[5.4] Demonology Warlock Guide

[JV Chequer]

In my First Kill i get the 522 UVLS.

And I'm not using it because I'm playing with Affliction.

RNG is a bitch.

[Biomega]

Hm, is it just me or have they finally fixed ToC updating Corruption to proper Pandemic/Glyph of Everlasting Affliction values?

[Apero]

Just tryed on a dummy, looks like they finally fixed it.

[Mazda]

Hm, is it just me or have they finally fixed ToC updating Corruption to proper Pandemic/Glyph of Everlasting Affliction values?

Really? Yay!!!

[Deleted]

If I get UVLS from LFR, is it worth it to replace the Shado Pan trinket with the LFR UVLS? My secondary trinket is Wushoolay's.

it is, but replacing your wusholay with it, would prolly be even better.

[Woz]

That's definitely more common in 25 than in 10, though I have some friends who are in 10 and their disc priests are getting the trinket. I still have to fight our spriest for it and the fact that it hasn't dropped let alone been coined by anyone but our boomkin doesn't give hope that I'll ever see it .

I only raid 25 man. Lawls, logic. Silly Blizzard!

[WildcatTM]

Is there any point in stacking haste beyond 8094? SimCraft is devaluing haste at my gear level (I'm above 8094) and I'm kind of annoyed by it (only 515 ilvl).

[Hellfury]

Is there any point in stacking haste beyond 8094? SimCraft is devaluing haste at my gear level (I'm above 8094) and I'm kind of annoyed by it (only 515 ilvl).

For single target fights in theory yes, personally in my view the difference and the RNG factors dont make it that worthwhile.

[Biomega]

Go for haste breakpoints instead of haste "stacking". 8097 (I think?) is one breakpoint, the next is quite a bit higher. If your gear is VERY good you might be able to reach that point, but most people won't be. Going for the most comfortably reachable haste breakpoint and then for mastery seems to be the most common way people gear.

[Count Zero]

Ugh so ... man, it's almost not even worth mentioning because of tiny sample sizes and rng and all that ... but I switched out my Wush back to the SPA trink ... all things considered I figured it really should be better (simply much less unlikely to match the proc with UVLS, also with Wush I was more over hitcap than I was comfortable with, plus it's simply very hard to take advantage of Wush as Demo if you have UVLS).

But, yeah ... on multiple dummy tests (I know, I know -- lack of buffs and all that) it was noticeably worse. Like around 10% worse (I did several as Service and several as Sacrifice -- altogether I spent about an hour at the dummy ... doing a five minute test, then waiting a couple/few minutes, then repeating).

This isn't at all meant to be conclusive in any way ... but, even when it felt like I could make use of the SPA trink proc in ways I couldn't make use of Wush, dps was way lower. I know I'll have to try it out in real raids to see, but ... I'm just real nervous about even bothering with it an am considering going back to Wush until I can replace it with Breath or Cha-Ye.

I actually have been going against what seems to be the advice here of not full-out stacking haste, but it's what's given me the best results in actual raids. I consider myself a decent lock ... but either I'd fallen off after Cata or every other lock got disproportionately better while I stagnated, yet going full-haste as Demo I'm having my best performances (peak and average -- in absolute and relative terms [compared to other demo locks doing the modes I'm doing]) I've had the entire xpac as any of the specs.

I dunno, maybe I'll hit some LFRs and see what things feel like ...

[Jessicka]

Go for haste breakpoints instead of haste "stacking". 8097 (I think?) is one breakpoint, the next is quite a bit higher. If your gear is VERY good you might be able to reach that point, but most people won't be. Going for the most comfortably reachable haste breakpoint and then for mastery seems to be the most common way people gear.

If you have UVLS that is, go crit rather than mastery if you don't after the breakpoint.

[Tramzh]

Ugh so ... man, it's almost not even worth mentioning because of tiny sample sizes and rng and all that ... but I switched out my Wush back to the SPA trink ... all things considered I figured it really should be better (simply much less unlikely to match the proc with UVLS, also with Wush I was more over hitcap than I was comfortable with, plus it's simply very hard to take advantage of Wush as Demo if you have UVLS).

