Why are warlocks drinking?
If youâre in a target rich environment itâs most efficient to pull enough targets that you have to stop and drink every few pulls. I still do this while farming Jadefire Run as a level 60 SM/DS warlock. I CAN handle around 7 targets, but often pull around 5 or 6 at a time so I only have to drink every 3 or 4 pulls.
Also, to clarify: you should be eating and drinking to restore your resources twice as fast.
But you literally have warlock abilities to regain health and mana on the fly. Otherwise you are just a mage with a pet.
Yes⊠those abilities allow you to stay alive with 6+ mobs beating on you.
The spec I said I was (Shadow Mastery/Demonic Sacrifice) gives up the pet for a buff. In most cases Iâm using the Voidwalker buff (Fel Stamina), which gives me something like 160 health per 5 seconds. I then facetank everything while draining life and running 3 dots (corruption, curse of agony, and siphon life). The dots alone are enough to kill the mob.
To be honest, most of the reason I have to eat/drink isnât because of the damage. Itâs because of the cost of the spells.
6 * (Corruption + Agony + Siphon Life) = 5.5k mana
You gain a bunch of that back because of siphon life (once you have some shadow spell damage), but itâs still a LOT of mana.
Sadly, we canât AOE while tanking mobs unless we go halfway down the destruction tree to get intensity. Attempting to do so would just waste mana, since our channel would end before a single tick of the AOE.
Soul Link basically gives you another 30% to your health bar, since youâre splitting damage with your demon. That makes you the tankiest of the clothies by far.
Too true! Of course, that can be useful if the healer gets healing agro. Thereâs been plenty of times where I tanked some trash off the healer until the tank could pick them up, because I am demon spec.
Because unless youâre specced for drain tanking, youâre better off dropping a shadowbolt and a few dots, then wanding than trying to lifetap and drain health in the middle of a fight. I only really life tap when I can see that the healer is OK on mana, or long boss fights. Bandage as well as drain.
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Realistically, you cant even do it then. RNG makes it too inconsistent. Half the time even with intensity I still get crazy interrupted.
Now, if I have a Paladin with me for concentration Aura, itâs another story. Then I can pull literally everything and hellfire it down while they heal me.
I did MC last night and ended up 3rd DPS in a very competitive group. We had 3 locks and I was responsible for putting up Elements, I think Iâm around 330 shadow power now and was using a DS/Ruin spec. It was a lot of fun to see some 3.5k shadowbolt crits, although I really had to watch my threat at times.
Even if you are cursing/banishing you can still do some great DPS with a bunch of shadow power and a good spec.
Itâs inconsistent AND horribly inefficient, but doable with a few mobs.
The only time I absolutely cannot use AOE is with Alzzinâs imps during a DM-E jump run solo after a wipe when I have to aggro and kill them to get around Alzzin to the cave behind him. In that case there are so many of them that intensity doesnât help. I have to have the VW aggro and AOE taunt, then hellfire for 2 ticks before using the VW shield. Sometimes I have to quick summon a second VW for a second shield to finish them off.
This thread is about leveling, why is someone coming in here about raid spec and gear
Soul link is great 1v1. You keep a VW out with soul link. Someone beats on you, when you get lower you sacrifice the VW, then Fel Dom another. Eat a hearthstone and keep going. When you get low again sacrifice the next VW, although it almost never gets to that since your opponent is dead. In that situation you can easily have 12-15k effective health.
One issue is when you run into a class that can clear off the VW shield. Then thereâs no point in sacrificing them but you can still get a second VW for the second soul link.
Basically you have to be able to survive while the dots tick. You might get off a shadowbolt or immolate but any smart player will LOS or kick your cast. Try baiting them with one school and cast the other but still a smart player wonât let you get a cast off. So itâs all up to instants, which locks donât have many.
Plus if youâre up against someone that can clear a dot that hurts, not to mention if they can heal.
Warlocks take a lot of damage to kill but itâs often tough to do enough damage verses certain classes.
- Warriors can be pretty easy, the VW shield doesnât let them get rage.
- Rogues arenât too bad, depending on the relative gear level.
- Hunters arenât too bad either, similar to rogues that the relative gear level and skill can matter quite a bit.
- Mages are tougher if you donât have a felhunter out, if you do then they are pretty easy.
- Shadow priests are very difficult
- Warlocks are tough if they are horde.
- Shaman can be very difficult.
- Druids arenât too bad but they can easily run away, heal, come back at you.
- Paladin are a pain, they take a long time and just outlast you.
Many of the matchups depend on player skill, gear, professions, race, spec, which pet you have out, who gets the first jump, and so on. So these are generalities and you may do better or worse depending on a lot of factors.
Another thing is that in mass PVP it can be very difficult to be a lock. Against a decent team all your curses and DOTs will get cleared off quickly. All you can depend on are your direct damage spells. A lot of times people are dancing around and will move in and out of range so long casts donât finish. We have very few instant direct damage casts, it can be tough to do much damage in a battle.
No a warlock has abilities that swap health for mana(life tap) and mana for life(life drain)
Itâs not quite a swap, if you are specced properly and have some decent shadow damage you are spending a bit of one resource to get a lot of another.
True but itâs not a cost free gain.
Shadow priests havent been too hard for me tbh. They pretty much oom before they can kill me. Helped along by Drain Mana.
True. Siphon life and drain life are where shadow damage starts almost acting like a defensive stat. (also T1 3pc when you hit lvl60)
However, with life tap, it doesnât matter how much gear you have, itâs a direct swap with a 20% bonus from the two talent points.
There are some good strategies against shadow mages but they can be very difficult fights, certainly one of the tougher opponents a warlock can face.
Iâve beat decent shadow priests but it can take a lot of things lining up right.
Felhound and Spellstone pretty much Req.
They should be using Mana Burn, which hits like a truck and quickly forces you to lifetap even if youâre using Shadow Ward.
A well geared spriest who knows what theyâre doing can be a real PITA.
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They oom way before you do. Curse of tongues, mana drain them. Use spellstone and doggo dispel defensively. Shadow ward is okay. Doggo interrupt their shadow tree. Etc.
Youâll force them to waste lots of mana. I also hope youâre SL. Think Iâm rocking about 170 shadow resist which makes a decent difference.
It hurts, and it feels counterintuitive to not try to nuke them. But theyâll oom before they can kill you if you attack their mana.
Try to dps race them and it feels like gambling on crits. Much more consistent to just take away their mana and then kill them at my leisure.
Iâd rather use a restorative potion and keep a Tome of Shadow Force in my offhand. A spellstone can be nice but I think you sacrifice too much to have it.