Affliction = Broken, Destro = Needs tweaking

[Deezlar]

After vigorous testing in BG's, There are some major flaws with these specs in PVP.

Affliction just does WAY too little damage to be truly Viable.
A full stack of dots should NOT be something that your enemy ignores.
Yet at the moment, a Warrior in combat with someone else does enough Passive healing so that your Dots dont even move his health Bar.

Saying that it is balanced around soul swap is just plain wrong. Not killing 1 person is the same as Not killing 2.

Destruction suffers from the usual problem of very low regular damage, and MASSIVE crit spikes, so that we are a RNG class once again.

Why do they not buff base damage so that Incinerates do more than 7k (less that warrior White damage) and make crits less of a factor.... RNG doesnt impress anyone and it makes fights nothing more than a roll of the dice, which takes zero skill.

The general route of balancing for this (as we saw last expac) was to cut crits in half, then leave it a few months before they fixed the terrible damage we were left with.


Anyway, this is just my observations from hours in WSG trying to 1v1, 1v2, groupvgroup as much as possible to get a decent feel for the specs.

Lock is far less fun to play this time around... Especially when you see other classes with some very cool PVP tools, and all we have to look forward to is our identity as a Lock being essentially destroyed with the Affli situation, and nerfs when they balance crits without improving anything else.

Oh and expect some nerfs to fear too... It actually holds for 1-2 seconds now, which is obviously WAY too long.

EDIT: Forgot to say this is on the Beta servers.

[Deleted]

I really hope they've got some rather intense changes for Affliction. Affliction IS the Warlock class for many people including me. I can't think of any class that has it's identity tied to a spec more then Affliction and Warlock, and neglecting it will upset a lot of people which we've seen evidence of on pretty much every Walock forum. I also completely agree with your soulswap agument. Our spec shouldn't be balanced around there constantly being two or more people present, and that we picked up a glyph. Glyph of Soulswap and Glyph of Shadowflame are two horrible design flaws.

I however love what they did with Demonology. Destro seems pretty cool aswell. Those specs however can never replace Affliction for me. I've been Affliction for two years and I might aswell play a fire mage which seems way more dynamic if the debuffer/healer eater role is neglected.

[paladins]

I'm surprised affliction is viable now(?)... in 2008/2009 it certainly was not, except as a, I'm dotting you then about to die, hope my mates can kill you.

Blizz hates warlocks.

First they gave everyone resilience cuz dots were OP.

Then they gave every class fear break cuz fear was OP.

Blizz loves melee DPS. Cuz "Your attacks ignore 90% of your opponents armour" means clothies just stand around naked while u trinket out of fear/stun and unload your CDs.

[Instinctz]

I'm surprised affliction is viable now(?)... in 2008/2009 it certainly was not, except as a, I'm dotting you then about to die, hope my mates can kill you.

Blizz hates warlocks.

First they gave everyone resilience cuz dots were OP.

Then they gave every class fear break cuz fear was OP.

Blizz loves melee DPS. Cuz "Your attacks ignore 90% of your opponents armour" means clothies just stand around naked while u trinket out of fear/stun and unload your CDs.

cuz you can fear melee before they even get to you, and kite them and they cant even get to you...seem fair that you can do that to us? no, thats why you wear clothe and die fast when hit at melee. cuz thats the only way to negate the fact that you can dps from ranged. oh and btw "your attacks ignore 90% armor", most melee dont even stack armor pen in pvp, so thats an invalid point

[Deleted]

Beta/ptr

[hidey0shi]

affliction IS the Warlock class for many people including me. I can't think of any class that has it's identity tied to a spec more then Affliction and Warlock

A bit offtopic but I have to disagree. Where in lore do warlocks use decay and slowly drain the life force out of their enemies? Thats what necromancers do (that and raise dead ofc).

Warlocks summon demons (which they often lose the control of), curse their enemies to weaken them and use felfire magic which is very powerful but almost equaly dangerous to both the warlock and his enemy.

