Warlocks and Emerald Nightmare

[gabagool]

So with the first raid just around the corner, let's talk about warlocks strengths/weaknesses in this raid, what specs/talents seem to be best for each boss and any tips or tricks for fellow locks. Speculation welcome!

I'll start with a question since most of us are going destro into EN: what fights will we see the most use of Wreak Havoc? In a raid setting is it better than Soul Conduit with adds not dying near-instantly like in dungeons?

[Draxtor]

For heroic:
Nythendra - Demo
Il'gynoth - Destro
Elerethe - Destro
Ursoc - Demo
Dragons of Nightmare - Destro (Wreak Havoc shines here)
Cenarius - Destro
Xavius - Destro

[Raex]

Nythendra - Demo
Il'gynoth - Destro
Elerethe - Destro
Ursoc - Demo
Dragons of Nightmare - Destro (Wreak Havoc shines here)
Cenarius - Destro
Xavius - Destro

Agree with most but I have my doubts on Elerethe and Dragons of Nightmare.

Elerethe: The fight is predominantly ST with the occasional short-lived adds. I *think* it would favour Demo's ST bias more and even if the adds are more prevalent than I thought you can always grab Dankglare for them. In any case it's probably very close.

Dragons of Nightmare: I keep seeing people tout this as THE Destro fight where WH shines. But am I mistaken that even on Mythic only 2 Dragons are attackable on ground at any point in time, and more importantly, they are tanked >40yrds apart? This means that the 2nd Dragon is out of WH cleave range and you aren't supposed to be in it's debuff radius. Heroic the radius is 40yrds while on Mythic is 60yrds and refreshes every 7 seconds, meaning trying to game it and joust in and out will simply result in a dps loss.
In short, this is again a predominantly ST fight where you only get to cleave perhaps 2 CBs when the dragons are being switched. Feel free to correct me on this one.

On Mythic, Nythendra and Ursoc will provide Havoc targets so Destro will catch up if not overtake Demo depending on how long lived the adds are.

[Turturin the Warlock]

Agree with most but I have my doubts on Elerethe and Dragons of Nightmare.

Elerethe: The fight is predominantly ST with the occasional short-lived adds. I *think* it would favour Demo's ST bias more and even if the adds are more prevalent than I thought you can always grab Dankglare for them. In any case it's probably very close.

Dragons of Nightmare: I keep seeing people tout this as THE Destro fight where WH shines. But am I mistaken that even on Mythic only 2 Dragons are attackable on ground at any point in time, and more importantly, they are tanked >40yrds apart? This means that the 2nd Dragon is out of WH cleave range and you aren't supposed to be in it's debuff radius. Heroic the radius is 40yrds while on Mythic is 60yrds and refreshes every 7 seconds, meaning trying to game it and joust in and out will simply result in a dps loss.
In short, this is again a predominantly ST fight where you only get to cleave perhaps 2 CBs when the dragons are being switched. Feel free to correct me on this one.

On Mythic, Nythendra and Ursoc will provide Havoc targets so Destro will catch up if not overtake Demo depending on how long lived the adds are.

It's true that from the center of the hit box the range is 60 yds....but those dragons have an awfully big hit box, and your havoc only needs to reach the edge of it. It is definitely fully cleavable on Heroic with no movement. The amount of movement on mythic is TBD, so not sure if it's worth it or not yet.

On elerethe I agree with you. As far as warlocks are concerned it's a single target fight with quite a bit of movement

[Draxtor]

Agree with most but I have my doubts on Elerethe and Dragons of Nightmare.

Elerethe: The fight is predominantly ST with the occasional short-lived adds. I *think* it would favour Demo's ST bias more and even if the adds are more prevalent than I thought you can always grab Dankglare for them. In any case it's probably very close.

Dragons of Nightmare: I keep seeing people tout this as THE Destro fight where WH shines. But am I mistaken that even on Mythic only 2 Dragons are attackable on ground at any point in time, and more importantly, they are tanked >40yrds apart? This means that the 2nd Dragon is out of WH cleave range and you aren't supposed to be in it's debuff radius. Heroic the radius is 40yrds while on Mythic is 60yrds and refreshes every 7 seconds, meaning trying to game it and joust in and out will simply result in a dps loss.
In short, this is again a predominantly ST fight where you only get to cleave perhaps 2 CBs when the dragons are being switched. Feel free to correct me on this one.

On Mythic, Nythendra and Ursoc will provide Havoc targets so Destro will catch up if not overtake Demo depending on how long lived the adds are.

