The Demonology Warlock - Raiding with a Felguard

Raiding as a demonology warlock is, by far, my personal favorite spec.  Nothing is more fun to me than killing bosses with my Felguard.  The various abilities provided by the demonology talent tree and the various pet available have made this type of spec vary versatile for many different types of fights. 
- In a threat sensitive fight such as Void Walker or Gurtog Bloodboil? No problem! Just pull out an Imp and have 20% additional threat reduction.
- In a magic resistance fight?  No problem! Pull out the Felhunter for +70 resist and leave on more DPS gear
- Need a magic damage tank with major threat power?  No problem!  Use your Soul Link to divert some of your damage to your Felguard or Felhunter and spam Searing Pain.

Best of all, the demonology spec is the highest DPS spec there is (with all other factors being equal), even higher than a pure destruction spec.  However, not every fight is well suited to using a Felguard.  Some fights, as will be discussed later, are impractical for using your Felguard.

The demonology spec doesn’t have as many DOTs to manage as an affliction spec, but it is just as challenging in terms of managing your pets position and health.  Unlike the hunters, we do not have a HOT we can cast on our pet.  On AOE fights, this spec can be very dependant on having a shadow priest in your group to help heal your pet.  If you pet is taking magic damage, then having a [Void Star Talisman] helps immensely.  The healers in your raid will likely not be looking at pet’s health; often times the only heals your Felguard will receive is from a shaman’s Chain Heal cast on some other melee.  With practice and experience, you will learn which fights you need to take extra precautions and/or ask for extra heals and/or beg for a shadow priest.  For now, don’t let the healing issue deter you from trying this spec.

The base spec for the demonology warlock that I will detail is http://www.wowhead.com/?talent=IzZMxczIizzxstxx0x.  This spec has 4 points left over; I will recommend talents for these extra points further below.  As I did previously for affliction warlocks, I will detail the selection of talents.

Demonology Tier 1

Improved Healthstone: Take 0, 1, or 2 points here as assigned by your class leader.  You can easily handle any size without hurting your DPS.

Improved Imp:  The base spec above has 2 points here as a way to get you lower into the demonology tree because of a lack of good talents on the Tier 2 level.  An Improved Imp is just nice on those fights where it is impractical to keep a Felguard alive.  However, if you need Improved Healthstone, take those points out of this talent.

Demonic Embrace:  Taking 5 points increases your stamina significantly.  While this does not directly add to your DPS, it does add to your survivability of both you and your pet.

Demonology Tier 2

Improved Health Funnel:  Skip this talent.  Using a channeled heal on your pet is too much of a DPS-loss for you in a raid.  You need to rely on other means of healing your pet.

Improved Voidwalker: Skip this talent.  You will never use a Voidwalker in a raid.

Fel Intellect: All 3 points should be spent here.  This talent increases your mana pool for both you and your pet.  This effect is active even if you do not have a pet.

Demonology Tier 3

Improved Succubus: Skip this talent.  You will never use a Succubus in a raid.

Fel Stamina: All 3 points should be spent here.  This talent increases the hit points for both you and your pet.  This effect is active even if you do not have a pet.

Fel Domination: Take this talent; if your pet dies in combat, you can use this spell to summon a new pet quickly.  Assuming you also take the 2 points in Master Summoner, then you can call a new pet in 0.5 seconds with this ability.  Keep in mind there is a lengthy cooldown on this ability, so you will only have it available once in a boss fight.

Demonic Aegis: All 3 points should be spent here.  This talent increases your Fel Armor’s effectiveness by 30%.  This means that your Fel Armor gives 130 spell damage (instead of just 100) and increases the amount of incoming heals.

Demonology Tier 4

Master Summoner: Spend 2 points here to reduce your summoning time by 4 seconds.  You only care in reducing the summoning time in combat, but hopefully you pet isn’t dieing that often.  However, you still need to spend points in mediocre talents such as this to get you lower in the tree.

