WoW Forever Warlock Guide

Blizzard has not published a Warlock deep dive. These are the Warlock changes from the September 13 deep dive recap and the beta development notes (September 24 and October 1 updates). Each line links to its source.

• Life Tap's tooltip now shows the Life converted and states that it scales with Spirit. [Blizzard blue post, September 24, 2026]
• Voidwalker Sacrifice now scales with 10% of the Warlock's spell healing. [Blizzard blue post, September 24, 2026]
• Hellfire can crit. Drain Soul is interrupted when you start another cast. [Blizzard blue post, October 1, 2026]
• Affliction: Soul Harvesting was renamed Soul Harvest and gives 50 or 100% Mana regeneration as intended. [Blizzard blue post, October 1, 2026]
• Pets: Aggressive mode is back. [Blizzard blue post, October 1, 2026]
• Trolls can be Warlocks in Forever. [Blizzard, September 13, 2026]

What the beta client shows

Our own read of the client tables. Blizzard has not posted these, so treat them as beta data that can change.

• Curse of Agony is now Bane of Agony (level 8) and Curse of Doom is now Bane of Doom (level 60). The Bane of Agony tooltip adds a new limit: one Bane per Warlock on a target. Curse of Shadow and Dark Pact are no longer in the class list.
• Create Healthstone is one spell with five ranks learned from level 10 (Classic Era: Minor at 10, the base spell at 34, then separate Lesser to Major spells). Create Soulstone starts at 18 with five ranks, Create Firestone at 28 with four, Create Spellstone has three.
• Conflagrate can be taken from level 25 (Era: 40) and has six ranks. Curse of the Elements is learned at 20 (Era: 32).
• Summon Felsteed and Summon Dreadsteed are gone, in line with the riding change.

The Warlock has three trees and 51 talent points at level 60, one per level from 10. Each tree opens a new row every 5 points. The 1-point picks behind the 10, 15, 20 and 30 point gates are the milestones Blizzard talks about: the 11, 16, 21 and 31 point talents. [Blizzard, September 30, 2026] The text below is the client's own tooltip at full rank, from build 1.60.1.70205. Plan a build in the Warlock talent calculator.

Affliction

The damage over time tree. Its milestones are Amplify Curse, Curse of Exhaustion, Siphon Life and the new Wrack, which makes your other Shadow periodic effects hit harder. The tree has 17 talents worth 49 ranks; the first row is Improved Life Tap, Suppression, Improved Corruption.

Point	Milestone talent	What it does (client text)
11	Amplify Curse	Increases the effect of your next Curse of Weakness or Bane of Agony by 50%, or your next Curse of Exhaustion by 20%. Lasts 30 sec.
16	Curse of Exhaustion	Reduces the target's movement speed by 30% for 12 sec. Only one Curse per Warlock can be active on any one target.
21	Siphon Life	Transfers 11 health from the target to the caster every 3 sec. Lasts 30 sec.
31	Wrack	Tears the target apart from within, inflicting 36 Shadow damage every 1 sec and increasing the damage they take from your other Shadow damage over time effects by 10% for 6 sec.

Demonology

The pet tree. Its milestones are Demonic Sacrifice, Fel Domination, Soul Link and the new Demonic Pact, which keeps a Demonic Sacrifice buff when you summon a different demon. The tree has 19 talents worth 50 ranks; the first row is Improved Health Funnel, Improved Imp, Demonic Embrace, Unholy Power.

Point	Milestone talent	What it does (client text)
11	Demonic Sacrifice	When activated, sacrifices your summoned Demon to enhance the opposing aspect of your power, granting you an effect that lasts 120 min. The effect is canceled if any Demon is summoned. Imp: Increases your Shadow damage by 15%.
16	Fel Domination	Your next Imp, Voidwalker, Succubus, Incubus, or Felhunter Summon spell has its casting time reduced by 5.5 sec and its Mana cost reduced by 50%.
21	Soul Link	When active, 30% of all damage taken by the caster is taken by your Imp, Voidwalker, Succubus, Incubus, or Felhunter Demon instead. In addition, both the Demon and the master will inflict 3% more damage.
31	Demonic Pact	Your Demonic Sacrifice effect is no longer cancelled by summoning a different Demon pet. Resummoning the sacrificed pet will still cancel the effect.

Destruction

The direct damage tree. Its milestones are Shadowburn, Conflagrate, the new Bane of Havoc (copies 15% of your damage to a second target) and the new Incinerate. The tree has 16 talents worth 50 ranks; the first row is Destructive Reach, Improved Shadow Bolt, Bane.

