Destruction Warlock Raid Guide
Last Updated:October 7, 2024|Change Log|FAQ
Welcome to the Destruction Warlock Raid guide for the World of Warcraft patch 11.0! This guide covers everything you need to know to understand your character! Are you starting out and leveling up from 70? Check out the leveling guide!
Overview
Hero Talents
- Hellcaller and Diabolist perform similary in pure single-target, with Diabolist being slightly ahead. Hellcaller excells in spread out cleave through Wither while Diabolist has a lot of passive AoE due to Diabolic Rituals.
- Spending a Soul Shard starts a cycle of one of 3 different Diabolic Rituals.
- Diabolic Ritual: Overlord
- Diabolic Ritual: Mother of Chaos
- Diabolic Ritual: Pit Lord
- Starts on 1. again.
- Only 1 Diabolic Ritual can be up at a time and each turns into their respective Demonic Art after it expires which is triggered after you spend your next Soul Shard:
- Demonic Art: Overlord
- A Fel Lord jumps at your target and applies Cloven Soul for 15 seconds.
- Demonic Art:Mother of Chaos
- Deals damage to your target and turns your next Incinerate into Infernal Bolt which generates 2 Soul Shards.
- Demonic Art: Pit Lord
- Summons a Pit Lord that attacks your target with Felseeker and turns your next Chaos Bolt into Ruination which deals a large amount of AoE damage.
- Demonic Art: Overlord
- Additionally, whenever a Demonic Art is active, your Soul Shard spending abilities benefit from Touch of Rancora.
- The duration of Diabolic Rituals is by 1 additional second per Soul Shard spent while Summon Infernal is up due to Infernal Machine.
- Your Summon Infernal is further empowered through Abyssal Dominion.
- Your Immolate is turned into Wither.
- Wither has no cast time or FACING requirement.
- You have access to a 1 minute cooldown called Malevolence.
- Wither can stack up and has multiple neat interactions with different talents which can increase its stack count or have other benefits.
- Spending Soul Shards on damaging spells increases the stacks of Wither by 1 and has a chance to gain an additional stack due to Blackened Soul and Bleakheart Tactics.
- Casting Malevolence increases all active Wither stacks by 3 while each Chaos Bolt adds 1 additional stack during its duration.
- Mark of Peroth'arn gives Wither the chance to add a stack whenever it crits.
- Whenever Blackened Soul deals damage you have a chance to gain Flashpoint stacks through Seeds of Their Demise even if you are not currently talented into Flashpoint.
- Wither has a built-in mechanic which consumes its' accumulated stacks one after another for more damage. This mechanic is called Corrupted.
- The Corrupted state of Wither is triggered by the following:
- Chance whenever Wither gains a stack.
- If Wither reaches 8 stacks.
- If the target Wither is on reaches 20% or is below 20% already.
- When Malevolence is up.
- The Corrupted state of Wither is triggered by the following:
Talents
When to use this Spec
Use this spec if want to do primarily Single-Target damage. You can use the same spec-specific talents with Hellcaller as well.
Gameplay Altering Talents
Discover all talents that significantly alter your gameplay within the Spec and Class Talent trees. This section gives a concise overview of these talents and their applications but for a more detailed look check out the Rotation and Deep Dive sections below.
Spec Tree
- Shadowburn
- Very strong 1 Soul Shard cost spender, especially if your target is below 30% health.
- Roaring Blaze
- It is crucial to keep this buff active as much as possible through proper Conflagrate usage.
- Cataclysm
- Another way of dealing upfront damage and refreshing Immolate at the same time.
- Soul Fire
- A hard hitting spell which is amplified by Roaring Blaze, it is also further enhanced by Decimation.
- Ritual of Ruin
- Passively nets you free Chaos Bolt casts and also spawns an Overfiend that generates more Soul Shards.
- Summon Infernal
- Your main cooldown for burst windows, this is enhanced by Rain of Chaos.
Class Tree
- Soulburn
- Enhances multiple utility spells, mainly used together with Demonic Circle: Teleport, Healthstone, Demonic Gateway and Drain Life.
- Sweet Souls
- Only works if other people use the Healthstones that you created.
- Soul Conduit
- Sometimes alters your cast sequence by refunding Soul Shards.
- Pact of Gluttony
- Massive for survivability since it alters your Demonic Healthstone to be useable multiple times per combat.
