The Warlocks Den - WoW Warlock Discussions

Although not 'bleeding edge' content anymore, there are still a fair few questions popping up asking, "Am I ready for Kharazan?" ... Is my gear ready for Kara? Is my spec ok for Kara? Do I have enough spell damage for Kara? etc, etc...etc. This guide is aimed at those just stepping into Kara (or wanting to) that have those same burning questions. A guide to provide the answers to those questions and more.

Contents:

• FAQ
• Gearing for Kara...
  • Stats to look for
  • Tailors
  • Badges of Justice
  • PvP Gear
  • Enchants, Inscriptions and Threads
  • Gems
• Consumables
• Talent Builds...
  • Key Talents
  • Not so Key Talents
• Playstyle and Spell Rotation
  • Spell Rotation (Boss)
• User Interface Modifications
• What loot should I roll on?
• Parting Advice...

Frequently Asked Questions

What minimum stats should I have before I enter Kharazan?
This is going to vary greatly, depending on your guild. If your guild is clearing Kara easily, they will be able to pick up some of your slack if you are under geared. If you are in a guild that is just starting Kara, then you will want to have the best stats available. But (assuming an affliction build) you will want at the very least:

• 7,000 hitpoints
• 6,000 mana
• 600 (unbuffed) spell damage (with pots, food and oil you can raise that significantly for a short while)
• and 50 to 74+ spell hit.

Note: Skill can certainly make up for those slightly below the “minimum stats”...


What is spell hit and how much of it do I need?
Spell hit is used to mitigate a mobs chance to resist a spell - it is NOT used for partial resists, it only determines if the spell is initially resisted or not. Every mob, regardless of level, has a base 1% chance to resist any spell you cast, that 1% can not be countered.

Depending on the level of the mob and the player, the resist chance changes. For a level 70:

• A level 70 mob will have a 4% chance to resist.
• A level 71 mob has a 5% chance to resist
• A 72 has a 6% chance...
• and a 73 (raid boss) has a 17% chance to resist.

No, that is not a typo, and it does need to be repeated. A level 73 boss will have a 17% chance to resist any spell that a level 70 player casts. All but the base 1% of this can be mitigated with spell hit. Roughly 12.6 spell hit = 1%, so 202 spell hit will max you out at 16% and allow you to hit raid bosses 99% of the time.

An affliction lock can offset this by taking the suppression talent, which adds 2% per talent point (up to 10%) +hit to all affliction spells (note, this means that Shadowbolt, Immolate, Shadowburn, Incinerate, Conflagerate, Rain of Fire, Hellfire, Soul Shatter, Searing Pain and any other non-affliction based spells do NOT get the benefit of suppression).


So, wait, how much spell hit do I need?
Two hundred and two! 202! CCII! A thousand minus seven hundred and ninety-eight. One hundred and one multiplied by two... 202!!


Gearing for Kara...
There are some bosses you can take down with out having the best gear, however, once you reach the curator you'll need to make sure your gear is up to par. The Curator is viewed as an armor check for guilds, this means that you are unlikely to make it past this boss until your guild is geared to a certain level.

Affliction Warlocks: The main stats affliction locks should be worried about are +damage and +spell hit. Don't worry about crit just yet, as it is not nearly as beneficial to you as damage or spell hit is.

Gearing Your Warlock (2.4 Edition): The Warlock Bible to gearing your Warlock! A wise Warlock will study it before daring to ask any "what gear should I get" questions for fear of rotten apples and mockery from the community at large.

Stats to look for:
At this stage in the game, your primary concern should be building up Spell Damage and Spell Hit. You will hear a lot of people talk about getting 202 Spell Hit ASAP and making that your number one focus. This may be a valid goal for you when you get all or most of the gear you need from Kara, but when your first starting out I would focus primarily on Spell Damage. The reasons for this are simple. There isn't a lot of gear, pre-kara, that will get you to 202 Spell Hit without some major sacrifices to other key stats you need such as Spell Damage. The ability to hit a target 99% of the time means nothing if you can't actually damage it. Keeping that in mind, if you focus primarily on spell damage, you can spec Affliction (with 5 points in suppression) to counter act your lack of Spell Hit.

