Noob looking for advice

[lastsolomon]

Hey guys. So, I logged onto DDO for the first time in 3 years, saw that they added my favorite class from PnP. I immediately fell in love with Warlock aaaannnnnddd it's nerfed. Okay, spilt milk. I was playing this build I found on the forums that seemed nifty. https://www.ddo.com/forums/showthread.php/464619-The-Gladys-Knight-A-tanky-swashbuckling-warlock-with-soul

After today's nerfs I feel like I can't kill anything quickly, and I'm looking for a change. I play primarily solo. Not real interested in doing Reaper but I want to be capable of getting things done at epic without it feeling like a slog. I think with the Warlock nerfs a deep splash is not so strong anymore.

So I guess what I'm asking, is what build would you recommend for a solo warlock on a first life? And a second, slightly more meta question, what do you guys think is going to be the best solo build now? Will it still be some kind of warlock or will it be another class?

[C-Dog]

After today's nerfs I feel like I can't kill anything quickly...
...I think with the Warlock nerfs a deep splash is not so strong anymore.
Anything "tank" is not designed to kill quickly, that's the trade-off.

The fact that 'Locks were so OP that they could splash deep and were still an exception speaks volumes.


...what build would you recommend for a solo warlock on a first life?
https://www.ddo.com/forums/showthread.php/470423-Build-Repository?p=5759371&viewfull=1#post5759371

[Maelodic]

So I guess what I'm asking, is what build would you recommend for a solo warlock on a first life? And a second, slightly more meta question, what do you guys think is going to be the best solo build now? Will it still be some kind of warlock or will it be another class?

For heroics, soul eater remains king, and even into epics if you don't play the hard stuff, take the soul eater T5 and combine it with the TS capstone and you'll do enough damage to get through just about anything. Add in faltering blast combined with bewitching blast, evards, and clever kiting and nothing will get to you. Particularly in Shiradi with nerve venom.

[Draxani]

The main changes to warlock have been dps based, but the Enlightened spirit tree still has pretty good defenses. In general, a well geared ES warlock will still be viable, but it will be slower to complete a dungeon. However, with its high defense and the temporary hp "healing", you should be able to survive in elite and reaper. The single target dmg of an ES warlock, however, has fallen even further behind, and so a potentially better alternative is to use TS and/or SE for your main dmg and single target damage, and if needed use ES for survivablity. Brilliance, Aura, and Shining Through are the key (in my opinion) benefits of the ES tree, as they provide passive temp hp and dmg, as well as a large amount of temp hp when Shining Through is activated, though for maximum killing ability, a T5 of SE or TS may be preferable. If you have the past lives and gear, I'd suggest going the path of a DC caster, using the spell and SLA finger of deaths or going dual burster till epics, then switching to the build you're following's enhancements. I personally followed blastywa's build: https://www.ddo.com/forums/showthread.php/477492-The-Warlord?

As for the best solo build, it depends a little on your preferences and resources, but in heroics, a ES warlock is still easy to play, and gearing is even easier (I only had 4 items equipped for lvls 1-16: a CON item, a radiance item, a Necro focus item, and a voice of the master). In epics, a warlock is substantially behind other classes as far as dps goes, but there are some first life and solo friendly builds, such as zombie shiradi (though its often regarded as boring). The most solo friendly, though sometimes resource-intensive builds are mostly the cookie cutter or broken ones: Shiradi, Broken Wolves, Trees, and Furyshotter Monkchers (Though if you use one, make sure they don't rely on AA imbues stacking with Shurikens, since they patched that).