[6.1] Affliction Warlock Guide

[Kyuu]

At the moment Demonology is the best spec, both for single-target and multi-target. It's also the less gear dependant spec since you get a lot of damage from your pets. Since it's your first character and you're very low geared I'd recommend you to spec Demonology if you want to do the most damage you can.

However, with proper gear and itemization, both Affliction and Destruction can be very viable in some cases. For instance, in Gruul and Oregorger, Affliction can do very well and sometimes even surprass Demo. BUT it requires a lot more skill and very good gear (690+ with Oregorger trinket mandatory).

[krille20]

Oh, wow. I did not think it was that bad. Thank you very much for the fast reply.

[Kyuu]

In the next patch however Demonology will be heavily nerfed (from what we've seen so far) and Affliction will be heavily buffed. So the tides will definitely change.

[SpikeySquad]

However, be aware that currently Affliction has some weak sides namely no cleave and poor AoE and hence on some fights other specs will always dominate.

So let's say I followed the Summonstone Guide for say Hans & Franz.

So either manual (or SB: SS) for Dots on Hans and SS over to Franz and something similar for when one brother returns (shard permitting). Now from anyone who has tested who has my most recent Corruption and hence for the 2 set I should be spamming Drain Soul on? I guess Franz but I wanted to check. Or of course the other possible option is to forget SS completely.

Thanks for any help in advance.

[Taalyn]

Manually Dot up Hanz, SS Franz, channel Drain Soul on Franz.

[Kyuu]

Hey, not sure if this is the best place to post but could someone give me a few tips? I tried Affliction for the first time in our Mythic Gruul run today and I seem to do very low DPS there. I'm aware that Gruul is probably our worst fight but I still feel like I could've done much better. I had a bit of a rough time in shard procs but if anyone could tell me what else I could improve on I'd be really grateful:

Log to Mythic Gruul -> https://www.warcraftlogs.com/reports...9#type=summary

[Xyronic]

Hey, not sure if this is the best place to post but could someone give me a few tips? I tried Affliction for the first time in our Mythic Gruul run today and I seem to do very low DPS there. I'm aware that Gruul is probably our worst fight but I still feel like I could've done much better. I had a bit of a rough time in shard procs but if anyone could tell me what else I could improve on I'd be really grateful:

Log to Mythic Gruul -> https://www.warcraftlogs.com/reports...9#type=summary

This isn't quite the right place, you should be posting in the "fix my DPS" forum. I'll respond here and hope the moderators move both your and my post to the correct forum.

Looking at your Haunting Spirit Uptime - you definitely need to learn to sit on shards in order to keep Haunting Spirits uptime at 100%. The only time you should cast a Haunt manually is when you are at 4 shards.

The other standout thing to me is when you are using your Dark Souls. Optimal Dark Soul usage should be your first two during Bloodlust (If it's on the pull), and your remaining Dark Souls with trinket procs or if you have <20 seconds before your second Dark Soul charge. Your third Dark Soul Lines up with a Crit proc, but this was a complete accident, as you cast it WAY before the proc happened. Your 4th Dark Soul was just cast whenever, which is never a good thing to do, unless you either will not have time to generate another Dark Soul charge, or you're sub-20%. Your last Dark Soul also was cast during nothing.

The last thing I notice is a somewhat low Drain Soul uptime. Comparing one of your logs to mine - you have 58%, versus my 65%. A nice, easy way to add to your uptime on this spell is knowing that you have the ability to cast a new Drain Soul during your current channel - Channeled spells benefit from Pandemic in the same way DoTs do, which means you lose no ticks by overwriting a Drain Soul with a new one.

Work on using your major Cooldowns at the correct time, and You'll see a noticeable difference.

[Deleted]

The only time you should cast a Haunt manually is when you are at 4 shards.

With the double nightfall 'bug' still in existence, is there a reason you recommend hovering at 3 instead of 2 shards? Do you value maintaining a higher average shard count in order to cover your bases when procs / cooldowns are up, over the potential loss of a few shards throughout the encounter?

[FurtyIRL]

With the double nightfall 'bug' still in existence, is there a reason you recommend hovering at 3 instead of 2 shards? Do you value maintaining a higher average shard count in order to cover your bases when procs / cooldowns are up, over the potential loss of a few shards throughout the encounter?

Pretty much always sit at 2 mid-fight.

[grizzlysaurusrex]

Is double nightfall still a bug on the PTR?

[Kyuu]

Work on using your major Cooldowns at the correct time, and You'll see a noticeable difference.

I definitely feel this is one of my biggest issues! I use weak auras to track trinkets/ring proc but I can never know when they're coming up. Do they have a set internal CD? Is there any way I can track it through weak auras to have a rough estimate time or should I just hold onto Dark Soul and wait 'till it procs?

Thanks for the advice btw, much appreciated!

[Jetjaguar]

Is double nightfall still a bug on the PTR?

yes its still there

[Deleted]

Pretty much always sit at 2 mid-fight.

That's what I do, but I was curious to hear Xyronic's reasoning for sitting at 3.

[Joryy]

I've been playing around with something that sort of bridges the gap between 2 and 3. Casting Soulburn at 3, rather than haunt. The 30 second duration means that it will only be wasted if you have to portal or SoC.

It saves the shard for debuff maintenance, but it also avoid shard waste. The downside is early refreshes when you get a huge glut of shards.

[Xyronic]

That's what I do, but I was curious to hear Xyronic's reasoning for sitting at 3.

I prefer having absoutely zero RNG screwing me over due to not having shard procs, rather than the extreme off-chance of a double Nightfall proc.

[Deleted]

I prefer having absoutely zero RNG screwing me over due to not having shard procs, rather than the extreme off-chance of a double Nightfall proc.

Yeah that's what I thought, although I think calling it an extreme off-chance is a strong way of putting it.

[Count Zero]

Yeah that's what I thought, although I think calling it an extreme off-chance is a strong way of putting it.

How often does it happen ? Haven't rocked Afflic all xpac

[Deleted]

How often does it happen ? Haven't rocked Afflic all xpac

afaik, it happens when you get a nightfall proc on a corruption tick and that particular tick also happen to multistrike, giving you 2 identically nightfall proccing corruption tick. i dont think it is necesarily a bug, i think it was simply some built in shard rng protection after they royally screwed over our old shard generation.

well, it happens fairly often, it what i wrote above is correct, then you can look at your multistrike and see how often it should happen in theory, with the blackhand trinket it should happen a bit more often, assuming what i wrote is correct, not saying that it is, but it is the only explanation that makes sense to me.

[Count Zero]

afaik, it happens when you get a nightfall proc on a corruption tick and that particular tick also happen to multistrike, giving you 2 identically nightfall proccing corruption tick. i dont think it is necesarily a bug, i think it was simply some built in shard rng protection after they royally screwed over our old shard generation.

well, it happens fairly often, it what i wrote above is correct, then you can look at your multistrike and see how often it should happen in theory, with the blackhand trinket it should happen a bit more often, assuming what i wrote is correct, not saying that it is, but it is the only explanation that makes sense to me.

Well, that's all well and good if that's what happens. Maybe if we had more info on how often it happens we could help eliminate some theories ... for instance, if it's just not at all lining up with multistrike chance then this one seems unlikely.

Something I theorized before (not sure if in this thread or another) is that perhaps the base nightfall chance and the draenor perk that gives additional nightfall chance ... aren't added together, but are actually two separate chances. I think I recall one or two people saying that the double proc doesn't happen on level 90s, and the two chances being separate could account for that.

[Deleted]

It happens a few times each pull.

It is not based on multistrike however, seems to be the Draenor Perk.