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# Improved Shadow Bolt – this talent now provides a 5% spell critical strike buff (similar to Improved Scorch).
# Improved Soul Leech – this talent now provides Replenishment (similar to shadow priests)
# Drain Soul now has a chance to produce Soul Shards even if the target doesn't die.
# Siphon Life no longer as an active ability but the talent grants the old Siphon Life effect to Corruption.
# Curse of Recklessness and Curse of Weakness have been combined into one spell
# Consume Shadows – this Voidwalker ability is no longer channeled but has a cooldown.
# Several other warlock talents have had their ranks reduced, their effects changed or removed. This list includes but is not limited to Demonic Empathy, Shadow Embrace, Eradication, Suppression, and Pandemic.
# Additional new talents have been added.

QuoteImproved Soul Leech – this talent now provides Replenishment (similar to shadow priests)

Falls into the statement that Replenishment is not a nice to have, but a requirement for raiding as stated by Blizzard.

QuoteDrain Soul now has a chance to produce Soul Shards even if the target doesn't die.

Nice concept, but this means we'll have idiots spamming Drain Soul instead of doing damage even more. Then again, that's the player, not the mechanic.

QuoteCurse of Recklessness and Curse of Weakness have been combined into one spell

So they can't run away - is the idea that the other side of recklessness is removed and now it's just less damage? If so, this is a huge change.

Updated:

• Curse of the Elements (Rank 5) - Increased to 13% spell damage, up from 10%.
• Curse of Recklessness has been removed.
• Curse of Weakness - Now also reduces the armor of the target by 5%.
• Enslave Demon: Spell haste penalty reduced by 10%, Melee haste penalty reduced by 10%.
• Warlocks now innately have an increased 10% spell hit chance on the Enslave Demon spell.
• Fire Shield (Imp): You can now cast this ability on raid members, rather than party members.
• Ritual of Summoning: The summoning of the initial portal is now instant cast, down from 5 seconds.

Talents
Affliction

• Eradication re-designed: Eradication: When you deal damage with Corruption, you have a 2/4/6% chance to gain the Eradication effect. The Eradication effect increases the critical strike chance of your Shadow Bolt spell by 30%. Each critical strike reduces the critical strike bonus by 10%. Lasts 30 sec.
• Haunt: Now only increases your shadow damage-over-time on the target. (No longer includes non-Shadow damage over time spells.)
• Malediction: No longer increases the effect of Curse of the Elements.
• Pandemic: This talent has been reduced to a 1-point talent, now grants your Corruption and Unstable Affliction the capability to critically hit.
• Shadow Embrace: Now only increases the damage done by your shadow damage periodic spells.
• Siphon Life: The Siphon Life spell has been removed. Siphon Life now causes your Corruption spell to instantly heal you for 40% of the damage done.
• Suppression: Now increases spell hit for all of your spells.

Demonology

• Demonic Empathy has been removed.
• Demonic Empowerment: This talent spell now has a unique spell effect and sound.
• Demonic Sacrifice:This talent has been removed.
• Fel Synergy has been moved to tier-1. No longer increases Intellect, Stamina and damage of your summoned demon.
• Improved Enslave Demon talent removed.
• Mana Feed: This talent is now a 1-point talent, down from 3-points. Now is the 21-point talent in Demonology. Now grants 100% mana return to your pet, up from 33/66/100%.
• New Talent: Molten Skin: Reduces all damage taken by 2/4/6%.
• New Talent: Decimation: When you Shadowbolt or Incinerate a target that is at or below 35% health, your next Soulfire cast time is reduced by 30/60% and costs no shard. Lasts 10 sec.
• New Talent: Nemesis: Reduces the cooldown of your Demonic Empowerment, Metamorphosis, Soulstone and Fel Domination spells by 10/20/30%.

