Hello,

Small introduction first. I been playing since beta and I would say I know my class fairly well. I been testing raiding with felguard with somewhat succesful results.

This is not a request to make warlocks more powerful (even if felguard spec might be pretty strong when raiding even as it is if player has mastered playing with felguard), but a request to make game more diverse and make playing same class have more options you could choose from. It's about making spec I love playable in AoE involving encounters.

I put a lot of time to this and I think you would listen to my concerns:

Problem With Avoidance:

I wish you would do do small adjustments to demonology tree to make it easily work in raids. This post also concerns some itemization problems that concern warlocks (as well as some other classes).

First of all ability avoidance that is supposed to make it workable in PvE, isn't really doing what it's supposed to do. I know that effect is 50% ignore because of PvP purposes (like nova). But I would wish you would search if it was possible to change the ability from:

Requires Level 60, Passive, Increases your chance to avoid area of effect attacks by an additional 50%.

To:

Requires Level 60, Passive, Increases your chance to avoid area of effect attacks by an additional 25%. This effect also reduces damage from AoE effects by 25%.

This small change that might be a nerf in PvP, but would actually make the build much easier to play in PvE as well.

Also I wish you would consider some fights from pet point of view. I'm not saying archimonde can't do doomfire, but changes you made to shatter for example vere really appreaciated. If that small change would be made to Felguard ability it would make it a much more working pet in PvE. Why?

Because this would allow chain heals and shadow priest to heal the pet. There's also problem with self healing, which is blood funnel, but changing that to dot, would have too much impact on PvP. Still this should also be reviewed and given thought if it could be made working somehow. Problem with luck based AoE damage migitation comes when some boss like high warlord naj'entus hits you for massive AoE effect. Problem especially with felguard is when you use Soul Link, it gives pet 105% damage from AoE, even if you count demonic resilience.

One example would be reducing cast time to 4 seconds which would apply healing over time after being succesfully casted for whole duration. This would make it also not so powerful in PvP.

---

Problem With Itemization:

Some items that are very must at the moment, like void star talisman, are random drops with 17% chance to drop from the boss. Now I wonder if it was your intention to make some talent tree raid viable only if you get lucky with loots?

Wouldn't it be more logical to make class token as static drop, similar to tier tokens which could be shared by different classes.

Also there's bit problem with splitting sets, so that mage gets 1 set and warlock gets 1 set, when paladins for example get to choose from three sets. It might seem to outside observer that warlock is a warlock, no matter what build he plays. But giving items that are tied to one talent tree as rewards like exalted with ashtongue, is just planned really badly. It's somewhat affliction favored trinket. This problem for example could easily be fixed with small patch that introduced items that are exactly same named, but you have three trinkets there (in warlocks case at least) that would be unique, so if you buy one, you can't get another to your inventory, so when you do plan to change your build, you would go and sell your trinket and buy one that supports another talent tree. There's working "multitrinket" for druids already, but such trinket wouldn't work for warlocks. It would be too powerful.

Wouldn't it be possible to add talent based sets for each class that gets big change in playstyle depending on where majorty of talents are spent and empower that tree or make up for something it lacks.

Some ideas:

affliction: per dot tick procs / heal / increased damage on dots / additional effects on spells like UA.
destruction: Shadow bolt / Incinerate tied effects (like current tier 6 4/4 bonus), crit boosting.
demonology: Pet survivability, life drain on pet attacks / chance to gain stats increase in some percentage for pet, when when pet hits.

---

Basically same kind of sets you are basically giving to paladins and druids at the moment.

I know it might be bit too late to start fixing things now, but in the future.. if you want to give class specific items (sets, trinkets etc) please make it optional for players to choose items to support their way of playing.

I'm not saying this is only problem to warlocks, I'm sure mages for example wouldn't mind some talent tree based bonusses as well, making arcane more powerful.

Sincerely,

Nyarlathotep of Method

About This Post:

I started testing felguard raiding first time June 2007 and started gathering screenshots and materials about this way of raiding that almost everyone considered to be for PvP and at least general opinion was like that. I did this a) cause it's fun b) just to prove that even if the build has few flaws, it can be played successfully in high end raiding and I hope people would think out of the box and test different things and builds instead of assuming that general opinion is always right.

Some stuff like conclusions chapter might be in weird position, but that's due to 10k letter limit per post on some forums, sorry for that (also some forums limit use of [.IMG] to 10 pictures, so I limit pictures according to that as well. If you use information from this post please link it, so more people have chance to learn from my experience.

Sadly our guild ran to some problems recently, which means there will be no updates at least for some time to hyjal / BT bosses. I will post about new bosses once I have access to those encounters. We're currently starting raiding again, but have to take step back. But happy news is I guess that I get to cover all the SSC bosses for people currently progressing there.

