Continuing the discussion from Demonology PvP Going into Shadow Lands:
The 6 second pet summon is close to a class breaker for Demo. Was Demo that OP in anything (PVE or PVP) that it needed something that approaches a class breaking nerf? If the pet was massively buffed such that the 6 second downtime was made up for it could start to make sense; but that is not my understanding of what is happening.
How does a developer sit around and come up with this and think this is a good idea?
Bumping this. To my understanding pets are still getting smoked in general cleave damage.
This truly stinks for Demo and BM Hunter.
/bump
A few ideas come to mind. After all this is a giant company and with all the talent and employees that have left over the years has resulted in, people who are not qualified to work on game development are making decisions.
People fresh out of college/uni with no experience, think they know it all.
My personal belief is that there is a vendetta against warlocks.
That’s the issue there’s is no reason/they have not given an explanation for the 6 second pet summon for any class that has a pet, where that pet is required to add to the class damage profile.
To include that the developers changed the game to have so many mechanics in mythics and raids that require moving/interrupting. It seems asinine to be making negative qol change to the pve side of the game.
Adding to that demo is a spec wholely built around setting up about 4 seconds setup that has cast times to about every spell in that setup. Don’t even mention what would happen if someone was using nether urggh.
Imagine in raids or mythic you’re doing something and suddenly your pet just gets stuck on some random 
(ie. poor dungeon/raid terrain layout) in the ground or wall (btw this has happened various times in bfa/previous expansions).
Much less the one where you jump down to a different level (to think after 10 yrs they still haven’t learned how to program a sprite to jump down with you, instead he has to run around through the entire floor and then to the next) and you suddenly lose 6 seconds of dps because you need to resummon and after because you’re class was then design to be a ramp up dps you have to build back up again.
If they wanna make changes like this they have to up their game with the pet pathing/ai or have some pet mechanic where if it gets stuck it resets.
In no way should a change like this that negatively impacts the players of said spec should of went through till they fixed the main problems behind it. Also doing this to then gives us a 3 min cool down is not enough of a reason.
You don’t created a problem and then invent a half baked solution to make it seems like you added something good.
I have a suspicion that when they were brainstorming unpruning and came up with fel domination, they also realized there was no reason for this button to exist with current demon cast times.
However, if you increase the cast times it becomes a more useful cooldown…
That 6 second summon time is to make summoning your demon a “Meaningful choice”. You know that current dumb excuse the Dev team is giving for all their bad game play changes…
Correct. Felguard on beta can literally get evaporated.
Can you imagine, 1demo lock in the entire world is actually in r1 range.
It was clearly not intended demonology has to be nerfed to the ground 
From what I recall. The idea was that they wanted locks to keep their demon alive. So they made it rough and long to summon it if it dies. To make us care about it.
I don’t agree with this way of thinking. The mechanic should reward us for keeping them alive not punish us if it dies. Like an alternative would be a buff that slowly builds the longer our Felguard remains in combat. That would encourage Warlocks to heal it rather than summon a new one.
if the pet was made to hit like a truck this could make sense; but it is my understanding that that is not happening.
feel free to like this beta post or bump if you have beta
https://us.forums.blizzard.com/en/wow/t/pet-classes-want-to-know-why-6-seconds/643262/31
Our pets need to hit a lot harder. I’m supposed to be a master summoner. Give me a powerhouse at my command.
Even if we ignore horrible pet pathing causing us to resummon, our pets aren’t nearly tanky enough or hit hard enough to warrant a 6 second cast time. Maybe if our pets had the vast array of abilities that got pruned from them over the years and didn’t feel like they did such mediocre damage.
Anyone remember sacrifice from voidwalker, or our felhunter having both an offensive and defensive dispel?
Pets in retail just feel squishy and like they’re a lackluster part of our toolkit. Hunter pets feel much better. Pets in MoP with grimoire of supremacy felt amazing compared to how they feel now.
I haven’t kept up on changes, this is the first lock I’ve played in a few years.
I went to solo LFR Kiljaeden for the quest and the trash pack on the bridge put a ramping debuff on me. I’m like, good thing I have my felhunter to dispel, pulled it out and had a WTF moment.
I didn’t know they took the sacrifice shield as well, I had thought I was gonna need it a few times but glad I didn’t lol.
But yea, until I got to about 400 ilvl the ole felguard was pretty squishy. It still is if I do a more challenging elite. This is end of expansion power too so I’m not looking forward to him being sneezed on and vaporized when SL hits.
Pit lord plz
Yea its kinda of a big deal, specially for Demo. https://us.forums.blizzard.com/en/wow/t/feedback-warlock-class-changes/490693/316?u=firecow-sulfuras That comment is 100% on point and changes like 6s summons are NOT helping us.
Is either “We’d rather people not play Demo at all” or they simple ignore us for that very same reason (“Demo is not priority rn”). IMO Blizz should stop acting like cowards and give a bit of communication. Our trust in the dev team its already pretty bad, even if they say something around those lines it won’t matter.
I feel like this change is less bad for Destro and Affliction (it’s still trash tho) and actually game breaking for demo
The new strat in PvP will be “Kill the pet twice and GG”
After the second felguard goes down, well lose significant damage, cc, the ability to keep someone in combat, soulstrike (which is damage and shard gen + the talent might as well not exist if your pet is dead)
So yeah. Arenas will be everyone ignoring you to kill your pet, oh and if you try to heal it LOL because our heal is a channel that costs health. 1 kick and you can’t heal him
Nice job Blizzard, you broke something that was fine just so you could claim to “fix” it… All because your developers can’t come up with fresh and new ideas
Total ineptitude
Demo should get a passive for the old master summoner. Of all the specs that could quickly summon a new pet, it should be us.
Either that or we should have a significantly reduced CD on FelDom like 1 minute
Edit: OR tie it into the master summoner PvP talent. “Your Call Dreadstalkers is now instant cast. In addition, Fel Domination cooldown is reduced by 2 minutes”
Purely my own speculation but I think it has to do with pvp. While it was skillful it was also oppressive being able to swap imp and single handly stop cc then swap fel hunter and interrupt afterwards.
Honestly why I think they nerfed it. BM is notoriously oppressive when its good and making pet rez 4 seconds singlehandedly ensures itll never be top tier again. Then mm rework which all but begs you do go pet less…yeah, just my tinfoil conspiracy but seems legit to me.
They prolly wont adress it until they see the hit to Warlock PvP live unfortunately