- Combo this together with Lifeblood for extra leech upon use.
Hero Talents
- Soul-Etched Circles
- Your default pick since you rarely use Howl of Terror.
- Infernal Machine
- Outperforms Cruelty of Kerxan.
- Infernal Bulwark
- An additional absorb is usually better in most scenarios.
- Good to pair with Dark Accord and Resolute Barrier for more frequent uses.
When to use this Spec
Use this spec if you're fighting 2-3 enemies for an extended period of the fight. If the fight has a decent amount of adds spawning that die rather quickly you can also spec Hellcaller with the same talents.
Talent Adjustments
Listing all the changes within the Class and Spec tree compared to the default build.
Spec Tree
- Added
- Havoc
- This serves as one of your strongest tools to damage two targets at once or generate additional Soul Shards in AoE situations.
- Havoc
- Removed
- Burn to Ashes removed for Havoc.
When to use this Spec
Use this spec if you're fighting 4 or more enemies for an extended period of the fight. You can use the same spec-specific talents with Hellcaller as well.
Talent Adjustments
Listing all the changes within the Class and Spec tree compared to the default build.
Spec Tree
- Added
- Inferno
- Greatly increases Inferno output.
- Pyrogenics
- Increases fire damage done to enemies affected by Rain of Fire.
- Havoc
- This serves as one of your strongest tools to damage two targets at once or generate additional Soul Shards in AoE situations.
- Inferno
- Removed
- Backlash removed for Havoc.
- Explosive Potential removed for Pyrogenics.
- Cataclysm changed to Inferno.
Rotation
Tier Set
- 2-Set: Incinerate critical strike chance increased by 20%. Conflagrate critical strike chance increased by 25%.
- 4-Set: When Conflagrate critically strikes, your Fire damage is increased by 5% for 6 sec.
Single-Target
Opener
- Your goal is to spend as many Soul Shards as possible without wasting resources while also keeping relevant abilities on cooldown.
- Always cast Immolate unless it was already applied by either Soul Fire or Cataclysm.
- Use your active trinkets, Tempered Potion and racials like Blood Fury or Berserking after using Summon Infernal.
- You can min-max your opener by pre-cycling through Diabolic Ritual: Overlord and Diabolic Ritual: Mother of Chaos before the pull starts to get Demonic Art: Pit Lord as your first Diabolic Ritual on the pull which provides you with additional burst due to the sheer amount of damage Ruination does.
Priority List
This is a general priority you aim to maintain throughout the fight.
- Keep up Immolate on your target.
- Cast Ruination if Ruination is up.
- Cast Chaos Bolt if Demonic Art: Overlord, Demonic Art: Mother of Chaos or Demonic Art: Pit Lord is up.
- Cast Shadowburn if you are capping on Soul Shards or if you have 2 stacks.
- Cast Chaos Bolt if you are capping on Soul Shards.
- Cast Infernal Bolt if you are below 3 Soul Shards and Infernal Bolt is up.
- Cast Conflagrate to keep up Roaring Blaze, or if you have 2 stacks.
- Cast Soul Fire with Decimation up.
- Cast Shadowburn to keep up Eradication.
- Cast Chaos Bolt to keep up Eradication.
- CastSoul Fire if you're not overcapping on Soul Shards and have Backdraft up.
- Cast Conflagrate to generate Soul Shards.
- Cast Incinerate to generate Soul Shards.
Opener
- Your goal is to spend as many Soul Shards as possible without wasting resources while also keeping relevant abilities on cooldown.
- Always cast Wither unless it was already applied by either Soul Fire or Cataclysm.
- Use your active trinkets, Tempered Potion and racials like Blood Fury or Berserking after using Summon Infernal.
Priority List
This is a general priority you aim to maintain throughout the fight.
- Keep up Wither on your target.
- Cast Shadowburn if you are capping on Soul Shards or if you have 2 stacks.
- Cast Chaos Bolt if you are capping on Soul Shards.
- Cast Conflagrate to keep up Roaring Blaze, or if you have 2 stacks.
- Cast Soul Fire with Decimation up.
- Cast Shadowburn to keep up Eradication.
- Cast Chaos Bolt to keep up Eradication.
- CastSoul Fire if you're not overcapping on Soul Shards and have Backdraft up.
- Cast Conflagrate to generate Soul Shards.
