Is the (Shadow)Priest the better Mage in WOW?

[savaughn]

I suppose it can look that way.  In my experience, once one has learned how to AoE and you're coordinated with the group puller, mage AoE doesn't become any easier to apply.  And especially in a raid, the fact that mages are the only ones with moving AoEs doesn't change anything, since if you want the entire raid's AoE on one target area, you *have* to hold still since everyone else's AoE doesn't move.
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I had been avoiding this thread, but because of a strange coincidence, I'm going to chime in.

I just had this conversation with someone who had some differing opinions. I had quite a long conversation the other night from someone coming back from killing Onyxia who explained how moving AoE is the fastest most effective way to round up and slaughter dragon whelps coming out of the eggs. It really doesn't matter how brilliant and coordinated your puller is when things spawn outside of the pull.

There are two phases to AoE: collection and destruction. Warlocks can't even play in the first part of the game and have higher DPS to trade off for some massive limitations in the second. Using your own example, a warlock can't run around TM collecting guards because a warlock can't run and AoE.

Looking at the other side of the argument (that Warlock ticks are better than Mage ticks) requires a) the Warlock is specced Destruction and B) there is a Paladin present with concentration aura on. Lets start with the obvious - Paladins are not present in most parties. This should be obvious since they aren't even available on the Horde side. With just a destruction Warlock, you are unlikely to get more than 2 ticks of AoE.

That said, you are saying flat out that Warlocks have better AoE despite the fact that you need more people to make that happen. 2 Warlocks + 1 Paladin are 3 people. You're right, if you have the right 3 people working together they can out AoE 2 mages - how does that diminish the fact that in equal situations mages still have better AoE? Three Mages > 2 Warlocks + 1 Paladin.

Your real argument is this: "If you already have a Paladin in the party and the group is extremely sophisticated in it's pulling, gathering, and mob control, it is possible for a destruction specced Warlock to achieve 39 more AoE DPS than a Mage in the same situation." This is true in many but not all cases. From this, you are asserting that a) Mages are therefore useless and B) Warlocks are the undisputed AoE masters. Neither of these claims are supported by this.

[Skandranon]

From this, you are asserting that a) Mages are therefore useless and B) Warlocks are the undisputed AoE masters.  Neither of these claims are supported by this.
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I think we need, at this point, to distinguish between the two, mostly separate, arguments I'm making, because you've mixed and matched my points and created a bit of a straw man.

1) Mages are not useful in the endgame.

This is a versatility argument, mage versus just about everything, not just warlocks. Mages put out AoE damage, do weak single-target damage and sheep things. Just about every other class brings more to the table except the rogue. Warlock gets some attention here, but so do other classes: I talked about the things that paladins can do. My point is that mages have an extremely limited set of capabilities.

IOW, none of my points regarding Hellfire were intended to contribute to the Mages are Useless argument. You're right, when I talk about Hellfire I don't support this argument at all: I didn't intend that, and it's misleading to imply that I did. Nor was my discussion of two warlocks and two mages etc. anything more than hypothetical, and it was answering a point unrelated to either of my main arguments. I regret pointing out that a second warlock gets free AoE, because even though it's true, it seems to have distracted the attention of a great many people. Just pretend I didn't point it out, it's not supposed to be part of my overall argument.

My point boils down to this: while raiding instances, I hit four buttons only: AE, AM, Scorch, and Polymorph. Surely we can do better.

2) Warlocks can fill a mage's role adequately in groups of 5-15, to the point where empty slots are better off filled with warlocks than mages.

For your information, I do actually know a little about AoE. The collection phase doesn't in any way require movement when positioning is proper. I wasn't collecting guards in TM; they were rushing the idiot who activated them all. I moved over there to get them - the collection phase was over already. Similarly, the AoE pulls in a great many instances from Uldaman on up don't require much in the way of collection. Even in Stratholme, which is end-game, I prefer that priests shackle pull, and then I place myself in the proper position to get them all.