Demo feels like the true warlock spec to me. But thats my opinion, I understand that it doesnt have to match yours.

[Bakis]

affliction IS the Warlock class for many people including me. I can't think of any class that has it's identity tied to a spec more then Affliction and Warlock

yup how the game actually portrais it all.

Warlocks summon demons (which they often lose the control of), curse their enemies to weaken them and use felfire magic which is very powerful but almost equaly dangerous to both the warlock and his enemy.

How lore portrais it all.

[Fligahgigook]

cuz you can fear melee before they even get to you, and kite them and they cant even get to you...seem fair that you can do that to us? no, thats why you wear clothe and die fast when hit at melee. cuz thats the only way to negate the fact that you can dps from ranged. oh and btw "your attacks ignore 90% armor", most melee dont even stack armor pen in pvp, so thats an invalid point

What melee class can a warlock kite, other than a lolret which has never really been well represented in pvp baring 1 or 2 patches.

---------- Post added 2010-10-06 at 04:09 PM ----------

Beta/ptr

4.0 is going live soon, we're past the point of "don't worry about it they'll fix it soon enough."

[Bakis]

Heheh yea, wondering how much Instinctz know about warlocks.
Not much it seems.

[Projexion]

I'm surprised affliction is viable now(?)... in 2008/2009 it certainly was not, except as a, I'm dotting you then about to die, hope my mates can kill you.

Blizz hates warlocks.

First they gave everyone resilience cuz dots were OP.

Then they gave every class fear break cuz fear was OP.

Blizz loves melee DPS. Cuz "Your attacks ignore 90% of your opponents armour" means clothies just stand around naked while u trinket out of fear/stun and unload your CDs.

I'm afraid that I'm going to have to disagree. Warlocks have had very, very little to worry about over the course of wow, especially when compared to every single other class (not specs, classes as a whole). The only real thing warlocks ever needed to worry about was pets dying easily in pvp, which was part of the classes skill cap (being able to prevent and deal with it). You're post is exceptionally ignorant and lacks any truth whatsoever, blizzard do not hate warlocks nor do they hate any other classes, you need to grow up and instead of whining, do something about it.

Currently Demo is good and the other two specs are lacking, it's unlikely that it will remain this way. You could try to learn to adapt to it (as EVERY single other class has to do when their favourite spec gets nerfed) or try demo, for now if you're in beta / play on ptr give blizzard as much constructive criticism as possible. They are not oblivious to the goings on in wow as many people seem to think, however it requires such huge amounts of effort to maintain and build wow that they need you to help them with detailed feedback and as a result make their aim of a balanced game easier to achieve.

[mei]

Whoever says warlocks can kite has odviously never played a warlock in their life.

[Robula]

Aren't Warlocks just Mages that fell to Fel Magic? They control demons and use Fel Magic to curse their enemies. Affliction and Demonology make sense to me. Destruction is also using Fire Magic they practised as a Mage.

The only major flaw with Warlocks is the fact they don't use Fel Fire, despite Warlocks using soley Fel Magic. Warlock Fire should be Green.

[Rédempteur]

I'm surprised affliction is viable now(?)... in 2008/2009 it certainly was not, except as a, I'm dotting you then about to die, hope my mates can kill you.

Blizz hates warlocks.

First they gave everyone resilience cuz dots were OP.

Then they gave every class fear break cuz fear was OP.

Blizz loves melee DPS. Cuz "Your attacks ignore 90% of your opponents armour" means clothies just stand around naked while u trinket out of fear/stun and unload your CDs.

In 2008, along with hunters, afflic warlocks were probably the best PvP class/spec when played well (at least part of it -> SL/SL). I had almost 16k (might have been low 15) HP when my kara tank had between 17 and 19k.

And if any melee (unless its a warrior, for some reason i have a really hard time killing them) trinkets out your first fear/Death coil, they are done for, as i have time to put all my dots + 2 SBs, and hopefully a drain life if i had some kind of dots on me. But now, pvp clearly balances around 1v1.

