Warlocks in 1.12 but with only MC open

[Rainyhealz]

Hey all,

Some say warlocks scale better once zg hits with spell hit gear.
Some say warlocks become great after 1.6 talent changes.
Maybe it's a little of both.

I understand what talent changes happened in 1.6 being demonology being affected the most for ds/ruin.

My questions are:
1. Was it a little of both? Or just talent change really? Or zg 3 piece set etc?
2. Do we think locks will perform insanely better in classic right from the start? If so, what about sm/ruin?

[Oozlz]

1: The talents help a bunch, but its mainly the lack of hit rating.
2: Only a bit better, and all but one of your warlocks should be DS/ruin as they wont use corruption in raids most targets, even on trash.

[Gratlim]

Having played warlock back then:
1. Talent change yes
2. Warlock will probably be a bit bad (or mediocre) until T2 and T2.5. Then they become middle of the pack, far behind outliners top tier DPS (Mage>Rogue/FuryWar) though.

Two things to keep in mind: as a warlock you will often not be able to go "all in" while DPSing because we hae a threat issue (our threat is high and bursty). And finally like others said, you will often be told that you can't dot (because of dot limit). Gimping yourself even further.

That is mostly the reasons why i won't roll one this time

Beside that, it is a really solid class though, and it excels later on in PVP. Remember to go Horde though, else you will end up getting chain stomped by UD rogues.

[Gaidax]

Warlock in raiding is basically a shitty Mage.

[Rainyhealz]

Just wanted to say thank you all for the information provided. Questions answered clearly

- - - Updated - - -

Having played warlock back then:
1. Talent change yes
2. Warlock will probably be a bit bad (or mediocre) until T2 and T2.5. Then they become middle of the pack, far behind outliners top tier DPS (Mage>Rogue/FuryWar) though.

Two things to keep in mind: as a warlock you will often not be able to go "all in" while DPSing because we hae a threat issue (our threat is high and bursty). And finally like others said, you will often be told that you can't dot (because of dot limit). Gimping yourself even further.

That is mostly the reasons why i won't roll one this time

Beside that, it is a really solid class though, and it excels later on in PVP. Remember to go Horde though, else you will end up getting chain stomped by UD rogues.

Thanks for your input. Yeah it would have to be horde lol, UD wotf hurts. I'm trying to decide between lock and rogue for literally every aspect. I think history will repeat itself with too many rogues to get gear and not enough warlocks.

[anon5123]

Having played warlock back then:
1. Talent change yes
2. Warlock will probably be a bit bad (or mediocre) until T2 and T2.5. Then they become middle of the pack, far behind outliners top tier DPS (Mage>Rogue/FuryWar) though.

Two things to keep in mind: as a warlock you will often not be able to go "all in" while DPSing because we hae a threat issue (our threat is high and bursty). And finally like others said, you will often be told that you can't dot (because of dot limit). Gimping yourself even further.

That is mostly the reasons why i won't roll one this time

Beside that, it is a really solid class though, and it excels later on in PVP. Remember to go Horde though, else you will end up getting chain stomped by UD rogues.

"warlocks are bad"
"oh, you have to hold back because you will pull aggro from too much dps"

???

[Skorpionss]

"warlocks are bad"
"oh, you have to hold back because you will pull aggro from too much dps"

???

DPS and threat generation are not directly related, some spells generate more threat than others, even if their damage is lower.

[anon5123]

DPS and threat generation are not directly related, some spells generate more threat than others, even if their damage is lower.

Shadowbolt does not have extra threat modifiers

[Machismo]

Shadowbolt does not have extra threat modifiers

It's still a big spell that gets damage modifiers on a crit. So, a few early crits in a row, and you can easily pull aggro in a hurry.

On that note, classes like mage have threat reduction with their main spells in MC.

[anon5123]

It's still a big spell that gets damage modifiers on a crit. So, a few early crits in a row, and you can easily pull aggro in a hurry.

On that note, classes like mage have threat reduction with their main spells in MC.

So again, Warlocks do bad DPS but also have to slow down and stop dps so they don't pull aggro.

You people are nuts.

[Trunksee]

So again, Warlocks do bad DPS but also have to slow down and stop dps so they don't pull aggro.

You people are nuts.

Doesn't seem like you understand how threat generation works with talents in classic. Mages have reduced threat in their talent trees for our main spells meaning our dps can be about 30% higher than a lock without pulling threat. Locks don't have the same threat reduction talents so even with less dps they will pull threat before a mage who is out dpsing them. Locks do a lot better on alliance with paladin buffs.

[Machismo]

So again, Warlocks do bad DPS but also have to slow down and stop dps so they don't pull aggro.

You people are nuts.

What did I say that was "nuts?"

I never made any claim about warlock DPS. I know they are middle-of-the-pack at best for most of Vanilla. But, they still have aggro issues early on in fights, because they can stack threat faster than mages. It's also why fury warriors (horde side) have early threat issues, as well.

[Morbownz]

Hey all,

Some say warlocks scale better once zg hits with spell hit gear.
Some say warlocks become great after 1.6 talent changes.
Maybe it's a little of both.

I understand what talent changes happened in 1.6 being demonology being affected the most for ds/ruin.

My questions are:
1. Was it a little of both? Or just talent change really? Or zg 3 piece set etc?
2. Do we think locks will perform insanely better in classic right from the start? If so, what about sm/ruin?