For a well thought out and clearly explained post of Spell Hit vs Spell Damage, please read this post: Reason why people say not to max spell hit right away - The Warlocks Den Forums

You will also want to look for gear that has Stamina, and Intellect. Although Intellect isn't nearly as important thanks to the fact we have the ability to Life Tap (and Dark Pact if your spec'd that way), the less often we have to, the more damage we can be putting out.


Tailors
If you are a tailor, your primary focus is in crafting the Frozen Shadoweave set. This set is fantastic for Warlocks and will serve you well in Kara and beyond. You will not want to replace these pieces until you start getting the Tier 5 gear from SSC and TK. This set consists of:

• Frozen Shadoweave Shoulders
• Frozen Shadoweave Robe
• Frozen Shadoweave Boots

And since you have tailoring, below are some other tailored options to consider. Note, if it says the pattern can be found as a Burning Crusades world drop, that means it drops of numerous mobs in various zones in the Outland, Kara, and the Caverns of time.

• Head
  • Battlecast Hood (Pattern drops off: Warlord Kalithrash, Steamvaults)
  • Spellstrike Hood (Pattern drops off: Grand Warlock Nethekurse, Shattered Halls)
• Wrist
  • Bracers of Havok (Pattern: Burning Crusades world drop)
• Waist
  • Spellfire Belt (Pattern: Taught by trainer, Requires Spellfire tailoring)
  • Belt of Blasting (Pattern drops in: Serpentshrine Cavern)
  • Girdle of Ruination (Pattern: Burning Crusades world drop)
  • Unyielding Girdle (Pattern: Burning Crusades world drop)
• Legs
  • Battlecast Pants (Pattern drops off: Thorngrin the Tender, The Botanica)
  • Spellstrike Pants (Pattern drops off: Murmur, Shadow Labyrinth)
  • Imbued Netherweave Pants (Pattern: Sold by vendor in Zangermarsh)
• Back
  • Cloak of the Black Void (Pattern: Burning Crusades world drop)

Outside of Tailoring: Gearing Your Warlock (2.4 Edition)!


Badges of Justice
If you've gathered some badges from heroic runs, please jump over to the following: Badge of Justice Pick Order Guide.


PvP GEAR (no arena needed)
For those that can tolerate a little PvP, I would strongly suggest picking one of these up: Gladiator's Spellblade or Gladiator's War Staff. And what I mean by strongly suggest is - DO IT! Unless you are in a guild that is clearing Kara, you will not be replacing either of these for awhile. The grind for honor doesn't take all that long. Which one you get depends on your personal preference, a good solid case can be made for picking up either of them.

Also - Vindicators Silk Cuffs with a +hit gem...


Enchants, Inscriptions and Threads
Once you get some gear that you will be keeping for awhile, you need to put enchants, inscriptions and thread on it.

• Bracers: +15 spell damage
• Gloves: either +20 spell damage or +15 spell hit
• Weapon: +40 spell damage. You also have the option of Soulfrost but the mats for that are rather daunting, and I would STRONGLY advise you not to bother with it yet.
• Chest: +150 health or +6 all stats
• Boots: Boars Speed (9 stam / slight speed increase) or Fortitude (+12 stam)
• Pants: either of the spellthreads - Mystic (+25 spell damage and 15 stamina) or Runic (+35 spell damage and 20 stam)
• Head: you need Sha'tar rep in order to pick up the Glyph of Power (22 spell damage and 14 spell hit)
• Shoulder: inscription will depend on what faction you choose. Aldor gets Greater Inscription of Discipline (+18 Spell Damage and +10 Crit) and Scryer gets Greater Inscription of the Orb (+12 Spell Damage and +15 Crit)

For more enchants, please see the Enchanting your gear - Recommended Warlock Enchants guide.


