How to Improve Affliction

Classes Warlock
42

You are correct some classes have seen feedback gathering in discord, but the same developer also feedback gathered in the PTR Feedback thread for said classes.

You are also correct, or at least, think you are correct that Class Forum Section is not usually visited by Developers.

But that does not mean all discords have Class Devs reading on them, and does not mean all forum channels aren’t read.

in particular, i have seen some sucess in feedback using the official feedback threads on PTR and BETA Forum channels.

Class Forum is better used to communicate with other players, check if people are in the same “page” and this helps in the sense of future feedback provided in those “official threads” when they are actively searching for feedback is more focused.

Sadly, Affliction Warlocks have always been in civil war with each other towards what they see as “true affliction”.

43

I agree which is why I said they are more likely to reach out to the class discords.

I think the issue is some people want the super easy style play of throw up dots and spam a filler and that playstyle doesn’t fit into the current game.

44

This doesn’t quite make sense. Plenty other classes deal large portions of their damage as DoTs and or needed to apply DoTs to unlock full effect even from their direct damage attacks, resource economy, etc.

What matters for M+ isn’t whether you have DoTs. It’s the average portion of throughput wasted against individual mobs’ time-to-kill (TTK) and collective pull’s effective TTK, which tends to improve as damage is dealt over less time, but not always.

Imagine there’s a spec with a 15s DoT and another with a 20s DoT, both of which are those spec’s openers. If the mob’s TTK is 38 seconds, the second will still be the better “fit” and thereby perform slightly better at that fight length, as the 12s DoT will optimally have to be reapplied a second time but waste far more of that application’s duration even while losing out on the filler cast replaced by the reapplication.

Not necessarily. Such changes, after all, could be as simple as causing remaining DoT damage on an enemy at time of death to be emitted (at increasingly reduced effect the greater the remaining duration) to nearby enemies or the DoTs themselves to be split over nearby enemies and added to the others’ durations (including as fresh partial afflictions), and/or Drain Soul causing DoTs to tick faster based on the target’s portion of missing health, etc. Still very much DoT-based, but recuperatively.

45

The only other dot spec is shadow priests and they don’t suffer from having to stack individual dots because shadowcrash applies all of them.

Shadow has to apply 2 dots versus Aff has to apply 4 and doesn’t have a shadow crash type of ability.

So just because other specs have dit damage doesn’t mean they operate the same.

Aff isn’t even in a terrible spot. It just requires big group pulls and isn’t likely to be meta. Doesn’t mean it’s unplayable.

Aff doesn’t have an issue dealing damage. It has an issue ramping up.

The specs that thrive in mplus don’t have ramp up times like Aff does.

46

Those are the same thing in any case worth talking about.

If you have a DoT that deals 400% of spell power in total, you’re not just “ramping up” unless you wouldn’t be able to get its full value anyways.

Those DoTs are frequently going to be your highest potency-per-uptime attacks if you even remotely consider their contribution to MR as part of the effect that unlocks that bonus instead of the spender that would be useless without them.

Which you should, because each cast embonused by that DoT is adding to the maximum potency the DoT can contribute over its duration — again, a matter of whether that duration goes partly to waste or not.

As for whether no spec of value in M+ has ramp up (or even specifically ramp GCDs to be able to reach normal/decent damage from their general attacks)… I highly suggest you try out more specs if you honestly think that.

47

The point clearly went over your head or you don’t understand how shadow does damage.

The issue with affliction is how it ramps up and has to apply dots to each individual target outside of seed/taint in order to maximize using MR or seed depending on pull size.

Shadow is able to instantly get dots up and then does a ST rotation with cleave from a talent. Not even comparable.

I don’t think you understand how a meta works.

But I can list the multiple classes I have done keys on this expansion if you want. I can honestly say I play more classes than most people.

48

Another layer of this is that afflictions spender is not only RNG but also requires dots to be on the target to fully utilize.

Most other specs with RNG spenders are procs. You get a proc, you use it. Simple.

