Rebalance the Warlock

[Kevin]

OK I'm tired of it with the warlocks. That class seems to get the most vehement arguments about it. I keep hearing this change is a nerf not a buff, this change is stupid, this change was great but we are more broken than before. Yet I still see warlocks doing things no other class can and topping the damage meters in both AoE and single target situations. I also see warlocks crumple like paper when one little thing goes wrong because of some of the prep issues and the balance by frustration. I see warlocks plumment in damage meters in situations where they are dealing with crowd control or runner control, more so than other classes that can do these things. So warlocks unlike any other class seem to be able to be all over the spectrum. A smoother more stable situation would seem better.

So how would you balance the warlock? Feel free to get rid of soulshards or make them stackable (give a value of how big the stacks are) or make a bag that you can stack shards in but not have them stackable in other bags (like a hunters ammo pouch bonus), though I don't see soulshards ever going away completely. I'm just curious as to how you think the class can be fixed. If you think the biggest issues are with the rest of the game say that and explain a way to fix it. If you think it's just end game that is the issue or PvP is the only issue let that be known. We've seen Blizzard act on well thought out ideas (though they do it slowly and will sometimes miss the key point but they do actually do some response to fans). If we can come to a consensus maybe we can get a unique and balanced class that can perform OK in all aspects.

I'm tired of half responses and gripes. I want to see what the lounge does well, thought out complete responses.

[TheLuminaire]

its fine learn 2 play ^_^

[Tal]

its fine learn 2 play ^_^
[right][snapback]90853[/snapback][/right]

You'll notice that this isn't the WoW.com forums.

[TheLuminaire]

You'll notice that this isn't the WoW.com forums.
[right][snapback]90854[/snapback][/right]

Fine, spoil my fun. :P

[Tal]

Fine, spoil my fun. :P
[right][snapback]90859[/snapback][/right]

Bolty charges me rent if I don't moderate even occassionally. ;)

[Lissa]

OK I'm tired of it with the warlocks.  That class seems to get the most vehement arguments about it.  I keep hearing this change is a nerf not a buff, this change is stupid, this change was great but we are more broken than before.  Yet I still see warlocks doing things no other class can and topping the damage meters in both AoE and single target situations.  I also see warlocks crumple like paper when one little thing goes wrong because of some of the prep issues and the balance by frustration.  I see warlocks plumment in damage meters in situations where they are dealing with crowd control or runner control, more so than other classes that can do these things.  So warlocks unlike any other class seem to be able to be all over the spectrum.  A smoother more stable situation would seem better.

So how would you balance the warlock?  Feel free to get rid of soulshards or make them stackable (give a value of how big the stacks are) or make a bag that you can stack shards in but not have them stackable in other bags (like a hunters ammo pouch bonus), though I don't see soulshards ever going away completely.  I'm just curious as to how you think the class can be fixed.  If you think the biggest issues are with the rest of the game say that and explain a way to fix it. If you think it's just end game that is the issue or PvP is the only issue let that be known.  We've seen Blizzard act on well thought out ideas (though they do it slowly and will sometimes miss the key point but they do actually do some response to fans).  If we can come to a consensus maybe we can get a unique and balanced class that can perform OK in all aspects. 

I'm tired of half responses and gripes. I want to see what the lounge does well, thought out complete responses.
[right][snapback]90852[/snapback][/right]

Things I think would go a long way to fixing the Warlock.

1) Remove shard requirements from damage spells. Reason being, the two damage spells that Warlocks have that require shard usage are already inferior to equivalent Mage spells (Shadowburn has twice the cooldown of Fireblast and Soulfire does less damage that Pyroblast). Since they're inferior having a shard cost is needless and thus annoying.

2) An escape/damage mitigation skill that gives us a chance in PvP. Right now the Warlock has to be utterly prepared for what is coming or they are just a speed bump for other classes. Either they need a true escape skill (the new Deathcoil will not be enough) or they need to go up to Leather Armor at 40 like was planned in early beta. This is still our top issue in PvP, the lack of escape.

