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January 22, 2007, 10:41 AM
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#1 (permalink) |
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Character Info
Demonblade 64 Human Warlock Executus US PvP Guild: Horde Hunters, Inc. Talent Spec: 7/41/4 |
From Affliction to Demo - Chaging Playstyle Ater 6 Months
Well yesterday morning, I did it. I switched from an Affliction heavy build to a Demo build. With gold coming fast and furious in The Outlands, I felt okay about taking a chance, knowing it would only be an hour or two's work to swtch back if I hated it. So far I'm LOVING it...for the most part. This is what I'm buidling towards ultimately: http://www.wowhead.com/?talent=AV0MZcxczIqzzxstxxbz WHAT I LOVE. I love the Felguard. I know he's taken a lot of heat for being neither fish nor foul (not as much damage as Succy, not as good a tank as VW) but tooling around Hellfire with him, it's like having my own mini warrior at my side at all times. I'm tougher than I was as an affliction lock AND I do more damage. That's a win/win. The other thing I REALLY like is that, as an affliction lock, many times I felt I wasn't contributing to my full potential in groups. I'd cast my DOTs and 9 times out of 10, the fight would be over before they'd even done half their damage. Now I feel like I'm really helping out. Once my immolate and shadowbolt cast times drop, it's only going to get better. And when I get machine gun imp - watch out! WHAT'S TAKING SOME GETTING USED TO. No iHOT. I miss my trusty security blanket mapped to my side mouse button. No Grim Reach. My range has taken a big hit. And most of all, no Suppression. I notice my DOTs are getting resisted a lot more. I know that I COULD put points into it, but that doesn't mesh with my plant to drill down into the Destruction tree. In EVERY build you give up something. Right now, the advantages to my Demo build outweight the disadvantages. And I've been an Affliction lock since DAY ONE. I may feel differently in a couple of weeks, but after a day of putting this build through its paces, I definately feel more powerful. To me it's the best of both words. I don't kill as fast as Destruction, but I'm tougher and more mana effecient. I don't have the range and utility of Affliction, but I kill a lot faster. To me, Demo seems the best balanced of the trees. Last edited by Demonblade; January 22, 2007 at 10:44 AM.. |
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January 22, 2007, 10:58 AM
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#2 (permalink) |
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Re: From Affliction to Demo - Chaging Playstyle Ater 6 Months
I made the switch recently myself and I enjoy the playstyle alot more and don't even see a huge drop in DPS from affliction. I have not done any pvp since the expansion, and I'm sure my dps is lower in battlegrounds, but as far as quest grinding or running hellfire citadel, my dps is increased for sure. Only difference is I've decided to go up the affliction tree and ignore destruction altogether. I went with higher survivability by getting imp life tap and imp drain life, plus instant corruption. As I continue leveling I'll grab Amplify curse and concentration so I don't get interrupted when draining life. Because I grabbed imp armor in the demo tree, I figured having imp. drain life will take full advantage of the 26% increase to healing from spell damage. I'm averaging 350 healing per tick from my drain life, which is a huge help when killing 3 or 4 mobs at once. |
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January 22, 2007, 11:03 AM
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#3 (permalink) |
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Character Info
Demonblade 64 Human Warlock Executus US PvP Guild: Horde Hunters, Inc. Talent Spec: 7/41/4 |
Re: From Affliction to Demo - Chaging Playstyle Ater 6 Months
That's certainly a viable way to go. I miss Amplify Curse. And 2 or 3 points in Suppression would be nice. The only things I took from the Affliction tree were 5 points in Imp Corrupt and 2 in Soul Siphon. I'll be counting on the faster shadowbolts (which I wasn't using at all as an affliction lock) to help me make up the damage I'm losing in affliction. Not to mention Shadowburn which, although it costs a shard, I like a LOT better than UA. I'm enjoying using my shadowbolts again, which, after I traded in my SM/Ruin build for a UA build, I stopped using. Last edited by Demonblade; January 22, 2007 at 11:25 AM.. |
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January 22, 2007, 12:53 PM
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#4 (permalink) |
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Character Info
Drayke 80 Undead Warlock Daggerspine US PvP Guild: Sacred Profile: Blizzard Armory Talent Spec: 0/13/58 |
Re: From Affliction to Demo - Chaging Playstyle Ater 6 Months