WH makes Havoc last 20 seconds, so you only need to go near the other boss once every 20 seconds. Even when you're not in range of the boss Havoc still sends spells to it. Elerethe I prefer Destro because not only are there the guaranteed spider adds theres also the adds from the transition, and how she flies away. Demo suffers the most when targets leave their ranged for extended period of time since they have to restart their ramp, and thats exactly what Elerethe does when she flies away

[Raex]

Cheers, some food for thought for sure.

Let's get into more specifics then,

Il'gynoth - Destro
MT vs Cataclysm - I think MT is the clear winner here, abundance of spread out Immolate targets and MT buffs that. Cata is good for bursting down slimes but MT just seems to be useful for everything especially inside the tree when it is pure ST. (ps: Fuck MT)
Eradication vs FnB - In this fight Incinerate is almost guaranteed to hit at least 2 targets everytime it is fired (not including Havoc), with the added benefit of being great for bursting down slimes as well. However, Eradication has guaranteed uptime on 2 priority targets and helps ST dmg on Tree in phase 2. Pretty torn on this one.
WH vs SC - WH will own Phase 1, however SC does have a place too for RoF spam and ST damage inside tree, again undecided on this one. WH should be more overall damage but SC gives more tree damage.

Elerethe - Destro/Demo
As Destro, would you go full ST or give some consideration to the mini adds as well? Cata seems good for periodic adds but they aren't always stacked from the vids I've seen. Perhaps simply take Soul Conduit as a pure ST spec and pool 3-4 shards for RoF spam for spiderlings? MT should also be workable since you can tap often with the high movement requirements for this fight.
As Demo, pure ST and just drop Doom on spiderlings and pray it ticks before they die I guess (at 37% haste Doom ticks in under 15secs, might be too slow still)

Cenarius - Destro
WH is a given. I'm mainly undecided on:
a) RB vs SB. Lots of adds to snipe, but long lived dual targets is really nice for WH/RB too.
b) MT vs Cata.
c) FnB vs Eradication. FnB should get good value during add phase, but Eradication is guaranteed on 2 targets and also gives better Cenarius phase damage.

[Sunlighthell]

Wonder how Blizzard will gather affliction data Any use of affliction in this raid?

[Turturin the Warlock]

Wonder how Blizzard will gather affliction data Any use of affliction in this raid?

It's not a bad choice for elerethe renferal.
- Dots tick during transition phase
- mobility is very valuable on that fight
- some opportunities for soul flame use

[Dioxy]

What stats do I want to go for, for Destro?

I've only been working on my Demo build. But I do have all three talent tree's at level 17 in case I have to swap.

[Deleted]

What stats do I want to go for, for Destro?

I've only been working on my Demo build. But I do have all three talent tree's at level 17 in case I have to swap.

We have stickies guides.

[Soulsworn]

If you're min/maxing: Destro for everything.

[Jondar]

I'll be running Destro for everything. Pretty much the same build for each.

I'll be running Backdraft/Reverse Entropy/Demon Skin/Eradication/depends on fight/Grimoire of Sac/Wreak Havoc or SC

Depending on how many adds are up on some fights, I'll take FnB over Eradication.. but that'll be a feeling process.

[Jaman]

If you're min/maxing: Destro for everything.

If you are min/maxing: Destro for most fights, Demo for a few.

[Rogalicus]

Which trinkets should I aim for as Destro? They all have some boring RPPM damage effects instead of stat procs, so I wonder if I just should go for prefered stats or there's more to them.

[Rayaleith]

Are there any logs from US?

[Deleted]

Thoughts on grimoire of sacrifice vs service?

Should sacrifice only be reserved for add heavy/AoE fights or are there any specific situations where picking sacrifice over service could prove useful?

[VladimirM]

Are there any logs from US?

Yeah, 3 clicks away:

https://www.warcraftlogs.com/rankings/10#class=Warlock

[Deleted]

Basically, for progression, it's pretty much destruction all the way, that is, if you're taking a warlock because you haven't got a mage to fill the spot.

Affliction is garbage outsid eof it's niche AOE

Also, as a lock you have to take a stack of tomes and switch talents every other minute

Work harder for less reward than people playing classes who can perform suboptimally with a macro and still beat you with a cookie-cutter all round talent build to boot

Which is exactly why half as many people play locks as play the next least popular class, and why five times as many play mage/hunter - or demon hunter alone.

They'd have to buff affliction to the roof to make it remotely attractive. And they won't.

[Deleted]

disgusting how far behind a pure dps class, with 3 pure dps speccs, is.

Even the best equipped warlock with close to ilvl 860 and legendary is 20-30% behind other classes.

That is simply unacceptable.

Melees are way too strong.

[DeadmanWalking]

I would love to switch specs but the way artifact weapons are set up I doubt I will get demo weapon to a point where it needs to be before this tier is over. I'm hitting everything I can for AWP on my destro weapon and it is just getting exponentially harder to get it completed to move into demo.