3) End game pets that are useful and don't require us to constantly re-enslave or no dimishing returns on Enslave for said pets. Due to the preset diminishing returns on Enslave, the Infernal (only really useful in PvP as a shock) and Doomguard are novelties and nothing more. These pets need to be made constantly viable or they need to be totally redone from the ground up so that they are viable. As it stands right now, if they got rid of the need to Enslave these pets, they would be balanced enough (they die easily as is to a conserted effort).

4) The ability to recall pets without mana useage or shard useage if recalling the same pet and the pet is not dead. Right now, during travel, Warlocks still lose their pets on occasion, this is no where more noticiable when you use a griffin/hipogriff/bat/wyvern and the pet goes away. Upon reaching your final destination, you need to resummon the pet using mana and usually a soul shard. Hunters on the other hand, simply use a spell and instantly summon their pet back at no mana cost. Some would say that because the Hunter can't change their pet on the fly, they should get this perk, but why should a Warlock have to resummon the exact same pet if the pet didn't die? This is something else needs to be looked at.

These are the top 4 items I see that would go a long way to making playing a Warlock more fun and less tedious.

[Tuftears]

Crazy idea but what about allowing warlock shards to stack to 50 per slot? Make warlock shard bags act as quivers, except they increase warlock chance-to-hit instead of ranged attack speed.

The point here is to commoditize the soul shard. Since it's used so often, it shouldn't be considered a 'valuable' resource, which is the effect that limiting it to one per space has.

[lemekim]

1) Number one issue with warlocks - shards. It is IMPOSSIBLE to balance warlocks with and without shards, by the very nature of the situation.

If you are balanced without shards, you will be overpowered with shards; if you are balanced with shards, you will be underpowered without them. Call the system a failure, get rid of shards, rebalance the class accordingly.

2) Number two issue is flexibility, which in large part relates to pets. Again, similar to above issue, if the warlock is ready for an encounter, and has appropriate pet out, the fight becomes much easier then if he had a different pet out. This poses another problem in balancing - you don't want warlocks with the wrong pet be too weak, and the warlocks with the appropriate pet to be too strong.

We have to treat the warlock pets as an extension of the warlock - almost like another form, or stance. If we look at other classes, most of them have forms and abilities that are better in some situations and worse against others. Druids are a good example - when they get aggro from heals, they can switch to bear form. Warrior is another example - they can switch stances between defensive to absorb damage or berserker to deal damage.

So what should be done? Simple. Make the pet summoning instant. Can you imagine how different druids would be if their forms took 10 seconds to cast? Of course, it would probably be necessary to introduce cooldown on the pets then. Perhaps something to the tone of 40 secs on imp and 2 minutes on most other pets, except maybe infernal and doomguard, who now can have 30 min-1 hour cooldown (perhaps they can be changed to a set duration, and buffed accordingly). Once this is done, it would be much easier to balance the warlock on the simple premise that all basic pets are available all the time.




Before this patch, there were two other issues, but I am glad to see them addressed:

3) Damage spikes. This is already is being addressed, in the form of Curse of Shadow/Elements change. I think it's a good change, especially since CoS will probably now work with DOTs as well, which with the DPS increase on the DOTs is huge.

4) Escape mechanism is being already addressed in the next patch as well. With new death coil and 3 seconds with the changes I listed above is enough time to get the right pet, get some distance, and proceed with the fight.

[kandrathe]

...
So how would you balance the warlock?
...
[right][snapback]90852[/snapback][/right]

I'll qualify first by saying my Warlock is only level 40, and my other experience has been by observing others. A long time ago I had reviewed the available talents and had laid out a potential specification for a Destruction based warlock that tried to maximize every possible ounce of damage. But, as Lissa pointed out, with the current way that COE and COS work this would work fantastic for PvP, but potentially deadly for PVE. I'm already finding that in group play I need to dabble in curses and afflictions for awhile until the MOB is in the "locked down" state, then I can pour on the damage. But, my best source of damage is a 3 sec cast shadow bolt, so not really very spammable.

