Aethelwulf wrote:I disagree. A Warlock would certainly be strong with all 3 trees (any class would), but demolocks are still susceptible to getting their pets purged (bye Soul Link) or murdered while they are locked down (which admittedly can be resummoned once). Destro and Affliction don't synergize that well since one focuses on shadow damage and the other focuses on fire damage. Shadowburn is something almost every lock builds anyway with 11 points destro, so all in all the bag of tricks doesn't get that big. Conflagrate and Siphon Life is really about it. Fire and damage compete against each other for actions and the fire dps isn't as good as shadowbolt dps so for the most part you are like a slightly heavier hitting SM/Ruin warlock with better survival.
Contrast Rogues for instance who can easily take advantage of having Cold Blood, Vigor, Adrenaline Rush, Preparation, and Premeditation all on the same Rogue while collecting all sorts of damage bonuses plus some utility here and there. That's going to get insane.
Or consider Hunters who will get both absurdly heavy hitting pets and monster attacks of their own plus survival and utility.
You're right, they dont get as many tools as e.g. mage or rogue. That Arcane Power+Combustion must be awesome. But consider the amount of damage bonus the warlock gets with all talents and the amount of passive bonuses. None of it is on a 3 minute cooldown or anything. It's just there.
Shadow Mastery: +10% shadow
Soul Link: +3% all damage
Master Demonologist (with succubus out): +10% all damage
Ember Storm: + 10% Fire damage
It doesn't matter that affliction and destruction dont synergize well when you get to have all the talents.
They only do shadow and fire damage, and with all talents that's at least 23% damage (with succubus out) to both schools. And then we're forgetting about Curse of Shadows or Curse of the Elements which (if i remember correctly) reduces resistances by 60 and increases damage taken by another 10%.
That's a lot of damage bonus.
On top of that, Immolate hits 25% harder when it lands. That makes that spell hit HARD and you get to cast Conflagrate right after that, which totals a shit ton of damage.
Devastation: +5% if you subscribe to the idea that 1% crit = 1% spelldamage. Somebody calculated it and it evens out. might be wrong though. Either way, it's still really good when you consider the talent "Ruin"
Ruin: 100% damage bonus on crits.
If you crit with shadowbolt you get another 20% shadow damage bonus to your shadow spells.
Let that sink in. If you crit with shadowbolt, which isn't that rare, while having Curse of Shadows up and Succbus out you have 23+10+20 = 53% shadow damage bonus, and we aren't even counting Devastation and that succubus+jumpercables bug. That death coil is going to heal for a lot to say the least.
Then you have all the passive shit in demonology:
Soul Link: 30% less damage taken which basically gives the warlock mail armor that also works against spells.
Demonic Embrace: 15% extra hp. A warlock in epics will have near 5k hp.
Improved Voidwalker: Voidwalker sacrifice shield is now 30% better and you can summon that shield in less than a second. That shield is better than Ice Barrier or Power Word: Shield ever was.
Improved spellstone: 30% better spellstone shield. Need I say more? It already absorbs a shit ton of spell dmg before the bonus.
Or, if you choose to have a felhunter out instead of a succubus you get +60 to all resistances.
On top of that you get to channel drain life which also has a talent which makes it heal (and damage) for 10% extra.
That makes the warlock a tank. I dont want to be the caster against that warlock