I haven't played Aff since TBC and I haven't PvP'd on my lock since the end of Season 12 and the first week of Season 13. That said, my friend was harassing me to go Aff because it's amazing right now.

So I've done a couple random BG's to get back into the swing of things, and I'm terrible. I've read that MG is pretty much dead weight in PvP right now. I understand that SS:SB puts all dots up and then I can fear. But here is where I'm kind of at a lost. Let's assume I'm 1v1ing someone, if I'm not supposed to cast MG, do I cast Haunt 3 times (+ Nightfall procs)?

At the end of the BG, it says I've done a ton of damage, but none of my damage is meaningful. Like I said, I know I'm way out of practice so I figured I'd ask for help.

"Clearly every aspect of one's life, from financial stability to social popularity, to sexual prowess can be boiled down to 4 numbers: One's Arena rating" ~ Xandamere

Haste is going to be good when you have amazing team members peeling for you. If you don't have that and wear melee as a perpetual butt plug then mastery is stronger. Top players have top player friends who can peel for them. Maybe you do, maybe you don't...but if you don't then mastery might be a better option. That said its pretty easy to sb:ss dots when you have CD's and/or procs up, SS around, and fear/cc when possible. Just not a satisfying playstyle if you want to actually kill things yourself...unfortunately as a damage dealer that occasionally sounds like fun. Or is that what alts are for?

Has anyone made a non aff spec work in pvp this season? The prejudicial nerfs to chaosbolt (plus the general headache of playing destro in pvp) seem to be no bueno and the fel flame change makes demo do as much damage to itself as it does to its target when you consider the mana cost conversion of using FF as a filler.

just changed my aff stats to as much haste as I can possibly get.. currently sat on 21% haste unbuffed and it feels mega ;p been doing 3s a lot this last week or so, but I have to use the oQueue addon to find team mates as my realm is dead an no one wants to do arena, or the few that do already have teams n stuff....

what im asking is, whats a decent viable comp for 3s with an aff lock so I can look specifically for them on oQueue.. thanks..

For a new player probably a tree + ele or spriest as the hybrid can offheal either the lock or the healer vs the plethora of mongo cleaves you will run into from about 1400-2K and after that they will just be smarter cleaves lol. Warriors make good team members as a) they are the fotm OP and b) ONLY if they are good at peeling not just tunneling something to the extent of all other awareness. The SV hunter works with an afflock since UA can cover black arrow so he gets to keep more damage that would otherwise be easy to neutralize.

Never been a fan of priest healers for the fear DR issue thus the root/clone druid or the buff synergy of a r.sham. Hpals can be nice vs cleaves but are easy prey to enemy casters/mages....so if you have one be sure to cover his butt big time since the other team will likely try to kill him on a swap.

More like you get the perfect storm of buffs and cooldowns > SB:SS > SS them around > CC the healer as much as possible while hoping the buffed dots + CC on the healer is enough to open a kill opportunity on someone. Pretty much once that part is over you are likely to die in the first CC that sticks on your healer to a derpy cleave that just tunnels the lock while tossing random CC at your healer. SB:SS > SS'ing is about all you get to do since casting vs a competent melee cleave just isn't happening. Sadly without all the buffs/CD's our dots get outpaced by instant/passive/cheap heals so there really isn't any pressure...not the kind of pressure a warrior parked on a lock creates.

been thinking about this for a while, anyone thought about why gateway has such a long cast time ? what's the point in having a ~3 sec cast on a spell we have such a close window of casting in some arena maps if we're balanced around it , it should be much faster to cast so we can set it up faster and get on with our business, not like it would be OP if i could cast gateway with a 0.5 sec cast time instead of 3 , it would make our lives much better with all the randomly leaping warriors and DKs charging and any class just doing the impossible to stop us from setting up gates at the start of the match which really pressures us and forces our teammates to have to run and try to stop them so we can set it up, all of that for a simple cast time that could be much lower.

In addition to making PVP gateway more balanced (as in you can more consistently place it thus you can balance locks around either having it or not having it not both half arse) Fast gateway cast would also be really nice for pve situations like thok, h.siegecrafter, etc where locks may have to run for their lives from hazards and portals despawn as a result. Then a potential wipe ensues simply due to buggy range on those things since others die as a result. Since its been quite some time and they aren't fixing the range bug least they could do is make them easier to place. Especially since there is already a recasting debuff/timer on casting gateway.