Unholy Power: Definitely spend all 5 points here to increase the DPS of your pet (who’s DPS is significant all on his own).  This is also a prerequisite for the Master Demonologist talent.

Demonology Tier 5

Improved Enslave Demon: There is no reason to enslave a demon in a raid, so skip.

Demonic Sacrifice: As a demonology warlock, you will very rarely want to sacrifice your pet.  However, this is a prerequisite for the Soul Link talent, so definitely get this.

Master Conjuror:  Worthless.  No one ever uses a Firestone in or out of a raid.

Demonology Tier 6

Mana Feed: It is very important to have 1 point, and only 1 point, in this talent to give you pet a way to gain mana.  Otherwise he will run out after 5 minutes or so.  More than 1 point is a waste as you will be Life Tapping more than enough to always keep your pet with mana.  If you have a shadow priest in your group, you won’t really need this talent, but you should not rely on always having a shadow priest in your group.

Master Demonologist: This talent is a cornerstone of your spec; put the full 5 points here. This is also what makes your spec so versatile.  The Felguard will be your most common pet; you may use the Imp for threat sensitive fights, and you can use the Felhunter on magic resist fights.  You will rarely, if ever, want to use the Voidwalker or Succubus in a raid.

Demonology Tier 7

Demonic Resilience: The net effect of this talent is lowering the damage done to your pet by 5/10/15%. Spending a few points here is very valuable to keeping your pet alive, I recommend 2 of your extra points be spent here.

Soul Link: Another cornerstone of your spec.  This gives you 5% more damage across the board for only 1 point.  Plus 20% of your damage is taken by the pet instead.  Definitely take this talent.

Demonic Knowledge:  Three points in this talent increases your spell damage by 12% of your pet’s stamina plus intellect values.  For me, with full raid buff, this is worth about 160 spell damage, so it is very significant to spend all 3 points here.

Demonology Tier 8

Demonic Tactics: Spend all 5 points here to increase your spell crit chance by 5%. 

Demonology Tier 9

Summon Felguard: This is what it’s all about.  The Felguard is the highest DPS pet you have, and can put out 400+ DPS all on his own.

The base spec includes 1 point in Improved Corruption in order to lower its cast time to 1.6 seconds (0.1 seconds more than the global cooldown).  Some people disagree on the usefulness of 1 point in Improved Corruption.  But without the Ruin talent (which is not possible in this build), every math I do says that a 1.6 second cast time Corruption is more DPSC than the average Shadow Bolt.

The base spec also includes 15 points in the Destruction tree.  I won’t discuss each talent there in detail, but you can read my previous post on The Affliction Warlock if you would like to see the specifics for the first 3 Destruction Tiers (it’s just the usual Improved Shadow Bolt x5, Bane x5, and Devastation x5).

The base spec now has 4 points left over.  I recommend putting the other 2 points in Intensity to increase your pushback resistance of your Immolate and Shadow Bolt spells.  I also recommend 2 points in Demonic Resilience to reduce the damage taken by your pet.

Don’t spend those points in Improved Healthstone. If you need that, then move 1-2 points there from Improved Imp. 

Demonology Warlock FAQ

Q: What spec do you raid with as a demonology warlock?

A: I am assigned 0/2 Healthstones and I don’t seem to need additional threat reduction from Destructive Reach, so I use http://www.wowhead.com/?talent=IzZMxczIizzgstxx0xb.

Q: What spells do you use? 

A:  I use my assigned Curse, Corruption, Immolate, and then spam Shadow Bolt at all other times.  However, if it is a fight with a lot of pushback, then I won’t use Corruption.

Q: Why do you not have any points in Destructive Reach?

A: The range increase is not useful because then your curse would be out of range.  So the only reason to put points here is for threat reduction.  By using a Felguard, a signifigant portion of your DPS will be cause by your pet and not by you.  Your pet’s threat level is separate from your threat.  Therefore, you really should not have any threat issues that you can’t take care of with Soulshatter.  Your milage may vary, and in the end if you feel you need more threat reduction, then it’s okay to spend one of your extra talent points here.

