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Affliction Warlock Guide — Class Guides · WoW Forever

Curses, damage over time and drains: the tree for long fights and leveling alone.

A cloth-wearing caster who curses enemies, drains their life and summons demons to fight beside them. Warlocks use Soul Shards, Life Tap and Healthstones. More about the warlock

Class
Warlock
Roles
Damage
Used for
Leveling, Raids and dungeons
Top talent
Wrack
Popular builds
2
Version
WoW Forever

How to play

Affliction in WoW Forever is the single-target damage-over-time warlock: Pandemic doubles the crit bonus of Corruption, Banes, drains and Wrack, Malevolence adds Shadow crit, Wrack tears at the target and makes your other effects hit harder, and Soul Siphon strengthens your drains for each of your effects on the target.

Put Corruption, Bane of Agony and Siphon Life on the target, Wrack when ready, and Drain Life or Shadow Bolt to fill; Drain Soul on a dying target with Soul Harvest refills your mana. Life Tap whenever you are healthy and low on mana.

Affliction is also the smoothest leveling warlock, with a Voidwalker tanking while your drains keep you up.

At a glance

Single-target damage
Damage to groups
Survivability
Utility for the group
Solo play and leveling
Ease of play

Rated 1 to 5 against the other specs in WoW Forever.

Rotation and priorities

  1. 1Corruption, Bane of Agony (or your assigned curse) and Siphon Life on the target.
  2. 2Wrack whenever it is ready.
  3. 3Drain Life or Shadow Bolt to fill; take Nightfall procs at once.
  4. 4Drain Soul on dying targets: Soul Harvest refills mana.
  5. 5Life Tap when mana runs low.
  6. 6Fear or Death Coil to stop an attacker.

Strengths and weaknesses

Strengths

  • Pandemic lets your effects crit hard.
  • Strong single-target damage.
  • Very little downtime while leveling.

Weaknesses

  • Slow to ramp up on each target.
  • Wasted on targets that die quickly.
  • Many effects to keep up.

Stats and gear

Stat priority

Most valuable first. Bars compare each stat with the best one; a cap in the note means the stat drops off once you reach it.

  1. 1

    Spell damageshadow damage counts

  2. 2

    Hitto the cap; Suppression covers some

  3. 3

    Critical strikePandemic and Malevolence

  4. 4

    StaminaLife Tap

  5. 5

    Intellect

  6. 6

    Spirit

What to look for

  • Shadow or spell damage gear, then crit: Pandemic makes crit far more valuable than in Classic.
  • Hit up to the cap against bosses.
  • Stamina for Life Tap.

Builds

Each bar splits the build's talent points by tree.

  • Affliction
  • Demonology
  • Destruction

  • Soul Siphon Wanderer

    DamageLeveling
    33/18/0

    Affliction leveling with your Voidwalker: Soul Harvest refills mana after Drain Soul kills, Soul Siphon strengthens drains, and Improved Voidwalker keeps the pet tough.

    • Siphon Life 1/1
    • Soul Siphon 3/3
    • Shadow Mastery 5/5
    • Wrack 1/1
    • Fel Domination 1/1

    Open in the talent calculatorTheorycrafting

  • Wrack Plaguebringer

    DamagePvE
    40/11/0

    Single-target Affliction: Pandemic lets damage over time crit hard, Wrack and Soul Siphon cash in your effects, and Malevolence raises Shadow crit.

    • Amplify Curse 1/1
    • Siphon Life 1/1
    • Soul Siphon 3/3
    • Shadow Mastery 5/5
    • Wrack 1/1

    Open in the talent calculatorTheorycrafting

Key talents

  • Wrack · top talent, up to 1

    Tears the target apart from within, inflicting 36 Shadow damage every 1 sec and increasing the damage they take from your other Shadow damage over time effects by 10% for 6 sec.

  • Improved Bane of Agony · tier 3, up to 2

    Increases the damage done by your Bane of Agony by 10%.

  • Fel Concentration · tier 3, up to 3

    Gives you a 70% chance to avoid interruption caused by damage while channeling or casting your Drain Life, Drain Mana, Drain Soul, or Wrack spells.

  • Amplify Curse · tier 3, up to 1

    Increases the effect of your next Curse of Weakness or Bane of Agony by 50%, or your next Curse of Exhaustion by [?]%. Lasts 30 sec.

  • Pandemic · tier 3, up to 3

    Increases the critical strike damage bonus of your Corruption, Bane of Agony, Bane of Doom, Drain Soul, Drain Life, Siphon Life, and Wrack spells by 100%.

  • Malevolence · tier 4, up to 5

    Increases the critical effect chance of your Shadow spells by 5%.

  • Nightfall · tier 4, up to 2

    Gives your Corruption, Drain Soul, Drain Life, and Wrack spells a 4% chance to cause you to enter a Shadow Trance after damaging the opponent. The Shadow Trance reduces the casting time of your next Shadow Bolt spell by 100%.

  • Siphon Life · tier 5, up to 1

    Transfers 11 health from the target to the caster every 3 sec. Lasts 30 sec.

  • Soul Siphon · tier 5, up to 3

    Increases the damage done or health drained by your Drain Life, Drain Soul, and Wrack spells by 12% per each of your other Affliction effects active on the target, up to a maximum increase of 36%.

  • Shadow Mastery · tier 6, up to 5

    Increases the damage dealt or life drained by your Shadow spells by 10%.

Affliction abilities by level

When each ability arrives: trained abilities at the level a trainer first teaches them, talent abilities (gold frame) at the first level the talent can be taken.

What WoW Forever changed

New talents in this tree

  • Soul HarvestKilling a non-trivial target afflicted by your Drain Soul increases your Mana regeneration by 100% for 10 sec and allows 100% of normal Mana regeneration to continue while casting.
  • Improved DrainsIncreases health drained or damage done by your Drain Life, Drain Soul, and Wrack spells by 20%.
  • Improved Bane of AgonyIncreases the damage done by your Bane of Agony by 10%.
  • PandemicIncreases the critical strike damage bonus of your Corruption, Bane of Agony, Bane of Doom, Drain Soul, Drain Life, Siphon Life, and Wrack spells by 100%.
  • MalevolenceIncreases the critical effect chance of your Shadow spells by 5%.
  • Soul SiphonIncreases the damage done or health drained by your Drain Life, Drain Soul, and Wrack spells by 12% per each of your other Affliction effects active on the target, up to a maximum increase of 36%.
  • WrackTears the target apart from within, inflicting 36 Shadow damage every 1 sec and increasing the damage they take from your other Shadow damage over time effects by 10% for 6 sec.

Classic Era talents the class no longer has

  • Improved Curse of Weakness
  • Improved Drain Soul
  • Improved Drain Life
  • Improved Curse of Agony
  • Improved Drain Mana
  • Improved Curse of Exhaustion
  • Dark Pact

Spells

New: Wrack. Changed: Corruption, Curse of Weakness, Life Tap, Bane of Agony, Drain Soul, Curse of Recklessness, Drain Life, Amplify Curse, Curse of the Elements, Curse of Exhaustion, Siphon Life, Death Coil, Bane of Doom.

Related

Other warlock specs: Demonology, Destruction