Guest Post: Raiding Warlocks Are Unwanted
This is a guest post submitted by Mekagojira, a fellow warlock who is looking for reasons why guilds like mages so much!
If you want your thoughts published, you’re welcome to submit your own post! And be sure to post a comment below.
Using Wowjutsu.com, a guild progression ranking site, I have looked at the top 10 ranked guilds on EU realms.
Out of a total 683 characters who are level 80 in those top guilds, we find 42 warlocks. That’s roughly 6% warlocks all in all. Considering there’s 10 classes to pick & choose from, we can un-mathematically clearly see that we are under-represented (bring the player, not the class)
The guilds I looked at seem to have roughly twice as many Mages as they have Warlocks. It’s hard accounting say Shamans, Priests and Druids since they are quite often healers rather than DPS, so I picked Mages since they are the only other ‘pure’ caster DPS class that applies.
And now ladies and gentlemen, the sad news. Seeing that we’ve so far only accounted for characters at level 80 who happen to be in one of the top 10 guilds on EU realms, lets crunch the numbers to see how many Warlocks these guilds decided to bring on the current end-game raids.
I’ve only counted the 25-man versions of Naxxramas and The Eye Of Eternity. (I.e. Heroic raids)
Total numbers of Warlocks ranked:
- NAX: 32
- MAL: 8
.. I’m sorry? If we unscientifically say that all 10 guilds only went once, there should be at least 250 players with The Eye Of Eternity, and we got 8 locks in there? I don’t know about you guys, but I’m going to sit here with my imp and QQ until Ghostcrawler decides to nerf us even more.
Personally I think the numbers have more to do with the massive rerolls and even quitting the game. I have yet to try the DPS in high-end raiding myself, but from all I’ve read our damage is quite competitive (affliction spec). But I do guess a lot of locks don’t want to hassle with overly complicated casting rotations it requires to stay competitive. Not having to spam one button (read: shadowbolt) is one thing, but having to stare at DoT timers among other things for several hours is hardly fun for anyone. It’s annoying as hell to try and squeeze as many Shadowbolts as possible in small windows when we don’t have to refresh DoTs.
Many took the easier path and just rerolled other classes, and I certainly can’t blame them.
I have to agree with you horns. I think its cuz of rerolls to DK(way to many on my server, none tank!) and the unliking of the rotation of affli which i like. But right now i am doing end game raiding of 10 and 25 man naxx and my dps is very competetive. I am always 2.5k+ on fights(besides the large movement ones, aka DDR). But i guess i kind of like the “complicated” rotation of affli, its honestly not that bad and i really dont have to use DoT timers i get it down.
Anyways i guess some ppl just dont like it and others like easy ways. All it means is more tier gear for us that remain!
Yeah, a lot of my guildies have decided to play there alts.. priest moved to hunter, warrior to rogue etc.. and with the 15% crit bug on rogues, the raid seems to benefit, but melee classes in general seem to be out dpsing us.. i can push about 2.4k dmg in naxx 10 epics, and just short of hit raiting.. we have always had a shortage of ‘locks ni my guild.. however, considering destro spec is nice for a undergeared lock, and affi seems to be quite nice.. we are being left behind.. i guess being GM and Raid Leader, i can force myself to be in every single raid, but i am personally dropping out other warlocks in some 25’s for other dps classes such as hunters (inc nerf ;)) and boomkins or shadow priests.. lets hope it gets better as after 3 years, i feel we had our supreme time at level 60.. and things have just got worse..
Thanks for your great post.
Forget about the game. You are doing them a favor if you level up an alt to play till your main gets un-nerfed. Which might mean around the time of the next expansion, this is how they did it in TBC.
At last someone with hard facts - i am tired of the noob locks saying L2P in the forums. Its not just raids its also heroics. And i am sick and tired to be told: bring imp out.
Also to those who think affliction will save them it wont. I just spend a fortune on speccs and i ended up back to my own full demo again.
I love locks. Just not for raiding. Theres classes that are less ‘Nerf-Likely’ for that.
You guys need to start editing guest posts.
Come On Guyz!!
