And non of those reasons are goods, avatar of destruction is amazing and it fit’s the fantasy of being a “Destruction” Warlock, people want to see their Inferno more frequent not less, if you feel avatar of destruction undermines Inferno, then that’s not Avatars fault, that’s Inferno issues. You should make that spell more impactful, not make it more impactful by removing other options.
Honestly their should be a spell to summon a horde of infernos and not just one in my opinion, it really feels like you guys just want to remove all the cool Demon pets for Warlock
First it was doomguards which still hasn’t been fixed and now infernos, what’s the point of “class Fantasy” if you all are going to constantly remove them…
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As an avid and loyal Destruction player myself, I have to say that this change of removing Avatar is a bad move. It undermines ritual of ruins place in the tree as they were connected being Sepulchers 2/4 set bonuses. Which was one of the best tier set bonuses we’ve had in a long time. Better than any in DF anyways…
Avatar is great simply because it helped smooth out the rotation from being so slow , it was like a mini cooldown phase, it got you excited to cast that last spell to literally rain destruction! Remove the stun , its alright we wont miss the stun that much compared to how good it made the rotation feel. Besides avatar may have shared the same model as infernal but it was purple. Most of us didn’t see it as the same. If you guys wanna bring back some class fantasy Id like to see the return of the WoD talent : Charred Remains.
For those who don’t remember it was a togglable buff like Fire n Brimstone used to be, only it enhanced it to not only make your incinerates hit multiple targets but all your other main rotation abilities as well. Making your conflag burst or cleave, would split Chaos Bolt into 3 smaller bolts that hit in an area around the target, spread immolate to other targets (forgot how many) as well as the Fire and Brimstone baseline affects. As someone who played back then, it was a great hit of Dopamine to fit that “Destruction” vibe. It could be a choice node with Demonfire bolt but having all of these nice toys in the toolkit would make the spec way more fun to play.
So just a TLDR : Keep Avatar of Destruction - remove the stun if you feel its too powerful, its too fun to remove all together. Bring back Charred Remains - its a fun AoE talent from Wod that really fit the fantasy!
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They aren’t wrong that the random AOE stun can cause problem, IE 3rd boss of Uldaman or Sanguine week.
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Seems like this post belongs in the Warlock class forum, not General Discussion; you even quoted from a different thread…
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They could just remove the stun. 
But yes. To echo my sentiments in another thread on the Lock class forums, I think it’s a huge shame they’re removing AOD. I’d rather AOD over Infernal so to remove it because it overshadows Infernal, just seems backwards logic to me.
I’ve not really enjoyed Destro since WoD but the closest I came to igniting that spark again for a spec I once loved was Shadowlands with AOD was the tier set.
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I agree with any change that makes warlock not fun to play, even better if they struggle to keep up with tanks in damage.
Warlocks are the single most nerfed class since launch of the game. Them taking away AoD isn’t even a minor set back, let alone an inconvenient struggle.
Do I want AoD to be taken away and replaced with Moldy Noodle Bolt? No, but like all the nerfs before hand and many more to come, I’ll deal with it and continue to play my lock and have fun with it.
I do get what they are saying. Having a fairly regular bonus stun is a pretty big advantage in some scenarios, but also can be bad in the wrong ones and you don’t really have much control over it unless you just stop casting. But overall it is powerful as utility and as a source of soul shard generation.
That being said, something big will need to replace it as a cap for ritual of ruin I think. Decimating bolt could be good, but if they just put it in avatar of destruction’s place, that seems awkward to me unless it gets some interaction with it.
As far as inferno goes, I hope the changes are good and that it’s not just a straight nerf to make cataclysm competitive. I don’t see how it will help us with aoe burst or short lived adds since we’ve mostly lacked that after the changes to fire and brimstone. Maybe something else will compensate though.
Actually it sounds like decimating bolt may be replacing soul fire? We will see what other changes come down the pipeline, but I hope we get a solid replacement for avatar of destruction.
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It doesn’t overshadow the infernal, just lessons the impact. One of the iconic things is the aoe stun and damage. We’ve been summoning a lot of lesser infernals throughout a dungeon, so that makes it less impactful.
It’s going to be a shame to lose it, but hopefully they replace it with something solid.
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I’m very bothered by this direction they’re moving in for destruction, I really enjoy the current playstyle that was introduced in SL. The stun from Avatar and runaway soul gen from inferno gave a very impactful moment to moment gameplay loop in mythic plus that I will miss. Especially if these changes are being made with no replacement, as it stands they’re only removing AoE gameplay loops and not adding any new ones. Destruction in its current state has a gameplay niche in all AoE which will not be replaced. I hope they get enough feedback to change course.
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I didn’t even mention the thematic implications of removing blasphemy or rain of fire spam, in no way would a decimating bolt readdition replace the hole that would be created. We summon fire demons. Decimating bolt is not even fire. There is nothing thematic about it.
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Great way to accept things outside of your control. I agree, I’m not a dev and this sucks, but what can I do about it? Nothing. I’ll keep on playing my warlock as has always been. Please don’t call me a sh** eater. We have no choice
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It is getting replaced with Decimating Bolt. A mild nudge back to Incinerate spamming nonsense, while wanting to put the least picked talents as baseline, while removing and tuning up things.
It says they are “reworking Decimating” so either it needs a big enough bonus to all abilities to benefit from picking or really something impactful to warrant such a change by a large portion of the Warlock players.
Impending Catastrophe from the Venthyr coven would have been a better pick versus the Maldrax moldy bolt.
Feels like a very wordy and round about way of nerfing warlocks without making the claim “we’re nerfing warlocks.” I mean, c’mon. Warlocks have been through more than enough meat grinders to understand what is happening, just detail it straight
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I haven’t seen the new alpha tree yet, but that just seems so weird if decimating bolt is taking avatar of destruction’s spot. It doesn’t connect with ritual of ruin at all, unless they are also adjusting or moving that around or heavily reworking decimating bolt.
I played kyrian in SL and I really liked the tithe ability. Of course that’s not very warlock themed, but they’ve reworked the visuals of some covenant abilities before like the feyline stomp for monks.
I’ll have to go try and find the new tree online and see what the positions look like.
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I’ve learned to give up on Blizzard and Warlocks.
Maybe it’s because it’s always one of the top classes ?
Remind me again why warlocks have highest HP pools across all dps classes? They used to because of life tap, that’s irrelevant anymore. Why do they have access to an insane HP pool, passive shields with soul leech, dark pact on a ridiculous low cd, and a wall?
There’s always one spec that’s completely broken either in raid in M+.
Destro recently got buffed, they didn’t need it AT ALL. There were specs below it in both in AoE and ST that didn’t receive anything. But previous warlocks can’t be at the bottom, nope, that would be a disaster right?
Not sure why you have such a personal grievance and vendetta against those who play warlocks.
Given your first comment here, seems pretty low to wish people who play a random class you don’t know some form distain.
You could put in a ticket with these loaded questions here to truly get an answer, though you seem more inclined on seeking attention to vent out what ever frustrations you actually might have.
I alt warlock this patch, my warlock has 15 less ilvl than my main, I play it like garbage and I still out-dps my main by a wide margin. Wowanalyzer tells me I play my main spec mostly right, and that I play warlock like garbage.
Numbers don’t lie. Warlocks are and always were broken. Nothing wrong with being at the bottom for a little while, I hope the class experiences it for a first time.
As someone who has played the class since launch, there have definitely been times over the years when various warlock specs have been at the bottom of the pile.
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I’m really hoping they read the feedback and go back on this change