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Fear

Fear

4% of base mana	30 yd range

1.7 sec cast
Requires Warlock
Requires level 14

Strikes fear in the enemy, disorienting it for up to 20 sec.

Damage caused may cancel fear. Limit 1 target.

Buff

Spell Details

Duration

n/a

School

Shadow

Mechanic

n/a

Dispel type

n/a

GCD category

Normal

Cost

4% of base mana

Range

30 yards (Medium)

Cast time

1.7 seconds

Cooldown

n/a

GCD

1.5 seconds

Effect

Dummy
Mechanic: Fleeing
Server-side script

Flags

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Ranged DPS
Overview -
Tips and Specs

Comments

Comment by bangy

Note that this is not instant cast, despite common belief. Nor does it fear you for an hour, as many also believe.
This spell is useful in many aspects, offensively and defensively.

Firstly, it is a great crowd control. However, be careful when using in instances (in fact, try not to use at all), as it may fear a mob into the wrong direction, creating a lot of aggro and bringing back many friends along with it to the party.
You can fear your target if you're about to die, to give you some time to either flee or put some spells up. However, this is not great, as the 1.5 sec and mana can be put onto a finishing move.
You can DoT up your target and fear - the damage does not always break the effect, so you can watch your fleeing enemy die in the distance!

With many uses to this, use it well, and it will serve you well.

PvP trinkets, fear wards and some other methods can remove fear.

Comment by Nate

Ugg this move. What seperates warlocks from the other classes. As a destruction lock, I rarely remember to use this skill as the immolate after it will usually break the effect. If you are always used to seeing it break and your not using it to crowd control, i recomend using rank 1 to save mana

It always seem like your fears never last, and your enemies fears last forever... haha

Comment by Ilikeguitaralot

This ability is currently bugged and apparently Blizzard is too lazy to fix it. "Damage caused may interrupt the effect" is a false statement, as you can be dotted and have multiple targets pounding on you at a time and will still be feared. This has brought up what people call "chain fearing" which makes Warlocks the most overpowered class in the game in most players opinions.

Comment by Wyrd

For soloing, this skill is god mode. You can dot-dot-dot-fear and most mobs will die, or be close to it when the fear runs out. many elite mobs also can be feared, making it possible to kite them with the dots and take out a mob many times your level.

Comment by jball2k

Having played a Warlock, it most definately CAN break on damage and does so quite often.

Fear can only last around 10 seconds in PvP anyways, not to mention there are quite a few ways to break it.

Comment by frmorrison

Direct damage will increase the chance of breaking, but DoT damage has less of a chance.

Will last a max of 10 seconds in BGs and Arenas.

Comment by Shadowvoid

NOTE* Blizzard is currently renameing this spell to I WIN also adding a chat macro to be entered when you cast this. Quote "U ARE GOING TO GET PWNED SO PLZ GO TO THE LOCK FORUMS AND SAY ZOMGZWTFBBQSAUCE NERF LOKZ THEY R N00BZ NERF THEM!" end quote. The new changes will make this spell even more fun and exiting!

Comment by Mac31892

This skill is now useless in almost all situations. With a recent patch any damage will break the effect. Even dot damage. This means in pvp the only use is very limited crowd control.
In pve if this skill is used as crowd control the mob will more than likely aggro more surrounding mobs to come to the fight. This makes it 100% useless unless your fighting in a very large area with no mobs as far as you can see.
Blizzard nerfs fear almost every patch, and it looks like they finally bridged the gap and made a warlocks most useful tool become a fond memory

edit: ok I spoke too soon, This does not brake nearly as much as most people, and myseld origionally thought. Thats for pve and pvp. This will now brake easier, but you can still get a few dots off, and mabey start to immolateor shadow bolt. Dont worry everyone f.e.a.r lives

Comment by Fizzleboy

Is this ability supposed to be used when you're about 37 to kill a normal mob?? > Cause I think pet taunt sucks, and I get aggro often.