But, yeah ... on multiple dummy tests (I know, I know -- lack of buffs and all that) it was noticeably worse. Like around 10% worse (I did several as Service and several as Sacrifice -- altogether I spent about an hour at the dummy ... doing a five minute test, then waiting a couple/few minutes, then repeating).

This isn't at all meant to be conclusive in any way ... but, even when it felt like I could make use of the SPA trink proc in ways I couldn't make use of Wush, dps was way lower. I know I'll have to try it out in real raids to see, but ... I'm just real nervous about even bothering with it an am considering going back to Wush until I can replace it with Breath or Cha-Ye.

I actually have been going against what seems to be the advice here of not full-out stacking haste, but it's what's given me the best results in actual raids. I consider myself a decent lock ... but either I'd fallen off after Cata or every other lock got disproportionately better while I stagnated, yet going full-haste as Demo I'm having my best performances (peak and average -- in absolute and relative terms [compared to other demo locks doing the modes I'm doing]) I've had the entire xpac as any of the specs.

I dunno, maybe I'll hit some LFRs and see what things feel like ...

I'm not sure why you would think Wush is bad for demo. It's simply amazing. Besides, I'd just say this: any RPPM trinket (atleast on normal) > SPA. SPA is terrible compared to Wush, and I'm not sure why everyone says that it's "hard to take advantage of Wush if you have UVLS". The only thing that is bad with it is pretty much the opener Doom because ur Wush won't be high stack before UVLS procs usually.

It's so easy to control during the fight, go in at 6-10 stacks everytime it procs and use 5-7 meta Soul Fires in a row. I'm going full haste and I'm pulling numbers like 200k on Iron Qon hc and 215k on twins hc with wusho normal and LFR UVLS and I'm slightly overhitcapped. I prefer full haste because I don't wanna lose procs from the LFR UVLS because of it's terrible procrate.

Wush all the way!

[Bonkura]

question for you people who are sitting in mostly heroic gear, have you switched over to using all/most molten core procs in meta or are you still trying to use them outside of meta?

[Deleted]

question for you people who are sitting in mostly heroic gear, have you switched over to using all/most molten core procs in meta or are you still trying to use them outside of meta?

If i have like <200 fury then ill use them in casterform, if i have like 800 fury and +6 molten cores, then ill use few of them in meta. I try use them all in metaform when i have BotH proc. Ofcourse it depends on when DS comes off CD and imp swarm. I want to have like 800 fury and +5 MC procs with DS+Imp Swarm, and +8 without Imp Swarm.

[Deleted]

1% Pet damage: ~600 Rating
1% Caster form damage: ~600 Rating
1% Metamorphosis damage: ~200 Rating

Compared with haste, can you fill the following table?

1 % more autoattacks: x haste rating
1 % more SB casts: y haste rating
1 % more Dfury: z haste rating

[Teye]

I still laugh every time someone says the SPA trinket is terrible. I'm not going to bother arguing it anymore, but if you know how to use it, its going to give you better dps than Woosh. Woosh without UVLS is great. With UVLS, SPA is better.

[Tramzh]

I still laugh every time someone says the SPA trinket is terrible. I'm not going to bother arguing it anymore, but if you know how to use it, its going to give you better dps than Woosh. Woosh without UVLS is great. With UVLS, SPA is better.

SPA isn't terrible in itself, but Wusho is just on a completely different level, so is all RPPM trinkets compared to any other. Having no int proc trinkets is kinda bad, as you fill both your trinket slots with procs that is "utility" and you got nothing to really spend your DF on cept DS burns.

[Teye]

SPA isn't terrible in itself, but Wusho is just on a completely different level, so is all RPPM trinkets compared to any other. Having no int proc trinkets is kinda bad, as you fill both your trinket slots with procs that is "utility" and you got nothing to really spend your DF on cept DS burns.

Exactly why the other two RPPM trinkets are better than SPA.

[Count Zero]

With the double-stack Shadowflame into Meta, and not wanting to be outside of Meta during the transformation cooldown, I wind up spending most of my fury just waiting out the meta cd anyway. Maybe some of y'all who are supporting Wush over the valor trink are doing something I'm not, but I only really make use of Wush by pure chance -- if I happen to pop into Meta when it's at 5+ stacks.

