Afflic vs Destro.

[newera32]

Actually...drain life isn't more mana intensive than shadowbolt. yes it costs more mana per cast, but it also lasts longer. Shadowbolt is 10% base mana every 2.5 seconds, drain life is 12% mana every 3 seconds. It kinda evens out.

and compared to zero points in mana feed, 2% mana returned for every crit does reduce life tapping by alot.



I was talking about heroic magmaw, not normal. in heroic there are bone constructs created which are generally kited around. And yes, generally the kiter has their own slows, but they are generally not 30 seconds in length. i.e. I've seen vids of using frost mages to kite nef's adds in P1. Frost mage has great slows, but none of them are very long lasting, and it's possible that some of the adds doesn't get slowed. If I have CoEX on all of them, then even if they aren't slowed by 50+% by the frost mage, they would be at least slowed 30% by me.

And yeah, demo is better aoe...but I hate demo....it is stupid. and dumb.

The constructs can't be kited or they blow up

[Seclorum]

Actually...drain life isn't more mana intensive than shadowbolt. yes it costs more mana per cast, but it also lasts longer. Shadowbolt is 10% base mana every 2.5 seconds, drain life is 12% mana every 3 seconds. It kinda evens out.

and compared to zero points in mana feed, 2% mana returned for every crit does reduce life tapping by alot.



I was talking about heroic magmaw, not normal. in heroic there are bone constructs created which are generally kited around. And yes, generally the kiter has their own slows, but they are generally not 30 seconds in length. i.e. I've seen vids of using frost mages to kite nef's adds in P1. Frost mage has great slows, but none of them are very long lasting, and it's possible that some of the adds doesn't get slowed. If I have CoEX on all of them, then even if they aren't slowed by 50+% by the frost mage, they would be at least slowed 30% by me.

And yeah, demo is better aoe...but I hate demo....it is stupid. and dumb.

Hahaha. Demo has its good and its bad. I find it quite relaxing after super stressful Destro bar watching. My god destro is annoying. At least ISF isnt totaly , Developmentaly Disabled, to keep up anymore but between refreshing everything, spamming Incinerates, making sure to always fire off conflag on CD and occasionaly fitting in a Chaos bolt I just want to hang myself. Plus the utter dogcrap that is its Multi Target AOE compared to Demo or Afflic.

[Gohzerlock]

Drain life is terribad

/thread

[Seclorum]

Drain life is terribad

/thread

Heh. Drain isnt terrible but its not the panacea of awesome. Look at those numbers, around 200dps difference. How different are they Rotationaly?

By and large people will probably be able to Eek out better performance as Sbolt than Drain, but some encounters will favor Drain over Sbolt.

[Gohzerlock]

Heh. Drain isnt terrible but its not the panacea of awesome. Look at those numbers, around 200dps difference. How different are they Rotationaly?

By and large people will probably be able to Eek out better performance as Sbolt than Drain, but some encounters will favor Drain over Sbolt.

Well thats just it... there isn't a marginal difference, especially when ur using a latency cast bar AND the big difference is ur healing urself for a ton. I can heal myself to 10% easily on chimeron, conserve mana for healers on long fights like nef.. it goes on and on.. which is why blizz is skeptical about afflic using this as filler. Which is probably the reason you'll never see a gap between sbolt filler and drain life until blizz decides to change it.
I personally think it helps make afflic more unique apart from other specs. I usually play destro, i'll be going back to afflic after patch. Not sure if i'll ALWAYS use drain life, but it'll definitely happen more than a few times as I like to see myself topped off.

[Seclorum]

Well thats just it... there isn't a marginal difference, especially when ur using a latency cast bar AND the big difference is ur healing urself for a ton. I can heal myself to 10% easily on chimeron, conserve mana for healers on long fights like nef.. it goes on and on.. which is why blizz is skeptical about afflic using this as filler. Which is probably the reason you'll never see a gap between sbolt filler and drain life until blizz decides to change it.
I personally think it helps make afflic more unique apart from other specs. I usually play destro, i'll be going back to afflic after patch. Not sure if i'll ALWAYS use drain life, but it'll definitely happen more than a few times as I like to see myself topped off.

Oh i dont doubt its advantages. Im prepped to try it out come patch day myself. Even a slight DPS drop would be worth the Self healing IMHO. Right now on live its not a Slight drop to go afflic.

Personaly, barring SB:SoC, I think the Drain spec has a more elegant Talent spread and the rotation feels smooth. The only problem is 1 of the new halmarks of the Drain spec in 4.1 is Mana Feed and getting a Full Investment feels better at 16% Return over only 8% return. But the points have to come from somewhere and SB:SoC feels like the only situational Talent you can really chop a point off.

[nilnar]

Drain life is terribad

/thread

Firstly, posting PTR sims is lame. On live its closer, even though its ridiculously close on the PTR anyway.
Secondly, those are single target, stationary sims. SB wins when it comes to cleaving. Those sims also pick up 2/2 mana feed, a pretty big dps increase. If you're taking 2/2 mana feed you cannot take SB:SoC unless you drop a point from pandemic or shadow and flame.

Literally the only fights I can think of where this spec would be worthwhile is chimaeron, atramedes or conclave of wind (on a non-add platform). Every other fight has either considerable cleaving (SB is superior), considerable aoe (SB:SoC is superior), or in the case of alakir a ridiculous travel time on haunt that makes keeping SE up occasionally problematic without SB spam.

Regarding Chimaeron, I don't see the issue with casting a single drain life after massacres with SB spec. Endless healing yourself to full isn't required, haunt and fel armor healing have always been enough to allow life tapping for me.

