Next week patch 5.0.4 will be hitting the live servers and a lot of changes are going to be happening. Not only to Warlocks, but everyone – so it’s time to get ready! Please note that the tooltips may not be entirely correct since things are still changing somewhat.

General Changes

These are some of the changes happening to the game in general:

• The Theramore Scenario, a lead-in to the Mists of Pandaria story. (Won’t be active straight away.)
• Account-wide achievements, pets and mounts.
• AoE looting!
• Prime glyphs are gone and we only have Major and Minor glyphs, both of which have had big changes.
• We get the new talents, abilities and skills for all classes.
• BattleTags are finally in WoW!
• Head Enchants will be removed.
• Ranged weapons no longer have a minimum range.
• Relics, wands, thrown and ranged weapons are gone or changed to take up a main weapon slot.
• Spell Penetration is gone, and instead we will see PvP Power on items.
• The current Arena season will end.
• You can no longer obtain Valor or Conquest points, everything will award Justice/Honor points.
• Items previously bought with Valor/Conquest can now be bought with Justice/Honor.
• Your current Valor points will be converted to Justice points, and current Conquest points will be converted to Honor points.

Warlock Specialisations

As Warlocks a lot is changing for us in the patch, since Blizzard has done quite some work on the class. First of all, each spec now has its own resource system. Affliction will keep using Soul Shards, while Demonology uses Demonic Fury and Destruction will have Burning Embers.

Once we choose our spec, the actual talent tree will be the same for all, and you can choose whichever talents you feel suit you since most are situational or might just simply suit your personal playstyle better. The only talents that actually increase dps are the level 90 ones, which we obviously can’t access yet. However, the tier 5 ones (Grimoires) have ones that are generally considered better per spec. This might still change of course, since the beta is still open.

According to Elitist Jerks, the grimoires we should use would be:
Destruction – Supremacy or Sacrifice (at 85 Sacrifice may be a tiny bit better, but the difference is rather small.)
Demonology – Service
Affliction – Sacrifice

Our new talent tree.

Spells & Abilities

There have been quite a few changes to our spells, and I’ll try to go through them all. The first thing to remember is probably that spells are now split in two categories; Core and Spec. Core abilities are ones that you have regardless of which specialisation you choose, while Spec ones are only available in their respective specialisation. In an effort to avoid this post being huge, I will only list the abilities that are new or changed for the Core ones. However, I will list everything for each Spec so that you know which spells belong where.

Core Abilities

• Create Soulwell (Changed. You can now do this alone! Yay!)
• Curse of Enfeeblement (New. Basically Curse of Tongues and Curse of Weakness combined.)
• Command Demon (New.)
• Dark Intent (Changed. Now a raid-wide buff.)
• Twilight Ward (New. Replaces Shadow Ward.)
• Unending Resolve (New.)
• Nethermancy (New. Passive.)

Destruction

• Chaos Bolt (Tooltip currently wrong, it costs 1 burning ember, not 10!)
• Conflagrate
• Dark Soul: Instability (New.)
• Ember Tap (New.)
• Fire and Brimstone (New.)
• Flames of Xoroth (New.)
• Havoc (New, changed from Bane of Havoc.)
• Immolate
• Incinerate
• Rain of Fire (No longer channeled.)
• Shadowburn
• Aftermath (New. Passive.)
• Backdraft (Passive.)
• Backlash (Passive.)
• Burning Embers (New. Passive.)
• Chaotic Energy (New. Passive.)
• Mastery: Emberstorm (Passive.)

Demonology

• Carrion Swarm (New. Metamorphosis.)
• Corruption
• Dark Soul: Knowledge (New.)
• Demonic Leap (Activates Metamorphosis.)
• Hand of Gul’Dan
• Hellfire
• Metamorphosis
• Shadow Bolt
• Soul Fire
• Decimation (Passive.)
• Demonic Fury (Passive.)
• Demonic Rebirth (Passive.)
• Mastery: Master Demonologist (Passive.)
• Metamorphosis: Chaos Wave (New. Replaces Hand of Gul’dan while in Meta.)
• Metamorphosis: Cursed Auras (New. Replaces Curse of Enfeeblement and Elements while in Meta.)
• Metamorphosis: Doom (New. Replaces Corruption while in Meta.)
• Metamorphosis: Immolation Aura (New. Replaces Hellfire while in Meta.)
• Metamorphosis: Touch of Chaos (New. Replaces Shadowbolt while in Meta.)
• Metamorphosis: Void Ray (New. Replaces Fel Flame while in Meta.)
• Molten Core (Passive.)
• Nether Plating (New. Passive.)
• Wild Imps (New. Passive.)

Affliction

• Agony
• Corruption
• Curse of Exhaustion
• Dark Soul: Misery (New.)
• Drain Soul
• Haunt
• Malefic Grasp
• Rain of Fire (No longer channeled.)
• Seed of Corruption
• Soul Swap
• Soulburn
• Unstable Affliction
• Improved Fear (New. Passive.)
• Mastery: Potent Affliction (Passive.)
• Nightfall (Passive.)
• Soulburn: Curse (New. Passive.)
• Soulburn: Health Funnel (New. Passive.)
• Soulburn: Seed of Corruption (New. Passive.)

Glyphs

As mentioned earlier Prime Glyphs are gone and we’re left with only Major and Minor glyphs. Few glyphs provide an actual dps increase, and instead may be useful in certain situations or are just there for fun/visual changes. Below is a list of glyphs that will be available to us as of the patch.

Major Glyphs

• Burning Embers
• Conflagrate
• Curse of Exhaustion
• Dark Soul
• Demon Hunting
• Demon Training
• Demonic Circle
• Everlasting Affliction
• Fear
• Healthstone
• Imp Swarm
• Life Tap
• Shadowflame
• Siphon Life
• Soul Consumption
• Soul Shards
• Soul Swap
• Soulstone
• Unstable Affliction

Minor Glyphs

• Carrion Swarm
• Crimson Banish
• Enslave Demon
• Eye of Kilrogg
• Falling Meteor
• Felguard
• Hand of Gul’Dan
• Health Funnel
• Nightmares
• Shadow Bolt
• Soulwell
• Subtlety
• Unending Breath
• Verdant Spheres

Suggested glyphs per spec:
Destruction - Burning Embers, Conflagrate
Demonology – Imp Swarm, Shadow Bolt
Affliction –  Soul Shards, Soul Swap

These are the major changes happening to Warlocks next week. Let me know if you have any questions, and I’ll try to answer them as well as I can.

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