2/2 Improved Life Tap reduces the time you spend Life Tapping, increasing the time you spend dps'ing.
Start with 5/5 Corruption, 2/5 Suppression, and 2/2 Improved Life Tap.Ģ/5 Suppression is useful early on so you can fight mobs slightly higher level, especially in caves and whatnot that quests have you go into. Prior to that you'll be using Voidwalker to tank for you, and won't need Improved Drain Life or Fel Concentration yet. Per Foxx33's suggestion below, save Improved Drain Life and Fel Concentration until right before you enter PvP zones and do your Succubus quest (level 26-28). Then go down the Destro tree for Improved Shadow Bolt, Bane, Shadowburn, Devastation and Ruin.
The build also selects talents like Suppression that help you survive and even win against higher level gankers.Īs you level, go all the way down Afflic getting all the talents that buff DoTs, Drain Life, Life Tap and Shadow damage. This lets you run Succubus or Felhunter while leveling, which are stronger than Voidwalker in PvP. This guide is for the former, but see notes on alternative Drain Tanking variants at the end for the latter.ĭrain Tanking means letting the mob hit you, not your pet, while you DoT it up and Drain Life it. Here's the build and playstyle guide:įor leveling on PvP servers you’ll want to run a Drain Tanking build, likely either 30/0/21 Shadow Mastery/Ruin or 45/5/5 Heavy Affliction. That means the warlock needs to be the tank, via Drain Tanking. The main difference is that on PvP servers you want to ditch your Voidwalker tank and run Succubus or Felhunter instead, which are stronger in PvP. Leveling on PvP realms is a different beast than leveling on PvE ones and requires different build choices.
Reposting here for posterity and continued discussion. I recently replied to Alive's guide on Warlock leveling with a comment that evolved into a full-blown leveling build recommendation for Classic PvP servers.