My point, which quickly got lost in details, was that Warlock AE damage is quite easily made adequate for primary AoE duties. Primary AoE doesn't *require* mobility, I think we can all agree. Whether mobility helps at all is actually a separate debate entirely. At the very least, we can get to the point where we can all acknowledge that primary AoE can be done well enough without having the caster move at all.

I still believe Hellfire is exceptionally powerful and can easily be made more fearsome than IAE (which, by the way, takes talent points too). But the argument about whether it's better or not is, again, separate. If the question is, can a warlock fill the AoE slot for a team adequately, I think we'll be able to come to greater agreement. I think they can.

So if they can do that well enough, then we turn our eyes to what else each class brings. Mage polymorph is humanoid CC which is excellent. Seduce is humanoid CC that is less excellent. But is it good enough? Sure. Spell Lock, likewise, is not counterspell...but it's good enough. In other words, Warlocks can fill all three of a mage's main roles. Definitely not as well as the mage can on at least two of the categories (and you may well believe on all three), but adequately well.

Past that point, however, mages have essentially nothing. They aren't better enough than Warlocks are at those three key roles. Warlocks bring soulstones and summonings for ultimate wipe recovery, healthstones which are virtually a 140 point stamina buff to the party, a variety of curses, demon/elemental CC, better single-target damage and a pick between even more stamina, a beefy offtank, more damage or the power to dispel magic like a priest. Mages can remove curses.

There are no combat capabilities unique to mages. That, in and of itself, isn't necessarily bad; if the three major capabilities were split among different classes, the package deal of poly, CS, and AoE of a mage might be attractive to fill a party slot. The problem is that the Warlock reproduces all three of those capabilities and then adds more on top of it.

My solution was to make the mage class clearly better at its specialization, AoE damage. The fact that there's reasonable debate on the topic now suggests that it's not clearly better enough. Of course, there's an alternative solution, which is to give the mage some of the capabilities of other classes, but weaker, just like Seduce is a weaker Polymorph. Perhaps we could get small resistance buffs castable on other players, or some minor form of self aggro reduction, or maybe a debuff of some kind, or perhaps a mana burn that doesn't inflict damage. There are a great many choices. However, in the current state, especially in 5-man parties, it's hard to see a particularly compelling reason to fill the slot with a mage if a Destruction spec warlock's around.

[Drasca]

You only have 3900 mana?

Correct positioning is not so hard with practice.
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Yes, I only have about 4-5k mana at any given time. I'm on a pvp server, and I'm not out to play magelock--which would be stupid given my demonology/affliction spec. PvE warlocks tend to put too much value into int, where stamina should rule.

In addition, I will be using that mana on other curses, summoning, etc. I do not have the luxury of instant mana citrines, or huge pools of mana. I life tap, and that takes time.

Correct positioning is of limited value when the are an indefinite number of aoe spawns. I have correct positioning. It takes time, especially with lag. In addition, any aggro I take will stay on me. I do not gain aggro through death of a thousand cuts, I gain one huge hairy ball of aggro I have little control over and cannot continue AoE'ing after I gain it.

Proper communication? Not everyone's on voice chat, and don't expect people to read much during combat. Those are too ideal conditions to be relied on most of the time. Can't count on it.

With WL HF (non specced), its one shot. You must get the aggro timing and positioning just right, or the aoe will be fubared. Even getting the aoe timing right, you may not have enough aoe after you start getting attacked.

[Drasca]

Some corrections:

healthstones which are virtually a 140 point stamina buff to the party[right][snapback]76526[/snapback][/right]

120 stam buff. The +20% healthstone talent only applies for the warlock, not for his buddies.

better single-target damage

Not while doing all the other crap. While mages/rogues, etc are focusing on damage or healing, warlocks are cursing/CC'ing etc. I've interrupted my own shadowboltsfe drain to refresh curse of shadows or charm. Mages can fire and forget poly most of the time, refreshing twice or three times at most. I refresh an ungodly number of dots, curses, and charms dozens of times during one pull. That takes time away from direct damage.

and a pick between even more stamina, a beefy offtank, more damage or the power to dispel magic like a priest.  Mages can remove curses.