Point	Milestone talent	What it does (client text)
11	Shadowburn	Instantly blasts the target for 66 Shadow damage. If a non-trivial target dies within 8 sec of being hit with Shadowburn, the caster gains a Soul Shard.
16	Conflagrate	Ignites a target that is already afflicted by your Immolate spell, dealing 95 Fire damage and consuming your Immolate effect.
21	Bane of Havoc	Afflicts the target for 5 min, causing 15% of all damage done by the Warlock to other targets to also be dealt to the cursed target. Bane of Havoc is limited to 1 target, and only one Bane per Warlock can be active on any one target.
31	Incinerate	Deals 97 Fire damage to your target and an additional 25% damage if the target is afflicted by Immolate.

Changed between beta builds

We hold 5 snapshots of the Warlock trees (70009, 70058, 70124, 70170, 70205). These are the differences, oldest first. Wording-only fixes are left out.

• 70124 to 70170: added Soul Harvest (Affliction); removed Soul Harvesting (Affliction).

These apply to every class, so they change how you play a Warlock too.

• Talents open at level 10 and use the same number of rows as Classic. The 1-point milestone talents at 11, 21 and 31 points in a tree are joined by a new 16-point milestone. [Blizzard, September 30, 2026]
• Dual Specialization unlocks at level 40. Talents, including Legacy talents, are changed at a class trainer in a major city. [Blizzard, September 30, 2026]
• Talents that used to hand out a key group buff are now baseline: Divine Spirit (Priest), Blessing of Kings (Paladin) and Improved Mark of the Wild (Druid). [Blizzard, September 13, 2026]
• Spell, melee and ranged hit chance are one stat now, and so are spell, melee and ranged critical strike chance. [Blizzard, September 13, 2026]
• Bonus healing also gives one third as much bonus damage, so healers are not stuck when questing. [Blizzard, September 13, 2026]
• Weapon skill works as before, but items give less of it per item. Some items add a new stat that lowers the chance for your attacks to be dodged or parried, and caster weapons carry spell damage and healing. [Blizzard, September 13, 2026]
• Riding follows the Burning Crusade model: the cost moves into riding training and you get a mount when you learn the skill. [Blizzard, September 13, 2026]
• Each race now has two active and two passive racial abilities, tuned to give a similar amount of offensive power. [Blizzard, September 13, 2026]

Every Warlock spell rank the beta client (1.60.1.70205) lists from level 1 to 30, the level cap of the beta. Read from the client's SkillLineAbility and SpellLevels tables on the class skill lines. Spells marked talent need the talent first; the level is the level the client requires. Training costs are set on the server and are not in the client.

Level	Spells and ranks
1	Demon Skin (Rank 1), Immolate (Rank 1), Shadow Bolt (Rank 1)
4	Corruption (Rank 1), Curse of Weakness (Rank 1)
6	Life Tap (Rank 1), Shadow Bolt (Rank 2)
8	Bane of Agony (Rank 1), Fear (Rank 1)
10	Create Healthstone (Rank 1), Demon Skin (Rank 2), Drain Soul (Rank 1), Immolate (Rank 2), Summon Voidwalker (Summon)
12	Curse of Weakness (Rank 2), Health Funnel (Rank 1), Shadow Bolt (Rank 3)
14	Corruption (Rank 2), Curse of Recklessness (Rank 1), Drain Life (Rank 1)
16	Life Tap (Rank 2), Unending Breath
18	Bane of Agony (Rank 2), Create Soulstone (Rank 1), Searing Pain (Rank 1)
20	Curse of the Elements (Rank 1), Demon Armor (Rank 1), Health Funnel (Rank 2), Immolate (Rank 3), Rain of Fire (Rank 1), Ritual of Summoning, Shadow Bolt (Rank 4), Shadowburn (Rank 1) (talent), Summon Incubus (Summon), Summon Succubus (Summon)
22	Create Healthstone (Rank 2), Curse of Weakness (Rank 3), Drain Life (Rank 2), Eye of Kilrogg (Summon)
24	Corruption (Rank 3), Drain Mana (Rank 1), Drain Soul (Rank 2), Sense Demons, Shadowburn (Rank 2) (talent)
25	Conflagrate (Rank 1) (talent)
26	Curse of Tongues (Rank 1), Detect Invisibility (Rank 1), Life Tap (Rank 3), Searing Pain (Rank 2)
28	Bane of Agony (Rank 3), Banish (Rank 1), Create Firestone (Rank 1), Curse of Recklessness (Rank 2), Health Funnel (Rank 3), Shadow Bolt (Rank 5)
30	Create Soulstone (Rank 2), Curse of the Elements (Rank 2), Demon Armor (Rank 2), Drain Life (Rank 3), Hellfire (Rank 1), Immolate (Rank 4), Siphon Life (Rank 1) (talent), Subjugate Demon (Rank 1), Summon Felhunter (Summon)

The beta class spell list (1.60.1.70205) compared with Classic Era (1.15.9.70003), levels 2 to 60, matched by spell name. A renamed spell shows up once as removed and once as new. Passive form auras and helper records are left out.

