Warlocks been destroyed by new nerf in PTR

[Deleted]

An incredible annoyance with the talent swaps.

You practically need demon skin for many things, especially for my gather lock, and it is a fun talent.

It is literally anti-fun for me as a warlock. But maybe that is just me.

[Alienshroom]

All kidding aside if they remove drain life from destro that would be about the end of it for me.

[purebalance]

While I'm definitely in the "wait and see" camp right now, I don't know how some people can talk like the balance ball has never been dropped. Classes and specs have been mediocre to dogshit for large stretches of expansions before. Warlocks have been mediocre to dogshit for long stretches before. It has happened; it will happen again.

ToC/ICC highest warlock spec below the highest spec of the lowest class(enh) and the other 2 specs competed with the lowest spec of that other class(ele) and the only reason to really bring a warlock was spell damage buff since guess who was the only other spec to bring that buff at the time? That's right, ele!

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All kidding aside if they remove drain life from destro that would be about the end of it for me.

I mean I'd be ok if they made ember tap a thing again, but they'd probably make it the joke it was before.

[Santti]

No class tuning has been done in Patch 7.1 yet. Changes from the PTR at this point are simply tooltip corrections.

What nerfs? There is no nerfs or buffs yet. It's mentioned right there, on the front page.

[Deleted]

lol the talent swap is how it should have been in the first place.

No, the class design philosophy was tankiness in exchange for mobility.

This new change removes a lot of tankiness but help hardly any with mobility.

The whole ideawas it was that our spells were alllong hard-casts because being an immobile turret is OK if the fire doesn;t kill you.

Being able to occasionally teleport to a pre-cast fixed location is not mobility. You'll still be a turret for most of the time, only this removes survivbility.

True mobility would be making, say, Demonic Empowerment instant or catsable whilst moving.

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No class tuning has been done in Patch 7.1 yet. Changes from the PTR at this point are simply tooltip corrections.

What nerfs? There is no nerfs or buffs yet. It's mentioned right there, on the front page.

The changes to talents and artifact traits are implemented though. They are not tooltip changes, they are changes.

[kamuii]

No class tuning has been done in Patch 7.1 yet. Changes from the PTR at this point are simply tooltip corrections.

What nerfs? There is no nerfs or buffs yet. It's mentioned right there, on the front page.

If I rob 100 people then make an announcement that I didn't rob anyone it must be true.

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All kidding aside if they remove drain life from destro that would be about the end of it for me.

I don't know about for pvp but it's the most useless thing ever for destr pve.


Not to mention Soul flame and Wrath of consumption on affliction staff are just laughable. Seriously how often does an affliction lock actually <kill> anything during a raid encounter.

[thilicen]

So, making them possible to actually kill is destroying the class?

[Deleted]

I just double-checked on the PTR and Destro and Demo no longer have Drain Life.
Destro's artifact still has the trait for it though.

This is honestly a good thing. This means increased survivability on Demo and Destro will no longer be tied to drain life (A massive DPS loss), and instead be tied to something else. Also means the PvP talent (50% damage reduction on target that is drain lifed) is likely to be changed.

I just hope they come up with something good, instead of something like "Burn 2 shards, restore 10% max hp". On a side note, since most classes are in a somewhat decent state, the class developers can focus more on the ones that are not, which hopefully means some amount of interesting things coming our way soon.

[Deleted]

wait are you seriously saying that only affliction has drain life now? or is this something similar as "all specs get the shadow bolt" bs?

[Deleted]

wait are you seriously saying that only affliction has drain life now? or is this something similar as "all specs get the shadow bolt" bs?

I'm gonna install the PTR now, will update when I know more. It could very well be part of a change, aimed at changing how survivability works for the individual specs. It would only make sense, since right now drain life is both a decent filler AND a massive survivability boost for affliction. It has always been "off" for demo and destro to use drain life to get back life / improve survivability, since it also cut into their DPS.

[FertsBlert]

Yup Drain Life is gone for Demo and Destro hoping that is a bug, it better be because all other sources of healing are completely unchanged, just checked on the PTR.

I love the optimism that Degn89 has that something will be put in to replace them, such optimism.

