Feedback Beta: Warlock

Classes Warlock
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I’m forced to write here because I don’t have access to the beta testers’ topics, but I hope that someone who reads and appreciates my feedback can easily make it their own and write it there if they have the chance. Thanks in advance. I hope we can use this topic to have a parallel one where those who find themselves in the same situation as me can help the developers improve where possible.

I won’t focus on bugs and balancing numbers as I’m giving these types of feedback via Issue Reporter, and I will focus on gameplay sensations and various suggestions.
Forgive the wall of text, but being very passionate about warlocks…

WARLOCK TREE

There are things that can definitely be improved and I would like it to be deeper like the current talent trees are, therefore concentrating 2 point talents in 1 point for example.

  • Demonic Circle: I find that such a skill should be basic and not selectable via talent

  • Demonic Fortitude requires a logical swap with Sweet Souls or Accrued Vitality and instead of Demonic Fortitude an Improved Mortal Coil could be interesting (range increase and 5% more healing, for example)

  • Lifeblood is practically never taken, at least in PvP, and could easily be removed. In its place you could put the current capstone Pact of Gluttony (which could also change its name to Demonic Healthstone)

  • Amplify Curse and Teaching of the Satyrs could be incorporated to save points and be able to include some more talents

  • Accrued Vitality now becomes totally useless as a talent even for affliction given the changes, and must be upgraded

  • Shadowfury: my dream is that it goes back to being an instant spell but without a reticle, a spell that stuns a selected target for 3 seconds every 1 minute

  • Shadowflame/Darkfury: Shadowflame is never taken in life, the few times I tried I missed the front targets several times even if in melee range. It could simply become an Improved Shadowfury to decrease the CD by 15 seconds and Darkfury can increase the stun range, CD 45 seconds, but not instant exactly like it is now

  • Teachings of the black Harvest: as has been written several times by many, it has no use unless you use demonology due to the Felguard bonus. Otherwise it makes no sense for those who play with Grimoire of Sacrifice or for those who use other demons other than the Felguard. Either you modify it in some way to make it more or less useful, or you put it in a grabby place without being necessary for Demonic Resilience

  • Demonic Resilience could be brought to a single point, or make a critical received have a small damage reduction (with internal CD maybe?)

  • Swift artifice: It’s my biggest regret about this new talent tree, as it’s totally useless in PvP BUT it would be mandatory to take Resolute Barrier. Among other things, there is no logical sense in such a defense after a decrease in the cast time of Soulstone and Healthstone, which should be positioned close to Sweet Soul or in place of Lifeblood

  • Fel Synergy: currently he cares for almost nothing, already in DF he is not taken into consideration by almost anyone. Now it is not clear whether the passive healing compared to DF has doubled (having two talent points instead of the current one point) or whether two points are really needed to take a capstone and healing practically nothing

  • Soul Link: ok, I’ve been using the warlock since the damage reduction via soul link was 50% but currently two talent points for a 10% reduction in PvE can be considered good, but in PvP the reduction is only 5%. He could probably be brought up to a talent point also because the 5% more stamina thanks to the Grimoire of Sacrifice can be considered fair for just one talent point

The current capstones are not exactly very captivating and powerful, unlike a blue post where it was specified how they wanted to improve the warlock’s final talents. We end up at a Soul Conduits of 5% which is very low.
My suggestion is to include some very interesting and powerful old talents (perhaps revised) such as the choice between Kiljaeden’s Cunning/Mannoroth Fury in order to have with the first a mobility or bonus damage for the single target (passive or active bonus), and with the second an emphasis on AOE (spells increase range, duration and magnitude)

AFFLICTION

Unlike Destruction and Demonology which had big improvements and a very good revamp in my opinion, Affliction is practically similar to what it was. It will certainly be more powerful, but the focal point is that despite the vast majority of warlocks saying from the first day that Malefic Rapture was introduced that it is a spell that should even be eliminated or at least weakened in its use, expansion after expansion this spell will not it just stays (that’s fine with me), but it becomes more and more central.
In the Affliction branch there are over 5 talents that increasingly strengthen this spell. Not only that: the first set bonus even increases the damage and critical and the second bonus has a chance to increase the duration of the DOT.
I don’t want to get into the usual Malefic Rapture yes or no discussion, which has become as cloying as talking about Metamorphosis, but I’m just saying that if it has to stay it doesn’t make sense for it to become such an obsessive spell, I dare say.

