Maybe other classes are fun to play, I dont know, but I get a little shiver of excitement everytime I think about putting up my Affliction rotation. I really do. Its not like I am like "ooooohhhhh pressing buttons" I just go "man, yes, this is like, something I am good at and I know exactly what to do and why I'm doing it and wow would you look at those numbers and those stacks of shadow embrace and wow. And its so great, because I have these spells that I cast, and they are SPELLS. Like haunt, where I send a soul that I have collected from another victim into my current target and it bounces around inside him like a firefly in a glass jar and then it steals his life force and brings it back to me, his pain giving me new life. Man that is so cool. I have always thought Haunt should cost a soul shard for lore reasons, and then of course you get it back and all, but like, its a soul right? I should send that soul shard away and then get it back. And then wow, unstable affliction. It just has a great name. I am just sending the power of the nether into my enemy, all that dark energy. And unlike curses which are instant bursts of spite and malice (as they should be) unstable affliction requires concentration. It is deliberate.
That deliberateness is really why I like the warlock class. I'm not a machine gun that stands and pewpews. I am carefully crafting a long, slow, tortuous death in pain. Can you imagine what it would feel like for shadow to burn? How it must hurt not your flesh but inside, inside your bones, inside your soul. Like smoking hot metal. Like screaming when your throat is raw and the pain is so much that you dont even think anymore it is just what you are, not sharp pain, not point-source, but everywhere and everything that is you.
Man. And so casting those spells is like...you are thinking about it. You are winding up. You are cranking the handle on the rack. You are paying attention. You are planning your next move. You are very much conscious and in the moment.
And those spells arent going up willy nilly, oh no. You have goals. You arent a mindless robot, you are a surgeon. You know you want to see that shadow embrace. You are running towards a boss, raging in battle formation. He sees your tank, and that devious lump of meat is going to beat on him. You know what your job is. You are lifetapping, breaking into your shadow powers, mouth watering. Running, your demon, bound to you by blood conquest, hate, and long loving companionship ready to do your will. He feeds on your thirst and charges. Your comrades in arms are already on him, bloodthirsty and swift. You claim your ground, back from the melee where you can be in full command of the whole room. You wind up your first pitch, warming up, ready for the big smackdown. WHOOSH. Shadowbolt. Then you swiftly and surely reach deep into the void for one of the poor souls that you own and blow it towards the boss with white hot mindforce. Smoldering, you throw him your unstable affliction, which is both your dark shadow damage, and too the fever of hate. Breathe! Fill him with corruption! Curse him with agony! You can feel Earth and Moon making him more vulnerable to your spells. You know that he is afflicted, tick by tick, with the full weight of torture from every direction. That power is affecting you too. You are up, in a totally different mental state. Wind up again. Hit him with a shadow bolt while he is down. Hit him again. Gasp a breath! You can feel the soul in your power is almost exhausted, it wants to return to you. Get ready to catch it in one hand and send out another in the same heartbeat, the two passing each other in mid air. Hit him again! Again! Watch for it, wait for it, keep the full weight of your arsenal on him. Your companions are feeding you. You know that they have poured their strength into you before the fight, made you stronger. You know that they are sharpening your focus, and feel a sharp ping every time you score a critical blow. They are urging you to cast faster, all together now, spells flying and clouding the air, a controlled fury that is so, so addicting. You can feel those moments, those powerful moments of eradication, when you hammer the boss with shadow bolts and turn and grab refresh your spite faster than ever. You can feel the sacrifice another warlock has made, sharing in his demonic pact that has weakened him, and bled inspiration into you.
It is not a warm feeling. It is a burning feeling. But not hot, not uncontrolled. It is a starburst inside your chest that radiates into your fingertips and out your ears and lifts your brow and the corners of your mouth and halts your breath and drinks in the world. Everything is in sharp relief, you didnt know your mind could be so clear or so good. Execution. Perfect. It feels good.
And then the scent of the kill fills your nostrils, and all at once that desire to batter him into oblivion is gone, and you want to savor this fight, suck it down and swallow it. You go crazy with lust and with your power on him, you drain his soul. Nothing is so satisfying, it is four times more painful to him than your spells alone, and you know that to keep that feeling, you need to hold onto your own control, and you do, you do. And as he gets ready to die you feel your excitement rise, a satisfaction that yanks that last drop of life out of him and when it does, the stream of light connecting you rocks, and for the merest moment you trace his outline of death before he yields the dead, dry, fragment of his soul into your keeping. It is done. The lust fades, and you are yourself again, the power your brothers imbued you with seeming so much weaker after what just passed.
You know the rest of your group is crowding around his corpse. Shiny possessions of a dead man are all well and good, but what is that hollow pride of ownership to the feel of battle? In time, you know you will want it, in the calm, ordered city of Dalaran you will want that worldy status of yes, I was there when he died. But in this moment, denied the indecently wanton state of being, you grasp instead the fleeting smugness of a raider, a feeling that is simultaneously hunger and fulfillment. You are never sated. But you know that you cannot begin that wind up anew just yet, you are too hot, you need to come down. And you do. You chase that high again and again, and because it is the feeling you crave, and not the death, you will never find fulfillment at the end of raid, an expansion, none of that matters, only that you get to do it again, and do it well.
But that is why you play a warlock. It is the cycle. Where is the pride in the machine gun firings of a mage? Where is the existential soul deep connection when you pierce him with arrows? Where is the dark pleasure in the pure energy of a lightning bolt? You cant even think about bashing his skull with a mace, or slicing into his kidneys with a dagger. Where is the magic? You like the wind up, the maintenence, the constant affirmation of "I know what to do next" and perfect differentiation between a fight and a kill. A beginning, a middle, an end. And again. Of course again.