The reason that you hear so much screaming is that PvP people love repeated huge crits of 4800-6000, while PvE folks don't enjoy randomly pulling the Core Hound off the tank and have half a raid wipe due to a series of untimely crits. As I understand it now they are leaving Ruin alone, and are implementing a change to lower bound of resistance. So, as a consequence some things might be harder that relied on -resists to enable/extend things like Fear, Banishes, Infernals, etc. And on the positive, other things, like -FR curses in MC on players causing one Core Hound breath attack wiping half the raid.

The other *nerf* I don't know much about has to do with Soul Link which was instant cast, took 30% of base mana for 30 seconds of 50% damage transfer with your summon. With demonology one could tank with a VW and soul link, once the VW was very low on health you could sacrifice it, and while bubbled summon a new VW, rinse repeat. If managed correctly would be the equivelent of giving the Warlock an effective 12000-15000 HP. They are dropping the shared health from 50% to 30%. The mechanics of soul link as I understand it is that if you had 4000hp and sustained a 1000HP blow currently you would take the full hit, and then be healed for 500HP. So if you were at 800/4000HP and sustained a 1000HP blow you would die. This change seems directly related to how people were using the survivability of Soul Link in PvP play.

To me; it looks like the developers are looking at the extreme aspects that unbalance the Warlock for PVE and PVP, and are bringing them more in line. However, I still think after these latest changes, with increases to DPS on DOT spells that Warlocks will have more available mana with Life Tap, more available HP, more armor, and still provide more DPS than mages, just in a more predictable way while still enjoying the flexibilities of being a pet class.

Anyway, I hope I get a another free respec to play around with Yet Another Warlock Build. :-)

[savaughn]

its fine learn 2 play ^_^
[right][snapback]90853[/snapback][/right]

Very few comments piss me off this much. You deserve a rather long string of profanity.

I have a love/hate relationship with the warlock class. I haven't capped either of mine yet. I've got two that sit on the edge, but I keep wandering off to play other classes. About half the time, the Warlock feels almost indestructable. The other half, I feel like I run myself completely out of life and mana doing what any other class can do almost trivially. There's no other class that has frustrated me like the Warlock class has in this regard.

I honestly don't know the fix.

[kandrathe]

Things I think would go a long way to fixing the Warlock.

1)  Remove shard requirements from damage spells.  Reason being, the two damage spells that Warlocks have that require shard usage are already inferior to equivalent Mage spells (Shadowburn has twice the cooldown of Fireblast and Soulfire does less damage that Pyroblast).  Since they're inferior having a shard cost is needless and thus annoying.

2)  An escape/damage mitigation skill that gives us a chance in PvP.  Right now the Warlock has to be utterly prepared for what is coming or they are just a speed bump for other classes.  Either they need a true escape skill (the new Deathcoil will not be enough) or they need to go up to Leather Armor at 40 like was planned in early beta.  This is still our top issue in PvP, the lack of escape.

3)  End game pets that are useful and don't require us to constantly re-enslave or no dimishing returns on Enslave for said pets.  Due to the preset diminishing returns on Enslave, the Infernal (only really useful in PvP as a shock) and Doomguard are novelties and nothing more.  These pets need to be made constantly viable or they need to be totally redone from the ground up so that they are viable.  As it stands right now, if they got rid of the need to Enslave these pets, they would be balanced enough (they die easily as is to a conserted effort).

4)  The ability to recall pets without mana useage or shard useage if recalling the same pet and the pet is not dead.  Right now, during travel, Warlocks still lose their pets on occasion, this is no where more noticiable when you use a griffin/hipogriff/bat/wyvern and the pet goes away.  Upon reaching your final destination, you need to resummon the pet using mana and usually a soul shard.  Hunters on the other hand, simply use a spell and instantly summon their pet back at no mana cost.  Some would say that because the Hunter can't change their pet on the fly, they should get this perk, but why should a Warlock have to resummon the exact same pet if the pet didn't die?  This is something else needs to be looked at.

These are the top 4 items I see that would go a long way to making playing a Warlock more fun and less tedious.
[right][snapback]90864[/snapback][/right]

I concur that these are needed changes.

