[Affliction] A Guide (4.2)

[nilnar]

I dont really understand the use of the UA glyph. It doesn't appear to lower the global cooldown.

[Sakpoth]

Glyph of Unstable Affliction won't lower your GCD below the GCD cap of 1 second, which is currently unreachable without major haste buffs in current gear. Here are some haste numbers posted by VoidStar on EJ (source):

Given that it takes 4951 Haste Rating* to get to ~50% passive haste for non-goblins and 4776 for goblins, it requires more than "decent" raid gear to get your unglyphed UA down to a 1 second cast time, let alone under 1 second.

With the glyph you'll still need 30% Haste which is 2589 or 2437 Haste Rating to GCD cap your UA, which is possible, but still more than the 372 profiles used in the Simcraft thread.

TL;DR: In current gear you don't need to worry about GCD capping your UA, with or without the glyph.

Your other glyph option is Glyph of Bane of Agony, but on single target fights you are casting BoD anyways. On fights where you use BoA, the BoA glyph might turn out as a slight dps gain, though. I did some Simulationcraft tests with BoA on single target (the off targets benefit is minimal since you're clipping BoA with Soul Swap) with the 359 and 372 profiles. The dps gain using BoA glyph over UA glyph was 20-30.

[Fateq]

Just wonder if someone can give me some advice on gear, this is my current gear: http://eu.battle.net/wow/en/characte...C3%A1/advanced

Wondering if to get the t11 legs or chest first, I also got the cloth legs from ZG Serpentine Leggings and was wondering it to replace with my current legs as that will recover the hit I lose from getting the t11 chest if that's the set piece I should get. Thanks if anyone can help me.

[pedrohromano]

I got a question, What should i do if the boss has 25% hp and someone use BL/TW? I dont know if i should use drain soul or spam shadow bolt cuz of BL!

[BombeNissen]

I got a question, What should i do if the boss has 25% hp and someone use BL/TW? I dont know if i should use drain soul or spam shadow bolt cuz of BL!

Drain Soul.

[antonp9595]

i'd like to ask a fast question ,im looking around at characters all over.. and why doesn't everyone have hitcap i see alot having like 15,5% - 16 %? is it just not worth getting a loss of SP or just that it's not needed ? Help please , getting kinda confused :P

[Licarius]

i'd like to ask a fast question ,im looking around at characters all over.. and why doesn't everyone have hitcap i see alot having like 15,5% - 16 %? is it just not worth getting a loss of SP or just that it's not needed ? Help please , getting kinda confused :P

I believe the reason a lot of people are running around with 16% - 16.5% hit is because thats only 0.5% chance to miss....

is so low its basically negligible... having 17.5% hit is pointless as once you hit 17% anything else is useless.....

basically people gear, reforge and gem to maximize dps... having a 105% chance to hit compared to maybe an extra 3% haste..... i'd choose the haste....

[vo1os]

I believe the reason a lot of people are running around with 16% - 16.5% hit is because thats only 0.5% chance to miss....

is so low its basically negligible... having 17.5% hit is pointless as once you hit 17% anything else is useless.....

basically people gear, reforge and gem to maximize dps... having a 105% chance to hit compared to maybe an extra 3% haste..... i'd choose the haste....

The reason is no choice in 372 itemization in cataclysm content. And the other reason - no choice in gemming, because most of slots are filled with +40 int.

[Ashkente]

i'd like to ask a fast question ,im looking around at characters all over.. and why doesn't everyone have hitcap i see alot having like 15,5% - 16 %? is it just not worth getting a loss of SP or just that it's not needed ? Help please , getting kinda confused :P

Hit still has a top priority after intelect. Reason why people run under hit cap is terrible itemization on 372 gear. I have every single item reforged to hit and still I'm at 15.5%... Geming for hit or equiping 359 gear with hit is DPS loss, so there isn't a way how to reach the cap.

[warlockSTAR]

The ramp up time for affliction is ridicules to actually get some decent numbers, I think they should make shadow embrace passive or something to fix.

[NickV]

On bosses, the 'ramp up time' is a nonissue. On trash it just plain doesn't matter.

[shybe]

This question might already been answered but do we change filler to dl during demon soul with a sb-specc?

[hrensgory]

Macros part of the guide needs to be changed.
using macro:
#Showtooltip
/cast [nochanneling: Drain Life] Drain Life

is actually a DPS loss in 4.1

Casting Drain Life while first Drain Life is channeling is now a "refresh" with the same mechanics as refresh on DoTs (i.e. the last tick will not be clipped, but rather moved to the next DL duration).
Using [nochanneling] macro means loosing whole latency before recast of Drain Life will start on the server ([nochanneling] test is done on client, not on server).
Without macro, you can even micro-spam DL before last tick: when you press DL twice in quick succession, second cast is stopped from being executed by GCD.

