Level 37 - Arcanist Doan Down

After collecting my warlock quest staves tonight, I was a bit unsure of where to go, but then I decided to give the Scarlet Monastry a shot. For me the wing of choice is the Library. Not only are my characters with level 36 and 37 just in the right rage, but the Library is also the source for the key to the Armory and the Catheral and maybe even more importantly, the Library's boss drops nice caster loot. The lowest level mobs in the place are 33 or 34 elite, while the boss is 37 elite.

Working my way through the guards was done without much difficulty. For single guards I used my DoTs followed by drain life. Casting a volley of shadow bolts, fire bolts and holy fire or smite twice would also do the trick most of the time, but I just like the visuals and the healing of the dot and drain method.

For guard pairs, I used Alaire's polymorph. Alaire's sheeping macro is /cast [target=party1target] Polymorph. I have no action bound to the respective action bar button on the four other chars, so I can trigger her sheep for Captn's target safely. The only issue is that the update Captn's target is slower for my other characters than it looks on Captn's screen. The warlock's fears work the same way.

While I did not intend to AoE at all, I did end up AoEing more than once. Usually when 2-3 targets were close to me. I did not want to use fear in this dungeon since it does not offer the space to do so, unlike the new Burning Crusade dungeons. The highest amount of mobs that I AoE nuked on this run was seven elites.

I made a fraps video of the Doan kill, but still need to see if it is useable.

Anyway, I will be certainly doing the library again.

Level 34 - Down the Scarlet Path

Things are happening. I have done the warlock quests for the [Enchanted Gold Bloodrobe] and the Felhunter. I ran all over Kalimdor to get gryphon points. Azshara, Thalanaar, Nijl's Point and Gadgetzan are now on my travel routes.

One thing has become abundantly clear in the quests I have done by now: I love 'kill x mob type A' quests. I hate 'collect X 5% drop rate quest items from rare mob type B' quests. I had a horrible time with the trolls in the Arathi Highlands. Admittedly, it was mostly bad for the trolls since what I did there is pretty much genocide, but it took me ages to get the drops from their witch doctors. The tougher follow up quest with the ogres I did in minutes. Joy and pain of sorting five chars. I disgress.

I have made good headway in the Stranglethorn quests, doing half a dozen for Booty Bay, and being mostly through with the hunter camp quest chains. As it should be for my level, the raptors and the king cat are missing.

Nothing major is happening with abilities at the moment, but I can almost feel the mounts comming my way. Two elephants and three burning horses please, on the double!

I removed Captn from my project guild < Minion > and put him into my actual guild. I could not stand the absence of the guild chat anymore.

Captn, out.

Level 30 - the 21st talent point

The team is level 30 now, which means that 21 talent points are at my disposal for each team member. There are several nice talents that require 20 points to be spent in a talent tree. The noteable new talents for the team are now 'Vampiric Embrace' on Captn, 'Siphon Life' on Blaire, Dlaire and Elaire and Blast wave on Alaire.

My warlocks are all Affliction specced, including 2/2 Soul Siphon, which increases the effect of 'Drain Life' by 5% for each affliction debuff on the target up to a maximum of 60% bonus damage dealt and life leeched. That means 12 debuffs are needed for maximal effect. Curse of Agony, Corruption and Drain Life itself makes for three per warlock. Adding Siphon Life for each warlock brings me up to maximal bonus damage when draining life or mana. That is extremely handy, because not only does it do wicked damage, it also keeps my warlock's health topped up.

Vampiric Embrace costs minimal mana but gives a percentage of all shadow damage dealt by the priest to the target as heal for each party member and each party members pet. This means I can nuke with all chars and provide group heals which will grow stronger with more talents and gear to the group. At level 30 a priest also learns 'Prayer of Healing' which is the priests heal for the whole party, and naturally because of this interesting for me with my targetting/focus challenge.

'Blast Wave' is a strong AoE fire damage and stun spell with a 30 second cooldown. I set it up so that I can use Blast Wave and start the warlocks using their Hellfire AoE when I hit ALT-7 and follow up with Arcane Explosion on pressing 7 while the Hellfire is running. I experimented with Prayer of Healing also being party of it, but decided to do it manually to avoid waste in overhealing. At a certain point I will respec Alaire to Arcane for improved mana shield and a bigger Ooomph in the Arcane Explosions.

Stranglethorn vale, here I come!

Level 28 - The Witches of Eastwick

All that is really missing are a couple of brooms and I am set. The witch hats are actually [Dread Mage Hat]s. Available only to warlocks as follow up for a quest next to the warlock trainer in Stormwind. I left them displayed for giggles for a while, but have switched them to be hidden from view later. I made [Enchanter's Cowl]s for the poor discriminated priest and mage of my team. Filling up a slot with an item is certainly better than leaving it blank and not getting any benefit from them.

Level 26 - The Stockade Riots

Things are happening in Stormwind. I cleared the Stockades and finished all quests for the instance for all my characters.

One thing that may catch your eye is that the [Simple Black Dress] has been retired. Instead I am now using [Robes of Arcana] which do offer +8 int, +7 spirit by themselves rather than nothing at all but nice looks like the simple dress.

Level 25 - Duskwood saved!

After completing all quest chains in Duskwood and getting matching gloves, legs and shoulders for my team I though it was time to hit the printscreen button again. I was actually surprised that I could take down Morbent'Fel, Eliza and Stalvan by myself considering the level difference.

Level 20 - Succubi!

I found the warlock's voidwalker minion is a passable tank while I used it. However, now things are different. At level 20 a warlock has access to a quest for the next minion. That minion is a succubus, with high damage output but less of a damage soak than the voidwalker and without an area threat move. That however suits me just fine.

From using an imp and two voidwalkers I swappted to using an imp for his stamina buff and two succubi. Besides clearly better looks this demon's damage output is really noticeable. It is extremely rare that one of my succubi dies. With two of them going at a target and my team blasting the target to smithereens at the same time there is simply no time for the mobs to deal enough damage.