Hello,
Can someone explain cleaving?
For example, the wowhead notes for G’huun include this statement:
The group should kill the Dark Young as the second priority, mainly by cleaving damage off of the Cyclopean Terrors onto the Dark Young.
Thanks
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simply put, some of your attacks on the primary target will also damage enemies near it. Some spells/attacks do cleave damage, some don’t. the spell tooltip will generally indicate if they do or not.
the tanks should drag the dark young and tank them near cyclopean terrors. when those terrors are dead, the young should be moved to others. so as people damage the terrors, the cleave damage will damage the dark young.
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This.
Use spells that deal damage to more than one target to deal their secondary damage to the dark young and primary damage to the cyclopean terrors. Basically the dark young need to die but not as fast as the cyclopean terrors and cleaving increases your overall damage output instead of just single target focusing the primary targets.
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Leaving the dark young alive is handy as you get a damage buff so the eyestalks are easier to kill. It’s real nice when you have two…you do take more damage however.
People always seem to zone in on the dark young for some reason.
Simply put, any damage ability that damages enemies that isn’t your current target.
Think of it like splash damage. That’s a pretty close analogy.
EDIT: Now hopefully I don’t have to explain splash damage : )
like if my rotation was I targeted one enemy and I only hit heartstrike and blood boil.
oh wait.
Cleaving, should relate to damage on targets that are not the primary, by means of spells that do both damage to the target and as few as one other. So for an example, Havoc as a Destruction Warlock, is a cleave spell that costs only a GCD but no resources. Thereby, the next 3 spells cast would be cleave damage if I havoced a second target, focused. Cataclysm is another Cleave spell for Destuction, but it does border on the more pure AOE spell territory because it’s area of effect and doesn’t do damage to the target, per se, if you put your cursor outside of the mob’s range and cast it, no damage.
Or, as Demo, I can use Bilescourge Bombers, which again is a borderline AoE spell but like Cataclysm, can be used to cleave off of the main target, without necessarily switching. I can focus the target to be cleaved and be careful to make sure his body and the current target are within my reticule, but that’s the general premise of cleaving, to do damage to other targets without necessarily swapping to them or, using a more pure AoE rotation/priority.
Affliction’s cleaving ability would be Phantom Singularity as it does both damage to the target as well as damage to targets nearby without having to actually target them.
Melee have cleaving ability too, but I don’t play them as much, not sure if Swipe for Druid would count or be a more pure AoE ability like Rain of Fire, etc.
Great explanations! Thanks for the posts.
Jim, I haven’t heard the term “splash damage” before but (unlike cleave*) it’s quite descriptive and brought to mind some of my deftly-executed cannonballs (off the diving board as a teenager) which splashed cold water on several of the young lovelies sunbathing around the pool. 
*I earlier thought of cleave as something that carved-out or separated a target from surrounding mobs — sort of like laser-guided (surgical) airstrikes which attempt to minimize collateral damage — but now understand it’s just the opposite.
Probably aoe