Feedback: Warlocks

#1 - Aug. 9, 2022, 10:03 p.m.

In this thread, please post your feedback on the revamped Warlock talent tree, once you’ve had a chance to test Warlocks in the Alpha.

Thank you.

#2 - Aug. 9, 2022, 10:06 p.m.

These trees were built to emphasize the strong thematic and rotational gameplay that is already present with each specialization.

That said, we are making a few changes to address the pain points we’ve experienced while playing and concerns that have been brought up by the community. You can read more about these changes below and our thoughts regarding why the change was made.

• Core Changes
  • Spell Lock in the talent tree
    • With Dragonflight, we’ve removed Spell Lock from Felhunters and Spell Lock is now available for Warlocks to learn themselves. With this change, we are aiming to allow for more pet diversity in content where Felhunters feel required like dungeons and PvP.
  • Dark Soul is not in the talent tree for Dragonflight intentionally. There are a few reasons for this:
    • All Warlock specs have access to a powerful summon cooldown that interacts with the rest of their spells where Dark Soul increases a stat by a large amount. We prefer to keep the interactive spell.
    • With cooldown stacking, a high percentage of overall damage is boiled down to the cooldown window. While this can be useful for bursting, but damage output outside of this window tends to be lackluster.
    • Across the classes there are new active spells which we are both excited about and equally cautious of causing keybinding issues by adding. Finding times to pull back on active spells is something we’re on the lookout for.
  • Shadow Bolt and Incinerate base damage has been increased
    • We’ve increased the damage of Shadow Bolt and Incinerate significantly and lowered modifiers from various talents. Our goal is for these spells to feel more powerful without having to ramp to see benefits from casting it.
  • Shadowflame
    • Shadowflame is returning; however, we don’t want a short-ranged cone spell to be a rotational for a caster, so we’ve removed the damage from the ability.
  • Affliction
    • Vile Taint revamp
      • Vile Taint has been reworked – Unleashes a vile explosion at the target location, dealing X Shadow damage over 10 seconds to 8 enemies within 10 yards and applies Agony and Curse of Exhaustion to them.
      • With this change, we aim to allow Affliction to ramp up faster in dungeon gameplay especially in combination with talents like Agonizing Corruption and Sow the Seeds.
    • Deathbolt is now a base talent
      • Through Deathbolt and its modifying talents we aim to give Affliction an interesting alternative to Malefic Rapture when the situation calls for single target damage.
  • Destruction
    • An Alternative to Havoc
      • We are exploring an alternative to Havoc called Mayhem. It’s a passive that gives your single target spells a chance to deal 60% of its damage to a random nearby target. The goal with this talent is to give a more passive two-target option for players who would like to opt out of Havoc gameplay. For tuning, we intend for active Havoc gameplay to be rewarded over playing with Mayhem.
• Along with these changes you’ll see both new spells and some old friends returning. Soul Rot and Decimating Bolt will be coming with us from the Shadowlands, Dimensional Rift returns from Legion, and many more.
• While the core rotations of each specialization will remain familiar, these talents offer new options that will allow you to modify your gameplay and choose what’s important to you.

Welcome back to Azeroth, Warlocks. We look forward to hearing tales of the chaos you’ll rain down across the Dragon Isles. Be sure to let us know your thoughts, our Eye of Kilrogg will be actively watching your discussions.

#25 - Aug. 17, 2022, 7:57 p.m.

From today’s Alpha update notes:

• Soul Conduit refund chance reduced to 10% at max rank (was 15%).
• Destruction
  • Backdraft now affects Soul Fire.

#36 - Aug. 22, 2022, 10:15 p.m.