This post started as private post on our forums at [url]www.method.no[/url], but then I posted it to elitistjerks forums. I also posted it to warlocks den and wow-europe forums after getting a lot of positive feedback about this in EJ.

I been raiding with felguard for a long while now and I think I can try to shed some light into this way of raiding that has been considered to be a PvP only talent spec by many.

If you want to compare damage to your possible build, use same addon (recount) to count damage and look dps number, not total damage done. Our guild is recently merged and there's two level of gears, so if you want to compare some people in our guild, look armory profile first. Also remember that group setup and raid setup affects very much, like who gets bloodlusts and so on. Or better yet, see WWS links.

This is an attempt to write mark II version of the same post with a lot more experience about raiding and include some future changes that will affect raiding with this talent build. I will also provide few WWS (once we start raiding). I will include the information from original posts in these four posts I will now write. I will also save original posts as well somewhere in case someone requests them.

This post is about how felguard raiding works, so some bosses I will go through briefly, if there is nothing special to that boss. For harder bosses I try to give some tips and name cases where felguards life is at risk.

Build that I'm using to raid is following: http://www.wowhead.com/?talent=NV0oZbxczIizzestxx0z]6-44-11

First post will go through The Eye encounters, I will include all I have done with felguard.

All these bosses and screenshots I was doing Curse of Recklessness on targets that had melee users on them, if no melee users were on the target I did Curse of Agony or Curse of Doom.

Reached nice spelldamage spike (without destruction potion) 1937 shadow damage.

http://img216.imageshack.us/my.php?image=hydrossspikevv6.jpg

for future reference:

Talisman, voidstar = Void Star Talisman (which I sadly don't have for the record)

I had shadow priest in all The Eye bosses that I wrote about here.

Requested WWS:

http://www.lossendil.com/wws/?report=4r4gf53m1wqpo 15th of August, Serpentshrine Cavern and Tempest Keep
http://www.lossendil.com/wws/?report=trih64khrajgc 16th of August, Serpentshrine Cavern

We use free WWS account, so this list will change accordingly.

The Eye:

Al'Ar:

At first Al'Ar seemed to be very hard fight to maintain decent dps. It was the first boss I tested felguard raiding, so to the belly of the beast right away. First time I was at Al'Ar I had big problems with Recount (errors) that distracted me so first kill isn't really the whole truth.

It is not so melee friendly fight because of exploding Embers. In phase 1 what now I basically do is CoR at first tank spot when melee still is hitting the boss. After melee goes for Ember of Al'Ar, I change curse to CoD on Al'Ar. Also request your phoenix tanks to be marked as maintanks. I choose Ember of Al'Ar from maintank list and charge my pet at that target. Our tanks call "melee get out" that's when I put my felguard at follow and after some time hold ground so it has less time to run to next Ember.

I do the same thing each Ember, which combined to monitoring dots, looking stopcastingbar and drooling after dps meter sometimes leads mr. Fel being dead. So I guess combined with moving, and other parts of the fight pet control is somewhat demanding to do it in optimal way.

First time I was on Al'Ar my felguard died 6 times, but like stated earlier it was partly due to UI problems as well. I been there more times now and felguard almost never dies. Sometimes if I'm careless I manage to kill felguard when we are taking down adds in phase 2.

Pet always died cause of fire damage, so talisman could be uselful, but with careful play you might as well use your best dps trinket. I done it so far, so can everyone else.

First kill:

http://img71.imageshack.us/my.php?image=alarqd9.jpg

Best so far:

http://img295.imageshack.us/my.php?image=alar070710il8.jpg

Void Reaver:

From this fight I get a lot of questions about. Felguard can stay in during poundings if you have shadow priest to heal it. Sometimes arcane bombs hit melee, that's bit too much for felguard if it keeps happening for a long time.

Overall this fight is very simple, send the pet in and dps all you can. Classic tank and spank fight. Sometimes you get unlucky with arcane orbs sometimes you get lucky. Dps in this fight varies a lot so it's not best fight to compare as caster.

First time I had some troubles cause I was bit too worried about felguards health. I payed too much attention to that and kept eating arcane bombs. Keep your resummon pet macro ready here to save your pets buffs in case pet starts taking arcane orbs AND pounding at the same time, that is too much for SP / pet to handle.

Talisman helps to make sure pet stays alive here as well.

First kill:

http://img213.imageshack.us/my.php?image=voidreaverux1.jpg

Best so far:

http://img165.imageshack.us/my.php?image=voidreaver070718de7.jpg

High Astromancer Solarian:

This fight is pretty much ideal for felguard build and no other warlock build should be able to top damage in this fight. Boss and adds are low armor and you can use cleave efficiently here during AoE phase. We use arcane resistance here to some extent that will give your pet more survivability. Pets can be targeted by wrath of the astromancer ability, so you have to be quick moving with your pet and use pet control well when moving the dot where your guild moves them. You can also use your charge efficiently here to stun priests and stop them from healing.

