So in my grand warlock experiment, mostly soloing to 60 with some instances thrown in and a little duo'ing now and then I leveled as demonologist and then headed downt he affliction tree. But I was 31 deep in demon before going into affliction. It worked fine I found some fun ways to kill quickly (Have your voidy garther 4+ mobs, slap a DoT or 2 on both, sac the voidy and hellfire everything with the shield up even with having to resummon and tap and such it can kill very quickly), I was able to use demons when needed and sac then at other times. I always focused on + damage gear and with very little twinking I'm sitting at 169 all damage and +21 more shadow damage with half a level to go to L60.
She's an herbalist/tailor (though I really might drop tailor since I've got my robe of the void) and I will be doing some solo grinding for herbs for sure. I will also likely play her in 5 mans and maybe the odd ZG/AQ20 here and there before the expansion hits, might even mess around with some PvP. Little to no chance of ever seeing a 40 man raid. So I want to pack a little more punch in the small group stuff. I don't really want to go SM/Ruin just because. So I'm thinking of two different builds that go fairly deep in demonology but get some other stuff help kick up the damage a bit more.
Demon + Affliction
Demon + Destruction
Both builds share the same core of 21 demonology. I figure the pet will be sac'd most of the time, but the points to dig down the tree were spent to make the pets as strong as possible in case I do have one out for CC or blood pact or just because it makes grinding easier (fel puppies are rather fun against the Saytrs in Felwood). But likely something will be sac'd. I've recently passed 3400 HP so sac'ing voidy for the health regen can actually speed up grinding over just having the ho out with soul link up and doing a life drain up every 4th or 5th kill. 3K HP seems to be the break point for that. Again recall that I was bit odd with the gear choices and haven't hit any of the end game instances past BRD and even then only 1 BRD run. I expect my HP to just keep climbing and the +damage to stay pretty much the same.
The affliction build would up shadow damage, so stronger DoT's and shadow bolts. A sac'd ho in the instances making that even better. With the solo stuff I figure I would never die. With all the life generation options being able to get a pet back up quick even if it just for a sac for a shield, what not. Of course having a hunter in top end MC gear I'm not sure how much solo grinding I'll do with this toon.
The demon + destruction build looks to do fun stuff for more damage. Sac'd pet again for upping the damage. Not as survivable (since without talents you can't drain tank and there is no way the pets could hold aggro since they can't really hold it now. :)
I'm leaning towards the first build which is more or less rearranging a few points in demon from my current build and taking 6 points from there and getting siphon life and shadow mastery. It would be a playstyle I'm already familar with on the lock. The other reason is my alliance lock is destruction but since he never gets played that doesn't mean much.
What I'm not sure on is which would actually do more damage in an 5 man situation. I don't think either will out damage SM/ruin, especially in my current and expected gear, but I could see both of them packing a decent punch. Since I've managed to push 200 DPS in BRD already and these changes should only up that. Just looking for thoughts, possible tweaks to the builds, etc.
She's an herbalist/tailor (though I really might drop tailor since I've got my robe of the void) and I will be doing some solo grinding for herbs for sure. I will also likely play her in 5 mans and maybe the odd ZG/AQ20 here and there before the expansion hits, might even mess around with some PvP. Little to no chance of ever seeing a 40 man raid. So I want to pack a little more punch in the small group stuff. I don't really want to go SM/Ruin just because. So I'm thinking of two different builds that go fairly deep in demonology but get some other stuff help kick up the damage a bit more.
Demon + Affliction
Demon + Destruction
Both builds share the same core of 21 demonology. I figure the pet will be sac'd most of the time, but the points to dig down the tree were spent to make the pets as strong as possible in case I do have one out for CC or blood pact or just because it makes grinding easier (fel puppies are rather fun against the Saytrs in Felwood). But likely something will be sac'd. I've recently passed 3400 HP so sac'ing voidy for the health regen can actually speed up grinding over just having the ho out with soul link up and doing a life drain up every 4th or 5th kill. 3K HP seems to be the break point for that. Again recall that I was bit odd with the gear choices and haven't hit any of the end game instances past BRD and even then only 1 BRD run. I expect my HP to just keep climbing and the +damage to stay pretty much the same.
The affliction build would up shadow damage, so stronger DoT's and shadow bolts. A sac'd ho in the instances making that even better. With the solo stuff I figure I would never die. With all the life generation options being able to get a pet back up quick even if it just for a sac for a shield, what not. Of course having a hunter in top end MC gear I'm not sure how much solo grinding I'll do with this toon.
The demon + destruction build looks to do fun stuff for more damage. Sac'd pet again for upping the damage. Not as survivable (since without talents you can't drain tank and there is no way the pets could hold aggro since they can't really hold it now. :)
I'm leaning towards the first build which is more or less rearranging a few points in demon from my current build and taking 6 points from there and getting siphon life and shadow mastery. It would be a playstyle I'm already familar with on the lock. The other reason is my alliance lock is destruction but since he never gets played that doesn't mean much.
What I'm not sure on is which would actually do more damage in an 5 man situation. I don't think either will out damage SM/ruin, especially in my current and expected gear, but I could see both of them packing a decent punch. Since I've managed to push 200 DPS in BRD already and these changes should only up that. Just looking for thoughts, possible tweaks to the builds, etc.
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It's all just zeroes and ones and duct tape in the end.
It's all just zeroes and ones and duct tape in the end.