Destruction Warlock 9.0.5 Guide

Destruction Warlock in Shadowlands

Destruction Warlock is a DPS machine against 1 or 2 opponents, as they provide the most effective burst on priority targets of all the Warlock specs. Add to that combat resurrection, healthstones, summoning, and much more. In our guide, you will find all the necessary information to master this specialization!

Destruction Warlock has 2 main resources: Soul Shards and Mana. When out of combat, Warlock has 3 Shards, while the maximum number is 5. Shards allow you to cast powerful spells and summon Demon Pets. Note that Soul Shards in the Destruction tree are different from those in other specs. Each Soul Shard consists of 10 Soul Shard Fragments, which are generated by your spells. Mana is your resource for any other spell.

Advantages:

• Decent damage to single targets due to the deaths of additional targets
• Sufficient constant damage against multiple targets
• Good switch
• Demonic Gateway can be useful for the raid when you need some extra mobility

Disadvantages:

• Frequent repositioning has a negative effect on your damage output due to a limited number of instant spells

The author

The author of the guide is Laevate1nn, a raider of the Exorsus Guild since 2018. Feel free to check out his Twitch channel – https://www.twitch.tv/laevate1nn

Main Abilities

Talents

General information. On reaching several levels, you will open new Talent tiers. In each tier, you can choose one Talent at a time. Talents can affect your abilities in different ways: add new ones, replace old ones, passively modify various effects and spells. You can change Talents while you’re in Sanctums or in rest areas, but if there are no such places nearby, you can use Tome of the Tranquil Mind, which allows you to change Talents within a minute. Note that Talents can’t be changed in combat. Also, if a Talent selected in a certain tier is on CD, you’ll have to wait for it to recharge in order to change it. 

Tier 1 Lvl 15, Talents that affect DPS

• Flashover– Conflagrate deals 25% increased damage and grants an additional charge of Backdraft.
• Eradication– Chaos Bolt increases the damage you deal to the target by 10% for 7 sec.
• Soul Fire– burns the enemy’s soul, dealing Fire damage and applying Immolate.

* Flashover is the best choice in any situation, as it allows you to generate more resources.

Tier 2 Lvl 25, Talents that affect DPS

• Reverse Entropy– your spells have a chance to grant you 15% Haste for 8 sec.
• Internal Combustion– Chaos Bolt consumes up to 5 sec of Immolate‘s damage over time effect on your target, instantly dealing that much damage.
• Shadowburn– blasts a target for Shadowflame damage, gaining 50% critical strike chance on targets that have 20% or less health. Costs 1 Soul Shard.

* Reverse Entropy is the best option in any situation despite its simple mechanics. 

Tier 3 Lvl 30, Mobility and Survivability

• Demon Skin– Soul Leech absorption now passively recharges at a rate of 0.5% of maximum health every 1 sec, and may now absorb up to 15% of maximum health.
• Burning Rush– enhances your movement speed by 50%, but also damages you for 4% of your maximum health every 1 sec. Movement impairing effects may not reduce you below 100% of normal movement speed. Lasts until cancelled or until your current HP drops below 4%.
• Dark Pact– sacrifices 20% of your current health to shield you for 250% of the sacrificed health for 20 sec. Usable while under control impairing effects.

* The choice is yours. If you need mobility, take Burning Rush. Want to counter regular damage? Go for Demon Skin. And if you take burst damage once every minute,then select Dark Pact.

Tier 4 Lvl 35, AoE DPS boost 

• Inferno– Rain of Fire damage is increased by 20% and has a 20% chance to generate a Soul Shard Fragment.
• Fire and Brimstone– Incinerate now also hits all enemies near your target for 40% damage and generates 2 Soul Shard Fragments for each additional enemy hit.
• Cataclysm– сalls forth a cataclysm at the target location, dealing Shadowflame damage to all enemies within 8 yards and afflicting them with Immolate.

* Cataclysm – for single targets.

Fire and Brimstone – your choice for AoE

Inferno – only used against a huge number of grouped opponents, provided that they will remain steady for the whole duration.