Actually...drain life isn't more mana intensive than shadowbolt. yes it costs more mana per cast, but it also lasts longer. Shadowbolt is 10% base mana every 2.5 seconds, drain life is 12% mana every 3 seconds. It kinda evens out.

and compared to zero points in mana feed, 2% mana returned for every crit does reduce life tapping by alot.

Glyph of shadow bolt.
2% on every crit isn't as much as 4% on every crit, which is what the sims are using.

[Veriu]

Glyph of shadow bolt.
2% on every crit isn't as much as 4% on every crit, which is what the sims are using.

Yeah...but 2% is more than zero percent, and having even 1 point in mana feed, is a big difference.

[Seclorum]

Yeah...but 2% is more than zero percent, and having even 1 point in mana feed, is a big difference.

PTR sims are using Felhunters, which is 16% per crit at 2/2 investment.

[Veriu]

Hahaha. Demo has its good and its bad. I find it quite relaxing after super stressful Destro bar watching. My god destro is annoying. At least ISF isnt totaly , Developmentaly Disabled, to keep up anymore but between refreshing everything, spamming Incinerates, making sure to always fire off conflag on CD and occasionaly fitting in a Chaos bolt I just want to hang myself. Plus the utter dogcrap that is its Multi Target AOE compared to Demo or Afflic.

I agree destro = annoying. not hard, just annoying. I don't like demo, because it's too reliant on pets. I don't like pets...I started playing a lock back in vanilla, where the best pet you could have out was your imp (for all specs in pve), and the best thing you could do with your imp, was have it phase shifted, on passive, and dark pact mana from it. So really, you didn't have a pet, you had a mana battery (as it was phase shifted, it wasn't in combat, so would fill up it's mana bar in like 1 second)

PTR sims are using Felhunters, which is 16% per crit at 2/2 investment.

.....Yes...I'm not sure what your point is. My point was that 1 point is better than none. It is a very noticeable difference.

[llcjay1]

Haunt is an unbelievable buff to afflic. Honestly, I would not even do afflic until you can get that spell (level 69). Come to think of it, I would not use it while leveling either due to the ramp-up time needed to see its best results. Destro will almost always be higher in 5mans due its burst capacity. However, on bosses that live longer than 30 seconds, afflic can either rival or outright beat most dps classes/specs.

However, if you love afflic, play what you want.

[Seclorum]

.....Yes...I'm not sure what your point is. My point was that 1 point is better than none. It is a very noticeable difference.

1 Point is better than nothing yes. Just a correction on the value.

@2/2
Succubus has a 4% Mana Feed Every Lash Crit, and Lash is chain cast like Imp Fireballs and seems to crit frequently.

Felhunter (4.0.6) Has a 4% Mana Feed every Shadow Bite Crit. Bite Occurs every 6 seconds (Effectively 4 GCD)
Felhunter (4.1) Has a 16% Mana Feed every Shadow Bite Crit. Bite Occurs every 6 seconds (Effectively 4GCD)

The Felhunter will deliver Spikier Mana Returns in 4.1 from mana feed investment because it takes 4x as long to get the next chance at a return.

This is still better than Sbolt Spec IMHO, where they get no returns except from Lifetap, which takes Time/Glyph investment.

[Veriu]

1 Point is better than nothing yes. Just a correction on the value.

@2/2
Succubus has a 4% Mana Feed Every Lash Crit, and Lash is chain cast like Imp Fireballs and seems to crit frequently.

Felhunter (4.0.6) Has a 4% Mana Feed every Shadow Bite Crit. Bite Occurs every 6 seconds (Effectively 4 GCD)
Felhunter (4.1) Has a 16% Mana Feed every Shadow Bite Crit. Bite Occurs every 6 seconds (Effectively 4GCD)

The Felhunter will deliver Spikier Mana Returns in 4.1 from mana feed investment because it takes 4x as long to get the next chance at a return.

This is still better than Sbolt Spec IMHO, where they get no returns except from Lifetap, which takes Time/Glyph investment.

Ah, I see....

yeah, I'm looking forward to 4.1 with the buffs to afflic....and I might play around with my spec, maybe give up something to get 2/2 mana feed....I'm not sure if that'll end up being more mana than succy now, but if so I may never even need to life tap

[Seclorum]

Ah, I see....

yeah, I'm looking forward to 4.1 with the buffs to afflic....and I might play around with my spec, maybe give up something to get 2/2 mana feed....I'm not sure if that'll end up being more mana than succy now, but if so I may never even need to life tap

I'm very much so looking forward to it as well.

Drain Spec will also give another 30% boost to Felhunter's damage when he bites while your drain is going. And considering the crazy amount of damage ive heard he deals on the PTR it gives me goosebumps.

And if you look at the EJ simcraft entry for drain you can see the Mana still is an issue, but that on average your going to use LT less than half as much. And certianly with all these fights with movement you will have ample opportunity to Tap on the move.

[tjleadingweb]

demo is better aoe..

[Veriu]

I'm very much so looking forward to it as well.

Drain Spec will also give another 30% boost to Felhunter's damage when he bites while your drain is going. And considering the crazy amount of damage ive heard he deals on the PTR it gives me goosebumps.

And if you look at the EJ simcraft entry for drain you can see the Mana still is an issue, but that on average your going to use LT less than half as much. And certianly with all these fights with movement you will have ample opportunity to Tap on the move.

Yeah, last time I looked life tap looked like about 1/4 of mana gains during a boss fight on the sims...much better than what it is now