- Cast Incinerate to generate Soul Shards
Multi-Target
Opener
- Below, you see an example of how your opener looks like using the recommended Multi-Target talent spec and depending on the number of Soul Conduit procs, among other factors.
- Always cast Immolate, unless it was already applied by Soul Fire or Cataclysm.
- Use your active trinkets, Tempered Potion, and racials like Blood Fury or Berserking after using Summon Infernal.
- You can min-max your opener by pre-cycling through Diabolic Ritual: Overlord and Diabolic Ritual: Mother of Chaos before the pull starts to get Demonic Art: Pit Lord as your first Diabolic Ritual on the pull which provides you with additional burst due to the sheer amount of damage Ruination does.
2+ Target Priority List
- Keep up Immolate on both targets.
- Cast Ruination if Ruination is up.
- Cast Havoc on a secondary target.
- Cast Chaos Bolt if Demonic Art: Overlord, Demonic Art: Mother of Chaos or Demonic Art: Pit Lord is up.
- Cast Shadowburn if you are capping on Soul Shards or if you have 2 stacks.
- Cast Chaos Bolt if you are capping on Soul Shards.
- Cast Infernal Bolt if you are below 3 Soul Shards and Infernal Bolt is up.
- Cast Conflagrate to keep up Roaring Blaze, or if you have 2 stacks.
- Cast Soul Fire with Decimation up.
- Cast Shadowburn to keep up Eradication.
- Cast Chaos Bolt to keep up Eradication.
- CastSoul Fire if you're not overcapping on Soul Shards and have Backdraft up.
- Cast Conflagrate to generate Soul Shards.
- Cast Incinerate to generate Soul Shards.
Opener
- Always cast Wither unless it was already applied by either Soul Fire or Cataclysm.
- Use your active trinkets, Tempered Potion and racials like Blood Fury or Berserking after using Summon Infernal.
Priority List
This is a general priority you aim to maintain throughout the fight.
- Keep up Wither on both targets.
- Cast Havoc on a secondary target.
- Cast Shadowburn if you are capping on Soul Shards or if you have 2 stacks.
- Cast Chaos Bolt if you are capping on Soul Shards.
- Cast Conflagrate to keep up Roaring Blaze, or if you have 2 stacks.
- Cast Soul Fire with Decimation up.
- Cast Shadowburn to keep up Eradication.
- Cast Chaos Bolt to keep up Eradication.
- CastSoul Fire if you're not overcapping on Soul Shards and have Backdraft up.
- Cast Conflagrate to generate Soul Shards.
- Cast Incinerate to generate Soul Shards
AoE
Opener
- This opener can vary by a lot depending on your Soul Shards generation. Below you see one variation of an opener on 4 targets assuming that you're playing the recommended Diabolist AoE talent spec.
- Always cast Immolate unless it was already applied by either Soul Fire or Cataclysm.
- Use your active trinkets, Tempered Potion, and racials like Blood Fury or Berserking after using Summon Infernal.
- You can min-max your opener by pre-cycling through Diabolic Ritual: Overlord and Diabolic Ritual: Mother of Chaos before the pull starts to get Demonic Art: Pit Lord as your first Diabolic Ritual on the pull which provides you with additional burst due to the sheer amount of damage Ruination does.
Priority List
- Keep up Immolate on targets that last over 9 seconds.
- Cast Havoc on a secondary target.
- Cast Chaos Bolt or Rain of Fire if you are about to cap on Soul Shards.
- Cast Cataclysm on cooldown if talented.
- Cast Conflagrate to keep up Roaring Blaze or if you have 2 stacks.
- Cast Soul Fire on cooldown especially with a Decimation proc.
- Cast Chaos Bolt to keep up Eradication or Rain of Fire.
- Cast Shadowburn if something is about to die within 5 seconds.
- Cast Conflagrate to generate Soul Shards.
- Cast Incinerate to generate Soul Shards
Opener
- This opener can vary by a lot depending on your Soul Shards generation. Below you see one variation of an opener on 4 targets assuming that you're playing the recommended Hellcaller AoE talent spec.
- Always cast Wither unless it was already applied by either Soul Fire or Cataclysm.
- Use your active trinkets, Tempered Potion and racials like Blood Fury or Berserking after using Summon Infernal.
Priority List
- Keep up Wither on targets that last over 9 seconds.