I guess different guilds use different tactics here, so I won't go much into that.

This is one of the fights where it's really nice to be felguard warlock.

First kill:

http://img213.imageshack.us/my.php?image=solarianwg0.jpg

Random screenshot:

http://img381.imageshack.us/my.php?image=highastromancersolarianmn4.jpg

Kael'Thas Sunstrider:

When I went to Kael'Thas first time I was sure it will be a nightmare for my pet, but frankly with right kind of pet control it actually is very nice fight to do.

There are some things you need to watch out though:

Flamestrike, Phoenix (hellfire and final explosion), Capernian AoE, Devastations whirlwind, Netherstrand volley, Telonicus grenades, Thaladred and nether beam he casts in phase 5. But most of these things are taken care by raids other members.

When you flow (gravity lapse), put pet on follow (will be below you). Both you and pet will link, so you have to think yourself as "a tower" and keep like 20y distance between you and pet and same for everyone near you and the pet. Keeping pet on boss isn't smart, tried and died (my pet that is).

By phases:

phase 1
Thaladred, keep pet on follow.
Sanguinar, put pet on attack.
Capernian, put pet on hold hiding somewhere.
Telonicus, put on attack.

phase 2
put attacking weapon which is primary dps target for you, beware devastation.

phase 3
put attacking sanguinar -> telonicus assuming that's your kill order (of those two).

Phase 4
keep attacking all times if you break his shields, if you don't call back during shields. Beware phoenixes and flame strikes.

phase 5
Keep on attack all most times, take it off during shield. Keep on follow during gravity lapse.

First kill:

http://img220.imageshack.us/my.php?image=kaelthasev6.jpg

Random shot:

http://img295.imageshack.us/my.php?image=kaelthassunstrider07071cw0.jpg

Serpentshrine Cavern:

All these bosses and screenshots I was doing Curse of Recklessness on targets that had melee users on them, if no melee users were on the target I did Curse of Agony or Curse of Doom.

Hydross the Unstable:

This is very easy fight to do with felguard. You set your pet on Hydross once the tank has one hit on him and never move felguard off him, not even poison/water changes. I never had problem there leaving pet on attack. You will most likely tank adds near the boss so cleaving attacks work well here.

I don't think pet gets hit by watery tomb, not sure Vile Sludge can hit the pet either.

First Kill:

http://img292.imageshack.us/my.php?image=hydrosspr9.jpg

Thooghun got on meters as well!

http://img170.imageshack.us/my.php?image=hydrosstheunstable07080kt6.jpg

Lurker from Below:

Pet is no longer affected by Lurkers spout ability (after patch 2.1.3), which makes this fight a lot easier. Only problem with the pet / control is that you have to always leave it on stay near Lurker's pool. If you put it on follow and are on platform pet might get stuck there and can't find path to go pummel lurker again. Whirl damage is healed by shadow priest.

Some pet control and fight should be easy job.

Few screenshots:

http://img100.imageshack.us/my.php?image=lurkerbelow070717jo3.jpg

http://img520.imageshack.us/my.php?image=lurkerbelow070815lo4.jpg

Leotheras the Blind:

Tanking duty, no jobs for Thooghun the Idiot there. Can only guess that it would work just fine since you only have to beware whirlwinds and it shouldn't be that hard.

<< No screenshot sorry been always tanking >>

Fathom-Lord Karathress:

Fathom-Guard Sharkkis: No problems with felguard. You can leave felguard on cleave at Sharkkis.
Fathom-Guard Tidalvess: Spitfire don't hit felguard. You can leave felguard on cleave at Tidalvess.
Fathom-Guard Caribdis: Waterbolt Volley might hit pet, frankly I'm not sure and will correct this once someone confirms this. I left pet in anyways, if it got hit, then shadow priest took care of the rest.
Fathom-Lord Karathress: You can leave felguard on cleave at Karathress.

Few screenshots from two last days of SSC clear, (big difference in DPS: I had good dps group in another screenshot, plus I probably tried harder as well):

http://img165.imageshack.us/my.php?image=fathomlordkarathress070ju4.jpg

http://img103.imageshack.us/my.php?image=fathomlordkarathress070tk0.jpg

Morogrim Tidewalker:

This fight is very simple as well, after the pull you can sign your felguard on the boss. I never got my felguard to disappear when I was in watery grave, so range works for our tanking spot at least. I also had cleave on all the time and never got aggro from murlocs. So there's no need to control felguard after you set it on the boss. Will check how earthquake affects pet here as soon as possible.

I reached rediculous 2039 dps according to WWS here (died at 25% though on due to paladin tank dieing, but anyways was over several minutes)

Few screenshots:

http://img183.imageshack.us/my.php?image=morogrimtidewalker07081vb3.jpg

http://img165.imageshack.us/my.php?image=morogrimtidewalker07081tr2.jpg

Lady Vashj:

Phase 1 is very straight forward, even if pet was rooted near person doing static charge, pet didn't suffer that much.