But affliction you get a proc, you hold them all, then you need to line up dots and CDs to spend them for the most damage. It makes affliction feel like this giant slog of requirements before you can do anything meaningful… if you even can because RNG spender lol

1 Like
49

This is a well thought out post I have always loved affy lock but honestly bliz has been struggling since legion with it they are afraid to buff dots and our single target or our aoe becomes none existent maybe it’s time they adapt the style to something different like caster tank leave our dots make changes to our armor and add some aoe ground based around fell and corruption then add in a dread lord major cooldown as to not make us like the lock demon form of old so we don’t step on DH

50

Ironic.

Again, there is no issue of “ramp-up” that is not really just an issue of…

  1. truncated damage potential (mob died before I could get full value out of it),
  2. little relative power generated over downtime (i.e., via CD value or passively generated stacks), or
  3. being flat out undertuned.

And each of those are areas that Affliction can improve upon, rather than throwing your hands up to declare, over uncritical feelcraft, that Affliction just cannot ever be viable in M+ without being turned into another spec.

Unless your interest switched from potential performance to solely playfeel, you’re still missing the point.

51

Considering you’re wrong.

Every spec isn’t going to be viable in mythicnplus as in meta. What part of that are you not comprehending?

And the fact that you can’t seem to understand that there is a major difference between shadow pushing shadow crash and having dots on everything to affliction having to tab target and apply dots.

I see why you don’t post on your warlock.

52

The part where inexplicably shifting the goal post from “competitive” (i.e., not a bottom tier unto itself) to “meta” is somehow honest communication.

No one asked for it to be constantly meta. But there’s a far cry from not being meta (like all but 5-8 specs in a given patch) and being so inherently dysfunctional in/for M+ that it must always be bottom-rung or nearly so, as you have often claimed.

53

I never shifted anything.

Affliction is viable for 90% of the playerbase keys. However due to its design and how it works it will probably never be a meta spec.

It’s not a meta spec because of its ramp up time. Which also is applied to all key levels.

What’s funny is you’re the one shifting goalposts because you’re trying to use shadow as an example when they operate completely different.

I said it’s traditionally warlocks worst mplus spec because of its design which is true.

I never said it wasn’t viable in majority of keys. You just made that assumption.

Like I said. Do you even play warlock?

54

The only instance of the word “shadow”, capitalized or otherwise, to appear in a single one of my posts… is inside of your quote.

The thread looks at ways to bridge Affliction’s pain points. No part of the OP asks to make Affliction meta.

If you insist that they are impossible to address to any noticeable extent without fundamentally changing the spec, that would require that Affliction suffers from a much larger performance gap than just “not being meta”.

Again, “ramp-up” is a conflation (nor even a particular appropriate term given that only at most a single spell doesn’t have to be reapplied) and if you just actually separate it into its real factors, it’s very much addressable.

55

Why you lyin?

You do realize you implied it here right?

I never said it was asking to be meta.

I said in order to fix those pain points it would negatively affect affliction in raiding.

Try to actually read the posts.

At this point it’s pretty clear you are lacking understanding of how affliction does damage which is why I have asked twice now if even play warlock.

Affliction. Has to ramp up its damage in aoe. Shadow priest aoe is very simple. You shadow crash the targets and then do a single target rotation.

Affliction on the other hand has to tab target dots on each target manually which is why affliction is better in higher keys with bigger pills.

This is the ramp up I’m talking about. That’s not even including agony takes time to stack up. It’s counter to mythic plus design where you want massive instant damage.

Which spell is auto applying Siphon Life UA or Haunt?

56

Which you’ve provided no evidence for. Again…

  1. Anything reducing the constraints of TTK is not going to be relevant in raiding except against short-lived adds. Improving Affliction’s value against such would not require balancing down its sustained damage.
  2. Siphoning a bit of our potency per GCD towards CDs instead does not harm raid so long as they don’t arbitrarily reduce the overall DPS contribution of that portion over constant combat.

I’m aware. I play both. You’re still missing the point.

Let’s say I have 4 DoTs to separately apply. Each deals X damage over its max duration and each has an instant or GCD-length cast time.

My periodic damage per second, yes, takes 4 GCDs to “ramp up”, but I’m still adding those DoTs’ total damage each GCD —which is vastly superior to what I get out of my fillers thereafter— so long as what I have afflicted does not die before I’ve gotten the full value of each DoT (that X total damage + 0.38n SP, where n is the number of Malefics you can fit within its duration). You can therefore still apply DoTs individually in Affliction’s same thematic way, and yet, by adding passives that reduce waste, remove the actual problem behind that “ramp-up”.

