Affliction Warlock DPS Stat Priority — Battle for Azeroth (BfA) 8.1

1. The Basics of Stats for an Affliction Warlock

The stat priority for an Affliction Warlock is:

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

This stat priority was determined using a Simulation Craft profile in standard pre-raid gear. It was meant to simulate a very "average" set of player gear, but you should refer to this information with care. It is highly recommended you sim yourself to determine which stats your character gets maximum benefit out of, as this is subject to change depending on your ratios.

The general rule is that you want a good balance between Haste and Mastery for single target, but as you add more targets in the scenario Mastery gradually becomes our best stat, even above Intellect.

Most players will notice their stat priority shifts as they acquire higher item levels, due to the variance in scaling.

These statistics have been obtained by combining common sense, in-game testing, and simulations using SimulationCraft.

2. Statistics Explanations for Affliction Warlock

Intellect is your primary stat. You should look for this stat in all of your upgrades. It provides you with Spell Power, which increases the damage of your spells.

Mastery, through Mastery: Potent Afflictions increases the damage of your DoTs ( Agony, Corruption, Seed of Corruption, and Unstable Affliction). Mastery does not affect your pets or Soul Shard generation at all.

Haste influences the cast speed of your spells and increases the number of ticks from your DoTs. This decreases the ramp up damage from Agony as well. Haste also reduces the global cooldown and scales with your pets. Since an increased number of DoT ticks also results in more Soul Shards, we can look at Haste as the stat that has the most effect on our resource generation.

Critical Strike increases your chance to critically hit with all spells and abilities.

Versatility is a flat-out damage done increase and damage taken reduction.

3. Changelog