Destro vs. Affliction in 7.2.5/ToS

[Bullettime]

Actually SE is used quite a bit, it is evident you have no experience yourself here and are talking off pure personal observation. The reason you see SC on top of logs is because of the RNG element it adds which allow for crazy parses during farm. Any lock that gives a shit during progression unfortunately used SE when it was reasonable as it was the much more consistent DPS producer of the talent tier.

Yeah.....SE is just a flat consistent boost. SC looks better on parses because it has higher highs but lower lows.

[Turturin the Warlock]

More buttons = Moar skillz

[Count Zero]

Can we take the number of buttons talk to PMs or a different thread ?

[mnylol]

I hope Affli will win. i dont wanna change my mainspec :/

[Deleted]

How do people deal with this on an AP level?

Do you just level both artifact weapons equally, or?

I stick with Destruction and do not bother with the other two specs because fuck farming AP and legendaries. Currently progressing on Gul'Dan mythic and I am doing fine in raids. Sure, without AP and legendaries being a problem I'd probably have swapped to Affliction to help my guild better, but it's definitely possible to just play the spec you like and still clear content before a new raid drops (and there's plenty of Destruction Warlocks who have already cleared Nighthold mythic).

They have really screwed pure dps classes this expansion...

[Bullettime]

I hope Affli will win. i dont wanna change my mainspec :/

Unless the other specs get massively buffed, Aff likely isn't going anywhere. As long as its number are tuned appropriately, it has the most effective and expansive toolkit of our specs.

Demo is more of the odd man out. Besides, legendaries aside, you'll be able to have Concordance in all of your weapons easy as fuck around ToS launch, if not just a little after.

[Lucrece]

I actually think destro has the better kit compared to affliction. It's the numbers that are tuned to shit. Affliction overperforms because it has the raw numbers, but it's a garbage spec for priority adds and has no burst whatsoever come the malefic grasp change (which will shit more damage out of empowered 2xUA into the other dots).

Demo is the one warlock spec I find to be irretrievably broken from a toolkit perspective. It's just a shitty version of affliction that's less mobile, has tighter windows for damage optimization, and its aoe mechanism is total shit as well. Doom should refund a damn shard when mobs die before it ticks. It's virtually the worst dot in the game.


Demonology also has unbearable ramp up to its damage.

[Deleted]

I hope Affli will win. i dont wanna change my mainspec :/

It wont

/10chars

[Deleted]

It wont

/10chars

it will just wait for it.... every new iteration of the PTR they buff afflictions dmg in someway it seems.

[fearmemortals]

Looking at the changes and set bonuses, which spec do people see performing the best in TOS and 7.2.5? I was personally glad to see SE go away.

The general opinion is that Aff will be the best 'overall' raid spec for ToS from a progression point of view. This is largely because of the new sub 35% execute talent which is extremely desirable for many hard encounters. However from strictly world first point of view, you might see some other spec played in a similar way to how Method et al had their warlocks 'mainspec' destruction even though it was overall weaker but because it was strongest for Mythic Guldan. I'm not friends with any warlocks playing at this level but I do know some in the top 20 and they all agree that Aff will be very desirable for progression in ToS.

[Deleted]

How do people deal with this on an AP level?

Do you just level both artifact weapons equally, or?

This is my exact problem. I came back to the game 4 months behind everyone else and have been playing catch up ever since. I'm at 48 traits as destro and 35 as aff. My raid spot has been pretty steady since I've been in my current guild but recently a bis geared aff lock rejoined the guild and another destro trial. Now I'm being rotated out missing our star auger mythic kill despite putting progress time in (apparently not because of my ability just because they try to rotate everyone out) but I'm concerned that I've put too much investment into destro. I still dont have my space time shoulders and I don't know whether to stick with the destro leggos i have now (feretory, bracers and trinket are the three dpos ones i have) and start getting aff leggos (i only have cloak) or wait until I have shoulders until I start investing my loot spec and AP into affliction.

The whole leggo/ap system of this expansion is the dumbest decision they've made. It's so unfriendly to anyone other than people with enough time on their hands to farm the shit out of two specs.

[pappaslop]

I still dont have my space time shoulders and I don't know whether to stick with the destro leggos i have now (feretory, bracers and trinket are the three dpos ones i have) and start getting aff leggos (i only have cloak) or wait until I have shoulders until I start investing my loot spec and AP into affliction.

The whole leggo/ap system of this expansion is the dumbest decision they've made. It's so unfriendly to anyone other than people with enough time on their hands to farm the shit out of two specs.

I too was primarily destruction and have been since Legion drop because of the priority burst damage/spread cleave it offers... I also swapped to affliction and have been looting it for the last 2ish months and it looks like the aff helm will be the LAST legendary I loot in the spec. I still do not have Space-Time in destruction (have feretory, bracers and trinket - same as you)... I've been primarily leveling affliction (will be 51 in the next day or so) and have 44 into destruction - will go back once I have concordance in affliction. We still have quite a lot of time left until ToS and AK levels are increasingly beneficial as time goes on. Legendary items are acquired so frequently at this point in time... You can safely expect one to drop every week/two weeks tops if you play the game on an average level (emissaries, broken shore caches, raids, some M+ and dungeons).

