Warlock & priest boosting, aoe changes

[heyaz]

I haven't found any official documentation, but it appears that aoe caps were either removed or significantly increased. And due to some changes in the warlock and priest talents, there are some new opportunities for boosting for those who don't have a paladin or mage.

- Shadowfang Keep

Still my favorite place to boost 10-22. With RAF it can be done in about 1 hour played. Of course you will have to log out to avoid lockout.
Pre patch I was using my priest with Holy Nova spec. Took 3-4 pulls due to aoe cap on nova being so low - I would go oom long before anything died. However since the patch I am able to pull nearly the entire instance at once - getting 300-500 a tick with nova where it used to be under 100. One thing that does suck is I can no longer use rank 1 swp to pull since there is no more downranking. It's a bit more running around but at least I can blow everything up at once.

- SM Armory

Previously took several separate SoC pulls with the Warlock - the cap would prevent you from pulling more than a few rooms, and once you got aggro the old pushback mechanics made it impossible to case another SoC. Now I am able to pull several rooms (as long as the VW survives), use a few SoC's then finish everything off with metamorphosis + immolation aura + hellfire. Due to new pushback mechanics, you can happily hellfire away with a million mobs beating on you, and it stacks with immolation aura.

I'm just now testing out LBRS and UD Strat. So far I've been able to pull at least an entire room of elite skeletons in UD, voidwalker lasts just long enough for about 4 SoCs, and they hit for the full 1400-2000 on every target which is enough to bring them down. I'll post more when I get a chance, but this looks promising. Previously I had to stop boosting around 42 because it was just too tedious or unfeasible to boost any higher level instances with a warlock. I think it'll be possible to boost up to 60 now.

[Harem]

Of course you will have to log out to avoid lockout.

Forgive my ignorance, but logging out allows you to do an instance more than 5 times an hour?

[heyaz]

Of course you will have to log out to avoid lockout.

Forgive my ignorance, but logging out allows you to do an instance more than 5 times an hour?

No, but I guess you could stay logged in and just stand there as well

[Marious]

Boosting with a lock is kind of rough later on, stuff takes way to long to kill, well at least that is the way I saw it prepatch. Have not tried it yet postpatch so not sure how it has improved or if it has at all. Normally I tend to pull smaller groups, I have even gotten killed in Stocks trying to boost with a lock. Where you should be able to pull half the place or all of stocks you can only pull each wing for the most part, or at least this has been my experience with an Affliction lock.

I do not have a priest to Boost, well I did not have one, I have one currently at 64 almost 65 he will be next time I log him.

I will have to see how the Lock does now, thinking it will be down the Demo tree vs. the Affliction tree but still Haunt is nice from all I am reading.

[heyaz]

Boosting with a lock is kind of rough later on, stuff takes way to long to kill, well at least that is the way I saw it prepatch. Have not tried it yet postpatch so not sure how it has improved or if it has at all. Normally I tend to pull smaller groups, I have even gotten killed in Stocks trying to boost with a lock. Where you should be able to pull half the place or all of stocks you can only pull each wing for the most part, or at least this has been my experience with an Affliction lock.

I do not have a priest to Boost, well I did not have one, I have one currently at 64 almost 65 he will be next time I log him.

I will have to see how the Lock does now, thinking it will be down the Demo tree vs. the Affliction tree but still Haunt is nice from all I am reading.

I've been testing everything today. Full demo I'm having no problem killing with SoC which was previously not feasible in the higher level instances (had to run around dotting everything by hand). I've tried BRD, LBRS, ZF, and UD Strat and SoC is hitting for its full amount no matter how many mobs I pull. For higher level stuff I metamorph and immolation aura + rain of fire and everything just blows up.

High level warlock boosting is a whole different game now with this patch

[Greythan]

Very very interesting. Hadn't thought at all about it.

So, BRD for example, gather up a bunch with the VW, plant four seeds and they're all going down? Do you go metamorphosis often in the higher level dungeons? (My lock seemed quasi-fragile even in SM, but that was with the old pushback mechanics. Spellcasting basically shut out = death.)

[heyaz]

Very very interesting. Hadn't thought at all about it.

So, BRD for example, gather up a bunch with the VW, plant four seeds and they're all going down? Do you go metamorphosis often in the higher level dungeons? (My lock seemed quasi-fragile even in SM, but that was with the old pushback mechanics. Spellcasting basically shut out = death.)

Yeah, warlocks can definitely boost all the way up to 60 now. With the aoe cap being so high, even in UD strat I didn't have to metamorph unless things went bad - you can pull those big skeleton packs and blow them up with 4-5 SoCs and rain of fire.

ZF is just a breeze. You can blow up the entire stair event at once by sending in your VW and using immolation aura + hellfire. The grave room - just sacrifice your VW, run around and click every grave as fast as you can while metamorphed, then kill them all. Most of the other pulls don't require metamorphosis (like the scarab room, pull them all with the VW then use soc).

Voidwalker is a lot stronger than it used to be. With a priest buffing me and the pet, it has over 15k hp and around 12k armor, so it can hold up long enough to pull huge packs.

I imagine it will be possible to boost through Ramparts as well - I'm thinking smaller pulls with metamorph, warlock tanks with 4 resto shaman bombing heals. Could probably take me to 64