Phase 2 I kept my pet on Nagas, but they do cleave very nasty, so had to do quite a lot of moving around and making pet follow to place it perfect.

Phases 3 is very similar to phase 1, we had very few poison pools there and pet didn't have much troubles there.

Shadow priest will do healing required here.

Few screenshots from last two clears:

http://img186.imageshack.us/my.php?image=ladyvashj070815yb6.jpg

http://img300.imageshack.us/my.php?image=ladyvashj070816vj5.jpg

Conclusions:

[*]So far I been playing, it's hardest build to play, since some fights require very precise pet control to pull it through, but also very rewarding for me for the same reason. I feel affliction and destruction bit boring because they are so easy to master.
[*]On fights that are not melee friendly, demonology loses to other builds. In melee friendly fights, this build rocks.
[*]Dependant on Shadow Priest, but so are many other builds in longer fights. When 2.2 patch comes, new tier-5 set bonus will surely help a lot and you don't always have to beg for shadow priest, but both combined, might make some of those nasty AoE fights possible to do.
[*]Remember keep cleave off when you have polymorphed targets, broke some polys when training for first time, a lot less now.
[*]Keep pet on passive, always.
[*]Damage overall is similar as other builds, ranging from bit lower on anti-melee fights and doing better on fights where pet don't get one shotted.
[*]On trash damage was devastating (I guess cause Thooghun the idiot don't miss and glance that much).
[*]Pet damage was around 250-300 dps on bosses that favored this build. My lack of shadow and flame / ruin was easily compensated by passive damage I get from my int / sta and my pets int / sta through Demonic Knowledge.
[*]Each time my pet died, it was because of elemental damage. So have to hope that void star talisman will drop one day, since it's crucial for this build. Some fights like naj'entus are impossible without that.
[*]Pet has around 8,2k hp and same about in armor, it can take 9,64k hit. Pet takes 15% less damage with Demonic Resilience, which means damage on pet gets migitated by 15% (and armor as well if it's physical damage). So formula to count single hit pet can take: pet hp / 0,85 (for physical count armor as well).
[*]You need more high stamina items (trash ring from BT, tier parts) to get my pet more stamina (and stats give me more damage as well) for my pet to be able to take up to 10k AoE attack, if I wish to keep playing with this. Passive 15% reduction to damage helps a lot and allows shadow priest to heal more.
[*]If pet didn't get one shotted, shadow priests healed it up very fast with VE.
[*]Some specialties like being able to stun when necessary is nice bonus and pet can be targeted by some nasty abilities that could kill a raid member, but on the other hand I have to be ready to dismiss pet sometimes, like Solarians Wrath.
[*]From first kills there's was long way to improve, like you can see from other screenshots.
[*]Three things: Stamina gear, Shadow Priest and Void star talisman (tier-5 will be added here next patch).

Hyjal Summit:

All these bosses and screenshots I was doing Curse of Recklessness on targets that had melee users on them, if no melee users were on the target I did Curse of Agony or Curse of Doom.

Waves:

Trash waves damage was good, better than other warlocks by far I guess cause Seed of Corruption gets more damage from high base damage.

Auto cleave:

[*]Pet gaining agro if you use it very early and die, good example is packs with lots of ghouls
[*]Chance of breaking shackled abomination / polymorphed necromancer.

Generally I clicked auto cleave on when there was no mobs nearby in start (way we kill necromancers for example). After we were given good to go on AoE, when tanks had enough threat on all targets, you can leave cleave on till next pack comes. Doing it earlier is dancing on the edge especially if you happen to cleave shackled abomination.

Picture of Kaz'Rogal trash, mobs here seem to take closer to normal Seed of Corruption damage, also includes tanking frost wyrm with CoD during that time, other time I was on CoR on melee mobs / CoA on gargoyles.

http://img59.imageshack.us/my.php?image=rogaltrash070704pz9.jpg

Rage Winterchill:

First time we killed Rage Winterchill, I didn't have shadow priest and it affected my performance a lot. First kill I was also very uncomfortable using re-summon macro, which ended up felguard dieing few times. This sucks especially on part where your pet loses all raid buffs.

Dodging Death and Decay is not that hard. You just have to see where the line ends, additionally since rage don't seem to target pets with his ice prison, you can send your pet in and take few last ticks of death and decay. I had sometimes troubles with getting felguard back from death and decay, but now with shadow priest it feels so much easier. If you can make distinction where death and decay ends and starts, naturally put pet on follow and park him after the line to be able to resume dps as soon as possible.

Later when we went there I could sustain higher dps with shadowpriest, around 1400-1450 or so, but had nothing to say to our top rogue, who was closer to 1600. But then again we give more bloodlusts for melee than casters, which affects a lot.

One of those fights where Void star would help, but is not necassery.

