Guide to Nests on Ji Kun, Throne of Thunder

The Nest Leader needs to know the route to fly to all the nests. This is because you have to be at the nest BEFORE it is announced by that giant red spotlight, so that you have more time to dps down the adds. 

There are 9 nests that we visit. After that we burn the boss. The walkthrough  is shown below. 

Important Information: 

Each feather has a cooldown of 1 minute. After you pick up one, you cannot pick another for the next 1 min. The feather has 4 charges. To see whether you picked up a feather. Look for the 1 min debuff called Lesson of Icarus. 

DPS abilities that are favored are strong AOE and cleaving abilities. Short 1 min DPS cooldowns are better than long 3 min type cooldowns. Pets often bug out, so try not to get a pet spec if possible. 

PHASE ONE: Lower Nests 

Shown as Green Spots on the Map

Lower Nest 1: Jump down before the fight starts. Kill all the adds and pick up one feather. Fly to Nest 2

Lower Nest 2: Kill all the adds. DO NOT PICK UP A FEATHER. Stand near the edge of the nest if you have to. You will get hit by quills here. It is recommended that you stay in the nest until quills is over to make it easier for the healer to heal. 

Lower Nest 3: Kill all the adds. You must get another feather here. Before leaving the nest, check to make sure that you have the debuff called Lesson of Icarus. The timing is very crucial for the third nest. Make sure you save DPS CDs for the third nest, because it takes more time to make it to the upper nests. 

Explanation: The reason why we pick up a feather at the third nest is that we need 4 charges to clear all the upper nests. If we take a feather at the second nest, we will miss one upper nest and may potentially cause a wipe. 

PHASE TWO: Upper Nests
Shown as Orange Spots on the Map

Upper Nest 1: After Nest 3, try to make it to this nest ASAP. You will need two feather charges to reach this place. 1 feather charge to go from Lower Nest 3 to the Red Spot. Another feather charge to go from Red Spot to Upper Nest 1. 

Advanced Tip: If you are skillful, try to dot up the boss or use instant cast attacks as you are flying past her. 

Upper Nest 2: Nothing special to note here. Kill adds and move on. As you are flying to Nest 3, if you see any low-health Juvenilles, try to burn them down if possible. 

Upper Nest 3: Kill everything and jump down. You won't die from the fall damage, just FYI. If possible, use your DPS CD here because it takes time to make it to the lower nests. Go back to the RED SPOT. 

PHASE THREE: Lower Nests

Exactly the same as Phase One. Go from Nest 1 to Nest 2 to Nest 3 and kill everything. After that, return to the platform and burn down the boss. 

Tortos DPS Guide for Warlock

If you need a basic brief on the bosses abilities and a good strategy for the overall raid team, you can check out icyveins' guide here. This guide specifically covers more advanced and detailed tips from a Warlock perspective. 


Talents for this Fight: 
Soul Leech - Passive Absorb to enhance your survivability 
Shadowfury - To reduce raid damage by stunning the bats
Sacrificial Pact - a 200K shield on you every minute. This is a must if you are the turtle shell kicker because this allows you to charge in even with rockfall to kick the shell. 
Burning Rush - 150% speed sprint. To get you into position to kick the shell
Grimoire: Supremacy. This is favoured if you have a lot of haste.
Kiljaeden's Cunning - To dps on the move. This is extremely crucial in this fight because you need to run away from a lot of Boss ground AOE

Addons you will need: 
NeedtoKnow - To track dots on your primary target and your focus target (which is Tortos) 
Tidyplates - to show the dots on all your targets, particularly for the turtles. This allows you to refresh dots on all the turtles very well 

Glyphs:  Glyph of Conflagrate (for Destruction) and Glyph of Curse of Exhaustion (for Affliction) 
These are for slowing the turtles. If they are running around at high speed, it is very disruptive to dps and healers. 

Tips and Tricks

1.) Slow the turtles when they come out. 

If they are zooming around at high speed, its very very hard to dps them and they will interrupt your healers by kicking them into the air. 

For affliction, use SoulBurn-Curse of Exhaustion. 
For Destruction, use Fire&Brimstone-Conflagrate

2.) Kick the Turtle Shells at Boss. There are two tips for this

Just press this macro when you are next to a turtle. It will auto select the turtle shell, kick it at boss and return you to your previous target. Amazing!


