How do I up my dps?

[shadowbreath]

I am currently spec'ed as an affliction lock (http://armory.worldofwarcraft.com/ch...n=Shadowbreath) and have been getting flak for not being able to out dps a boomkin (http://armory.worldofwarcraft.com/character-sheet.xml?r=Hellscream&n=Kyrule). I am just wondering if it might be a spec, equipment, or spell rotation problem. I currently have the Crusade trinket and the Scryer Bloodgem too and use them as soon as I can in trash and boss fights. My spell casting order is Curse of Shadow, UA, corruption, and shadow bolting for trash and Curse of Doom or Curse of Shadow, and dot up with UA, corruption, SL, and immolations followed my Shadow Bolting. I would also like to have advice on what else i can work on for raiding gear and some pvp substitutes before raiding for Zul'Aman. Thank you for reading

[NewfieDave]

202 spell hit rating will solve all your problems.

Until then, max out your points in Suppression to help mitigate some of your missing problems.

[Lucrowene]

I find the best affliction raid spec for top dps out put is
http://www.wowarmory.com/character-s...ge&n=Lucrowene
and spell rotation is do your insta dots for trash and SB and for bosses Curse of Agony,SL,UA,Coruption and the just SB untill dots are about to drop then rinse and repeat

[Coud]

on paper

8% of your dots won't land
12% of your destruction spells won't land

your boomkin friend

9% of his / her spells won't land

as affliction about 60 to 70% of your dps is from your dots, the other 30 to 40% is from SB. the immediate solution is to max suppression. the long term solution aim for more hit in your gear. 202 is cap

for trash....... in 10man i just cast Curse of Agony or corruption and then spam bolts....

for boss in 10man, i've personally found CoD > CoS if i'm the only warlock there.

in terms of gear, I'd prob replace your pants with spellstrike and your belt with girdle of ruination since they are relatively easy to get ( gold pending)

[Lepht]

well i was going to suggest checking the thread on stopcasting out, but the red zone is supposed to be gone in 2.3.

here is the thread anyways -
http://www.wowmb.net/forums/showthre...light=dr.+boom

i have a similar problem, though my question is, for those locks that can keep there DPS so high, how do you keep your threat reasonable? Soulshatter has a fairly long cooldown. I keep getting high threat and have to stop doing anything for quite a few seconds at times. My guilds tank is VERY proficient so i highly doubt its anything he is doing wrong (unless he is overgeared)

recently i respecced and maxed out drain soul just for the threat reduction and put subtlety on my cloak. havent played since i got the cloak enchant, but i cannot think of anything else to do.

also, what are some easy yet good items that add +hit? i found Great Dawnstones, but thats not enough! I know there is +hit to gloves, but what amount of +hit is greater than +damage? is the +15 spell hit to gloves better than 20 spell damage?

My guild is just breaking into Gruuls, though with ZA coming out probably next week, focus may shift.

[nme]

http://www.wowarmory.com/character-s...Shandris&n=Nme

i find myself in the same boat in a way. How can i improve my dps over all? we are working our way through kara now, and soon to begin 25 man content. I recently replaced most of my +9 spell damage gems to more of the + hit and + crit variety and happened to match a few socket bonuses. So other than getting decked out in gear that i wont be seeing for awhile, any suggestions? Many thanks!

[Lucrowene]

ok so +202 is the hit cap but if you are maxed out in supretion you only need +100 spell hit and for gems Veiled noble topaz is probibly the best gem in the game

[Template]

not quite - you still have to max out your +hit eventually to overcome the miss rate of your *destruction* spells. Suppression only affects affliction spells.

[NewfieDave]

@Lepht: Assuming there is nothing your tank can do to improve his threat generation, I would suggest simply holding back early in the fight. On most boss fights I cast CoS and then wait for the tank to build 10k threat before I cast anything else. This gives a decent threat buffer. When I see that I'm approaching the tank's threat levels I take some time to Life Tap and Dark Pact myself back up to full mana while my threat cools off. The goal is to keep yourself near full mana for when you Soulshatter so that you can really go all out.

[Arkanius]

1) Go for spell hit first. In long boss fights, you're apt to miss ALOT and thats lost dps right there. For some reason, people think you don't need 202 til Illidan. no. wrong. stop. don't. It's the same through and through. Get to max spell hit cap. THEN, filter out spell hit as you get spell hit on your gear (shade's wand, prince's back piece, t4/t5, etc)

2) Ideally, the crafted sets are better:
Girdle of ruination
Spellstrike set
FSW/Spellfire set

3) Gem only if the socket bonus = +hit or + damage. The more +hit, the more spells that land. High crit won't matter if the big crit you almost had misses.

4) DO NOT BE AN AFFLICTION LOCK CAST CURSE OF SHADOWS. I'e done the math elsewhere, including my guild forums, it makes no mathematical sense unless i'm proven wrong.

First off...based on the damage spreadsheets for warlocks, my Curse of Agony does about 4900 damage in 24 seconds. Cod does more. Over a LONG raid fight, say VR/Gruul, it amounts to 100,000+ damage.

