Warlock

[Kvek]

I just had a game vs a CL, i wiped tics just by using destructor on them, and then putting immolate in the retreat path, could we please fix this shit ? It's incredibly easy to do, and if your opponent doesn't retreat in 1 second after he spots the WL with his non ac tics they are dead.

[crazyman64335]

people still struggle against the warlock with tics vs chaos? imo destructor is easy to dodge early game. once you see the warlock's energy bar drain, it means he's trying to shoot you, dodge it. I know i'm not the only one who notices this and dodges them, sounds like it's the player who's just letting his tics get bullied fault imo.

[Ace of Swords]

You know the wl can just cancel it?

Beside you don't destructor on their units unless they are in a melee fight with shees, you mind game it and cancel it if you see the tics going in a different direction than expected.

[Torpid]

Yeah against somebody who knows what they are doing it's impossible to dodge it unless you get really lucky with your timing of worship, or every time the warlock pops around a corner you hit 'w'.

[Codex]

So Warlock didn't go for Merciless Witchblade or Witchblade of Kurnous? I call that a win.

Against Eldar, unupgraded tics need not be in the front line once Eldar has some power under their belt. Whereas unupgraded tics do admirably against guardians and banshees, they have to get into melee and are vulnerable to destructor while doing so. This is natural, so you bait with your tics, don't overcommit with them, and use them to create space for your CSM to dps.

On the other hand once Eldar have some power, they have fleet of foot, aspect upgrades and commander wargear that will seriously nullify the combat utility of tics. Thus tics don't need to be in the frontline without AC. They play a supporting counterinitiation role, protecting the CSM against shees. Why would you want them in the frontline? What are you going to charge down that can't fleet of foot away, or just focus you before you reach melee? Guardians? Banshees? Shuriplat?

The only units against which I would put unupgraded tics front and centre is against ranger spam. And even then, not against Warlock with that potential for kinetic pulse into a destructor.

If you have 2 tics, have a combat tic and a supporting tic, and rotate them as needed. Just get one leader and have that squad on combat duty, and rotate them in the middle of the fight as needed, especially once the initial burst damage has been thrown out. Then the unupgraded tics are more relevant. If you have 1 tic, great, make sure to upgrade it then.

Speaking on Kvek's anecdote directly, the player you were up against must have been quite inexperienced. In the end, even with immolator he only has 2 damage abilities, and even if the first hits on fully he's still got to land the immolate. Immolator gives Warlock a nice flame icon above his head so in that case I would just kite until you drop the flames, sidestep it, perhaps losing 7/8, but not the whole squad. It's not like Warlock can FOF after them to position it better after dropping 2 abilities.

Even if you lose the whole squad, so what? It's 210/0, just buy it and an AC and be happy he didn't go for a different weapon.

[Panda]

Codex,

You seem to know quite a bit about Chaos, so I hope you can answer a question I have that has really perplexed me for some time now. How are Chaos supposed to counter a Warlock? If he goes for MWB with a bubble shield then what on earth can Chaos do against him in T1? He hard counters all Heretics and Raptors, can do a quick shot on Havocs suppressing him to deset them up and close in and can be immune to noise marine knockdown.

Furthermore, ranged attacks with MWB deprive the Plague Champion and Sorcerer of any presence at all, he beats the PC in melee no matter what the PC outfits himself with in T1, he handles the Chaos Lord well and even drains his bubble shield with the MWB.

The only unit Chaos seems to have that counter him to a degree are Chaos Space Marines, and let's be honest one squad of these guys aren't going to pressure him in Tier 1. 2 squads of CSM are highly illogical against Eldar in any game mode and leave the Chaos player vulnerable to almost every build order used by Eldar in the modern metagame.

This is leaving aside the fact that he will also have an army supporting him and other Eldar units won't be sitting still whilst you bring your whole army to bear against the Warlock.

I'd really appreciate an answer as, if you'll pardon my language, I've been positively fucked in this match up ever since I've played this game.

Thanks

[FiSH]

i'll just add on to Codex's comment regarding Kvek's game.
immolate cast radius is shorter than destructor, and destructor does more damage the farther you cast. getting destructored -> bad. walking in enough to get destructored and retreat and still be in range of immolate -> worse.

[Torpid]

Basically panda never go 2x tics vs WL, it's pointless and once the WL + autarch arrives you're screwed. Do 2x csm into havocs as the CL.