Greetings Warlocks,

Our Eye of Kilrogg has been watching the community discussions unfold over the past two weeks and we have several changes that we’re summoning into this week’s Alpha update, based on the feedback we’ve observed. There’s a lot to cover with Core and each Specialization tree receiving significant changes, so grab your Healthstones and let’s dive into our grimoire of updates:

Core Tree

We took another look at the Core tree and came to the same consensus that a lot of the community shared: while it was cool to get access to buttons previously unavailable or completely new, it created a lot of button bloat and added some additional mechanical complexity to each rotation. In lieu of this, we’ve cut out a lot of the throughput centric talents (Devastating Bolt, each of the Pacts, etc.) and introduced (or re-introduced) some utility talents in their place. Here are some examples of spells you can expect to see:

• Soul Armor – When your health drops below 35%, the percentage of damage shared via your Soul Link is increased by an additional 5%.
• Demonic Resilience – Reduces the chance you will be critically struck by 4%. All damage your primary demon takes is reduced by 15%.
• Abyss Walker – Using Demonic Circle: Teleport or your Demonic Gateway reduces all damage you take by 4% for 10 sec.
• Fel Synergy – Soul Leech also heals you for 25% and your pet for 50% of the absorption it grants.
  • Soul Link has been divided into two parts: Fel Synergy and itself (the damage reduction portion). The reason for this change is Soul Link offers too much value for a single talent node. That said, Fel Synergy and Soul Link are very close to one another, and neither are multi-rank.

Additionally, the following abilities are now implemented and testable:

• Summon Soulkeeper (was Summon Jailer) – You gain Tormented Souls periodically and as you slay enemies. Consume all Tormented Souls to summon a Soulkeeper that periodically blasts nearby enemies. The Soulkeeper’s lasts 2 seconds per Tormented Soul consumed.
• Inquisitor’s Gaze – Summons an Inquisitor’s Eye that periodically blasts your enemies.

We’ve also rearranged some talents, such as moving Accrued Vitality and making Demonic Circle much more accessible.

By removing excess throughput from the Core tree, we have more freedom to funnel it into the specialization trees and focus on amplifying each specialization’s rotation.

Affliction Tree

Our primary goals with this pass of Affliction are to remove a lot of the button bloat introduced during the first pass, remove excess rotational maintenance, and focus on Affliction’s single target toolkit. With these goals in mind, we’ve removed: Deathbolt, Death Dealer, Pact of the Nathrezim, and Malefic Wrath.

With space being a bit freed up, we have some new talents and changes that we’re excited to get feedback on:

• Creeping Death no longer decreases the duration of your damage over time effects.
• Malefic Affliction – Malefic Rapture causes your active Unstable Affliction to deal 5/10% additional damage, up to 15/30%, for the rest of its duration.
• Doom Blossom (a choice against Dread Touch) – If Corruption damages a target affected by your Unstable Affliction, it has a 10% chance per stack of Malefic Affliction to deal Shadow damage to nearby enemies.
• Dread Touch (a choice against Doom Blossom) – If Malefic Affliction exceeds 3 stacks, the target instead takes 20% additional damage from your damage over time effects for 6 seconds.
• Soul-Eater’s Gluttony – Whenever Unstable Affliction deals damage, the cooldown of Soul Rot is reduced by 0.5/1.0 second.
• Grim Reach (a choice against Wilfred’s Sigil of Superior Summoning) – When Darkglare deals damage, it deals 50% of that damage to all enemies affected by your damage over time effects.

We’ve also rearranged several talents on the left side of the tree. We will continue to watch for feedback and will be tuning as we continue to test.

Demonology Tree

Overall, we’re happy with the community’s reception of the Demonology tree but have some changes and iterations we’d like to make.

