If you’ve been following Elitist Jerks or Warlock’s Den, you’ve probably noticed that the latest 3.1.2 simulations have 0-13-58 at the top of the DPS heap. You might have also noticed that the recommended glyphs do NOT include Glyph of Life Tap.
According to recent simulations and theorycrafting, Destruction Warlocks that invest points in to Improved Soul Leech do not Life Tap nearly as often as any other Warlock spec, making Glyph of Life Tap less appealing.
The misconception about the glyph is that it should be refreshed every 20 seconds to have a 100% uptime on the additional spellpower but that is actually NOT the way to do it at all. Life Tapping every 20 seconds is actually a DPS loss, even with 4T7.
You Life Tap when you need mana and benefit from the buff but no more, no less.
This is where we hit a wall as a Destruction Warlock. Having Improved Soul Leech means we will be Life Tapping a hell of a lot less than any other Warlock spec, thus getting less of a benefit from the Life Tap glyph.
Making sense?
When 3.1.2 hits and you Destruction Warlocks (myself included) rejoice in being at the top of the heap, take a look at your glyphs and consider using Glyph of Conflagrate, Glyph of Immolate and Glyph of Incinerate over Glyph of Life Tap.
The debate right now is between Glyph of Immolate and Glyph of Life Tap. Some Warlocks feel that Immolate or Incinerate glyphs lose their viability to Life Tap because you get no benefit from them while mobile.. which is a valid concern if you were a Warlock NOT specced in to Improved Soul Leech because you’ll be Life Tapping much more frequently, thus getting more benefit from the Life Tap glyph.
Keep in mind that simluations run using the best gear & enchants but are usually pretty accurate predicting the highest DPS specs and so far 0-13-58 w/ Improved Soul Leech using Glyphs of Immolate, Incinerate & Conflagrate is king. We’ll see, though.
Original source for this information can be found here.