The issue here codex is more one of the warlock making GL tics useless. They need to be near the front because alongside nm they are a good suppression/shee counter, however this means they are destructor bait and then get shot up and need to retreat promptly, in this time the warlock has ran farther forward so he can immolate in retreat thus guaranteeing the wipe. It is rather powerful, but the simply fact of the matter is that you just don't get GL tics vs WL. Ultimately it is a blessing for him to not get MWB.

[Codex]

The counter to melee beasts are always the same: kiting, suppression, stun and ranged focus fire. Knockback and snare also apply but do not apply to all targets.

Whereas Warlock leap has returned in Elite Mod and it has a huge disruptive influence, the cooldown for it is double compared to retail Warlock's melee charge. As a result, it is actually easier to kite the Warlock than in retail. Fleet of foot reduces his damage but Swift Movement does not, so you have to be mindful of that.

In the end, how much attention you pay towards Warlock (or any other melee hero, or indeed any unit) is their contribution vs how hard it is to nullify it. Obviously, in DOW2 squad mechanics means that if you can wipe a squad you tend to commit more to get it vs just doing harass damage and taking a couple models.

In the early game, Warlock (or Warboss... etc) contribute very little, but are very hard to take down, so you focus on his squads. Logical. If he gets the champion's robe you are probably better off not focussing him until you've forced off his supporting army, preferring instead to delay his impact with suppression/stun/etc.

Carrying over this logic to say Warboss, the moment you get something like Klaw, it becomes much harder to kite him because of his damage output and his contribution skyrockets compard to before. Thus you might have to focus him despite not wanting to.

In general you can ignore Warlock because even though the opponent can tank him up and put very impressive amounts of damage on him, you can suppress him and go for his squishy army, and if his army backs off, you can focus fire him down while he is isolated. Rinse and repeat. If he takes the fight (which is risky) then you've got a fair shot.

Going back to how to kite the Warlock with Chaos (assuming witchblade and shield), you basically never want to be meleeing him unless you are going for the killing blow and if he doesn't retreat he will get killed. You should be using your tics as a melee barrier, and if he tries to get to your ranged units, rush in, doomblast, then kite. Do not expose your tics to too much ranged fire or the risk of getting caught by banshees with doomblast on cooldown (if he shees are there then try to doomblast them both before kiting). As a result, you kite with those tics after the intial contact, and focus down any opportune melee targets. Reposition back a bit, and rinse and repeat.

I'm not so sure that Warlock makes 2+ tic builds useless. Tics are expendable and in the end if Warlock goes shees I think he's got a bit of a disadvantage against 2 tics. He can't literally get everything that he wants to if Chaos puts on the pressure. E.g. I've seen a well microed 3 tic build work against Warlock quite well with that endless speed worship.

[Asmon]

Basically panda never go 2x tics vs WL, it's pointless and once the WL + autarch arrives you're screwed. Do 2x csm into havocs as the CL.

Multiple tics are very viable vs WL. You can search for replays of Tex vs myself on GR.

i'll just add on to Codex's comment regarding Kvek's game.
immolate cast radius is shorter than destructor, and destructor does more damage the farther you cast. getting destructored -> bad. walking in enough to get destructored and retreat and still be in range of immolate -> worse.

Destructor's damage is not affected by distance.

[crazyman64335]

You know the wl can just cancel it?

Beside you don't destructor on their units unless they are in a melee fight with shees, you mind game it and cancel it if you see the tics going in a different direction than expected.

yes i know that, codex and i had a little fight early in a game where i was chaos and he was the WL, needless to say he kept trying to destruptor and i kept dodging, so he cancelled and the process continued, which is an obvious win for chaos because that means the WL isn't destroying the rest of your army

[FiSH]

Destructor's damage is not affected by distance.

EyeOfHorus y u lie

[Ace of Swords]

You know the wl can just cancel it?

Beside you don't destructor on their units unless they are in a melee fight with shees, you mind game it and cancel it if you see the tics going in a different direction than expected.

yes i know that, codex and i had a little fight early in a game where i was chaos and he was the WL, needless to say he kept trying to destruptor and i kept dodging, so he cancelled and the process continued, which is an obvious win for chaos because that means the WL isn't destroying the rest of your army

And the unit of which chaos has need the most for almost any job isn't doing anything either, I would say the eldar is easily winning while shees/DAs/SCPs are killing everything in your army.

[Black Relic]

Destructor's damage is not affected by distance.

EyeOfHorus y u lie

EyeOfHorus isn't lying lol. He is right. It does not do more damage te further away from the warlock. The reason why destructor is so dangerous to tics is that their formation is shit and they are always so close together. And desructor is not just dangrous to tics, it goes for any other squad\army that is blobed up.