The talents themselves are also nice, useful, surely it can be done better by concentrating some two-point skills in one point.

The talents I would like to focus on are

  • Darkglare: absolutely not a fan of this “burst”, I don’t like the skin or the theme (I don’t understand the point of an octopus demon that increases the duration of the dots and shoots laser beams). I don’t understand why we are obsessed with giving all specializations a demon that must act as a burst. We had a beautiful Dark Soul a while ago, I don’t understand why not reuse this ability instead of Darkglare

  • Oblivion: honestly it is a really bad spell, regardless of the damage it can develop it is “dangerous” to use it in any PvE and PvP context. Two shards and 45 seconds CD, three seconds of channel without reduction due to haste, and if by chance you press and then have to move for any reason or for a knockback or a silence you have lost in order: two shards, one talent, time. Plus it’s very ugly aesthetically, more suited to a shadow priest. Why not give Shadow Implosion, an instant that also gives damage based on the number of dots on various targets?

  • From a PvP point of view, why not make a spell like Malefic Rapture/Unstable shadowflame school so that if you get shadow kicked you can at least do damage by casting Malefic Rapture? I think it’s the only spec in the game that has only one line of magic.

  • Unstable Affliction: I don’t understand why it is limited to a single target and that in order to use it on more than one target you need to use a PvP talent, effectively making the Affliction limited to only 3 PvP talents. Maybe you will make some changes to the PvP talents, but it would be much better if the Unstable was always castable on a maximum of three targets in order to have a greater choice of talents in PvP.

  • Seed of Corruption: I don’t understand why I’m forced to take Seed of Corruption thinking about PvP arenas, it would be preferable for Seed to be moved elsewhere so as not to force it to be taken

  • Drain Life without inevitable Demise and the 30% haste becomes sincerely useless, exactly like in the current Demonology and Destruction which it is possible not to even put it on the bar. We are talking about the warlock’s spell par excellence in terms of thematicity.

  • Grimoire of Sacrifice: considering that many (like me) like to play with this talent and without a demon, why don’t you make it more competitive than the Summoner Embrace? Maybe sacrificing the demon from Affliction can give you a 3% haste buff

DESTRUCTION

I was very worried about Destruction given the very first interactions in alpha, but unlike what I thought it went in an excellent direction and I am currently very happy and satisfied. Here too it is possible to make improvements, for example I am very happy with being forced to take Rain of Fire (unlike the Seed, in PvP it is always very useful both as an anti-cap, both in anti-stealth function, and to speed up the Ritual of Ruin), even if having to necessarily take another talent like Pyrogenics or Inferno/Cataclysm is not the best.

  • Cataclysm: in my opinion it would be very interesting if it became an instant spell with the usual grid to choose the area, but which detonated later. In practice you click on the desired point and after the time that would normally be needed for the cast time, the detonation arrives
  • Improved Conflagrate: currently and even in Beta it is not a useful skill, as the counterpart is clearly superior. This is a shame as three stacks of Conflagrate are awesome. Perhaps in addition to the 3 charges a substantial bonus could be added to the damage of the conflagrate itself in order to mitigate the difference with Roaring Blaze
  • Dimensional Rift: if it also hit AOE or in any case once a target dies it continued to do damage to the next one it would be a big improvement
  • Channel Demonfire: I would like it to have a better visual, for example similar to the Diabolist’s Mother of Chaos attack, and to be able to cast on the move. Maybe take it from 3 total talents to just 2
  • Improved Chaos Bolt: a talent that could simply be integrated into the Chaos Bolt itself, in order to have an extra spendable point
  • Grimoire of Sacrifice: it would be wonderful if it could go back to how it once was, i.e. an increase in damage of some spells (conflagrate, shadowburn, incinerate), and that it isn’t a random dot. Or to compete with Summoner Embrace which gives a flat 3% critical bonus
  • Avatar of Destruction: change the name to “World in Flame” and give the possibility to choose between two possibilities: one that uses Chaos bolt on single targets and one that uses Incinerate enhanced by Fire&Brimstone for AOE situations

P.S. Soulfire with Decimation is honestly awesome, it makes the game so much more fun and smooth, thank you

DEMONOLOGY

It seems much improved compared to DF, and the Demonic Core generation is not as low as I initially thought. However, here too, something can be improved.

