How can i improve my Demonology play?

[Deleted]

Hello MMOchampion,

I am a Demonology Warlock and i consider myself pretty decent at it. However, i want to get even better with this considering it's my favourite spec. This is a rather good parse of me on Atramedes, which i consider a pretty good fight for measuring aptness with your spec.

WORLDOFLOGSDOTCOM /reports/rt-atz6ffrv6in31cy9/details/2/?s=2363&e=2733

This is another one from Chimaeron: /reports/rt-atz6ffrv6in31cy9/sum/damageDone/?s=4126&e=4402#Kanaxai

(Sorry, can't post links yet.)

My armoury is Kanaxai on Al'Akir EU.

I am looking for the non obvious things to improve my play, and the ins and outs of my spec.

Thanks in advance,
Kanaxai

[Deleted]

What's up with the lack of Shadowflame? Atramedes and Chimaeron's hitboxes are huge. Keep SF on cooldown, it'll also strengthen your puppy's Shadowbites. Your Dot-uptimes should be a little higher, close to 99%.
Haven't looked at your armory yet but you should use BoD with proccs (Volcanic Destruction especially) / Meta + Demon Soul. Refreshing it at ~14 seconds (again, Volcanic Destruction 45s CD is very useful in that case) helps keeping uptime at almost 100%.
You've used Fel Flame a lot during Atramedes, but I doubt it was because of the 4-set-procc ... either you've been targeted by his flame and you've kept running a lot or you're just running around because of the sonar bombs. Usually I just keep casting SBs / HoGs and hop out if a bomb targets me. 98% of the tries I get out in time.

[Deleted]

What's up with the lack of Shadowflame? Atramedes and Chimaeron's hitboxes are huge. Keep SF on cooldown, it'll also strengthen your puppy's Shadowbites. Your Dot-uptimes should be a little higher, close to 99%.
Haven't looked at your armory yet but you should use BoD with proccs (Volcanic Destruction especially) / Meta + Demon Soul. Refreshing it at ~14 seconds (again, Volcanic Destruction 45s CD is very useful in that case) helps keeping uptime at almost 100%.
You've used Fel Flame a lot during Atramedes, but I doubt it was because of the 4-set-procc ... either you've been targeted by his flame and you've kept running a lot or you're just running around because of the sonar bombs. Usually I just keep casting SBs / HoGs and hop out if a bomb targets me. 98% of the tries I get out in time.

Unfortunately i consider these one of the obvious things. I cannot get my hands on DMC: Volcano and i use Shadowflame whenever possible however i cannot stand in melee range during this fight. Or close enough to use Shadowflame. Your other advice on Atramedes is, however, much appreciated.

[Deleted]

Unfortunately i consider these one of the obvious things. I cannot get my hands on DMC: Volcano and i use Shadowflame whenever possible however i cannot stand in melee range during this fight. Or close enough to use Shadowflame. Your other advice on Atramedes is, however, much appreciated.

Get a range addon. As I mentioned, both Atramedes and Chimaeron have huge hitboxes ... you can stand in the rangecamp (well at least in our raids in the range camp) and Shadowflame still hits ... and you have more than enough spare time to get out of sonar ... pulse thingies.
And at least in the Atramedes fight Shadowflame's been used only a few times while it's uptime should be (considering the flight phases) about ~30-40%

[lightgil]

Yeah on atramedes fight you can stand a good 20 yds away from him and still hit him with sflame it seems lol

[frshovinstuf]

I've been playing warlock for a while now and unfortunately demo has become more of a supplementary spec for raids. In 10 man I'm not sure you can afford to have one unless you're doing a Maloriak style fight. 25m should have a 'token' demo lock, but due to play style I feel demo is overall lacking on single target fights such as your Atremedes/Chimeron. Even if you play demo perfect it doesn't have the execution boost that affy or the general strength of destro.

It's been my experience that most locks go PVE affy/destro main spec and then demo as off for aoe fights. But i feel for ya man, demo is fun but it's a little cumbersome and lacks single target strength. Maybe a bit of a dmg boost for decimation and molten core procs are needed. Wouldn't mind hearing more feed back though, I've been seeing good things at high lvls of mastery instead of haste. Anybody have good luck with this?