I Have Heroic Gear (With 2 from Naxx10 & One Deadly PvP) With Some Sucky Blues, And Im Poppin 3k DPS On 10man and 4k DPS on 20man… And I Tell You, It Nots Difficult!!
In heroics?? Just Go Deep Destro Or 0/31/40 And You’ll Top There!!
The Case Just Is That Warlock Is Not “I DPS” Oneclick Class… It Now Require Some Thinking!! And Most People Rerolled Other Classes Cuz They Got Warlocks In BC Cuz Of That “I DPS” Spell…
So Guyz, I Wont Say L2P - I Just Say: Affliction Warlock Is HIGHEST DPS IN RAIDS atm. And Destro Is Not At The Bottom Too…
So?..
Regarding the first point, warlocks are about 7% of the level 80 population– so 6% of top guilds is just about perfect, actually.
Regarding the second point, well… I think it’s actually a bit early to really compare damage (since the raids are quite easy right now), but I don’t think it’s too early to start QQing, because if you wait until it’s really justified… you’ll get fixed about 6 months late.
i’m raiding a lot and can say that our dmg is far not so good as some others. in almost all gear from 25man (2100sp with felarm, 28% crit fir destro, hit cap, 150 haste - build 0/15/56) im doing more dps than any other equally geared build (rotation: dots+immo+chaos on CD+innci+conflag and repeat)… im doing 2.4-3.0k dps on bosses where you have to watch enviroment, move sometimes etc. on stationary bosses im going to 4.0k dps or even more… but DK can go 5.0k BM hunter 5.3k and frostfire 5.8k dps so im not most wanted on raids, all progress is done, just runing for achievments where optimal raid grp is needed, usually without warlock
I tell you what worries me most of all about locks being unwanted. It might not be that bad right now but think about what happens when dual spec comes into the game.
So now given hybrid classes dps just as well and currently much better than pure dps classes all you’ll need in your guild will be paladins, druids, priests, and death knights.
I suppose you can argue that wont be happening, but there will surely be those classes wanting to roll on tank, healing and dps gear. So if a lone lock does get into a raid you’re gonna be competing with all the classes for dps gear.
If I was organizing a guild it would be much more flexible to have hybrids with dual spec than pure dps classes. Infact is there any reason to have anything but a hybrid class now, which offers much more raid flexibility?
…first time reader and poster, but this definitely caught my attention.
I played a Lock for a few years, but ceased to log onto it since about a year ago.
In regards to the initial topic, I don’t know if this is a clear cut case of Warlocks being unwanted. Horns and a few others mentioned the re-roll thing, and I certainly believe that to be a major factor.
Being a GM myself, I can honestly say that the only 2 things I care to recruit right now are Mages and Warlocks. We have a very small raid team for 25 mans… but it’s packed with melee, and quite honestly I hate it. Is it getting the job done? Sure. But the content we’re facing right now doesn’t particularly matter when it comes down to raid composition, but it likely will in the future.
Despite the whole “bring the player not the class” theme that’s been quoted all over the place recently, something eventually will have to *give*. Difficult encounters will always have some form of favorable setup for the majority (not all) raids.
I really wish we had access to 1 or 2 more Warlocks for our raids (we normally have 0 or 1)… and it would be a benefit to the Warlock community if there were, because quite honestly I’ve seen terrible DPS from most of them — and if there were more.. and additionally more good ones putting up solid dps numbers, while acknowledging the sort of fight which favors their spec… it may force other people to step up their game a little bit.
On the other hand… maybe it wouldn’t. =p
In response to Paulski, I’ve done some thinking about that.. and ultimately it’s going to come down to the type of people you have in your raid, and the way your raid distributes loot. Additionally, most people really don’t want to play multiple specs in a raid setting — they have one specific thing they like to do, and want to stick to it. DKs are the big exception to this right now… they want to tank and dps everything in the game simply because they can.
Anyway… just thought I’d drop a note.