• Demonic Consumption has been removed and replaced with Reign of Tyranny.
• Reign of Tyranny – Active Wild Imps grant 1 stack of Demonic Servitude. Active greater demons grant 2 stacks of Demonic Servitude. Demonic Tyrant deals 3% additional damage for each stack of Demonic Servitude active at the time of his summon.
  • Demonic Consumption was largely invisible in terms of how much power your Tyrant was getting and encouraged utilizing defensive cooldowns offensively for maximum throughput. With Reign of Tyranny, we’re trying something that is more visible to players and with better, controllable scaling.
• Guillotine (was Hold This For Me) is now playable and available for testing.
  • Your Felguard hurls his axe towards the target location, erupting when it lands and dealing Shadowflame damage every 1 second for 8 seconds to nearby enemies. While unarmed, your Felguard’s basic attacks deal damage to all nearby enemies and attacks 50% faster.
• Ner’zhul’s Volition has been updated.
  • When Nether Portal summons a demon, it has a 2/4% chance per Soul Shard spent to summon an additional demon.

Destruction Tree

Like Demonology, we’re happy with how the Destruction tree has been received. We’ve implemented many tuning changes for Destruction, and a few changes to spells based on feedback:

• Backdraft now affects Soul Fire.
• Dimensional Rift is now in the Destruction tree as a choice against Chaos Incarnate.
• Combusting Engine has been removed and replaced with Explosive Potential.
• Explosive Potential – Reduces the cooldown of Conflagrate by 2 seconds.
• Chaos Shards has been removed and replaced with Scalding Flames.
• Scalding Flames – Increases the damage of Immolate by 13/25%.
  • We’re removing Chaos Shards to ensure that Destruction’s Soul Shard generation is at a healthy cadence rather than overflowing.

That’s it for now! Thank you for all the feedback and discussions. We’ll Demonic Circle: Teleport back here when we have further updates to share.

#46 - Aug. 25, 2022, 1:19 a.m.

Here are the development notes for Warlocks in today’s update:

• Class Talents
  • New
    • Abyss Walker – Using Demonic Circle: Teleport or your Demonic Gateway reduces all damage you take by 4% for 10 seconds.
    • Gorefiend’s Resolve – Targets resurrected with Soulstone resurrect with 40% additional health and 30% additional mana.
    • Fel Synergy – Soul Leech also heals you for 25% and your pet for 50% of the absorption it grants.
    • Resolute Barrier – Attacks received that deal at least 5% of your health decrease Unending Resolve’s cooldown by 10 seconds. Cannot occur more than once every 20 seconds.
    • Soul Armor – When your health drops below 35%, the percentage of damage shared via your Soul Link is increased by an additional 5%.
    • Demonic Resilience – Reduces the chance you will be critically struck by 4%. All damage your primary demon takes is reduced by 15%.
    • Summon Soulkeeper (was Summon Jailer) – Summons a Soulkeeper that periodically blasts nearby enemies.
    • Inquisitor’s Gaze– Summons an Inquisitor’s Eye that attacks your enemies.
  • Removed
    • Pact of the Annihilan
    • Pact of the Eredar
    • Pact of the Imp Mother
    • Decimating Bolt
    • Dimensional Rift
  • Changes
    • Rearranged various talents and created new pathways and choices.
    • Claw of Endereth is now a 1-point talent.
• Affliction
  • New
    • Malefic Affliction – Malefic Rapture causes your active Unstable Affliction to deal 10% additional damage, up to 30%, for the rest of its duration.
    • Doom Blossom – If Corruption damages a target affected by your Unstable Affliction, it has a 10% chance per stack of Malefic Affliction to deal Shadow damage to nearby enemies.
    • Dread Touch – If Malefic Affliction exceeds 3 stacks, the target instead takes 20% additional damage from your damage over time effects for 6 seconds.
    • Grim Reach – When Darkglare deals damage, it deals 50% of that damage to all enemies affected by your damage over time effects.
    • Soul-Eater’s Gluttony – Whenever Unstable Affliction deals damage, the cooldown of Soul Rot is reduced by 0.5 seconds.
  • Removed
    • Malefic Wrath
    • Deathbolt
    • Death Dealer
    • Pact of the Nathrezim
    • Deliberate Malice
  • Changes
    • Rearranged various talents and created new pathways and choices.
    • Sacrolash’s Dark Strike now extends Curses by 0.5/1 second (was 1/2 seconds).
    • Creeping Death no longer decreases the duration of Agony, Corruption, Unstable Affliction, or Siphon Life.
    • Soul Flame’s icon has been changed.
    • Vile Taint’s cooldown is now 30 seconds (was 20 seconds).
    • Calamitous Crescendo is now a 2-point talent.
• Destruction
  • Infernal Brand – Your Infernal’s melee attacks cause its target to take 3%/6% increased damage from its Immolation, stacking up to 15 times (was 15%/30%).
  • Rolling Havoc – Now stacks up to 5 times (was 10) and lasts 5 seconds (was 8 seconds).
  • Backdraft – Now affects Soul Fire.
  • Chaos Bolt – Damage reduced by 30%.
  • Incinerate – Damage reduced by 30%.
  • Dimensional Rift – Damage reduced by 30%.
  • Immolate – Damage reduced by 17%.
  • Rain of Fire – Damage reduced by 17%.
  • Shadowburn - Damage reduced by 50%.
  • Conflagrate – Damage reduced by 15%.
  • Soul Fire – Damage reduced by 25%.
  • Fire and Brimstone – Incinerate now hits all enemies near your target for 13%/25% damage (was 7%/15%).
  • Mastery: Chaotic Energies – No longer reduces the Warlock’s damage taken.
    • Developers’ note: With its access to powerful defensive talents in the class tree, Destruction Warlocks do not need additional survival bonuses.
• Demonology
  • New
    • Reign of Tyranny – Active Wild Imps grant 1 stack of Demonic Servitude. Active greater demons grant 2 stacks of Demonic Servitude. Demonic Tyrant deals 3% additional damage for each stack of Demonic Servitude active at the time of his summon.
    • Guillotine – Your Felguard hurls his axe towards the target location, erupting when it lands and dealing Shadowflame damage every 1 second for 8 seconds to nearby enemies. While unarmed, your Felguard’s basic attacks deal damage to all nearby enemies and attacks 50% faster.
  • Removed
    • Demonic Consumption
  • Changes
    • Ner’zhul’s Volition has been updated – When Nether Portal summons a demon, it has a 2/4% chance per Soul Shard spent to summon an additional demon.
    • Nether Portal’s cast time reduced to 1.5 seconds (was 2.5 seconds).
    • The Expendables and Stolen Power have swapped places and moved to row 9.

