 post you would've noticed we're talking about aff/destro mostly.

oh you were talking about "aff/destro mostly" yeah I see how that's specified.

now go create a fire mage post where you complain that you don't have enough slow abilities and that you will you had auto triggering roots, blizzard and ebonbolt.

if you want to be a tank play the tank spec. how hard is it?

edit: I read the whole thread. 1 person talks about affli and 1 talks about demo. nobody about destro. why don't you just admit it?

[purebalance]

oh you were talking about "aff/destro mostly" yeah I see how that's specified.

now go create a fire mage post where you complain that you don't have enough slow abilities and that you will you had auto triggering roots, blizzard and ebonbolt.

if you want to be a tank play the tank spec. how hard is it?

edit: I read the whole thread. 1 person talks about affli and 1 talks about demo. nobody about destro. why don't you just admit it?

Warlocks in general are supposedly tanky compared to other casters according to devs. We aren't.

[Deleted]

Warlocks in general are supposedly tanky compared to other casters according to devs. We aren't.

yes we are. which caster is more tanky?

[wholol]

yes we are. which caster is more tanky?

Balance druid ? ele shaman ? mage is pseudo-tankier with all the defensives they've got compared to us, you want to talk about tankiness in pvp ? face the facts. we aren't talking about demo locks, we're talking about affliction and destro tankiness, demo is tanky coz it has soul link.

We're discussing why the other specs aren't as tanky, and if you seem to have issues comprehending this topic then maybe you lack the capacity to process things properly, either that or you have a different agenda in mind.

[Deleted]

Balance druid ? ele shaman ? mage is pseudo-tankier with all the defensives they've got compared to us, you want to talk about tankiness in pvp ? face the facts. we aren't talking about demo locks, we're talking about affliction and destro tankiness, demo is tanky coz it has soul link.

We're discussing why the other specs aren't as tanky, and if you seem to have issues comprehending this topic then maybe you lack the capacity to process things properly, either that or you have a different agenda in mind.

okay, destro has a 40% shield wall with 1 minute cooldown, and port.

I don't lack any capacity to process things properly, and my own main is a warlock. I just don't get why you are complaining about something that doesn't need complaining. What would my agenda be?

Ele shaman is one of the easiest casters to kill in this game, and balance druids are only tanky when they sacrifice damage and sit in bear form.

Now, before we continue this discussion. Are we talking about random bgs/rated at 1200, or are you actually good at warlock? Do you have any pvp achievements to show?

I get the feeling i'm not the one with an agenda here

[Resentless]

Balance druid ? ele shaman ? mage is pseudo-tankier with all the defensives they've got compared to us, you want to talk about tankiness in pvp ? face the facts. we aren't talking about demo locks, we're talking about affliction and destro tankiness, demo is tanky coz it has soul link.

We're discussing why the other specs aren't as tanky, and if you seem to have issues comprehending this topic then maybe you lack the capacity to process things properly, either that or you have a different agenda in mind.

The only squishy warlock spec seems to be destro atm, and even then they are less squishy than shadow priests. Demo is a tanky god spec, and affliction is nearly impossible to 1v1 unless youre a dh (its quite close) or a rogue.

edit: oh and if we're not talking about 1v1s or something, then locks are quite easily the tankiest caster that can still do damage. Mages get trained to oblivion and unless they are fire, they lose the ability to cc or do damage if interrupted. Boomkin has to sit in bear, cant mention shadow priests they die in a global and ele... i dont even know if ele has any defensives. Certainly doesnt seem like it. Locks on the other hand have self heals and short cooldown shields and all specs seem to have a heal ability (maybe its a healthstone buff talent) to make them full HP again. Better than other casters for sure.

[wholol]

okay, destro has a 40% shield wall with 1 minute cooldown, and port.

I don't lack any capacity to process things properly, and my own main is a warlock. I just don't get why you are complaining about something that doesn't need complaining. What would my agenda be?

Ele shaman is one of the easiest casters to kill in this game, and balance druids are only tanky when they sacrifice damage and sit in bear form.

Now, before we continue this discussion. Are we talking about random bgs/rated at 1200, or are you actually good at warlock? Do you have any pvp achievements to show?

