1. #1

    Help With Affliction

    Hey warlocks, I've been running dungeons with my guild and noticed that my DPS is the lowest of our raid team, and as our raid leader I'd like to set a good example. My DPS ranges from 35k to 45k, depending on how much moving I have to do, and SimCraft lists my DPS as a potential of 55k~. I've used the guides listed here and I feel like my rotation is right, but I'm just not seeing the same numbers our enhance shaman, windwalker monk and frost deathknight are pulling, sometimes I'm not even in spitting distance of their numbers and I'd appreciate some tips or just a slap on the wrist for bad gearing, enchants, rotation, etc.

    The rotation I'm using for bosses is Curse of the Elements > SB:SS > Haunt> Dark Soul> Malefic Grasp > Refresh DoTs > Haunt (when available) > Drain Soul -20% health.

    Here's my armory, (sorry I can't post links yet, finally made an account) my enchants aren't optimal I know, I'm waiting for better gear before I spend 2k on shoulder and pant enchants. Any help is greatly appreciated, thanks!
    us. battle.net/wow/en/character/nagrand/Toofsday/simple
    Last edited by Mhael; 2012-10-10 at 06:19 AM.

  2. #2
    Blademaster planktin's Avatar
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    this is the nature of affliction, I had the same doubts while gearing up. I thought warriors DK's and mages were effortlessly pulling 60k in dungeons while i struggled to keep up. As you gear you will naturally start doing more on single target bosses then AOE and eventually overall damage. DPS can be misleading as affliction, to keep yourself up track your Boss damage done relevant to the other classes and you'll notice its significantly higher. It's not a spec where you can cut corners and be lazy either. Some tips I can give you are to
    A)Make sure your dots have enough duration to channel MG/DS for the full duration of your haunt
    B)Dots are reactive to buffs, so refresh accordingly
    C)Abuse Drain Soul to maximize Soul Shard generation

    Good luck

  3. #3
    Thanks, I'll keep all that in mind!

  4. #4
    I think with SB :SS you can get 2 "sets" of the Dark Soul Buff before it expires.

  5. #5
    I'm the same way. I pulled around 51k dps with 463 gear last week, took some advice on here and stat weighted in favor of mastery in spite of hit only to barely see a DPS increase and even a loss on most.

    My hit was 8% and I missed godly amounts of hits. Agony dropping off is a huge dps loss, and I had 2-3 resists in a row reapplying. I found myself using SB:SS just to make up for the time I was missing on my dot applications. I'm thinking I'll be reforging back to around 13-14% and see if this can help. I can handle missing a dot here or there, but not to the extent I was experiencing misses.

    I'd really like to see some plots showing haste/mastery benefits as you scale higher in gear. I'm nearing 470 and finding myself rarely hitting 55k on Feng.

    I'd recommend finding the right balance for your preference if you choose to not be hit capped. It seems most of the top Aff locks are not hit capped.

  6. #6
    Blademaster planktin's Avatar
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    Also I noticed you put "Demon Soul" after Haunt in regards to your rotation. I'm assuming you mean Dark Soul and if so you should cast this prior to your SB:Soul Swap as DoTs are reactive to buffs and its a 30% haste buff. As a general rule I suggest you refresh dots right before the end of your Dark Soul as well. You will also want to consider taking professions that benefit your dps. Although I believe gathering professions are not befitting a raiding main, if you are gathering to aid your guild resources, Herbalism would be the better choice in Afflictions case due to the haste buff Lifeblood provides as opposed to the Stamina provided by Mining.

    ---------- Post added 2012-10-09 at 11:16 PM ----------

    Quote Originally Posted by Hemsky View Post
    I'm the same way. I pulled around 51k dps with 463 gear last week, took some advice on here and stat weighted in favor of mastery in spite of hit only to barely see a DPS increase and even a loss on most.

    My hit was 8% and I missed godly amounts of hits. Agony dropping off is a huge dps loss, and I had 2-3 resists in a row reapplying. I found myself using SB:SS just to make up for the time I was missing on my dot applications. I'm thinking I'll be reforging back to around 13-14% and see if this can help. I can handle missing a dot here or there, but not to the extent I was experiencing misses.

    I'd really like to see some plots showing haste/mastery benefits as you scale higher in gear. I'm nearing 470 and finding myself rarely hitting 55k on Feng.

    I'd recommend finding the right balance for your preference if you choose to not be hit capped. It seems most of the top Aff locks are not hit capped.
    During his "earthquake" your chance to hit is reduced by 75% I believe, take this into consideration and refresh your dots and get your MG channeling prior his cast

  7. #7
    Casting Dark Soul before SB:SS makes a lot sense, don't see how I missed that. Thanks.

  8. #8
    Quote Originally Posted by planktin View Post

    During his "earthquake" your chance to hit is reduced by 75% I believe, take this into consideration and refresh your dots and get your MG channeling prior his cast
    Oh, definitely. I'd just DS during unshielded phases. I'm talking about all encounters!

  9. #9
    Hey, im kinda wondering to. I pull avg. 55k in raids, on sim with my gear im avg. 74k. What am I possible doing wrong? I DS, SB, SS, Haunt -> MG, refreshing dots at about 50% and refreshing when I have 1 or more SP procs up. Kinda wondering, since I think its wierd that I pull this little compared to my gear.

    eu .battle.net/wow/en/character/auchindoun/Wazzap/advanced

  10. #10
    Are you only casting Haunt if you have time to channel MG for its entire duration? Refreshing dots while the Haunt debuff is on target is a dps loss.

  11. #11
    The timing of Dark Soul doesn't really mater much in the long run because compared to the rest of your rotation.