I've also switched to Demo from Affliction since my wife respec'd from Holy / Disc to Shadow. Since her healing took a hit and she was contributing a lot more DPS to our duo, I wanted the added survivability. When my wife was holy and I was affliction-spec'd, I accounted for roughly 3/4ths of our duo's damage. I would pull multiple mobs, DoT them up, and wait for them to die, occasionally receiving a little healing love from the priest. In raids, it's hard to beat affliction. The ability to DoT multiple targets, all of whom remain standing long enough for your DoT counters to run out, while bearing little risk of pulling aggro is unnmatched in our talent trees. Our mana bars are consistently full, and our improved CotE and CoS makes us a very popular class with the raid leader. The demonology spec has proven to be more effective in instances and against single targets than Affliction. I have always sort of had the perception of the Affliction lock being the "thinking man's" warlock, while the Destro lock was more the the twitch-gamer's version, geared toward ambushes and quick kills. Demonology always sort of occupied a middle ground in my mind...I saw the obvious benefits of it, but dismissed the tree because it required so many talent points be wasted on useless skills. I will admit it's a complete paradigm shift for me. Suddenly I'm not nearly as fragile...That's good, because I have to get closer to my target to kill it. I'm also so woefully dependent on my pet that if it dies through my own carelessness or a focused attack by an enemy, I'm rendered completely ineffective. (Any demonology locks will know that if their pet's killed and their quick-cast replacement pet is down you kill at Holy Priest speed). I am in average gear, and with just Fortitude and Blood Pact on me last night, I had 7300 HP -- Or 1300 more than our tank. With that in mind, it's really hard to beat a Shadow Priest and a Demonology Lock in PvP. Unless we're overwhelmed by numbers, my wife and I can pretty much butcher any comers, and that's a good feeling, especially now that the unspoken truce that governed inter-faction leveling the first week after the expansion is fraying around the edges. I do miss the range, and I miss the complexity of Affliction. For me, my average fight now goes something like this: Pet Attack > Agony > Corruption > Drain Life, Drain Life, Drain Life. When your Drain Life is ticking at such insane numbers, why waste cast time on a non-instant cast? When I get incinerate, this may change, but until then, it feels like a 4-button game. The payoff, of course, is that my wife rarely has to pop out of shadow form to heal because I'm healing myself to the tune of 350 per second. It's truly a devastating build, but when we go back to raiding I will probably drop it for Affliction again. 
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January 22, 2007, 01:04 PM
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#5 (permalink) |
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Re: From Affliction to Demo - Chaging Playstyle Ater 6 Months
i think when i hit 50 im gonna head to demo...its always interested me since level 1. but early on when i was newb i was destro cause of big crits. i was a big crit fanatic but now im afflic and i love it so much. I can 1v1 a warrior about my level and dot him up and just drain life over and over again and win by a landslide. but ive never really tried demo so i think its time to farm some money and make the switch when i hit 50 of course |
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January 22, 2007, 02:03 PM
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#6 (permalink) |
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Re: From Affliction to Demo - Chaging Playstyle Ater 6 Months
I wouldn't bother to change to Demo until 53 if you are planning on playing with the Felguard. As with most warlock pets he really doesn't get fun until he gets a talent or two (Cleave is cool). I played demo straight to 53 and I've enjoyed every level of it. I also have an affliction warlock on another server and he's also a blast (more fragile, but more instatnt cast stuff). The nice thing with Demo is you have a few extra seconds to react if your brain isn't in high gear when you are playing. j |
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January 22, 2007, 02:21 PM
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#7 (permalink) |
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Character Info
Medaho 80 Human Warlock Earthen Ring US RP |
Re: From Affliction to Demo - Chaging Playstyle Ater 6 Months
Just chiming in.... I am Demo built as well after being Afflict during my heavy BG days.. I did much more damage as an Afflication 'lock BUT in raids and instances - mainly going against NPC's...either the mob died too quickly for my DOT's or I was a serious aggro-magnet. I was great in WG or AB, but in AV where we tookon NPC's and real-toons, the NPC's would agrro on my viciously.. Without the extra HP, I was dead quickly. Since BC, I have re-spec'ed to demo and tend to hold my Felguard as an off-tank or more importantly as a last line of defense should something come for me or the group healer. On the 5-mans in the Ramparts or Blood, I am normally very high on the damage chart with DOT's and draining anyway. The felguard may not always be able to take on an instance MOB -one-on-one to the death, but can hold anything off of either me or the healer until I can attend to it or the tanks can assist. I'm looking forward to enhancing my spec as I level. I suspect that if I go down the Destruct tree and get Shadowburn, I will be even more formidable in the BG's. |