Tier 5 Lvl 40, Control

• Darkfury– reduces the cooldown of Shadowfury by 15.
• Mortal Coil– makes an enemy target flee for 3 sec, healing you for 20% of maximum health.  20 yd range, CD 45 sec.
• Howl of Terror– unleash a terrifying howl, causing 5 enemies within 10 yds to flee in fear, disorienting them for 20 sec. Damage may cancel the effect.

* The choice is yours. Howl of Terror with its additional control can be useful for interrupting enemy abilities in M+, while Mortal Coil is a good alternative for immobile encounters. Darkfury is quite situational and can be useful in M+ if your group has problems with AoE control. Mortal Coil is your sustain tool.

Tier 6 lvl 45, Talents that affect DPS

• Roaring Blaze– Conflagrate increases your Immolate, Incinerate, and Conflagrate damage to the target by 30% for 8 sec.
• Rain of Chaos– while your initial Infernal is active, every Soul Shard you spend has a 20% chance to summon an additional Infernal that lasts 10 sec.
• Grimoire of Sacrifice– sacrifices your Demon Pet for power, gaining its command demon ability, and causing your spells to sometimes also deal additional Shadow damage. Lasts 1 hour or until you summon a Demon Pet. 

* Roaring Blaze – for single targets

Rain of Chaos – for long cleave fights and AoE

Grimoire of Sacrifice is never used

Tier 7 Lvl 50, Talents that affect DPS

• Soul Conduit– every Soul Shard you spend has a 15% chance to be refunded.
• Channel Demonfire– launches 15 bolts of felfire at random targets afflicted by your Immolate within 40 yds. Each bolt deals Fire damage to the target and Fire damage to nearby enemies.
• Dark Soul: Instability– increases your critical strike chance by 30% for 20 sec. 

* Soul Conduit combines with Rain of Chaos really well. 

Channel Demonfire is good for cleave and single targets.

Dark Soul: Instability enhances your burst damage, which is suitable for any situation (But Channel Demonfire is still better against single targets).

Here are your common builds:

For single targets and cleave:

Flashover, 

Reverse Entropy, 

Burning Rush, 

Cataclysm, 

Mortal Coil, 

Roaring Blaze, 

Channel Demonfire

For AoE / Mythic+:

Flashover, 

Reverse Entropy, 

Burning Rush, 

Cataclysm, 

Mortal Coil, 

Rain of Chaos, 

Dark Soul: Instability

Covenants: 

The best choice:

Raids: The Kyrian

Mythic+: The Kyrian

The Kyrian

• Scouring Tithe– deal Arcane damage instantly, and over 18 sec. If the enemy dies while affected by Scouring Tithe, you generate 5 Soul Shards. If they survive, Scouring Tithe’s cooldown is refreshed. CD 40 sec.

Has some potential in M+ dungeons, but it’s still questionable.

• Summon Steward – call your steward to bring you a Phial of Serenity. CD 4 min. It may seem useless, but don’t underestimate the extra heal. It also removes all Curse, Disease, Poison, and Bleed effects – very useful throughout the game.

The Venthyr 

• Impending Catastrophe– call forth a cloud of chaotic anima that travels to the target enemy, dealing Shadow damage to enemies in its path.  When the anima reaches the target it explodes, inflicting either Curse of Weakness or Curse of Tongues, and dealing Shadow damage over 12 sec to all nearby enemies. CD 1 min.

It’s a strong AoE ability.

• Door of Shadows – castable blink with a great potential (skipping enemies in Mythic+ dungeons and teleporting over dangerous areas in boss fights).

The Night Fae

• Soul Rot– wither away all life force of your current target and up to 3 additional targets nearby, causing your primary target to suffer Nature damage and secondary targets – Nature damage over 8 sec. For the next 8 sec, casting Drain Life will cause you to also Drain Life from any enemy affected by your Soul Rot, and Drain Life will not consume any mana. CD 1 min.

It combines well with Inevitable Demise in M+ dungeons and raid cleave battles.

• Soulshape – turn into a Vulpin, teleporting 15 yards forward and increasing your movement speed by 50%. You may reactivate Soulshape every few sec to teleport again. Lasts 12 sec, or indefinitely while in a rest area. 