First kill with felguard:

http://img64.imageshack.us/my.php?image=ragewinterchill070704kf9.jpg

Better results:

http://img467.imageshack.us/my.php?image=ragewinterchill070719nw6.jpg

Anetheron:

Anetheron was really easy fight to play as demonology. On first kill though I managed to die. I'll posted shot on the moment when I died. I know it's bit cheesy to post a screenshot just when I died, since staying alive is part of the fight, but since I'm writing about raiding with felguard, I think it's still relevant to see what the build is capable of if the owner plays better. Infernals were not any danger to felguard cause our tanks tanked them away from the raid.

Also this fight I had shadow priest so I didn't have to pay any attention to my pet, could just focus pressing stopcasting macros :)

Pet won't pull infernals with cleave, if your tanks know what they are doing.

Recount during my death:

http://img62.imageshack.us/my.php?image=anetheron0707041ai7.jpg

Better results:

http://img526.imageshack.us/my.php?image=anetheron070729fk0.jpg

Kaz'Rogal:

Pet don't get affected by mark of Kaz'Rogal. I had Medallion of Karabor on there to resist some mana drains.

Damage there was very nice, fight was very straight forward, just send demon behind the boss and after you don't need to pay attention to it. Towards the ends this fight favors melee by a lot though (vs mana users). Kaz'Rogal does cleaves, so keep pet behind the boss.

First kill with felguard:

http://img54.imageshack.us/my.php?image=rogal070704xj3.jpg

Random shot:

http://img526.imageshack.us/my.php?image=kazrogal070712da1.jpg

Azgalor:

This fight is one of the fights that I would say are extremely hard without void star talisman and even with that would be really hard. This fights nature is really I guess unfriendly to everyone. Rain of fires hurt a lot and one fire almost kills the pet. This leads you re-summoning pet in fear of losing buffs, which leads less time to dps and you also get those lovely silences to interrupt your casting when you're about to re-summon pet. Frankly as demonology I hate this fight. I managed to do highest damage from warlocks last time we were there, but I have to say, this fight is very very hard for demonologist warlock.

That's why I usually here offer myself for imp duty to minimize casualties for the raid, since just feels playing here without void star feels like holding back the raid.

Also there's possibility of pet being target of AoE effect and getting rain of fire on tanks / melee / Thrall (if you use thrall on boss). I don't know if rain of fire or any other sort of AoE effects like that can target pets, and would appreciate if some one could enlighten me, especially cases like: Winterchills Death and Decay and Azgalors Rain of Fire.

Definitely needs void star and shadow priest. Azgalor also cleaves so keep the pet behind the boss.

One bonus of having felguard there is it will keep damaging during silences, but so will affliction :)

Trying with felguard (I know pretty sad numbers):

http://img526.imageshack.us/my.php?image=azgalor070801am1.jpg

Archimonde:

Old (slow) Doomfires were very nasty from pet point of view. I tried felguard there, but I would say this fight again needs void star and sp minumum to make it work. Haven't tried with new one, but I guess they are a lot harder, making this another fight very hard / impossible for felguard owners.

One of those fights you can ask if anyone needs an imp and still do ok, but you could also be doing lot better with 41-0-20 (or similar) or 0-40-21 builds in those fights.

Now some experiences from Archimonde with felguard:

First of all before each doomfire it's safe to move pet bit closer to yourself and set it on stay.

Pet disappears when you leave it on Archimonde and get flown away by airburst. If this happens you should use dismiss macro to retrain buffs on pet or set pet on follow when you get blown away, might work.

Pet can be targeted by Grip of the Legion and rarely gets decursed, also grip of the legion seems to stick over dismiss macro, which is a major issue. Unless you will agree with some mage / druid to take care of pet decursing, will be an major issue.

If this would be major problem for first 90% of the fight, you could use imp until then and during 10% instantly summon felguard (before shield is given) and use it to do higher damage on 10% -> 0% burnphase, but since last 10% is sure kill, it's really first 90% that matters.

But question raises if pet gets Shield of Elune, if not it's surely dead when hit by finger of death.

The Black Temple:

All these bosses and screenshots I was doing Curse of Recklessness on targets that had melee users on them, if no melee users were on the target I did Curse of Agony or Curse of Doom.

High Warlord Naj'entus:

I was playing here with an imp to give raid as high stamina as possible for obvious reasons. I tried soul linking an imp, which wasn't that smart. Shield explosion hit so hard imp died fairy fast.

Not even SP + tier-5 2/4 bonus kept imp up. I resummoned imp three times. I was still highest warlock in damage, mainly I guess because other warlocks had to keep imp up as well (as destruction isn't the best for dps).

This fight, by far, seems hardest fight for demonology build. It surely needs good SP who will constantly heal with VE, void star and possibly (downgrading) to tier-5 2/4 bonus to be done with felguard. Plus very high amount of stamina as well. Even with 2.2 patch tier-5 set bonus and if you could keep felguard up here, I think warlocks should use imp for blood pact here, since bigger HP members have, more time healers have to react and less unlucky deaths you get.

