Affliction Warlock DPS Easy Mode — Shadowlands 9.1

This section is intended for players who are new to the game or class, have no intentions of raiding Mythic difficulty, or simply want a more straightforward way to play their specialization without being overwhelmed by the numerous priorities and active abilities that need to be taken into consideration for optimal play.

Affliction is a specialization that revolves around maintaining damage over time effects on your active targets. While it may not have many buttons, it requires careful attention to cooldowns and uptimes, with the level of complexity increasing with number of targets. Despite that, it is a good specialization for all levels of players, and it can be streamlined to a simple set of priorities.

For newcomers, it is advisable to browse the Spell Summary page first, in order to learn more about the abilities available and to familiarise yourself with.

These Talent recommendations are optimized for ease of use. If a talent requires significant optimization to provide DPS gains, we will instead recommend a competitive talent that requires less knowledge to make use of. See the Talents page for a full and objective evaluation of the Talent tree. These talents aim to present a strong build that has very little punishment for unfamiliarity or mistakes.

• Level 15: Nightfall
• Level 25: Absolute Corruption
• Level 30: Burning Rush
• Level 35: Phantom Singularity
• Level 40: Mortal Coil
• Level 45: Haunt
• Level 50: Soul Conduit or Dark Soul: Misery

If you are looking to maximise your output as Affliction Warlock instead of simplicity and ease of use you can find a more in-depth analysis and rationale on our talent page as follows:

Currently, you will want to prioritize secondary stats as follows:

1. Mastery ≅ Haste;
2. Critical Strike;
3. Versatility.

In general, at the beginning of the expansion Intellect is more important than secondaries, about 2 if not 3 times better, depending on the secondary stat.

While stats priority is a general guideline, there might be situations where the lists differ. If you are interested in a detailed explanation on Stats with the effects and implications each one of those provides, head to the page below.

1. Maintain the Agony DoT.
2. Maintain the Unstable Affliction DoT.
3. Maintain the Corruption DoT.
4. Cast Malefic Rapture if you are at 5 Soul Shards (to avoid wasting Shards).
5. Maintain Haunt on the target.
6. Cast Phantom Singularity when available.
7. Cast Malefic Rapture during Phantom Singularity debuff.
8. Cast Shadow Bolt as a filler.

Be sure to cast Summon Darkglare when you have the maximum amount of DoTs applied. This will extend them and deal strong damage to the main target. In most cases, you want to refresh your main DoTs, and Phantom Singularity, then immediately Summon Darkglare. This combo results in a very large damage spike, as you are able to chain multiple Malefic Raptures with the maximum numbers of periodic effect on target.

Try to not delay Summon Darkglare and instead manage your Soul Shards around its cooldown.

Use Dark Soul: Misery on cooldown, so you can line it up with Summon Darkglare at 6 minutes.

When at least 3 targets are stacked together, you should always use your Seed of Corruption to apply and maintain Corruption. Keep Agony applied to all targets (up to 5) for Soul Shard generation and damage. Cast Phantom Singularity on cooldown for damage.

Soul Shards are usually better spent on using Malefic Rapture rather than spamming Seed of Corruption unless you decide to talent into Sow the Seeds.

For a more comprehensive explanation on the priority list, including openers, check out the rotation page.