And detect magic/counterspell. Detect gets useful against casters, far more useful than mages alone have been thinking about. Sure, detect is useless to a mage alone because he can't do anything but see it.. but his party members finally know exactly when to dispel or purge enemy buffs. I encourage my mages to use it more.

The problem is that the Warlock reproduces all three of those capabilities and then adds more on top of it.

In a limited fashion yes, but warlocks pay heavily to do so.

My solution was to make the mage class clearly better at its specialization, AoE damage. The fact that there's reasonable debate on the topic now suggests that it's not clearly better enough.

However, in the current state, especially in 5-man parties, it's hard to see a particularly compelling reason to fill the slot with a mage if a Destruction spec warlock's around.

Asking Warlocks to go destruction spec would be stupid. I myself, and very many other warlocks are a lot happier with other builds. You present a rather niche issue, as non-destruc builds hold equal or greater attraction than destruc spec. . . and there are a LOT more mages than warlocks.

In addition, your aoe speciality arguement is centered around the 'with proper positioning' detail. That's simply not the case. Positioning is a luxury. Savaughn, myself and others have already provided multiple examples where mobility rules, and preperation is not available.

I think you've been spoiled with the lurkers, and playing with not one but two destruction locks on a PvE server.

If you ever saw me play in instances, I'd be all over the place completely ignoring single target, multi and direct aoe dps playing support roles, setting up doom, dots for later, refilling my life and mana bars with life drain/tap, keeping pets alive with health funnel, soul draining (rank 1) enemies about to die, and then finally finishing up bosses or elite enemies. Dps is low priority.

Being a mage who can fire and forget, and move onto dps. You fail to see when a warlock is doing anything "on top of that", the warlock is not doing dps. You don't see the menagerie of necessary micro-management involved in a well played warlock that takes away from damage.

Heck, I was confused at first when I saw a mage counterspell melee enemies, but then realized those melee mobs have silence-able skills too. My spell lock only works if I catch them while casting. Yours doesn't always even require that.

The grass is greener, but you haven't seen our utility bills.

Edit: Oh. One more thing! Shamans replace the need for warlocks with their reincarnate ability. Play some more horde man. The balance is completely different when you don't need a warlock for wipe recovery. Instead of hundreds of dumb pallies with very limited wipe recovery in pickup groups, we have hordes of shamans who can reincarnate at will from any number of death locations.

You may need a warlock far more on alliance for wipe recovery (than a mage), but that demand is marginalized with the presence of shamans on the horde side.

[Lissa]

Yes, I only have about 4-5k mana at any given time. I'm on a pvp server, and I'm not out to play magelock--which would be stupid given my demonology/affliction spec. PvE warlocks tend to put too much value into int, where stamina should rule.[right][snapback]76538[/snapback][/right]

Actually, most PvE Warlocks go heavy stamina too. The difference is, Int give 15 Mana while Sta give 10 Health. When fully buffed up, Taha has close to 6k health and nearly 7k mana yet has a 450+ Sta and around 360 Int. PvE Warlocks do go after Stamina just a PvP do, it's just the difference in the amount of Health and Mana given per each point in to Sta and Int.

[Skandranon]

In addition, any aggro I take will stay on me. I do not gain aggro through death of a thousand cuts, I gain one huge hairy ball of aggro I have little control over and cannot continue AoE'ing after I gain it.

And you think this is somehow different for the mage? The first IAE generally grabs all aggro, and mages have no way to shed it that isn't Ice Block (and not all mages have Ice Block).

Proper communication? Not everyone's on voice chat, and don't expect people to read much during combat. Those are too ideal conditions to be relied on most of the time. Can't count on it.
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The communication required is generally only that the mobs get pulled past the correct position. It's not that complicated.

[Skandranon]

In a limited fashion yes, but warlocks pay heavily to do so.

Pay...in what?

You talk about paying higher costs all the time, but I don't see any. What costs? Shards are easy to come by in instances; everything else is just skill.

Asking Warlocks to go destruction spec would be stupid.

I'm just going to stop here and let you and Lissa argue about why Tahapenes' build is "stupid". I think it's powerful and effective, but I don't play one.