/targetexact Whirl Turtle
/click ExtraActionButton1
/targetlasttarget


Another thing to note is that you do not stand near the turtle shell in case you get targeted by rockfall. If there is only one turtle shell there and there are a lot of spinning turtles around (high chance you will get kicked up), put your portal next to the turtle shell. When it comes to time to kick, teleport to the shell and kick it. 

3.) Keep dots rolling on boss 100% of time

You need an addon to track this. You absolutely must keep your dots on the boss all the time. This will increase your dps by about 30% at least. There must be 100% uptime on him for your three dots: Unstable Affliction, Agony and Corruption. Never let Agony drop off the boss. Every time it drops off, you lose about 200K of damage. If you are having problems keeping dots up on him, use this macro: 

/cast [modifier:alt, target=focus] Agony

/cast [nomodifier:alt] Agony

When you press alt, you target the focus target (Boss) and cast your dot on him. 
When you don't press alt, you cast the spell on your current target. 

4. Gain back SoulShards (Low Priority)
Do this only if you have dots running on all the turtles and the boss and you have nothing else to do. 
Dps the vampiric bats using either SoulBurn-SoulSwap (Single target) or SoulBurn-Seed of Corruption
This will allow you get back at least 4 shards, which will greatly improve your single target dps. 

5.) DBM Tips 
Take away all the various bars and warnings except for Call of Tortos (Turtles are coming!) so that you can put your mass slow on them. And also Furious Stone Breath. Kick the Turtle when the DBM countdown timer says "1". 

How to be Awesome!

Look around you. Whether it is your workplace, the hawker center, the World of Warcraft, how often have you encountered people that are mindblowingly awesome? By awesome, I mean they are so absolutely breathtakingly amazing that you wonder how they achieved their level of skill. This could be the hawker that produces amazing world class char kuey teow, your coworker who seems to have infinite energy and can do the work of five men, or your healer that can keep everyone alive even despite overwhelming odds.

Today, I am going to focus on just one specific topic: How to be Awesome in the World of Warcraft. Most average raiders do the following: they read guides online, then they practice them in raids. This is a technique that gives you okay and decent performance. If you are happy with being average, then by all means, carry on with whatever you are already doing. But it probably will not make you into a super awesome raider. Why do I say that? Let's use an example that many of us can relate to better. 

Maria Sharapova is one of the best tennis players in the world. Now, can you imagine her reaction when her coach tells her this. Okay, I have a new technique to teach you. I will tell you how to do it now, and you will immediately use it tomorrow during your big match. 

It would be suicide for her to attempt to master and use a new technique immediately in an important match. She will probably practice a technique thousands of times before considering using it in an actual match. 

Now, let's talk about World of Warcraft. Raids are chaotic and messy, especially when you are trying them out for the first time. In a raid, raiders are often so preoccupied with sooooo many other things that they seldom have to chance to truly focus on their dps rotation. Furthermore, raids are rather random, in that boss abilities target different people every pull. This means that it is hard for you to really practice a dps rotation because the situation changes almost every time. 

In order to get better at something, you have to practice it in a controlled environment and you have to do it again and again. Repetition is the mother of skill. Only when you have internalised a technique (through lots of practice), can you truly use it effectively in a real raid. 

To get better, you have to do three things: 

1.) Practice the skill in an isolated and controlled environment (target dummy) 

2.) You have to repeat it again and again until you get it right. You must know the skill so well that you no longer have to think consciously about it (just like driving, for example)

Trying to "practice" in a raid is a bad idea because you cannot focus with fire flying all around you. Mostly likely, you will get it wrong in an actual raid if you are doing it for the first time. In other words, raiders that "practice" in a raid are practicing how to fail. 

3.) 

It's not enough to practice until you get it right. 
Practice until you can't get it wrong. 

Why Play a Warlock?

1.) Top DPS 

Warlocks are currently doing extremely well in the latest raids and providing extremely competitive DPS. All three warlock specs are viable and are in the Top 10 DPS for Throne of Thunder. 