OT : As for destro being a lot of RNG, if it comes out as a BC style, only wait till your fully raid geared and have enough crit to support the spec, otherwise, l2p demo.

[Zantal]

yes and 1 single corruption taking me from 35k hp to 17k is fair, and 1 conflagrate (or what the hell it was) crit me for 11k after anohter insane crit is fair.

i think you are just a scrub that can't live with the fact that you cannot play, hence you blame someone else for your lack of daily bg glory.

do yourself a favor and reroll any other class before coming here and shouting "MY CLASS IS BROKEN"
and you humiliated yourself again, yes that is on BETA! which in developer terms means "hey hey this is my playground and i change things as i want till i find something that is ok, and if it doesn't work we will find another way"

[Deleted]

yes and 1 single corruption taking me from 35k hp to 17k is fair, and 1 conflagrate (or what the hell it was) crit me for 11k after anohter insane crit is fair.

i think you are just a scrub that can't live with the fact that you cannot play, hence you blame someone else for your lack of daily bg glory.

oh hai !!
you know nothing ! hai !

how long did that corruption take to bring you to half health ? full duration? yeah that's what i thought. (if it's any less, get some gear or something, really... its like a rogue applyng poison and going for /nap).
And yeah the big crits you mention is in destro spec. You're either crap for not having interrupted / silenced, and he's been casting for 30 secs non stops, or just bad RNG. Which is what WE are complaining about

On your beta is beta crap (or were you talking ptr ?), i don't see many adjustments coming before the next patch (4.0) which is prolly in 6 days. So yeah they could double everything's damage (just an example, ofc not double) but it would still be imbalanced.

I would be very surprised to see a balanced game experience before March tbh, this game is big. QQ will keep coming

Oh yeah green fire plz

[Chad warden]

yes and 1 single corruption taking me from 35k hp to 17k is fair, and 1 conflagrate (or what the hell it was) crit me for 11k after anohter insane crit is fair.

i think you are just a scrub that can't live with the fact that you cannot play, hence you blame someone else for your lack of daily bg glory.

1 single corruption doing 18k dmg on resi target? No. just no. I dont know if youre talking about with or without Haunt/shadow embrace but its impossible anyway. AND even if it did 18k dmg to you, that would take 18 seconds.

11k conflagrate on resi is impossible on live, if youre talking about ptr, then sure. but 11k on PTR is actually VERY weak. Arcane mages are doing 39k NON CRITS with arcane blast. (its possible that was on beta but its still 50% of your hp, for a spammable 1.5 sec cast spell.)

[ComputerNerd]

In 2008, along with hunters, afflic warlocks were probably the best PvP class/spec when played well (at least part of it -> SL/SL). I had almost 16k (might have been low 15) HP when my kara tank had between 17 and 19k.

And if any melee (unless its a warrior, for some reason i have a really hard time killing them) trinkets out your first fear/Death coil, they are done for, as i have time to put all my dots + 2 SBs, and hopefully a drain life if i had some kind of dots on me. But now, pvp clearly balances around 1v1.

OT : As for destro being a lot of RNG, if it comes out as a BC style, only wait till your fully raid geared and have enough crit to support the spec, otherwise, l2p demo.

SL/SL was not about pvp, but simply outlasting the opponent.
It was more about a prot pally vs prot pally playstyle, and seeing who dies from boredom first.

[Deezlar]

Wow I must be psychic...

A few hours after making this post, Conflag got nerfed.

So now Affli AND Destro are pretty much useless.

Nice.

[Instinctz]

Wow I must be psychic...

A few hours after making this post, Conflag got nerfed.

So now Affli AND Destro are pretty much useless.

Nice.

cuz .6 * the huge conflag hits you guys have been reporting (low ive seen is 30k) isnt broken in pvp....(btw that makes it 18k, still more than enough to reduce most people to less than half health with 1 spell)

[Deleted]

From a mage perspective, i really agree that the damage output is a bit low for you but no comments on current fear in beta? gogo 100-0! TAHTS BALANCED SHIET