Level 60 Tank Warlock Build Speculation

WoW Classic Season of Discovery
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As someone who has been tanking as a warlock nearly every BFD lockout and can solo SFK I’ve been thinking about what end game builds are going to look like at level 60.

I think there is probably going to be 2 viable builds and going full Demonology for Soul Link is not one of those builds (even at 40 and 50); lest we get a rune which gives our Pets Avoidance (lots of AoE that will kill them) a rune which passively heals our pets when we do damage (otherwise pets will likely die from damage were sharing with them loosing Soul Link and Master Demonology), and a rune which makes Master Demonologist either usable with Demonic Sacrifice or changes what it does (the 10% phys dmg reduction from Voidwalker isn’t worth it when we will likely already have 60% from armor). Also healers probably won’t want to heal our pets.

So the builds I think will dominate are the following:

21/8/22: Going Siphon Life, Ruin and Shadowburn (for snap threat)

I think this will be the best build and will pull ahead with damage. With for the Affliction tree the 3 points of Improved Agony being changeable if warlock tanks will be expected to use Curse of Shadows/Elements in raid which I doubt because Agony is free threat.

In Demo the 3 points to Improved imp being free to change if Imp isn’t our pet of choice (I think it will be because Tank groups want Blood Pact) and can be moved elsewhere.

In Destro the 5 points in Aftermath can be moved to Improved Shadow Bolt (I think the Daze chance will be better than Improved Shadow Bolt as most of our shadow damage is from our DoTs)

21/21/0 Siphon Life, Demonic Sacrifice (9 free points)

The other build I think will pull ahead is a 21/21/0 build with 9 free points to spend picking up Siphon Life and Demonic Sacrifice (with intent we will be sacrificing our Voidwalker for the 3% HP heal every 4 seconds or Fire Imp for 15% more damage if Fire continues to be our primary spell school) assuming our pets have 0 chance of survival. I do suspect most will put 5 of the free points into Cataclysm but with HoTs like Demonic Sacrifice and Siphon Life and Drain Life (with Master Channeler).

7/21/22 DS/Ruin Flex Build (1 free point) (able to change to Fire Lock runes if you don’t need to tank a boss).

Alternatively a 7/21/22 DS/Ruin build might be a Dark Horse for maximum damage sacrificing the self heals we get for more damage and threat or for offtanking so we can flex into Fire Warlock runes if an additional tank is not needed.

Talents people think they should take but likely won’t be taken:

Aside from the aforementioned Master Demonologist and Soul Link here are a few talents I don’t think will be picked and why.

Intensity: I suspect we are likely going to get a rune which changes Hellfire (or the less likely Rain of Fire) into Immolation Aura while in Metamorphosis solving our AoE threat and not needing pushback reduction. Furthermore while channeling we lose the ability to dodge. However a dungeon build might take this for Pyroclasm’s 26% chance to stun if it works with the hypothetical Immolation Aura.

Destructive Reach/Grim Reach: We are already likely to be within 20 yards of the boss for Drain Life (24 if Grim Reach is taken) so it’s just dead points imo.

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This will be the absolute most tanky build bar none.

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Improved Drain soul is dead points.

And as I mentioned before Soul Link is likely going to kill our pets mid (or early) fight if a Boss’s AoE doesn’t kill them prior. And Healers will not heal our pets.

So your pet dies at the start of the fight, you lose your Soul Link and Master Demonologist, you use Fel Domination only for your pet to die again shortly after. Leaving you either needing to spend 6 seconds resummoning a pet or not having Soul Link and Master Demonologist Active.

By that point the threat (and damage) increase of Demonic Sacrifice or Ruin will be far better. As DW Fury Warriors have been far better than Deep Prot in Classic Era. But unlike DW Fury we are already tanky without a shield equipped.

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I’m sure if warlock tanks need their pet to stay alive for that extra tankiness from soul link healers will keep your pet up. Especially when progging, then maybe they’ll want you to swap to a more DMG oriented spec down the line, not sure why you think healers would refuse to heal pets though if it’s going to keep their tank up.

