How to improve my warlock

Anti

Afternoon fellas.

Armory link first : http://eu.wowarmory.com/character-sheet.xml?r=Moonglade&n=Mendez

I dinged my lock to 70 last week, and have been concentrating on getting its gear up. Ive taken shadow tailoring and plan to make myself the three piece set. And i know ive a few greens, but nothign better has dropped in instances yet, and yeah my trinkets are fairly bad too . The problem is i dont seem to be doing much DPS atm. Would i be best of to go destro ? instead of affliction ? My shadow bolts hit for around 1200 each, and crit for 2800 (max ive seen) I've also been told speccing fire is a waste of time too

Main problem is when doing heroics the mobs are dead before i get a chance to do damage, well thats after i layed down all the dots, im lucky to get in 2 SB's.

Any help, advice or links are very much appreciated.

Kiith

I generally just put on Curse of Agony and Siphon Life, followed by a shadow bolt or two (or more), finishing with Drain Life. You should get a few Nightfalls (assuming your Affliction specced) that way, increasing your dps. Plus, with Dark Pact, i have almost zero downtime.

I find i do decent damage with my gear, even though i'm only currently at +650 damage. I have only done one or two heroics so far though. I'm currently trying to get my tailoring to 375, as well as enchanting, so that will help. Get the 3 piece set, with some pvp gear, and you'll be flying.

Anti

First off, thats for the advice

Secondly, whats Dark Pact ? And whats a Nightfall, is that the instant SB i get every now and they ?

I usually hit them with full dots, CoA, unstable affliction etc etc all 4 of them and then a sypnon life.

Im currently trying to get the pvp wand and the bracer/waist. Leveling tailoring is a pain atm a some of the mats are stupidly expensive.

nix

affliction locks dont really shine till long fights (raids)

and tbh with how easy it is to get epics now i wouldnt bother leveling for the shadoweave set, save your gold imo

just ninja into a guild kara run or somethin

Kiith

Anti wrote: »

First off, thats for the advice

Secondly, whats Dark Pact ? And whats a Nightfall, is that the instant SB i get every now and they ?

I usually hit them with full dots, CoA, unstable affliction etc etc all 4 of them and then a syphon life.

Im currently trying to get the pvp wand and the bracer/waist. Leveling tailoring is a pain atm a some of the mats are stupidly expensive.

Nightfall is the instant Shadowbolt that is procced by Siphon Life and Corruption. Its dead handy when it does happen. Dark Pact is an instant mana drain from your pet. Your imp has very high spirit levels, so he generally goes to full mana during a fight, allowing you to drain (roughly) 3.5k mana from him afterward. For bosses, i put every dot i have on him, then shadowbolt till i cant no more, making sure to reapply any dots.

The only problem with CoA is that it only gets damaging towards the end of the spell, and if the mob dies quickly, its not really mana efficient. And as nix said, levelling tailoring is quite a pain, and with the easy availability of PvP epics now, it might not be worth it. The only reason i am bothering, is cause i am already at about 340.

Also, put +stam enchants and gems on everything :pac:

incubus

why +stam ?

Anti

I was told to go for as much +hit as i needed it in aff/destro spec.

Im at 350 tailoring atm so can make the hands, but already have the T4 hands fro my first kara run.

Ivan

incubus wrote: »

why +stam ?

Because it increases survivability and your mana pool with life tap.

incubus

surely if he is trying to increase his dps going for hit or damage enchant/gems would be more beneficial? Also with dark pact he shouldnt really have mana problems especially not in 5 mans

Anti

Nah i dont have a mana problem at all. No issues there. Didnt even have issues on the curator/shade/ilhoof fights, healers will pop a hot on me as soon as i hit 25% mana and start life tapping like a mofo. Problem is dps, im hitting 430max atm. But in 5mans im hitting 200-300 max on mobs as they die before i get to do any real damage. I guess i will also have to look at the way i use the spells, as it seems very mana-inefficient to pop on all the dot's. Maybe corruption and coa as they are both instant cast, and immo followed up with SB's ?

