Who Left My Lock Out in the Rain?

I have never really bitched about my class before. I am not one to QQ a lot. I believe that Blizzard is always trying to do the best they can with class balance and believe that eventually it will all even out. What is a nerf for you today will be a nerf for me tomorrow and that sort of thing.

However, this has gone on far too long and I've something to say about it!

Back during BC I noticed this trend. For some reason people decided that warlocks were just too OP. Fears and DoTs were just too much for everyone else to handle I guess and the complaining began. I guess those rogues in AV just couldn't stand it any longer. Hah!
Thus the steady decline of the warlock began.

Now I look around and I don't see very many of us. All hail the mighty paladin, the cunning rogue and the ever lurking shadow priests.
Alas, where did all the warlocks go I ask?

So let me share with you my little story from this past week that has led to this verbose and exasperated post...
With the ready availability of tier gear I had decided that now was the time to truly delve into my evil destructive lockiness and really attempt to pull some higher dps.
I began to really read up on stats, gems and enchants.
Hit vs Haste. Haste vs Crit. Int or Spir. How much spell power is enough?! (ad infinitum actually)
After all this research I went out and applied my knowledge. I ground my little warlock ass off and procured a tier 9 set of my own. I laid out gold by the hundreds for the right gems, the right enchants...the right food for god's sake!
And I tweaked! I read some more, and tweaked some more til I my head was full of visions of warlock goodness and my eyes were full of the grand numbers my crits would be throwing up on my screen!
Do you know what? It sucked. I stopped. I stopped for a week or so and thought. Then I went back to reading. Back to hit caps and spirit. Back to trinkets and gear and 4 piece set bonuses. Until at last I thought I had it figured out....again.
But no.  Oh FUCK! (and lots of other cuss words...oh and some stomping and desk pounding in for good measure)
I backed up to step one. Visiting videos for new warlocks. Pouring over my spec point by point. Believing that if I really understood what each talent point gave me I would be better for it. And really I was, there is always something new to learn...but...FUCK!
The only thing I have not done at this point is start theorycrafting and crunching numbers. Frankly I hate numbers and it's not going to happen. I rely on those of you that have the patience for that to help us poor misguided math losers. Oh, and I haven't done anything like plug into a SimulationCraft. (article about said program here)

Ok so...after all this munching and crunching and chewing on information I went back and looked over my toon. I realized some basic things that were a little off and again replaced gems. Some gem guy on my server has made a ton of $$ off me. Though some I have been able to make myself on my warrior. Luckily the enchants are free huh?
2 days ago I went to Exodar and found the practice dummies. It is nice and quiet there and I don't have to worry about some random warrior coming along and standing in front of me.
I'm working here, shove off!
I pulled up the stopwatch, added my normal fel armor, a firestone, and a food buff, and turned off recount so I would focus. Then I proceeded to wail away on this dummy for 2:30 sec. Enough time for my CoD to proc twice. Then I stopped. I waited for it to finish its 3rd kaboom...so we're talking 3 minutes and a bit here. Then checked the numbers.  (thinking back I should have recorded my number right then or finished up the 3 minutes completely)
I was devastated. Barely 3k! So I'm standing there pouting in guild chat, and thinking I've had it! I can't believe I can't produce decent numbers, and what the fuck are all these people talking about with 4-6k dps? WHAT IS GOING ON?! I just must be a totally crappy player! Against a target dummy!
If I have followed all the recommendations and all the proper this and thats. If all my attention to every fucking detail was not paying off then it must be me...it has to be right? I am one of those people that Blizzard doesn't think you should be playing with.... oh god nooooo! Not after all this time, and all this MONEY! Are you kidding me? All that stuff about you can lead a camel to water....and isn't there some saying about a thoroughbred or show dog or something? I don't know.  /sigh

In the mean time....

There were other wheels turning. I had listened to an episode of  The Instance, where they talked about this.

This is a chart that Blizzard created showing an average of dps during the Festergut fight in ICC. I don't know if it is 10 or 25 but I'm going to assume 25 because of the numbers.



16th!! Would that make YOU happy? Surely not.

Now, I don't think that I can reasonably expect to be doing that kind of dps in a 5 man heroic, but apparently I can't reasonably expect to be anywhere near the top in any raid situation either. I should expect that 15 other specs will beat me out. So in a 25 man I might come in before the tanks. If they're not pallys that is.

In the mean time back at the target dummy fuming....
I begin to solicit my guildmates help.
"Please" I beg. "You must help me figure out what is going on!!" I am reviewed. My armory data is scrutinized. The result is there is no reason why I should not be putting out wonderful stupendous flames of dps goodness, and thoroughly burning the shit out of anything in my path. So again it must be me right?

Actually...somewhat is the answer.

*First, I learned that I clipped my DoTs and that doing that is very very bad. And I did it a lot! Not allowing that extra tic is tre importante. (No I don't speak French or Spanish but it worked in my head so let it go)
*Second, I never set recount to merge me and my pets dps. In my head it seemed logical to keep my imps info separate. I guess that is not right. The end numbers did show a difference worth mentioning.
*Third, I wander. My fingers wander, my mind wanders, my toon wanders. I do not always keep everything flying at a steady rate. When I need to be there I am, but in the mean time I might miss cast something, clip something etc.
These things do add up to a significant portion of missed dps, but when you're flying through a heroic it doesn't much matter. When I spend the majority of my time in 5 mans I am not as regimented as perhaps I could be. Am I a lousy player? I say nay nay. Is there room for improvement? Absolutely.

So what does all this rambling add up to? In the end, I think that my class as a whole is just not able to generate the numbers that come so easily for a few others. I think Blizz has some work to do and I want, no I DEMAND! some Warlock love.

I hear wonderful snippets of promise coming from Blizz about this for Cataclysm. I am hopeful and afraid at the same time. The complete overhaul of the shard system has me shaking in my demon booties. I do not want to be a Death Knight in cloth. I really really hope this system doesn't turn into a runic type one similar to DK's. But OMG I will be so thankful to get rid of a bag of purple things. Really would love to have a bag back, gee wouldn't that be nice. /sigh

Please please Blizz, make me a blazing bad-ass again that everyone thinks is OP and everyone wants to be! I really do miss the days of "oh shit its a warlock".