- Cast Havoc on a secondary target.
- Cast Chaos Bolt or Rain of Fire if you are about to cap on Soul Shards.
- Cast Cataclysm on cooldown if talented.
- Cast Conflagrate to keep up Roaring Blaze or if you have 2 stacks.
- Cast Soul Fire on cooldown especially with a Decimation proc.
- Cast Chaos Bolt to keep up Eradication or Rain of Fire.
- Cast Shadowburn if something is about to die within 5 seconds.
- Cast Conflagrate to generate Soul Shards.
- Cast Incinerate to generate Soul Shards
Deep Dive
Conflagrate, Backdraft and Roaring Blaze
- Make sure to space out your Conflagrates to ensure a high uptime on Roaring Blaze.
- Use your Backdraft charges on Soul Fire then Chaos Bolt and otherwise on Incinerate.
- Don't cast Soul Fire or Channel Demonfire without Roaring Blaze present on your target.
Min-maxing Eradication
- Your casted spell still gets the benefit from Eradication if it finishes before the previous Eradication fades from the target.
- You aim to have a consistent uptime of Eradication to maximize your damage output.
Below, you find an example of how to correctly manage the Eradication timing assuming it takes the Chaos Bolt 2 seconds to reach its target.
- Shadowburn also applies Eradication but doesn't have the added benefit of "travel time" since it's an instant cast spell.
Maximizing your Havoc
To maximize your damage while Havoc is active you need to spend as many casts on Chaos Bolt or Rain of Fire as possible. For this to happen you should enter the Havoc window with as many of the following conditions as possible:
- A high amount of Soul Shards or Soul Shard income.
- Conflagrate should be close to 2 stacks.
- Refresh Immolates so they won't drop off during your Havoc window.
- Pre-build Ritual of Ruin stacks.
Below is an example of what happens when you correctly manage your Havoc window.
- This is not a fixed rotation; This is just one example of how to play during your Havoc window. Soul Conduit procs, critical hits and Soul Fire resets can increase your Soul Shard generation, allowing you to spend more Soul Shards on Chaos Bolt or Rain of Fire.
Using Rain of Fire vs. Chaos Bolt / Shadowburn
The way you spend Soul Shards varies based on the number of targets you're fighting, whether Havoc is active or not and some additional conditions. The table below should help you reach a decision quickly.
Condition | Is Havoc active? | Which spell do you use? |
---|---|---|
Fighting 1-3 enemies | No | Chaos Bolt / Shadowburn |
Fighting 2-6 enemies | Yes | Chaos Bolt / Shadowburn |
Fighting >=4 enemies | No | Rain of Fire |
Fighting >6 enemies | Irrelevant | Rain of Fire |
Targets are moving | Irrelevant | Chaos Bolt / Shadowburn |
Deal priority damage? | Irrelevant | Chaos Bolt / Shadowburn |
While moving/disrupted and/or you are about to overcap on Soul Shards. | Irrelevant | Shadowburn / Rain of Fire |
Targets are dying? | Irrelevant | Shadowburn |
Condition | Is Havoc active? | Which spell do you use? |
---|---|---|
Fighting 1-3 enemies | No | Chaos Bolt / Shadowburn |
Fighting 2-3 enemies | Yes | Chaos Bolt / Shadowburn |
Fighting >=3 enemies | No | Rain of Fire |
Fighting >4 enemies | Irrelevant | Rain of Fire |
Targets are moving | Irrelevant | Chaos Bolt / Shadowburn |
Deal priority damage? | Irrelevant | Chaos Bolt / Shadowburn |
While moving/disrupted and/or you are about to overcap on Soul Shards. | Irrelevant | Shadowburn / Rain of Fire |
Targets are dying? | Irrelevant | Shadowburn |
Understanding Mechanics
Rotational min-maxing is just one aspect of mastering a specialization, but there are numerous other key mechanics that influence your performance. Use the following guides to improve them.
Nerub-ar Palace
← Scroll for more Bosses →
Offensive Cooldown Usage
Boss Tips
- You can immune Stalker Netting on Heroic difficulty if you use Soulburn together with Demonic Circle: Teleport or are talented into Soul-Etched Circles.
- Place a Demonic Gateway away from the boss to help your raid quickly escape when they are pulled towards the boss during Carnivorous Contest.