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January 22, 2007, 02:25 PM
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#8 (permalink) |
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Re: From Affliction to Demo - Chaging Playstyle Ater 6 Months
im dying to try a full affliction spec and have been for some time, but for the grind to 70, i think the Felguard is just too valuable to give it up. He helps me level and hes great in instances for off tanking Once i hit 70, i think i will go Afflock. |
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January 22, 2007, 02:32 PM
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#9 (permalink) |
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Re: From Affliction to Demo - Chaging Playstyle Ater 6 Months
I have been back and forth between affliction and demo at least 4 times before The Burning Crusade came out. I went from 60-63 as an affliction lock as I have heard many times, that affliction is the better way to go while grinding as you can DoT up multiple mobs and do iHoT and then drain life off the last mob. Unfortunately this is not always the case. You have some mobs that Daze you slowing your movement speed by 50%, and you even have a few that silence you. Thus your only able to pull 1-2 mobs at a time of a certain type of mob species if you will. I did have some fun being able to do this a few times and pulling it off. BUT the Outlands is full of people. Its actually rediculous how many people were there Wednesday night thru Sunday night. You can't really pull a ton of mobs for two reasons. Lack of mobs is a big one and also for frear of pulling multiple adds and possibly putting your life at risk. All in all it was a fun build and it definately has alot of pros to it. A buddy of mine is already a level 70 lock. His gear was below mine going into The Burning Crusade. He has been a demonolgy specced lock pre The Burning Crusade as well. He was always #2 on the damage meters with his imp out and soul linking his imp (yes, you can do this as long as you don't pull aggro lol). I was affliction lock and I was voted to put up Malediction since I had 2/3 talent points into it. Unfortunately this seriously gimps the affliction lock. You can't use Curse of Agony due to CoS being used. So you are already going to do less DPS. I was just amazed at how much damage he was doing in raids such as MC. I had a chat with him last night and he is still Demo build and other points into affliction. He hit level 70 on Saturday night. I can now see why he hit 70 so fast. You are basically slicing thru mobs like crazy. Grinding is faster and yes it is like you are questing with a warrior that is a level or two below yourself. You get full credit for the kill (xp wise) and I love to grab multiple mobs of my level and DoT them up and let the felguard do his thing. Sure I have to heal him occasionally, but what warrior doesn't have to heal themeselves as well right. The survivablity is insane. I was in the forest area last night (sorry forgot name and too lazy to look it up) just out side of Shattrath, Trokar forest? something like that. Anyways, I wanted to see how good the felguard would do. I was pulling mobs 2 levels higher than me inside this Tome and all of a sudden the entire room starts to respawn. I had 4 mobs on me that were level 63-65, My felguard and I both survived at about 20% health. Needless to say, I quickly did my business of finding my quest info and got the heck out of there. I am glad I respecced last night into Demo. So I am happy I went with the felguard
__________________
RL : "Banish the elemental", "wait.... DOn't" Grrrrrr |
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January 22, 2007, 02:37 PM
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#10 (permalink) |
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Character Info
Demonblade 64 Human Warlock Executus US PvP Guild: Horde Hunters, Inc. Talent Spec: 7/41/4 |
Re: From Affliction to Demo - Chaging Playstyle Ater 6 Months
I did the final stage of the Honor Point quest last night where you have to kill some named demon and shut down his portal. Well, I kill him and I'm milling about killing a couple of other demons when he respawns under a minute later. His respawn rate is ridiculous. So it's me and my Felguard against 3 demons PLUS this named demon that has just respawned. The Felguard died in the fight but I lived. I'd have NEVER made it through that as an affliction lock. Another affliction lock might have but I know I would not have. Maybe Demo just fits my playstyle better. I just love how balanced it is. That's a perfect fit for how I like to play. |
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