What is the Best Evoker Leveling Spec in Dragonflight?
The unequivocal answer to the question, “What is the best Evoker leveling spec?” is Devastation. While the Evoker class offers three specializations – Devastation (damage dealer), Preservation (healer), and Augmentation (damage dealer with support) – Devastation stands out as the most efficient and effective choice for leveling in World of Warcraft’s Dragonflight expansion. This specialization combines high burst damage, self-sustain capabilities, and excellent crowd control, making it a breeze to navigate the leveling process.
Why Devastation is the Top Choice
Unmatched Burst Damage
Devastation Evokers are designed to excel at quickly eliminating threats. Their Mastery: Giantkiller provides a significant damage bonus against high-health targets, making them exceptionally potent against quest mobs and elites. This built-in burst is invaluable for speeding up your leveling experience. Instead of slowly whittling down enemy health, you can dispatch them rapidly, moving on to the next objective quickly.
Strong Self-Sustain
Leveling isn’t just about dealing damage; it’s also about surviving. Devastation Evokers have access to solid defensive and self-healing options, allowing them to take on multiple enemies without needing to constantly stop and recover. While not as defensively robust as some other classes, their ability to heal themselves with abilities like Renewing Blaze (though it is described as a weaker version of the old mage spell Rewind Time) means they can handle most leveling encounters without hassle.
Effective Crowd Control
Gaining distance from enemies, slowing them down, or disrupting their attacks is critical for survival. Devastation Evokers have a toolkit of abilities like Landslide, Wing Buffet, Tail Swipe, and slows that provide valuable control, letting you create space between you and foes and efficiently manage groups of enemies. These crowd control abilities make it much easier to pull multiple mobs at once and take them down efficiently without suffering too much damage.
Mobility Advantages
The class itself, regardless of spec, boasts inherent mobility, which is another key factor for smooth leveling. A streamlined set of skills and abilities like Hover allow you to move through the world faster, cut down travel time and quickly get to the next quest objective.
Augmentation Evoker as an Alternative?
While Augmentation Evoker can be a viable option for leveling, it is not the ideal choice if your main goal is speed. Augmentation focuses on buffing your allies, which is not particularly useful while leveling solo. It has control tools that make it highly viable but it doesn’t have the sheer raw power of Devastation. If you are interested in a more team-oriented playstyle later on, it’s worth exploring, but it’s not the most efficient way to level solo. It may be worth noting that the Augmentation specialization is not too difficult to play, and some of its abilities may be rebalanced or nerfed in the future, according to some comments.
Preservation Evoker for Leveling?
Although Preservation Evoker is primarily a healing spec, you can technically level with it by queuing for dungeons, however, this is not an efficient way to level alone. Preservation lacks the raw damage output required to rapidly kill quest enemies. If you prefer a group experience while leveling, then you could use Preservation to queue for dungeons, but again you would be much slower leveling than if you used Devastation. The same applies to any healer for leveling. If you are interested in speed then you should use a DPS spec like Devastation.
Key Leveling Tips for Devastation Evoker
- Prioritize Mastery: For Devastation Evokers, Mastery is the most important stat. You will want to get it above 85% because you will then be doing almost double damage on high-health targets and during your cooldown Dragonrage. Then Critical Strike, Haste and Versatility.
- Utilize your mobility: Make sure to use your abilities like Hover to get around the world faster.
- Take advantage of Crowd Control: Employ your toolkit of abilities like Landslide, Wing Buffet, Tail Swipe, and slows to stay safe and efficiently pull multiple enemies.
- Practice your rotation: Get a solid understanding of the basic rotation to maximize your DPS potential.
Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)
Here are 15 frequently asked questions to further clarify the best leveling options for Evokers, which is the Devastation specialization.
1. Can I level as a Preservation Evoker?
Yes, you can level as a Preservation Evoker by queuing for dungeons, however this will be much slower than leveling with the Devastation specialization. If you enjoy dungeons and prefer a healing role, then it is an option, but it is not the most efficient.
2. Is Augmentation Evoker good for leveling?
Augmentation Evoker is viable for leveling with its survivability and enemy control tools, but it lacks the raw DPS that Devastation offers and thus will be much slower to level with. It is more focused on team play, which is not very useful when leveling solo.
3. What are the weaknesses of the Evoker class?
Evokers, particularly Devastation, are relatively squishy compared to other ranged DPS classes. They have limited defensive abilities, meaning you will have to position yourself to avoid damage as much as possible.
4. How does the Evoker’s mastery work?
The Evoker Mastery: Giantkiller makes you do more damage based on the health pool of the enemy you are fighting, making them do double damage on high-health targets.
5. What is the Dracthyr Evoker’s unique racial buff?
The Dracthyr Evokers provide a utility buff called Blessing of the Bronze, giving a unique benefit to the raid.
6. What stats should a Devastation Evoker prioritize?
Mastery should be your highest priority stat, followed by Critical Strike, Haste, and Versatility. Mastery significantly increases your damage against higher-health targets.
7. Is Evoker a fun class to play?
Yes, the Evoker class is considered fun to play, with excellent mobility, utility, and a more modern feel compared to other classes. Specializing as either a damage dealer or a healer, it offers a dynamic and engaging playstyle.
8. What weapons can Evokers equip?
Evokers can equip Daggers, Staves, Fist Weapons, 1H and 2H Swords, 1H and 2H Axes, and 1H and 2H Maces. They can also use off-hand items, but cannot dual-wield.
9. Can Evokers dual wield weapons?
No, Evokers cannot dual wield weapons. They can use off-hand items, however.
10. Can Evokers use armor transmogs in their Dracthyr form?
Due to their draconic nature, you will not see armor transmogs when they are in their Dracthyr form.
11. What is the new Augmentation Evoker spec?
The Augmentation spec is a new damage-dealer role that enhances the abilities of nearby allies. They use the essence of the Black and Bronze dragonflights to empower their team.
12. Are Evokers good in Mythic+ dungeons?
Evokers are considered good in Mythic+ dungeons, particularly Devastation with their incredible uncapped burst AoE and strong boss damage. They are proficient at cleave and can focus on priority targets. They also have excellent stopping capabilities with spells such as Deep Breath+Terror of the Skies, Tail Swipe, and Wing Buffet.
13. Can you get a legendary on an Evoker?
Yes, you can get an Evoker legendary on Normal difficulty, but the chance is lower than on Heroic difficulty.
14. Do Evokers summon vexes?
Yes, Evokers can summon devilish flying beasts called Vexes that can pass through walls. These vexes have a secondary attack which conjures a row of fangs to erupt from the ground, designed to keep the player moving.
15. Do I need to be level 60 before starting Dragonflight quests?
Yes, you must reach at least level 60 to start the Dragonflight intro questline.
Conclusion
In summary, Devastation Evoker is the ideal choice for leveling in Dragonflight due to its strong burst damage, self-sustain, effective crowd control, and superior speed. While other specializations have their unique strengths, they are not as effective for solo leveling. By focusing on Mastery, utilizing your mobility, and practicing your rotation, you can quickly level your Evoker and jump into the endgame content. The Evoker class itself has a number of useful utility abilities such as Blessing of the Bronze, as well as very potent AoE abilities, and so it is a great class to play, and Devastation is the best spec for leveling.