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You should play some more Alliance, too, and see how the abilities of a paladin greatly enhance warlock capabilities.

[Drasca]

Fully buffed? On I get the rare occasion to be "fully" buffed, I have somewhere around 7-8k health. I regularly have 6k-7k health with any buffs.

What does he have base though? That's what matters. Buffs.. I can take or leave. Can't be relied on.

The first IAE generally grabs all aggro,
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In controlled situations, only if you rush. Ever hear of waiting for party to grab aoe aggro? Mages can space their aoe out. I cannot.

In a run away trash mob (non-elite, say bugs or skeletons), mages may death of a thousand cuts at will (or four IAE's). You have the option of running aoe, leading toward or away from healers, whereas warlocks stand their ground and await playing staring games with death.

Pay...in what?

You talk about paying higher costs all the time, but I don't see any. What costs? Shards are easy to come by in instances; everything else is just skill.

You completely ignore the mobility and versatility cost, the lower damage cost, the inability to escape, the higher mana costs, the health cost, the time cost, the talent point cost, the interrupt cost, the attention spread across a million mobs costs, the fact that easily over half the warlock's luster is in his pet, and pet die fast and don't come back easily, long preps, and cooldowns on an warrior's level (yes we have 1 hour cooldowns too), and cast times... oh the cast times. Our regular day to day summoning spell is 10 seconds

Instances. Harumph. That's only 10% of the game until level 60, and even then its still only half the game.

If you want a full list of gripes, go to the warlock forums. I'll even save you the trouble and link one of the posts.
Over here

He has gripes that I don't agree with, but that's still more than I care to bother listing here.

You've already listed yourself how various warlock skills are 'adequate' for various tasks, but obviously not 'the best' or nearly as reliable. Seduce is very fun to play with, and I'll use it whenever it applies but enemies cannot be chain charmed without interruptions in between from a single target.

Fear? That's incredibly risky in an instance when you're not extremely careful. I can go down the list... but ugh. Which skills are you jealous of again? I already showed you how hazardous unbuffed warlock hellfire is.

The communication required is generally only that the mobs get pulled past the correct position. It's not that complicated.

Completely ignoring mobs that spawn mid-battle. Whoot, narrow-thinking.

Play alliance, no way. I hate paladins and their cheap cleanse. KoS Pallies!. Only synergy you've shown me so far is the uninterruptable (with destruc spec) one. Blessing of Kings can actually bug Demonic Embrace, giving warlocks LESS stamina.

Oh yeah... mages don't have to deal with ignorant bastards like named albino

As for destruct locks... I'm telling people not to ask for Destruct locks, not discouraging warlocks from being them. If you see an non destruct lock, and want a "mage-plus" go get a mage. Don't ask for respec.

Locks are only better than mages in certain areas IF and ONLY IF they are spefically specialized to do so. You certainly dont expect frost mages to do better damage than Fire/Arc mobs most of the time, do you? You don't see the marginal cost of goign destruct as opposed to much needed versality of demonology or longetivty of affliction, or taste of all worlds hybrid build trees.

As for utility, we are a martha stewart class. If you want pure utility, and finally understand all its costs, play a lock--preferably horde and on a pvp server. If you want oodles of forms of damage, reliable CC, fire and forget skills, sick damage, and magical damage mitigation skills, play a mage.

EDIT:

For a better perspective of warlock gripes, read the haikus here:
Haiku

[Drasca]

Oh. Mr PvE Mage... look here
Read: Responses to common statements! 4/29/05

[Skandranon]

Oh. Mr PvE Mage... look here
Read: Responses to common statements! 4/29/05
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Have you even read that post? It completely confirms my point. He says that Warlocks need PvP buffs, which is true. But it concedes that Warlocks rule in PvE.

The only PvE issues we really have are the 8 debuff limit and infernal being not-so-useful.

Ayep.

[Skandranon]

In a run away trash mob (non-elite, say bugs or skeletons), mages may death of a thousand cuts at will (or four IAE's). You have the option of running aoe, leading toward or away from healers, whereas warlocks stand their ground and await playing staring games with death.

