You finally did it blizzard, you killed one of the most iconic specs in the game, we are officially one of the worse specs in the game for running mythic + dungeons in wow. Keep feeding rogues, demon hunters, mages. Maybe one day you will realize that warlocks deserve to play your game too.
22 Likes
Idk, demo is pretty dang fun right now.
2 Likes
affliction spends about 2-3 years being god tier
does low dps in mythic+ for a little while
YOU KILLED AFFLICTION BLIZZARD
you people never cease to amaze me, please get off this board
24 Likes
I agree. That nerf to UA was unnecessary. Why that happened idk, but it absolutely was wrong. Mythic+ is a bust as is now we can not even dps well. I am aff4life but man they made that hard.
1 Like
They nerfed it because Aff was rediculously OP at the start of Uldir. Like 2k over the next highest classes on a few bosses.
1 Like
I don’t think you understand that fun is important, and aff lock is the least fun class in the game to play in dungeons right now. Consistently less dps than the tanks with 5x the effort of any AoE class. Performance in raid is irrelevant if tools can be made to improve aff’s viability on trash packs. Imo manging dots on 8 targets for 20-30 seconds should do ultra damage, not 1/5th of everyone else spamming 1 aoe key.
22 Likes
“You killed affliction in M+” is fair.
It is unfair for people to say that just because affliction was / is good in raids that they don’t deserve to be good in M+, or PvP. They are different environments, and saying that affliction doesn’t get M+ means that you are forcing people who want to play affliction to raid. And this isn’t an established standard. Elemental shaman are good in both M+ and raids - should we ask that they be nerfed in one?
If we are the best raid class (which we are objectively NOT) or even in the top tier (which we arguably are) there are many ways to improve our M+ performance without increasing raid performance. If sow-the-seeds were back to the way it were last expansion (perhaps slightly nerfed so we aren’t the strongest class by a mile) that would help immensely in M+ without improving raid performance. And adjustment to phantom singularity, where it does the same amount of damage ST as AoE-per-mob would be massive as well.
The problem is right now that affliction isn’t just bad, it’s not viable in M+. You will not bring an affliction warlock except as a favor. If you bring one you have to adjust your strategy and group around them in order to accomodate.
Now that said, demonology is good in M+ but it’s the only viable spec for it available to warlocks, and even though it’s our best M+ spec it still pales in comparison to frost mages, boomkins, demon hunters, and arguablyl warriors.
12 Likes
I think you guys are going a bit extreme here. Are there situations in which aff can feel useless in M+? sure. Run with an aoe heavy group and it feels utterly pointless to try to dps trash sometimes.
Ive done about 10 M+ this week (granted all were in the +7-9 range), and how effective i was was basically dependent on group comp (and a few bosses that can clear dots). some groups i was right up there with everyone on trash and great on bosses. some groups i was useless on trash and still great on bosses.
Would i try reaping as aff? probably not. I have been specifically avoiding doing that.
That’s a problem though - you’re avoiding the real content which is a 10.
And if you pull a medium hp pack once every 45 seconds then sure, you could probably be competitive on those packs with phantom singularity, but that’s it. If you were in a group that chain pulled you would lag behind 2 out of every 3 packs (significantly), be on par for the third, and then maybe be average or slightly better than the rest on bosses. And if you’re doing as well as the group they are deliberately hamstringing themselves.
Take a peek at your overall dps for the run if still available - i bet you are much further behind the group than you think you are.
1 Like
once again, depends on group comp. Against melee like dh, rogues, and warriors? not a chance. the worst your group is, the better affliction does.
also, if you are not at the top or near the top on bosses, something is fishy or you are fighting a boss that can clear dots like the snake boss in temple or the two tidesages in shrine.
affliction overall is mid tier in mythic plus
so you are saying that affliction warlocks can only do M+ content with bad classes and dont trye to do at least a weekly M+10, thats crap, i dont think any class should be a second class in wow, thats blizzard fault for not balancing classes in every content available in the game, they could easily fix this if they wanted.
2 Likes
that is not what i said, and you dang well know it. Also, affliction is a spec, not a class.
You’re confusing class and spec. Aff is terrible at M+. Demo is not. It’s been true for essentially the whole of WoW’s run that certain specs are better at certain content than others, and Aff is still a god in BoD:
https://www.warcraftlogs.com/zone/statistics/21
you are the one confused, i already told that affliction is only good for raiding, but you show your warcraft logs, however you didnt show the data for M+ or PVP content wich is what i am complaining about. But why dont you show those logs for DHs, mages, rogues?. Affliction is a second class spec in wow since we are not even the top 1000 players in those contents. I wish we had a button like your class DH that blow all trash in AoE, instant 200k dps on reaping.
This is the key point I was making, actually. Class != spec. Aff may not be superbly viable for M+, but there are a number of specs that’s true of. Aff is incredibly powerful in raids (apparently so is Destro), and you can change specs in seconds for that M+ run.