The Necrolords

• Decimating Bolt– hurl bolts of decimating magic at your target, dealing Shadow damage and increasing the damage of your next Incinerate by 100%.  The ability damage and bonus damage from Incinerate both increase as your target’s health decreases. 

It’s a powerful ability for single-target damage, which also empowers your execute.

• Fleshcraft – form a shield of flesh and bone over 4 sec that absorbs damage equal to 20% of your maximum health. Channeling near a corpse claims their essence to grow the shield, up to 50% of your maximum health. This is most effective against strong enemies.

Surprisingly powerful absorb, a bit better than the kyrian Phial. It can be extremely useful against raid bosses that periodically take massive damage.

Conduits

Potency (In descending order, disregarding covenants):

• Infernal Brand– your Infernal’s melee attacks cause its target to take 2% increased damage from its Immolation, stacking up to 15 times.
• Ashen Remains– Chaos Bolt and Incinerate deal 4% increased damage to targets afflicted by Immolate.
• Combusting Engine– Conflagrate increases your remaining Immolate damage by 8% until Immolate expires or is refreshed.

Other:

• Duplicitous Havoc– Havoc transfers 10% more damage.
• Catastrophic Origin– Impending Catastrophe‘s damage over time and the inflicted Curse lasts 50% longer against your primary target (requires Venthyr).
• Soul Tithe– when a target dies under the effect of Scouring Tithe, gain 10% increased damage to your Chaos Bolt for 10 sec (requires Kyrian).
• Fatal Decimation – Decimating Bolt‘s missiles deal 50% increased damage (requires Necrolord).
• Soul Eater– Soul Rot‘s damage and radius are increased by 25% (requires Night Fae).

Finesse:

• Demonic Momentum– Demonic Circle: Teleport increases movement speed by 30% for 5 sec.

Endurance:

• Resolute Barrier– attacks received that deal at least 5% of your health decrease Unending Resolve‘s cooldown by 10 sec. Cannot occur more than once every 30 sec.
• Accrued Vitality– Drain Life heals for 44% of the amount drained over 9.4 sec.
• Diabolic Bloodstone– anyone who consumes your Healthstone infuses you with 10% leech for 6 sec.

Soulbinds

The best soulbinds:

The Venthyr – Nadjia,

The Kyrian – Pelagos,

The Necrolords – Emeni,

The Night Fae – Korayn.

The Venthyr

Nadjia the Mistblade:

Dauntless Duelist– The first enemy you damage in combat is marked as your Adversary. You deal 3% more damage to them, and they deal 1.5% less damage to you. You may only have one Adversary at a time.

Thrill Seeker– while in combat, you gain a stack of Thrill Seeker every 2 sec, or 4 stacks on killing an enemy. At 40 stacks Thrill Seeker is consumed to grant you Euphoria, increasing your Haste by 20% for 10 sec. Thrill Seeker decays rapidly while you are not in combat.

Exacting Preparation – the benefits of Well Fed, Flask, and weapon enchant effects are increased by 20%.

Theotar the Mad Duke:

Soothing Shade– your spells and abilities have a chance to call Tubbins and Gubbins to your side for 12 sec, parasol in hand. Standing in the shaded area grants you 525 Mastery.

Wasteland Propriety – activating Impending Catastrophe signals the start of tea time, granting 10% Versatility to you and 4% Versatility to up to 4 nearby allies. Lasts 10 sec. Tea time may only occur once every 1 min.

Refined Palate – the effects of combat potions last 100% to 200% longer.

General Draven is good for survivability and maybe PvP, while for DD’s he’s not quite useful.

The Kyrian

Pelagos:

Let Go of the Past – using a spell or ability reduces your magic damage taken by 1% for 10 sec. Using another spell or ability increases this amount by 1% when it is not a repeat of the previous spell or ability, stacking to 3%.

Combat Meditation – activating Scouring Tithe increases your Mastery by 5% for 20 and occasionally expels Sorrowful Memories. Walking through Sorrowful Memories extends this effect by 3 sec.