No screenshot, melee was dominating in damage. Best build for this boss would be affliction surely.

Screeshot with IMP, just to show how build works, haven't dared to test felguard yet:

http://img501.imageshack.us/my.php?image=highwarlordnajentus0707xy9.jpg

Supremus:

Fight was much easier with felguard what I first expected. Volcanos do nasty damage, but other than that, it's pretty easy to keep felguard up here as long as you keep it on relatively tight leash. I left my felguard on Supremus when he's loose, which lead to my pet dieing. I think when Supremus changes targets, he might briefly attack closest attacker highest in threat (aka pets/melee and only my pet was there).

I got one bloodlust in this fight, which gives a major damage boost for felguard warlock.

Good fight for Demonology warlock, not so boring as you need to do some pet control.

First kill with felguard:

http://img223.imageshack.us/my.php?image=supremus070708qw5.jpg

Shade of Akama:

Another easy fight. I was on duty to kill spawning adds on left side, so it's bit hard to compare here. Pet can intercept which is nice thing for this fight. At some point our raid leader told me to go nuke channelers, so can't really say this is fair comparison to some people with different roles.

Very high base damage + Seed of Corruption works like dream here if you have loads of channelers up and felguard cleaves channelers for very high damage.

In my opinion this fight is very good fight for demonology warlock, no matter what ever task you're assigned on. However depending on your role in this fight it is very hard to compared damage to another guilds WWS / screenshots. I'm sure I would reach ridiculous numbers if I was left on channelers for whole duration as an example and got bloodlusts.

Killing channelers most of the time:

http://img174.imageshack.us/my.php?image=shadeofakama070715nj1.jpg

Teron Gorefiend:

I previously had many try screenshots, cause I never took screenshot of a kill with felguard, so I post one typical damage spread screenshot here.

Fight itself is very straight forward and you can send your pet attacking Teron right from start. Pet does enormous damage on Teron, critting up to 1,3k. But again this isn't best fight to compared damage, since some people get to be ghosts etc. That's why I posted four screenshots from tries where we did fairly well, except of course missing the actual kill.

Also melee groups got all bloodlusts here, which needs to be taken into account when evaluating damage.

Best build you can have by far for this fight.

Teron try:

http://img178.imageshack.us/my.php?image=terongorefiendwipe07070zq9.jpg

Gurtogg Bloodboil:

Felguard managed to keep alive with VE very well here, but it was low hp from time to time. If you get fel rage, then it's bye bye felguard and might as well click re-summon macro right that moment to dispel pet and after fel rage, re-summon it.

Gurtogg cleaves, so leave your pet behind the boss on attack and make sure when boss moves, you don't leave it front of the boss. Other than these, I don't think there's anything special to this boss.

Only have screenshots as affliction when killed, so posting those will serve no purpose. Next time we go there (will be a while) I will go as demonologist if possible.

Reliquary of Souls:

Essence of Despair: Demonology works great here, since you have 20% damage absorbtion, which makes you a viable tank for phase 1. Also warlocks greatest strength is Life Tap, that is very unusable in first phase. Felguard will keep dpssing the boss as long as it's alive for free.

Essence of Desire: As far as we got it worked great, but I can't say we did got too far. We were only learning the boss and lot of things might be different when I would get to kill it one day.

Best try with felguard:

http://img338.imageshack.us/my.php?image=wowscrnshot071007214857ze8.jpg

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Also I lack void star talisman which makes some bosses unplayable with felguard, but then again some bosses like naj'entus I always have to keep imp for raid most likely.

Here's summary of demonology raiding per boss (some being estimates):

Serpenshrine Cavern:

[*]Hydross the Unstable, demonology works great.
[*]Lurker from Below, demonology works great.
[*]Tidewalker, demonology, demonology works great.
[*]Karathress, demonology, demonology works great.
[*]Leotheras, demonology would be great build. Needs precision with whirlwind though.
[*]Lady Vashj, demonology would be great build here.

The Eye:

[*]Al'Ar, demonology works great, hard to play very well though.
[*]Void Reaver, demonology works great.
[*]High Astromancer Solarian, demonology works great.
[*]Kael'thas Sunstrider, demonology works great.

Moun Hyjal:

[*]Rage Winterchill, demonology works great.
[*]Anetheron, demonology works great.
[*]Kaz'Rogal, demonology works great.
[*]Azgalor, demonology damage compares to other warlock build damage, needs good pet control (void star talisman is must for this fight).
[*]Archimonde, demonology damage compares to other warlock build damage, this fight I would classify as very hard, but doable with SP (void star talisman is must for this fight).

