Why are Warlocks Overpowered in PVP?

Simply put, they have the best player versus player (PVP) crowd control in the game combined with very effective and easy to cast damage over time spells (DOTS). Specifically, let's look at their crowd control spells.

• Death Coil (Instant Cast) - 3 second fear that returns health to the caster equal to damage inflicted. Technically this is considered horror not fear. So not included in diminishing returns for fear. 2 min cooldown.
• Howl of Terror (1.5 sec cast) - 8 second area of effect fear that affects 5 toons. 40 sec cooldown. Also considered terror or horror so not included in fear diminishing returns.
• Fear (1.5 sec cast) - 10 second fear in PVP. Can only be cast on 1 toon at a time. Diminishing returns. The first spell is 10 seconds, the second 5 seconds, the third 3 seconds. Then a toon is immune from your spell for 15 seconds. Then, everything is reset and you can be feared again.

This is a very powerful set of spells. Most classes have 2 or 3 crowd control spells. But because Warlocks spells are all fear based, this gives them an advantage.


What Makes Fear based Spells Different from Other Crowd Control?
There are a couple of things that set fear apart from other crowd control spells.

1. Complete control of your toon is lost.
   
2. Damage can be increased while the fear effect is in place.

When feared, your loss of control is total. Your current target is lost. The camera angle cannot be controlled or changed. Basically you cannot do anything for the duration of the Fear effect except sit back and watch. This differs from many crowd control effects like Roots, Frost Nova, Earthbind Totem, or Hamstring which allow you to maintain control of your toon even though your movement is impaired. The only counter for most classes is the PVP trinket you can earn in battlegrounds. The trinket will break a fear effect, but has a 2 minute cooldown this limiting its usefulness.

Many crowd control effects seem to have some limitation in regard to damage. Polymorph actually causes the affected toon to regenerate health and mana faster. Cyclone makes a toon immune to damage. A Freeze Trap breaks if the toon suffers any damage. Sap break with any damage.

Fear effects differ in that damage over time spells can be added without breaking the effect. In theory, at some magical threshold, damage from DOTS will break fear. But in practice this seems to be a very rare occurrence. Burst spell or melee damage has been changed and now breaks fear. But, only poor arena players would actually risk breaking fear in this way.

Thus, in many situaltions, a good Warlock can reduce your health by 50% without using any of their damage spells and without you having a chance to fight back. Add to this one of the warlock pets charming you, pounding on you with a large axe, or silencing your attempts to heal and the situation is grim indeed.

Nerf Warlocks?
The simplest solution would be to merely put all warlock spells on the same diminishing returns timer, just like every other class. At least with 15 seconds of immunity to fear effects, you would have more of a chance. Any solution should only affect PVP. Changing any classes overal abilities is a bad idea when only a PVP fix is needed.