Destruction

• Aftermath re-designed: Increases the periodic damage done by your Immolate by 3/6%, and your Conflagrate has a 50/100% chance to daze the target for 5 sec.
• Backlash has been moved up to tier-5, up from tier-7. Now requires Intensity (pre-req).
• Cataclysm: Now reduces the mana cost of Destruction spells by 4/7/10%. No longer increases the chance to hit.
• Conflagrate: Spell now works similar to Swiftmend, consuming an Immolate or Shadowflame effect on the target and dealing damage based on the strength of that effect. Reduced to a single rank.
• Improved Immolate: Now increases the damage done by your Immolate by 10/20/30%, rather than just the direct damage.
• Improved Shadow Bolt: Now increases the damage done by your Shadow Bolt spell by 1/2/3/4/5%, and causes your target to be vulnerable to spell damage, increasing spell critical strike chance against that target by 1/2/3/4/5%. Effect lasts 30 sec.
• Improved Soul Leech: Now has a 50/100% chance to proc Replenishment.
• Master Conjuror: Increased from 15/30% up to 150/300%.
• Molten Core: This talent has been moved to Demonology (Tier 8 ).
• Pyroclasm re-designed: Now increases your Shadow and Fire spell power by 2/4/6% when you critically hit with Searing Pain or Conflagrate. Lasts 10 sec. Also moved down to tier 7, down from tier-5.

Some major changes here. Blizzard has finally done away with the old tactic of Destruction warlocks sacrificing their demons.

love the new siphon life

i HATE the new siphon life...

for no other reason than the fact that i can't run thru low level instances and just use sihpon life....

Quote from: Maiarhero on Thu, 2009-02-26 : 16:17
i HATE the new siphon life...

for no other reason than the fact that i can't run thru low level instances and just use sihpon life....

Uhhh, you'd just use Corruption. I wish they would have added this to BC, so you would have stopped stacking +Heal gear earlier.  :whackit:

Quote from: Maiarhero on Thu, 2009-02-26 : 16:17
i HATE the new siphon life...

for no other reason than the fact that i can't run thru low level instances and just use sihpon life....

comeon man L2 insta-cast corruption, now there's one less dot to have on your global cooldown

Quote from: Kellanon on Fri, 2009-02-27 : 14:43

Quote from: Maiarhero on Thu, 2009-02-26 : 16:17
i HATE the new siphon life...

for no other reason than the fact that i can't run thru low level instances and just use sihpon life....

Uhhh, you'd just use Corruption. I wish they would have added this to BC, so you would have stopped stacking +Heal gear earlier.  :whackit:

lol that was a very long time ago, and i never stacked it over dmg or anything else.

Updates to Pat's last list

• Ritual of Summoning: Now has a 6-second PvP duration.
• Doomguard: Cooldown reduced to 30 minutes, down from 60 minutes. Damage reduced approximately 30%, and health reduced approximately 30%
• Soul Shard: This item now has a maximum count of 32 in inventory.
• Voidwalker: The health bonus on this pet has been reduced from 60% to 10%.
  Talents

Affliction

• Eradication: Whenever you deal damage with Corruption, you have a 6% chance to gain the Eradication effect. The Eradication effect increases your spell casting speed by 6/12/20% for 10 seconds. Internal cooldown removed.
• Malediction: No longer increases the effect of Curse of the Elements, but now also increases the periodic critical strike chance of your Corruption and Unstable Affliction spells by 3/6/9%.
• Siphon Life: The Siphon Life spell has been removed. Siphon Life now causes your Corruption spell to instantly heal you for 40% of the damage done. In addition, the damage done by your Corruption, Seed of Corruption and Unstable Affliction damage over time effects is increased by 5%.
• Soul Siphon re-designed: Increases the amount drained by your Drain Life and Drain Soul spells by an additional 3/6% for each of your Affliction effects on the target, up to a maximum of 9/18% additional effect.
• Unstable Affliction and Immolation are now in the same exclusive category (both damage- over-time effects cannot be present at the same time by the same caster on a target).

Demonology

• Master Conjuror: Increased from 15/30% up to 150/300%. (pat you had this in Destruction i moved it to demonology thats where the patch notes has it)

Destruction

• Chaos Bolt: Damage increased approximately 15%.

lets see...just some of my thoughts and opinions.  some may be wrong, I'm kind of generally irritated today and not really caring whether I'm thinking straight so here we go...

Quote
Doomguard: Cooldown reduced to 30 minutes, down from 60 minutes. Damage reduced approximately 30%, and health reduced approximately 30%.

NERF, aparently alot of warlocks have been using Doomguards for alot of extra dps.  With a 30% reduction, that's a direct hit to our dps when using the demo to supplement our dps.

Quote
Soul Shard: This item now has a maximum count of 32 in inventory.

NERF, kinda...very irritating..why are they doing this...

QuoteVoidwalker: The health bonus on this pet has been reduced from 60% to 10%.
Talents

NERF, goodbye 40k+ Voidwalkers..  :-\

QuoteSoul Siphon re-designed: Increases the amount drained by your Drain Life and Drain Soul spells by an additional 3/6% for each of your Affliction effects on the target, up to a maximum of 9/18% additional effect.