2.) Superior Survivability 

As a warlock, you probably have the best set of survivability options among all the ranged dps classes. Take a look at this package: 

Passive Heals

• 1st Tier Talent (Soul Leech) : Your Malefic Grasp creates a shield that absorbs 20% of damage dealt
• Glyph of Corruption: Your corruption spell heals you for 20% of the damage done

Active Mitigation: 

• 2nd Tier Talent (Mortal Coil): Restore 15% health every 45s
• 3rd Tier Talent (Sacrificial Pact): 200K shield every 1 min
• Glyph of Healthstone: Healthstone restores 40% life over 10s. 
• Imp Pet: Cauterize master: Restores 12% Life over 12s. 

Other Special Abilities: 

• 4th Tier Talent (Unbound Will): Purges all Magic Effects and all CC on you. Works on raid boss abilities that stun you. 
• 6th Tier Talent (Kiljaeden's Cunning): Dps while moving! 

3.) Well-rounded, with no clear weaknesses

Warlocks are extremely well-rounded! 

Superior Single Target DPS with all three specs

• They are well-balanced and have competitive dps
• Warlocks rank in Top 10 dps in all three specs in ToT

Solid AOE

•  Warlocks have both burst AOE and sustained AOE.
• Currently, warlccks come in the Top Three DPS in AOE fights like Horridon and Elder Council  

Good at Target Switching: 

• Soul Swap (Affliction) allows you to transfer all your dots to a new target quickly 
• Destruction allows you to quickly burst a target down Havoc and Chaos Bolt 

Good in movement fights 

• We can move and dps at the same time. This means that warlocks do not lose any dps in fights with heavy movement:  Durumu's Maze and Imperial Vizier Zorlok's Attenuation. 

Good at Bursting 

• All three Warlock specs have a special "burst" mode that can be toggled on and off to quickly burst down important targets
• Destruction: Chaos Bolt and Havoc (Copies Spell to second target for free) 
• Affliction: Soul Swap (Immediately puts all dots on Target) and Haunt (Extra 30% Damage for 8 seconds) 
• Demonology: Demon Form (Damage increase by 24%) 

Provides Many Useful Raid Abilities

• Mass Slow (70% slow for 15 seconds every 10 seconds) 
• Mass Debuff (5% extra magic taken)
• Mass Stun (3 seconds)
• Healthstones 
• Demonic Gateway for easy raid movement 
• KnockBack 

4.) They look good and have engaging, unique playstyles 

• Warlocks look suitably demonic and cool
• They have green fire now! 
• Each spec plays differently and has its own "feel" and style. 
• Warlocks have unique mechanics (Soul Burn, Metamorphosis, Havoc Chaos Bolts) that other classes do not have. 

Destruction Basics Guide (For 5.3)

Destruction is the preferred spec if you are new to playing a warlock. It is the best DPS spec at low gear levels until about ilevel 525.

Recommended Talents and Glyphs 

They have changed the Talents and Glyphs to make them more situational. There isn't a single best option that is the best for every fight. Here, I will share my thoughts on which are the more useful talents. 

Tier 1: Soul Leech 
Soul Leech is amazing especially for Destruction. It returns 10% of damage dealt from certain key spells as a shield that absorbs damage. Use this for all fights. 

Tier 2: Mortal Coil or ShadowFury 
Mortal Coil should be the default option. Having a 15% Health Heal on 45 s cooldown is amazing. However, for certain fights, it might be necessary to spec into Shadowfury for add control. An example is if you need to stun the Loa Spirit on Council of Elders.

Tier 3: Sacrificial Pact
This is a 200K shield every minute. Amazing! You can have this up every time on Jinrokh's Lightning storm or Megara's Rampage.

Tier 4: Unbound Will 
Purges all magic and all CC from you. This works perfectly to neutralize many raid bosses abilities. Examples: Pinning Arrows from Spirit Kings, Amber Prison from Heart of Fear, Quicksand from Council of Elders.

Tier 5: Pick any. 

They are all pretty close right now. Pick one that you like and roll with it. I personally use Supremacy because I like the Pet abilities that I can use: Disarm, Cauterize Master, Mass Dispel, Interrupts, etc. Grimoire of Sacrifice is better at higher gear levels > 530.

Tier 6: Kil'jaeden's Cunning. 
This talent allows you to DPS while moving. Best ability in the game in my opinion.


