Affliction warlock good dps even possible?

[Basjohn]

So for the past few months I've been playing an (orc) Affliction lock and loved it while leveling but now that I'm 80 (with decent mostly epic equip) I'm finding myself hitting the bottom of the DPS rankings consistently. In fact the only rankings I do win are the healing rankings.....(due to siphon life and drain life)

Best I've managed so far was 1533 (in VoA against 1st boss only) and while I have impressed a few groups by taking on 3-4 elite mobs on my own when everyone else wiped...everyone seems so dps recount obsessed that my little lock feels inadequate to say the least.

So I'm asking you guys....can an Affliction lock even get good dps? I keep hearing that I should respec to destruction instead but is it worth heeding that advice?

 

[Esea]

what I have heard is Affliction heavly gear based and Destruction is more of a no brainer entry level high DPS tree

 

[Riot2]

1.5k dps and u claim to be decently epic equipped?
then u are doing something seriously wrong
even by pug standards thats incredibly crap and would get u kicked from voa be even attempting emalon (after a tempest warder pops cuz of over all bad dps, contributed too by ur atleast 500dps too little
a decently blue geared level 80 lock should push in the 1300 to 1400 mark
check out www.maxdps.com and be.imba.hu for advice on ur character
do u have (mostly/all) your enchants at the "best in slot" by enchanting profession and additionally the other enchants
that is exalted rep with hodir for shoulders
exalted ( i think off hand) with ebon blade head enchant
epic crafted pants enchant
crafted belt socket etc
and then ofcourse all the best gems socketed into available slots
this makes a HUGE difference overall
conclusion: you are doing it wrong

 

[Basjohn]

Alright so we've established you're an ass. Now we can move on to discussing how I suck.

My question is whether or not AFFLICTION locks can do good dps. Specifically that. I've only done roughly 20 hcs so far but in the entire time I have I've never once run with another afflic lock, infact even the demonology locks look down on afflic dps.

So I'm not asking you to belittle me here lad, I'm asking if anyone has run with an affliction lock who actually DOES do good dps. (Forum articles via google seem so far to run with affliction dps = teh suck but I'm willing to believe you lot more than some random google result).

Finally I'm not Naxx or Ulduar geared nor am I enchanted out. (At best I have embroideries from my tailoring prof) It's simply a waste at this point as I keep coming across better gear so rapidly. Decent gear isn't "awesome" gear you see. Gear score of 2552 if it helps establish where I sit on the table.

 

[Riot2]

w00t im an ass ur have an ass...
okay over that
no that gear ranking doesnt help much (every site about has their own ranking of gear, for example on be.imba.hu a rating of 600 is basically as high as you can go

to answer the question yes i see afflication locks dealing huge amounts of damage
20 heroics? lol
gearing my warrior i was doing easily 5 a day (was on holiday and had the time) for a couple of weeks --> it needs to be done, then buy all ur emblem gear ( i geared up tanking and dpsing gearing to rougly equal levels in that time tho)
and secondly, unfortunately to push that extra bit of edge that u need to just keep up to the ppl in voa u will need to put expensive enchants on gear that u could very well replace in a few hours
and by expensive if u dont plan on keeping it for more than a week the 2nd best enchant will also do a alot to help and will cost alot less

lol i often had days where i ended up with 40-odd silver after grinding 1000g on dailies, spent on enchants and replaced items in the week

but yeah if u want to get any where nearing 4.5k dps in a 25man raid environment u have to do some work

 

[Basjohn]

Right well I did what I should have done from the start and said a jolly good fark it. I switched to Destro and without even being experienced in the spec I'm now doing 1913dps which while not fantastic by some people's standards is certainly much better than before.

(And it should be noted I've only been lvl 80 for a week so hence the apparently lol-able 20 Heroics)

 

[Pitbull]

Go Felguard/Emberstorm build

00/41/30 (Google it)

You will be topping the DPS meter this is till you at least get T7x4 and higher.

Affliction is THE DPS build but only once you have AWESOME gear. Don't even bother to play Affliction with anything less than 2.3k SP (Unbuffed)

 

[Skurm]

1:Are you hitcapped? Every DPS should get him/herself hitcapped before anything else
2:Are you stacking and timing dots correctly? If you're letting dots expire your dps will blow. If your refreshing to early you're wasting GCD's and your dps will blow. Get a decent Dot timer if you don't already have one.
3:Are you focusing on how much DPS you're doing on bosses rather than trash? Affliction locks do poor damage on trash. Don't let overall DPS stats bother you too much, focus on how much damage you're doing on bosses. As an affliction lock your job is burning down bosses rather than trash.

Affliction locks should be some of the highest single-target DPS'ers in any raid, right up there with the rogues and hunters. But they have a relatively complex rotation, and constant and careful DOT and GCD management.