Kleia:

Valiant Strikes – your critical strikes grant you stacks of Valiant Strikes, up to 20. If a nearby party member drops below 50% health, you consume these stacks to heal them for 1% of their maximum health per stack. After healing this way, you may not benefit from Valiant Strikes for 1 min.

Pointed Courage – chance to critically strike is increased by 1% for every nearby enemy or ally, up to 8%.

Forgelite Prime Mikanikos:

Hammer of Genesis – damaging a new enemy grants you 2% Haste for 10 sec, up to 5 stacks.

Bron’s Call to Action – after using 90 damaging or healing spells and abilities, your next spell or ability summons Bron, knocking back enemies on arrival and attacking and healing your targets for 30 sec.

The Necrolords

Plague Deviser Marileth has no useful abilities for DD’s.

Emeni:

Gnashing Chompers – gain 3% Haste for 10 sec after defeating an enemy, up to 15%.

Lead by Example – activating Decimating Bolt increases your primary stats by 5% and nearby allies’ primary stats by 2% for 10 sec. You gain 2% additional primary stats for each ally affected, up to 8%.

Bonesmith Heirmir:

Heirmir’s Arsenal: Marrowed Gemstone – after landing 10 critical strikes, you gain 18% increased chance to critically strike for 10 sec. May only occur once per 60 sec.

Forgeborne Reveries – upon death your armor anchors your soul, allowing you to fight for an additional 10 sec. During this time, your damage and healing done is reduced by 50% and you cannot receive healing. Additionally, your primary stat and Armor are increased by 1% for each enchantment on your armor, up to 3%.

The Night Fae

Niya:

Niya’s Tools: Burrs – your damaging attacks and spells have a chance to toss Niya’s Spiked Burrs under your target. The burrs latch onto the first enemy to cross them, reducing movement speed by 20% and inflicting Nature damage over 6 sec.

Niya’s Tools: Poison – your interrupting abilities apply Niya’s Paralytic Poison to the target, dealing Nature damage over 30 sec. Targets with Niya’s Paralytic Poison take additional Nature damage if interrupted once more.

Grove Invigoration – healing or dealing damage has a chance to grant you a stack of Redirected Anima, which increases your maximum health by 1% and your Mastery by 25 for 30 sec, and stacks overlap. Activating Soul Rot grants you 6 stacks of Redirected Anima.

Dreamweaver has no useful abilities for DD’s.

Korayn:

First Strike – damaging an enemy before they damage you increases your chance to critically strike by 25% for 5 sec.

Wild Hunt Tactics – your damage to targets above 75% health and healing to targets below 35% health are increased by 10%. When your spells and abilities are enhanced this way, you gain 15% bonus movement speed for 5 sec.

Legendaries:

Overall, Destruction Warlock has 16 available Legendary Items.

The best items effects:

• Wilfred’s Sigil of Superior Summoning– every Soul Shard you spend reduces the cooldown of Summon Infernal by 1.5 sec.
• Memory of Azj’Aqir’s Cinders– Conflagrate has 1 additional charge and has its recharge time reduced by 3 sec.

Good item effects:

• Odr, Shawl of the Ymirjar– enemies marked by your Havoc take 25% increased damage from your single target spells.

• Madness of the Azj’Aqir– Chaos Bolt increases the damage of Chaos Bolt by 25% and reduces the cast time of Chaos Bolt by 20% for 3 sec.

• Embers of the Diabolic Raiment– Incinerate now generates 100% additional Soul Shard Fragments.

• Relic of Demonic Synergy– damage done by you or your primary demon has a chance to grant the other one 10% increased damage for 15 sec.

• Claw of Endereth– Drain Life now channels 100% faster and restores health 100% faster.

• Pillars of the Dark Portal– Demonic Gateway is now instant cast, and your first use of the gateway does not trigger its cooldown.

As for non-class Legendary Item Effects:

• Echo of Eonar – summons a spiritual familiar to your side, increasing your damage and healing by 5%. Your spells and abilities have a chance to send your familiar to a nearby ally, increasing their damage and healing by 5% for 15 sec.