Secondly, you're an affliction lock and you're 2 biggest damaging spells NEED time to tick, Curse of Agony/COD being those spells. By putting up COS (which all locks have) you personall lose 100,000+ damage, or 200dps if done properly. Yes it's that much.

Third...Malediction is a WASTE unless you take lots of locks, shadow priests and arcane mages. Seriously it has to be 8+ shadowpriests/locks/arcane mages doing 900dps to out dps you.

Here's the breakdown...

VR...4,750,000 HP
3% = 142,500

Now, a lock/mage/priest doing 900dps over 9 minutes = 486000.
3% = 14,580.

Curse of Agony (conservatively) = 4900/24 seconds, 21 applications per 9 minute fight.
102,900

If you carry a combined total of 7 shadow priests, arcane mages, or locks, they better be doing 900 dps each, or its a waste for you to apply it.

A more REALISTIC dps figure for most NON bt players is 700dps...378,000pts
equaling 11,340 of ADDITIONAL damage FOR your THREE talent points. You'd need MORE mages/locks/priests doing mediocre damage to make sense for one affliction lock to spec 3 points there AND apply it.

The raid gets better use of Shadow Embrace (-5% damage) than a bonus 3% to shadow/arcane spells. NOW, if 2 locks spec malediction, you lost 240,000+ of damage off to locks.

And here's ANOTHER reason its dumb for the AFFLICTION lock to do it...most raids that could use it, have alot of silence effects or sessions where you are out of combat...lurker, in the water, gruul, silence and shatter, cave in moving, vr, arcane orbs and can't use siphon life.

Having an affliction lock, who shines when moving IS a fundamental of the fight is dumb. You're already losing one DOT on vr, and then you apply another useless dot when you have to move alot? Add in the fact I've gotten 3 orbs in a row, and I'd be down to Corruption, since I wasn't doing Curse of Agony/Cod, or SL. That ain't alot of damage.

No, COS is a waste of speccing. Let the destro lock who isn't putting talents in it to apply it and won't be putting up any curses do it. The 10% IS good, but it makes no sense for an affliction who specs to IMPROVE his curses to do that. You'd need a good amount of crit and spec 18+ into destro with HIGH hit to offset it, and even then, you may want to go RUIN instead of UA for the simple fact that your SB would be 40%+ of your damage and if you're not casting curses then the increased dps has to come from your SB's (i.e. crits, bigger crits and more crits). So choose...high crit, more crit...or affliction, and get a good rotation of dots.

5) Cast Sequencing Macros and StopCasting Macros.

I started with using StopCasting Macros, but have since created 2 Dot Macros that are cast sequences. Unless I'm a nub, the Cast Sequence is doing better than the SC macro. This is either the result of BAD damage meters which don't account properly when you SC everything, OR, some peculiar math scenario where CS works better.

I'll tell you, I get MORE dots up faster with CS b/c I'm pressing 1 button then jumping to SB's with a SC macro built in. It looks like this...

/#showtooltip
/castsequence reset = 17 Unstable Affliction, Corruption, Immolate, Siphon Life

then...

/cast Amplify Curse
/stopcasting
/cast Curse of Doom

Those 2 are my raid boss ones

trash is...

#showtooltip
/castsequence reset=17 UA, Corr, Immolate, Curse of Agony, SL

If you wonder why the reset, b/c on fights like Shade, I don't want to be hitting the same button writing over my dots. The reset means in 17 seconds you reset the rotation, which is about where UA and company end. I'm playing around with it. I take no credit for it, it was from a hunter. This has worked better as I'm on top of dps with the highly geared Destro Locks topping 800dps with 195 hit in only partial t4, spellstrike and FSW, and a very crappy 1hander.

MACROS MACRO MACROS. For the lock they are huge b/c we have so many things going on.

Boomkins do high dps. Get used to it. They have to, they don't have much else. Same as a rogue imo. A roge has no real in combat CC that lasts. They do insane DPS for sustained time periods, but kara isn't melee friendly. There isn't ONE class which should out dps the other. Each class has different mechanics based on gear/skill/spec/macros/lag and group composition. However, a kara raiding aff lock can do 600-700 dps with the right setup.

I hope this helps. I'm no BT raider, so I maybe off in some of my theories, but i have found this to work and put me atop dps meters once again, so I know I"m pulling my weight. I was als able to convince the guild affliction locks are wasting points and dps on speccing into Malediction. Often you are moving and need a mobile curse. Furthermore, if you give COS to caster who get silenced alot, in gruul or vr, etc, then you gimp yourself, and rely on THEM to get sufficient casts in. DOTS help on VR and Gruul in the event fools get silenced. In gruul dots ticking means he gets less growths in if done right. Keep in mind you bypass 2 possible talent point spots for Curse of Agony to be improved.

And while people think it's dumb to use, it is 24 seconds (most trash won't live that long), it only gets MORE powerful at the end (most pvp doesn't last that long) and it's INSTA cast, making it one of the higher DPCTs we have, next to COD. Alot of locks with amp cod, then do Curse of Agony until Amp is up again. In either event, that combination will set you right. And keep in mind, NOT using them is costing you 200 dps. Yes, that much. So if you're at 500-600, you'd be at 700-900 with a few macros and proper referesh rotations.