Recommended Major Glyphs: 
Glyph of Healthstone: Healthstone restores 40% life over 10 s
Glyph of Siphon Life: Corruption heals 20% of damage done.
Third One: Up to you. If you cannot decide, use Glyph of Soul Stone.

Minor Glyphs: Entirely up to you. 



DPS Rotation/Priority List 

Single Target 

1.) Keep these up on boss 100% of time: 
Debuff: Curse Of Elements (extra 5% damage)
Dot: Immolate 

2.) Big Damage Spell: Chaos Bolt
Cast Chaos Bolts only when you have buffs on you. Don't cast an unbuffed Chaos Bolt ever. If you are a beginner, use Chaos Bolts only during Dark Soul or you reach 4 embers (capped).

Havoc allows you copy Chaos Bolt over to a secondary target for free. Literally doubles your damage. 

3.) Haste Buff - Conflagrate
Use Conflagrate as often as possible. It buffs Incinerate and/or Chaos Bolt cast speed. 

4.) Filler Spells - Incinerate and Rain of Fire
Use these spells to regenerate embers for you to cast Chaos Bolts. 
If you have a lot of mana, use Rain of Fire (very mana intensive) 
If you are low on mana, use incinerate. 

5.) Execute Phase - Shadow Burn
Replace Chaos Bolt with ShadowBurn.

6.) Special Cooldowns: 
Use your Summon Doomguard (10 min Cooldown) at the start of every fight. 
Use your Dark Soul Cooldown at the start of the fight and as often as possible throughout the entire fight.

AOE Rotation 

• Keep Rain of Fire up all the time
• Cast Fire and Brimstone --> Cast Immolate 
• Cast Fire and Brimstone --> Cast Conflagrate 
• Cast Fire and Brimstone --> Cast Incinerate 
• Use Shadowburns and Havoc if target health is < 20%

Gemming and Reforging


This is not of high importance. Playing around with your secondary stats only affects a very small portion of your dps. If you are pulling a lot lesser than what you are supposed to, its probably not due to secondary stats.  

Some quick advice. All three secondary stats are very close to each other for Destruction. However, you might want to prioritise Haste/Mastery if you have an affliction off spec like me.


Advanced Tips: 

• Never use the Conflagrate Buff on Chaos Bolt. This is mainly for better mana efficiency.
• ShadowBurn can be copied three times on an additional with Havoc. For example, I cast Shadow Burn three times and deal 300K per cast. If I use Havoc before casting Shadow Burn, it copies the spell three times for free. You get 1,800,000 damage in total, which is a huge amount. This can increase your dps by a few thousand. 
• You might want to delay your Dark Soul for a short while to wait for the boss to drop below 20% health, so that you can use Dark Soul together with Shadowburn (more value for money)

Affliction Basics Guide (For 5.3)

Introduction

Affliction is the preferred spec if you have good gear (ilevel > 525). 

If you have slightly lower ilevel, but have a Legendary Meta Gem or have a ToT Raid Trinket, Affliction might be better for you too. You need to use Simcraft to simulate to confirm this for yourself.



Before I begin, I would like to point out this excellent guide at Icy Veins which is significantly more detailed than the one that I have here: 

Recommended Talents and Glyphs 

They have changed the Talents and Glyphs to make them more situational. There isn't a single best option that is the best for every fight. Here, I will share my thoughts on which are the more useful talents. 

Tier 1: Soul Leech 
Soul Leech is amazing especially for Destruction. It returns 10% of damage dealt from certain key spells as a shield that absorbs damage. Use this for all fights. 

Tier 2: Mortal Coil or ShadowFury 
Mortal Coil should be the default option. Having a 15% Health Heal on 45 s cooldown is amazing. However, for certain fights, it might be necessary to spec into Shadowfury for add control. An example is if you need to stun the Loa Spirit on Council of Elders.

Tier 3: Sacrificial Pact
This is a 200K shield every minute. Amazing! You can have this up every time on Jinrokh's Lightning storm or Megara's Rampage.

Tier 4: Unbound Will 
Purges all magic and all CC from you. This works perfectly to neutralize many raid bosses abilities. Examples: Pinning Arrows from Spirit Kings, Amber Prison from Heart of Fear, Quicksand from Council of Elders.