You can buff an ally to increase your raid’s DPS, but hardly your own. Use this effect only if you are sure that your allies play better than you 😉

• Sephuz’s Proclamation– reduce the effectiveness of crowd controlling effects by 10%. Successfully applying a loss of control effect to an enemy, interrupting an enemy, or dispelling any target will increase all your secondary stats for 15 sec. Cannot occur more than once every 30 sec.

This effect has a great potential when you can permanently trigger it.

Rotation 

To start with:

• Incinerate 2.5 sec before a fight starts
• Cataclysm or Immolate
• Conflagrate
• Summon Infernal
• Generate 4 Soul Shards, avoid getting 5
• At 20-ish seconds of the Summon Infernal ability, use Dark Soul: Instability and an active trinket (if you have one)
• Use Chaos Bolt, generating Soul Shard Fragments with Incinerate and Conflagrate as often as possible, spending charges of Backdraft on Chaos Bolt

Two targets:

1. Incinerate 2.5 sec before a fight starts
2. Cataclysm or Immolate
3. Conflagrate
4. Summon Infernal
5. Generate 4-4.5 Soul Shards, avoid getting 5
6. At 20-ish seconds of the Summon Infernal ability, use Dark Soul: Instability, an active trinket and racial traits (if you have them)
7. Cast Havoc on the secondary target 
8. Use Chaos Bolt until you spend all the Shards
9. Conflagrate
10. Try to use Chaos Bolt as often as possible while Havoc is active 
11. Use Chaos Bolt, generating Soul Shard Fragments with Incinerate and Conflagrate as often as possible, spending charges of Backdraft on Chaos Bolt

Priorities

1. 1. Racials and active trinkets, whenever available 
   2. Permanently maintain Immolate on the target You can refresh it with Cataclysm, if you have the Talent
   3. Use Chaos Bolt to avoid 5 Shards
   4. Channel Demonfire on recharge, if you have the Talent

• ON TWO TARGETS – use Havoc on the secondary target whenever you can, saving 2-3 Soul Shards and 1 charge of Conflagrate. While Havoc is active, you should use Chaos Bolt thrice and Conflagrate twice

1. Soul Fire on recharge
2. Conflagrate can be cast in motion, avoid having 2 charges 
3. Use Incinerate to generate Shards

Detailed instructions: 

• Summon Infernal is a simple yet powerful burst, so use it on recharge. When you play with Dark Soul: Instability, you also use it whenever you can, but before you cast it, make sure that your target is under the Immolate effect and you have at least 3 Soul Shards. While this ability is active, use Chaos Bolt as often as possible.

* If a fight lasts less than 190 sec, Dark Soul: Instability is used on recharge.

* If a fight lasts 190-250 sec, Dark Soul: Instability is only used in combination with Summon Infernal.

* If a fight lasts 250-380 sec, the second Summon Infernal is postponed until the third use of Dark Soul: Instability.

Multiple targets:

1. Rain of Fire has a higher priority when there are 3+ targets, all of which are within the ability range
2. Rain of Fire has a higher priority than Chaos Bolt under the Havoc effect when there are 5+ targets
3. Keep up Immolate on up to 8 targets if they live for more than 6 sec
4. Immolate has a lower priority than Rain of Fire and Chaos Bolt
5. Use Havoc on recharge on any target except the primary one

A few more tricks:

1. Spells duplicated by Havoc also generate Soul Shards. Havoc can be cast on targets that are immune to damage for increased generation of Soul Shards.
2. Cataclysm + Channel Demonfire is a very effective combo in M+ dungeons. If you have these Talents, try to use them together.

Choosing a race

For single targets and AoE:

• Human (Alliance)
• Goblin (Horde)

Stats

Your basic stats priority is the following:

Intellect>Mastery>=Haste>Crit>Versatility 

Haste reduces the cooldowns of your main abilities, GCD and the cast time of spells. 

Due to Mastery, your spells deal increased damage, plus a random amount of additional increased damage based on your Mastery. You take reduced damage, plus a random amount additional reduced damage.

Versatility simply amplifies damage dealt and reduces damage taken.

Crit increases your chance to deal double damage with your abilities. 