[Thagrynor]

Affliction

Agony Inflicts increasing agony on the target, causing up to [ 90 + 36% [ 54 + 21.6% of Spell Power ] Shadow damage over 18 sec. Damage starts low and increases over the duration. Refreshing Agony maintains its current damage level. Agony damage sometimes generates 1 Soul Shard. Warlock - Affliction Spec. 3% of Base Mana. 40 yd range. Instant.


Not sure if this is just a tooltip update, but it is listed in the spell changes on MMO-C. If this is indeed a change, it is a bit worrisome. Affliction is already garbage damage and they nerf one of our DOTs? How does that make sense?

[Deleted]

Dont mind if they remove drain life from destro so we can get another trait instead of improving dmg/healing from drainlife on a proc...

[Deleted]

I'm gonna install the PTR now, will update when I know more. It could very well be part of a change, aimed at changing how survivability works for the individual specs. It would only make sense, since right now drain life is both a decent filler AND a massive survivability boost for affliction. It has always been "off" for demo and destro to use drain life to get back life / improve survivability, since it also cut into their DPS.

Its not "off", if you mean rotation wise in a raid/dungeon yes ofc, but so are many spells. Drain life at least for demo is extremly vital for example in any form of pvp if you dont have a pocket healer, so vital as kidney shot is for rogues. Even on pve/solo play i have tanked many times with voidwalker,funnel and drain life when we didnt have a tank around.

For destruction it might not be so practical because you cant cast spells and DL at the same time (with demonology you can tank while your demons do dmg similar to affliction) but its their only form of selfhealing.

Anyway, imo its huge if its gone, just because it isnt in the main rotation doesnt mean its not impactfull. I just hope its a bug

[Silara]

Dont mind if they remove drain life from destro so we can get another trait instead of improving dmg/healing from drainlife on a proc...

I'm also OK with the removal of Drain Life from Destro, as long as they buff another damage ability AND change the artifact ability to something useful. I only use drain life to help out my healer so that they wouldn't have to heal me up during dungeons or if I had to life tap for mana (rare occurrence).

[Deleted]

The talent changes seems very good for raiding, 5% off your soul leech and the passive regen seems like not a big deal tbh.

[Baconeggcheese]

It'll make taking shadowfury a lot easier that's for sure, which is what I imagine is the intention here.

Which absorb thing to take will be situational, which is fine. It's going a bit back to the past model where you have the same kinds of talents on the same row that compete for different situations.

I'm curious what they'll do for survivability otherwise though, since people are correct in saying this has an opposite effect on doubling down on our tankiness.

[Sunlighthell]

I love the optimism that Degn89 has that something will be put in to replace them, such optimism.

I will not be surprised if they remove drain life from demo and destro but leave traits of artifact weapons unchanged at this point.

[Deleted]

Its not "off", if you mean rotation wise in a raid/dungeon yes ofc, but so are many spells. Drain life at least for demo is extremly vital for example in any form of pvp if you dont have a pocket healer, so vital as kidney shot is for rogues. Even on pve/solo play i have tanked many times with voidwalker,funnel and drain life when we didnt have a tank around.

For destruction it might not be so practical because you cant cast spells and DL at the same time (with demonology you can tank while your demons do dmg similar to affliction) but its their only form of selfhealing.

Anyway, imo its huge if its gone, just because it isnt in the main rotation doesnt mean its not impactfull. I just hope its a bug

It is "off" in the sense that the logical comparison would be:

Affliction drains life, deals filler damage + dot damage and gains drain life survivability, continues to gain shards via Agony.

Demonology drains life, deals demon damage + drain life damage and gains drain life survivability, does not generate shards, drain life hits like a wet noodle.

Destruction drains life, deals drain life damage and gains drain life survivability, does not generate shards, drain life hits like a wet noodle.

As affliction you didn't really lose out on anything, demo and destro both did. From a design perspective, it was very much "off". I'm not saying it was completely useless as the other specs, I'm pointing out there was a big discrepancy between using drain life as affliction and using drain life as the other 2 specs. This is what they want to fix, I hope.

Of course, if we don't get it back or get something to replace it, then I'll be extremely disappointed and confused. I very much doubt that is going to be the case though.

[Deleted]

I will not be surprised if they remove drain life from demo and destro but leave traits of artifact weapons unchanged at this point.

They could change these traits to buff unending breath instead (also pvp talent 50%+ swimmspeed) Then they can change burning rush to affect swimming too and make water mobility our niche.

(to tired to make a serious post)