NERF, right now it's 4% for each, and a max of 60%...  this coupled with the Soul Shard limit irritates the fuck out of me

QuoteUnstable Affliction and Immolation are now in the same exclusive category (both damage- over-time effects cannot be present at the same time by the same caster on a target).

NERF, now not only did we lose Siphon Life as a dot, we've lost yet another dot.  I'm not sure if Unstable Affliction will be worth having.  My gut says it would be better to throw Immolate and use Incinerate as a filler spell while waiting for cooldowns.



Fucking anoyying, I honestly do not see the "improved" things outweighing these "nerfs".  Lets see...

Quote
Eradication: Whenever you deal damage with Corruption, you have a 6% chance to gain the Eradication effect. The Eradication effect increases your spell casting speed by 6/12/20% for 10 seconds. Internal cooldown removed.

And there was much rejoicing....this is nice since we'll proc Eradication more often which means we can cast more spells in a fight, which increases dps..etc etc etc...but it's not like Eradicate procs that often now.  This really just means, it can proc twice in a row.  But it would be neat if this makes it so it can stack...that is endless possibilities.

Quote
Malediction: No longer increases the effect of Curse of the Elements, but now also increases the periodic critical strike chance of your Corruption and Unstable Affliction spells by 3/6/9%.

Direct benefit to dps.  Really nice since we don't really use Curse of Elements.  Makes this talent very worth it.

Quote
Siphon Life: The Siphon Life spell has been removed. Siphon Life now causes your Corruption spell to instantly heal you for 40% of the damage done. In addition, the damage done by your Corruption, Seed of Corruption and Unstable Affliction damage over time effects is increased by 5%.

So it's passive now I assume, and it no longer does any damage by itself.  I wonder if the 5% damage increases will make up for that loss.  By the way, make note that it increases the damage over time effect of Seed of Corruption and Unstable Affliction, not the damage cause when Seed of Corruption explodes or when Unstable Affliction is dispelled.

Quote
Master Conjuror: Increased from 15/30% up to 150/300%. (pat you had this in Destruction i moved it to demonology thats where the patch notes has it)

THIS is sweet.  I ALWAYS have a spellstone applied to my staff....ok that sounded a little wrong...I will be rubbing my stones all the time with this talent...now if only I can figure out a way to get that deep into Demonology and still get the good stuff from Affliction...

Quote
Chaos Bolt: Damage increased approximately 15%

Yay! ... wait aren't we Affliction?  Isn't that the best spec right now?

Quote from: Skree on Fri, 2009-04-10 : 11:22
Updates to Pat's last list

• Ritual of Summoning: Now has a 6-second PvP duration.
• Doomguard: Cooldown reduced to 30 minutes, down from 60 minutes. Damage reduced approximately 30%, and health reduced approximately 30%
• Soul Shard: This item now has a maximum count of 32 in inventory.
• Voidwalker: The health bonus on this pet has been reduced from 60% to 10%.

PVP change is whatever.
Doomguard change is smart. The Doomguard should only be used by Affliction warlocks to boost DPS. This change will allow Warlocks to push out more damage over the course of the raid and will balance what was always intended to be a tactical pet.
Soul shard - the maximum shard bag size is 32. Why anyone would need more in a raid situation is beyond me. It's called juggling your spell rotation.
Voidwalker - expected change. A pet should not be tanking bosses.

Quote
Affliction

• Eradication: Whenever you deal damage with Corruption, you have a 6% chance to gain the Eradication effect. The Eradication effect increases your spell casting speed by 6/12/20% for 10 seconds. Internal cooldown removed.
• Malediction: No longer increases the effect of Curse of the Elements, but now also increases the periodic critical strike chance of your Corruption and Unstable Affliction spells by 3/6/9%.
• Siphon Life: The Siphon Life spell has been removed. Siphon Life now causes your Corruption spell to instantly heal you for 40% of the damage done. In addition, the damage done by your Corruption, Seed of Corruption and Unstable Affliction damage over time effects is increased by 5%.
• Soul Siphon re-designed: Increases the amount drained by your Drain Life and Drain Soul spells by an additional 3/6% for each of your Affliction effects on the target, up to a maximum of 9/18% additional effect.
• Unstable Affliction and Immolation are now in the same exclusive category (both damage- over-time effects cannot be present at the same time by the same caster on a target).