Black Temple:

[*]High Warlord Naj'entus, demonology is totally unplayable here from my experience.
[*]Supremus, demonology works great.
[*]Shade of Akama, demonology works great.
[*]Teron Gorefiend, demonology works great.
[*]Gurtogg Bloodboil, demology works ok.
[*]Reliquary of Souls, demonology works great as far as we went.

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On average it seems demonology damage is higher than other warlock build damage. There's some fights where you can offer being imp warlock and still have decent damage with buffed imp. Void Star Talisman your pet to stay alive in all elemental fights that you have problems. Shadow Priest is must to keep pet up. For resistance fights, pet gains portion of your resistances, so those are totally doable with high resistances.

At the time of testing, Thooghun the idiot had 8320 HP fully raid buffed, which seemed to be enough for most cases, wouldn't mind some tier 6 parts though. Pet does very high damage and peaks up to 3-3,5k AP when all +damage stuff procs.

I have changed my raiding build to be felguard build for good as long as it is as good as other warlock raiding builds.

I hope you liked reading this. Feel free to give feedback or requests.

Thanks a lot for this very interesting thread. It's good to hear that even in high-end raids demonology can be viable.

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Q u o t e:

Because this would allow chain heals and shadow priest to heal the pet. There's also problem with self healing, which is blood funnel, but changing that to dot, would have too much impact on PvP. Still this should also be reviewed and given thought if it could be made working somehow. Problem with luck based AoE damage migitation comes when some boss like high warlord naj'entus hits you for massive AoE effect. Problem especially with felguard is when you use Soul Link, it gives pet 105% damage from AoE, even if you count demonic resilience.

One example would be reducing cast time to 4 seconds which would apply healing over time after being succesfully casted for whole duration. This would make it also not so powerful in PvP.

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I'd like to discuss this point a little bit further. I also think that blood funnel is a great problem.

The reduced cast time would definitely be an improvement.
(Although I would love to have an instant hot/dot instead. Would it really be 'overpowered' in pvp?)

But imho much more of a problem is the range of blood funnel. 20 meters is too short to be really useful in raids.

Since drain life was changed to 30 meters, it's only logical to change also blood funnel to keep it in line with the other spells.

Posting in a legendary thread, a very interesting read :)

I liked this thread alot. Lovely to see ppl raid with specs which generaly is considered to be "Less effective". Cool to see you do it with success.

Also, this thread summarize some of the things you will have to rely on, like how importan shadow priests are, the two piece setbonus from T5 and Voidstart Talisman.

Hope you make a guide about Felguard raiding, once you become better at handling your Felguard in raids.

There's very of us felguard raiders and I bet even less who raid without void star talisman :p (like me).

The fact remains that each warlock build has it's strengths and weaknesses. Affliction for example which I respecced for last nights Gurtogg Bloodboil is by far superior to any build, since even if destruction or demonology might be higher damage, the fight is not dps check, it's healing check and being able to sustain your own HP at full even with two dots on matters more than some hundreds of more dps you can put out.

But then again that's why we have respec costs so that we wouldn't be changing builds to each encounter that makes the encounter harder and I think part of the fun becomes when you can shine on some fights and on some fights you have to compensate for your builds weaknesses.

Reliquary of souls would seem to be good example of warlock builds and their order how they work at different essences.

Personally I loved felguard raiding a lot cause it was more challenging and pet control isn't easy, I'm just bit frustrated of some fights which won't allow me to play with felguard due to nature of the fight, like Gruul used to be, which was later fixed to be pet friendly.

Every warlock can raid and do good dps, even top dps on many fights, in what ever build as long as they master it well and have gear to support it and same level of gear to other people they compare they damage to.

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Q u o t e:

Every warlock can raid and do good dps, even top dps on many fights, in what ever build as long as they master it well and have gear to support it and same level of gear to other people they compare they damage to.

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It would be a shame to let such a good thread die.

A question to your raid setup: How many warlocks do you take with you on 25-raids?

Thank you very much for this interesting read. Very well written and excellent examples. I actually learned a thing or two, I was already interested in Felguard raiding (and actually already tried it a few times myself) but I'll give it another try for sure.

I can't explain it, but somehow the build keeps attracting me. I won't deny that the warlock itself has to do less (2-button spec lol), but keeping your pet under control does take quite some practice. All in all a very fun build to play with.

Nice work, would love this as a sticky.

I'm currently testing/raiding with the felguard as well, and i really like since it's so different from the 2 other trees. Takes some time to adapt to each boss and trashmob, know where to be careful for aoe attacks or cleave around CC-ed targets, but once you get the hang of it, it becomes a very powerful spec.

Downsides are that you'll be frowned upon when you first summon your mighty Lolguard in a raid ("Wtf, why are you pvp specced?!) and that it requires more cooperation from your raid as well.
- 2/5 Tier 5 is a must (hope they fix it so hots work as well)
- Void Star Talisman is a must
- Shadowpriest is a must ("Wtf, you're a lock, you dont need manaregen!")
- Gotta scream bloody murder to get some buffs for the pet.
- Very, very rarely a healer will specifically throw a heal on your pet. The bulk of the healing must come from setbonus and vampiric embrace.