I get the feeling i'm not the one with an agenda here

Destro has a 1 min wall and port, if you want to talk facts let's have at it then, I'm assuming giving your grandiose speech that you're talking about 3v3, let's compare a bit shall we? balance druids have displacer or a 30% heal (further enhanced by celestial guardian if chosen), they have ironfeather armor or celestial guardian talents depending what they're facing, guardian affinity making bearform nearly unkillable, you say they dont deal dmg while in bear form yet they only need to go into that form when cds are poped giving them the best defensive form to avoid all that, not to mention they have barkskin as well and a 15% chance when hit in moonkin form to get an instant lunar strike making them the least favored targets to begin with,There's a reason they were favored so much to flag carry in rbgs.

Elemental shaman is the easiest to kill, if they're bad. try killing an ele who knows what he's doing,1.5 min astral shift + gust of wind leap + thunderstorm knockback +ghostwolf for kiting(with spectral recovery) + root/stun etc giving them more than enough tools to avoid burst windows vs comps like tsg,turbo,jungle etc. Oh and they wear mail not cloth which slightly helps and they can heal themselves if needed.
You wanna compare lock cds to that ? or maybe you just haven't seen good ele's play, right next up.

Mages, let's see, double blinks, cauterizing blinks as fire ,cauterize, blazing barrier ( also reduces physical dmg taken while it's up ), I don't even need to mention nova,iceblock and dragon breath and the myriad of instant cast / cast while blinking/ instant cast procs and castable while moving they can pull off , oh and temporal, not sure if i should mention frost, figured the crippling slows and roots are enough of a justification.

Either way the only time a mage is taking more damage than a destro lock is when a lock has unending resolve active and that's only for a few secs, not that it matters much since mage is designed to avoid being connected to most of the time while locks are meant to tank through things ( which is the point of this thread).

The only caster left now is SP, and although I feel this is probably ranked the squishiest caster of all, I'd still rate almost on the same rank as affliction ( with destro being slightly tankier ),since destro is slightly tankier than SP I will talk about affliction.

The thing is spriest has higher sustain than afflock once they have VT on everyone( pets simply add more to the sustain ) in 3s, since aff wont be able to drain tank much vs comps such as turbo/tsg/jungle etc, let's take a look at what affliction has as survival tools compared to SP ye ?

3 mins 40% dr, mega HS heal ( 1 time use since resetting is nearly impossible),port. I could say gate but since this is applicable to anyone the lock is playing with ( like the SP for example) I'll keep this out for now.

SP has 10% physical reduction outside of voidform, 1.5 mins 60% DR (untalented) disperse that heals you for 50% max hp (artifact), 1.5 min cd 40% leech on all non aoe dmg (talented), PW: Shield,higher mvt speed,can heal if needed.

So out of the above SP has a better wall that come up in half the duration it takes for locks' wall to come up, 10% passive reduction to physical vs soul leech dmg reduction, lock has better passive reduction with dots up on everything but once SP has PW shield up it's almost the same, faster mvt speed via mania or BnS depends which is talented, VT spread outsustains affliction's garbage siphon life by miles ( out sustains soul leech refill if more than 3 targets are dotted in 3s, aka pets), not gonna mention mind bomb/PS coz locks can fear or infernal stun nor am i gonna mention mind control or silence.

Now there's the higher mvt vs port, in some cases porting is more efficient than moving faster, in other cases moving faster to los or keep up with target/ chase might be better so i'll call a stalemate here.

Now that we've established that SP has better sustain ,better wall defensive cds, what's left is mega heal HS vs VE 1.5 min cd that heals the entire team.
I will ignore the amazing utility provided by VE and will only talk about it's personal benefit, once VE is poped if the priest has VT on everything and enters voidform they won't even need a healer to keep them up for a few seconds, now the counter argument could be said that dampening would also limit this, but so does HS healing, if we also consider that locks' mega HS can only be used once, it becomes clear that SP has the upper hand in this.

The only reason I did not state SP to have better survival odds vs afflocks is because of gateway and curses which somewhat puts them around the same level of tankiness, the only spec warlocks have that is rly tanky is demo, and that is because of soul link.

So now tell me, how is a class who was designed to tank upfront damage somehow ended up being at the very bottom for 2 out of 3 of it's specs ? sure destro is slightly tankier than affliction due to it's shorter cd walls and volatile RNG mastery dr, but affli has more sustain than destro due to dots, both affli and destro have abysmal survivability vs a lot of comps, so how does blizzard's tanky warlock class fantasy model fit here?

