State of vanilla warlocks? [High end perspective]

[Ghingis]

Heyo,

I recently started out on Nostalrius, and after seeing different videos (as well as my memories from the game) I decided to roll a mage since they seem to be the strongest class. However I have played a warlock from TBC up to MoP and after playing mage some I really feel like I want to play a warlock.

It is very important for me that I play a class that can compete on close to the highest level if played flawlessly, is this the case with warlocks or will they always be sub-par in PvE? Is there any class in vanilla that warlocks have no chance against in a straight up 1v1 situation? (As an example mages vs warrior / mages vs warlocks, extreme counters regardless of how well the matchups are played)

I will be playing both PvE and PvP, aiming to join Dreamstate eventually for server first clears and if time allows I would also like to get HW. Have personally been hardcore raiding on every expansion of WoW apart from WoD, as well as several rank1s in arenas, so I am very comfortable with the class.

Thanks in advance for any help/insights!

/Ghingis

[Cousy]

While biased, I'd say Warlocks have the potential to be one of the best classes in Vanilla. Until ZG hits, we cannot reach our full potential in raids but ZG should be out soon and it will impact how the top 100 DPS look in raids. (You can see the current top 100 in MC here: http://realmplayers.com/RaidStats/Ranki ... &realm=NRB)

The reason why ZG is necessary is because 1) Increased Debuff limit to 16 allows space for Shadow Priests and specifically shadow weaving, increasing our DPS by 15%. 2) Bloodvine set which gives us a lot of much needed hit and is best-in-slot until Naxx.

With these, casters just in general do better. Warlocks' top potential should be higher than mages on most fights pre-fire and is usually better than the non-ignite mages too come AQ.

As far as PvP goes, rogues are the rock to your scissors. Especially if you're alliance, UD rogues and Warrior have an big advantage over you. Horde warlocks can use succubus much more reliably and win those 1v1s. Warlocks are one of the best PvP classes in general with their utility and CC.

Hopefully that helps.

[varth]

I'll echo that warlocks become tip top dps after ZG hits, definitely super viable in endgame

[Setup]

By the end of AQ, warlock is the best ranged DPS class in PVE.

Ideally, you want ~8 warlocks in your naxx raid.

[Ghingis]

Thank you for the replies!

Just a question; Most naxx raids that I have seen it seems like mages are still pretty much destroying warlocks, is this because of player skill or lack of items possibly? Or is that just the way it is?

[Breesy]

Did you play on daggerspine-eu on tbc and later on in stormscale? I vaguely remember the name.

And if you truly want to play with the strongest players on the server I'd reconsider your chosen faction.

[Ghingis]

Did you play on daggerspine-eu on tbc and later on in stormscale? I vaguely remember the name.

And if you truly want to play with the strongest players on the server I'd reconsider your chosen faction.

Yea thats correct, was me

In terms of faction I thought horde was generally stronger on the PvP server? Also seems to me like Dreamstate is the strongest guild, but I might be wrong?

[Rylox]

Thank you for the replies!

Just a question; Most naxx raids that I have seen it seems like mages are still pretty much destroying warlocks, is this because of player skill or lack of items possibly? Or is that just the way it is?

If you average the DPS of the mages it will be even with the warlocks.
You may see some way overshot mages due to them getting a lot of initial ignites (first mage to crit gets all the damage) compounded with having blessing of salvation to further abuse it.