Demonology Warlock DPS Guide — Season 4

Last updated Yesterday at 12:50 by Motoko 43 comments
General Information

Welcome to our Demonology Warlock guide for World of Warcraft — Season 4. Here, you will learn how to play as a Demonology Warlock in both raids and Mythic+ dungeons: from the very beginning to maximizing your DPS.

If you were looking for WotLK Classic content, please refer to our WotLK Classic Demonology Warlock guide.

1.

Demonology Warlock Overview

Demonology Warlock is a versatile specialization centered around summoning waves of expendable minions to do your bidding while you generate resources in between. While the specialization does have some ramp-up time, it does feel smooth and fast once it is running at full steam. Demonology Warlocks are especially strong in encounters that have stable mobility rather than helter-skelter movement.

Like all Warlock specializations, Demonology brings Demonic Gateway Icon Demonic Gateway, a powerful raid cooldown that can transport your entire group 40 yards instantly.

1.1.

Demonology Warlock and Guide Changes for Season 4

Season 4 of Mythic+ signals the return of all the 8 Dragonflight Dungeons alongside the previous raids with a new "Awakened" twist. While the patch mostly focuses around User Interface and Accessibility changes, some class tuning has happened, for the most part around itemization changes in the case of Demonology Warlock.

Reissued tier set bonuses from previous tiers, and gear that can now be acquired with Antique Bronze Bullion Icon Antique Bronze Bullion currency all received some form of updates with the aim of bringing a relative sense of balance across specialization and among item choices.

Being a major patch with returning tier set and trinket it did require a whole revisit on both Talents Page and Rotation Page.

A new Season means higher item-level gear from returning Mythic+ Dungeons alongside the previous raid tiers. As such, Gear Page has been updated with new BiS lists, weapon and trinkets recommendations, and different embellishments to craft.

2.

Leveling a Demonology Warlock

We have a dedicated leveling guide to help you get your Demonology Warlock to max level, complete with many tips and suggestions.

While playing with the default UI for the leveling is entirely possible, transitioning to a max level rotation with a substantially different UI layout can feel overwhelming and ultimately disorient or frustrate the player. We recommend instead to implement Layout changes gradually in order to allow yourself to acclimate to a more effective and personal UI. The Addon page below offers some recommended options.

3.

Basics of Demonology Warlock Gameplay

Demonology Warlock is a spec designed around continuously summoning temporary demons to do your bidding with relatively short cooldowns, some of them requiring a precise setup and a good amount of pet management. At its core, the gameplay is about generating and spending the Warlock's iconic resource: Soul Shards.

Demonology is the spec that embodies the rule of Always-Be-Casting the most but is also straightforward and intuitive. Keep generating Soul Shards through Shadow Bolt Icon Shadow Bolt and Demonbolt Icon Demonbolt and spend those resources on Call Dreadstalkers Icon Call Dreadstalkers and Hand of Gul'dan Icon Hand of Gul'dan.

If you are a newcomer to the spec but would like to learn the basics, start browsing the Spell Summary and head over to the page linked below.

For those more familiar with Warlocks, we invite you to check out the Talents and Rotation pages to have access to more detailed and in-depth information.

4.

How to Gear Up as Demonology Warlock

Due to the increased number of variables and additional systems, picking gear has become a much less intuitive and immediate process. Nevertheless, you can find guidelines on how to best equip your Demonology Warlock on our dedicated gearing page, including the current Best in Slot equipment for the current tier.

Equipping gear is not enough, as you also need to choose the right consumables and gear augments to maximize your character potential. Below is listed a page that can guide you through those choices as well as a page to better understand the implications each stat has on your Warlock.

5.

End-Game as a Demonology Warlock

Being geared and well-equipped is only half of the journey, as the end game activities require each a different approach to the spec. In order to find out more information regarding how to better tackle these challenges, check out the pages below.

6.

Improving as a Demonology Warlock

Understanding your errors and refining your performance is a constant exercise, which can be frustrating or confounding at times. Below are listed some pages that offer tools and can point to and help correct those mistakes.

7.

Demonology Warlock Viability in the Current Patch

Demonology Warlock in Season 4 retain all the strengths and the few weaknesses of the Season 3, offering a solid overall performance, excelling in burst AoE situations and suffering from a mediocre pure single target. It is an overall well rounded specialization, able to perform in a variety of situations without requiring substantial talent changes.

While not the highest single target performer the tier set bonus, specifically in dungeons offer a dynamic and interactive gameplay that not many other spec can boast.

8.

Changelog

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