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Any speculation is moot until as we’ll be seeimg two new waves of runes between now and then

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I would have preferred the Metamorphosis in WotLK, or even the one in WarCraft 3 where he gets to shoot instant cast Chaos Bolts.

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This is pretty much it. Can’t spitball hypotheticals when no-one has a clue what’s coming with runes.

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It’s still fun to speculate given what runes we currently have and what would likely be needed to make other builds viable :slight_smile:

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I think most meta locks will go down deep destro for extra threat, and stuff like making hellfire not break on damage sounds nice for aoe threat

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Its possible to me soul link will be used for progging or say, patchwerk style bosses and then the rest of the time destro with imp searing pain spam for threat and other boosts to fire damage output.

Soul link gives the pet 30% of incoming healing as well so something like a voidwalker will already be sturdier than say your typical hunter pet. And im not sure why healers wouldnt refuse to heal pets either especially if its a tank’s second hp bar. Maybe bad ones won’t.

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For sure, if anything it’s an extra target to throw heals on which I feel like is a good thing when healers are being sniped constantly anyway. But yeah I agree I’m sure most will go for higher threat builds than mit but I guess we’ll see how the new raids are or changes to existing ones.

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Not in Classic Era, its just 30% shared damage taken.

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Warlock Classic Season of Discovery Talent Calculator - Classic World of Warcraft (wowhead.com)

and

Warlock Classic Season of Discovery Talent Calculator - Classic World of Warcraft (wowhead.com)

are the most likely choices i dont believe anything else is close and the 2nd build is entirely dependent on itemization/what runes are added if any to make us tanky enough at 60 to drop soul link/VW the way warriors drop shield and tank as fury.

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For the 1st build, as discussed previously, Soul Link will kill your pet and be mute, its not like future versions of WoW where the pet receives healing you do. Also the 10% physical damage from having Voidwalker out isn’t that great when we are likely going to be 60% armor already with the better Master Demonologist pet to be Syadd for 10% more damage (and in turn threat) or Felhunter for Resistance.

If your pet is dead (which will happen unless we get runes that give our pets avoidance and self heals) you lose out on Soul Link’s effect and Master Demonologist.

As for 2nd build, Grim Reach and Destructive Reach are dead points as warlock tanks will be well within a 20 yd range when tanking (for most encounters). Also Grim Reach will only extend Drain Life’s range to 24 yards over its OG 20 and leaving that range breaks the DoT from Master Channeler.

Furthermore Improved Shadowbolt is dead where our only non-dot shadow damage ability is Shadow Cleave and likely will be applied by other warlocks who go shadow while most of our attacks (unless changed with a rune) are Fire based. Better to spend the points in Aftermath for the daze chance unless there is an encounter where Daze is a bad idea.

Also unlike Fury Tank Warriors we already are pretty beefy without a shield. So I doubt we would need the extra survivability from Soul Link (which might fall off 30 seconds into the encounter) and the heath leeching from Drain Life and Siphon Life will probably be enough.

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Pet dying is pure speculation at this point we truly don’t know if that will be the case phase 2 will be the testing ground for that, and with a lot of fire dmg in say molten core if we could possibly keep the pet up we would be the best tanks by far, because even warriors have no mitigation for spell dmg, but we would. 60% DR from armor as you put it+10% physical DR, means the pet isn’t really taking much from the 30% transfer and we ourselves have the ability to heal it when we get taunted off of on tank swaps. This becomes even more true as kill times improve.

For the 2nd build I included range increases purely because there is no duel spec and I pve to pvp, so for me those are very valuable, but you can move those around. Also the shadow bolt talent I took is 1. Speculation that they add another direct dmg shadow ability such as chaos wave that came with metamorphosis in MoP. 2. Because nothing else helps you get down that tree while also staying useful, as we current have no access to chaos bolt, molten core will force the use of more shadow abilities, we’re more likely to fill with a new shadow dmg rune or shadow cleave than we are to cast immolate.