Gems
You have a few options when it comes to gems, but you should use either Veiled Noble Topaz (4 spell hit and 5 damage and is theoretically the best bang for your buck until you get hit capped) or Great Dawnstone (+8 spell hit) in most of your gem slots. You can safely ignore most socket bonuses, the exceptions being +hit and +spell damage. If you want to keep your socket bonus, then use the Glowing Nightseye for blue and the Veiled Noble Topaz for yellow and red. Obviously, if the gear you are gemming is not going to last for awhile, just throw in the cheap versions of these gems... Once you get hit capped, straight +spell damage gems are what you will want.

You will never, not at any time, want Spell Penetration, Spirit, Int or any other stat than the ones listed above from a gem. An argument can be made for +crit/+damage gems, but for an affliction spec they are NOT what you want. The only gems you should be socketing are Veiled Noble Topaz, Great Dawnstone or to save a socket bonus Glowing Nightseye. I repeat this because I can not count how many times I have seen Warlocks ruin good gear with horrible gem choices.


Consumables
We have several different types of consumables available to us and using these gives will you a huge boost. If I am using all my consumables, I generally add 135 spell damage onto my total. That is about 11% increase, which is very significant!

The first, and easiest, consumable buff to get is the well fed buff. Certain types of food will give you certain buffs for 1/2 an hour (or until you die, whichever comes first) if you eat them. Blackened Basilisk, Poached Bluefish and Crunchy Serpent all offer +23 spell damage buff, while Skullfish_Soup offers you +20 crit rating (this is useful on Illhoof when you are on Seed of Corruption duty). Except for rare occasions the only food I ever use is Blackened Basilisk due to the +damage buff providing more to an entry level Warlock than crit will. The Basilisks are also abundant in and around the rivers of Terrokar, and the drop rate on the meat is very high, farming up a stack or 3 does not take long at all. Then cook it up (or if you're like me and never leveled cooking, find someone else to do it for you) and you are set.

Next, we have our oils. These are applied to your weapon which then give you a buff that lasts for 1 hour. As an Affliction Warlock, the only oil that should ever be used is Superior Wizard Oil which gives you +42 spell damage. Brilliant Wizard Oil is better than (or at the very least equal to) the superior wizard oil for crit based builds.

Lastly, we have our elixirs and flasks. the Elixir of Major Shadow Power is the only elixir you should really concern yourself with. There are a few others that are not bad (Adepts Elixir and such) but there are to many flasks to link individually, so here is a list of all the elixirs available. You can use both a Battle and a Guardian Elixir at the same time. Unfortunately, when you die you lose the buff provided by an elixir, and have to consume another one.

Ultimately though, when given a choice, you will want to use a flask, which counts as both a guardian and a battle elixir. Flasks offer much better buffs that last for 2 full hours and persist through your death. We have 2 that we can use: Flask of Pure Death which gives +80 shadow spell damage and the Flask of Supreme Power which gives +70 spell damage to all spells. I generally use the Supreme Power flasks simply because the mats for the Pure Death Flask are double the cost on my realm.

Tip: If you or your guild are just learning Karazhan, a good tip is to use Flasks over Elixers - you will wipe a lot and it was cheaper for many people in the long term. Once you get something on farm switch to Elixirs.


Talent Builds...
If your just getting into Kara, I highly suggest building your talent spec around the Affliction tree. Affliction warlocks only need 76 Spell Hit (with 5/5 suppression) which is a lot easier to obtain at this stage of the game than the end goal of 202 (16%) Spell Hit cap. Yes, you can run a Demon or Destruction spec, but if you want to maximize your DPS potential on boss fights, and your usefulness to the raid itself, you should look at being Affliction.

The Warlocks Den has a few spectacular threads on raiding builds, but the one we should be concerning ourselves with is the full affliction 41/0/20 build, and its variants.

The “I don’t care what anyone says, I’m raiding as destruction and that’s that!” argument.
Go right ahead, those chain Shadowbolt crits on trash mobs help fuel the ego, but I can guarantee you that if you’re wondering if you have the gear for Kara, you DO NOT have the gear for a destruction build.

