Warlock builds

Leveling to 80
A comprehensive guide to leveling, including talent selection, can be found under Leveling a warlock.

Affliction Builds
The DoTs Bane of Agony and Corruption are some of the most mana-effective and time effective spells available for the Warlock. The Affliction talent tree can improve on these even more.

There is always the issue of the mob dying or getting killed before the full completion of a DoT. This is especially bad for Bane of Agony, that causes more of its damage in the last third of its duration.

There are also some issues with using DoTs in parties and raids. In particular, many Crowd Control abilities break if the affected creature takes any damage. A mob affected by a DoT spell essentially becomes immune to a significant number of CC measures.

This is a build that focuses on a great AoE and not letting you die in raids, with the Soulburn: Seed of Corruption, you will have almost instant Corruption in all nearby enemys and this combined with Siphon Life gives you a good health recovery, after that you keep casting Seed of Corruption on the mob that is in focus on all the party and you get a great AoE. Basic rotation for single enemies will be Haunt, Shadow Bolt, Corruption, Bane of Agony or Bane of Doom, Unstable Affliction and Haunt again. After the first rotation you have to keep casting Soul Fire which doesn`t require soulshards anymore as the main damage dealer, casting Haunt whenever possible in order to reset Corruption and Shadow Bolt whenever the effect of Shadow and Flame goes off.

Updated for 4.0.1.

This build places more emphasis on your own DPS. You can actually pick Glyph of Bane of Agony instead of Glyph of Unstable Affliction if you like to cast Bane of Agony instead of Bane of Doom. Always use either Bane of Doom/Bane of Agony combined with Curse of the Elements. Bane of Doom now has the advantage of a 20% chance to summon a demon guardian.

Glyph of Fear is now very usefull now when fear can be used as a cc, it's probably a good idea to stick with that, though Glyph of Soul Link can be changed to fit you better.

The basic opening rotation:

With no Unholy Death Knight, Boomkin, or warlock that's willing to cast Curse of the Elements:

Bane of Doom (Bane of Agony), Curse of the Elements, Shadow Bolt, Haunt, Corruption, Unstable Affliction, Shadow Bolt filler. Renew DoTs as needed.

With an Unholy Death Knight, Boomkin, or another warlock willing to cast Curse of the Elements:

(Curse of Weakness,) Shadow Bolt, Haunt, Corruption, Unstable Affliction, Bane of Agony, (Bane of Doom,) Shadow Bolt filler. Renew DoTs as needed.

Under 25% HP of the mob, Shadow Bolt is replaced by Drain Soul.

The doomguards and infernals will benifit this build more than any other.

Demonology Builds
Updated for 4.0.1 This build now provides both burst and sustained damage. Updated due to the new pre-cataclysm patch.

This build provides high burst damage, high crit chance, and high rate of attack to further boost minion crit chance, which boosts coverage of Demonic Pact. Single target rotation is Metamorphosis + Demonic Empowerment, Curse of Elements, Bane of Doom, Immolate,Shadow Bolt unless Molten Core (Warlock talent) is active (then Incinerate), until DoTs/debuffs need need refreshing or cooldowns are up, or the target is under 35% health. When target is sub-35% health, replace Shadow Bolt with Soul Fire. Hand of Gul'dan to refresh your immolate on the target, use when cd is out.

Multi-target Metamorphosis + Demonic Empowerment, Immolation Aura (all while walking to the mobs), Hellfire, tab, Hellfire etc. And hope your tank has good AoE taunts going. }}

Destruction Builds
This build is pure DPS. No raid support or survival talents. Minion of choice is the Imp due to Empowered Imp and is supported by Burning Embers (warlock talent) and Dark Arts. You will have the imp on Defensive and will disable auto cast of Phase Shift so he will be buffed as well.

Opening rotation with the expectation of Improved Shadowbolt being provided by someone else, as well as Curse of the Elements/Earth and Moon/Ebon Plague:

Bane of Havoc or Bane of Doom, (Curse of the Elements), Soul Fire Improved Soul Fire, Immolate > Chaos Bolt > Conflagrate > Corruption > Incinerate filler.

When Empowered Imp procs, cast Soul Fire

Talents: Demonic Embrace can be changed to Fel Synergy (as utility) or to Doom and Gloom (as a further improvement to the damage capabilities of this build) if you like it more; otherwise I suggest to stay with the glyph and talents, glyph of fear is excellent now when fear can be used as a cc on certain mobs.

Refresh according to the following priority:
 * 1) Immolate
 * 2) Conflagrate
 * 3) Chaos Bolt
 * 4) Bane of Havoc or Bane of Doom
 * 5) Life Tap when out of mana.

This destruction build gives a nice burst damage capability and some useful survivability skills.

Notable talents:

Shadowburn and Improved Searing Pain give a quick way to kill your opponents while they are under a certain percentage of HP.


 * 1) Aftermath dazes the target every time Conflagrate is used.
 * 2) Backlash gives an instant opportunity to strike the target with Incinerate if you are struck in melee combat.
 * 3) Nether Ward and Nether Protection give more survivability against both melee and magic attacks.
 * 4) Shadowfury may be used to stun multiple targets at once.

Eventual variations:
 * 1) Improved Corruption points may be moved to Doom and Gloom at your choice.

Glyphs:


 * 1) Glyph of Immolate and Glyph of Conflagrate are used to maximize your output damage.
 * 2) Glyph of Shadowburn is a nice way to double-hit an opponent who's under 20% HP to bring him down more quickly.
 * 3) Other suggested glyphs are for mere survivability. One may change Glyph of Soul Link with Glyph of Demonic Circle if it feels more suitable.

Older Builds

 * Warlock Builds Vanilla
 * Warlock Builds TBC
 * Warlock Builds WotLK