Cheers,
Weezzii
Personally, I think most warlocks are just turned off by the fact that their greatest dps rotation and spec right now are much more difficult and taxing than previous specs (prebc/bc). I really don’t know what all the griping is though with warlocks right now in regards to PVE. I rerolled a lock at the beginning of BC after playing a moonkin initially (before it was cool, lulz) and to be honest I still see myself at the top of damage in 25 mans now as I did with 0/21/40 SB spam. I’m currently full affliction (55/0/16) and am still really happy with my damage output (pushing 4k dps with some 70 level gear still) and raid utility (summons, healthstone, soulstone). I understand many people are leery of going Affliction or turned off with having to deal with probably the most involved dps rotation in the game right now (I have a horde SP and its rotation is cake compared to afflic). However, with incoming fixes and alleviations on our rotation in future patches these apparent “difficulties” with our current sequence should allow some warlocks to sleep easier at night.
Well I guess I’m sort of a newbie when it comes to warlocks, I’ve played the game as a tank for 3.5 years then rerolled a warlock when the last expansion came out. So to me the Warlock is fine, I didn’t get to experience the high end DPS from before, so I’m not complaining. I use a Hybrid build 0/41/30, my hit rating is at 17.19%(capped), my rotation is CoE(raid) or CoA, Corr., Immolate, Incinerate x 3, then Immolate, Incinerate x 3, back to DoTs when they expire and then rise and repeat. I do the occasional Shadow Bolt when needed but I don’t use it much. Depending on the group make up my end DPS is different, 10 man I do around 2k to 2.3k over all DSP and finish in top 3 on recount, 25 man is around 2.4k to 3.2k overall DPS and finish in the top 6 on recount. So I’m not sure what you guys are complaining about? PvP isn’t that bad either, we are getting a few changes in the future, I’m looking forward to them too, but I’m doing fine as it is.
While I don’t agree us locks are completely unwanted there are classes that are much more desired now, especially in certain fights, than they were before. In straight out dps locks are no longer king but I still see the ones in my guild as top 3-5 in dmg all the time with afflic specld locks hitting 3500-4k dps on boss’s easy and I hit 3-3.5k as fg/ember spec easily now too. Its just mage and hunter dps is better(for now) and those classes havw sone unique features that make them more desired.
All that said we still use 2-3 locks in a 25man raid like we did in bc…
I think locks have more or less crashed and burnt. On my server Karazhan, the top guild has 3 and the second has none!
We are only wanted for SS now, and maybe fel/imp buff as mage dps double.
My gear not awesome, hit capp, 1804 self buff sp, 400 self buff haste, 32% crit on destro (14% crit on aff).
DPS tops out at 2k on the stoopid dance bosses (proper attention), 3k on patch, but generally in HCs averaging 1.5k
The mage averages 2.5 (his gear a bit better).
But new ding fury warrior with couple craftables 1.5k dps
Just daft, we need lots of top gear, to be able to compete.
Coming from a mage and hunter perspective, i gotta say, sympathy I have not. do any of you remember what it was like trying to get into a group for any raid? hell even bloody kara only had room for one mage( if i was lucky).
and again i;d wager those figures are not taking into account the rerolls and alts going on. not to mention they might just be taking their time leveling.
locks have been spoiled for so long they dont know what its like to not be the golden class.
i tried raiding on my lock 1800 spell power self buffed, 170 hit rating. Affliction: I spent most of the fight watching dot timers, and not really looking at the fight.
Made sure all my dots were up, throwing in the occasional shadowbolt as a filler.
I barely made it to 1.3k dps on the bosses. The amount of concentration needed to maintain all the dots is very high, if looking at dot timers is your thing you’ll love it other wise.. yawn!. Quite frankly, there isn’t much left in the game that is enjoyable on this character.
The people who say locks are fine in PvE must be on smack or playing a different game to me.
To Jake: Why all the hate dude..? I want to explain that I am not a warlock in real life I just play the game. I imagine a world where we are judged on the content of our character and not the class we play, a world where mages and warlocks live in harmony.. Free from the tyranny of Blizzard and Tom Chilton.
its not hate so much as pleasure. schadenfreude if you will. you need to tkae it from everyother classes perspective, how every raid the lead warlock would link dmaage meter every mob pull or boss battle, how i wouldnt even CONSIDER dueling a lock unless there was asinine rules like no fears.
pve raiding and pvp are three different aspects. for all of bc locks ruled all three, so now they domt quite dominate like they used to, such is life. mages were barely fun for pve in bc. dont even get me into raiding and pvp
Sounds like your angry with Blizzard and your sad life dude. Pleasure at other people having a hard time..? Really..? thats just sad. If you want to go trolling the wow forums are especially good for that. bye.
