Caperfin’s Full-Time Warlock Raid Tank Guide

Can a warlock tank in WoW? The short and to the point answer is, yes. You might be rubbing your eyes right now in disbelief of this answer. Perhaps concocting up an entire four page manifesto around how only warriors can and should tank. Although, I could go on a long rant about how there are many other classes that can tank, today I will be focusing on our demonic friend, the warlock.


Introduction

My intent and statement with this guide is not to upset anyone or downplay different classes, but to bring to light a rarely talked about topic of the game. Nothing about what will be detailed in this guide is orthodox — many distinctive elements can be tied to other hybrid classes looking to stray away from the path of normality.

Every possible subject that comes to mind will be dissected to answer any lingering questions you might have. In the likely situation a subject is not addressed, or poorly addressed, please bring it to my attention. I expect the same amount of scrutiny from readers as I have put into writing this guide, so don’t hold back. Before continuing, an important aspect needs to be brought to everyone’s attention. For some players this will be old news, but for many others players this will be a much needed revelation.

The topic of Viable and Optimal is a highly controversial topic, as some people simply don’t see the difference, or mix these words up and commonly interject their own misguided philosophy onto it. To put it simply, Optimal is the most efficient and foolproof solution to solve a problem that eliminates as many negative variables as possible and favors a more easy going route. Next, is Viable or commonly referred to as possible, which is seen as the more challenging path to take, but to many feels like a greater personal feat.

With all of this in mind, where is a warlock tank placed? Warlocks are classified under Viable. Many warlock tanks will agree their motivation comes from the glory of accomplishing something the the rest of the server population dares not even try. If this sounds like you, I encourage you to continue reading on. To restate my point, you decide to go warlock tank if you want a challenge in an otherwise easy to clear raid. For example, Molten Core can be cleared without any contention. If it wasn’t made obvious before, shield bearing is a sizable undertaking. When experienced players pick up a warlock tank and put in the effort, it shines tenfold. Nonetheless, your guild must also be experienced and prepared for a tempestuous task ahead.

You will often see experienced raiders from top guilds play as a purely damage dealing warlock in raid and build a tanking set while healing. Eventually, they will transition into warlock tanking due to its extra challenge in an otherwise easy to clear content patch, they usually make the switch after the initial rush to get world first on a boss or raid is claimed and the subsequent following content drought approaches.

Basics

Let me put your fears to rest, a warlock tank is fully capable of tanking 5mans, 10mans, off-tanking and even main-tanking a few raid bosses. Of course, as stated before, each form of tanking is heavily reliant on personal and guild experience. An important fact needs to be stated before moving on. A warlock’s overall armor will never approach a warrior’s armor mitigation. This results in a lower mitigation of physical damage.

On this notion, pending any major weird coding or other factors, warlock tanks can do about the same threat as a protection talented warrior. But there is a drawback, many spells are mana intensive, so be prepared to farm some mana regenerative items before a raid. However, you compensate in other areas and provide some beneficial assets.


Race

Horde doesn’t have access to Concentration Aura & Devotion Aura among many other aspects, therefore, an Alliance warlock race has considerable advantages. These benefits will especially stand out when raid tanking.

What does this mean?: Gnomes are the most optimal race for our tanking purposes within the Alliance faction.

What does this mean?: Orc are the most optimal race for our tanking purposes within the Horde faction.


Professions

While leveling, select Herbalism & Alchemy. Herbalism provides reagents for Alchemy and a source of gold for our eventual endgame professions. The goal is to gather a large supply of gold and a bank full of potions the raid might need, for example the potion, Flask of the titans. A valid case can be made for having a lvl 5 character in a major city to disenchant unwanted items through mail and store items at a bank for later use.

After drop Herbalism and go for the late game profession, Engineering. In order to scoop up a few useful tools, such as: Goblin Sapper Charge among many other beneficial gadgets.


Threat

Now, let’s examine the threat of a warlock. With proper optimization, their threat is nearly equal to a pure protection warrior and in some situations just shy of a druid tank. Of course, the shorter a fight, the better, since a warlock can freely throw mana around without going out of mana as fast. Resulting in more dependable damage being dished out and correlates into predictable threat. Let’s see how to get creatures more mad at you than unusual.

