Mists of Pandaria Classic Destruction Warlock Rotation and Cooldowns

This page contains all relevant information needed for Destruction Warlock before the release of Mists of Pandaria Classic. We will be updating this with all the latest information as soon as more is discovered, so make sure to check back.

Destruction Warlocks have phenomenal burst damage, as well top-tier single-target and superb AoE damage. Destro spells offer a perfect balance of single target, cleave and AoE, thanks to Havoc, Fire and Brimstone, Chaos Bolt, Rain of Fire and more. They focus on unleashing hard hitting spells by utilizing the new Burning Embers resource to cast devastating spells like Chaos Bolt and the new and improved Shadowburn. The specialization offers a straightforward rotation with limited sweat needed to carry your raid, making it accessible for newcomers and rewarding for veterans who master its nuances.

Burning Embers is a new Destruction only resource that plays a vital role in your success as a Destruction Warlock. You have four Burning Embers containers, and each of these containers can fill up with 10 shards. When the container reaches 10 shards, the Burning Ember can now be used to cast your strongest spells like Chaos Bolt, Fire and Brimstone and Shadowburn. Almost all of your Destruction abilities generate Burning Embers, with some of them generating twice as much if the spell crit.

You generate one full Burning Embers when out of combat, and the other three will slowly decay when combat ends. You will also be spending Embers on Ember Tap, which heals you for roughly 20% of your Health at the cost of an Ember.

As a Destruction Warlock, Immolate is an important spell as it's your DoT spell and also a nice way to gain Burning Embers. MoP Classic changed the way DoTs work thanks to the Talent Pandemic. When you refresh your DoTs, the duration remaining on the previous effect is added to this new one, up to a maximum of 50%. This means that if a DoT duration of 20 seconds and you refresh it when there are 10 seconds remaining, the new duration will be 30 seconds.

Your DoTs benefit from your stats at the time you casted the DoT. This means that Immolate will take into account your stats at the exact time you cast Immolate, and it will keep that Haste, or Spell Power buff even after you lose the buffs yourself.

The single target rotation for Destruction is more of a priority system and it's pretty straightforward. Your goal is to build up as many Burning Embers as possible by casting Incinerate, Immolate and Conflagrate, then spending those Embers on the now buffed up Chaos Bolts and Shadowburns once the target is below 20% HP.

Immolate should be on the target as close to 100% uptime as possible with the new Pandemic changes and Conflagrate should be kept on CD as much as possible.

It's important to also pay attention to buffs that you'll get from your spells like Backdraft, which reduces the casting speed of Incinerate and Chaos Bolt by 30%. You only get this which you get after casting Conflagrate a target. Tracking Backdraft is crucial to your success as a Destruction Warlock.

1. (Prepull) Make sure your Demon is out.
2. (Prepull) Pre-Pop a Potion of the Jade Serpent.
3. (Prepull) Precast Incinerate if you can, so that it lands on the boss right when the pull timer hits zero seconds. Also make sure your Demon is attacking.
4. (Prepull) Immediately cast Immolate.
5. Cast Rain of Fire underneath wherever boss will be tanked. This is worth it on single target for the Burning Embers alone.
6. Cast Curse of the Elements and keep this up full time if no other member is putting up the debuff. Rogues will naturally apply this debuff.
7. Pop your cooldowns like Dark Soul: Instability, Grimoire of Service, Blood Fury, Trinkets and whatever else you have.
8. Cast Summon Doomguard/ Summon Terrorguard right before your Raid either Bloodlusts, Heroisms or Time Warps, since it will also be Lusted. Summon Doomguard dynamically updates to your stats, so no need to worry about snapshotting spell power.
9. Cast two Conflagrates. Keep this on cooldown and try not to cap over the two stacks.
10. Cast Incinerate until you have at least 3-4 times to build Burning Embers.
11. Cast two Chaos Bolts as soon as you proc your buffs.
12. Recast Immolate. Keep this on the boss at all times. Refresh around 10 seconds or if it's below 50% of the duration and you get another buff proc.
13. Fill with Incinerate while waiting to dump Chaos Bolts, waiting for Conflagrate to come off cooldown, or to reapply Immolate.
14. Spam Shadowburn once the target is below 20% HP, while keeping Immolate up.
15. Cast Fel Flame whenever you have to move.
16. Cast Havoc if another target is available. Pair this with Shadowburn if you possible, if not then Chaos Bolt.

1. Cast Rain of Fire and keep this down 100% of the time. You can cast multiple of these, but they don't stack with each other.
2. Activate Fire and Brimstone.
3. Cast Curse of the Elements if you have 4 Burning Embers and there is not a Rogue in the party/raid. This will spread to all targets within 10 yards of the main target.
4. Cast Immolate. This will spread to all targets within 10 yards of the main target thanks to Fire and Brimstone. If you don't have the Burning Embers for Fire and Brimstone, manually apply Immolate to all the targets.
5. Cast Incinerate. This will hit all targets within 10 yards of the main target thanks to Fire and Brimstone
6. Cast Havoc on a high prio/Health target and use this on cooldown.
7. Cast Shadowburn if any target is below 20% Health. Pair this with Havoc if possible.
8. Make sure to throw explosives if you're Engineering for extra damage.