Here are some talent specs that will benefit you early on:

40/0/21 or 41/0/20 – http://www.wowdb.com/talent.aspx?id=...3e2fe2f4ef6ef3
This build will allow you to nuke with a little more power than the previous build. However some of your survivability and group buffs will be diminished without the demonology points. The difference between the two is the choice between UA and Ruin. While UA theoretically will produce more total DPS than having Ruin, that only counts if you actually use UA on every fight and keep it refreshed. Ruin works passively and doesn't require any action on your part to use. The choice is up to you on where to spend that last point.

41/3/17 - Talent Calculator - World of Warcraft
A standard build that provides Improved Shadow Bolt, Bane, Devastation and Destructive Reach - all very important core raiding talents. No raiding build should be without at least 10 points in Destruction for at least ISB and Bane.

You can take these builds as they are, or create variations of them. You'll note that not all fights are suited for Affliction in Kara. For example, a 0/21/40 build works really well on Illhoof when the warlocks job is to spam seed of corruption. By sacrificing a Felhound, your mana will remain up, and with nether protection, you wont get the spell pushback from the imps constantly launching fireballs at you. However, I wouldn't spec differently for just this one fight, a pally with concentration aura, and blessing of wisdom on you, along with a shaman with mana spring totem or shadow priest works just as well. While this build may work great on the Illhoof fight, due to your low Spell Hit you will not be as effective on other boss fights.

To see more options and learn more about builds to use, please see the Raiding Builds section of the forum.


Key Talents

5/5 Suppression: This could be the most important talent to take in the build. No it does not look sexy and a lot of people don’t know the true value of it. You are there to kill raid bosses not light up the trash DPS meters, so suppression is a must. This is because with zero spell hit you have only an 83% chance to hit raid bosses.

Having a spell resisted is the biggest hindrance to DPS there is. You waste time and mana casting the spell, yet it does nothing. Boss fights tend to last 5-10 minutes, so landing only 83% of your spells over that long amount of time is going to bring you damage done significantly down.

Suppression acts as free hit on you Affliction spells (but only on your affliction spells, i.e. not on Immolate, Shadowbolt, or Soul Shatter.) Taking 5/5 Suppression brings you from having a 83% chance to hit raid bosses up to a 93% chance to hit raid bosses. You should then try to pick up enough gear, gems, and enchants with +spell hit so you have AT LEAST +76 spell hit rating.

Having 76 hit brings you to the hit cap on your affliction spells. That means that you will land 99% of all the Curse of Dooms, Unstable Afflictions, Siphon Lifes, and Corruptions you cast. Since the majority of your damage is going to come from damage over time spells, having them hit capped is the most important thing you can do to pump out more damage.

NightFall: Instant Shadowbolts are great!

Grim Reach: Increases the range of your affliction spells by 10%.

Destructive Reach: It’s good to have both schools able to cast from the same distance. Also reduces threat.

Improved Drain Soul: Not only will this help with mana return, but it will also lower your threat from affliction spells by 10%

Imp Corruption: Instant corruption. This is a fantastic talent for fights in which you have to move a lot.

Empowered Corruption: Short answer: you gain 33% more from your bonus spell damage. Long Answer: Increases the spell coefficient of your corruption spell from 93.6% to 129.6%

Improved Shadow Bolt: One of the best debuffs in the game (+20% shadow damage after crits)

Bane: A must have for raiding, speeds up the Shadowbolt spam.

Devastation: More crit=more damage and more ISB uptime.

Unstable Affliction: Another dot that scales great with your +damage

Shadow Mastery: 10% increase to all shadow damage

Dark Pact: Takes mana from your summoned pet and gives it to you.


Not so key talents...
There are some talents you do not really need but a lot of people feel they are essential. Here is a short list of these talents and my argument as to why they are not needed for Kara:

• Improved Curse of Agony: 10% more damage to a curse that will not be used on boss fights is not really worth it.

