Affliction Warlock - is it worth it?

I’m getting some mixed opinions about Affliction Warlock: guides and logs online say they are the best spec for M+ with highest dps of all Warlock specs with Destruction being close second. The forums say the complete opposite? Granted, the guides and videos I’ve seen are as old as one year, but I’m thoroughly confused now.

Even after my research, I’m struggling to do any considerable damage with my DoTs and I feel like I’m doing something wrong. Then again, I’m not as geared as I want to be at 120, but even in a normal dungeon my damage is simply embarrassing.

So my question is - is Affliction Warlock worth getting into even with the buffs coming up in 8.3? What makes it better than Destruction for M+? Halp.

Affliction is the worst, destro is meh, demonology is the best, but does not have an interrupt.

Affliction has never been good in M+ in BFA.

Affliction is currently the second least used ranged dps specc in M+. The only one doing worse are arcane mages. The difference is that fire and ince mages are widely used in M+, while destro locks and demo locks are meh at best.

Between demo and destro, demo is objectively better at dealing the kind of dps you need in M+, but the lack of an interrupt means that in certain dungeons it’s almost unusable, which means most people prefer destro. Destro being easier to use and a more viable specc in pvp and raids means that most people prefer it.

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I would say take everything with dose of critic and salt. After years of playing on my warlock, I got rather comfortable with all specs. So, I’d play based on feeling what I feel that works better and not what someone random on internet says. I saw only recently that icy veins fixed up their guides to be more accurate than before but before they fixed it, I disliked it how they served their information basically “it is like that for every warlock and every player”.

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This is funny, I have bigger dps with affli even in Mythic - and I know, the spells are stupid. I also dont use haunt and Im fine, always over 30k dps.

Btw, why to stack crit in M+? I have 20% crit… and after dungeon my addon says. every spell had 15% crit.

The game is broken on many ways and as affli you have to fight not only with AI enemies but also with stupidity of Blizzard employees.

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Let me just add that you should play what your gear pulls out the best performance. You can always check on raidbots or somewhere like that.

I appreciate all the responses, thank you guys!

I agree, that makes it very complicated for new players who are trying to learn the class have realistic expectations of what a certain spec can do.
Without a doubt, I think Affliction has somewhat of a learning curve to it, it feels clunky to me.

Good idea, I will check that as well.

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affliction has trouble in dungeon because of the dots and how they work, you need time for agony to ramp up which means unless you are doing high keys on fortified week you are not going to have fun, but affli is good for single target and bosses currently.

i also wouldnt really say that they are getting buffed in 8.3. deathbolt has been an important part of the rotation and damage breakdown for the entire expansion and its getting nerfed, drain soul should be interesting to use for some extra execute damage, but i think overall its kinda so-so, not really a buff and not really a nerf, just less burst damage

generally for dungeons demo is cosidered the best but has the issue of no interrupt, and destro is a good spec for dungeons as well, has good AoE and ST damage and has the interrupt as well as the other utility that other specs bring

Thank you!
I wish this was in all the guides I read before I started. I was having such difficulty to keep up in every way possible, it was a struggle.

For now, I’m rolling with Destruction because I feel like I’m missing a limb if I don’t have an interrupt.

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ikr sema they shouild prune felgard from dmeonology and make fa hunter baseline pet imho

Go destruction and faceroll. Their control is insane.

I’d take affli over demo anyday just because of that bloody interrupt

@OP it is bad, but really fun spec at the same time

Affliction was awesome in Legion.
Blizzard then hit SOC and Drainsoul with the nerf bat.
I miss my affliction lock :(. Occasionally spec into it but respec quickly back to destruction.
Aff is still a single target machine but that’s it

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Legion affliction was wonderful

That pre-nerf drain soul was just :ok_hand: :ok_hand: :ok_hand:

Dot them up then drain drain drain, I remember managing to 2v1 the enemy team in a ranked arena just by being careful about their interrupts and keeping that drain going to keep myself topped up while they slowly died

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Affliction is one of the lesser good specs. I like Demonlogy is Warlocks best spec.

No specc is worth it.

Rolling a entire class for a single specc will never do a player well you will get screwed over in a lot of patch’s trying to play this way.

You need to pick a class based on the class, as you will need to adapt and change speccs when needed. Also balance changes and what works isn’t always static.

No class has 3 perfectly balanced speccs and no class performs consistently in only one specc.

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