General Warlocking - Soul Shards

This post is actually aimed to my girlfriend who just started her third warlock.  yes folks, that conversation will come true one day.  she will have five warlocks and five priests.  all with the same face but with different hair (no one tell her hunters, rogues, paladins and mages all have different gear sets at the end, she might wanna make those classes too!).


So with general warlocking, i just want to post a few things every once in a while about warlocks that may help the general public (and my gf, ofc) understand and play the warlock class a bit better.

Soul shards are the "reagent" for many of the warlock's spells and abilities.  They are required when summoning demons (except for the Imp).  they are required for making Health Stones (use if you need health, like a health potion).  they are required for making summoning portals, soul stones, spell stones and even for several high damage spells.

How to make soul stones:
Begin by attacking a mob around your level.  Mobs with their names in gray will not yield soul shards.
Lay on the hurting until you see the mob's health go to 25%.  Then use Drain Soul. You must keep the spell channeled.  when the mob dies, you gain a soul stone, maybe two.

Yep, thats it.

Amateur Tip #1:  Buy a Soul Bag.  There are various bags that are used specifically for soul shards and cannot be used to place anything else in it.  it will reduce the amount of stuff you can stuff in your bags, but it will keep your shards organized in one bag. 

Amateur Tip #2:  There are addons that will limit how many shards you keep by automatically trashing shards for you.  Tell the addon you want to keep only 20 shards and the addon will automatically trash the 21st shard you pick up... all the time. 

Another thing to understand about Drain Soul is that it benefits you the most when you're using it on someone under 25% health.  it will hit for 4 times more damage.  say a tick of drain soul hits the mob for 5 damage each time. but under 25%, each drain soul tick hits for 20 damage. 
This is good because your other nuke spell is Shadow Bolt and should be used when the mob has health greater than 25%.  the idea here is that at 25%, your shadowbolt might take too long to cast and the mob might be dead by then, thereby wasting a good 2 or 3 seconds casting (ie. doing no damage).  Instead, casting drain soul at 25% will ensure you do a little damage during the 3 seconds before the mob dies. 

This is pretty much accepted practice among many warlocks.  cast shadowbolt if the mob has a lot of health.  cast drain soul or drain life when the mob is at 25% health or lower.  now drain soul and drain life have different properties i will not get into yet.  but if you're low on health, drain life might help a little (just a little). 

As a warlock in low levels, there are only several spells to worry about.  all three talent specs (affliction, demonology and destruction) all play very similarly at lower levels as much of their spells and specializations have not been fully developed. 

The battle should usually go like so:
1.  Cast an instant cast spell to "pull" the mob to you.  (Corruption, Curse of Agony)
2.  The instant cast spell will cause your pet (set on "Defensive" mode) to intercept the mob.
3.  Once the pet, usually a void walker, intercepts the mob, you're free to cast immolate. You dont want to cast immolate too quickly, as you want your voidwalker to give the mob a few hits, thereby establishing aggro. 
4.  Cast shadowbolt. 
5.  Refresh Corruption, Curse of Agony and Immolate when they drop, but always be casting Shadowbolt in between refreshes.
6.  At 25% health (make sure there's at least one DoT on the mob) cast Drain Soul til its dead.

Thats basically it for battling monsters.  And you get a soul shard to boot!


Uses for Soul Shards
1. Summon Minions.
This goes without an explanation. But i should mention that sometimes, especially when grouping with others, using an Imp is preferred, or a felhound, or a succubus.  in most cases, i use a felhound as affliction, a felguard as demonology, and an imp as destro.  again, it all depends on the situation.  for the demonology warlocks who do not have the felguard yet, you can use any pet really.  while questing, use a voidwalker to help keep the damage off of you.

2. Creating Spellstones.
You're basically converting a soul shard into an item that you can use.  these Spellstones have 3 charges and are used to add more damage to your spells.  you must apply the charge to your weapon (staff, sword, dagger) for this to take effect.  your spellstone stays with you forever, or until you use it three times.  each time you use it, you get a slight buff to your spell damage for an hour.

3. Creating Health Stones.
Once you transform a soulshard into a Healthstone, it will forever be a healthstone.  these stones are best used during battle when you need some extra health.  right click on the healthstone and you should see some health return to you.  this can even be used to replenish your health after a lifetap.  say you're out of mana for a fight and need to tap but your health is uncomfortably low now.  you can use a health potion and a healthstone to bring yourself back to comfortable levels once again.  another use for healthstones is when you're in a group and everyone is taking damage.  use it so your healer wont have to stress so much and focus on others.  you can also make healthstones and give them out to your party members for them to use.  remember, one healthstone requires one soulshard.  so if you have a party, you're gonna use 5 soulshards at least. 

3. Creating Soul Stones.
Soul stones are used to bring yourself back to life.  basically.   You make a soulstone from a soulshard, then target the person you want to "soulstone" and click on the soulstone.  they will receive a magical ability to come back to life if they should ever die.  now, you can use it on yourself if you want, so while questing, its a good idea to soulstone yourself.  in groups, you should always soulstone someone who has the ability to resurrect the group after a wipe.  paladins, priests, shamans and druids all have resurrecting powers.

4. Spells and Abilities. 
As the warlock levels, he will be able to learn more spells.  some of these spells will require soul shards to use.  they are usually "nuke" spells which you spend a few seconds casting and it ends up doing A LOT of damage when you finally cast it. each talent tree should have their own specialty spell that do use shards.  Another ability that uses shards is Soul Shatter.  This consumes a soulshard and reduces your threat.  Use this when you pull too much aggro. More on aggro another day!

So there you have it!  the importance of having soulshards, having a soulbag, and always using drainsoul at the end of a fight. 


Fianally....
For soul shard management tools, look for Shardmax, Shardtracker or Necrosis LDC. 
Shardmax and shardtracker will only manage your shards, while Necrosis LDC will do much more for the warlock than just manage soul shards. You may want to try Necrosis first to see if the features there dont totally confuse the hell out of you.  Then, use shardmax or shardtracker or any other shard management addons out there.  you can also use macros to destroy your soulshards, but that requires a little more attention.