Comment by smdante

Er... fearing every mob while soloing isn't exactly normal, but it's always a viable choice, I guess.

Take note that there are talents in Demonology to improve VW taunts and Afflict allows for you to drain tank with your imp as a mana battery.

Comment by CthUlUh

F ear
E verything
A nd
R ecover

Comment by Demurr

I just can't resist mentioning. The fear icon above teh feared mob / player is damn funny =D

Comment by Toldry

The only thing you have to fear is fear itself.

Comment by aukid32

most overpowered ability in the game

Comment by thantik

Most people don't pay attention to the patch notes enough to know this first-hand so I'll put it here on wowhead. They changed DoT damage to apply the "breaking" math upon application. Which means if you stack your DoTs FIRST, and THEN fear, you shouldn't get a break unless they happen to use trinkets, etc. Obviously this isn't ALWAYS an option, but keeping it in mind can help you out, especially when ganking people without anti-fear methods.

Comment by loppiera

this need a 30 second cool down atleast

Comment by joeyb101

i used to totally suck until i got fear now i can easily pone a lvl 20 with my lvl 14

Comment by Rorschach

Noob question...

Does anyone know how long the person is immune to fear before the cycle restarts again?

Not that I would ever have the opportunity to use fear that much... I just want to know xD

Comment by tofujr

Without fear, a Warlock is mostly useless, PvP wise.

Comment by flicker

is fear breaking early on DoTs with this new patch? i didn't have a warlock before 3.0 but the glyph description suggests that now it breaks on a certain fixed amount of damage instead of "on application of DoTs" as the above poster says

Comment by vladamirjones

People complain more about this spell than any other I have seen. Unfortunately, Fear is no where near good enough to deserve the complaints. The cast time, breakability, short range and enormous plethora of racials and items to cancel it make fear my least used spell in Battlegrounds. Warlocks Unite! Buff Fear!

Comment by flicker

Well.. how much damage can someone take before this breaks, un glyphed, and at lvl 80 on pvp targets? 3k? 4k?

The People has the right to know!112

Comment by eromrab

Start listing gear that improves fear... is this the only gear out there?

Hateful Gladiator's Felshroud

Any trinkets or anything?

Comment by Belse

Fear is one of the few really unbalanced spells. If used against a player without counters it's OP, but if used against an enemy with a counter (trinket for example) it's almost useless but can still help you get a cast of. This is one of the reasons warlocks are so hard to balance.

Comment by Superunknown

Almost utterly useless for pvp. If you get 1.5 secs to cast this, your enemy is hitting you with balloons.

Comment by reflectivesol

Just a heads up but it seems like all undead mobs I've come across are immune to fear.

Comment by Heath

Fear has such a pretty icon ;)

Comment by Secarious

As many dots there are on the mobs as more quickly the fear will be vanished from it.

Comment by shadyz

omg...this gonna be instant cast when cata comes

Comment by Downrated

As sad as it is, if you fear somebody close to a cliff, they will not run over the edge and die :(.
Instead they will change direction once they reach the edge.

Comment by Aratheras

The only "IWIN" button without a cooldown.

Comment by tasuki

Except every class, bar rogues, have a way to counter Fear directly:

paladin: Divine Shield
druid: Berserk & feral forms can have a high chance for reduced Fear duration
priest: Fear Ward
shaman: Tremor totem
warrior: Berserker Rage or Recklessness
hunter: The Beast Within talent and the pet talent Bestial Wrath
mage: Counterspell and Ice Block
death knight: Lichborne

Undead: Will of the Forsaken
Humans: Every Man for Himself

All players classes also have easily accessible pvp counter trinkets, such as "Insignia of the Horde", "Insignia of the Alliance" or the "Inherited Insignia of the Horde", "Inherited Insignia of the Alliance" BoA trinkets.

Rogues with opening superiority due to stealth and Sap as well as diminishing returns on being chain Fear'd as well as Cloak of Shadows easily decimate all but the most experienced, prepared and geared warlocks. They don't need a counter - they are effectively as a whole class a counter to warlocks.