Okay, this section tells me that you haven't read or understood any of what I've been saying, and I don't have any desire to keep going round and round on this. I've already listed counter-arguments to these statements multiple times. Go look them up.

Tell you what. I'll start a warlock, and I'll play primary AoE. I will play to level 60 and take notes. If, in that experience, I find that I can run primary AoE adequately and without significant detriment from the way I do it as a mage, will you accept that warlock AoE might just not be as bad as you claim it is?

Play alliance, no way. I hate paladins and their cheap cleanse. KoS Pallies!.

Right. And I thought I was dealing with someone rational. I'm done.

[Drasca]

Tell you what.  I'll start a warlock, and I'll play primary AoE.  I will play to level 60 and take notes.
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Hellfire is great when timed against aggro, but it is simply not as verstatile as mage aoe. Take notes on the other differences between mage/lock as well and limitations of said warlock powers. Note we're the only class consistently nerfed every patch.

Borrow someone else's account for a few days if you can. Save the trouble, unless you genuinely want to try warlocks. You'll see what happens when your spells interrupted, your succubus killed from her own charm actions, your pets are out of position or go ballistic (even on passive), when your primary forms of CC are unavailable to you group is to near the next mob, or you don't have the right pet out.

Imagine if... oh, say pyroclasm backfired on you. Small % chance that instead of you doing damage, you'd get a critical failure and the damage would be done to you instead of the enemy. Except, many warlock skills and talents are bugged or designed this way.

My gripes above don't even account for the number of factual bugs


While pallies have some interesting abilities, like uninterruptable and no-aggro salvation, I'd rather not play alongside them given they're the anti-warlock in terms of their blessings but buffs aren't limited. Pallies, fun for alliance, but horde refuse to get near them.

[Tharn]

If your group is warrior, priest, rogue, warlock, the obvious choice is paladin: if it's priest, paladin, druid, hunter, you might think about the mage.  But in just about every case where you might want to fill the slot with a mage, a warlock fills the slot better.

My mage is lvl 43, so I won't pretend I understand mages more, but I happen to a bit different opinion.

Group 1: Warrior, Priest, Rogue, Warlock
If you added Paladin to this group, you're basically giving up AoE alltogether (except those low-hp mobs intended to be AoEd), because one AoEr will get depleted mana on the typical 2 elites+3 non-elites group causing a lot of downtime. But Mage+Warlock will tear through the non-elites easily with quite a leeway. Paladin can't cure curses, and you have rest of debuff removal covered by priest.

Group 2: Priest, Paladin, Druid, Hunter
In this case mage would not do anything special. Single-source AoE is inefficient except for pulls with many non-elites (4+) and the low-hp trash mobs, curse removal is covered by druid (who is quicker with it), there's AI+drinks sure, and mage has okay single-target DPS at the cost of downtime (unlike Rogues).

[Quark]

My mage is lvl 43, so I won't pretend I understand mages more, but I happen to a bit different opinion.

Group 1: Warrior, Priest, Rogue, Warlock
If you added Paladin to this group, you're basically giving up AoE alltogether (except those low-hp mobs intended to be AoEd), because one AoEr will get depleted mana on the typical 2 elites+3 non-elites group causing a lot of downtime. But Mage+Warlock will tear through the non-elites easily with quite a leeway. Paladin can't cure curses, and you have rest of debuff removal covered by priest.

When you people have AoE, does the rest of the party do nothing while people are AoEing? I'm sorry, I went through every instance up through BRD without any AoE, and I gotta tell you having just 1 character that can do it is awesome, Warlock or Mage. This is why MongoJerry stressed that non-elites should be attacked first by everyeone. It makes sure the AoEer doesn't get as pounded, takes down non-elites incredibly fast combined with the AoE, and then gets rid of this "mana problem" since it's not just the AoEer attacking non-elites. Using better tactics means double AoE isn't needed - ever.

One AoE is enough, all the time, every time. Group 1 already has AoE, CC versus Undead, CC versus Elemental/Demon, and 2 CC versus Humanoid. An offtank, backup healing/save spells, and Blessings add much more than one extra AoEer can. The only thing unique a Mage can add to this group is Conjured Food/Water.