  • Demonic Core from Dreadstalkers: currently 35% chance for Dreadstalker, it can happen that you have two as zero and that’s not the best. The Latins said “in medio stat virtus”, in the middle lies the virtue, so you could get a 100% demonic core for every two Dreadstalkers.
  • A PvP talent with which to free demons from CC and snare would be very useful, a talent that existed several years ago, once every one minute for example, if obviously the warlock is not in CC
  • The right side of the Felguard branch is really very weak, probably if it had been very strong it would have created problems choosing between Doom (excellent) and the new enhanced Vilefiends, but it would still be interesting to see changes to Immutable Hatred (which, having less Demonic Core generation, is greatly weakened) and Guillotine (which could be replaced by the old Demonic Empowerment, obviously making it instant and with a CD
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Very well written! In my opinion, the biggest issue atm the class tree talents being literally locked and not giving us any room for some preference / flexibility.

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I saw this on a US post and I think the second idea is great.

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Anyone who says aff is just fine never tried to play it in m+ obviously. Because with 18sc duration of agony and 25sc+ on vile taint that spec is nowhere near to be playable.

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I think they also need to completely overhaul Malediction for Affliction after they nerfed it so badly, there is no way you would ever waste points on that talent now.

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When I read such long and well thought out summaries I always think; Why isn’t this person working at Blizzard?

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After seeing and trying the new changes I can say that I am relatively “satisfied” with some things but absolutely still disappointed regarding the warlock tree. There are still some really useless talents or really weak but necessary talents to take other talents.

Other talents are very difficult to take despite being particularly useful (resolute barrier and demonic resilience). Even 4 more points for having a damage reduction which in PVP is 5% and an extremely low passive healing, when they could be combined into a single talent with 2 points.

AFFLICTION
there are still too many 2 point talents that don’t allow you to take some talents that deserve to be taken into consideration (I have extremely difficulty taking soul rot to be clear). From a PvP point of view there are really things that simply need to be improved, such as the Malefic Rapture moved to the shadowflame school.

As I wrote above, affliction is the only spec in the game that has a single magic school. Being kicked on the shadow means not being able to do anything for several seconds, not even teleporting or unendig resolve is possible. Until now, in the event of a kick, many expected the enhanced drain life, now that the drain life can even be avoided, it will be painful and you will be kicked at the first spell.

Drain life is a point I argue about a lot, it’s absurd how such an iconic spell is literally useless in war within. At this point I really hope that a drastic change in the dynamics of the spell is evaluated, for example that it becomes a very powerful instant DOT that drains life over time from the target, transferring it to the warlock, with CD or better with a cost soul shard so as not to be able to abuse it. The capstones are still decidedly uninspired, sad, absolutely underpowered. Instead of Oblivion I would consider the return of Death Bolt, perhaps revisited a little.

On the other hand, the change to the hellcaller is very good and with Seeds of their Demise it allows you to have many malefic rapture instants. The Death Embrace capstone is good. However, the hellcaller talent Zevrim’s Resilience is not very good, despite the 100% buff the problem itself is not the healing but the main fact that being limited to the time of the dark pact it can last several seconds like very few. I really can’t play Soul Harvest, the graphics of the “scarecrow demon” that comes out of the floor like a wind-up clown make me lose any desire to try this hero talent.

Always forgive my talkativeness and the enormous wall text, I only hope to be able to give the best possible contribution, particularly loving the class from the beginning…

My biggest regret is definitely the warlock tree, there are talents like Resolute Barrier (which should go to just one point anyway) and Demonic Resilience that are uncatchable.
The solution would be to condense Fel Synergy and Soul link into a single 2-point talent. It is disproportionate to use 4 points to have very low passive healing (in DF you have the same healing with just one point) and a 5% damage reduction in PvP or +5% health.
At this point Sargerei Technique should be incorporated natively into the various spell fillers and should be removed from the game to make room for takeable talents or perhaps new talents.

DEMONOLOGY

The Demonology spec is certainly very good, especially thanks to Diabolist which in my opinion is the best hero tree ever among all the classes and with a crazy visual.
However, there are some things that could be significantly improved to make the spec more playable and fun without incurring exaggerations.
Soul Harvester on the other hand is honestly ugly, not very thematic and the “wind-up clown within” is the ugliest and most grotesque that has ever been graphically inserted into the game and in all honesty I refuse to play it so as not to constantly get punched in the eyes. A simple animation would be enough in which a sort of dark demonic ghostly shadow similar to the aesthetics of your warlock slightly rises from the upper part of the character - shoulders and head - and then diminishes once the spell has been cast

Demonic Core Chapter: I can agree as I have written other times that there is a decrease in this proc, but I remain very perplexed by the fact that if the frequency of a skill is decreased it is very strange that then the whole spec (which revolves around to this proc) remains anchored in many spells and abilities to this proc WITHOUT compensation.