lol trolling a troll eh? my life is sad yours on the other hand? qq locks arent OP as much as they used to be QQ.
punks these days
So I am dominating every time Malygos 25 with my 0/31/40 specc and I dont know why all warlocks are QQing. Hunter are not the best dealers in that fight and even mages are not that powerfull because we can teleport us down on the ground and get 10 seconds more to cast. So we are no Top50 world guild, but still Top400. The most time I am the only warlock, just because our realm is a small one and every lock rerolled the op classes like rogue, paly or dk for pvp concerns.
My warlock: 2 pieces of naxx 10 gear (shoulders/the soulblade) the rest heroics/badge/crafted (ring)/ pvp (cloak) gear
1725 dmg/healing
a little more than 14% hit (376 rating, 14.33%)
254 haste
391 crit rating (14.93%)
Affliction speccd: 53/0/18
And I did second damage on Malygos 25 (with around 4000dps, around 3100 phase 1, 2100 at the end of phase 2, and kept my stacks up on phase 3)
And I did second damage on Malygos 10 (with 3846 dps, let my stacks fall off once in phase 3 because im bad)
When I started WOTLK I did around 2k on the heroic dummy with my 70 gear, and yesterday I did around 3100 dps on the heroic dummy over the course of 900,000 dmg, my imp was oom for a while.
High affliction dps is possible, though it requires (i believe) much more micromanagement than other specs, and is not possible without a DOT timer.
yes it is possible without a DoTimer, as affliction goes there is a “spamable” rotation that fits with in 1 macro that WORKS, it is not 100% efficient in all fights (interupts etc..) i still reccomend a DoTimer 4 those fights, anyhow, it gives u about a 97% Dot uptime and doesnt clip (glyphed) CoA at all, and most locks laugh at amp curse when they should be laughing at eradication. MUUUHAHAHAHA!
Aah the joy of self-selected statistics. I’ve followed Mekagojira’s methodology, and with such a hopelessly tiny sample size of a sample with 10 results (you’d want 2000 or so people in the survey for it to be useful, not 250), its pretty likely (40%) that one or more classes would account for as little as 8/250 or less of the population. Add into that the fact that Mekagojira is a warlock feeling wronged and searching all the data he can find to support him, lets say he has checked 3 statistical sources and published the one that backs him up best, then the odds of a statistical anomaly of this size rise to 72%.
Or in plain English, this “study” shows nothing whatsoever. Maybe locks are under-represented, maybe not.
Sorry to disappoint those of you praising the “hard facts”, but these are “soft hunches”. Phrases to watch out for “I’ve only counted the…” means “I’ve counted all sorts of things and this backs me up best”; “If we unscientifically say” means “I don’t know the truth so I’m making things up”.
My lock is destru. I hate affliction. I dont like watching dot timers and running around.. its just not fun for me. I still have a difficult rotation, deep destru with CB. On patch, I do 4k+ and on loatheb, 5k+ but on normal run around like a chicken with your head cut off fights, 3.2k+. I weare 4/5 T7.5 plus some other 213/226 lvl gear. I don’t see the problem. It’s all in your rotation. I rotate 6 spells, affliction is 7.. not too much different. I dunno what everyone (other locks) are complaining about.. L2Play.
well, i was a SB spammer during bc and it was awesome!!! 10k crits where so ftw back then that i miss them, why because my stats have doubled and my dps i feel is still lacking. http://www.wowarmory.com/chara.....%A2l%C3%AE check me out. im doing 3.5-5k dps on fihgts butmages and mele clases are roflstomping my dps with simmilar gear.
Kâlî thats how u spell my name in case u want to check my armory. i have to say that raid buffed with totems foods flasks felguard buffed to the tits and when the sundial procs i have 4k spellpower, hit capped and decent haste.
my point is that we are not scaling properly with our stats. in bc iwas doing 10k crits like i said with only 1600 spell power fully buffed, now i have 2.5 times that and the most i get with my procs up(trinks,molten core ect ect)is about 9-10.5 crits. something is wrong with us.