Shadowbolt vs. Drain Soul as the filler

[Kithelle]

.... The Point is that BOTH can be considered oldschool by now

LOL

Yeah because nothing said old school like a fresh new way of doing something!

[Yhcti]

I dont actually see drain soul on the bfa talent calc. I reckon theyve remo ed it in bfa and brought shadowbolt back. If they have then im back in heaven lol i miss nightfall proccing my free shadowbolts

[Schattenlied]

Bolt is better IMO.

Drain soul bores me because channeling spells for that long is meh... Bolt is better for balance because it means their primary source of selfhealing isn't also a large part of their normal rotation... It would be like if they took Justicar's Vengeance for Ret Paladins and Death Strike for DKs, and made them the main HP/RP dump for the DPS specs... It would be horrid design... They are meant to only be used when the player needs selfhealing, and are a DPS loss vs Templar's Verdict/Frost Strike. That should be the same relationship Drain Soul has with Shadowbolt.

[Gotanks305]

Shadow bolt cause IMO Wrath to me was the perfect iteration of Affliction again just my opinion and cause dat Shadow bolt glyph was dope but in all seriousness when the made the change to Drain/Malefic it just felt to familiar to Spriest mindflay

[Deleted]

Why not both ? and drain life.. and drain mana please :'(

[Groven4]

Give me both. Shadowbolt for filler, Drain soul for execute.

This. 10Chars

[Frozenbeef]

I like drain soul/ malefic grasp/ drain life, just remove the healing. Don't know why they are obsessed with making all casters the same with different visuals. if i wanted to spam shadowbolt i'd play destruction

[ThrashMetalFtw]

Remove the Healing from Drain Soul

[Stacie]

Just recently rolled a affliction warlock alt having not played one since wrath. Feels so odd not having the shadow bolt.

[Sting]

Drain Soul all the way. The biggest advantage is that you cast it for exactly as long as you need to on dying mobs, no time wasted. Not losing all your damage when you have to move is nice too.

[Inshabel]

I prefer drain soul, but with the visual of MG.

[imf39]

I like being able to stand in bad and heal thru it and just generally not have to rely on the healers so much.

[Reek]

Remove the Healing from Drain Soul

uh no? PVP.

[Tradu]

I really don't understand why affliction having strong self healing is "broken."

Why? Are demon hunters broken as well? Because I mean, they have absurd self-healing as well. My guild puts me and our other affliction warlock and a demon hunter on our own add on mythic kin.

The DH does more healing than we do, and unlike him both me and the other affliction warlock can die while refreshing dots, he just keeps doing his rotation.

So there's 1 other class that has similarly broken selfhealing during their CDs(and with Demonic slightly more frequently), while also having to be in melee range to do it. It's not a difficult concept, really. DPS are not meant to be selfsustaining, because then why would you need healers(as perfectly displayed by Ego's Blood DK/Aff lock raids on freshly levelled alts)

[Ooshraxa]

DPS are not meant to be selfsustaining, because then why would you need healers(as perfectly displayed by Ego's Blood DK/Aff lock raids on freshly levelled alts)

Or Warler doing 1 x Blood DK, 4 x Affliction Warlock +20 M+

[ThrashMetalFtw]

uh no? PVP.

Bring back Drain Life as a separate spell if that's what you care about.

Also, Aff selfhealing should be removed/nerfed because Shadow Priests have historically been the "selfhealing" spec, not Warlocks. Both thematically and gameplaywise.


Blizz basically removed something SPs had for 10 years, just to give it to Warlocks instead (yes I'm aware that Locks always had some selfhealing aswell, but it was always much weaker than the selfhealing of SPs).

[Deleted]

Remove the Healing from Drain Soul

Yeah i think most people don't realize this is a possibility. From what i read in several posts some votes go to shadowbolt because people dislike the healing aspect, like the current version of Drain Soul is a force of nature or made by God and can't be changed.

Not sure if the OP should have been more specific or people are too rigid in their thinking but i feel this boils down to "projectile vs drain", for the majority of its existence Drain Soul did not have a healing component, sure it had a different purpose but that's irrelevant. Healing from Drain Soul is not a must and shouldn't be a decision factor in this poll.

[jackofwind]

Bring back Drain Life as a separate spell if that's what you care about.

Also, Aff selfhealing should be removed/nerfed because Shadow Priests have historically been the "selfhealing" spec, not Warlocks. Both thematically and gameplaywise.


Blizz basically removed something SPs had for 10 years, just to give it to Warlocks instead (yes I'm aware that Locks always had some selfhealing aswell, but it was always much weaker than the selfhealing of SPs).

Shadow Priests just had Holy healing spells as part of their kit, nothing that healed on damage dealt. Lock self-healing was always a big deal considering drain tanking existed in Vanilla.

I wouldn't say Shadow Priests were the selfhealing spec any more than Elemental Shamans were. They both had access to baseline healing spells, but no passive healing via damage (Apart from UD Plague which was limited, minor, situational, and effectively unusable in PvE).

[kail]

uh no? PVP.

Drain life. Other two specs have it.

Bring back Drain Life as a separate spell if that's what you care about.

Also, Aff selfhealing should be removed/nerfed because Shadow Priests have historically been the "selfhealing" spec, not Warlocks. Both thematically and gameplaywise.


Blizz basically removed something SPs had for 10 years, just to give it to Warlocks instead (yes I'm aware that Locks always had some selfhealing aswell, but it was always much weaker than the selfhealing of SPs).

Locks have had self healing for sometime. Drain life used to be the filler and even outside of that their Damage often leeched for life/shield. Spriest self healing was often stuck with VE, which was normally a DoT that then turned to a buff and now a CD. Affliction lock was and still is a draining spec.

[Nazgul91]

I love drain soul. Blizzard always has to dramatically make changes it seems. I don't understand why they can't just nerf the healing a bit. Just tune the numbers.