Which curse gives optimal damage for affliction?(raiding)Follow

Would that be CoA with all the talent boosts, or CoS with all the talent boosts? (This is assuming you're the only shadow caster in the raid) , thanks.

Also, (sorry I'm new to the ways of the lock) could someone explain the shadow embrace effect? Does it reduce the damage dealt by the mob its up on?

Good post - it's a topic worth discussing for sure - and I've not seen it discussed in depth before in these forums.

From a personal point of view - I'm not sure which is theoretically more dps - CoA or CoS - it's not a trivial calculation because CoS does more than just increase dmg by 10% - it cuts through 75% of the mobs resistance too.

From a raod perspective - mike is right to say - throw up the curse which helps the raid. We have a lock channel in our raids to co-ordinate just that.

We have also been using Curse of Weakness at times - and it does make a difference, particularly on hateful strikes.

One of the dilemmas in the Affliction Tree is that it increases your affliction spell damage greatly - but if you take malediction - you're likely to be the warlock on CoS/CoE duty - hence missing out on a large chunk of the very dps for which you've specced for.

Like mikelolol said, I use whatever Curse benefits the Raid the most. Sometimes its CoE, sometimes CoW, othertimes I've even used CoT because that little bit of additional casting time can quite literally mean death for a mage. Every Curse a Warlock, Affliction Specc'd or not, learns has its proper place in the world of PvP.

The only way CoS is going to provide more damage for a single caster is if less than 9% of your damage comes from Curse of Agony (or in the case of Malediction, less than 12%). Since CoS accounts for more damage than anything but Shadow Bolt, I would find this extremely hard to believe.



Weakness is worth it to let your Warrior keep up a different shout. Tounges is just one of those niche spells.




I'm printing a retraction. The two are just too close to call.


Edited, Jul 28th 2007 2:31am by Loki

Curator... god I love curator.

Wait 40 seconds. Trinket. Amplify Curse. Curse of Doom. Your only goal now is to apply as many shadow debuffs as possible just before CoD pops. Shadow Vulnerability, make the SP put up shadow weaving and misery, whatever else you can get into it because OMGWTFBBQ is that a pretty hit. My top is just short of 29k. That's with Curse of Shadows, a Shadow Priest, and Shadow Vulnerability all on. Probably the most glorious thing ever. Ever.

A 45k hit is insane, unbelievable, actually. That means it was 22.5k before Curator's evocate bonus.

22.5k? God... 13% for CoS, 10% for Shadow Weaving, 5% for misery, 10% for Shadow Mastery, 15% for a sacced Succubus, 20% for Shadow Vulnerability.

68% bonus to the damage.

That means the spell itself was going to do 13393 damage. 4200 for base. The damage coefficient is x2, and the whole thing will get another 50% bonus. If his shadow power at the time of casting was 2400, that makes the spell worth 9000 before amp curse,for a total of 13500.

Wrath of Air = 101
Spellstike Bonus = 92
Eye of Magtheridon = 170
Icon of the Silver Crescent = 155
Divine Spirit = 10
Voidheart Bonus = 135
Flask of Supreme Power = 75
Highest shadow power of any lock according to WoWmetrics = 1319

Total it all up = 2057

Even if you ran over to Botanica real fast, MC'd the mob and got the 250 spell power debuff you would still fall short of being able to put up a 45k CoD. Please explain to me how the hell someone gets over 45k damage.


(I am fully aware that Amp Curse's 50% bonus should be applied with the rest of the multipliers, but for the sake of even making 45k look possible I through it in where I did. If the amp curse mod was applied as the other multipliers are the target spell power for a 45k CoD would be 3061. So... how did he pull this off again?)

He could've been lying.. this is our photoshop wiz, after all..

And I've heard from several people (including the raid leader.. >.<) that the damage bonus is an additional 200%. In normal english, three times damage. Boss strats can never seem to aggree on this either.. some say 350%, some say doubled.. 250%.. lmao. I know my own guild can't agree on what it is..

I'm pretty sure my amplified CoD has crit multiple times. I was actually using it a lot the other day and I too believed it couldn't crit. I was normally hitting 4500 dmg as I expected, but on a few occasions, it hit 6000 dmg. Again, more than once I hit for over 6k. Next time it happens, I'll make sure to check the combat log to see if it actually states a crit.


Sorry, you're right. I'm wrong. I was getting approx 4500 dmg when I didn't amplify it, 6000 when I did.




Edited, Jul 27th 2007 2:03pm by Betraal

Yeah. Also, it's worthwhile bribing your rogues to lay down an Improved Kidneyshot for that CoD hit.. another 9%. Just another 4k damage if you're hitting for 45k.. not a biggie.

Also.. trinket/spellstrike proc + Power Infusion from a disc priest will make you grin (just a little though..)

Edited, Jul 27th 2007 12:41pm by Banatu

There is no other shout. Demoralizing Shout doesn't prevent Warriors from using... well, anything. The only exclusive ones are that each Warrior can only keep up either Battle or Commanding Shout, but not both.

Apologies if this is a double - my post does not seem to appear :


The reason CoD is more effective than CoA in a boss fight is not primarily because of the Amplification effect (although that is significant), it's because CoA has a greater opportunity cost.

Again and again - I see warlocks comparing dps of dots, and forming a strict conclusion from that alone. The correct technique in comparing all spells (including direct ones such as shadowbolt), is to look at the damage delivered against the opportunity cost of the cast time.

This of course pre-supposes all DoTs considered do actually last their full duration. That goes with out saying - but I mention this just because someone always comes along to try to make this point.

Yes I did. Why so many locks still think that you compare spells with straight dps I don't know.

ok :D

in the forums I visit it's pretty much done and dusted.