[KiloVictor]

Quoting a bit out of context, just to make some random comments:

1)  Mages are not useful in the endgame. 
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One of the things that I find really cool about this game (and others here have stated as well) is that you can defy the conventional logic on what is "required" for an end-game party and still have a good run. I ran with three warriors and a rogue last night, it was very different from our regular group, but still good fun. And 100% wipe-free.

My point? Mages can find a party at 60 and still have fun, just like any other class. While people have differing opinions on the relative value of various classes, at least there's no one true loser class that absolutely can't play at the end game. Cheers to Blizzard for getting that right.

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My point boils down to this: while raiding instances, I hit four buttons only: AE, AM, Scorch, and Polymorph.  Surely we can do better.

Sure, can you conjure me a drink? :P (sorry, couldn't resist)

My life in instance raids is spamming Flash Heal and Renew, tossing out PW:Shield for those deemed in immediate peril, and recasting Prayer of Fortitude every 50-odd minutes. Surely I too can do better?

I think this hits on one of the issues I do see in the end game, which is that each class seems to get stuck in using one or two skills continuously for the duration of the raid. It would be more entertaining for all, I think, if the end-game encounters required more nimble work from the players. Perhaps that's why I prefer 5-manning: with variable team composition, you have to think a little bit about how your class is going to best work with the other 4 in the party.

Raids are guaranteed to have all classes present, and therefore reduce each class to the one (or maybe four) defining skills of the class. Not great for excitement.

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2) Warlocks can fill a mage's role adequately in groups of 5-15, to the point where empty slots are better off filled with warlocks than mages.

Personally, I like having at least one of each in a group if possible.

We seem to have a harder time finding warlocks than mages though. That's Horde PvE, I haven't played a significant amount on the Alliance side, or on a PvP server.

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My point, which quickly got lost in details, was that Warlock AE damage is quite easily made adequate for primary AoE duties.

Rain of Fire is OK, but it's useless when your targets have decent fire resistance. The mage ability to deal frost, fire, or arcane AoE is a big plus.

If the targets aren't fire-resistant, warlocks can provide fairly mediocre AoE with RoF. Sadly, my experience with Hellfire is that it's a good way to grab a bunch of aggro and spend a lot of mana before getting interrupted. Maybe I'm not doing it right.

In fact, I barely even use it anymore because I've found that so many times that I go to deploy it, it fails. If the warlock talents worked to make it run more than a single tick (i.e. no bugs in Pyroclasm, and perhaps Intensity + some other class skill/talent allowing Horde 'locks better than 70% chance of avoiding interruption), then I would trot it out a lot more often.

If there's one thing that would reduce me to consorting with paladins, it's the prospect of watching Hellfire run through full duration in a self-immolating bath of destruction. I get goosebumps at the mere prospect: seeing my enemies wilting around me, curling up in cinderous waves at my feet; stacking charnel about me whilst my party gaped in awe at the fearsome wave of self-sacrificing havoc that I wreaked upon our opponents -- oh, what a glorious thing that woud be!

As it is, I don't even have it mapped to my toolbar anymore. Perhaps my ambivalence towards warlock AoE comes down to not being able to use it. ;)

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Primary AoE doesn't *require* mobility, I think we can all agree.

Well...... ok. But I'm not sure that you can eliminate mobility from the argument so easily, I still think the mage's mobility is a key to mage effectiveness at AoE. I'd characterize the sub-debate as being this: is a mage (weaker, multi-elemental, instant-cast AoE + mobility) better at AoE work than a warlock (longer cast, higher damage, fire-based, channelled AoE).

I still think that only in ideal circumstances will the warlock approach the usefulness of a mage at AoE.

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I still believe Hellfire is exceptionally powerful and can easily be made more fearsome than IAE (which, by the way, takes talent points too).

Conventional wisdom in some warlock circles (again, this is Horde side) is that the Intensity talent isn't worth having unless you're filling space to go higher in the tree. For 70% chance to avoid interruption, it's just not good enough. Again, if Pyroclasm weren't bugged and the two talents combined to let you get most of the way through channelling Hellfire, it would be different. Five points in Improved AE looks like a good deal in comparison, as it's guaranteed uninterruptible damage. Warlocks would take that deal any day.

