Do Warlocks need a real interrupt?

[Atrea]

That chart is fail though, you cannot fear undeads, it's impossible, this accounts for all types of fear. you never have been able to fear undeads, in the start of the life of WoW you weren't even able to fear the playable race undeads, however that was changed to balance out the races.

I beg to differ, as I greatly enjoy casting Turn Evil on the undead adds along the hallway up to Ptah, in Halls of Origination.

This is a silly thread, though.

Warlocks have an interrupt in the form of a Felhound.
"It's got a 24 second cooldown!"
So does Counterspell from Mages, and Silencing Shot is close, at 20 seconds - something ONLY Marksmanship Hunters can use.
Silence - a Shadow Priest-only spell (and one not every one has), has a 45 second cooldown!

ANY Warlock can use a Felhound, and thus, Spell Lock.

"But it costs me DPS to use!"

It costs Rogues DPS to save energy for Kick.
It costs Warriors DPS to save rage for Pummel/Shield Bash.
Arguably, Silence causes a DPS loss, as it is not typically part of a PvE Shadow Priest's spec.
It costs Prot Paladins DPS (and thus TPS) to save Avenger's Shield (not to mention a GCD for it), and more to save a GCD for Hammer of Justice. (Fortunately, in the next patch, Rebuke will be baseline.)

You already HAVE an interrupt.
The fights that require you to give your absolute max DPS, damning everything else, are not the same as the fights that require reliable and consistent interrupts. And if you are too obsessed with your own numbers to contribute to the overall success of a group, then you have larger problems to deal with.

/thread
Don't trip over your e-peen on the way out.

[Deleted]

why does spell lock only work under certain circumstances? It's a spell interrupt that can be bound easily and simply requires a "pet class" to have a certain pet to get a certain utility...

Ok, let me put it this way. It doesn't matter if I'm a pet class, or that Spell Lock has been bound just as easily as the 40 odd other bindings I use. If a Raid boss is immune to Spell Lock, but can be counter spelled or otherwise interrupted with a Rogue's kick for example it means that the OP's question regarding whether we need a versatile non-spec or non-pet dependent interrupt when (some other) classes do is a reasonable one. In the spirit of that I gave my opinion and for what it's worth, my experience also.

Examples:

A Rogue may spec any way he wishes but has a reliable interrupt on hand if it is needed with no DPS penalty.

A Mage may spec any way he wishes but has a reliable interrupt on hand with no DPS penalty.

A Demonology Warlock is asked to use his Felhunter on an encounter to silence a boss. The Warlock gladly does so with little regard to his standing on the damage meter, which is just as well because the Boss is immune to Spell lock and the Warlock's DPS is through the floor.

To restate the question the OP poses - Do Warlocks need a real interrupt?

I answered the poll "it would be nice" and in doing so I'd take it from the Felhunter and give it to all Warlocks as a baseline ability. But in reality I'm not hankering after one though it was a good question OP. Sod the people that have difficulty with a simple discussion.

Fatality!
---
So to those asking for buffs in the form of clone-mechanics, I give you the dreaded L2P (also known as check your spellbook, get into fights, and test everything out).
Be creative when begging!
Why would you want to become even more like mages?

It makes me sad when I see people wasting their brilliant minds regurgitating the same old phrases and sentiments in order to look like they fit in. You should know that bosses are immune to the things you quoted in almost every case which still leaves the question of whether we need a true interrupt. I promise we are not talking in code.

The OP isn't jumping up and down demanding an interrupt. He noticed we don't have one from that chart and he's asking the community *if* we need one. Two different things. I felt it was a very valid question worthy of reasonable discussion. Shame we're not getting one.

I beg to differ, as I greatly enjoy casting Turn Evil on the undead adds along the hallway up to Ptah, in Halls of Origination.

This is a silly thread, though.

Warlocks have an interrupt in the form of a Felhound.
"It's got a 24 second cooldown!"
So does Counterspell from Mages, and Silencing Shot is close, at 20 seconds - something ONLY Marksmanship Hunters can use.
Silence - a Shadow Priest-only spell (and one not every one has), has a 45 second cooldown!

ANY Warlock can use a Felhound, and thus, Spell Lock.

"But it costs me DPS to use!"

It costs Rogues DPS to save energy for Kick.
It costs Warriors DPS to save rage for Pummel/Shield Bash.
Arguably, Silence causes a DPS loss, as it is not typically part of a PvE Shadow Priest's spec.
It costs Prot Paladins DPS (and thus TPS) to save Avenger's Shield (not to mention a GCD for it), and more to save a GCD for Hammer of Justice. (Fortunately, in the next patch, Rebuke will be baseline.)

You already HAVE an interrupt.
The fights that require you to give your absolute max DPS, damning everything else, are not the same as the fights that require reliable and consistent interrupts. And if you are too obsessed with your own numbers to contribute to the overall success of a group, then you have larger problems to deal with.

/thread
Don't trip over your e-peen on the way out.