Q: How should I use my Felguard on boss fights?

A: Make sure that your Felguard’s Anguish ability is off.  In fact, it should always be off.  Otherwise your pet will taunt and be killed instantly.  Always have your Felguard on passive; you want to control when it attacks.  Positioning your Felguard is much easier now thanks to Patch 2.3.0 where all pets now automatically attack from the side or behind the target.  Because of this change, you pet is not likely to ever get cleaved or take damage from frontal cone attacks.  This means you can usually just have your pet Intercept in after the tank gains a little threat and let him auto-attack and cleave away.

Q: The mages are complaining that the Felguard is breaking their sheep when fighting trash.

A:  It is best to just turn off your pet’s Cleave ability in those situations.  The Cleave damage will break any crowd-control method except a Banish.

Q:  Is the Felguard spec really more DPS than a destruction spec?

A:  People’s opinions to this will vary, but I am convinced that it is.  When comparing the two, it is only a valid comparrison if both warlocks are equal in terms of gear AND abilities (including Blood Lust or a shadow priest in the group).  So don’t compare someone like Chaosbane who gets a shadow priest and 2 Blood Lusts to a Felguard Warlock who doesn’t. 

Q: What fights are not good for Felguard Warlocks?

A:  Unfortunaetly, there are some fights where you will not be able to keep your Felguard alive if it were on the boss.  These fights usually are very heavy in AOE damage.  Off the top of my head, I can think of High Warlord Naj’entus and the Illidari Council in Black Temple and also Archimode in Hyjal Summit as two fights where it is next to impossible to use your Felguard effectively.  In these fights, it is best to just call an Imp to raise your party’s stamina.

Q: What fights can I use my demonology spec as a warlock tank?

A: There are several fights that are tuned such that a demonology warlock is needed to get and keep agro on a target while taking magical massive damage.  Warlocks are very suited to this because of our double-threat Searing Pain spell, and out Soul Link to move 20% of our damage to our pet.  In Serpentshrine Cavern, you will be asked to tank the demon form of Leotheras the Blind while wearing fire resist gear.  In The Eye, you will be asked to tank Capernian in fire resist gear during the Thaladred fight.  In The Black Temple, you will be asked to tank the demon form of Illidan Stormrage in shadow resist gear.  In each of these fights, you will need either your Felguard or a Felhunter, depending on how much additional magic resist you need.

Q: What kind of buffs should I have put on my Felguard?

A: Your Felguard will receive all of the party-buffs that are cast on you.  If your party wipes, you need to re-summon your Felguard ASAP to avoid asking for pet buffs directly.  Paladin buffs are treated differently if you have a Felguard out versus any other pet.  Felguards will receive paladin buffs based on being in the “warrior” class.  All of your other pets will receive paladin buffs based on being the “warlock” class.  This way, your Felguard will receive a Greater Blessing of Might.  You can also use Kibler’s Bits and a Scroll of Agility V to buff your Felguard’s DPS.

Q: Is there any way to keep the buffs on my pet if he dies?

A: If you or your pet dies, then your pet will lose ALL buffs.  If your pet is about to die, you can dismiss him and upon re-summoning, your pet will be at full health, retain all buffs he previously had, and will be free of any debuff.  It is best to have a macro setup on your toolbar to do this quickly.  The macro is:
 /script PetDismiss()
 /cast Summon Felguard

Q: How do I cancel Soul Link?

A: The only way to turn Soul Link off is to have the pet (or you) die and summon a new pet.  Demonic Sacrifice works best, and then just summon a new one.  Dismissing the pet or going out of range is not sufficient to remove Soul Link. Having your pet go out of range from you and summoning a different pet are treated as having dismissed your original pet.

If you have any Demonology questions, feel free to leave a comment below and I will answer as best I can.