I still remain of the opinion that to have a good compromise the two summoned dreadstalkers must always give a 100% Demonic Core. Or if you stay with the current percentage, it may be interesting that the felfiend/charhound has a chance to give a Demonic Core and the Tyrant gives one at 100% at its end in order to have a more even distribution.

Felguard enhancement chapter: the Immutable Hatred capstone is the classic example of a talent that works thanks to the frequency of Demonic Core in retail, on single targets it does no more than 2.5% total damage and should be greatly enhanced or perhaps completely revisited.

Implosion: the basic idea of ​​the spell is fun, but the problem for me is that it is contradictory in many game situations in the sense that a demonology warlock has every interest in getting as many imps as possible and not getting a certain number to get them to blow up. It would be much more intriguing and useful, for example, to give the possibility to choose whether to be active as now or passive, and in the case of passive that the imps who have completed their task automatically launch themselves against the target exploding.

The Houndmaster’s Gambit is takeable despite not taking Vilefiend as a talent.

Sacrificied Souls: very very weak capstone, need a buff and maybe a further and useful passive effect.

Doom Chapter: The current iteration is positive, much preferable for me to be passive. Unfortunately it is still a bit buggy and Demon Bolt does not always apply Doom correctly. Very positive is the fact that a wild imp is summoned as soon as the Doom explodes. The huge problem: the proc rate of the final talent, which should summon a Doomguard, is so low that in 30 explosions on the dummy not even one came out! (EDIT: 60 Doom explosion, NO ONE Doomguards…)

(RE-EDIT: more than 100 Doom explosion, ONE Doomguard in about 15 minutes)

It would be enough to ensure that the Doomguard’s proc rate is much higher (and that on average there is at least one summon every minute, for example) and to prevent two or more from being generated, simply set the limit to one summon at a time. Certainly, to encourage players to focus on this talent, it could be interesting to include the fact that the target takes more damage/crits during Doom. It’s a shame that you lose the AOE ability with the Doombolts, to compensate you could simply make sure that there are no longer 5 casts but 3 for example.

Ruination is a fantastic, thematic spell despite being an enhanced version of Hand of Guldan’s. I hope the cast on the move remains obviously, but they have to insert a sound effect during the fall of the meteor and not just during the impact as I often feel like I haven’t even cast it. For Destruction I hope that the spell visually becomes a giant Chaos Bolt that explodes on all targets in range exactly like Ruination does now, and obviously without the demonic imp which has nothing to do with the Destruction spec.

Infernal Bolt: many warlocks had complained that the excessive speed of casting the spell created problems with the GCD and the feeling it gave was of “strangeness”, there were two ways: either make it instant or make it slightly slower for speech GCD that was annoying. They obviously chose the third way, giving it a very long cast time. It’s a spec already highly tied to hard casting, especially now in the current Beta, was it so necessary to burden it with further long cast times?
Instead of three soul shards (the overcap is statistically very high), it would be better to make the spell instant and two soul shards obtained, maybe.
It would be great if the spell returned partially to how it was at the beginning, a channel of 3 Infernal Bolts in 1.5 seconds, a shot every half second, castable on the move like Ruination!

Fel Obelisk: I’ve never been a fan of this skill, I really hope that after being eliminated from the game soon we can see a new exciting, useful and above all instant PvP talent. I always hope for a talent that allows you to free the demons from snares, slow and CCs with a CD if the warlock is not under the effects of CC.

Drain Life chapter: a topic should be opened specifically for this discussion, but I’ll summarize: it is THE spell par excellence and thematicity of the warlock, and both in DF and in the current Beta it has absolutely zero use. Now it’s useless for Affliction too. Obviously a change is needed that is not a simple “buff”, for example the spell could change based on the specialization exactly like the Corruption/Immolate/Doom and Drain Soul/Incinerate/Shadowbolt concepts.
For Affliction it could be a powerful instant DOT that does damage and heals you over time, with CD or use of Shard, for Destruction it could turn into Ember Tap/Soul Tap and using a shard cauterizes wounds, for Demonology it could turn into Dark Regeneration , instant, with some healing over time. Certainly something needs to be done to the spell because at present it can be avoided by inserting it into the bar

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