- Additionally, a Demonic Gateway can be used during Ready to Feed to speed up the feeding process of the boss.
- You can also utilize Burning Rush and Demonic Circle to feed the boss additional Chunky Visceras.
Offensive Cooldown Usage
If you're assigned to Group 1:
If you're assigned to Group 2:
- Do note that the length of the fight impacts your cooldown usage heavily. If your fight lasts shorter than 6 minutes you use your Summon Infernal on pull followed by using it after every Goresplatter.
Defensive Cooldown Usage
If you're assigned to Group 1:
If you're assigned to Group 2:
Boss Tips
- Use Demonic Circle to easily jump over the Spewing Hemorrhage geysers to save globals.
- You can outplay Goresplatter easily by pre-placing a Demonic Circle and Demonic Gateway. Use the Demonic Gateway first to get away from the Boss and use Demonic Circle: Teleport to get back. This way you are not forced to run through the Black Blood and take unnecessary damage.
Offensive Cooldown Usage
Boss Tips
- Dark Pact whenever you are targeted by Decimate or Decimates are about to hit Cosmic Simulacrums.
Offensive Cooldown Usage
Boss Tips
- Stun Infested Spawn with Shadowfury.
- Move out with Spinneret's Strands and quickly teleport back with Demonic Circle: Teleport.
- Put down a Demonic Gateway to help your raid keep up with the boss when he changes his position.
Offensive Cooldown Usage
Defensive Cooldown Usage
Boss Tips
- Pre-use Demonic Circle: Teleport before the Unstable Web casts go out to immune their application entirely because of Soul-Etched Circles or Soulburn and Demonic Circle.
- Be careful of your Demonic Circle placement since you're going to trigger a Web Eruption at your Demonic Circle's location.
- Use Summon Felhunter on this boss to be able to interrupt Poison Burst with Spell Lock.
Offensive Cooldown Usage
Boss Tips
- Defensives on this fight in general are more of a reactive nature. You can only get 1 Twilight Massacre per Phase meaning you can use your Dark Pact and Unending Resolve for those hits.
- Use Unending Resolve as an emergency button. For example, if you get hit by multiple Twilight Massacres.
- Multiple stacks of Queensbane can be quite dangerous. Consider using a defensive!
- The main thing to keep an eye out for on this boss is the position of each Nether Rift. Their placement dictates how much you get pulled towards them. Try to position yourself in a way that each Nether Rift is at a similar distance to you.
Offensive Cooldown Usage
Defensive Cooldown Usage
Boss Tips
- Use Dark Pact at 8 seconds left on your pull timer to cover the first Venomous Rain while ensuring you have Dark Pact back ready for the second Venomous Rain as well.
- Pre-place a Demonic Circle and teleport back instantly after getting pulled in by Web Vortex to save yourself some movement.
- Alternatively, use Demonic Gateway to negate the pull in effect.
- Try to get some good distance from the adds that spawn from Call of the Swarm since they fixate the closest target.
Offensive Cooldown Usage
Defensive Cooldown Usage
Boss Tips
- Try to get access to a Blessing of Autumn from a Holy Paladin to be able to use your cooldowns more efficiently. Otherwise, you don't get the full value of them on Platform 1 in Phase 2.
- Utilize Demonic Circle together with Soulburn or Soul-Etched Circles to immune every root from Silken Tomb.
- Apply Curse of Tongues to Ascended Voidspeakers, Summoned Accolytes, and Chamber Acolytes to reduce damage taken.
- Use your Demonic Circle to quickly teleport over Frothing Gluttony without taking the Abyssal Conduit to reduce your damage taken.
- Demonic Gateways are very useful in Phase 3 right after the range bait during Gorge to quickly stack up for the upcoming Royal Condemnation.
Stat Priority
Understand your stat priority and the tertiary stats needed for optimal performance during Raid boss fights as a Destruction Warlock. For more detailed information, visit the Stats and Attributes guide.
Higher Item level items are better in most scenarios. For an accurate representation of what item to equip you should use Simcraft! A static "Stat Priority" is just a starting point and can easily shift depending on your individual gear.
- All secondary stats are affected by diminishing returns. Click here to learn more!
Tertiary
- Avoidance - Great stat to reduce the damage intake of "Area of Effect" abilities.
- Leech - Provides additional healing through damage dealing. The damage of your pets does not heal you thus Leech is a great tertiary for you since most of your damage is coming from your own spells.