I'm sure this is done for balancing reasons (i.e. trading certainty of damage vs. magnitude of damage), but I think the warlock side is still a bit out of whack. In theory, the warlock can indeed provide fearsome AoE. But to quote Larry McVoy (Sun software engineer and version-control guru), "In theory, theory and practice are the same. In practice, they're different."

I think that's what warlock AoE comes down to: great in theory, not so good in practice.

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So if they can do that well enough, then we turn our eyes to what else each class brings.  Mage polymorph is humanoid CC which is excellent.  Seduce is humanoid CC that is less excellent.  But is it good enough?  Sure.  Spell Lock, likewise, is not counterspell...but it's good enough.  In other words, Warlocks can fill all three of a mage's main roles.  Definitely not as well as the mage can on at least two of the categories (and you may well believe on all three), but adequately well.

Past that point, however, mages have essentially nothing. 

My analogy for this is knives: the warlock is a Swiss Army knife, the mage is a sharp butcher's knife.

If I'm fussing with a cork in my lunch, obviously the butcher's knife is not so valuable to me as the utility of the Swiss Army knife. However, when I want to cut up much stuff fast, I'll reach for the big chopping knife. Ultimately, only a fool would always prefer one over the other -- right tool for the job, and all that.

Mages to me are about blasting your opponent down before he can harm you, whereas warlocks are about stubbornly outlasting them. Both are exceptionally useful in a party.

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However, in the current state, especially in 5-man parties, it's hard to see a particularly compelling reason to fill the slot with a mage if a Destruction spec warlock's around.
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Perhaps that's another crux of the discussion: I don't see a lot of Destruction 'locks out there. We see lots of Affliction 'locks (my spec) in the PvE world, and most PvP types seem to spec Demonology for survivability.

Destruction doesn't have the mana efficiency to maintain mage-level destructive output for long, and it lacks the self-sustaining nature of a mage who can conjure drinks. Warlocks can use life tap and bandaging, but it's too slow and expensive to be a regular habit for mana refills.

Really what we have here is an interesting game of World of Theorycraft, positing the rare AoE Kiting Party vs. the endagered species known as the Destruction Warlock. :)

Thanks for the discussion though. It's been spirited and entertaining!

Kv

[Drasca]

If the targets aren't fire-resistant, warlocks can provide fairly mediocre AoE with RoF. Sadly, my experience with Hellfire is that it's a good way to grab a bunch of aggro and spend a lot of mana before getting interrupted. Maybe I'm not doing it right.
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Hellfire giving you trouble is perfectly natural for warlocks. Unlike mages, you have to get the timing and far less difficult, positioning, just right.
In 5 man you must coordinate with your party to have everyone move up in a concentrated AoE circle so enemies don't shuffle around too much.

You must wait until your party has grabbed sufficient aggro (not hard with high damage rogues around) so that you have 'just enough' buffer time through aggro and hellfire range distance before your AoE steals aggro. It is an extremely delicate operation. A few seconds waiting extra can mean everything goes splat, or your hellfire is cut short and we have a much longer battle.

Hellfire can be very effective, but the gap of versatility is the difference between AoE and no AoE and a dead caster. Mages can still AoE under attack, warlocks cannot. KV experiences the easily attained situation when warlocks cannot aoe after a HF attempt.

KV's non-use of HF is pretty one sign of the difficulty using warlock skills. Currently, I have 100 skills on my hotbar. I still need more buttons. In addition, I'm just getting into macros now... and they're absolutely necessary to use certain skills effectively. Warlocks are difficult to master. I maintain warlock utility bill costs are extremely high.