Also, don’t talk like I only play DH. I have a warlock (https://worldofwarcraft.com/en-us/character/thrall/Kaedis) that was just as geared as this DH before he started getting BoD gear, and was planning on swapping to that lock for BoD because of how melee-unfriendly Uldir was and how many melee we had (8 or 9). My guild decided to keep me on my DH, though, because we had around half our melee decide to step back from raiding and recruited another half-dozen ranged, including 4 locks. I’m quite familiar with warlocks in both M+ and mythic raids. I just also understand that if you’re one of those people that insist on only ever playing one spec period, you’re going to have types of content that you are not optimal for.
And consider how oppressively dominant Aff was throughout all of Legion in both raids and M+, I’d say it’s about time that Aff took a backseat in at least one of those.
1 Like
I am just genuinely curious for a second. Why is it you base your entire opinion of class balance on M+? Practically every post I’ve ever seen you make complaining about Aff focuses on M+.
Like, we will never ever EVER be as broken as we were in Legion ever again. That was inexcusable from a balance perspective and it shouldn’t ever be like that.
Aff and Destro are literally broken in BoD right now and Demo is hella good in M+ and all 3 specs are at least pretty solid in PvP.
Personally I’m fine with that balance. It’s kind of annoying right now because we don’t have a ton of 400 and 415 azerite so we have to keep swapping traits, but that’ll go away in a few weeks.
10 Likes
I think saying that affliction should be crazy in M+ is over the line. But I think most people would agree that all classes should at least be viable in M+. Be honest - if you were running an 11 or 12 key and a warlock applied and told you they were affliction, would you bring them (other than out of pity)? Assuming you wanted to time the key? What other specs would you outright exclude from your M+? Perhaps bear tanks / feral dps, maybe enhancement shaman (though their cleave is nothing to scoff at)… who else? Fire mages i suppose but honestly I have just not seen a fire mage in any content in months…
I agree affliction had it’s reign for a long time - but just because it did doesn’t mean it should be a burden to groups to bring one along. Warrior tanks were a similar burden at the start of the expansion, and blizzard finally acknowledged his and buffed them to ensure they were viable in higher keys.
Just because a spec is good at raiding doesn’t mean you should be unable to use it effectively in M+. And to those saying it’s mid-tier in M+, i’d strongly disagree, having played affliction exclusively in M+ until 8.1 when i switched to demo. I have good affliction M+ experience (in spite of my io score, which reflects how difficult it was to do keys with an affliction warlock and prot warrior tank).
Now all that being said, given how reasonable demonology is in M+, warlocks do have a viable M+ spec so we would be bottom of the list to fix. The only thing I would then say is, if blizzard has decided we have only a single viable M+ spec, they need to make it a proper M+ spec and give us a silence like literally every other class has that does not require us to sacrifice 20% of our dps.
1 Like
I was an Affliction then I noticed a nice DPS drop with the nerf, swapped to Demo and without even having a rotation down I gained a nice amount of DPS and it only went up. I tried to go back to Affliction and swapped out some gear and it was bad, doubt I will look back at it anytime in the near future.
Warlock is viable in M+. You’re mistaking Aff being terrible in M+ for warlocks being terrible in M+. Granted, they aren’t the best ranged, but Demonology definitely holds its own in M+ and has comparable representation to spriests, elemental shamans, and a bit behind BM (keys 15+, sourced from raider.io).
Also, in terms of M+ representation at 15+, Aff is still ahead of Feral, Arms, Subtlety, Enhancement, Fire, and Arcane, and is trailing Frost (DK), Unholy, and Marksmanship by a smidge. Aff isn’t the only spec in the game with next to no M+ viability. But as a sum of all 3 specs, and comparing just to DPS specs, warlocks are way ahead of monks, DKs, and paladins, and marginally ahead of warriors, priests, and shaman. So stop trying to make it out like warlocks are uniquely terrible as a whole for M+. Only Aff is, and that’s perfectly fine. Not every spec has to be amazeballs, or even viable, for all types of content, especially on a pure DPS class where you have two other specs only a couple second cast away, and ESPECIALLY especially for a spec that is still the dominant option in progression raiding and was the absolute dominant choice in all content for the entire last expansion.
You are right about my typo - i meant affliction not warlock. I do believe every spec should be able to carry their own weight (not just affliction). I will note that representation isn’t necessarily the best way to gauge how good a class or spec is.
I would argue that arcane and fire mages are low not just because they aren’t great, but because frost is so ridiculously good in M+ (providing utility snares AND very high dps). Arguably a similar issue for demonology vs. other specs, but demonology has less utility than the others who can run felhunter more easily.
But your point is taken - and I feel like warlocks as a whole cling to their SPEC as a class identity more than other classes. That said, I place the blame for this squarely on Blizzard and artifacts last expansion, which forced people to identify as a spec instead of a class (and azerite traits that require you to pay to change them have furthered this divide).
The last point I will make is this: If Blizzard wants each spec to have a unique identity and role (i.e. Demonology for M+, Aff/Destro for raids) then that is fine, but then they need to stop punishing people for multi-specs; let every piece of azerite automatically change to your set “destruction” traits when you go destro and the same item goes to it’s chosen “affliction” traits when you go affliction. If the punishment for changing became less severe, perhaps we could go back to a class identity instead of a spec identity.