Classic is starting with 16 debuff slots. Locks can spec immediately into SM/Ruin meaning they can use Corruption in raids and pray for Nightfall proc's. They shouldn't be too bad at the start. It also depends on how well you gear your character for raids.
Another thing to note, Classic is not like Retail WoW, you don't look at the damage meter's in MC to decide why you wiped, you'll never wipe due to low DPS if you are executing your strategy. It's only when you get to AQ40 and beyond where this can change. So worrying about DPS at the start is not the best way to choose a class.

[The-loon]

Hey all,

Some say warlocks scale better once zg hits with spell hit gear.
Some say warlocks become great after 1.6 talent changes.
Maybe it's a little of both.

I understand what talent changes happened in 1.6 being demonology being affected the most for ds/ruin.

My questions are:
1. Was it a little of both? Or just talent change really? Or zg 3 piece set etc?
2. Do we think locks will perform insanely better in classic right from the start? If so, what about sm/ruin?

Hey! I’m a long time Warlock player in both retail and on private servers. I had some additional information I wanted to add!
In Vanilla they reworked the talent trees often which drastically changed the performance of many classes over the lifecycle of Vanilla. Furthermore, in both Vanilla and private servers there was progressive itemization which is not the case for Classic. Due to talent synergies between ISB, DS (succubus), and Ruin Warlocks will perform better and better as they gain access to gear with large amounts of hit, crit, and spell power. This will be further compounded with the 16 debuff slots from day 1 (also wasn’t the case in Vanilla and private servers). Having a priest put up the shadow weaving right away debuff along with curse of shadow means your shadow damage multiplier is 145.48%. This is much higher than a mage multiplier for both their Frost and Fire specs.

Typically Warlocks started to collect enough gear to start outpacing mages (or perform similar to mages) in patch 1.5 when the modified “Of Shadow Wrath’ gear was introduced; and even more so in patch 1.7 with the introduction of the Bloodvine set.
Since we will have 1.12 itemization from day 1 the upgraded shadow wrath gear will drop from day 1, also items like Ban’thok Sash will drop with its upgrade stats. As a result Warlocks preraid BiS and raid buffs (excluding flask) will give 439 spell power 4% crit and 2% hit. Just to compare if Classic did not have this progressive itemization a Warlock would only have 329 spell power 3% crit and 0% hit.

The gear Warlocks have access to day 1 in Classic coupled with the supporting debuffs being allowed from day 1 will mean that Warlocks are actually going to be very solid DPS contenders immediately. As mentioned in other replies Warlocks do not have any threat reduction talents and shadow bolt produces 1 threat per damage done (before factoring in salvation or tranquil air totems. This means that they end up being the highest threat producing DPS class. Making sure you run with a great tank in raids will be important so you don’t have to sit on your hands.

Final side note. Someone mention to cast shadowburn on CD, this is not correct. Using shadowburn is a personal DPS increase if you’re the only Warlock using it on CD. Since it is an instant cast it has a very low spell power coefficient (42.86% of your spell power). You don’t want to have a spell with this low of a spell coefficient eat a stack of ISB. The only time you should shadowburn is when both ISB and nightfall debuff are on the boss or if the target will die before the next Shadowbolt will hit the boss before it dies.

[Gratlim]

So again, Warlocks do bad DPS but also have to slow down and stop dps so they don't pull aggro.

You people are nuts.

I never said it was "Bad". If you expect to reach Mages dps levels be it early in Classic or later on in Naxx, you're delusional though. With T3 they are god tier. Not many will get there though i guess. Before that they are top dogs with rogues.

As for the threat issue, it was explained earlier by others. I played SM/Ruin back then. But if you want to test it out, be my guest. Rogues and Mage have great threat mitigation tools. Locks do not.

[Mamut]

So again, Warlocks do bad DPS but also have to slow down and stop dps so they don't pull aggro.

You people are nuts.

Today dps = aggro but in Vanilla there were spells that generated more aggro even when doing low dps. So yeah you could pull aggro with bad dps.

"You people are nuts."

[Heathy]

its group comp right so if you have 3-4 warlocks then you put them in a group with a boomkin and you have a shadow priest for shadow weaving, your warlocks keep curse of elements up so they make the mages do more damage, and the shadow priest makes your warlocks do more damage. I don't think its really that min/max orientated in the sense that you need perfect comps the exact amount of class x and y, so long as you have a good mix of classes, things will die. i bet every raid is slightly different in terms of how many of each class they take. but I think it was more about what you bring as that class, over needing to be the best dps. individual ppls dps isn't as important as doing the thing that only your class can do.

[Thage]

Also keep in mind most guilds will want a warlock or two along just for the utility summoning brings to the raid. Many guilds seem to treat any DPS you bring along as a nice bonus when compared to how insanely useful summoning rituals are (since you only need a handful of the raid to get there to help the warlock summon everyone else). Also keep in mind that with 16 debuff slots available from launch rather than patched in later, you could possibly be put on curse duty, which will make you more valuable to the raid as those curses generally allow everyone to do more damage or cause the boss to do less damage, making life easier on your tanks and healers.

[jackofwind]

Warlocks start to shine as raid DPS when Bloodvine is released, but before that it's an absolute struggle to get %Hit gear.

[Meanshield]

Played a healer in all of vanilla, so didnt really pay attention to damage. However I do know warlocks were great once T3 was out, however that's very deep into the game.