Shadow Priest FAQFollow

Excellent guide, Phoenix. I like the colors, though chartreuse has always been a favorite of mine.

One thing though: Humans also get the spell Feedback at level 20.

The priest becomes surrounded with anti-magic energy. Any successful spell cast against the priest will burn x of the attacker's Mana, causing y Shadow damage for each point of Mana burned. Lasts 15 seconds.

Obviously I am a shadow priest, too. Very nice guide! Only a couple comments. With improved Mind Blast you gave it like a D or an F for raiding. I'm a raiding shadow priest right now, and what I did is I put 4/5 into it, which reduces the CD to 6 seconds. This allows me to get exactly two Mind Flays in before the CD is up. It's not terribly important, I just like the way it fits together nicely.

Also due to the sucky changes of Silent Resolve, I picked up Shadow Affinity and I've noticed a difference. Pre-TBC I could rip aggro on almost any mob, and now I've only done it once since the changes. I found myself with 2 points left over after my build, and I decided to grab imp Fade, which I've never had before. The reason I got this is 'cause I was paranoid about ripping aggro in Kara because almost everything can 1-2 shot me XD. I also got it in case I need to heal; if I heal now, I have no threat redux, and imp fade will give me 6 extra seconds to live in dicy situations. I don't recommend it unless you have nothing better to get, like me. This is my raiding build. I never PvP so I didn't get Silence. As for Shadow Power, the extra crit is not necessary for raiding, but if you're going really deep down the shadow tree it's nice to have. Afterall, I AM a DPS class, and I have about 28% crit for MB and SW:D, I want to maximize my dmg output. Another note you should add under Shadow Fiend or Vamp Touch: since the fiend's dmg IS shadow dmg, it will restore even MORE mana for every time it hits the mob while Vamp Touch is on it. The Shadow Fiend also does more dmg if you're shadow specced. Shadow Fiend for a Shadow Priest is more effective than for a holy priest. So when you're OOM, wait 'til you can throw up Vamp Touch before sending your fiend in. You'll get so much mana

Spirit Tap is useful in BGs, but not Arena. It's probably obsolete now, but I loved getting to regen some mana back for my next fight so I didn't have to drink all the time. But it's probably not worth getting over Blackout. By the way, dunno if you mentioned this but Blackout is not only useless in raiding, but dangerous. Blackout, although most of the mobs are immune to the stun, the stun effect STILL causes extra hate! This fact is why imp Revenge for warriors is still good even in raids, the stun effect causes hate. (If this has changed in the expansion or any patch, please let me know)

Anyway, that's my two cents. Great guide. If any of my friends start a shadow priest I'll tell them to look here.

Edited, Mar 22nd 2007 4:36pm by SamuraiFox

I'm going to have to disagree about SP being the paper and Locks being the shredder. I have a good friend I duel regularly who has both good gear and lots of pvp and pve experience. Right now he's 70 and I'm only 65 - which is a bit of a lvl difference. However I have beaten him in a duel and can get him down to 20% or less hp regularly which pets out. He also changes his spec regularly, so this goes for all specs of locks (this works well for hunters too).
- While fort usually gets all the attention, don't forget about shadow resistance.
- The primary mistakes I see and make when fighting a lock is that I will forget to dispell his dots from myself. Remembering to do so is imperative since thats how you lose a lot of your hp. When you dispell them it usually takes them a moment to notice, giving you time for some more offensive.
- dispell (I think this is key) anything he has on him and spam fear (You can use silence if you have it. But I often consider it to be a waste of time and don't have it).
- when you fear make sure you get him and any pet he has out. Thats imperative.
- Make sure to have SW:P on him at all times
- Despite blackout's drop in popularity, I'm a personal fan: particularly when fighting locks and hunters. Those 3 seconds give you the time to pop a shield or renew as well as fit in MB which usually can crit and knock off a good chunk of their hp. As well as get you some hp back. During which the dots are still doing their job.
-pets are annoying. Just keep them away from you as much as you can with fear. Maby dot them and use VE to use them as a source of hp.
- when seduced or fleeing will of the forsaken is your friend if your undead.

And while shadow form is all the rage, I don't use it in duels (or I start in SF then leave it after 10 or so seconds). Renew and flash heal are pretty useful for when your hp is dropping and you can't pop a sheild because of weakened soul. I rely on PW:S and when I can't pop it I fear or heal myself and add any dots I can to the lock. When I'm sheilded thats when I cast MB and any MFs.

lol

thermalnoise: I believe it has less to do with mb and swd having high threat yeilds and more to do with you are hitting with very large numbers in a very short amount of time. Mind flay does its damage over time, instead of in a single burst.