Eradication is a nice buff for the DD spells Affliction warlocks will be casting.
Malediction is Blizzard taking their "criticals on DoTs" movement one step forward. Quick math in my head says it will be a mild boost in DPS.
The Siphon Life change is a welcome one. Siphon Life rank 8 transfers 81 health every 3 seconds for 30 seconds, and costs 16% of base mana. Since any Affliction Warlock with half a brain is going to have Corruption and Unstable Affliction on the target already, this is a simplification of the Affliction tree with a net gain to damage. Blizzard has long stated that the Affliction tree was bloated, and this is a great step.
Soul Siphon seems like it was designed to stop the prevalence of Warlocks just standing around in raids doing Drain Life.
Interesting change with Unstable Affliction and Immolation.  Tree splitting by Blizzard? Looks like it.

Quote
Demonology

• Master Conjuror: Increased from 15/30% up to 150/300%. (pat you had this in Destruction i moved it to demonology thats where the patch notes has it)

Significant boost to haste and spell damage. (Thanks, I copied and pasted source.)

Quote
Destruction

• Chaos Bolt: Damage increased approximately 15%.

Nice boost for Destruction warlocks.

Yea, I went a little nuts on that post earlier...  to sum up though, the Soul Siphon change and the Unstable Affliction/Immolate change irritate me the most.  And for the record, I like having 50 Soul Shards so I don't have to farm them before a raid and I sure as hell do not have the bank space for them.

Yea you shouldn't be standing around draining, but at least when you drain at the end of a fight you can do some good dps if your dots are still up.  Well I guess it doesn't irritate me as much as I first thought.  I was pretty generally anoyyed earlier.  But the Unstable Affliction/Immolate change still makes me mad.  Yea we got a boost to some of the dots but why suddenly decide to make them mutually exclusive?  Making an affliction spell and a destruction spell incompatible is silly IMO.  So lets make Shadow Bolts mutually exclusive with Corruption...can't have affliction and destruction mixing.  Oh and lets make it so you can't use Incinerate or Curse of Agony while you've got a demon out. 

I can understand things like Seed of Corruption and Corruption and not being able to stack certain buffs because one is a more powerful form of another, but Unstable Affliction and Immolate aren't even close to being the same.  I think they needed to dock something because they were afriad they made Warlocks too powerful with the changes to Siphon Life, Eradication, Malediction, and Master Conjuror.  I think they should have spread the changes across the trees more, and concentrated on making demonology and destruction more raid worthy.  I can understand Affliction is basically the epitome of the Warlock mindset cannon-wise, but there are two other specs that people enjoy playing that are just as sinister.

on another note.....TGIF  i'm sick of the work week.... :suicide:

the biggest thing that annoys me about the changes is the simplification of affliction, i enjoy managing 6 cooldowns, i think its fun, now affliction is going to be a head roll

im going to be looking at a demo/destro spec after 3.1

Quote from: Skree on Sun, 2009-04-12 : 19:59
the biggest thing that annoys me about the changes is the simplification of affliction, i enjoy managing 6 cooldowns, i think its fun, now affliction is going to be a head roll

im going to be looking at a demo/destro spec after 3.1

nice, you summed up my irritation pretty nicely.  we do NOT want things to be simpler.  the thing I like about affliction is the challenge.  take that away and it's just pressing buttons and gets old and boring fast.

I don't get the Siphon Life change hate. Any Warlock that's interested is going to have the Siphon Life talent. Any Warlock that has Siphon Life is going to have the Corruption-boosting talents. You're stacking for a single spell that delivers twice the goodness. In PVP, this spell is going to be even more brutal.

It's mostly about play prefrence, I liked the complicated dot managing of afflication past, and I wont really be able to see if SL and an affliction build would be better than the one I have now until I can test it in a raid situation, and the ways its looking that wont be for a while.

It's a little bit of a nerf to drain tanking though, just off the top of my head.  I haven't actually looked at the math, but my gut feeling is this indirectly nerfs the Soul Siphon talent.  It's one less dot, thus lowers the return on health by roughly 3%.  I haven't gotten around to checking to see if the 40% of the corruption tick after being increased by 5%, returns more or less health than the 3% that is lost on Soul Siphon.  Of course I'm talking about self healing but the same numbers apply to damage done, which isn't really what you care about when drain tanking.

But Skree is right, it's mainly play preference.  I'm enjoying Destruction again lately.  It's nice that it's viable now, and has gotten to be alot more than just spamming shadow bolts (to over simplify a little).