Rebalance the Warlock

[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.
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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.