What does this mean for warlocks?

[capnpop]

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Q u o t e:
Nathaera posted that the DoT nerf is indeed true and that its around 10%. This is a LIE!

The dot coefficient went from 120% (from 100% that its been since release of the game) to 93%

That's a 27% percent nerf, not a 10%. On top of that, its now even lower then its EVER been. ?
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I don't know offhand exactly what Naethara said, but the 10% damage reduction refers to the total damage the affected spells deal after the nerf (if you have approximately tier 3 quality amounts of spell damage gear, less if you have less), not the amount the bonus coefficient was reduced by. I don't believe that warrants calling it a 10% nerf a "lie".



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Q u o t e:
Spells which take 3.5 seconds to deliver their damage (cast time) get 100% of the damage. So why do spells that take 18 seconds to deliver their damage not even get a full 100% of the +damage
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Because the spell didn't take you 18 seconds to cast. Considering the actual combat time invested is generally 1.5 seconds (global cooldown), you're actually getting far better damage scaling from these spells than ordinary spells (varies somewhat depending on how much of the total duration you assume the spell effectively lasts for on average). Possibly too much still, we'll see.




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Q u o t e:
On top of ALL this, there is NO mention of the DoT nerf in the patch notes. So other then the post where Nath confirmed this, this is still a silent change.

VERY unproffesional.
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Unfortunately, changes we make near the very end of the patch process often don't get into the patch notes since the patch notes have already been sent off for translation in other regions and/or because a change to the patch notes is a change to the client, which is more time consuming for QA to re-test than a server-side change.

So, since it's not entirely uncommon for us to wait until the near the end of a patch to make final balance changes, it's not entirely unusual for some of them to be absent from the patch notes. That being said, would it really have made you ok with the change if it had been in the patch notes? Do you actually believe we feel the need to "sneak" a nerf in? I mean really...

If it helps I'm happy to say it, DoTs were (and some/all possibly still are) OP.



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Q u o t e:

Also,

There are now reports that affliction spells (dots, fear) ie. the things that MAKE the warlock class are getting HEAVILY more resisted. A player on the warlock boards posted a screenshot of a GM saying that this is intended by the developers. Many other players have noticed it too.

This AGAIN is another silent nerf for the warlock and frankly, though the DoT nerf may have been needed (although only back to 100% not this new 93%) the affliction resist was NOT needed.

I would link you the post but the search function on these boards does not work.

So these are two major silent nerfs done to the warlock community and we have had NO official response to this whatsoever. This is unacceptable and highly unprofessional.

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Previously, dots in general were 1/10th as likely to be resisted as normal spells. That has been fixed, they're now as likely to be resisted as other spells. Please let us know whether there's any reason to believe they aren't working this way.

Note: all Quote blocks inbetween the lines are from the WoW forums post that are quoted by the Blue who wrote the above response. 

What this means for warlocks:
1) affliction starts to look less attractive.  The current coefficiants are unknown (they could be calculated I guess...) but there is a definate change...(Corruption ticking for almost exactly 10% less with +444 shadow dmg and actually under the 100% coefficiant it had before (I should be getting ticks of 211 with 100% and ticks are around 205 or so...)) 

2) destruction remains uneffected and able to deal massive dmg

3) Demonology got a nerf noted in patch notes of less +dmg and felguard hits softer, i'm not demon so i haven't payed attention or noticed...will prolly notice come BC and respec for grinding...

4) New raiding spec may be 0/21/40 since demon will be difficult for raiding (people contend that felguard won't work for bosses due to it being glass compared to tanks).  Affliction lost up to 10% of it's damage (more for some people, less for others) so the high DPS that some warlocks were experiencing with Affliction may be gone (i've seen reports of sustained 800+ DPS over a 5 min fight with very high +dmg).  The only thing that may be different with that spec could be 0/17/44 or 0/20/41 to get shadowfury (it actually stops axe spinners in ZG).

What could be coming for warlocks: DoTs ending when we die. That is the next big push by the WoW non-warlock community. This would destroy most Affliction warlocks who rely on DoTs to do most of their killing (or all of it unless nightfall procs). 

For all of those people who cry "OP" every time a warlock kills you:  I'm sorry.  For some reason before we were given a decent return on our gear for affliction we were forced to kill you via shadow bolt and searing pain coupled with affliction (sm/ruin).  Now we can use only affliction and kill you.  Apparently this game is balanced for 1v1...

Just 1 question: I can't eat through a mage killing me with 2 of their fire spells (fireblast?) so why is an affliction warlock doing the same amount of damage over a much much much longer period of time such a problem (oh, and DoTs don't crit...)?