[Deleted]

It's been my experience that most locks go PVE affy/destro main spec and then demo as off for aoe fights. But i feel for ya man, demo is fun but it's a little cumbersome and lacks single target strength. Maybe a bit of a dmg boost for decimation and molten core procs are needed. Wouldn't mind hearing more feed back though, I've been seeing good things at high lvls of mastery instead of haste. Anybody have good luck with this?

Always been, always will be Demonology.
Always top 3 DPS, only outdamaged by our hunter who's got a few 372s more than I have.
Haste is just enough for new corruption tick (~1990 or something), Mastery gives me a 50% damage bonus in metamorphosis and Doomguard and Fel Hunter hit like trucks with crits up to 70 / 80k.

[Penguin FTW]

The dps in your raid are probably doing something wrong if they are consistently losing to a demo lock

[Monkeyy4]

Well played demo dps is actually pretty good right now.

Just because a demo lock is at the top does not mean the other dps are slacking

[lightgil]

Well played demo dps is actually pretty good right now.

Just because a demo lock is at the top does not mean the other dps are slacking

This theres really no real class that matches or exceeds my dps easily

[Penguin FTW]

I guarantee I would as affliction ;-)

[Cirque]

Wouldn't mind hearing more feed back though, I've been seeing good things at high lvls of mastery instead of haste. Anybody have good luck with this?

I'm pretty sure Mastery > Haste for Demo locks, but you should probably sim this for yourself and see what stats turn up for your lock.

I looked it up:

Stat Priorities

This is subject to change depending on your actual gear setup.

Int >> Hit (to cap) > Mastery > Haste > Crit

Source: http://elitistjerks.com/f80/t110366-...n_4_1_updated/

[Deleted]

Mastery is recommended to be stacked once reaching the haste threshold of 1993 rating I believe. In pre- Hc gear haste sims as more valuable.

[Calabera]

Looking at the report - your shadow flame should be a bit higher as stated by previous posters - Chimearon and Atramedes have huge hit boxes you can stand behind the tank (keeping the required range) and still hit him. On atramedes you can stand a good 20-25 yards and still hit.


Your dot up-times should be a bit higher as well, seems as corruption is giving you a hard time to refresh or keep up as well as you are doing the other two. To reach 100% on Immolate make sure you cast it as fast as possible, when I roll as demo I start with HoG followed by Immo, BoD, Corr. For my playstyle seems optimal opener.

Demon soul and Meta, you should be having an equal amount of meta's and DS, some fights you have more of one than the other. Seeing as how DS benefits demo you should probably consider a macro.

#showtooltip
/cast Metamorphosis
/cast Demon Soul
/cast Immolation Aura

--- Hit it twice to make sure Immo aura goes off.

Fel flame on the move, better do little dps and refresh a dot while moving than just move.

I would replace your Figurine - Jeweled Serpent for a Theralion's Mirror as Demo benefits from mastery. Regardless of the pre-haste requirement this trinket would increase your DPS significantly.

[Metalfenrir]

Actually, the figurine is the 3rd best trinket for demo locks. Only behind DMC: Volcano and Heroic Bell.

Source: http://www.simulationcraft.org/410/W..._Trinkets.html

[god of lock and pala]

i would recomend using succubus on atremedes since it can hit boss while its in the air, so you dont miss out on pet dps 50% of the fight.

but if you just fire off guldan when its off cd, and keep bane up and corr there isnt much to improove, maybe use teleport to run and loose less dps. but the rotation is simple so not much to improove, just do the basics.

and as some stated yeah keep shadow flame up. but if ur out of range it is not something you run for. meta + charge is a way to solve it, but dont waste precious time running to get in range for it

[kushlol]

i would recomend using succubus on atremedes since it can hit boss while its in the air, so you dont miss out on pet dps 50% of the fight.

but if you just fire off guldan when its off cd, and keep bane up and corr there isnt much to improove, maybe use teleport to run and loose less dps. but the rotation is simple so not much to improove, just do the basics.

and as some stated yeah keep shadow flame up. but if ur out of range it is not something you run for. meta + charge is a way to solve it, but dont waste precious time running to get in range for it

Are you sure lash of pain hits while boss is in the air?

On topic you need to get rid of your mastery gems badly and try to get as much int as possible . Also getting enough haste to get additional ticks of corruptions and immolates are very important aswell.