DarthWraak

Heres some gear suggestions, that shouldnt be too hard to get if you have the cash/time to farm for

Head - Spellstrike hood (tailoring), or T4
Neck - Shattered Sun pendent (get exalted with SSO), Prince drops a good crit one too
Shoulders - FSW, as you said yourself
Back - Dont worry about, decent cloaks drop in Kara a lot
Robe - FSW with +6 stats
Wrists - Pretty good, Id prefer them over the ones from maiden tbh
Hands - Good, but you should have put +hit on them I think
Waist - Belt of Blasting (tailoring)
Pants - Decent enough for starting raiding, but aim for Spellstrike pants (tailoring)
Boots - FSW with vitality, 12 stam or boar speed
Rings - Okay for now, the badge ring would be great for you, and get exalted with scryers for the crit ring
Trinkets - The first thing you should spend your badges on is the Icon of the Silver Cresant. I still use it in PvE and PvP. Trinket number two would have to be the Scryers bloodgem, and when you are hit capped (202) go for Quag's eye, drops off the last boss in H slave pens
Weapon - Gemmed pretty good and is a good starter off, but if you are farming honor go for the merc spellblade. With a decent offhand, such as the badge one (orb of the soul eater) it will bring your spl damage right up.
Wand - The Black Stalk drops in heroic Underbog, Aran also drops a spell hit wand

Spec is good, Im glad you went affliction. So many nublet locks go 0/21/40 straight away in greens, makes me sigh irl . Destro doesnt become efficient until you are hit capped and have around 20% crit rating. One thing I do recommend though is maybe take 2 points out of SE and put them in amplify curse/CoEx. Amplified CoD on Curator is teh lol ^^, and if you get as far as SSC CoEx will be needed .

As for your problem in heroics, for trash use curse of elements and SB spam. For bosses put on your dots then SB spam.

Hope that helps!

Kiith

What spec are you btw? I cant see your armoury link as i'm in work. If you have Siphon Life, its a must cast in any fight. I cant really comment on Destruction though, as i have never specced futher then 11 points into it.

incubus

give EJ Warlock PVE Raiding Compendium a read. Some of the tips regarding gear and such is a bit dated but regarding specs and rotations not much has changed.
Personally i would recommend a dot timer mod and dont be afraid to dot multiple targets.
The 2 points in grim reach wouldnt be bad either but not in any way game breaking

DRakE

i've never played a warlock past 20..

but hwo can you not have some kind of rotation figured out if you've levelled all the way to 70

DarthWraak

incubus wrote: »

give EJ Warlock PVE Raiding Compendium a read. Some of the tips regarding gear and such is a bit dated but regarding specs and rotations not much has changed.
Personally i would recommend a dot timer mod and dont be afraid to dot multiple targets.
The 2 points in grim reach wouldnt be bad either but not in any way game breaking

That thread is amazing, I remember reading up on it like a bible when my lock got 70

Anti

DRakE wrote: »

i've never played a warlock past 20..

but hwo can you not have some kind of rotation figured out if you've levelled all the way to 70

It was my first toon i created just before last xmas. I was demon spec all the way to 70 so i just sent in the minion(felguard) and dotted em up. Then life drain. But i cant do that with a VW as it holds **** all aggro.

My rotation isnt that bad, but could be better i guess.

@ Darth, thanks for that lad. Exactally what i was lookng for egar wise. Much appreciated.

Sykk

Hey there mate,

For your gear I'd spec affliction, Keep Corruption, Curse of agony and curse of (Cant remember name, one that increases shadow damage taken) then spam drain life.

Then when you get lucky with your drops, slap in + hit/speldam or + crit/spelldam and spec destro, can be very boring as the only thing that spec does is spam shadow bolt. Hope this helped.

Kiith

Sykk wrote: »

Hey there mate,

For your gear I'd spec affliction, Keep Corruption, Curse of agony and curse of (Cant remember name, one that increases shadow damage taken) then spam drain life.

Then when you get lucky with your drops, slap in + hit/speldam or + crit/spelldam and spec destro, can be very boring as the only thing that spec does is spam shadow bolt. Hope this helped.

Thats curse of elements, and dont forget Siphon Life!

Sykk

That it is! I hate locks..! Dot, Dot, Dot, Aggro!

pedro ferio-vti

Would recommend not using immolate on mobs as there's too much downtime casting it, just use insta dots on thrash and all relevant dots on bosses. Some macros would certainly help too. Have a 35 lock myself and they can be quite tricky to play effectively i've found, I rolled one because they seem to own quite easily in PvP but now it seems they do require a fair bit of skill to play.

Would recommend Necrosis as an addon too, it's pretty awesome. Needs a small bit of configuring but I really like it, has shoutouts for when you get nightfalls, if a mob is immune to fear, if it's a demon and can be banished etc. Can also keep track of dots on mobs too.