- Speed - Niche tertiary that can be very useful and has been proven useful in the past. Makes playing certain mechanics a lot easier.
Gear
Slot | Item | Location |
---|---|---|
Head | Hexflame Coven's All-Seeing Eye | Tier / Catalyst |
Neck | Sureki Zealot's Insignia | Sikran |
Shoulder | Hexflame Coven's Altar | Tier / Catalyst |
Cloak | Wings of Shattered Sorrow | Rasha'nan |
Chest | Hexflame Coven's Ritual Harness | Tier / Catalyst |
Wrist | Skeinspinner's Duplicitous Cuffs | Silken Court |
Gloves | Hexflame Coven's Sleeves | Tier / Catalyst |
Belt | Burrower's Cinch | Ara-Kara, City of Echoes |
Legs | E.D.N.A. Stabilizers | The Stonevault |
Boots | Consecrated Slippers | Crafting |
Ring 1 | Seal of the Poisoned Pact | Queen Ansurek |
Ring 2 | Devout Zealot's Ring | The Dawnbreaker |
Trinket 1 | Spymaster's Web | Silken Court |
Trinket 2 | Mad Queen's Mandate | Queen Ansurek |
Weapon | Sovereign's Disdain | Queen Aurek |
Offhand | Vagabond's Torch | Crafting |
Below you are presented with a good list of farmable alternatives that are obtainable outside of WoW’s weekly lockout system. While replaced in time as you progress, these offer immediate character power.
Slot | Item | Location |
---|---|---|
Head | Crown of Enfeebled Bodies | Grim Batol |
Neck | "Emergency Stop" Keychain | The Stonevault |
Shoulder | Reanimator's Mantle | The Necrotic Wake |
Cloak | Anvilhide Cape | The Stonevault |
Chest | Arachnofrost Vest | City of Threads |
Wrist | Vitriolic Veinwoven Wraps | City of Threads |
Gloves | Tricksprite Gloves | City of Threads |
Belt | Burrower's Cinch | Ara-Kara, City of Echoes |
Legs | E.D.N.A. Stabilizers | The Stonevault |
Boots | Membranous Slippers | The Dawnbreaker |
Ring 1 | Circle of Bone | Grim Batol |
Ring 2 | Devout Zealot's Ring | The Dawnbreaker |
Trinket 1 | Ara-Kara Sacbrood | Ara-Kara, City of Echoes |
Trinket 2 | Empowering Crystal of Anub'ikkaj | The Dawnbreaker |
Weapon | Melodious Iron Songspire | The Stonevault |
Trinkets
Below you can find active and passive alternatives to our recommended trinkets. Do note that some trinkets are better than others depending on the boss fight.
Every active trinket but Spymaster's Web this season is very weak compared to passive alternatives. So if you were unlucky with dropping Spymaster's Web in the raid then it's highly recommended to farm one of the passive alternatives from Mythic+, preferably Ara-Kara Sacbrood and Empowering Crystal of Anub'ikkaj or Gale of Shadows.
Active Trinket alternatives
- Treacherous Transmitter
- Can be a bit annoying to use if you get the wrong mini-games.
Passive Trinket alternatives
- Empowering Crystal of Anub'ikkaj
- Has about a 10% uptime on its Crit, Versatility, Mastery and Haste buff.
- Gale of Shadows
- Provides you with a decent amount of passive intellect.
- Unbound Changeling
- Great passive trinket with a high uptime.
Embellishments
- 1x Darkmoon Sigil: Ascension
- Only crafted on your main hand or off-hand weapon. Craft it on your main hand for more power early on or on your off-hand for long-term BiS.
- 1x Writhing Armor Banding
- The optimal slots to craft on are Wrists, Boots or Waist depending on your available gear.
or
- 1-2x Elemental Focusing Lens
- Deals a decent amount of damage in Single-Target.
- The optimal slots to craft on are Wrists, Boots or Waist depending on your available gear.
or
- 1-2x Dawnthread Lining
- The optimal slots to craft on are Wrists, Boots or Waist depending on your available gear.
Remaining Sparks
- Crafted items are 636 item level and regular items are 639 on max item level, therefore, it's not beneficial to equip crafted items outside of your 2x embellishments unless you don't have access to other high item level gear on that slot.