Some changes i'd like to see :

- HoTs working with the T5 setbonus (i assume it's coming some time in the future)
- Felguard needs a bit more HP. Fully buffed he's around 8300 HP, which is not enough for certain fights/attacks. Contribution from stamina gear should be higher, so that fully buffed it can reach about 10k hp, which is a bare minimum for players on certain fights (and thus also for pets).
- Health Funnel should be changed to apply more healing in a shorter amount of time. Or changed to HoT, so you dont lose too much dps time from channeling. To preserve PVP balance a cooldown could be applied on Health Funnel to compensate for the improved healing (lets say, 30 sec or so).
- Some sort of pet "class" for buffing purposes. Mainly to make blessings easier. Right now each pet has to be blessed individually, making pallies /grmbl. Would be much easier to treat all pets as their own "class", to make 15min blessings easier

Nyarlya, this thread is some quality read mate.

Can't say the time since I've read such an informative topic. Thought me a lot about felguard raiding.

I vote for a sticky!

Another two more dead Solarians, but no Void Star Talisman, Blizzard make it as a reputation reward, would gladly choose that over Corruption trinket from Ashtongue.

As if that would happen :p

A very good read. I went to gruul as FG last night and it worked out great (at least on Maulgar). Think I won't bother respeccing for pve / arena for a while now.

How do you use the FG on gruul himself? I sent him in and he died pretty quick. Ended up parking a succubus next to the wall to get 10% damage increase + Demonic Knowledge, and that worked without a problem.

Heya! Very informative topic =) I've been thinking of testing out a FG spec myself for raids, I'm reluctant to try it before I get my hands on 2/5 t5 and a void star talisman though.

Currently affliction, and can't help but to love the self-sustainability of this spec. However I've been speced affliction for a long time at 60 and all the way leveling to 70 with it, so I kind of need a change :)

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Q u o t e:
Heya! Very informative topic =) I've been thinking of testing out a FG spec myself for raids, I'm reluctant to try it before I get my hands on 2/5 t5 and a void star talisman though.

Currently affliction, and can't help but to love the self-sustainability of this spec. However I've been speced affliction for a long time at 60 and all the way leveling to 70 with it, so I kind of need a change :)

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Shadow Priest will be enough to keep the pet alive in most fights.

Problem with Tier 5, 2/4 bonus is that you get your pet overhealed and when pet needs heals, you might not need heals.

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Q u o t e:
A very good read. I went to gruul as FG last night and it worked out great (at least on Maulgar). Think I won't bother respeccing for pve / arena for a while now.

How do you use the FG on gruul himself? I sent him in and he died pretty quick. Ended up parking a succubus next to the wall to get 10% damage increase + Demonic Knowledge, and that worked without a problem.

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I sent pet always in, you just have to pay attention to Cave In ability, that will kill your pet, nothing else, unless you take massive damage, have no shadow priest and no tier 5; 2/4 bonus.

Tier 5 bonus works for some fights nicely and I'm sure few big AoE hit fights I might even change from tier 6-> tier 5 to make sure pet gets healed as well.

Big problem with tier 5 bonus is that it's bugged at the moment, it only heals from direct heals and not from hots or drain life, which is very common form of raid healing.

You can also use pet dismiss macro if your pet is about to die and summon him again to keep his buffs (I haven't used to make the best of this yet though, so usually me pet dies before I get to click this):

/script PetDismiss()

It works "so so" as in you have to be very aware with that, since when pet usually dies, it happens very fast. Also some stuff like Grip of the Legion will last over petdismiss so it's no use in some fights. But it's of course better than nothing. :)

Also had nice idea that could work, talent tree tied reputatio?

You could make void star talisman reward for getting exalted with say, Stygian Demonologists or whatever make up some name. This is how it would work:

You get 1 rep per each mob you kill and say, bit more killing any 5 man normal / heroic boss. Some decent rep for killing raid bosses. This rep would be given to one of the three talent-tied-reputations (makingup some cheesy names):

Stygian Demonologists (demonology):
Burning Wish (destruction):
Dark Grip (affliction):

Now when you have most talents in one build, you will get rep to that reputation tree. So basically whatever you kill you get reputation to one faction that is tied to your talents. This would make going to instances, etc once more interesting and also this would allow correct some basic mistakes that are making some builds very hard to raid with. These trinkets would be very closely tied to talent trees, maybe giving stuff like: Increase coefficiency from shadow and flame, felguard will recieve <something>, Unstable affliction procs can trigger 100 spelldamage for 10 secs, Tieing stuff to 40/41 talents also would limit use to one trinket only, even if some one grinds them all.

Great idea, eh?