I.e. you can chain-channel DL now without clipping ticks(!) if you start channeling next DL before the last tick. But you need to cast DL spell, not macro for that. Casting any other spell/using ability will interrupt channeling. And [nochanneling] will prevent you from chain-channeling by adding lags between two successive DL casts.

[Falconys]

I disagree with the spam cast idea. DL has a duration of 3 seconds and tickes every 1 second, but a global is 1.5 seconds.... so if you spam cast it you risk refreshing between the first and second tick, rather than the second and third. Haste doesn't change this because the full duration of a Drain Life cast will always be double your global cooldown until you gain an extra tick (if thats even possible) which would only make the damage loss worse, not better.

It would be a great place to use a cast delay macro, but those were broken years ago.

So Ideally, you would have to just watch your channel timer and recast in the last second of it's duration which is about one full second after your global ends. Certainly a step in the right direction as far as the spell mechanic goes, but it's not quite enough to make it truely queable the way Shadow Bolt is.

[hrensgory]

@falconys:
you seem missunderstood what I meant by micro-spam. That means that after you had your second tick on the first DL cast, or third tick on renewed DL cast, you can press DL a couple of times in a quick succession without risking to loose DPS. Next DL will be chained to the first one and the last tick will be moved to the chained DL.
Using [nochanneling] macro means you never do DL chaining (even when your latency is close to 0) because [nochanneling] is checked on client when server sends STOP_CHANNELING to client, after that client will execute macro and send START_CHANNELING to the server - you loose whole latency between two chains.
When you just press DL about half a second before last tick - you will get REFRESH_... command and the last tick will be moved to the next DL - no loosing ticks or latency.
Micro-spamming about half a second before the last tick is to help with frame rating or similar lags. and two-three press on DL in quick succession protect well enough from REFRESHING DL one more time by GCD.

[Ponchu]

I have a question - If the boss is at 25.5% hp say, and I know he is going to drop below 25% by the time i cast a shadow bolt should i start drain soul channeling at 25.5% or cast shadowbolt/refresh haunt and wait for the <25%?

Basically what im asking is if you accidently started channeling at just above 25% hp would drain soul automatically update to its sub 25% dmg once the bosses hp dropped or would you need to stop channeling and restart after his hp dropped?

[Sakpoth]

Drain Soul will not update to sub-25% damage if you start the cast above 25%. This works the other way around as well, if you start the channel while the target is below 25% and the target is healed up above 25%, your Drain Soul ticks will still do 2x damage.

[Ponchu]

Sweet as, thanks. My guild asked me to swap to my lock so Im still getting the hang of her, but great fun.

[Sakpoth]

To add up on the question and clarify how and when your spells update their damage, as I've seen a ton of confusion how this works on these forums. Here's how everything works and this is also being added to the guide in an attempt to clear up some of the confusion and give people a point of reference.

There are basically two categories of things that affect your spells' damage.

Buffs/debuffs on target - this includes

• Debuffs provided by you and fellow raiders, such as Curse of the Elements and Shadow Embrace.
• Target being in a "weakened" state.
• Target standing in puddles that increase/decrease damage taken.

Buffs/debuffs on you - this includes

• Buffs on you such as Bloodlust/Heroism and Improved Soul Fire.
• You standing in puddles that increase/decrease damage dealt.
• Target health percent.

This is how each type of spell's damage update on buffs/debuffs.

Normal, single hit, casted spells - such as Shadow Bolt and Immolate.

• Buffs/debuffs on you are taken to account at the end of the cast, when your mana is being withdrawn.
• Buffs/debuffs on target are taken to account on impact, when the spell deals damage.

"Pulsing" spells - channeled spells that deals damage to targets in impact area, such as Hellfire and Rain of Fire.

• Buffs/debuffs on you are taken to account on each pulse.
• Buffs/debuffs on target are taken to account on every hit, when the spell deals damage.

DoTs - Debuffs left on target dealing damage over time and channeled spells giving the target a debuff. Spells such as Corruption and Drain Life.

• Buffs/debuffs on you are taken to account once, at the end of the cast, when your mana is being withdrawn.
• Buffs/debuffs on target are taken to account on each tick of damage.

There is one known exception to these rules, that is the 5% crit debuff provided by Warlocks and Fire Mages, Shadow and Flame and Critical Mass. This is a debuff that should be in the "Debuffs on target"-category, however testing shows that it works like a buff on yourself.

This was hastily put together late when I'm tired, so if anyone have something to add or spot anything wrong, please do correct me.

[vo1os]

I had a dispute about [nochanneling] Drain Life vs 4.1 channeling clipping.
I'm sure, that clipping can give 100% uptime while spamming DL using clipping system. Also I'm sure, that in past [nochanneling] macro had a guarantied delay between casts (depending on ping).

Maybe somebody tested delay with [nochanneling] post 4.1 ?