*trips over premature /thread instead*

You raise a couple of good points regarding Max DPS vs Utility. I agree that an all out fight and a control fight can be two different things (but often combined so not often as clear cut as you make out) and any player worth his salt will do what needs to be done. I don't believe anyone here said they wouldn't do what was necessary so I'm not entirely sure where all the generic forum piss and vinegar is coming from.

That said, it is worth mentioning again that Spell Lock and other warlock "interrupts" / CC do not work on the majority of raid bosses in my reasonable experience, whereas something like Counterspell or Kick would. Your argument would be sound without this basic oversight.



Just remember, the OP posted an open ended question and just wanted to have a discussion about it. So many people are quick to judge and in the process completely miss the point of exploring the topic properly in a civilized way.

I recommend this thread be (war or spell)locked as it has reached a point where people can't differentiate between a legitimate question and QQ. Such is the state of affairs.

[elitistb]

My only comment is that it is extremely startling to see how many people responded to this when they have no idea what an interrupt actually is. See all this "fear, lol" response makes me wonder why these people bother responding.

[Andyclan]

wow i cant believe this thread was even made lol....
first. no you should not have an interrupt. why? Fear, casted aoe fear ( instant if affl), instant fear. so we're at 3 diff fear spells now. Shadowfury, fel pup, seduction, hand of gul'dan, 5 sec pet stun from demo as well. so no, i dont think locks should get an interrupt.

[Deleted]

Spell Lock? Shadowfury? Death Coil? Fear? Seduction? Axe Toss?

Give me that felsuccoguard demon you are using! Please....

[Fenrir_Rendar]

Spell Lock? Shadowfury? Death Coil? Fear? Seduction? Axe Toss?

Spell lock is the only TRUE Interrupt. But those all work nicely, I wouldn't mind being able to have a Spell lock style spell instead of being spec/Pet required.


EDIT: Epiphany they could rework Curse of tongues somehow, and change spell lock into something else. Just a thought, but it's unlikely but it would be nice.

[Pieterman]

8 second lockout feldawg is OP as it is, ye don't need more.

[bloodwine77]

My only comment is that it is extremely startling to see how many people responded to this when they have no idea what an interrupt actually is. See all this "fear, lol" response makes me wonder why these people bother responding.

Fear acts as an interrupt in PvP and for most PvE trash (although it should be used as CC in PvE and not as an interrupt).

Fear does not act as an interrupt on PvE bosses, though. So it all depends on the context whether or not fear is considered an interrupt.

My definition of an interrupt is anything that stops the mob or player from finishing a cast or ability.

Personally, I don't need or want an interrupt for boss fights. We already have a pretty wide arsenal of utilities and if we got an interrupt then likely it'd be at the cost of something else. Blizzard isn't just going to beef up warlocks for the sake of it.

[Tommy2er]

For PvP it would be nice, but most locks use fel puppy in PvP (apart from those demo specc'd) so not necessaey but would be nice.
For PvE it would be very nice as most dont use Fel puppy on bosses and bosses are immune to stuns and CC spells such as shadowfury and fear. So yes it would be very good for PvE.

[Nexxia]

I think the OP is talking about a free cast interrupt ability, in a pve setting casting fear to interrupt isnt going to play out lol. Too long a cast time. Death Coil :/ TBH alot of mobs are immune to what we have for interrupts what there are. I didnt notice this being a pvp thread so I think I can see what hes saying. Like the heroic Meta achieve for first boss HSFK, We have no real interrupt for his abilities. Its up to melee etc to interrupt his ability to get the meta kind of annoying not being able (as destro) to do anything in some situations.

[Rayzan]

We have many ways of interrupting. DC, shadowfury, fear, succy's knockback, fel puppys silence, Fel guards charge and axe throw, howl of terror, HoG's stun, seduce...I'm sure I'm missing one or two. Sure only one can silence but they all will interrupt a spell that's being cast. Warlocks have enough control IMO. If you see that you're about to come in contact with a caster hard cast or SS insta cast your fel puppy for the silence or Succy for the seduce/knockback and your golden. I never have problems interrupting, it's avoiding being interrupted or silence that sucks.

[Mix]

I selected "It would be nice" but only because when you end up in a group that has many interupts and they decide not to use them, you soulburn-summon felhound but his has a quite a long cd and yeah...be nice to feel a bit less helpless when it comes to interupts.

I use axe toss, fear, (not normally dc), shadowfury (when destro) on trash but these things do not always work on bosses or rather they normally do not The only one we have is spell lock. The biggest issue is that this requires a pet which isn't top dps (for any spec i think) - succubus is favoured for demo and I've seen afflocks running her too. Then destro loses a bunch of dps if they drop the imp. Obviously dps isn't the biggest concern when the boss is nuking your group with something interuptable BUT when interupters fail, it would be nice to have one to help out.

Necessary - no, but certainly would give me more control over fights when something does need interupting on a boss. Then again we could say the same thing about removing boss buffs - a purge-type ability would be nice.

[gherkin]

Locking this because my email is filling with complaints. Was an interesting discussion while it lasted.