It doesn’t have to noticeably change damage profiles nor how it plays to improve its general performance.

…???

If only at most 1 does not need to be reapplied, then the remaining still need to be reapplied. What was unclear there?

57

Because if you ramp up afflictions damage profile for aoe it makes it stronger in council which will cause it to be nerfed in ST.

Blizzard is not going to shorten the ramp time without lowering the damage.

This would hurt affliction ST.

Doesn’t mean you have a basic understanding.

If you can’t tell the difference between one global applying dots to needing

Haunt
UA
Siphon life x5
Vile taint
Seed

1 global compared to 4 casts and 5 globals to do damage.

Like are you trolling?

Thanks for proving you don’t know what you’re talking about.

In a pack of 5 you have to cast Haunt/UA on one target. Put SL on all 5 targets vile taint and seed before going into MR for damage.

58

“Ramp up” is nebulous af, as is “damage profile for AoE”.

If by that you mean allow them to set up all relevant DoTs more quickly as to get more Rapture value within their overlapping windows, then as already stated, you don’t need to do that to improve Affliction’s performance in the AoE situations in which it is currently weakest.

If you mean that Focused Malignancy should be removed and Rapture buffed outright, you don’t need to do that either. Nor should you.

If you mean that Unstable Affliction should be able to be cast on more targets… neither do you need to do that. Nor should you.

You only need to reduce the waste of mobs dying with DoT duration still on them. That’s it. While it won’t recoup lost bonus damage to each Rapture (for which you already have decent bankability and control), it can at least ensure that the base total damage of your DoTs is far more consistent, allowing said DoTs to act more obviously akin to (per-target) soft-CDs.

You don’t need 5 globals to do damage. You need as many globals as the fight lasts to do optimal damage over that fight.

The number of those globals are completely and utterly irrelevant. All that matters is whether any casts lose value due to fight length.

If, for instance, I have a 24s, 22s, 20s, and 18s debuff that I must apply individually but the fight ends 24s after its started, I’ll be doing just fine, because not a single one of my GCDs got less than

The DoTs aren’t prologue to Rapture. They’re the per-target soft-CDs to which Rapture plays filler and which you want to maximally exploit, just as you would Colossus Smash or Shadowdance with Dark Shadow or what-have-you. Their damage contribution per GCD is the far higher and the more bottlenecked.

This has nothing to do with what you just quoted.

You called needing to apply DoTs individually a matter of ramp-up even against a single-target. For it to solely be ramp-up, rather than cyclical, it would need to be applied only once per fight / need never to be refreshed, similar to Slice and Dice under old Cut to the Chase.

But that is only the case if taking Absolute Corruption, which you then can’t take Siphon Life with anyways, because they share a choice node. How is this new to you?

59

You clearly don’t have any idea what you’re talking about or what these terms mean.

In order to do actual damage you have to set up the dots on every target. I don’t know why you aren’t understanding this.

No because that would destroy affliction single target and make it unviable for raiding. If anything FM needs buffed a little bit more.

No it shouldn’t as that adds even more setup needed to do damage which is why Ua has the current interaction it does with doom blossom.

This isn’t even an issue.

No. You need more than 5 globaled as you need to get every single dot up.

You need to get haunt and ua up.
You need to get siphon life on 5 targets
You need to VT to get Agony on 5 targets.
You need to seed to get corruption up on 5 targets.

That’s more than 5 globals plus cast times.

You do realize each dot increases MR damage right? Hence why you have to get SL up on every target.

The fact you said this proves you don’t have any idea what you’re talking about. MR isn’t a filler. It’s your main source of damage up to 5 targets.

There’s a reason you get all of your dots up and drain soul to three stacks before you dump your shards on MR. Single target isn’t an issue. It’s an issue in aoe.

What’s your warlocks name because every post you make shows a complete lack of understanding on how the spec even does damage.

No one mentioned AC because no one good takes it.