Edited, May 24th 2007 3:17pm by DigitalSocrates

One thing I found is that alot of people tend to put points into Disc for the Inner Focus Move.. I dont know if its worth it but I dont use it on my Shadow Priest

This is in regards to ranking the talents for raiding. I used to be of the school of thought along the lines of Dots and Mind Flay only. However, now that our guild tanks have better gear and are pumping out more threat I feel as though I'm not doing enough anymore. They have a HUGE threat lead if I only DoT and Flay these days.

On the other hand, using too much Mind Blast and Death can cause mana issues, and can put your health dangerously low.

Therefor I would have to say that Imp. Mind Blast and Shadow Power are not useless raiding talents, however they are not useful for every shadow priest.

For example, if your guild is well progressed (ie your tanks are great at generating threat) you can use Mind Blast pretty freely. And, lets just say you don't pvp or instance much so Imp. Psychic Scream and Silence don't appeal much to you. Why not put 2 points in Imp. Mind blast to reduce the cooldown by 1 second? With most people's latency this allows for two mind flays in between each mind blast. Personally I tend to forget to drink mana potions often enough so I didn't choose to reduce the cooldown on Mind Blast for that reason only. I did stick 3 points into Shadow Power though so that when I do use Mind Blast the extra chance to crit gives a nice mana return when it does happen.

Another question that I see asked a lot is: What spell rotation do you use in raids?!

Answer: There is no set spell rotation. What you need to do is set an order of spell priority.

When just starting Kara I was geared in all tailored epics so my +shadow dmg was pretty good compared to the gear of the tanks. So, my spell priority would be something like:
1. VT
2. SW:P
3. MF
4. MB if enough threat room

I would generally leave out VE unless the healers would have a hard time keeping up without it. I find it helps on the Aran fight, or curator for example.

Now that our tanks are better geared, I tend to go for a more aggressive cycle on the High King Maulgar fight, or Gruul himself.
1. VT
2. SW:P
3. MB
4. VE
5. SW:D if my health level is safe (if it is, I tend to use Death and then Mind Blast right after to get a good chunk of the health back)
6. Mind Flay

Of course, keep an eye on the threat meter and drop back to the first cycle if you're doing too much or if you need to conserve mana. The major key to learning how to pump out more damage is learning when to chug your first mana potion and when to use your Shadowfied to get the most out of it.

P.S. Note: if there is no paladin in the raid and you do not have Salvation, it is probably a good idea to stick to DoTs and Flays only. Make friends with your paladins and love them! :D

Edited, Aug 3rd 2007 2:33am by Khalane

As I've started doing 25-mans I've found it much easier to weave Blast and Death into a rotation. I usually keep Death on cooldown, unless I know some damage is coming (Ground Slam/Shatter), and then follow up with Blast (if threat is an issue, I do Death and not Blast). More damage, more mana return, and you will often have enough of a threat margin that you won't pull aggro (just watch out for aggro wipes). Once my tank's threat generation gets higher, I'll probably start using Blast more and more often, to the point where they're both always on cooldown (which, as I understand it, tends to be what most Hyjal/Temple spriests do - keep Blast and Death on cooldown, Flay when you have a break, stop it early for higher DPS if you need to).

Hey, another picky note :) I noticed this when I was writing something up for my guild forums. Shadow Weaving is now a 2% vulnerability per stack, for a total of 10% (rather than 3% and 15% total as it is written now).

Cheers!

Indeed a good way of playing but I've found it less stressing on the healers to leave out SW:D on some bosses. Many BT bosses are unforgiving if you do a SW:D spell and some random elements hit you and your dead before you know it.

If you're lucky, only your group will whine at you but you getting yourself killed usually means the entire raid whining due to loss in DPS/mana regen for ure group and a DPS loss for the other casters in your raid!!

You're better off rotating VT, SW:P,MB, (SW:D if HP/threat allows) and do mind flay till MB is off of CD keeping your DoT's up (which goes without saying).

Forsaken shadow priests rule :)!! 3 dots and one of em heals us >:)


FOR THE FoRSAKEN!!!!!...oh yah...and the horde...

im stoked about the changes too the priest skills, i leveled as a pure disc priest, and starshards happened to be a useful skill for me, sucked to be channeled, but i could just throw on more shields, which was also very useful with my reflective shield.

since respeced to shadow, and now i throw it on whenever i can because its free damage, and its a racial so i can still use it when silenced, which is a big bonus. if only it was some shadow damage for my VE and VT

shadowmeld is a very kick *** skill defending in PvP, nuff said