[savaughn]

My solution was to make the mage class clearly better at its specialization, AoE damage.  The fact that there's reasonable debate on the topic now suggests that it's not clearly better enough.  Of course, there's an alternative solution, which is to give the mage some of the capabilities of other classes, but weaker, just like Seduce is a weaker Polymorph.  Perhaps we could get small resistance buffs castable on other players, or some minor form of self aggro reduction, or maybe a debuff of some kind, or perhaps a mana burn that doesn't inflict damage.  There are a great many choices.  However, in the current state, especially in 5-man parties, it's hard to see a particularly compelling reason to fill the slot with a mage if a Destruction spec warlock's around.
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I hate to drag this one back out but for some reason I had two thoughts on this that I think actually balance this a bit more, specifically on the damage of the two AoE's under consideration. The conversation was left at a 169 DPS vs. 208 DPS stopping point, but is that really what we're talking about here?

Arcane Power and Arcane Instability both increase the DPS of Arcane Explosion, moving from 169 DPS to 233 DPS. In addition to this, I'm pretty sure Arcane Explosion can crit and the Warlock equivalent can't. Let's assume a base crit rate of only 5% that is increased to 8% by Instability (obviously, Mages can get crit rates substantially higher than this). Now we're talking about 251DPS.

By comparison, I believe that Emberstorm is the only way to improve the Hellfire damage, bringing it to 229 DPS.

Now, sure this is only the first 10 Arcane Explosions, but that should still balance the scale. I should think that an 8% crit rate is pretty conservative compared to what you can get, as well.

[Quark]

Now, sure this is only the first 10 Arcane Explosions ...
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Nit: 9, practically. And even then only if you're really good with the timing. All in all sounds good in theory, but that means you're not going Fire or Frost heavy. Granted I'm not, but a class that's designated as "best AoE" really shouldn't have to go 31 points into a tree to make that true.

Oh, and you brought up a question for me: what, if any, Warlock abilities critical?

[Drasca]

By comparison, I believe that Emberstorm is the only way to improve the Hellfire damage, bringing it to 229 DPS.
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Damage wise, Emberstorm isn't the only way to increase hellfire damage.

Demonic sacrifice alone (+15%) can bring hellfire damage to 242 dps. I presume its additive +25% total. I have not tried both. Costs too much. I think that's just a waste of talent points to have both. AoE isn't that big of a deal to a lock. If we're aoe'ing in raids, there are other aoe'ers to borrow aggro time against. 5-man, aoe situations don't require talent specialization.

Intensity is 17 points. Demonic sacrifice is 21 points.

iAE for instant cast is only 15 points. Fully arcane specced for Arcane power would cost 31.

All that for merely aoe is a bloody waste.

Sure a character (mage or warlock) who SPECIALIZES TALENTS in AoE damage gets better dps. Not everyone's so obsessed. Skan's arguement is fairly speculative because it requires a talent specialization. Why shouldn't a main caster who specializes in an area surpass another. That said, skan hasn't seen how succubi are killed after charming (thus breaking charm and removing CC humanoid ability all together), hasn't seen warlocks interrupted and shredded to bits after taking oodles of damage. Hasn't seen life tap be the last thing a warlock does before biting the dust. Hasn't seen warlocks being killed by their own hellfire.

Most recently, our soul link prevents any shields from working. This is a 31 talent point investment that hastens our own death.

[Drasca]

Oh, and you brought up a question for me: what, if any, Warlock abilities critical?
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Here's what doesn't: All dots, all channeled. Categorically, that's 2/3 the warlock abilities. Play wise, a warlock could be useing all dots/channeled spells and nothing will ever critical in a battle.

Our pet attacks can critical, and pet spells lash of pain and firebolt.

Non-channeled destruction spells critical. Shadowbolt, Searing pain, Immolate, Conflagorate (talent), shadowburn (talent). Of these, only shadowburn is guaranteed to be instant. Expect to be interrupted. With 17 point nightfall talent, shadowbolt may become instant if the talent procs, but there's a whole array of bugs associated with that.

I've never seen death coil critical.

I repeat, no dots critical. No channeled spells critical.

By comparision, almost all mage dmg spells can critical. Only a few don't. Short list for non destructo-locks, as half the critical-able spells are talent based and all our channeled spells cannot crit.

Hmm. Once in a long long while, health stones critical heal. I do not know if equipment can help healthstones critical.