Tier 5: Pick any. 

They are all pretty close right now. Pick one that you like and roll with it. I personally use Supremacy because I like the Pet abilities that I can use: Disarm, Cauterize Master, Mass Dispel, Interrupts, etc. Grimoire of Sacrifice is better at higher gear levels > 530.

Tier 6: Kil'jaeden's Cunning. 
This talent allows you to DPS while moving. Best ability in the game in my opinion. 

Recommended Major Glyphs: 
Glyph of Healthstone: Healthstone restores 40% life over 10 s
Glyph of Siphon Life: Corruption heals 20% of damage done.
Third One: Up to you. If you cannot decide, use Glyph of Soul Stone.

Minor Glyphs: Entirely up to you. 

DPS Rotation/Priority List 

Single Target

1.) Keep these up on boss 100% of time: 
Debuff: Curse Of Elements (extra 5% damage) 
Dots in order of priority: 

• Agony (highest priority. Never let this drop off boss)
• Unstable Affliction 
• Corruption 

2.) Damage Increase Buff
Haunt (Lasts for 8 seconds)
Cast this when: 

• you have a lot of buffs on your dots
• you get to dps for 8 seconds without being interrupted. (to Life Tap, or refresh dots, move from boss, etc) 
• You have 4 Soul Shards and nothing better to spend them on. 

3.) Filler Spell
 Malefic Grasp. Cast this when all your dots are up and you have nothing else to cast. 

4.) Execute Phase (< 20% Health)
You will have almost unlimited soul shards during this phase. 
Use Soul Swap (Soul Burn to refresh dots if they are going to expire) 

Use Haunt as often as possible. 
Use Drain Soul as Filler Spell instead of Malefic grasp. 

5.) Special Cooldowns: 
Use your Summon Doomguard (10 min Cooldown) at the start of every fight. 
Use your Dark Soul Cooldown at the start of the fight and as often as possible throughout the entire fight.



AOE

Greater than 5 targets: 
Seed of Corruption (Soul Burn) to put Corruption up on everyone.
Soul Swap (Soul Burn) to explode the Seed 
Then cycle through all the targets and cast Seed of Corruption non-stop. 
When you see corruption about to expire, recast Seed of Corruption (Soul Burn)

About 2 to 4 targets
Soul Swap (Soul Burn) to instant put dots on all the mobs. 
Carry out your single target rotation on one of the mobs. 

Note: Affliction Spec has poor burst AOE. If you need AOE burst damage, use Destruction Spec.


Gemming and Reforging.
This is not of high importance. Playing around with your secondary stats only affects a very small portion of your dps. If you are pulling a lot lesser than what you are supposed to, its probably not due to secondary stats. 
If you want some quick advice, go for either: 

• 6637 haste and rest mastery (for low gear levels < ilevel 500) 
• 9778 haste and rest mastery (for ToT geared)
•  Avoid Crit and reforge out of it. 

Understanding Simcraft for Warlocks

Introduction 

This is the first in a series of posts about Simcraft and how to use it to learn more about playing a warlock. Simcraft for warlocks can be found here. There are some important pieces of information found in Simcraft that can help you learn how to be a better warlock 



Estimated Theoretical DPS

This is useful for gauging your own performance. Simcraft is designed pretty well for warlocks and currently, it is possible for warlocks to perform very close to the simulated values (Within 5K dps) for single target fights. If you are pulling 20% below what simcraft suggests for you, it means that we need to work on your dps. Fortunately, that's what we are here for. 



Damage per Execute Time (Value for Money!)

A layman's way of understanding Damage per execute Time is Value for Money. A spell with a high Value for Money means that you will get very good damage for the time you spend casting it. 

A spell that has high Damage may not always have high Value for Money. For example, a spell that hits for 1,000,000 damage but takes 1 hour to cast is not as good as a spell that hits for 500,000 but takes 3 seconds to cast. 

This graph below is very useful for us because it tells us how to prioritise. 

 Basically, Agony gives us the most Value for Money and it is our most important Dot. In any multi-dot fight (Council of Elders, for example), you will do much more damage if you cast Agony and keep it up on all the bosses instead of other spells.