• Malediction: You will not gain much benefit from this talent with only 1 or 2 shadow casters. This talent really shines in 25 man raids though.

• Shadow Embrace: another talent that is best left for later raids. In Kara if your tank needs this in order to stay alive, you should be more worried about gearing either the tank or the healers up.

• Nightfall: This is a really fun talent to have. It is one of the best things to see 1 Shadowbolt chasing down a second, and getting 2 crits. Unfortunately, for raid purposes, this is not that great a talent (I will sometimes take it just for the fun factor). You still have the Global Cool Down (GCD) to deal with, which means that you only gain 1 second from a regular Shadowbolt cast.
  
  Nightfall has a 4% chance to proc, and only from Corruption (you will almost never be using Drain Life in a raid setting). In order for Nightfall to proc, you will have to have Corruption tick an average of 25 times, or more than 4 full cycles. On a raid boss, that means at least 72 seconds (4 cycles * 18 seconds each cycle = 72 seconds), on average, per a Nightfall proc, and all to save 1 second.

Playstyle and Spell Rotation
A few things to note when you are stepping in Kara. Chances are your tank is going to have a little trouble keeping his threat up. If it’s a warrior tank I recommend waiting until he has at least two sunders on the mob before you start blasting. If it’s a druid or paladin tank give it a 2 or 3 count before you lay into the mob. This is all subjective to your group and how your main tank is geared, but they key thing to remember is a dead warlock does not damage. It better to wait a few seconds in the beginning before going all out.

On Trash: You will get the most damage out of only throwing up instant dots (corruption, curse of shadows maybe) and then just shadowbolting. Most of the damage from Curse of Agony comes from the last few ticks, and chances are the trash mob won’t live that long, so it’s not a good option. On trash mobs that live a bit longer Immolate is a good spell to use, as it can crit on the initial damage.

Once you get a feel for you tank and how well he holds agro you can get to the point where you can use UA as well. As the tank pulls you can start to cast UA, so it lands right as the tank gets the first hit in. Follow it up with corruption and you have two dots going as soon as the tank gets their sunders up. Then you can either cast immolate or go straight to shadowbolt, again depending on your tank and the dps you have in your raid.

On Bosses: This is what it’s all about. A lot of people have a set spell rotation to start boss fights. That’s all well and good, but know that things change in the heat of the moment. Resists happen, you have to avoid certain dangers, and your whole rotation can be thrown off. The key thing to remember is to KEEP YOU DOTS TICKING ALL THE TIME. Try not to over-write you dots before they expire, as you will lose the last tick. Shadowbolt between refreshing dots and only use drain life as a emergency healing method (pots and healthstones are on cooldown, healers are busy.) Always try to be casting something.

Spell Rotation (Boss)

Amplify Curse, Pop Damage Trinket, Curse of Doom, Unstable Affliction, Corruption, Immolate, Siphon Life, Shadowbolts until UA/Corruption/Immolate need refreshing. I like to pair up UA with Corruption and Immolate with Siphon Life, as both have cast time spells followed by instants.

With this rotation UA, Corruption and Immolate end around the same time. If you maintain this you will be able refresh all three around the same time each rotation and keep them up the entire fight. Cast as many shadowbolts as you can while your dots are going. Also remember that there is a delay between the game and the server, so almost always you can start casting the next shadowbolt before it shows your cast bar finished on the last one.

Life Tapping/Dark Pacting: Make use of these two spells to maintain mana. Always try to dark pact when your imp has atleast half its mana so you get the full amount of mana for the global cool down time you spent. Also lifetap as soon as you will get the full amount back, that way the imp can start regenerating mana earlier. Try to cast dark pact/life tap only when all your dots are up and ticking. The healing from siphon life should not go to waste either. Warlocks have more stamina than other casters, so we can afford to sit at 90% health and be ok.

