Affliction Warlock DPS Spec, Builds, and Talents - Dragonflight 10.2.7 (2024)

Last updated on May 07, 2024 at 11:20by Motoko40 comments

With the introduction of the new talent system and the ability to freelychange points and share/import builds free of consumables costs. At the sametime, out of combat, it is highly advised to adapt the build based on thetype of situation at hand.

3.

Talent Explanations for Affliction Warlocks

3.1.

Tier 1 (Rows 1-4) Class Talents For Affliction Warlock

See Also

How to Unlock Warlock Hidden Artifact Weapon Appearances - World of Warcraft Dragonflight - Warcraft TavernUlthalesh, the Deadwind HarvesterAffliction Warlock DPS Mythic+ Tips - Dragonflight 10.2.7

3.1.1.

Talents for all situations

Talent	Reason for taking
Demon Skin	Passive damage mitigation
Fel Armor	Passive damage mitigation
Burning Rush	Greatly increases Warlock mobility
Fel Domination	Offers instant pet swapping or resummon in case of an untimely death.
Mortal Coil	A percentage-based heal on a very short cooldown, which makes potions trivialin comparison.
Curses of Enfeeblement	Gives access to Strong utility curses while opening the path for Demonic Embrace.
Demonic Inspiration	DPS increase
Wrathful Minion	DPS increase

3.1.2.

Optional / flexible talents

Talent	Reason for taking
Fiendish Stride	Substantially reduces Burning Rush health cost while also increasingthe max speed.
Amplify Curse	Enable to empower Curses (which works with Vile Taint).
Banish	Useful to control Demons or Aberrations if the situation arises.
Demonic Embrace	Max HP increase, which works well with percentage-based mitigations such as Soul Leech and Dark Pact.

3.2.

Tier 2 (Rows 5-7) Class Talents For Affliction Warlock

3.2.1.

Talents for all situations

Talent	Reason for taking
Sweet Souls	Further increase the healing from Healthstones.
Demonic Gateway	The unique party/raid-wide movement tool exclusive to Warlocks can be usedto quickly relocate, move between locations at different heights, and skipotherwise mandatory pathways.
Dark Pact	Powerful defensive cooldown that increases the Warlock's effective healthpool.
Strength of Will	Increases the value of Unending Resolve to a more relevant 35%.
Socrethar's Guile	DPS increase.
Sargerei Technique	DPS increase.

3.2.2.

Optional / flexible talents

Talent	Reason for taking
Frequent Donor	Further reduces the cooldown of Dark Pact to match Mortal Coil.
Shadowfury	AoE stun for when the situation requires it
Dark Fury	Increases the frequency of use of Shadowfury.
Dark Accord instead of Strength of Will	In cases where the silence/interrupt immunity is valuable.
Lifeblood	When additional sustain is needed.

3.3.

Tier 3 (Rows 8-10) Class Talents For Affliction Warlock

In this section, there are DPS increase talents worth prioritizing

3.3.1.

Talents for all situations

Talent	Reason for taking
Soul Conduit	DPS increase
Grimoire of Synergy	DPS increase
Summon Soulkeeper or Inquisitor's Gaze	Both a DPS increase, the former is better suited for AoE situations and canadd a bit more burst. At the same time, the latter is the safe single targetchoice.
Soul Link	Extremely strong passive damage mitigation tool.
Soulburn	A powerful utility that can massively boost either the survivability or themobility of the Warlock, depending on what spell is used.

3.3.2.

Optional / flexible talents

Talent	Reason for taking
Grim Feast	Mostly used in tandem with Inevitable Demise to offer a marginal dpsincrease.
Profane Bargain	Increases the potency of Soul Link at critical health.
Fel Synergy	Helps mitigate the health loss from Soul Link, especially on pets.
Resolute Barrier	Cooldown reduction for Unending Resolve.

4.

Affliction Warlock Talents

The following section will go through Affliction Warlock Talentswith a focus on PvE scenarios.

4.1.

Tier 1 (Rows 1-4) Affliction Warlock Talents

The first section is where you choose the general direction of the build,whether AoE is needed, and to what extent.

4.1.1.

Talents for all situations

Talent	Reason for taking
Malefic Rapture	Main Shard spender
Unstable Affliction	Strongest single target DoT, which also retains value in multitargetsituations thanks to the shard generation on target death and further synergiesdown the tree.
Writhe in Agony	A passive damage increase on the second strongest DoT, which is relevant inany conceivable scenario.
Kindled Malice	Damage increase on spenders, regardless of the situation.

4.1.2.

Optional / flexible talents

Talent	Reason for taking
Nightfall	Single target damage increase.
Shadow Embrace	Single target (and technically up to 3 targets with proper management)damage increase.
Seed of Corruption	AoE specific shard spender, and a quick way to spread Corruption onmultiple targets in a single cast.
Sow the Seeds	Increase the strength of Seed of Corruption making it the betterchoice for AoE over Malefic Rapture.
Dark Virtuosity	Single target DPS increase.
Shadow Embrace	Damage increase in single target mostly but is relevant up to 3 targets aslong as either Shadow Bolt or Drain Soul are frequently usedin the rotation.

4.2.

Tier 2 (Rows 5-7) Affliction Warlock Talents

A continuation of the previous section where to decide between AoE or singletarget options.

4.2.1.