Your #2 is a PvP balance issue, which could be solved with a stun effect/talent buyable to 100% resistable chance for a 15-30 duration. Other than Fear, Warlocks (and Priests baring shackle, or MC) have no escape mechanism. Maybe give Warlocks a "possession" skill like MC. :-)

Your #3 is a big problem, and I'm not at all excited to even get Infernal or Doomguard at this point. That is just wrong.

Your points #1 and #4 are game mechanic annoyances that don't affect balance.

[Lissa]

4) Escape mechanism is being already addressed in the next patch as well. With new death coil and 3 seconds with the changes I listed above is enough time to get the right pet, get some distance, and proceed with the fight.
[right][snapback]90869[/snapback][/right]

3 seconds every 2 minutes still will not be enough of an escape skill. We come back to the same arguement Horde makes against Paladins using bubbles without realizing that 12 seconds out of every 300 does not help that much. Warlocks have even less time for escape than Paladins. 3 seconds out of 120 seconds just means that Warlocks will still get steam rolled. Warlocks need a true escape mechanism. Until Blizzard nerfed the hell out of fear, we had that, no more.

[Lissa]

I concur that these are needed changes. 

Your #2 is a PvP balance issue, which could be solved with a stun effect/talent buyable to 100% resistable chance for a 15-30 duration.  Other than Fear, Warlocks  (and Priests baring shackle, or MC) have no escape mechanism.  Maybe give Warlocks a "possession" skill like MC.  :-)

Your #3 is a big problem, and I'm not at all excited to even get Infernal or Doomguard at this point.  That is just wrong. 

Your points #1 and #4 are game mechanic annoyances that don't affect balance.
[right][snapback]90874[/snapback][/right]

Actually, #1 and #4 are very big balance issues in PvP. In PvP, having as many instant cast spells as possible is important for both Warlocks and Mages. This goes back to an arguement that a lot of PvP Warlocks make, why must a Warlock farm for 2 to 3 hours to get enough shards to PvP for 15 minutes? Think about how annoying it would be for a Hunter that had to go out and farm for Arcane Arrowheard or Flight Feathers for arrows to use things like Arcane Shot or Aimed shot and require the Hunter to use some kind of channel power to get said items from green or better mobs? Conversely, think about how much a pain it would be for a hunter every time they went anywhere they had to spend mana to get their pet back or spend 10 seconds waiting for the pet to come back and during that time you're waiting you're thrown into combat? These are more than just annoying, they can be downright detrimental to play.

[Tal]

Very few comments piss me off this much.  You deserve a rather long string of profanity.
[right][snapback]90873[/snapback][/right]

I actually think, based on his response to me, that Lum was going for humor in his post rather than too dismissive.

[TheLuminaire]

Very few comments piss me off this much.  You deserve a rather long string of profanity.
[right][snapback]90873[/snapback][/right]

Oh relax. It was a joke that obviously no one got. Remind me not to have a sense of humor in future. <_<

[q4m]

While the improved deathcoil will be nice, it makes deathcoil unusable in many, many situations now. You sure as hell don't want to fear something in an instance, for example. With fear attached to deathcoil, it becomes almost completely useless outside of pvp, which is a bummer.

Also, a short duration fear doesn't help a lot. For example, rogue hits you, you death coil them, they use trinket, you're dead.

I really think the idea of soul shards is cool, but they are a gigantic problem. I think a "shard bag" is a step in the right direction, but I really fear it will be say 20 slots and take a bag spot. Making shards stackable would help inventory management, but we'd still end up having to farm them. I really like the idea of removing the shard requirement from damage spells. Our damage spells w/a shard requirement are not impressive enough to require a shard.

Mages have a talent that gives 100% chace to crit (I forgot what it's called). Why not give warlocks something like that and require a shard for it? Something like that might be worth using a shard for. Another idea I've been thinking might help w/defense. Give warlocks a skill/talent that requires a shard and makes the next spell instant cast. Both of these would obviously have to require a decent cooldown time.

[Zippyy]

Oh relax.&nbsp; It was a joke that obviously no one got.&nbsp; Remind me not to have a sense of humor in future.&nbsp; <_<
[right][snapback]90886[/snapback][/right]

I laughed.