Please note, this guide is not an all-inclusive raiding guide. It focuses specifically on affliction, due to the fact that affliction rotations are particularly difficult. This thread dissects all information regarding just this aspect of raiding. For more comprehensive raiding, there will soon be a new WOTLK guide. This guide will still supplement that one, specifically for affliction.

The thread here is about Affliction Raiding. This will answer very common questions such as these: Should I use immolate? Should I drop any DoTs from my rotation? What is the rotation? My DPS is really bad, what am I doing wrong? How can I get better at affliction? This will be broken up into 2 posts. The first, below, dealing with DPCTs and whether or not you should be casting all of your DoTs.

I'll start by clarifying what DoTs should be used. The answer simply is, ALL of them. This includes immolate! Affliction is all about efficient use of the Global Cooldown or GCD. If you're not constantly casting something, then you're losing DPS. (this is true with any spec really) But, with affliction, that loss is more noticable. Because affliction is so dependent upon efficient GCD usage, one of the most important things to know for any affliction warlock is called DPCT. (Damage Per Cast Time)

DPCT is a measure of what you get in return for the amount of time used to cast a spell. For example. If you cast a shadowbolt, and your shadowbolt's average damage is 1000, with a 2.5 second cast time, the DPCT is 1000/2.5 or 400DPCT. If you cast a DoT that will do 1000 damage (no matter how long it takes to do that damage), and the DoT is instant cast, then the DPCT is 1000/1.5 or ~667DPCT. (instant casts "time used casting" is whatever the length of your global cooldown is)

So, what does this mean to an affliction warlock? Simple. Shadowbolt is your "filler" spell. IE, it's what you cast when your dots are ticking and none of them need refreshing. You fill this gap with shadowbolts. That said, any dot that has a higher DPCT than your filler spell (shadowbolt) should be cast, because it will mean more dps for you. This is because you get more damage for the amount of time spent casting the spell than you would casting a shadowbolt.

 

[TheShogun]

Affliction isn't a terrible spec but it's nowhere near as good as Destro.

I did a Sarth 10 3D the other day with a Caster Zerg group and we had 3 Destro locks in T7 and T8 pushing between 7K-9K depending on their gear.

And best of all, Destro isnt the Shadowbolt faceroll it was in BC so you're not juggling as much as Aff but you're still able to do enough to have fun.

 

[sotherin]

Afflic Lock

I'm not sure if you have your answer yet, but here goes...

Essentially what everyone is saying is correct, Destruction builds scale much better at low level gear, if you have average gear (not Uldar and above) spec destro and AOE ftw time to see those 10k + shadowbolts.

The key to afflic is simple, Destro caps at around 6-7k dps (fully raid buffed with heroisim etc)

It is technically possible to get higher than this with affliction. ( Very much gear and rotation based)

the core is;-
1. Hit Capped
2. Massive crit (need over 27% base)
3. Spellpower needs to be over 2.3k (unbuffed)

I would say the problemmo is your gear and rotation.

let's take 3 targets, you should never have time to drain life / soul, basically
rotation is

Target 1: Corruption, CoA
Target 2: Corruption, CoA
Target 3: Corruption CoA
Target 1: Haunt, UA, Shadowbolt
Target 2: UA, Shadowbolt
Target 3: Haunt UA
Target 2: Haunt (GCD Will be up), Shadowbolt

Give a quick 3 second Fire Storm AOE, Then re-rotate (Rinse and repeat)

Here's the aflic build you *should* be running;-
http://talent.mmo-champion.com/?warlock=235002200102351005350033115100000000000000000000000000055001205000000000000000000

The scale for stats is as follows;-

Stat Weight
intellect 0.23
spirit 0.79
crit rating 0.85
haste rating 0.93
spell power 1.45


Affliction is REALLY dependent on the Glyphs you have, for PvE afflic have a good look at elitist jerks and the Rawr file build.

Major Glyphs for afflic are;-
* Glyph of Life Tap:
* Glyph of Haunt:
* Glyph of Curse of Agony:

Basic single target (Boss Rotation);-
Life Tap>Shadow Bolt>Haunt>Corruption>Unstable Affliction >Curse of Agony

obviously pop a shadow bolt when Shadow Trance Procs

 

[lordneon]

Affliction is and has always been very depended on a good rotation and making sure ur dots have 100% uptime.

Good luck m8.

 

[zippy]

Affliction is and has always been very depended on a good rotation and making sure ur dots have 100% uptime.

Good luck m8.

And the way boss fights are designed, this is much more difficult in WotLk than in TBC and earlier. Makes it hard to beat hunters and melee dps on the dps meters. This is where skill comes in. And dual-spec

We only have 1 active warlock(me !) in our our guild and 2 active mages...... maybe thats why.

 

[Soulreaver]

Aflliction is great for leveling, grinding and dailies. busy grinding rep items for my alts with my aflliction lock. i just throw my 3 dots and life tap on a mob and move on to the next one, i never go oom - dark pact, and i never need to heal up.