#65 - Sept. 1, 2022, 9:08 p.m.

Some Destruction updates in today’s Beta:

• Rearranged various talents and created new pathways and choices.
• Combusting Engine – Replaced with Explosive Potential.
• New Talent: Explosive Potential – Reduces the cooldown of Conflagrate by 2 seconds.
• Chaos Shards – Replaced with Scalding Flames.
• New Talent: Scalding Flames – Increases the damage of Immolate by 13%/25%.

#92 - Sept. 7, 2022, 8:19 p.m.

Hello Warlocks,

In the next upcoming build for Dragonflight, you’ll see that Spell Lock has been removed from the talent tree and readded to the Felhunter. We wanted to take a moment to explain why we added Spell Lock to the talent tree and our decision to revert the change altogether.

Our goal was to try and de-power the Felhunter from a utility perspective to increase how often Warlocks might use different demons such as Sayaad or Voidwalker throughout endgame content. Our attempt at this was to move Spell Lock to Dragonflight’s new talent trees, first as a choice and then as a guaranteed ability. However, after playtesting, we noticed something was lost.

Warlocks have always been able to utilize demons to perform actions independent of whatever state the Warlock is currently in. Spell Lock is iconic to the Felhunter identity and has a lot of history behind it. We considered making this a choice-style node, but ultimately felt that we want to retain the gameplay of knowing what a Warlock is capable of by what demon they are accompanied by, and the unique identity Warlock has: utilizing powerful tools tied to their pets rather than themselves.

Thank you for your thoughts on this change, we genuinely appreciate the feedback, and we will continue to watch discussions as they unfold.