These stats are connected quite tightly, while their value is constantly changing. 

For that reason, we recommend that you use Simcraft or Raidbots.com after getting new equipment, so that you can know for sure what attribute to focus on.

Based on the above-mentioned characteristics and your own simulation results, let’s move on to Gems, Enchants and Consumables.

1. Gems

• Quick Jewel Cluster/Masterful Jewel Cluster by default, or Deadly Jewel Cluster/Versatile Jewel Cluster

1. Enchants

• Bracer: Eternal Intellect
• Rings: Tenet of Haste or Tenet of Mastery 
• Cloak: Soul Vitality
• Chest: Eternal Stats
• Weapon: Celestial Guidance

Stones, Oils and Armor kits

• Heavy Desolate Armor Kit
• Shadowcore Oil

1. Food

• Feast of Gluttonous Hedonism or Tenebrous Crown Roast Aspic

1. Flasks and Pots

• Eternal Cauldron > Spectral Flask of Power 
• Potion of Spectral Intellect
• Potion of Phantom Fire(if Shadowcore Oil is applied to a weapon for single targets)

• Spiritual Healing Potion

BiS Gear & Trinkets

Macros:

• Banish at the cursor position.

#showtooltip Banish

/cast [target=mouseover] Banish

• Soulstone at the cursor position.

#showtooltip Soulstone

/cast [target=mouseover] Soulstone

• Fear at the cursor position.

#showtooltip Fear

/cast [target=mouseover] Fear

• In Mythic+ you often have to call off your Pet, as you don’t want accidental pulls (when on a Mount, your demon doesn’t pull anything).

/petdismiss

• Imp’s ability to remove debuffs off friendly targets.

/cast [target=mouseover] Singe Magic (Command Demon Ability)

• Summon Infernal at the cursor position.

#showtooltip Summon Infernal(Guardian)

/cast [@cursor] Summon Infernal(Guardian)

Addons:

Bartender4 is a highly customizable panel addon.

Chatter allows you to customize chat.

Deja Character stats – adds more information about the character.

Sexy map – makes your minimap super sexy!

Shadowed unit frames – an alternative to ElvUI for unit frames.

WeakAuras is probably the most important addon in modern WoW. With its help, you can set up almost anything, and on wago.io you can find hundreds of useful auras and import them to your game in a few clicks. You can also find a full pack of auras for any spec, check out this link!

BigWigs/Deadly Boss Mods – addons with timers and announcements for bosses in raids and M+, choose either of these. It’s also super useful in PvE. For BigWigs, the instance module, LittleWigs, must be installed separately.

ElvUI is an all-in-one global build for fans of a neat and concise interface. Replaces several addons at once. On wago.io you can also find a large number of different customized profiles for ElvUI.

Details! Damage Meter is the most up-to-date and advanced damage meter at the moment.

Plater Nameplates – an addon from the author of Details that changes enemy nameplates. Fully customizable design and a huge number of available features, as well as the ability to import profiles and mods from wago.io – what else do you need?

Pawn – helps you find upgrades for your gear, requires SimCraft.

SimulationCraft – a tool to explore combat mechanics and optimize your character.

Exorsus Raid Tools – an addon for raids that includes a lot of useful features.

Move Anything – allows you to move and resize any part of your interface.

World Quest List – groups your world quests to the left of the map and filters them by zones.

PRO Tips:

Don’t use Corruption, it’s useless for this spec.

Useful macros that give you a better control of the pet, for example, for more precise casts, dispells and attack commands:

To make your pet attack the desired target:

/petpassive

/petattack [@focus]

You can also separate these macros and use or combine them as you want.

Make your pet idle:

/petpassive

Command to attack:

/petattack

Order to follow you:

/petfollow

In order to send a pet to a desired location in advance, use “Send”.

Sometimes when you want to use a dispell on yourself or an ally, your Imp is too far away. To make it return to you and apply the cast, use the following command (click a few times):

/cast Flee

/cast [target=mouseover] Singe Magic (Command Demon Ability)

That’s it, guys! We hope you have no more questions and are ready to get down to practice. Thanks for tuning in! Best of luck in the world of Azeroth!