Demonology, correct use of procs? (43 replies to this topic)

Apologies in advance if this seems like a bit of a hand-holding question.

I've played affliction/destro since I rerolled warlock for ulduar patch, I never liked the feel of demo.
With 5.2 coming demo appears to be winning the dps race of the 3 specs and to attempt to cut a long stort I ask:

When do you cast metamorphisis?
Is it more opportune to wait for intellect procs and potentially waste excess demonic fury?
The same question applies to dark soul (for demo) and dark soul in conjunction with metamorphisis.

As affliction if my procs are incoming i'll hold back a dark soul: Misery, especially if i'm 2/3 shards to try and get more benefit from the cooldown, is this an optimal strategy to adopt when playing demo?

TL;DR: Never played Demo, HOW DO COOLDOWNS?

With new trinkets coming, things will be very random on procs.  Right now, you can almost predict when procs will come allowing you to stack CDs for Meta.  Your best bet is to get some sort of tracking addon that allows you to see when procs happen.  Anytime you have a decent proc, it's worth going into Meta form to throw out a couple of Touch of Chaos and refresh Doom if needed, but you'll want to have 800+ Demonic Fury saved up for when Dark Soul comes off CD.  Dark Soul improves your damage scaling in Meta form 3x as much as it would in normal caster form, so make sure you use it appropriately.  On fights where you start with 200 DF (every pull except in 5 mans), you'll want to hold off on Dark Soul until you've built up enough Demonic Fury.  It has a little ramp up time, but it'll be worth it in the long run.  On use trinkets are better for Demo, but since those don't exist anymore in the next tier or this one, you have to rely on a little luck.

I'm in the same position with the poster. I play warlock since early wrath but never played demo seriously, my question is if its better to wait for some demonic fury on a bloodlust pull?

Zagam, your input is extremely appreciated, thanks man!
One last thing though, with regard to procs.
As with affliction it is bad for dps to use haunt with no intellect procs (I only use it when I have 2 or 3 of the following: jade spirit, lightweave, light of the cosmos)
Are there any demonology specific spells that are unopportune to use without intellect procs?
Or is it just metamorphisis?
I realise I could probably save myself a lot of time by reading the icy veins demo guide more intently but I found with affliction only skilled player input (evrelia) really helped me play affliction to a higher standard.

Once more thanks so much for your advice!

Jonnyb, on 23 February 2013 - 12:25 AM, said:

Well, with Affliction it's not so much "Don't Haunt with no INT procs" as it is "Don't Haunt when you don't have uber dots up on the target".

As for Demonology, you've basically got it right.  Try to use multi proc scenarios to shed some Demonic Fury and to extend the duration of your Doom through Pandemic.  You can't really worry too much about the dot power of Corruption because Touch of Chaos messes with it so much, but *definitely* try to maintain the highest power Doom that you can for as long as possible.  With the current 4 piece and Pandemic you can ensure that your Doom is always empowered by Dark Soul, which is pretty fancy.  =)

Long story short, there is no "Haunt" type ability to worry about with Demonology.  Just don't waste Demonic Fury when you don't have procs or Dark Soul up.

As you get more comfortable with the spec you'll realize that you don't *really* need to dance around the 800 Demonic Fury limit that people like to suggest.  Even with 200 DF at the start of the fight and popping all of my shit I can *almost* be in demon form through the entire duration of Dark Soul.  Imp Swarm helps a lot and I'm sure once I start using Grimoire of Service it will be even easier.

Edited by Omaric, 25 February 2013 - 04:19 PM.

Omaric, on 25 February 2013 - 04:18 PM, said:

Aye that's exactly what I meant with regard to the haunt/dots thing, doesn't hurt to cast the would-be uber dots with the haunt flying toward the boss incase you're only 2/3 shards and would rather not soulburn/soulswap so you can haunt right the way through procs/dark soul if you understand what I mean?
You might waste 1/2 seconds of haunt but it beats wasting a full 8 second haunt!
Assuming you assume that you are lucky enough to get a nightfall proc during darksoul time.

BUT MORE TO THE POINT OF THIS THREAD!
Glad to hear i'm roughly spot on with demonology and i'll take the time to read about imp swarm, thanks a lot for the advice!

Speaking of demonology, what is/will be the best secondary stat priority for now/5.2. I remeber Zagam said haste=mastery> crit because crit scaling was awful, I was searching a while ago and I found out mastery=crit>haste. I know haste is bad for demo because ToC spam doesn't scale with haste so if crit scaling is bad I would expect mastery>haste>crit. I'm really confused about secondary stats right now as you see. With the last nerf to affliction I'm considering to gem for demo(I always reforge when I try) and learn but I need some help and I would appreciate any help.

Edited by Sifon, 26 February 2013 - 01:30 AM.