  • Searing Pain is first on the list as it provokes a high amount of threat because of its 2x damage threat modifier. Downranking is not necessary as Spain barely consumes any mana. The main downside is early raid content is somewhat resistant to fire. As a point of reference, anything that resembles an elemental (noticeable in Molten Core) will have a rather high resistance to fire. Don’t worry, items can counter this damage dampening, ex: Eye of Moam & Staff of the Qiraji Prophets among many others. Here is a chart to better explain the notion of resistances.
  • Major Rejuvenation Potion & similar potions are global and .5x of the amount given. Health or mana effects cause no threat if at maximum capacity. Players on coherent fights will use a heal pot after Goblin Sapper Charge to deal a lot of threat. Below are Food/Consumables, in order of threat:
  • Death Coil is third, sadly high level bosses are unable to be feared but still get damaged. This spell sees the majority of its usefulness during periods where a lot of movement is required. Because the spell grants 100% of the damage back in health, it can provide a decent amount of threat if timed properly with Goblin Sapper Charge.
  • Goling Sapper Charge and similar bombs are great to generate additional threat and a definite must have against multiple mobs. The majority of bombs are made with engineering with the exception of the last two in the following list.
  • Thorns is the highest damaging reflective effect. These type of buffs are great against many mobs but still have relevancy in single target scenarios. You can only have one reflective buff on you at a time with the exception: Gift of Arthas (debuff causes threat).
  • Shadowburn is sixth on the list of threat generators and gained through talents. It’s mostly utilized during periods with a lot of movement, since it triggers a GCD. Its important to remember, this situational spell consumes a debuff slot, so properly weigh the pros and cons. Some players will not pick this talent, which is perfectly fine.

Threat Diminishers

Aggro and threat from teammates is a daunting obstacle to tackle. Conveniently, there are ways for heavy hitting classes to reduce their threat. To begin with, ranged classes are highly adored because if they were to mistakenly get aggro, they are likely at that sweet 30-40yrd range, so it’s easier to supervise. Also characters standing out of the 30-40yrd range will not draw aggro until they exceed the threat level of the mob’s current target by 30% as opposed to 10% for melee classes. Here are a few examples of threat diminishers or dumps in no particular order:

Items:


Gear

Gearing is simple, if facing a boss that only deals physical damage equip a set that focuses on Armor>Stamina>Agility. Against a boss that mostly deals magical damage aim for Stam>Magic Resistance>Armor>Agi. In order to maintain a constant flow of threat it’s suggested to acquire Knight-Lieutenant’s Dreadweave Gloves.

  • Below is a Gear Spreadsheet to help with gear progression
  • Below are BiS sets by Phase for defensive aspects, see above for threat.
    • PreRaid AoE
    • Phase 1 AoE Fire Resist
    • Phase 2 (no PvP) AoE
    • Phase 3 (no PvP)
    • Phase 4 (no PvP) Nature Resist
    • Phase 5 (no PvP) Nature Resist for Huhuran
    • Phase 6 (no PvP) Nature Resist

Enchants
Similar to gear, enchants must be tailored against the specific boss you will be facing. To avoid constantly having to re-enchant a piece of gear to tailor to a specific boss fights, have different versions of that gear in the bank or backpack to save on time and money.

Here is an Enchant Spreadsheet Link.


Talents

There exist two possible talents for a warlock tank. Naturally, if you are only doing dungeons the road ahead is much easier and there’s more freedom to move points around. However, raid tanking is rigid and follows strict guidelines in order to be effective.

  • “The Basic” 0/31/20
    The new player starter pack in 5mans. Pick if unsure of an upcoming boss fight or are still learning about dungeon warlock tanking.
  • “The Advanced” 0/30/21
    Centralized entirely on generating as much threat as possible. In this situation, our imp can be Demonic Sacrifice to bolster fire damage but high tier gear is required alongside buffs, such as: Flask of Titans, Moldar Moxie, Lay on Hands, etc…

Rotation

Because dungeon tanking is fairly trivial, the following rotation will mostly surround raid tanking. Naturally, many actions are synonymous with both tanking environments.

  • Pulling: Sacrifice and resummon Voidwalker and put it on the stay command near the casters in the raid. Unlike warriors, we and the Voidwalker benefit from shield absorb effects. Face the boss and cast a max rank Soul Fire followed by Shadow Bolt
  • Combat: Depending on the run speed of the boss a Shadowburn can be sucked in before most debuffs are applied and the boss reaches you. Next, continuously cast Searing Pain.
  • Situational: If the enemy suddenly targets a raid member or drops aggro due to a unique mechanic or you predict it happening, save Death Coil for this inevitability and follow it up with Goblin Sapper Charge or Shadowburn. For foreseeable threat problems refer to the topic: Warlock Tank Threat.
  • Healer Actions: Power Word: Shield should be active constantly alongside similar defensive buffs, see: Buffs for suggestions. Voidwalker should only have Stamina related buffs and appropriate resistance buffs.