Anti

cheers, will give that a go.

Einstein

Hey great thread,
I too am affliction specced. bout 100k from 69 and also looking to better.

http://eu.wowarmory.com/character-sheet.xml?r=Hellfire&n=Audiumata

thats my link...but tbh it's not too impressive...

Will def take a look at the necrosis AO aswell.

You happy with your lock Anti? Get much PvP use with him?

Anti

Not doign vast ammount of pvp as my pvp gear is so poor. Only have merci shoulders and dreadweave robe. Not got the rep to get the rest. Took me ages to get this toon to 70 as i was always on my hunter. So when i did play i was always at double XP so never spent much time in instances.

Overall im happy enough, really need to sort out the gear and gems though. Still kara this weekend so will hope to pick up the blade and t4 from prince and a few other pieces along the way. Then ZA on monday so hopefully a few more. And then Grull next friday, but will probably take the hunter there as thats pushing out upto 900dps.

MrShadow

check out http://be.imba.hu/?zone=EU&realm=moonglade&character=mendez

for affliction your over the hit cap and for destruction spells your under.
which means points wasted in supression.

If your the only lock in the group with no shadow priest then your spell rotation should be UA, Corruption, Agony, Immolate, shadow bolt, shadow bolt.....

trick here is as soon as the mob is pulled start casting UA, 2 secs cast and 3 secs before the first tick = 5 secs for tank to get agro, UA and corruption should be applied together as they run out together makes it easier to refresh your dots.

If you really want to shine as affliction you should set up macros and use focus targets. idea is to be able to cast curruption and agony on the off tanks target.

Anti

MrShadow wrote: »

check out http://be.imba.hu/?zone=EU&realm=moonglade&character=mendez

for affliction your over the hit cap and for destruction spells your under.
which means points wasted in supression.

If your the only lock in the group with no shadow priest then your spell rotation should be UA, Corruption, Agony, Immolate, shadow bolt, shadow bolt.....

trick here is as soon as the mob is pulled start casting UA, 2 secs cast and 3 secs before the first tick = 5 secs for tank to get agro, UA and corruption should be applied together as they run out together makes it easier to refresh your dots.

If you really want to shine as affliction you should set up macros and use focus targets. idea is to be able to cast curruption and agony on the off tanks target.

Cheers for that. I have been casting curses on the OT's targets as well, and in big groups using SOC and spamming SB at it.. Gives a nice ammount of damage to mobs around it, but usually aggros them. But i have a -aggro trinket and use soulshatter if that dosent drop the aggro. But being over the HC is nice to know. I can throw some mana regen or spell damage gems now. Would really like to get upto 800+ spell damage.

romdjoll

Just a note to add to what the others have been saying - be very very careful about using Seed of Corruption in instances - waaaaay too much aggro. I generally only use it against mech targets when all trash has been cleared. Destro is only viable as a raiding spec and you need serious epic gear for useful damage bonuses. It's incredibly frustrating for pve (esp. the daily grind). In instances it's generally the destro lock casting Curse of the Elements (+ shadow/fire/frost dmg) and backing up with shadow bolts aplenty. By all means as an afflock use your bolts, but they are secondary to lining up your DoTs, keeping your imp on passive (stam boost and mana pot) and really only need to be used on bosses (unless nightfall has procced - then boom one out instantly).
Necrosis is really handy, and don't forget to get your 28-slot soul bag (once tailoring is at 375) as you'll need to be carrying at least 28 shards around for heroics/raiding. Get your gloves and rings enchanted with +spell damage and you'll notice the improvement instantly. Also, it helps to have a macro to allow you to use +spell damage trinkets and amplify curse when they're off cooldown.
*Shuffles off to level yet another alt*

Anti

I was under the impression that only enchanters can enchant ring (being their own rings) Or has this chnaged ?

dlofnep

I've a 70 lock - haven't played him in months though. He's destro spec. Much more fun to play than affliction spec.

gino85

when i had the shadow weave set i only used the imp and dotted everything in sight, was really easy as an afflic lock to grind could pick up 5 or so mobs and then start drain life bashing

i put my dots on a loladin i know and they done over 12k dmg after they ticked down but i got over 1100 shadow dmg

DarthWraak

Manties wrote: »

I was under the impression that only enchanters can enchant ring (being their own rings) Or has this chnaged ?

nope

romdjoll

My bad - getting op mixed up with the chap that was levelling his enchanting.
Should not post when half-asleep....