Shard Management Problem During Fights. (16 replies to this topic)

Hello,

I've been checking out this site for a week or so, and first wanted to say thanks for maintaining an informative class guide/forums and all the work that entails. It's greatly appreciated.

I'm basically new to being a warlock. I played one during BC, and needless to say, playing one now is basically a whole new ball-game.

My question is regarding soul shard management during fights. What do you do when you are out of shards in the middle of a fight? I have read over the Affliction lock guide here numerous times, but there isn't really anything there about this exact situation, or at least that is not clearly pointed out that I could see. Do we cast Drain Soul to get shards back even though the boss' health is much greater than 20%. or keep casting Malefic Grasp as the filler and pray that we get some lucky Nightfall procs?

Regards

Edited by Damien, 29 October 2012 - 06:03 PM.

If you run out of shards, you do NOT cast Drain Soul pre-execute phase.  You just deal with it until Nightfall procs.  Your Soul Shards should only be used to cast Haunt outside of Dark Soul duration.  As long as you don't let your DoTs fall off, you shouldn't have too many issues running out of Soul Shards.  Remember to utilize any adds in a fight that you can kill to fully replenish your shards (Gara'jal's Shadow Realm, Will of Emperor's adds, etc)

Your DPS isn't modeled around 100% Haunt uptime.  A good % to aim for is about 50% which is easy to obtain because you should have 100% coverage once you hit execute phase.

Ah, I see. Thank you for the quick reply!

One last question for the time being - do you use Fel Flame to refresh dot durations, or just manually hardcast each individual dot near the end of their duration?

Guttersnipe, on 17 October 2012 - 05:01 PM, said:

Do NOT use Fel Flame to extend the duration of your DoTs unless BOTH conditions are true:
1) You are moving
2) Unstable Affliction has 2 or less seconds left.

Fel Flame adds 6 seconds to UA and Corruption.  It does nothing for Agony.  Since you can do Agony and Corruption while moving, this should be your priority...

1) Keep Agony at 10 stacks
2) Keep Corruption applied
3) UA < 2 seconds left on duration: Fel Flame
4) Mana < 75%, Life Tap
5) Fel Flame

Fel Flame refreshes DoTs but only adds 6 seconds to their duration.  It also updates stats (great if you're moving and you get a proc from tailoring or enchanting), but you're much better off recasting the DoTs.  If you cast Fel Flame, you get +6 sec to Corr and +6 sec to UA.  If you use the same global to apply Corr, you add 16 sec which means you're already better off in the long run.  Same goes for UA...you add 14 seconds to UA if you reapply by casting UA instead of Fel Flame IF all of your DoTs are running, your mana is fine, and you're moving.  Be weary...Fel Flame is a mana sucker.  So if you have to move and cast for a while, be prepared to do multiple Life Taps.  If you were casting Fel Flame while moving and end up stationary but with 40% mana, you have to waste time you COULD have been using Malefic Grasp on Life Taps.  Be mindful of everything and prepare your actions as you're doing the previous actions.

Excellent. Thank you for the help.

also, you can actually build up from Zero shards by using haunt at the correct time. If you get 2 haunt procs in quick succession, DONT cast it a second time. You never want to overwrite a haunt with a fresh haunt. The shard generated from a nightfall proc doesnt disappear if you dont use it during the duration of nightfall.
Took me a while to figure this one out myself and I had a tellmewhen icon pop up when the nightfall buff was active. I have no idea WHY nightfall shows as a 5 seconds buff as the duration is totally irrelevant.

Boradan, on 25 October 2012 - 07:23 PM, said:

Prior to MoP Nightfall just gave you an instant-cast Shadowbolt.  I assume the 5-second buff is just left over from that, it wasn't fully removed when the talent was changed.

Stunlocked, on 25 October 2012 - 09:47 PM, said:

Before Nightfall had a 10 second buff duration

Edit: Yes I did fail to maintain a stream of tought;
I agree that this buff should be completly removed from the game. (The animation is still nice 'cause it announces you when you get an extra shard)

Edited by Zauxst, 30 October 2012 - 07:16 PM.

Whatever the duration, Boradan is correct...it should just award you the Soul Shard and give you a spell effect called Nightfall, not give you some superficial buff lasting 5 seconds that benefits you none whatsoever.

Try to "fish" for shards during a fight if you want more shards (which you should). By fishing for shards, cast Corruption on every living target unless you're told not to. It's still pretty RNG but it's much better than to pray for a Nightfall proc. On single target fights, just do what Zagam says, you're not meant to have 100% uptime on haunt.

Zagam, on 17 October 2012 - 06:27 PM, said:

Why is this important.  I usually wait till i feel its eaiser on the healers before I life tap in raid.  Or when I know my cookie is up.  Is there a dps bonus from keeping high amount of mana?

Nope, actually lifetapping each time you get below 75% mana is not that good. You should do so when you fall below 35%.

So I use a macro which casts SB+SS at the pull of the fight...on a Single boss fight I use this same button refresh the DOTs when they get low and also I try to keep haunt up as much as I can.  With this combination I have been finding that I run out of Shards as well.  

So I am curious.  Do you actually manually keep up the DOTs with each spell  of their own and not use SB+SS each time to keep the dots up?  Because I have read the Affliction guide and it seems to point to keep using this Macro over and over again to keep them up but if thats the case then I run out of Shards fast and the procs on Nightfall is not the great for me (I am probably the most unlucky person you will ever know!  lol)

So thoughts??

mazar, on 01 November 2012 - 08:42 PM, said:

wisredz, on 01 November 2012 - 10:10 PM, said:

The key here that is missed is DURING MOVEMENT.  I never once said to Life Tap each time your mana goes below 75%.  If you are moving and you have more than 75% mana, you can use Fel Flame BUT ONLY IF YOU WON'T OVERWRITE POWERFUL DOTS.  You really should be utilizing movement to get your mana back.

Macavity, on 13 November 2012 - 04:52 PM, said:

I apply DoTs with SB:SS at the beginning and then manually cast them after that.  Haunt uptime is a better usage of your shards than reapplying DoTs.

Macavity, on 13 November 2012 - 04:52 PM, said:

For a single target, it does indicate to use the Soulburn with Soul Swap at the initial pull but to maintain the DOTs manually before each falls off as the fight continues. At the burn phase where you begin to use Drain Soul you would return to using Soulburn with Soul Swap to refresh the DOTs.

The multi-target rotation I haven't really tried . Usually this would be used with trash or adds and they usually fall before the application of DOTs to all of them is complete. Part of this is because I am old and slow, at times, but a geared group can make trash or adds fall rather fast. At best with a group of four or more I make use of Soulburn with Curse of the Elements and do a brief drain life to squeeze what DPS I can out of them. Guess I am not the best source for advice on this but the single target should be accurate for use.

The secret to shard management is not running out in the first place :-)  Its always tempting to blow them all but sometimes you need to mentally evaluate what procs may be coming up and wait for them to pop rather than blowing a shard on haunt with a low spell power set of dots running.  This is where addons like dotHaste and AffDots are your friends :-)