Classic warlocks, of course you want tweaks/balance changes. OR DO YOU!?

[shadofall]

this has been a funny read.. stack stam crit and spell power. phase shift imp with dark pact on passive for your mana battery. curse of shadows & curse of elements were loved by any caster in the raid, 3 warlocks and you even got a curse of weakness as well which was superior to other reduce armor/ap on target side from sunder which it stacked with.. and so long as your tank kept your raid informed on missed sunders threat was easy to control. (albeit it more difficult than other classes)

between dark pact and life tap pots and stones a warlock was going to be able to keep doing damage long after your mages/token shadow priest went oom

warlocks held their own in raid and made other classes even better.

[M1r4g3]

Lets ignore the fact that if you buff classes you have to rebalance all the mobs/elites/raids/dungeons/pvp to account for that otherwise you get a stompfest which if you want you have retail.
Also every class had its use it wasn't all about dps like it is today so keep that mentality away from classic..

[Cairhiin]

I was a raiding and pvping Warlock in vanilla (Horde), and no Warlocks do not need changes in vanilla. While horde warlocks have it harder (though at some point Shamans got a threat reduction totem, it didn't help Warlocks all that much, at least not the first two in the raid as they'd be in the tank groups and obviously wouldn't get threat reduction totem), you can't just start changing the balance of one class and Warlocks were more than playable in vanilla, and their DPS was good enough.

[Trollhammer]

Warlocks = Curse of Elements/shadow bot.

[Avainer]

I absolutely love when everyone and their mother is/was/will be a pro over any other player in the mmo-champ community.... Also although I'm not a purist or anything (I simply don't give a fuck about it. I'll prolly try classic but I have no horses in this race) but explain me this pls. If u want this, that and that fixed /changed isn't that basically like an expansion just without the content? So basically u want vanilla content and the rose colored glasses and what not but if its possible ud preferred fixes that came later right? Isn't that some kind of dream state of the game that never existed?

[Eurhetemec]

if they did it to Warlocks, what would stop them from changing Mage(Refreshment Table instead of trading food) etc, Why not give Warrior dps a "feint" like ability so we wont overaggro, hell, lets give Paladins a taunt aswell so they can "tank", but that would mean they'd also need specific gear to get to the defence cap, but it also has to give spellpower so they can keep aggro, its a whole can of worms that should be spoken about, but its a extremely delicate topic

That you think these things are comparable is a huge problem, frankly.

It illustrates the entire problem with the Classic discussion.

Warlocks potentially have to farm for an extremely long time before every raid, and to have massive amounts of bagspace and so on, and you think that's the same as very occasionally overaggro'ing?

We're talking potentially dozens of hours or more of essentially "janitorial" gameplay, and you think that's the same as handing biscuits every so often, or overaggro'ing?

Jesus fucking wept.

[Deleted]

should clarify that my top 3 comment was meant class-wise. obviously you won't have a single rogue in a 40 man raid. but in almost every fight that didn't require much movement you'd see a warlock at the top. considering how much they bring to the raid as a class that's really good.

vanilla wasn't balanced at all. blizzard didn't care that some classes do twice the dps as others or if a class was raid viable. if you want to do pure dps in vanilla and always be relevant then pick rogue or a warrior, although warriors were horrible in early tiers.

warlock was really good throughout entire vanilla which you can't say for most classes apart from rogues who were pretty much the best vanilla dps class

[kamuimac]

If you say warlock dps wasnt good then you were a shit warlock

Even spamming shadowbolt you could do alot of damage with a shadow priest on raid

you are mistaking vanilla with tbc

but hey half of this forums are claiming vanilla had bloodlust so why not

- - - Updated - - -

I absolutely love when everyone and their mother is/was/will be a pro over any other player in the mmo-champ community.... Also although I'm not a purist or anything (I simply don't give a fuck about it. I'll prolly try classic but I have no horses in this race) but explain me this pls. If u want this, that and that fixed /changed isn't that basically like an expansion just without the content? So basically u want vanilla content and the rose colored glasses and what not but if its possible ud preferred fixes that came later right? Isn't that some kind of dream state of the game that never existed?

pretty much your last statement

thats why ton of people were telling them that vanilla was crap - and they didnt listen

only now they wake up from slumber and start to realise that unless they are planing to play warrior/rogue/mage they are pretty much fucked.

[Eurhetemec]

every class had its use.
that is what vanilla was
warlock was curses, soulshards, and in some fights good dps, or with the propper gear and propper players, enough dps to keep up with the best.

None of this argues against Soulshards stacking and/or Soulstones etc. not disappearing at 30 mins at logout.

Both of those problems combined to basically make Warlocks into a sort of "janitor" class, who had to do a ton of shit for everyone else's benefit. I mean, I felt bad for the guys and I played a Paladin so had to spend about 2 mins out of 5 buffing the raid lol.

I do think one thing you're missing out is that your screenshots etc. mostly only show 1-2 'locks in a wall of Mages and Rogues, and AFAICT, all your shots are from 1.12 and of geared-AF (by Vanilla standards) players. So if we do start at 1.12 and with most content unlocked, they'll be more true than otherwise.

I still think they need to make SS stack and not vanish so quickly though. I know in MC and BWL before we had Warlocks DC for so long that they couldn't even get back online before their stuff vanished!