 

There are a lot of interesting things to note for Destruction. Firstly, you will see that ShadowBurn should be our highest priority. Interestingly, Immolate has a higher Value for Money compared to Chaos Bolt. Incinerate(our filler spell) has the lowest priority of all. This means that in any fight, we should try to cast LESS Incinerates and MORE Immolates whenever possible. Notice that Rain of Fire has better Value for Money than Incinerate and it generates the same amount of embers. If you can cast Rain of Fire on at least two targets, it will result in a noticeable gain in DPS. If you can cast it on only one target, it will result in a slight gain in dps.

DPS Timeline

The last thing that I want to show is the DPS Timeline. This graph tells us two interesting things. Firstly, our opening burst is super important. If we can line up Bloodlust at the start, it will result in us having significantly more DPS

Another interesting thing to observe. Do you notice the little humps in DPS? Warlocks are like rubber bands. They do their damage in bursts. Learning how to take advantage of important procs makes the difference between a good warlock and a bad one. This will be the topic of my next post. 

Professions and Trinkets

How do you tell which Professions and Trinkets are best for you? 

To get really accurate results. 

1.) Simulate it using Simcraft 
2.) Get the profession/trinket and test it out in a real world setting. Ultimately, real-world data >>> simulated theoretical data


For the average player though, there really isn't a need to use Simcraft. If you are having problems with a raid boss, it is probably not a issue with your professions as long as you have two professions that provide a dps bonus. If you don't have any professions at all, then that might be a problem. 

The rule of thumb is to pick professions and trinkets that:
Have a HIGH bonus over a SHORT period of time (most important!) 
Have procs that are triggered by you (not so important) 

As far as possible, avoid those which give a LOW bonus over a LONG period of time. 

There are many reasons for this choice: 

• We are a dot-based class. We can extend these procs/buff for a longer period of time through our dots. We have Soul Swap (Soul Burn) which allows to reapply all our dots instantly. For example, even though a proc lasts for 4 seconds (Lei Shen Trinket), we can make it last for 40 seconds. 
• A lot of our damage is done through bursts. Destruction's Chaos Bolts are a good example. I can fit Three Chaos Bolts in a 10 second window. I want to have three HIGHLY buffed Chaos Bolts instead of three LOW buffed Chaos Bolts. 
• Some profession procs can be stacked with our cooldowns for massive damage. For example, Haste Buff from Herbalism can be paired up and used together with our Dark Soul cooldown all the time. 

The recommended list of  professions are 
Tailoring: 2000 Intellect over 15 second proc
Engineering: 1920 Intellect for 10 seconds every minute
Herbalism: 2880 Haste for 20 seconds every 2 minutes. 

For Trinkets, we apply a similar reasoning. HIGH bonuses over a short period of TIME. Almost all trinkets are good for warlocks this tier.  Even the valor trinket is very decent. 

The recommended trinkets for the various specs 
Demonology: Unerring Vision of Lei Shen (Absolute MUST!)  and Volatile Talisman of the Shado Pan 
Affliction: Breath of the Hydra and Wushuulay's Final Choice
Destruction: Wushuulay's Final Choice, Pick any 2nd Trinket


For Demonlogy, the 100% Crit proc from Unerring Vision is super important compared to the rest of the other trinkets. For example, even if you have a proc from Breath of the Hydra, you will not refresh it over a 100% Crit Doom. 

Affliction - The Opening Attack!!!

For Warlocks, the opener is super important. 

Look at the DPS chart above. In the opening sequence, you pull roughly 3 times the average dps for the rest of the fight. If you screw up the opener, it will greatly reduce your dps. 

This is the Opener that I use. I will try to explain the rationale behind each step so that all of you can learn. 

For Single Target

Before the Boss is Pulled 

Tell your tank to have a Pre-Pull countdown: 5,4,3,2,1 PULL! 
One second before the boss is pulled: Consume a Potion of the Jade Serpent
Additional Note: In the execute phase (Boss < 20% Health), use another Potion of Jade Serpent together with your Dark Soul. 