Talents for all situations

Talent	Reason for taking
Drain Soul	Direct upgrade over Shadow Bolt, relevant both in single target dueto the damage increase, in cleave through better application of Shadow Embrace and with multiple targets thanks to the shard generation.
Absolute Corruption or Siphon Life	Infinite duration on Corruption goes a long way to continue damaging targetsthat are out of range or focus on something else. Siphon Life instead isanother single target (up to 3 targets) damage increase.
Vile Taint	High damage cooldown-based abilities with a little point cost with theupside of easier Agony application.
Soul Swap	Should be considered for the strategic position in the tree coupled with thelow point investment or for opening pulls when saving 1 global cooldown isbetter than spending an extra shard.
Grimoire of Sacrifice	Single target damage increase does not scale with additional targetsbut rather, the single target proc will affect different targets. Pickedto path down more easily.

4.2.2.

Optional / flexible talents

Talent	Reason for taking
Pandemic Invocation	Damage increase as long as there are DoTs to refresh manually.
Inevitable Demise	Turn Drain Life in a noticeable damage increase.
Soul Flame	Great passive cleave with the only requirement of tagging an enemy that isabout to die.
Focused Malignancy	Single target damage increase.
Withering Bolt	Offers a damage increase on anything that is not heavy AoE spam.
Sacrolash's Dark Strike	Mediocre damage increase coupled with the utility of extending the Curses.

4.3.

Tier 3 (Rows 8-10) Affliction Warlock Talents

4.3.1.

Talents for all situations

Talent	Reason for taking
Creeping Death	Damage increase for DoTs, mostly taken to progress down the path.
Xavius' Gambit	A very powerful damage modifier for the already strongest DoT.
Dread Touch	Another very strong single target rotation-defining DPS increase.
Tormented Crescendo	Helps alleviate the heavy shard cost of Dread Touch
Soul Rot	Required for the set bonus interaction; also pairs wellwith Inevitable Demise.
Soul-Eater's Gluttony	Increases the frequency of Soul Rot and thus tier set bonusesactivations.

4.3.2.

Optional / flexible talents

Talent	Reason for taking
Doom Blossom	For a more cleave-oriented option over Dread Touch.
Haunt	Debuff on target that increases all damage from the Warlock. Useful in anysituation until AoE spam.
Seized Vitality	Mainly used to reach the following node.
Haunted Soul	Powerful damage multiplier on periodic effect spells.
Summon Darkglare	A fairly decent cooldown for a minimal investment cost.
Malevolent Visionary	An alternative to Haunted Soul with slightly higher damagewith a more rigid cooldown management.
Grim Reach	Turns Summon Darkglare into a potent AoE cooldown.
Wrath of Consumption	Noticeable damage increase, which triggers targets dying, mostlyuseful in cleave situation when there is no Seed of Corruptionspam.
Dark Harvest	Decent damage increase, which is mainly relevant in AoE scenarioswhere Soul Rot can cleave.

Do note that the builds suggested above do not account for specific fightsin the current raid tier; that said, we have a dedicated page that coversboss-by-boss talent recommendations, which you can find linked below.

For specific Mythic+ advice, which typically involves having a set-up thatcan perform both in single target *and* AoE, this set-up can also be influencedby affixes and other things like party composition and pull layout. Check outour dedicated M+ page below.

Since several talent choices affect your gameplay, we recommend reading ourrotation page linked below to find out how to adapt your playstyle and prioritybased on your selected talents.

Other than a handful of DPS increase nodes, the path progression is generallyflexible and allows one to opt in or out of specific utilities that may not berelevant in a specific situation. The following sections will highlight the keytalents while suggesting what to pick to progress down the tree.

For detailed information about each talent, follow the link to the spellSummary page:

Under our Talents section, there is the option to enter "War Mode." EnablingWar Mode provides the following benefits:

• PvP talents enabled in the outdoor world;
• 10% increase in World Quest rewards at maximum level;
• 10% more experience gained while leveling;
• Earn Conquest Points, which can reward gear every week.

With the benefits of enabling War Mode for leveling and PvE content, youshould enable the feature. In most situations, this will allow maximum returnsdespite the risks. You will make yourself available for open-world PvP, and thepossibility to be "ganked" while leveling or doing World Quests exists.

In this section, we will rank the PvP talents best for leveling and doingsolo / small group PvE content. Below is a ranking of both General PvP Talentsand Affliction Warlock-specific PvP talents.

1. Essence Drain stacks a damage reduction effect on enemies that aredamaged by your Drain Life. You can reduce their damage by up to 25%,which greatly increases your ability to survive and sustain.
2. Bonds of Fel allows to burst targets by dragging them away from themarked location.
3. Bane of Fragility reduces the target's maximum health by up to 10% by15 seconds, which is desirable when setting up bursts.
4. Casting Circle is a 1-minute cooldown ability that creates an areawhere you are immune to silence and interrupts for 8 seconds. Removessilence/interrupt immunity from Unending Resolve.
5. Gateway Mastery increase your gateway's range by 20 yards andreduces the duration of the debuff placed on players using it by 15 seconds,making it a good choice when increased mobility is needed.
6. Nether Ward summons a shield lasting 3 seconds and reflecting allharmful spells targeted at you.
7. Call Observer is only relevant when dealing with a lot of castingmobs.
8. Precognition and Shadow Rift are mostly irrelevant in thecontext of leveling.

1. Rampant Afflictions increase the target limit for Unstable Affliction to 3.
2. Rapid Contagion is a decent cooldown, primarily useful for Unstable Affliction.
3. Rot and Decay can be handy in situations with high sustained damageintake. Combining this with Essence Drain dramatically increases yoursurvivability and sustainability and opens many doors for soloing difficultcontent.
4. Bane of Shadows causes damage over time effects to strike anadditional time for 20% of their actual damage while active. This offers alittle bit of extra burst damage on a short cooldown.
5. Oblivion is a 45 seconds cooldown burst ability that deals ShadowDamage over 3 seconds to a target increased by 10% for each damage over timeeffect applied, up to 30%.