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VWdot vs TankDrain
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Post by
136063
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Post by
136063
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Post by
Dunsinane
You've posted a thoughtful series of points. I have a few facts to point out, and then a simple question to ask you.
- Your voidwalker uses mana to hold aggro.
- His mana recovery is atrocious, especially if you are fighting non-stop.
- You have no way of restoring his mana without speccing deep into demo, and doing so will severely hurt your damage output in the early levels.
So,
- What do you do when your voidwalker is low on mana?
Yes, you can level with a voidwalker. You can level petless. You can level talentless. You can buy a sword on the AH, equip a firestone and level as a melee lock if you wish. Really, getting to 50, 60, 70 in this game is more a matter of putting in the hours than any particular indication of skill. A trained chimp could probably hit 70 in a month.
Quick, efficient leveling is not just about killing mobs faster. If that were the case, we'd be telling you to spec destro. It is about maximum damage, AND MINIMUM DOWNTIME. Draintanking is non-stop. Voidwalker grinding requires downtime for your pet to recover.
It is also not about killing mobs above your level. Mobs at or below your level are the targets because they're simply more efficient to kill and the higher levels don't give enough extra XP to worry about the trouble. Many low DPS classes focus on mobs below their level for this very reason.
The experimentation you speak of has already been done by thousands of new warlocks since the game was first released. We don't say draintanking is the most effective strategy because it is the one we like. We say it because it has been shown, both in theory and in practice, to be the fastest method.
The strategy you describe IS used in leveling, up until about level 30 when the draintanking method becomes superior.
As for the felguard, many would suggest not speccing toward him until your mid-50s, when he becomes far more effective. And yes, you will often spend your time healing him in a fight while leveling. The demonology leveling grind is more "Kill several mobs quickly, then several more a lot more slowly" as opposed to the steady roll of affliction draintanking.
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136063
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117940
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136063
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116665
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Post by
Porcell
I just have one more thing to toss in there.
If you've been leveling with a VW and not drain tanking, your defense rating will probably be pretty low and you'll take more damage and crushing blows.
I did the VW thing all the way until 58 when I started reading up on drain tanking. At level 58 you are supposed to have 290 defense rating and I was only around 240. I started drain tanking and was getting mauled, but after a while and my defense rating got up to the right level things were a bit better.
Post by
129077
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Post by
Avalonia
What you are getting at is that each and every player has different tactics.
Everyone one of those tactics is viable for the player using them. End game, there are many times you want to sensibly use your void walker, and there are many times you simply want to drain tank or fear and drain.
They are all different mechanics that are used for different encounters by different players.
Find something that makes you comfortable and use it. Forget what others say other than taking them as slight suggestions unless its an universal truth...such as destruction does more raid damage once you hit certain stats and shadow is better than fire.
Post by
Avalonia
- What do you do when your voidwalker is low on mana?
Same thing you do when leveling past 60 with a fel guard? Sacrifice him and summon another one.
Also, the ammount of mana the VW to maintain aggro if you understand how to manage your own aggro is much less that what it actually regenerates. L2useCoS. L2keepVWbuffup.
Post by
Dunsinane
- What do you do when your voidwalker is low on mana?
Same thing you do when leveling past 60 with a fel guard? Sacrifice him and summon another one.
Also, the ammount of mana the VW to maintain aggro if you understand how to manage your own aggro is much less that what it actually regenerates. L2useCoS. L2keepVWbuffup.
In other words -
You pause in the middle of your grinding to take an action that isn't gathering XP.
The whole point to the series of questions I asked was to point out this very fact, and the discussion was on the most efficient means of leveling a warlock. This is indeed a "universal truth", such as you mention in the post before. While there are situations where you may choose to swap the voidwalker in (to complete a specific quest), draintanking is simply a better method for taking down mobs after level 30.
VW buff? The only buffs a warlock has that it can give the VW or vice versa are sacrifice, detect invisible, and water breathing. Not useful grinding abilities.
Post by
Kaitain
- What do you do when your voidwalker is low on mana?
Same thing you do when leveling past 60 with a fel guard? Sacrifice him and summon another one.
Bonkers. If you are resummoning your Felguard often you are really messing up. If you want to level with a Felguard, 3/3 Demonic Resilience is essenital and 1/3 Mana Feed is essential, 2/3 is better until you +spell dmg gets high and the mobs' lifespans go down.
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126131
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101561
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Post by
Dunsinane
- What do you do when your voidwalker is low on mana?
There are two things wrong with this. 1 it assumes constant pulling with 0 break inbetween. I personally do not hunt in death traps so this is unlikely. You can also turn of your pets auto cast (omg!) or switch him to passive and do THE supposed lock tactic of drain tanking, if necessary, if you wanted to. However walking 20 ft from mob 1 to mob 2 is generally enough time for my VW to regen enough mana to fight another mob(I dont know about anyone else but my VW didnt win any track and field titles). The only time i find myself low on mana is when i get several nightfall procs i just cant let go to waste.
Just because drain tanking isnt the primary form of killing something doesnt mean we CANT do it.
Hell half the time i would be done with the area for quests or my bags are full, and since drain tanking is alrdy the more expensive route loosing out on vendoring would be a terrible waste aswell.
Okay. Let's go through this step by step.
1) It assumes constant pulling with 0 breaks in-between.
Exactly. What would be a higher rate of XP gain? Drain tanking can do this. VW grinding cannot.
2) You can turn off your pet's autocast.
Indeed you can. And you can thus make your VW completely worthless at holding aggro. Which is supposedly the whole point of having him out.
3) And then you could drain tank.
Indeedy. But without the succubus' extra damage or the imp's mana regen. The VW is the worst choice for a pet to have out while drain tanking. It provides nothing that another pet doesn't do better.
4) Walking twenty feet from mob 1 to mob 2 allows mana regen.
Learn the 5-second rule. It applies to your pets. If your pet is not casting regularly to gain/hold aggro, you aren't killing as fast as you could while drain tanking. If it is, it is burning mana faster than it can recover.
5) The only time I find myself low on mana...
It isn't a question of you being low on mana. If you're using life drain and life tap as your main spells, you should never be low on mana unless you screw up a pull. It's a question of your VW being able to keep up the pace while holding aggro. It cannot.
6) A warlock using the VW can drain tank.
See #3.
7) My bags get full and I have to leave things behind.
Your poor planning is not a problem for drain tanking.
8) Drain tanking is more expensive from durability loss.
Given the discussion is on efficient leveling, this is completely irrelevant. Not to mention grasping at straws.
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And though it's not relevant to the discussion - the build will do very well for you in PvE instances and raids at 70.
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