Buffs

Prioritize obtaining Defensive buffs before acquiring Threat related buffs. Agility for example has the added byproduct of helping with defensive and threat measures. Generally, off-tanks or known as “OT”, take less damage, therefore, it’s not fully needed to aim for Defensive buffs. Also, some buffs are unobtainable due to certain patch restrictions or unable to stack with others.

There is a max of 32 buffs, though Talents, Set bonuses & Equip effects don’t count. But Gear enchants count (with exceptions: Crusader enchant and enchants from the profession enchanting don’t count). Resistance enchants however need to be reconfirmed as they make it seem now like those should count.

Let’s move on and explore relevant buffs to our tanking duties. The following buffs are classified into sub-groups to better highlight their usefulness and showcase different options.

Note: Voidwalker should be get Stamina related buffs.

Threat Increasing Buffs

Survival Increasing Buffs

Alliance Only:

  • Devotion Aura: +735 armor. Players may only have one Aura on them per…

Horde Only:

Resistance Buffs

Mind Control Buffs

It is possible for an Alliance priest to use  Mind Control or someone with engineering to use the head slot item Gnomish Mind Control Cap versus players on the Horde. For that duration the mind controlled Horde character is now considered an Alliance player. This allows the character to receive buffs from paladins. In the many guild raids I’ve taken part, we’d have 2-3 players on their paladins and priests stationed near the raid entrance for mind control buffing. It’s also possible for a priest of any faction to Mind Control certain mobs, which can dish out buffs to all raid members.

Mind Control Buffs from mobs

Special Event Buffs

On an ending note for buffs, we can also get buffs from special events. An example, is The Midsummer Fire Festival an event celebrating the hottest season of the year. It lasts about two weeks (mid-late June to early July). The next ones are Love is in the Air, Lunar Festival, Wickerman Festival and Scourge Invasion. The following buffs are separated by their event.

Wickerman Festival (October 18th – November 1st)

Scourge Invasion

Debuffs

There can be a total of 16 debuffs on a boss. Having as many debuffs on a raid boss is crucial. All debuffs on the list below benefit us in either Threat or Defensive aspects and assumed to be at their maximum rank and talent improvement. The following debuffs are placed into sub-groups to better highlight their utility and showcase different options.


In conclusion, let’s compile all of the buffs we have seen.

threat and survival buffs
Here is a screenshot of the best buffs we can get for our means
threat and survival buffs realistic
Here is a screenshot of realistic buffs we can get for our means

Tank Compare

On patch 1.12 a full BIS and buffed Warlock will be the closest in stats to approach a feral bear tank, let take an in-depth look at the stats to see the differences. As a guideline, the Example Druid Tank below is BIS/buffed and able to clear most bosses without a problem. A Warlock like other tanks tailors his gear in accordance with the boss he will be facing. Obviously, the Example Druid Tank can reach higher numbers and has a plethora of defensive spells, but the goal is to showcase the class with the closest similarity to a Warlock in stats across the board that gets the job done in raids.

example warlock tank stats wow classic warlock guide tanking

Druids have the luxury of having multiple categories covered and a broader safety net. While Warlock tanks are required to significantly maximize a specific category for a certain boss.


Raid Composition

Raid composition differs with each boss, but is seen as a skill that evolves over time and reflects the playstyle of a guild or raid. The following composition is an example with minor exceptions differing from the norm. By no means is it perfect since compositions change along side: patches, gear, experience, etc… With the raid leader’s permission offer your advice on an ideal comp catering to your needs without overstepping.

example raid composition wow classic warlock guide tanking

Thanks for Reading!

If you have any questions regarding warlock tanking, feel free to drop by the Twitch stream to chat. https://www.twitch.tv/caperfin

Author

I'm known in the community for pushing WoW to its absolute breaking point during my +6 years of playing it and have redefined what classes can do. Discord: Caperfin#0125

Subscribe
Notify of
guest

0 Comments
Most Voted
Newest Oldest
Inline Feedbacks
View all comments