    First cap your hit, reforge it if needed because missing a single spell is a bigger dps loss then getting 1% haste. See it like this you having to recast a dot is a bigger lose then that very dot does a little bit more damage (because improving a single stats only improves your dps a little bit), instead of using MG to do more damage you had to spend that single MG tick recasting the spell that you missed.


    Second how do you compare your dps to the rest of the raid? Are you just looking at overall (so trash included) or just bosses. Personally I never topped dps overall because my dps on trash mobs isn't the best even if I'm top dps on every single fight.

    Affliction warlocks just aren't good for short period of fights no mater what blizzard does.

    First I would remove the reforing where you exchanged hit for haste
    Second it is my understanding that because of MG haste is better for warlocks then mastery so don't remove haste for mastery.
    Finally if you wish to max your dps then lvl 2 crafting professions

  12. #12
    Blademaster planktin's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Haffmaistro View Post
    Hey, im kinda wondering to. I pull avg. 55k in raids, on sim with my gear im avg. 74k. What am I possible doing wrong? I DS, SB, SS, Haunt -> MG, refreshing dots at about 50% and refreshing when I have 1 or more SP procs up. Kinda wondering, since I think its wierd that I pull this little compared to my gear.

    eu .battle.net/wow/en/character/auchindoun/Wazzap/advanced
    Simcraft is based on optimal settings, no movement, uninterrupted key smashing with no human error on a single target boss fight. when you say 55k average dps are you referring to bossfights or overall including trash. If boss fight only, this doesn't really justify a 20k dps deficit. Are you Flasked, prepotting, and potting again coordinated with big cooldowns? Summoning Doom Guard? Does your raid have every possible buff and debuff on the target? If you are constantly refreshing at 50% elapsed(especially on Superbuffed DoT's) on dots You are using more GCD than you need to. This time can be spent channeling MG more. Also the nature of the encounter can alter your dps. Fight mechanics can up your dps ie Elegon; or lower DPS ie Feng's Epicenter.

    I just wanted to add; look at your parse from your damage meters and compare it to the simcraft breakdown of time spent on each spell, and damage done by each spell.
    Last edited by planktin; 2012-10-10 at 06:30 PM.

  13. #13
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    Not sure what is going on with some of y'all. I wasn't able to run mogushan last week since I wasn't quite 90 yet. Because others had the experience from last week didn't get in this weeks raid either, but found a guild group running looking for one dps so I joined. Other than reading strats never went in there or had experience. I have 463 ilvl gear and the only epic is the hit/haste boots, from where I can't remember, but a lot of people are wearing them. I reforged for hit cap and haste. I was easily pulling 60k, some of the more perfectly executed attempts I was pulling over 85k during portions of the fight. My only contender in the group was a mage decked out in about 4 or 5 epics including relic of yulon. He outgeared me by quite a bit and we were always back and forth for 1 and 2 on dps. Pretty much the same for Feng as well. Pushing well over 60k most of the time

  14. #14
    Quote Originally Posted by Explosions View Post
    Not sure what is going on with some of y'all. I wasn't able to run mogushan last week since I wasn't quite 90 yet. Because others had the experience from last week didn't get in this weeks raid either, but found a guild group running looking for one dps so I joined. Other than reading strats never went in there or had experience. I have 463 ilvl gear and the only epic is the hit/haste boots, from where I can't remember, but a lot of people are wearing them. I reforged for hit cap and haste. I was easily pulling 60k, some of the more perfectly executed attempts I was pulling over 85k during portions of the fight. My only contender in the group was a mage decked out in about 4 or 5 epics including relic of yulon. He outgeared me by quite a bit and we were always back and forth for 1 and 2 on dps. Pretty much the same for Feng as well. Pushing well over 60k most of the time
    Pretty sure the OP was asking for help... not to hear how awesome you are

  15. #15
    Quote Originally Posted by Mhael View Post
    Hey warlocks, I've been running dungeons with my guild and noticed that my DPS is the lowest of our raid team, and as our raid leader I'd like to set a good example. My DPS ranges from 35k to 45k, depending on how much moving I have to do, and SimCraft lists my DPS as a potential of 55k~. I've used the guides listed here and I feel like my rotation is right, but I'm just not seeing the same numbers our enhance shaman, windwalker monk and frost deathknight are pulling, sometimes I'm not even in spitting distance of their numbers and I'd appreciate some tips or just a slap on the wrist for bad gearing, enchants, rotation, etc.

    The rotation I'm using for bosses is Curse of the Elements > SB:SS > Haunt> Dark Soul> Malefic Grasp > Refresh DoTs > Haunt (when available) > Drain Soul -20% health.

    Here's my armory, (sorry I can't post links yet, finally made an account) my enchants aren't optimal I know, I'm waiting for better gear before I spend 2k on shoulder and pant enchants. Any help is greatly appreciated, thanks!
    us. battle.net/wow/en/character/nagrand/Toofsday/simple
    I would change your opener slightly, use all on use cd's, dark soul, pot, trinkets, racial, 1 second BEFORE pull (so u get another pot later) and then start ur current rotation. Dots work with your current stats, they don't get stronger if you use cd's after they are applied.

    Edit: Also i see you are using the brewfest trinket Mithril Wristwatch? I would recommend trading it for Flashfrozen Resin Globule off of Vizier Jin'bak in Niuzao Temple. Crit is one of our worst stats and it almost all just going to waste. It will help you reach hit cap while not taking away from other more usefull stats. Also i see your hit is a little low, 13.77% you should be aiming for 15% for 0% miss on raid bosses. You can now use expertise on a 1-1 ratio with hit, so it's even easier to reach cap than ever before. (Getting exp and hit on some items) Hope this helps some!
    Last edited by Slure; 2012-10-11 at 07:31 AM.
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