Soul Shatter: One of the most important spells a warlock has when it comes to raids. Chances are you will only get to cast it once (maybe twice) so make it count. Try to wait until curse of doom goes off the first time until you use it. The more threat you have the more will be cut in half, and then you can pop your damage trinket again and continue to go all out.

Boss Strats
The best asset you can be to your raid is to know what you're doing. The following are guides to each of the bosses you will find in Karazhan to help you learn what happens, their abilities and the role you play.

- Attumen the Huntsman
- Big Bad Wolf
- Chess event
- Maiden of Virtue
- Moroes
- Netherspite
- Nightbane
- Prince Malchezaar
- Romulo and Julianne
- Shade of Aran
- Terestian Illhoof
- The Curator
- Wizard of Oz

User Interface Modifications
Every Warlock has a list of mods that he insists are the end all be all for raiding. The truth is, there are very few mods that you have to have. I would suggest having a look at the Recommended Add-ons thread to see ones that members feel are "must haves" vs "fluff".


What loot should I roll on?
There are many really good drops in Kara. So if your wondering what drops you should save your rolls for, here is a list.

• Main Hand
  • Nathrezim Mindblade (Prince Malchezaar)
  • Staff of Infinite Mysteries (The Curator)
• Off Hand
  • Jewel of Infinite Possibilities (Netherspite)
  • Talisman of Nightbane (Nightbane)
• Wand
  • Tirisfal Wand of Ascendancy (Shade of Aran)
• Head
  • Helm of the Fallen Hero = Voidheart Crown (Prince Malchezaar)
  • Uni-Mind Headdress (Netherspite)
  • Wicked Witch's Hat (The Crone)
• Neck
  • Ritssyn's Lost Pendant (Random Drop)
• Shoulders
  • Mantle of the Mind Flayer (Shade of Aran)
• Chest
  • Robe of the Elder Scribes (Nightbane)
• Bracers
  • Bands of Nefarious Deeds (Maiden of Virtue)
  • Harbinger Bands (Attumen the Huntsman)
• Gloves
  • Gloves of the Fallen Hero = Voidheart Gloves (The Curator)
  • Handwraps of Flowing Thought (Attumen the Huntsman)
• Waist
  • Malefic Girdle (Terestian Illhoof)
  • Nethershard Girdle (Moroes)
• Legs
  • Trial-Fire Trousers (The Big Bad Wolf)
• Feet
  • Boots of Foretelling (Maiden of Virtue)
  • Boots of the Infernal Coven (Shade of Aran)
  • Ruby Slippers (The Crone)
• Back
  • Ruby Drape of the Mysticant (Prince Malchezaar)
  • Shadow-Cloak of Dalaran (Moroes)

Parting Advice...
Know your role (Jabloni!). Read up on and be prepared for boss fights. You still probably won't quite understand everything until you see the actual fight, but you will be much better prepared and know what to expect. If you have questions about something in a fight, do not hesitate to ask. On that same note, if you have suggestions for strats (and your raid leader is a good one) do not hesitate to mention them to him. Keep your healer (or designated person) Soul Stoned. Don't hesitate to create a Soulwell when you think it might be needed. I try to remember to put one up both before and after a boss fight. make sure your imp is unphased for buffs so that he gets more mana.

Also, be prepared. yes, just like a Boy Scout. give yourself 5 or 10 minutes before the raid invites are going to start to get ready. Make sure you are repaired and have enough consumables for the planned time of the raid (I generally bring extras for the people that forget or in case the raid lasts longer than planned, which generally works out well as most others do the same for the days that I forget to get something from my bank!). Farm shards if you need to. I suggest bringing at least 28 shards (a lot of people suggest bringing even more), and don't hesitate to grab one every now and then on the trash. I know of one lock that keeps an entire bag of shards in his bank just in case he doesn't have time to farm for them prior to a raid.

And finally, have fun. Kara is still one of my favorite instances in the game. it is fast paced and a challenge for new raiding groups. It is a great place to learn how to raid. Imagine, you have literally hundreds of wipes to look forward too!

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