Destructor is similar to doom bolts in that sense. They do lot of hurt to blob units. Which is why most of the time you see players targeting blobs of unit with both abilities sense the damage is hitting their aoe. That's what a destructor is. A very small aoe ability. Does damage to a targeted area. And all units in that area, take the set amount of damage. Why you have to attempt to dodge, even if only5 tic get hit, it is better then taking 54 damage (retail i think, not sure about elite) on all 8 members. That is about 432 to the tic overall health. Not sure if i explained it all right. Maybe someone else can do better. I can play the game well, but that's about it.

[FiSH]

eyeofhorus literally said that destructor does more damage at longer range. that is what i was referring to.

[Black Relic]

oo lol u are right my bad lolz. So i switch who i support if its not too late lolzz. Laughing atm.

[Kvek]

Okay to be more clear, i caught those tics when they were capping, and also used SM to get to retreat path.
(they had GLs)

Speaking on Kvek's anecdote directly, the player you were up against must have been quite inexperienced. In the end, even with immolator he only has 2 damage abilities, and even if the first hits on fully he's still got to land the immolate. Immolator gives Warlock a nice flame icon above his head so in that case I would just kite until you drop the flames, sidestep it, perhaps losing 7/8, but not the whole squad. It's not like Warlock can FOF after them to position it better after dropping 2 abilities.

Actually the player was better than i am.

Well, you are probably right, i forgot about the fact that he can't FoF and then use Immolate because of lack of energy.

[Dark Riku]

Whereas Warlock leap has returned in Elite Mod and it has a huge disruptive influence, the cooldown for it is double compared to retail Warlock's melee charge. As a result, it is actually easier to kite the Warlock than in retail. Fleet of foot reduces his damage but Swift Movement does not, so you have to be mindful of that.

Eum, ... The WL lost his leap in retail a long time ago. So it's actually harder in Elite.

[sk4zi]

the cooldown of the leap is a huge factor on this thread.

Fires a roiling blast of psychic energy that does 54 grenade damage in radius 5.

Rt time 1640 second cooldown.

no sign of any range modificator here ... i dont know if this is up-to-date.
if it is , its a grenade with no explosion timer.
and if this is true, it should even better work, the other way round (1st imolate, then destructor)

[Lulgrim]

WTF no it doesn't do more damage at longer distances, why would someone say that?

Also - as you may have noticed playing the game - Destructor doesn't behave like a grenade. It doesn't have a splash pattern with very high damage in the center, and it doesn't have the 5x (4.5x in Elite) damage to retreating units modifier.

[Codex]

The point is that leap has 12 second cooldown, whereas in retail Warlock melee charge has 6 second cooldown. So if you kite during the initial leap it's easier to kite Warlock in Elite than retail.

[Dark Riku]

I'm a little confused here Lulgrim. Grenades do 90% dmg on retreat (0.9)
Or what are your number referring to?

The point is that leap has 12 second cooldown, whereas in retail Warlock melee charge has 6 second cooldown. So if you kite during the initial leap it's easier to kite Warlock in Elite than retail.

But the leap knocks over your stuff and instantly closes the gap while melee charge can't do such a thing. And his base speed is 5.5 while the common speed is 5.
Not to mention his default FoF ability. Kiting the WL is a lot harder in Elite due to the knockback and the instant distance he travels if you ask me.

[Codex]

Riku, in retail grenades do 5x damage on retreat:

0.2 (retreat modifier) x 5= 1

And in Elite 0.2 x 4.5= 0.9

Secondly, I disagree. It takes a bit more micro, but I don't find that Warlock is that great at sticking on a target if he doesn't use Fleet of Foot or Swift Movement, and FOF in a fight is poor for his damage output, allowing the enemy to focus on the enemy army instead, and Swift Movement, well that is something completely different.

[Panda]

I'm a little confused here Lulgrim. Grenades do 90% dmg on retreat (0.9)
Or what are your number referring to?

The way retreat works is basically a mathematical equation. Remember decimals from kiddie school? It's just that

Normal damage has a damage modifier of 1. Retreating reduces this to 0.2 (or 80% less).
Melee damage has a 6.5 damage modifier on retreating units. Since 6.5x0.2=1.3, it ends up dealing 30% more damage on retreat.
Ranged damage is unmodified against retreating units, so it deals 0.2 of normal damage, or 80% less.
Grenades have a 4.5 damage modifier on retreating units. A damage modifier of 5 would be 100% of normal damage, and since 4.5/5 = 0.9, grenades do 90% of normal damage on retreat
Explosive damage (eg most nukes) has a damage modifier of 5 on retreating units, so it does 100% of normal damage

Appreciate the response Codex, although I believe the warlock against Chaos is one of the very few remaining matchups that is still notably imbalanced. iirc someone made a good list explaining why warlock against chaos is so hard for chaos to win but I can't remember who..

