Warlock tanking

Post by 207582

This post was from a user who has deleted their account.

Post by WoWTheoryCraft

I'm guessing you mean Siphon Life, not Drain Life, as Drain Life is channeled so you can only use it on one mob at a time.

There is a technique called drain-tanking that is similar to the one you describe, but you let your DoTs kill the mobs without any need for AoE spells.

However, this isn't theorycrafting and would be better posted in the Warlock Forum.

Post by Zalambar

Sort of but not in the way you seem to be thinking of.

Competent damage dealers will generate more threat than a warlock's aoe damage does so you won't be able to hold aggro against equal level players.

Drain life is a single target spell and is channeled so you cannot use it and cast aoe abilities. Siphon life can be used on multiple targets but heals for significantly less than a challanging mob will hit you for. Haunt can provide a decent amount of health but is again limited to a single target and so cannot counter the damage you would take from several creatures hitting you at once.

Affliction locks will frequently fight several targets at once when they can make use of fear to reduce the damage they take. A well played lock can generate enough health from their various abilities to constantly engage two or three targets without any downtime. However as soon as you set foot in an instance around your level this no longer holds true. Elite mobs will crush a lock who tries to "tank" a difficult encounter the way you described.
A reasonably well geared lock can drain-tank a single target pretty effectively. They won't generate particularly much threat but using all their health draining abilities on one target can keep them alive fairly well. However this is far from the sort of tactic you seem to be hoping for.

Post by WoWTheoryCraft

Haunt can provide a decent amount of health but is again limited to a single target and so cannot counter the damage you would take from several creatures hitting you at once.

Haunt isn't limited to a single target, you can have it on multiple mobs at the same time.

But again, this isn't theorycrafting, or even advancing Warlock techniques at all.

/lock or /delete pls.

Post by Zalambar

You're right Haunt can technically be used on two targets but the cooldown limits it to only 4s of overlap so you can only have it active on two things for 1/3 of its duration.

In any case yes this does not belong in theorycraft, report the original post and hopefully an admin will move it.

Post by WoWTheoryCraft

You're right Haunt can technically be used on two targets but the cooldown limits it to only 4s of overlap so you can only have it active on two things for 1/3 of its duration.

I actually wasn't even considering the Haunt CD, just goes to show that you need to concentrate even when replying to these type of posts!

Because Haunt has a cast time as well, the biggest overlap you're ever going to get without haste is 2.5 seconds. You'd never do that anyway because it would then be on CD when you needed to refresh it on your primary target.

I wasn't (intentionally) being an ass, just careless.

Post by 207582

This post was from a user who has deleted their account.

Warlock tanking

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