Simcraft
To find the best combination of gear available to you or identify the best possible upgrades, visit our Simcraft guide to learn how to utilize Simcraft easily and effectively.
Consumables
- Phials
- Flask of Alchemical Chaos -- maximum DPS.
- Flask of Tempered Versatility -- less DPS but more survivability.
- Food
- Feast of the Divine Day
- Combat Potion
- Tempered Potion
- Health Potion
- Algari Healing Potion -- a big burst of healing
- Weapon Oil
- Algari Mana Oil -- default
- Oil of Deep Toxins
- Augment Rune
- Crystallized Augment Rune
- Sockets
- Culminating Blasphemite -- Unique, as a Destruction Warlock you don't care about using other colored gems currently.
- Masterful Sapphire
- Deadly Emerald
- Quick Ruby
- Deadly Onyx
Enchantments
Head | Nerubian Gemweaver |
Neck | Magnificent Jeweler's Setting 2x |
Cloak | Enchant Cloak - Chant of Winged Grace |
Chest | Enchant Chest - Crystalline Radiance |
Wrist | Enchant Bracer - Chant of Armored Avoidance Nerubian Gemweaver |
Waist | Nerubian Gemweaver |
Legs | Sunset Spellthread |
Boots | Enchant Boots - Scout's March |
Ring 1 | Enchant Ring - Radiant Critical Strike Magnificent Jeweler's Setting 2x |
Ring 2 | Enchant Ring - Radiant Critical Strike Magnificent Jeweler's Setting 2x |
Weapon | Enchant Weapon - Authority of the Depths |
You buy Nerubian Gemweaver from the Great Vault Vendor to add sockets to your Helm, Wrists & Waist.
Races
For min-maxing a Destruction Warlock in raiding, different racial traits can provide a tremendous benefit to your character. If this is not your top goal, picking a race that fits your style works just as well.
- Stoneform -- Dwarf
- Dispels Magic and Bleed debuffs. Has been useful in the past on some bosses with Bleeds.
- Rocket Jump -- Goblin
- Do a small jump in the direction your character is facing.
- While you're in the Rocket Jump animation you are placed on a global cooldown until your character lands.
- Berserking -- Troll
- Strong DPS racial but lines up poorly with Summon Infernal.
- Reduce the duration of movement-impairing effects by 20%. This was only useful once in the recent history of progression raiding but is still worth noting.
- Blood Fury -- Orc
- Strong racial for damage because of both Command and Blood Fury which lines up with Summon Infernal.
- 20% reduced stun duration on you which can be useful in some situations.
- Spatial Rift -- Void Elf
- Spawn a shadow traveling into your facing direction, and activate it again to teleport to it.
- Maximum range of 100 yards.
Recommendation
In general, it's safe to say that if you care about min-maxing your DPS, you should go with the highest DPS racial. That being said, the story is a bit different if it's about progression raiding. Some help out massively to speed up the progression on certain bosses. Notably, Dwarf with their Stoneform helped out on Tindral Sageswift and Fyrakk the Blazing in the latest Race to World First by having easy access to dispelling yourself at crucial points of the fights mentioned.
Macros
Discover recommended macros for Destruction Warlocks during Raid encounters and watch a quick video guide on creating simple macros for your character.
Cursor Macros
Cataclysm -- Casts Cataclysm on your cursor without confirmation.
#showtooltip
/cast [@cursor] Cataclysm
Summon Infernal - Uses Summon Infernal on your cursor position without reticle. Can't be used while Channel Demonfire is being cast.
#showtooltip
/cast [@cursor, nochanneling: Channel Demonfire] Summon Infernal
Rain of Fire -- Casts Rain of Fire without confirmation click which can save you valuable time and increases your Rain of Fire casts per second.
#showtooltip
/cast [@cursor] Rain of Fire
Shadowfury -- Casts Shadowfury on your cursor without confirmation.
#showtooltip
/cast [@cursor] Shadowfury
Mouseover Macros
Pet Macros
Utility Macros
Addons
Below, you see a screenshot of the author's User Interface for their Destruction Warlock, outlining which addons are used and how they are utilized in Raids to make your life easier.
Addons
WeakAuras
Changes this Patch
Patch 11.0.2
Patch 11.0.1
FAQ
Q: Why is my Eradication uptime low?
Credits
Written By: Xerwo
Reviewed By: Shodam