Affliction Warlock DPS Gear and Best in Slot — Shadowlands 9.0.2
On this page, you will find the best gear and best in slot items for your Affliction Warlock in World of Warcraft Shadowlands 9.0.2.
If you were looking for WoW Classic content, please refer to our Classic DPS Warlock gear and best in slot.
Gearing a Affliction Warlock
Welcome to our Gearing Page for Affliction Warlock, this section will cover everything you need to know about equipping your character correctly.
If you have a new piece of gear that you need gems and enchants advice for, you can find everything you need on our dedicated page below.
Gearing Early on in Shadowlands as Affliction Warlock
When Season 1 of Shadowlands begins, most of your gear will come from either Raiding, Mythic+, PvP, or the weekly chest. However, none of these options are available in the first couple of weeks of Shadowlands. Below, we go over some of the best ways to get geared early on in Shadowlands.
- Covenant Callings: These are daily quests that can give you up to 200 item level gear and Conduits.
- The Maw: Rares and Events in The Maw can drop up to 184 item level gear.
- Battlegrounds: You can exchange Honor Points for u to item level 184 gear.
- Mythic dungeons: Although Mythic+ is not open yet, standard Mythic dungeons are open. These drop 184 item level loot and can be looted once per week.
- Reputation: Getting honored allows you to buy 181 item level gear and getting exalted gives 200 item level gear.
How To Effectively Compare Upgrades as an Affliction Warlock
Due to the simplicity of determining upgrades with a simulation in the current era of the game, we recommend using the popular Raidbots tool to determine which pieces of gear offer the most potential for your character. The main reason why this is a huge advantage is due to the huge number of variables that differ from character to character, such as Stat Quotients, and Scale Factors.
The Top Gear function can be especially useful, as it allows you to compare multiple items and item types to find the best combination of upgrades.
Learning to use the tools available will allow you to reach the most accurate conclusions with the least effort. It is highly recommended you avail yourself of these tools, and they will serve you well when evaluating items.
What Gear Do I Farm/Bonus Roll/Chase After?
When identifying what gear you should be aiming after, we recommend using RaidBots' Droptimizer feature. It requires the SimulationCraft Addon. Once you have the addon installed, write "/simc" into the chat in-game, and copy-pasting the contents into the RaidBots Droptimizer.
Simply select the raid and difficulty you are interested in, and RaidBots will take a while to figure out where you should spend your bonus rolls, and more.
Legendaries for Affliction Warlock
Both Relic of Demonic Synergy (Head) and
Perpetual Agony of Azj'Aqir (Chest) are extremely important in both
raiding and Mythic+ situations. It is advisable to craft them with
Missive of Mastery and
Missive of Haste.
Prioritise Relic of Demonic Synergy, as it performs extremely well on
all 3 specs and offers the best DPS increase for Affliction until 4 targets,
compared to
Perpetual Agony of Azj'Aqir.
After crafting and upgrading the above 2 choices, it is advisable to consider crafting other more niche choices, such as:
Sacrolash's Dark Strike (Legs), to unlock limited slowing potential with
Absolute Corruption.
Malefic Wrath (Shoulder), a very powerful but situational damage increase legendary.
If you are looking for an in-depth explanation on what Legendary to pick for what situation and how to obtain them, read our Legendary page below.
Conduits for Affliction Warlock
Best Single-Target Potency Conduits for Affliction Warlock
Best Cleave / AoE Potency Conduits for Affliction Warlock
For more info regarding what Conduits to pick for what situation, check our full Covenants, Soulbinds, & Conduits page.
Best in Slot Items for Affliction Warlock
Castle Nathria Best in Slot
Here we have provided a list of the best available items from Castle Nathria, which may be advantageous for players who have little interest in Mythic+ dungeons or PvP.
Dungeons Best in Slot
Slot | Item | Source |
---|---|---|
Helm | ![]() |
General Kaal in Sanguine Depths |
Neck | ![]() |
Mists of Tirna Scithe |
Shoulder | ![]() |
Sanguine Depths |
Cloak | ![]() |
De Other Side |
Chest | ![]() |
Halls of Atonement |
Wrists | ![]() |
Theater of Pain |
Gloves | ![]() |
The Necrotic Wake |
Belt | ![]() |
De Other Side |
Legs | ![]() |
Spires of Ascension |
Boots | ![]() |
Plaguefall |
Ring #1 | ![]() |
De Other Side |
Ring #2 | ![]() |
Plaguefall |
Main-hand + Off-hand | ![]() |
Halls of Atonement |
Trinket 1 | ![]() |
De Other Side |
Trinket 2 | ![]() |
Spires of Ascension |
Trinkets for Affliction Warlock
Due to the prevalence of high item level trinkets via Mythic+, raiding, and PvP, there are a variety of suitable options when it comes to trinkets. It is always best to use Raidbots Top Gear to determine what your optimal trinkets are.
From dungeons, Inscrutable Quantum Device is by far the most potent
trinket, rivalling raid trinkets of a similar item level.
Satchel of Misbegotten Minions and
Infinitely Divisible Ooze are
the 2 best passive trinkets.
Empyreal Ordnance is worth mentioning as
the delay in buff application allows you to run it as a second on-use trinket.
Trinket Simulations for Affliction Warlock
Single Target
Cleave
Changelog
- 28 Dec. 2020: Added Sun King Salvation as another source of drop for the Abominable Anima Spherule weapon token.
- 04 Dec. 2020: Updated Castle Nathria BiS list, added dungeons BiS list, and updated trinket recommendations.
- 24 Nov. 2020: Added disclaimer about Bloodmallet sims.
- 23 Nov. 2020: Page updated for Shadowlands release, added Legendary and Conduits sections, and Castle Nathria BiS list
- 12 Oct. 2020: Page updated for the Shadowlands pre-patch.
More Warlock Guides
Guides from Other Classes
This guide has been written by Motoko, Warlock main since The Burning Crusade, co-admin in the Warlock Discord, and theorycrafter and contributor for LockOneStopShop.
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