RE: MODERATOR TYRANNY.
I made this post before the onslaught began, and went home from work for the night. I just came back to... this mess. I apologize for the judicious use of locks, I'm attempting to clean it up.
As such, I'm locking my own thread. I hope that appeases those who are upset.
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http://blue.mmo-champion.com/t/24038...eview-warlock/
Overall, I think we got hosed on the Mastery system. It's simply a raw damage increase to the type of damage we do, rather than an interesting mechanic like Elemental Shamans or Resto Shamans. Yes they can't all be unique and beautiful ponies, but I'd have like a fun mechanic rather than a "lol 20% more damage"
New Demon:
Not this expansion please. I agree with blizzard in that it would make our current pets less cool. They can't give us a higher damage pet without trivializing the old one, we can't be given an "upgrade" pet (i.e. super-felhunter, ultra-succubus) because then that just penalizes anyone who doesn't get that pet, and there is really no more room for a pet otherwise. Therefore any pet we get will be marginalized or completely replace the ones we have. I'm not sure if that is appropriate unless you further niche the voidwalker into anti-melee and the felhunter into anti-caster in pvp with the succubus being half and half both worlds. Since this introduces all sorts of balance issues, no thank you to the demon.
Pet changes:
*Actual taunt on voidwalker? AOE +aggro ability? Hells yeah.
*Knockback from a succubus? I'm going to camp Lumbermill, see you after Cataclysm ends. ****
*Stacking debuff from an Imp? Nice mechanic to increase Destruction damage without increasing burst
I'd love to see the Felguard get a better buff, such as the ability to give him a different weapon. Axe for cleave, Sword for single target, Mace for a new stun ability or something. That'd make it much more interesting.
**** Seriously, the succubus change is amazing. I love it.
New spells:
Fel Flame - Exactly what we needed, a way to do decent long range instant damage while moving.
Dark Intent - Focus magic but with less suck! I like it.
Demon Soul - A lot of demon lovers will like this, and I think I will too. Finally, a cooldown!
I can't stress this enough - these three spells alone round out our arsenal perfectly. We bring a buff like Focus Magic that buffs us as well, affliction gets a movement oriented spell better than "Refresh dots or lifetap", and we get a cooldown. A COOLDOWN. OMG.
Affliction:
I'm concerned. Overall the changes are a step in the right direction (no clipping = less hand holding!), but I'm apprehensive about the duration changes. I probably need to see it in action, but if you get X% haste and it extends the duration of the dot, it may not actually give you an extra tick until X+1% haste. This means we will have severe gear issues where everyone wants EXACTLY X, Y, or Z% haste and not a penny more or less because not all your spells will receive full benefit.
Drain Soul refreshing all three of our dots at execute phase? O. M. G. DO WANT.
Demonology:
Demon Bolt looks really neat, and gives demonology a way to increase single target damage (I assume its on a short cooldown). This is the same mechanic as say Immolate as a prerequisite to Incinerate (for more damage) and Shadow Embrace. Makes the spec much more interesting, and it already is quite interesting.
RNG cooldown reduction sounds.. gimmicky, but neat at the same time. Hard to balance and probably won't make it into Live.
Destruction:
Shadowburn execute? It'll have to do a HELL of a lot more damage to be viable in PVE, but maybe they're just trying to bring it back for PVP? Immolate with Haste AND Crit sounds very good to me, as well as a hasted Conflag dot. If the latter scales with haste as a normal dot would then we have a very good mechanic on our hands. It's possible the stacking Imp buff gives destruction the Shadow Embrace-esque single target boost, but we'll see what happens.
Shard System:
3 Shards per fight (lets say 5 minutes) does not a good cooldown make. Needs to be buffed a bit more in some places (the pvp ones are bang-on, but the pve ones are severely lacking). Something like "Haunt + Soul Burn = Your next haunt increases your dot effects damage by 40% instead of 20%".
Curses:
I want a new curse if you're only leaving me with two.
Overall:
Do like, a bit concerned in places but I'll be first in line to bitch about them in beta.