This is gonna be really horrible and vague and contain a lot of questions so I apologize (again) in advance.
I actually took the time to try demo today and whoa boy was I confused.
I just can't get my head around opening and intellect procs at all!

after reading this:
**Hand of Guldan- The 'correct' way to use Hand of Gul'dan is to wait until there is less then 6s until you get 2 charges of HoG. You then want to use one charge, cast a few spells, and then clip shadowflame right before it runs out so you have ~5s of a one stack shadowflame, then 6s of a 2 stack
shadowflame. Doing this correctly will make Hand of Gul'dan out-preform Chaos Wave virtually always, and makes Chaos Wave pretty useless in PvE.

I got totally thrown, does that mean when I pop CD's at the start of the fight I want to trigget this 2 stack HoG before I pop meta?
I really didn't even understand the part I copy pasted to be quite frank, basically I never want to HoG until I have 1 charge and 6 secs till another charge?

Jonnyb, on 26 February 2013 - 02:02 AM, said:

http://www.icy-veins...ock-assistance/ There is a quoted post from Dotexe which should help you with your problem

Sifon, on 26 February 2013 - 12:48 PM, said:

So it's just about using the 2nd HoG when you meta, using meta for excess fury/procs and using meta for when your wild imps/lolguard/darksoul are up?

Guess it's not rocket science after all!

Jonnyb, on 26 February 2013 - 03:06 PM, said:

You got it.  =)  But yes, popping into meta before the 2nd HoG lands is pretty big.

I feel that the 5.2 trinkets are going to throw a curveball at the Demo spec in general though.

Edited by Omaric, 26 February 2013 - 04:43 PM.

Omaric, on 26 February 2013 - 04:23 PM, said:

One final thing i'm confused with is using an even number DS.
Do I want to DS then first HoG? or DS for my second HoG Meta?
The second DS confuses me in general, basically if i'm popping DS as soon as it comes up (with 4pc) does it become more optimal to wait for 3rd DS to line up with 2nd GoSup/imp swarm or to just use 2nd GoSup then impswarm without DS? Or should only my intellect procs dictate these decisions?

Whilst writing the thing about HoG my brain starting running riot, my bad. Does higher item lvl change anything as i'm 500 atm

Jonnyb, on 26 February 2013 - 04:35 PM, said:

I'm a little hazy on that too, but from what I've gleaned - use DS on CD and use imp swarm/GoService (I assume you meant Service) every other DS until we replace our current 4 piece.

My start up looks like this:

-Pre-pot
-CoE
-1st HoG
-Imp Swarm/On-use Trinkets/DS/GoService
-Corruption
-2nd HoG
-Meta (before HoG hits) > Doom
-Spam ToC until out of DF
-Build up a bit more DF with a couple Soulfire's/Shadowbolts while your imps are still spamming
-Pop into Meta again before your buffs wear off to extend the length of your Doom

Demonology opener is a cluster fuck to be certain, haha.

Omaric, on 26 February 2013 - 04:50 PM, said:

Clusterfuck is very apt choice of words!
Yeah I keep on getting mixed up with the grimoir names since I quit due to LH 25 HC boring me to death and skipped cata
Really appreciate your advice anyhow dude.
I've actually had to install affdots i'm getting that confused (i'm really minimalist) when previously I could keep track of which DoT's were affected with int procs manually I was that used to affliction!

Oh and yet another question.
Why isn't the wrathguard grimoir miles ahead of a 20 second extra demon?
100% uptime 20% extra damage is surely superior? (except in AoE scenarios for double felstorm)

Jonnyb, on 26 February 2013 - 05:09 PM, said:

Because that would only be the case if the Wrathguard did as much damage as two felguards. It doesn't. As it stands the two Grimoire's are pretty close and you can take Wrathguard if you like the simplicity of not having to watch another cooldown and not feel too gimped, but proper usage of Service will net you a small DPS increase in most fights.

I'll also add that Demonology is about rollercoaster DPS. It's about a short duration of huge burn followed by a period of lower consistent dps while you build back up to that burn again. In that sense Service helps facilitate that nicely.

Jonnyb, on 26 February 2013 - 05:09 PM, said:

Because whenever you pop Service you're generally rocking major buffs.  You definitely have Dark Soul up.  Two super buffed felguards are generally better than one Wrathguard over the duration of a fight.  Also note that the extra felguard generates more DF than a single Wrathguard can.

And yes, Affdots is amazing for watching Doom.  =D

Edited by Omaric, 26 February 2013 - 06:12 PM.

Gonna have to ask another question yet pal
In situations like elegon HC what spells do I want to use on the sparks as demo?
Do I want to time HoGx2 when he finishes draw power?
I'm just worrying about my burst for HC Elegon/HC tsulong since with affi i'd just pound my face into the keyboard

Jonnyb, on 26 February 2013 - 09:32 PM, said:

Honestly, if you can time it right, I'd use one HoG per spark spawn.  That will ensure that you're getting as much DF as possible.  Just maintain Doom/Corruption on Elegon and ToC the sparks.

So, after the HoG I'd Corruption my target and then meta and spam ToC.