Then again blizz case history is incredibly solid of hotfix asap nerfing lock issues but taking major patches if not expansions to fix bugs/issues....

anyone knows what the most viable set up in 2's is?
I see few destro locks (probably with a healer and trying to line up cds perfectly so they can get off one incinerate...)
but with the new ladder system i can't really see what classes they team up with. I've played alot with my mw monk and have yet to see a good warlock, I can't recall losing to one.

anyone knows what the most viable set up in 2's is?
I see few destro locks (probably with a healer and trying to line up cds perfectly so they can get off one incinerate...)
but with the new ladder system i can't really see what classes they team up with. I've played alot with my mw monk and have yet to see a good warlock, I can't recall losing to one.

Is moonkin/afl still strong?

I've had some success going Demo in Dark Apotheosis and spam CC while letting imps and felguard do a bit of damage. As Aff I feel like I die too fast since almost every 2s team in existence has a god damn warrior. Can't comment on Destro.

Unless the warrior is just really terrible you can pretty much forget getting any casts off when he's on you. Between the 4'ish ways he has to stop you casting or prevent it hitting on short cooldown plus how much damage they pump into you while being nigh unkiteable its the kind of thing that just breeds frustration. Warriors have always hard countered warlocks and yet again they are fotm so expect to see them like flies on shite.

I wish they'd remove it and balance us some other way. Remove gateway and give DB baseline as a 4 sec root that breaks from any direct damage or something.

would be a blast, but then again pushing more cc is kinda meh

anyone knows what the most viable set up in 2's is?

affly boomy, possibly pairing with spriest, warr or mage. affly/healer, with current gear, is a pain to play

globaling teams in DS ? we must be playing wow in different dimensions.

Pop ds, berserking, lifeblood+ enchant and jade spirit usually proc and dot all. Now thats a serious pressure and ofc with the amount of cc go 1st for the healer. Thats a pretty big opener that can lead to win. Might not fully global but it does opens numerous kill windows. Its dumb as it sounds. My point was that this kind of play creates enormous dmg spikes, but the dmg outside of all this is no where near the idea of building pressure.

PvE is a minigame // Rerolled from affly to spriest after 8 years, thx pandaland changes

Haste is going to be good when you have amazing team members peeling for you. If you don't have that and wear melee as a perpetual butt plug then mastery is stronger. Top players have top player friends who can peel for them. Maybe you do, maybe you don't...but if you don't then mastery might be a better option. That said its pretty easy to sb:ss dots when you have CD's and/or procs up, SS around, and fear/cc when possible. Just not a satisfying playstyle if you want to actually kill things yourself...unfortunately as a damage dealer that occasionally sounds like fun. Or is that what alts are for?

Has anyone made a non aff spec work in pvp this season? The prejudicial nerfs to chaosbolt (plus the general headache of playing destro in pvp) seem to be no bueno and the fel flame change makes demo do as much damage to itself as it does to its target when you consider the mana cost conversion of using FF as a filler.

I don't get why mastery is better against melee if you don't have good team mate that peeel for u. I don't get your logic. More haste = less time for casting fear + UA faster + one more tick from corruption = 10% more chanche TO get a shard....

I got another question. Is better the season 14 chest or the soo one with 3 red sockets???

I don't get why mastery is better against melee if you don't have good team mate that peeel for u. I don't get your logic. More haste = less time for casting fear + UA faster + one more tick from corruption = 10% more chanche TO get a shard....

I got another question. Is better the season 14 chest or the soo one with 3 red sockets???

For instances PvP, s14 PvP gear is always better then PvE gear due the ilvl ceiling.

Also, Mastery is better for affliction for all cases. Even when you can free cast all game long, the damage gain from mastery is still bigger then the gain you get from haste. As for extra ticks on corruption, they really don't matter that much since only your last applied/refreshed corruption can proc nightfall meaning that if you play affliction somewhat correctly, you'll never get a proc on that extra tick ever.

In a 3's match vs a cleave you just don't get to cast nearly at all thus haste's value is wasted. Mastery still works at full power even if you only get to SB:SS > SS and cast UA's/fears during a howl/sfury/etc. Faster fears are nice but when a warrior has 4x ways on a short CD to stop a cast (and/or reflect it) plus the other melee's CC plus the healer's CC you can forget about it. Especially when the other healer pillars and you are getting ridden constantly. Sort of why harvest life isn't taken ever....no matter how strong it is if you can't use it then it has no value.

Yeah is fair enough why mastery is the best option in Arena, i came out with this question about Mastery Vs Haste becouse i saw the top affly lock on the ladder gemming and reforging haste, having said that i'm running full mastery
@Nicola i read in the pvp forum that u reached 2.3k in 3v3, double lock and resto druid, you were destro?