New in Forever

Spell	First level	Ranks	Type
Bane of Agony	8	6	Trainer
Incinerate	40	3	Talent
Wrack	40	1	Talent
Bane of Doom	60	1	Trainer
Portal of Summoning	60	1	Was a talent in Classic Era

No longer in the class spell list

Learned at a different level

Spell	Classic Era	Forever beta
Create Healthstone	34	10
Create Soulstone	40	18
Curse of the Elements	32	20
Conflagrate	40	25
Detect Invisibility	38	26
Create Firestone	36	28

Different number of ranks

Spell	Classic Era ranks (levels)	Forever beta ranks (levels)
Conflagrate	4 (40, 48, 54, 60)	6 (25, 32, 40, 48, 54, 60)
Create Firestone	1 (36)	4 (28, 36, 46, 56)
Create Healthstone	1 (34)	5 (10, 22, 34, 46, 58)
Create Soulstone	1 (40)	5 (18, 30, 40, 50, 60)
Create Spellstone	1 (36)	3 (36, 48, 60)
Curse of the Elements	3 (32, 46, 60)	4 (20, 30, 40, 50)
Detect Invisibility	1 (38)	3 (26, 38, 50)

Field by field changes to every Warlock spell (damage, costs, cooldowns) are on the Warlock spell changes page.

The beta client (1.60.1.70170) allows 5 races to be a Warlock. "New" means the pair is not in the Classic Era client (1.15.9.69722). Blizzard can still switch a pair off on its servers. All pairs are on the races and classes page.

Racial notes from Blizzard

Every race has two active and two passive racials in Forever. [Blizzard, September 13, 2026] Blizzard has described these so far:

• Gnome: Eureka became a 10% discount on Mana, Rage or Energy abilities. [Blizzard blue post, September 24, 2026]
• Gnome: Eureka no longer applies to periodic effects; channeled spells do not count as periodic. [Blizzard blue post, October 1, 2026]
• Human: Will to Survive got a new visual, matching Dispel Magic. [Blizzard blue post, September 24, 2026]
• Undead: Will of the Forsaken still removes Charm, Fear and Sleep but no longer grants immunity. Cannibalize restores Mana as well as Health. Touch of the Grave is a new damage racial. [Blizzard, September 13, 2026]
• Undead: Touch of the Grave no longer breaks crowd control and no longer fires from spells without a damage part. [Blizzard blue post, September 24, 2026]
• Undead: Cannibalize cannot be used while you are immune to Physical damage. [Blizzard blue post, October 1, 2026]

We do not publish guesses. These wait for launch or for Blizzard to say more:

• Stat priorities. Itemization is still moving in the beta, and Blizzard has posted no stat weights.
• Best in slot lists. The two new raids in the client (Hyjal Summit and Barrow Deeps) have encounter names but no loot data yet.
• Raid roles and group makeup at 60. The beta stops at level 30.
• Training costs. Trainer prices are set on the server and are not in the client files.
• Whether Warlocks get a tank option. Nothing official or in the client points to one.

Blizzard

• Blizzard: WoW Forever launches November 4, September 12, 2026
• Blizzard: World of Warcraft: Forever deep dive panel recap, September 13, 2026
• Blizzard: Class Deep Dives, Priest and Warrior, September 30, 2026
• Blizzard: The WoW Forever beta is live, September 17, 2026
• Blizzard blue post: Beta development notes, September 24 update, September 24, 2026
• Blizzard blue post: Beta development notes, October 1 update, October 1, 2026

Beta client data

• Talent trees: the beta client's Trait tables, build 1.60.1.70205, decoded into our talent snapshots (beta builds compared: 70009, 70058, 70124, 70170, 70205).
• Spells by level and the Classic Era comparison: SkillLineAbility, Spell and SpellLevels for build 1.60.1.70205 against Classic Era 1.15.9.70003, read from our datamine on October 5, 2026.
• Races: the client's character creation table, build 1.60.1.70170, against Classic Era 1.15.9.69722.

How we work: Blizzard statements are quoted in our own words and linked with their date. Client data is shown as the client stores it, with its build number, and is not a promise about the live game. Press reports and datamining rumors are not used on this page.