Warlock changes in Beta build 8982

Mostly good things for Warlocks today. Well, since yesterday, I mean. In the latest Beta build, Haunt has been thankfully buffed to heal you for 200% of the damage it did, up from a measly 20%. This is massive. Did I say massive? I mean gargantuan. Godzilla-like. This is the pure awesome that you can only ask for in Beta. Except... it actually doesn't heal for 200%. In fact, I think it still heals for 20%. Koraa has popped over to the Warlock Beta forums to say a couple of things about this: one, that "it should be more than 20%" and two, that they'll fix it. That should be comforting. Although it's Koraa talking, so... light your Doomsday Candles now and start chanting.

Metamorphosis cooldown has been reduced to 3 minutes instead of 5, which feels a little more useful. Although to balance this out, it lasts 30 seconds (down from 45) and increases damage by 20% instead of 40%. It's a nerf to total DPS, but still not a bad change, as a shorter cooldown allows more flexibility in the use of the ability. The real problem with Metamorphosis right now is that the demon abilities are just... all wrong. Demon form actually merits it's own post, so I'll write about that some other time, but I'll leave you with this one to chew on: Challenging Howl. Yeah, just in case you're one of those cuckoohead Warlocks who've always dreamed of tanking, you've got your wish. You weirdo.

Improved Corruption now increases the damage of the now *ahem* instant-cast Corruption by 10% and increases the crit chance of Seed of Corruption by 5%. Not too shabby for a talent that used to just reduce the cast time of a spell that should've been instant cast to begin with. Backdraft was fixed to the proper 10/20/30% haste bonus per rank of the talent. Beta was always really wonky that way, anyway, but Improved Shadow Bolt was nerfed even more to a mere 10% bonus, which is about half of what it is on live. I'm not too thrilled about that, but overall, I think Warlocks got away mostly unscathed this build. Keep that candle burning, brothers, keep it burning...