60

I played affliction back in MoP. For me, it was the most fun, interesting, and engaging class/spec to play. Nothing else came close. I loved the Malefic Grasp mechanic. Modern affliction feels similar to MoP, except they obviously removed malefic grasp, along with every quality of life mechanic the spec had. It simply feels like a gutted version of what affliction used to be. No ability to apply multiple dots at once. No ability to dot multiple targets. No ability to extend dots. Modern shadow priests have all these things! Modern affliction is so tedious and boring, it really needs a complete redesign. I don’t know how everyone felt about Malefic Grasp, but I want it back. I doubt that will happen, but I think there are ways to make affliction tolerable again.

Give it a way to apply multiple dots at once. Like it used to have.

Give it a way to spread dots. Like it used to have.

Give it a way to extend dots. Like it used to have.

Give it anything but malefic rapture, it’s awful. Just spamming a completely uninteresting and uninspired ability.

Multiple charges of soul swap, and the option to reuse it on the original target would solve multiple issues.

A cooldown that puts most or all of your dots on the target.

Seed of corruption spreads dots, like it used to.

Maybe a talent choice between malefic rapture and a drain soul with a mechanic similar to the old malefic grasp. Players would have a choice.

I recently came back to wow, and couldn’t believe what they did to affliction. It used to be the most unique and interesting spec in the game in my opinion. I made a new warlock and gave it a distinctly affliction based name, not imagining I wouldn’t be able to enjoy it and change specs. I’ve been playing demo and it’s incredibly boring. 3 buttons and a few cooldowns. Going to give destruction a go. But I miss affliction. I don’t need it to be top dps as it was in MoP. I just want it to be fun to play. I don’t think the absurdly low number of affliction warlocks in the game is due to its awful damage, but its awful design.

1 Like
61

Only because it’s been buffed by your DoTs. See how much damage it deals otherwise.

And what makes it deal that higher damage? The DoTs.

Let’s say I have a 1-minute GCD that deals 40% SP but increases my damage dealt by 20% for 20 seconds, while my Shadowbolt-equivalent is 140% SP. Do I not use the first because its damage is lower in itself?

Now, the same question, but for a 40% SP ability that increases your Shadowbolt-equivalent damage by 40% SP each for those 20 seconds in a situation? Do I not use the prior because its damage is lower in itself?

That latter spell hasn’t increased that damage on its own; it’s more useful to think of the first as contributing 40% SP per GCD for its GCD and each filler within its duration, rather than considering the otherwise neutered skill as the source of all that damage.

Tl;dr: You’re conflating a details entry with what actually gave it that bonus. There’s a reason warcraftlogs redirects that bonus back to the Priest/Augvoker.

I’m not the one misunderstanding this. You’re still missing why this isn’t merely a matter of “ramp-up” / why that conflates separate smaller and otherwise addressable factors.

If each DoT were solely a damage amplifier for Rapture, you’d have a point —just as having n uses of Colossus Smash would be inferior to a single Warbreaker— but they’re not. You instead have n uses per soft-CDs of, when at all accounting for their indirect contribution, your skills with the highest maximum damage-per-global. What limits them is simply what causes that potential to go to waste.

Nor is it even true that you should always set up every single DoT on every single target.

A Seed applying Corruption across 10 targets (example number chosen for obviousness of effect) will have already increased your Malefic Rapture damage by 380% SP per cast. The more additional time you spend applying DoTs to the extent of losing MR casts over the periods of densest application, the more you devalue (cause waste among) each previous DoT since they each generated 38% (or in Seed’s case, 38n%) less SP.

  • One more DoT granting 38% more damage per each of 5 Malefic casts thereafter is not worth getting one fewer Malefic in while 10 simultaneously applied DoTs are running unless its base damage is worth more than 190% SP.

That’s not a ramp-issue so much as anti-synergy among high target counts that creates an especially soft (and Haste-dependent) effective target cap. One that, again, can be dealt with through additional effects regarding DoTs already placed and, especially, DoT duration that would otherwise go to waste.

Stop conflating the different loss factors as a single thing and voila, there are solutions aplenty without having to change Affliction’s playflow.

It would still have the limitations faced by, say, 5-cap-AoE DPS (making them shine more at higher Fortified keys with their smaller pulls than elsewhere) but their contribution per high-total-SP/gcd spells would be more assured.