Boss is Pulled 

Our job is simple: 
Get all possible procs and buffs UP as quickly as possible.
Extend and keep these procs and buffs for AS LONG AS POSSIBLE

The spells to use are (in this order): 

• Curse of Elements  - 5% Damage Debuff
• Summon Guardian: DoomGuard. Benefits from all procs too! 
• Use all possible DPS Cooldowns (Dark Soul, Profession, Trinket, Racial, etc) 
• Soul Swap (Soul Burn)-  Apply all Dots on Target Immediately.  
• Malefic Grasp until you have all your Procs/Buffs UP. Important Note: You must have an addon to track all your Procs/Buffs on your target
• Once all Buffs/Procs are UP, Recast all the dots manually to benefit from the new procs. Do it in this order: Agony, Corruption, Unstable Affliction
• Cast Haunt(30% Damage Increase) as much as possible but keep one Soul Shard as backup. 
• One second before the Big Buffs expire, Refresh all the dots again using Soul Swap (Soul Burn)
•  
• For example, in the screenshot above, the Red, Blue and green Buff are going to expire soon. I refresh all my dots NOW to keep the buff in my dots. Even though the proc is gone, my dots continue to tick and benefit from them. 
• One second before Dark Soul expires, refresh all your dots again using Soul Swap (Soul Burn) to keep the Dark Soul Buff on your dots. 

For Multi Target

This is mainly for fights like Council of Elders, or Stone Guards where there are a few bosses to attack at the start. 

The main thing to note is this: 

Cast LESS of Haunt and Malefic Grasp

Use MORE of Soul Swap (Soul Burn) to multi dot all your targets. 

Before the Boss is Pulled 

Tell your tank to have a Pre-Pull countdown: 5,4,3,2,1 PULL! 
One second before the boss is pulled: Consume a Potion of the Jade Serpent
Additional Note: In the execute phase (Boss < 20% Health), use another Potion of Jade Serpent together with your Dark Soul. 

Boss is Pulled 

Our job is simple: 
Get all possible procs and buffs UP as quickly as possible.
Extend and keep these procs and buffs as LONG as possible.
Multi Dot ALL Bosses with our Super Buffed Dots as much as possible.

The spells to use are (in this order): 

• Curse of Elements  - 5% Damage Debuff
• Summon Guardian: DoomGuard (Don't use Infernal unless you have 6+ targets)
• Soul Swap (Soul Burn)-  Apply all Dots on Target Immediately.  
• Malefic Grasp until you have all your Procs/Buffs UP. Important Note: You must have an addon to track all your Procs/Buffs on your target
• Once all Buffs/Procs are UP, Use Soul Swap (Soul Burn) as much as possible to put Dots on all the bosses. 
• Just before the Big Buffs expire, if you still have shards, use Soul Swap (Soul Burn) on as many bosses as possible. If no shards, refresh Agony manually on all the bosses again. Never ever let Agony drop off any of the bosses. Get an Addon to show Dots on the name plates of the bosses. If you are having problems, just refresh Agony slightly earlier (when > 10s left on Agony left). 
• Before Dark Soul expires, refresh all your dots again on all the bosses to extend this buff in your dots. 

Destruction - the Opening Attack

This is the Opener that I use. I will try to explain the rationale behind each step so that all of you can learn. 

For Single Target

Before the Boss is Pulled 

Tell your tank to have a Pre-Pull countdown: 5,4,3,2,1 PULL! 
One second before the boss is pulled: Consume a Potion of the Jade Serpent
Additional Note: In the execute phase (Boss < 20% Health), use another Potion of Jade Serpent together with your Dark Soul. 

Boss is Pulled 

Our job is simple: 
Get all possible procs and buffs UP as quickly as possible.
Cast as many Chaos Bolts as we can while the Buffs are up. 

The spells to use are (in this order): 

• Curse of Elements  - 5% Damage Debuff
• Summon Guardian: DoomGuard. Benefits from all procs too! 
• Dark Soul + all On-Use Trinkets, Professions Cooldowns
• Immolate
• Rain of Fire (to increase proc rate of trinkets and generate embers) 
• Conflagrate x 2 (For haste buff on Incinerate/Chaos Bolt) 
• Incinerate x 4 (to build up embers. We prefer to use Conflagrate buff on Incinerate instead of Chaos Bolt for mana efficiency) 
• Chaos Bolt x 2 (sometimes 3 if you get lucky) 
• Immolate one last time just before your Dark Soul runs out.