Thanks to askemil for pointing out the missing DK item spell!

Comment by WarlockHolmes

This is a great warlock ability... So cheap though. Chain fear a mob or a player while putting DoTs and attacking him, he'll be helpless...

Comment by haloman800

If I'm not mistaken, there was once a time in BC where you could constantly fear a target without diminishing returns.

I did this a lot in arena. DoT up the healer, fear the other.

This is by far my favorite spell as a Warlock.

Comment by Icoo

I can report that this does NOT break on damage...

not EVER, EVER, EVER does this break.

I have been the test subject on my mage a few times, it just wont break.

Comment by Ranguvar13

You are looking at possibly the single most cried-about ability in World of Warcraft.

Comment by brabebhin

i have a question

can this spell be casted when the target is not in front of you?(yeh im a noob at this game).because all other spells can not.maybe i had some lag spike, i don't know, but i need some clarification on this. thanks

Comment by ProgressiveOne

What I'd be interested in ...
Is there any way to calculate the dmg that is used to break it?
As in cataclysm it will be a powerful cc in dungeons due to the fact that it is able to stand an amount of dmg before the target rages through your grp again <_<

Comment by Bumluffa

As of 4.0.3 Fear has now been buffed to a 30 yard range

This should be a great help to warlocks everywhere

Comment by ExQR

Now fear break's on 8000-8400 dmg or near it.
Test it some times with direct dmg and dots. Bane of agony with 760 dmg tick break fear on 11 tick. Fel flame with average dmg 2100 break fear on 4 use.

Comment by wodaen

Fear is awesome. For a mere 2 shadow mana I make my pet immune to everything but undead and mechanical npcs. It lasts until someone dispels it or my pet dies.

Comment by natonos

Man this ability is weak now. When im in batleground and dots up the target with all available spells it breaks 100% at next tick. So often it happened that I didnt even get to put another spell on my target, that it broke leaving the dam pally near me to butcher me. I hope blizz does something soon cause a CC that last sometimes not even 1 full second is of no use. Also the dam spell counts even the dmg absorbed cause of rezilience I think, cause my targets dont even get a pinch from my dots but fear breaks. I usually try to use whiplash from succy cause its more usefull or axe trow from felguard cause fear has such a low reliability in my case. Warlock is a nice class but considering that his base CC isn't reliable át all im thinking to switch on other class for PVP. Also blizz u suck wars and rogues still butcher locks like crazy and u dont even get them 20% of from their full health and trust me ive been playing lock for 3 years now and im no noob.

Comment by natonos

Oh did i forgot to mention that in cata pala,war,dk have 4 sec interrupt with 10 sec cd that makes this ability really 100% useless if u are less than 20 yardz wich u are pretty almost all the time. 4 sec of shadow school lock usually means u can go and eat cause u really gone die once more.

Comment by simkaest

This is the most useless CC in the game I think.. Not only the duration is so low, it actually breaks so easily too. Something is seriously wrong with that!

Comment by Pipkins

Turns into sleep when in a demon form(Metamorphosis or Dark Apotheosis), meaning demonology locks can use this and banish to medium term cc any NPCS other than mechanicals.

Comment by xXzCodProxXz

Imo this ability and polymorth(signature moves of mage/lock) suck now
READ WHY don't just downvote

Look at the range and the cast time.
Most know what all classes now have some kind of an instant stun/interrupt with a 40 yard range which makes these obsolete and given what warlocks and mages have an array of stuns which have low cd there is very little reason to even keep it on your toolbars

Thus effectively locking out your shadowschool so half of your toolbar is out so all in all you are just screwing yourself over casting it
Good luck getting it off in low-mid level pvp with all the shield slam going on, I doubt you will even get a cast time off

We can only hope what classes will get their ccs removed or diminished

don't post what your "feared healer x" and caused his team to die because most likely he had bad positioning; I am not sure what healer allows them to come into a 30yd range when they mostly have 40 yd spells to work with(holy or disc priest say)

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