Seriously, Lum has been around for almost a decade. By now, everyone should know not to take him seriously.

[Zippyy]

Also, a short duration fear doesn't help a lot.&nbsp; For example, rogue hits you, you death coil them, they use trinket, you're dead.
[right][snapback]90893[/snapback][/right]

Death Coil's fear effect cannot be countered in any way. The fear sticks and cannot be prevented/removed with WotF, zerk, trinket, etc. This is another way of the devs saying "oops, we nerfed Fear a little too much."

The only time I've found that the fear effect doesnt work is if the monster is immune to life drain effects.

I'm also assuming that bosses and such will be immune to the fear effect. And here's to hoping that MC trash mobs are immune to it too :)

[Warlock]

Personally, I'm *very* satisfied with my Warlock. Yes, the class need to prepare and plan more than other classes, but with that bit of extra work it is a very strong class indeed. I mostly play PvE, very much the warlock's strong suit - mobs don't remove curses and DoTs, don't intelligently interrupt, act predictably and are easily fooled into attacking inappropriate targets. Some can even be banished or enslaved. I feel that most Warlock complaints come from PvP play and agree that improvements are needed for this style, though improving our abilities in PvP without putting us over the top in PvE will be difficult.

Shards - PvE, these are not an issue (apart from inventory space) as shards are easily obtained in ordinary play. During most instance runs I accumulate them on trash (still doing very high damage through AOE or having DOTs ticking on multiple targets) in order to allow repeated Shadowburn against bosses. So I think Shadowburn is fine as is, with the shard cost, in PvE play. Removing the shard cost in PvE without rebalancing other spells would put my damage after an instance run even further ahead of the #2 player as I could use it constantly. While it is inferior to Fireblast, Mage's don't have DoTs or a Pet contributing damage.
In PvP, obtaining shards is much harder and the need for them greater. I've suggested adding 'get a shard' to the new deathcoil on the blizzard boards, which would help without trivialising them in PvE.

PvP Escape/Defence - I don't have much PvP experience but our 1v1 defences (eg. Sacrifice, Seduce) don't seem too bad against most classes. Group play hurts as that shield goes away with one click. At least they're not killing our priest :D I do think Mages need to keep a decent edge over us in this area to compensate for our significantly larger number of hit points.

Endgame pets - I use the Infernal semi-regularly already. It's not hugely stronger than our other pets but it has several convenient features (no shard cost, 2 sec summon, can use it and a DS buff at the same time). Buffs are supposedly coming for both the Infernal and Doomguard.

Loss of pet after travel - completely concur, this is an irritant not a balancing factor.

[Lissa]

Also, a short duration fear doesn't help a lot.&nbsp; For example, rogue hits you, you death coil them, they use trinket, you're dead.

You can't get rid of the Deathcoil fear with a trinket, WotF, etc. The problem is, 3 seconds just isn't enough time for an escape ability. An escape ability needs to give you a way to get some serious distance and 3 second fear won't do that.

I really think the idea of soul shards is cool, but they are a gigantic problem.&nbsp; I think a "shard bag" is a step in the right direction, but I really fear it will be say 20 slots and take a bag spot.&nbsp; Making shards stackable would help inventory management, but we'd still end up having to farm them.&nbsp; I really like the idea of removing the shard requirement from damage spells.&nbsp; Our damage spells w/a shard requirement are not impressive enough to require a shard.&nbsp;

Best solution for shards is to get rid of them or at minimum, not require them for damage spells.

Mages have a talent that gives 100% chace to crit (I forgot what it's called).&nbsp; Why not give warlocks something like that and require a shard for it?&nbsp; Something like that might be worth using a shard for.&nbsp; Another idea I've been thinking might help w/defense.&nbsp; Give warlocks a skill/talent that requires a shard and makes the next spell instant cast.&nbsp; Both of these would obviously have to require a decent cooldown time.
[right][snapback]90893[/snapback][/right]

I think Warlock talents are fine as they are right now. I don't think we need any serious changes on talents or talents added. What we need is things changed around directly, either new spells or spells made more effective.