[Genoism]

can't complain really....those dots WERE overpowered. 3 dots on me and i was dead on my hunter...it wasn't even remotely challenging anymore....dot em up and start on the next. Not very skillful eh? I wouldn't call this a nerf...more like balance. Even the locks knew they had it coming so ya...fair game i think. When rogues got their nerf they dealt with it, same with hunters. You just gotta realize that sometimes when something looks like a nerf isn't done because lots of ppl complain, but simply cuz it wasn't fair to everyone else.

[un4]

One would bring me to 30% health.
Three was a waste of mana.

[capnpop]

i can understand one curruption getting 156% of my +dmg being overpowered...but now i'm doing under 100% (which apparently nobody had a problem with before) and including additional resist checkes that don't take into account supression and other talents that are supposed to impact each spell...affliction locks needed a nerf (mainly because people didn't like dying 15+ secs after the fight was done) but instead of going back to the pre-2.01 or whatever +dmg coefficiants they actually lowered those (although it's still above 100% for those with low +dmg).

basically they took everything and tried to normalize the +dmg for everyone so the lvl 60s in all purples can't destroy 2+ lvl 60s in greens (unless they are destruction specced...) and that the people in greens won't be as gimped as they actually are... (i've heard people compare it to rage normalization, but i'm not familiar with it so i can't elaborate). 

I guess my main problem is that Blizzard has no "in between." They either give too much or take too much and that inflexibility is starting to annoy me.  I guess I'll just have to wait til i'm a walking World Boss again to PvP.  I give it 3 weeks...

[Genoism]

i can understand one curruption getting 156% of my +dmg being overpowered...but now i'm doing under 100% (which apparently nobody had a problem with before) and including additional resist checkes that don't take into account supression and other talents that are supposed to impact each spell...affliction locks needed a nerf (mainly because people didn't like dying 15+ secs after the fight was done) but instead of going back to the pre-2.01 or whatever +dmg coefficiants they actually lowered those (although it's still above 100% for those with low +dmg).

basically they took everything and tried to normalize the +dmg for everyone so the lvl 60s in all purples can't destroy 2+ lvl 60s in greens (unless they are destruction specced...) and that the people in greens won't be as gimped as they actually are... (i've heard people compare it to rage normalization, but i'm not familiar with it so i can't elaborate). 

I guess my main problem is that Blizzard has no "in between." They either give too much or take too much and that inflexibility is starting to annoy me.  I guess I'll just have to wait til i'm a walking World Boss again to PvP.  I give it 3 weeks...

about the resists....i wouldn't believe that at all. I got 4 60's they all went through nerfs and for every single one of them people always complained about how some spell or set of spells suddenly have a higher resist or lower chance to hit. In the end it wasn't true and i never had a problem with it. I've had a spell resist 3-4 times in a row before and if your recording that your %'s will suddenly get all screwy just cuz of that chance situation(even after heavy use) and then ppl will grab those %'s and exaggerate them to make their point stronger. Blizzard was never afraid to say that something got nerfed, only forgets to mention it. They have 8 million people playing the game they know they won't get away with anymore stealth nerfs. So if the CM says 10% nerf i'd believe her over that guy regardless of his 'research' because if you most likely do your own research your numbers won't be as bad as that guy says they are. That guy probably hadn't even recorded his previous numbers before the nerf so he has nothing to compare to other then throwing some guesswork into the mix.

[Darkling]

Being a warlocks most hated enemy, I have to say that the lock nerf doesn't show much. I still get dotted to death as some people saw when i was in finishing up a bg while in a party for a group quest. I still die fast, your dots and fears still kill me. Am I going to cry nerf? No. Because you guys were nerfed enough. You were overpowered for pvp, so they gave you a minor nerf. No more dot dot dot fear and walking away while players die. It's nice to see warlocks who don't know how to play their class past three buttons to actually learn how to play their class, imho.

Hell, I had a lock shadowbolt crit me this morning for almst 3000 dmg. He was lvl 63. I even had Cloak of Shadows on.

I can see one thing coming though, casters are going to get Rogues nerfed again because a lot of them can't play around CLoS.

Anyway, with the new gear available, Warlocks will get higher dmg counts, non-crits. The crits some are giving me now in PVP is more than before TBC. More nerfs will probably come because Rogues gave up crying about Warlocks. But the way has turned again, and if you look at the rogue and warlock/priest/mage forums on WoW, they all cry about CLoS, which is easily beatable (only lasts 5 seconds, and if you want tips on how to get around it, ask me or any other rogue that is using it in pvp now).

Personally, I think Blizz should just leave all of us alone now with the nerfing for pvp because it is harming pve now. PVP is based on group PVP now, not 1v1. And many players are not realising this.