Either I'd have to dispense with the double Shadowflame->Meta thing, or dispense with proper UVLS use, to make use of Wush. SPA trink, I can almost always get near max benefit from (Shadowbolts in caster form, Molten Core'd Soulfires in Meta).

This was my reasoning for why SPA should be better for me, anyway. Again, on the dummy it's less damage than my dummy tests with Wush. I realize all the inherent flaws with dummy tests, but I have minimized variables -- both my Wush and SPA tests are self-buffed (Dark Intent and Crystal of Insanity [500 to all stats]), five-minute tests, and I do multiple in a row. Last night I spent about an hour testing my SPA setup (about 30 minutes with Service and about 30 minutes with Sac). I wound up with a fairly-consistent average, which was approximately 10% lower than my average dummy tests with Wush.

Also again, I know I'll have to test in a raid setting to get a much clearer idea ... but the breakdown is I'm making better use of the SPA proc, yet getting lower damage, with full-buff testing required. One other thing I've noted is that my standard deviation was smaller ... if I got lucky with Wush timing (say 8-10 stacks when UVLS procs), my damage would be much better, but if I got unlucky it would be much worse (although after multiple five-minute tests a definite approximate average was clear). With SPA trink every result was fairly close to the average.

In general I'm more a fan of consistency than gaming for outliers (hence why I went for hitcap as Afflic in early t14 ... after an initial experiment with sub-hitcap, which I wound up hating due to that large variance) -- although this doesn't really line up with me going full-haste rather than a breakpoint then mastery. But it's worked better for me in real encounters (and on the dummy) than anything I've tried the entire xpac. So, I dunno.

What I find is the best thing about the mmo-c forums is that you get a wide range of players (skill and gear levels) reporting real results. Hopefully my experiences can help someone in a similar position make a more-informed decision about their own gearing and playstyle.

[Tramzh]

With the double-stack Shadowflame into Meta, and not wanting to be outside of Meta during the transformation cooldown, I wind up spending most of my fury just waiting out the meta cd anyway. Maybe some of y'all who are supporting Wush over the valor trink are doing something I'm not, but I only really make use of Wush by pure chance -- if I happen to pop into Meta when it's at 5+ stacks.

Either I'd have to dispense with the double Shadowflame->Meta thing, or dispense with proper UVLS use, to make use of Wush. SPA trink, I can almost always get near max benefit from (Shadowbolts in caster form, Molten Core'd Soulfires in Meta).

This was my reasoning for why SPA should be better for me, anyway. Again, on the dummy it's less damage than my dummy tests with Wush. I realize all the inherent flaws with dummy tests, but I have minimized variables -- both my Wush and SPA tests are self-buffed (Dark Intent and Crystal of Insanity [500 to all stats]), five-minute tests, and I do multiple in a row. Last night I spent about an hour testing my SPA setup (about 30 minutes with Service and about 30 minutes with Sac). I wound up with a fairly-consistent average, which was approximately 10% lower than my average dummy tests with Wush.

Also again, I know I'll have to test in a raid setting to get a much clearer idea ... but the breakdown is I'm making better use of the SPA proc, yet getting lower damage, with full-buff testing required. One other thing I've noted is that my standard deviation was smaller ... if I got lucky with Wush timing (say 8-10 stacks when UVLS procs), my damage would be much better, but if I got unlucky it would be much worse (although after multiple five-minute tests a definite approximate average was clear). With SPA trink every result was fairly close to the average.

In general I'm more a fan of consistency than gaming for outliers (hence why I went for hitcap as Afflic in early t14 ... after an initial experiment with sub-hitcap, which I wound up hating due to that large variance) -- although this doesn't really line up with me going full-haste rather than a breakpoint then mastery. But it's worked better for me in real encounters (and on the dummy) than anything I've tried the entire xpac. So, I dunno.

What I find is the best thing about the mmo-c forums is that you get a wide range of players (skill and gear levels) reporting real results. Hopefully my experiences can help someone in a similar position make a more-informed decision about their own gearing and playstyle.

I'm just saying that I've been in the same position as you and in theory you can think that SPA is amazing, it won't matter. Wusho will always pull ahead by a good margin, especially with high haste values. The only annoying part of wusho is the hit, it's really the only negative side of it compared to SPA.