Some tips for Drain/healer setups in 2v2.

[orionlol]

(please excuse my english. its not so good.)

Hey, I've not seen any guides anywhere regarding drain setups in 2v2.

Drain setups are setups (usually warlock-healer and hunter-healer) that are based almost entirely around winning the mana war. I've gotten to gladiator with a warlock drain setup and duelist with a hunter setup so I figured I would go ahead and throw some tips here.

Use the right spec: I cannot emphasize this enough, This is absolutely game breaking. Without the right spec you can end up losing a ton of utility that benefits your setup. Destruction warlocks, BM hunters.......They just do not belong in a drain setup team.

As a warlock, The best spec to use would be the rather infamous SL/SL spec, (Soul link, Siphon life). What this spec does, is gives you very massive survivability, Consistent damage through DoTs and all the necessary talents to use drain mana in a 2v2 setting.

As a hunter, You would want 11/41/9 marks, This spec offers Bestial swiftness so that your pet can keep on the enemy healer and keep him in combat, decent sustained and burst damage, And improved stings. Which increases the amount of mana drained by viper sting, As well as giving it a 30% chance to resist dispel.

As for partners, You would be best off using a restoration druid with either class. They're the dominating healing class in arena at the moment. High CC, Incredible mana efficiency and they are VERY hard to kill. Good alternatives would be the holy paladin for the warlock, Or a discipline priest for the hunter. The paladin has amazing synergy with the warlock in that he has incredibly mana efficient heals, and with judgment of justice....Can pillar kite like a god. The priest works well with the hunter in that between viper sting and the priest mana burning, You can drop an enemies mana incredibly fast, Giving you obvious advantages. Pain suppression can also be game breaking to stop that Adrenaline rush'd rogue or heroism/windfury beefed up warrior from destroying you if they catch a hole in your CC.

People constantly say that mana drain setups are easy mode in 2v2, I tend to disagree because of the high amount of micromanagement it can require. In either setup...You have to monitor both of your enemies, Your pet, Your healer, and yourself constantly, While keeping a decent level of CC and pressure on your enemy.

The pressure part brings me to stats......A lot of people assume if they ignore attack power and spell damage and just stack stamina and resilience they will be better off, After all, Those don't effect drain mana/viper sting right? This is true, But you have to keep in mind that 80% of the pressure you put on the enemys mana pool will more then likely come from raw damage. Being able to put out 4000~ damage on an enemy while his healer is preoccupied can have huge effects on the game, They will tend to panic and use a large heal, Larger heals are more inefficient and as such cause them to burn mana at a higher rate.

I choose to maintain about 1250 spell damage on my warlock (With fel armor and demonic knowledge), Leave my resilience at about 460 (With the 4 piece armor bonus, instead of double two piece) and health at around 12800. I also dropped 3 points in fel concentration for 2/2 improved curse of agony and 1/3 empowered corruption. The result between my high spell damage stacking and talent choices, Is I do much more damage with my dots, And it has a very noticable effect on my enemys mana pool.

As a warlock, Always use your felhunter. As a hunter, always use a scorpid. His poison provides something of a dispel wall to your viper sting.
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*Going deeper into the gearing thing, Hunters tend to make the mistake of using an offensive trinket like bloodlust brooch for their non-medallion trinket, This is most unwise as one of the battlemasters trinkets will get you much further, The 1750 hp on use effect has saved me more times then I can count, It's also amazing for duels.

Skipping out on the amazing welfare 2h axe and grabbing two 1h axes and slapping 30 int on them can be quite rewarding, This IS an outlast setup and those two enchants come out to 900 extra mana, As well as over 30 extra mp5 when you're low with aspect of the Viper up. As a warlock you will want the 1h dagger and offhand, As the crit on the staff is useless for you. (If you're playing the 23/38/0 spec I suggested).

The biggest tip I can give you, Is to WATCH YOUR HEALER. Too many teams get stuck at low ratings simply because the warlock/hunter isn't watchful enough of his own healer, Are you dotting/shooting and harassing the enemy healer? See the enemy warrior/warlock/hunter running past you? Turn around and fear or wing clip them, This alone can help your healer hugely. The same can be said for wing clipping/Curse of exhaustioning/ fearing etc. the enemys pet, This will give your healer some leeway and can give them a few seconds of drink time, or more. This is ABSOLUTELY game breaking.

A somewhat universal PVP tip but one unusually overlooked, Is keybind and turn with your mouse. This increases your reaction time and mobility in PVP, and that is HUGE.

As for your healer, Have them turn on Enemy Name Plates (Default is Ctrl - V I think), This lets them know where the enemy is on the other side of the pillar and makes pillar kiting WAY easier.

These are just a few tips that I think will help some people, Drain mana setups are not easy at first...But believe me, They get easier with practice.

[Yooloze]

nice though +rep

[Voip]

this is a Nice guide..its actually the Strat I use for my Lock + rep my friend for helping others out

[orionlol]

Edit: Updated with a few new tips.