[Kvek]

the cooldown of the leap is a huge factor on this thread.

Fires a roiling blast of psychic energy that does 54 grenade damage in radius 5.

Rt time 1640 second cooldown.

no sign of any range modificator here ... i dont know if this is up-to-date.
if it is , its a grenade with no explosion timer.
and if this is true, it should even better work, the other way round (1st imolate, then destructor)

If you think it will work better that way, they will just retreat out of it, and destructor will do shit, but with actually playing the immolate to retreat path after hitting em with destructcor means that they are dead if they dont have ac

[Dark Riku]

I know how retreat works Panda . But thank you and Codex for the nice explanation ^^ It's rather confusing though if you don't use the end results.
Nades in the end don't do x5 damage on retreat. It's an extra modifier they get so their end result is 100% (90% in Elite) on retreat.

[Ace of Swords]

His damage is poor only at the start all of his weapons grant him a very high damage, sure that requires investment but so does every single hero, try going back to playing retail, the leap made a huge difference in how you play the WL, he was way, and way more vulnerable without doubts in retail, without it he had 0 single entity killing potential(and controlling too), aswell as it was much easier to kite in general and supression was actually an effective counter.

[Codex]

As a straight up combat weapon I think Immolator pales in comparison to Merciless Witchblade, if not for the ranged knockback, energy drain, then simply for the high melee damage, high power melee damage special attack, which is 360 and has a large radius (is impossible to kite out of), and has been buffed in Elite to not do friendly fire...

Ace, I disagree. In retail, Warlock had 720 hp off the bat, which scales up much to quite a bit more than 690 does in Elite. And I believe that in retail Warlock was a more effective retreat and single target killer, not less.

The leap gives the Warlock more utility but less chasing power. In the end there is nothing that forces him to stick to his target (assuming a lack of swift movement or fleet of foot), so having a 12 second cooldown on the leap means you can chase less reliably. Think about it. 12 seconds is a LONG time in this game. Whereas with 6s melee charge in retail you can pretty much chase down enemies endlessly, not to mention leap being totally useless at chasing down targets on retreat.

Further to this, a warlock leap on a kiting target doesn't knockback anything half the time. If the target is standing still then that's a different matter. So all in all, this makes Warlock worse at retreat killing and chasing well microed troops, because all you have to is stun/snare/suppress/knockback/whatever the warlock immediately after the jump and then kite, and you have 12 seconds where the warlock cannot stick to a target and effectively do damage. Unlike in retail, when the delay was only 6 seconds.

Yes, the leap makes his initiation power stronger, but at the same time, if you respond correctly it's not online again for 12 seconds and you can focus fire the army instead.

[Ace of Swords]

I'd say his retreat killing potential is more or less the same, but perhaps i didn't notice that much since it's the shees job, also, the WL jump does domino knockback for me it always KBs the selected unit and often, even when chasing fast units such scout, it will kb 2 if not all of them, you have to take in consideration that the WL leap is an effective CC on any hero(except HT-BC-CL) or subcommander for 2-3 extra seconds which is quite alot and you can follow up with something else if you need so, for me, there is no doubt that the WL is way stronger like this, remember that the leap is basically instant also, that reduces to 0 any damage taken during the charge and I think it cannot be stopped by a KB like shotgun blast.

[Dark Riku]

I'm finding some different values here:

@Codex:
"Melee charge cooldown increased from 6 to 10 seconds"
(From the original Retail to Elite mod patch notes)
"Melee charge (leap) cooldown increased from 6 to 16 seconds"
(From the main.info site)
Which one is it? °_O I can't even find 12 seconds :p

It's quite long from the feeling in game.
But I've noticed my sense of time in game is totally skewed.

His faster movement speed is enough to keep him on the units that are trying to kite.
Also the tanking problem lies not with the starting WL health.
But with the very good combo of shield and buffed Heart of Darkness.
Yes I'm aware it isn't cheap but you are also getting a lot for it.
And also feels rather dirty when I use him like that.


@Ace
It shouldn't do domino kb and I don't think it does atm anymore.
But I'm not 100% sure. Will try to look out for it in my future games.
"Warlock combat leap domino knockback removed"
(From 2.1 patch notes)