[shadofall]

Also soul shards didn't disappear after logging out for 30 min or 15 min. that was only conjured items from shards. Spell stones, health stones. fire stones soul stones (or was changed fairly early in wows life that they didn't because I don't remember that :P)

[Dianova]

I do remember that too, but I can't really specifically remember which mobs I farmed Before. I Think I used to go to felwood and farm the satyrs to get essence of shadow at the same time. And then I drain souled every trash mob in the raid also /naughty.

If you where on the Alliance you could go to the cemetery in Duskwood use Detect Invisibility. That would allow you to see these level 55 - 60 Ghosts that you could farm. Thats where I spent most of my days farming, nice secret hidden in plane sight.

[FelPlague]

None of this argues against Soulshards stacking and/or Soulshards not disappearing at 30 mins at logout.

Both of those problems combined to basically make Warlocks into a sort of "janitor" class, who had to do a ton of shit for everyone else's benefit. I mean, I felt bad for the guys and I played a Paladin so had to spend about 2 mins out of 5 buffing the raid lol.

I do think one thing you're missing out is that your screenshots etc. mostly only show 1-2 'locks in a wall of Mages and Rogues, and AFAICT, all your shots are from 1.12 and of geared-AF (by Vanilla standards) players. So if we do start at 1.12 and with most content unlocked, they'll be more true than otherwise.

I still think they need to make SS stack and not vanish so quickly though. I know in MC and BWL before we had Warlocks DC for so long that they couldn't even get back online before their stuff vanished!

soulshards did not dissapear 30 minutes after logging out
ever
healthstones did, soulstones did,spellstones did (Until a patch), but not soulshards. Soulshards were not conjured items
also making them stack ruins the tailoring market, as it makes soulshard pouches useless.

[browneyekaboom]

Like I said before, these are all valid arguments:

1. Aggro too high - other classes could nulify this. Locks have to stall shadow bolts and wand instead.

2. Mana cost too high - can't life tap yourself to near death every minute in progressive raids because you'll end up dead or ooming your healers.

3. No dots allowed due to debuff limit.

But roll a warlock when classic rolls around and see for yourself.

Those Nihilum Horde warlocks didn't seem to have any trouble keeping up with the mages without salv / Human tanks. Too bad you can't go back in time and ask them for advice.

[Deleted]

tbh, if they let soulshards stack to 10 or something, and release classic with 16+ debuff limit, i'd consider rolling warlock main. Otherwise i'm probably going mage

[FelPlague]

tbh, if they let soulshards stack to 10 or something, and release classic with 16+ debuff limit, i'd consider rolling warlock main. Otherwise i'm probably going mage

yes, lets make tailoring useless well were at it ;p

[shadofall]

yes, lets make tailoring useless well were at it ;p

only if its patch 1.9 or higher :P

[Deleted]

yes, lets make tailoring useless well were at it ;p

yes, because the only reason tailoring is used is for shard bags...

[getupkid55]

This post really confuses me, and I don't want to resort to the usual arguments and rather discuss constructively, but if you say warlocks were one of the best DPS classes in vanilla it leads me to Believe you never raided in vanilla or are remembering wrong, or are trolling. Because it's so obviously incorrect.

It was literally impossible for our warlocks (in a Guild called Forte which got a few EU firsts in Naxx 40 and realm first everything from BWL to Naxx) to out DPS any of the other DPS specs. Rogues, hunters and mages topped the charts, fury warriors were also beasts later on with proper gear.

The DPS was abysmal in due to the following facts:
- No DOTS allowed due to debuff slots.
- Holding back already subpar DPS because of aggro.
- Insane mana issues and a rotation consisting of only shadow bolt and Life tap.

Now we were overall a great class. Dungeons were better because of shorter bosses and more DPS from dots. PvP was awesome. Leveling and soloing was a breeze.

But nobody who did any serious raiding then can with any conviction claim warlocks raid DPS was good, or anything better than subpar.

However if that's the vision and intended then hey ho I can buy that. But if we're supposed to be a pure DPS class it isn't really good design at all.

I raided as warlock in Vanilla, and can safely say SM/Ruin was basically the top DPS spec in the game for the better part of vanilla. No clue what you're on about.

[Eurhetemec]

soulshards did not dissapear 30 minutes after logging out
ever
healthstones did, soulstones did,spellstones did (Until a patch), but not soulshards. Soulshards were not conjured items
also making them stack ruins the tailoring market, as it makes soulshard pouches useless.

None of them need to disappear, though, do they?

As for "ruins the tailoring market", ROFL jesus wept. You are joking/trolling right? Surely? A niche item for one of the least-popular classes in the game, and you believe the entire tailoring market revolves around it?

[Cairhiin]

aggro was not too high, yes once in awhile if you went all out at the very start of a pull you would gain aggro, but that is ANY CLASS that went all out as soon as you dpsed.

Normal dpsing as a warlock didnt have an aggro problem until TBC when our dps was SUPER MEGA HIGH.

Mana cost was not too high, you could for sure keep up a normal rotation with mana pots and bandage after using lifetap.

dots were not allowed by ANY CLASS until the debuff cap was increased ,then warlocks were allowed to dot.
oh and dont forget that the best dps spec for most of vanilla for warlocks would LOSE DPS by applying their dot.
but oh yeah you never played warlock in vanilla.
rolled a warlock 13 years ago, rolled one literally 3 seconds ago.

To be fair, regarding aggro he does have a point. On Horde side you often had to wand or you'd pull aggro, this was especially a problem in BWL for me. However, it doesn't need fixing. Warlocks were fine in vanilla. We sometimes had BWL raids with 6-7 Warlocks.