At the end of the day, if you only have the time to raid log... Legion isn't as friendly to you relatively speaking but if you can at least put time in on the weekend I wouldn't worry too much. Soon enough, everyone will have their BIS legendaries and enough AP to play more than one spec at a viable level. If I were you, I'd play what makes you happy because all three of our specs are viable and competitive.

[Count Zero]

For me it's the combination of AP and Legendary rng. I started out xpac as Destro, felt useless in dungeons and most raid fights but stuck with it because I didn't want to start over on both AP and legendaries.

Well I never got a BiS Destro leggo. Or 2nd or 3rd BiS.

Due to a combination of various irl factors as well as feeling (I didn't say being, I said feeling - but a matter of a few percent really is a point of "Well I guess you guys should bring the higher performer" for me, as when I raid with a guild that guild's success is my in-game priority) worthless in raids and high mythic+ I took my first extended full-on break from raiding in years (I've had a couple semi breaks but no full cessation).

So anyway I'd been screwing around casually for a bit before 7.2 and by that patch the only non-shared leggo I have is RoF ring. Patch hits and I switch to Aff. So now I'm dumping points into Aff and I wind up getting the UA bracers, so my first really good legendary the entire xpac (Norgannon's isn't terrible now, but it was my first leggo and it was really disappointing pre-buff).

And now I'm seeing Aff slightly nerfed and Destro slightly buffed on the ptr and I don't know what the hell to do. The combination of the slight nerf and the relative dearth of small adds in Tomb will compound with one another. And it might play into Destro's strength, depending on how they wind up tuning the cd of Havoc.

So now I have to try to plan weeks in advance which leggos to try to farm for and which weapon to dump AP into. I'm probably fairly close to my next legendary now, and I could probably get yet another before Tomb drops, but that could still very well be the difference between getting two more I won't use, or getting my two BiS Destro ones, or getting the Helm for Aff ...

I totally am glad Blizz felt free to experiment with making the specs somewhat unique, but they just didn't do enough to make sure pure dps specs could be complete with just one spec. Demo for ST, Destro for cleave (and only doing about middle of the pack when playing to its strength) and Aff for aoe was a really terrible experience the first part of Legion for me and I imagine a lot of Warlocks. It was hard enough trying to keep AP in my one weapon, much less needing to dump points into at least two - when hybrid dps classes and mages could whatever they could do inside of one spec.

[Gaidax]

IMO the Affliction nerf is underestimated by many, sustain may only get affected somewhat, but it will lose a lot of add burst it can do now, simply because MG is destroyed and Soul Conduit won't be a thing either.

I am convinced that given the above Destruction will be the spec to go for progress, while affliction will be basically cheese spec for Soul Flame and Death's Embrace where these matter.

[Deleted]

It's actually not a bad place to be when the community is divided in their thinking what will be the best spec. That just means that both of them seem viable. Only the world-first community and the cheesing community ("I have the biggest logs of all") will play a spec that is not their favorite just for their specific purposes (extremely undergear encounters on the first, do senseless damage just to rank on the second).

On legendaries: if you put in enough effort, you should already have all of them for one spec. That allows you to switch to a second already. I'm assuming (and hoping) that the rumor of new leggies coming with 7.2.5 is a fake (otherwise they should be on the PTR already). With that in mind, you should be able to get all leggies for 2 specs before ToS opens. Admittedly, that includes doing all emissaries, all LFRs, all NHs (or mythic as far as you can get), and norm/hero EN every week. If you really are as hardcore as you think you are when asking for what the "best warlock spec" is, then you do this anyway.

[Gaidax]

There are already traces of placeholder legs on PTR and rumor says what they do is give you effect of one of your talents when it's not selected.

Grain of salt needs be taken for the above tho, just heard it from certain someone.

[Walrock]

Why do you think the "new legendaries" for patch 7.2.5 is fake news?

"Patch 7.2.5 is micro-holidays, a Timewalking raid, and new legendary items." <-- is directly from the transcript of the latest Q&A.

[Scroff]

There are already traces of placeholder legs on PTR and rumor says what they do is give you effect of one of your talents when it's not selected.

Grain of salt needs be taken for the above tho, just heard it from certain someone.

inb4 ring of royal grandeur

[Walrock]

A legendary which gives you 1 extra talent point or reduces the number of items needed for a set bonus sounds nice, but i don't think it will happen.

Sounds like a balancing nightmare, atleast the "extra free talent" one.

[Gaidax]

A legendary which gives you 1 extra talent point or reduces the number of items needed for a set bonus sounds nice, but i don't think it will happen.

Sounds like a balancing nightmare, atleast the "extra free talent" one.

Well extra talent one could be "utilitish" one like our lvl 75 or lvl 45 rows, would make it sorta meh legendary but they could slap some extra stats on it too. Think like "you benefit from Demon Skin talent at all times" and some extra stats - sorta like Prydaz really.