Warlock Changes coming

[bonemage]

My biggest Warlock isn't even in his 20's yet, but I still don't see how soul shards are any different than hunter ammo for space.  Yeah, hunters get ammo pouches/quivers, but they take up a bag slot.  So a hunter loses 6-16 slots just for ammo because they lose a bag slot to it.  Most warlocks seem to only carry 5-10 shards.  That means they still have more bag space than a hunter, with the ability to get rid of an easily replacable shard to pick something else up.  Hunters can only put ammo in an ammo pouch and the attack speed increase of that ammo pouch isn't that huge.  Am I missing something here?  Is there something at the higher levels that eats up space for a warlock?  Shards in PvP of course would be a good thing.

I will be happy when improved healthstones work for party members since they don't get the bonus right now (but they do have a chance to critical heal).

I just can't comment on any of the other warlock changes though.
[right][snapback]69766[/snapback][/right]

The issue with the shards, is that longer battles (mainly PvP and raiding) burn through your shards rather quickly, so you need to stock up like crazy for a raid, since you won't get any during the fight like you can PvE.

What I see differently about soul shard and hunter ammo is the amount of use you get out of each. A six slot ammo bag yields 1200 shots, a 6 slot bag of shards yields 6 uses. There is a good comparison here, as obviously 20 hunter shots in a fight isn't unheard of, but 20 shards being used would take a long, drawn out fight. However, it's pretty easy to burn 4-6 shards in one encounter with a party in an instance. Couple that with Raiding/PvP and you can go through 10 shards in a raid in no time. I could easily go through those in a raid in 5 minutes on shadowburn alone, so health/spell/soulstones and resummoning pets aren't even part of my math here, and that's using shadowburn half as frequently as possible. In PvP situations, that spell (instant cast shadow damage) is one I fire whenever I can, even watching the cooldown timer so I can set it off again. However, I haven't been in longer fights, but in raids where there are corpse recoveries and protracted fighting, you could see how easily one could burn all shards and be hurting. How many hunters burn 10 inventory slots in 5 minutes of fighting? To compare, 200 shots takes 1 inventory slot for a hunter. If a hunter spends the entire battle fighting at range (not too likely) and shoots every 2 seconds burning his ammo as fast as he can, that one slot will last him over 6 and half minutes. If healthstones and summons are all the shards get used on, they won't burn too fast, and that's really where they go on sub-20s warlocks. However, some higher level spells use them as well, and some are for PvP situations, and I think it's clear that a warlock will expend his ammo related inventory slots at a rate that far exceeds a hunter.

I don't do PvP, so this isn't an issue with me. I have only been tight on soulshards, never out, and only really anxious about it once. I also like the fact that I can destroy shards to get more loot to sell, so I prefer no special bags, but having them stack to 2 or 3 at the most should address the issue nicely. They do need to get shards in PvP, but who knows when that will happen as the honorable system will have to be done first, and that is down the road. Again, not an issue for me, but I can see the point of my fellow 'locks.

The post by Eyonix linked to here only addresses spell/fire stones, enslave demon, and upcoming changes to Curse of Agony and Ritual of Doom deaths. The warlock shard bags that were discussed by Icebird are part of an earlier post.

So, after about a month, the latest information about updates addresses only half of one of the most pressing warlock issues. That's why most warlocks are underwhelmed.