Also while we're at it, don't bring up pvp achievements into this when you don't know what you're talking about,you want to insult me with rating epeen? the only way you out rank me is if you are a multi R1 lock who's been in a lot of tourneys and I know most of these locks anyways.

The only way you don't see my point is if you're not even playing 3s or haven't been higher than whatever crap achievements passes for good these days like 2.4k legion garbage where you've probably been facing tunneling idiots that didn't rotate their cds properly and maybe didnt even train you so you've been able to use your single target chaos bolt spec or 123 tab rotation affliction dmg with an SP bugging voidform prefix to climb up to your mediocre rating range.

I am here to discuss class fantasy in relation to pvp and how it affects 2 out of 3 specs for locks, affliction and destruction, I'm not here to argue with ignorant people stating they aren't squishy because "this one time I faced an IQless potato who did not interrupt any of my casts, nor used any defensive and lost 1v1" as the stereotype for all such situations.

Good day.

[Deleted]

I'm sorry but what the fuck are you on about.
Come by my stream. There's a reason there's a gladiator title before my name.

Where does it say that warlocks are supposed to be invincible?

I still stand by the fact that demo is the most durable spec in the game. of any caster and any melee. Affli and destro are not as much, but they are not weaker than other classes. even after your rant.

edit: and while you are listing all the defensives of all the specs, don't forget fear

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The only squishy warlock spec seems to be destro atm, and even then they are less squishy than shadow priests. Demo is a tanky god spec, and affliction is nearly impossible to 1v1 unless youre a dh (its quite close) or a rogue.

edit: oh and if we're not talking about 1v1s or something, then locks are quite easily the tankiest caster that can still do damage. Mages get trained to oblivion and unless they are fire, they lose the ability to cc or do damage if interrupted. Boomkin has to sit in bear, cant mention shadow priests they die in a global and ele... i dont even know if ele has any defensives. Certainly doesnt seem like it. Locks on the other hand have self heals and short cooldown shields and all specs seem to have a heal ability (maybe its a healthstone buff talent) to make them full HP again. Better than other casters for sure.

Yeah, thats what Im thinking. He's saying the other casters are harder to kill becuase they have cc and ghost wolf and roots and shit. I thought this was about just standing still and tanking damage. isn't that what this whole "class fantasy" shit is about?

[wholol]

I'm sorry but what the fuck are you on about.
Come by my stream. There's a reason there's a gladiator title before my name.

Where does it say that warlocks are supposed to be invincible?

I still stand by the fact that demo is the most durable spec in the game. of any caster and any melee. Affli and destro are not as much, but they are not weaker than other classes. even after your rant.

edit: and while you are listing all the defensives of all the specs, don't forget fear

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Yeah, thats what Im thinking. He's saying the other casters are harder to kill becuase they have cc and ghost wolf and roots and shit. I thought this was about just standing still and tanking damage. isn't that what this whole "class fantasy" shit is about?

Sigh, listen, we both agree demo is very tanky , let's discuss why you seem to think affliction and destro are tankier than other casters ok ?

You claim you're a gladiator streamer, which doesnt mean much in my eyes rly, but what I fail to see is how you think affliction for example is tankier than a mage or a balance druid for example, the reason I brought up standing still and tanking damage is because that's how our class fantasy was designed, I bring up ele sham and mage , sure they can't tank frontal damage like a demo lock, but they have the tools necessary to survive , tools that fit their class fantasy yeah ? the only spec that fits our class fantasy is demo atm, it's the only spec that can really stand still tanking damage ( and I'm not talking about stand still and do nothing tanking).

You speak like someone who hasn't played affliction this season ( or the last for that matter) and faced comps such as turbo or jungle, if you have you would see how silly it is attempting to survive that if they play it properly ( also depends on which comp you're playing ), so tell me in all honesty, have you faced a turbo or jungle as affliction this or last season ? if you had you would know what I'm talking about, even if you claim you know what you're saying, you haven't provided any argument to counter what I said above, all I hear from you is " affliction and destro locks are tanky because I'm a badiator streamer and that's why I'm right" where's your actual proof? you can't deliver on proof because you don't know what you're saying, what I'm saying is a shared view by a lot of top locks, there's a reason we're only seeing demo in tourneys right now, any other spec is a liability that needs to be catered to in order to function properly.