Hi,
I just reached lvl 70 and my guild wants me to stay shadow for kara raids. I crawled my way to hit my tailoring to 375 and made myself the Frozen shadoweave set. (Still working on the other upgrades).
The question I would like to ask is can a shadow priest outdps the other classes like mages, locks.
I do notice that my DPS was much better as compared to before but the mage in my group took off so fast I couldn't catch up. Futher more shadow priest don't have much spells as compared to the other classes. SW:P, SW:D, VT,VE, MB. So is it true that a properly geared shadow priest can't out dps the other classes.
Sorry if this is a silly question as this is my 1st time being playing as a priest. It fun to play but I would like to know more about shadow priest's DPS.
Thank you in advance and good hunting good drops
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Like most things in this game, it depends. Boost your +damage as much as possible and you can easily outdps the majority of classes at the Karazhan level. Once you start moving past gruul and mag into TK and SSC you'll find that the itemization for the other dps classes is somewhat better and that you'll have a harder time staying top of the meters.
Compared to the other dps classes in our guild I rate just below our top warlocks on ranged fights, and usually in the top 5 on most others. Thats mainly with kara epics and crafted gear (not many 25 man drops so far).
Compared to the other dps classes in our guild I rate just below our top warlocks on ranged fights, and usually in the top 5 on most others. Thats mainly with kara epics and crafted gear (not many 25 man drops so far).
You have so much more to a add other than dps its not funny. What are you using for your spell cycle?
Stolen from a really long and boring article that interviews a wow player shadow priest that leads dps in the top wow guild.
muqq on:
– gear stats
Spell damage and hit rating are your most important stats. After capping your hit rating at 16%, you should look into improving your spell damage as much as possible. Crit is nice once you are getting very well geared, but do not take it over spell damage or hit unless you are already capped. I would say once you have two or more pieces of tier 6, or around 1200 spell damage, you can look into crit. The problem is, even with high crit at lower spell damage, your mana probably won't allow you to use a whole lot of Mind Blasts and Shadow Word: Deaths anyway, which makes crit even worse than it already is for shadow priests.
– tailoring
Tailoring is a great way to get good gear early on. It rivals tier 5 in dps output, and is a great choice for any spellcaster, really. Once you get tier 6, you can live without tailoring. It was a huge advantage being a tailor early in TBC, and one of the reasons that made spellcasters outperform the melees and hunters early on. Tailoring is still very viable, also for those raiding Serpentshrine Cavern and Tempest Keep.
– spell rotation
I use Vampiric Touch - Shadow Word: Pain - Vampiric Embrace - Mind Blast - Shadow Word: Death - Mind Flay - Mind Flay. Reapply dots as they wear out, and a good dot timer is good for this purpose. Depending on how well geared you are, you can keep Mind Blast and Shadow Word: Death on their cooldowns. For lesser geared shadow priests: Shadow Word: Pain - Vampiric Touch - Vampiric Embrace - Mind Flay. Keep Mind Flaying until dots run out, and then reapply them. Once you get better gear, include a Mind Blast after the Vampiric Embrace and keep Mind Blast on cooldown at that point.
Edited, Oct 19th 2007 5:09am by crazyhtown
Stolen from a really long and boring article that interviews a wow player shadow priest that leads dps in the top wow guild.
muqq on:
– gear stats
Spell damage and hit rating are your most important stats. After capping your hit rating at 16%, you should look into improving your spell damage as much as possible. Crit is nice once you are getting very well geared, but do not take it over spell damage or hit unless you are already capped. I would say once you have two or more pieces of tier 6, or around 1200 spell damage, you can look into crit. The problem is, even with high crit at lower spell damage, your mana probably won't allow you to use a whole lot of Mind Blasts and Shadow Word: Deaths anyway, which makes crit even worse than it already is for shadow priests.
– tailoring
Tailoring is a great way to get good gear early on. It rivals tier 5 in dps output, and is a great choice for any spellcaster, really. Once you get tier 6, you can live without tailoring. It was a huge advantage being a tailor early in TBC, and one of the reasons that made spellcasters outperform the melees and hunters early on. Tailoring is still very viable, also for those raiding Serpentshrine Cavern and Tempest Keep.
– spell rotation
I use Vampiric Touch - Shadow Word: Pain - Vampiric Embrace - Mind Blast - Shadow Word: Death - Mind Flay - Mind Flay. Reapply dots as they wear out, and a good dot timer is good for this purpose. Depending on how well geared you are, you can keep Mind Blast and Shadow Word: Death on their cooldowns. For lesser geared shadow priests: Shadow Word: Pain - Vampiric Touch - Vampiric Embrace - Mind Flay. Keep Mind Flaying until dots run out, and then reapply them. Once you get better gear, include a Mind Blast after the Vampiric Embrace and keep Mind Blast on cooldown at that point.
Edited, Oct 19th 2007 5:09am by crazyhtown
I can say from experience that I rarely am not #1 on Kara damage meters if you're looking at them from an entire run. There are certain fights that other classes excel at (Illhoof comes to mind) and you there's no way you can keep up regardless of your gear. Sustained DPS is what the SP does, although that's not to say we can't put out nice burst damage on occasions. If your only concern is the amount of DPS you can spit out, you can put those fears to rest. We do great.
You can check out my armory page if you want to see what I've got. Just missing a few minor upgrades from Kara and I don't have any 25 man pieces. But you were just asking about Kara, right? Anyhow, I'm Shadowurms on Uther if you're interested.
You can check out my armory page if you want to see what I've got. Just missing a few minor upgrades from Kara and I don't have any 25 man pieces. But you were just asking about Kara, right? Anyhow, I'm Shadowurms on Uther if you're interested.
Shadowpriest.com is a wonderful resource.
Your #1 priority is to keep VT and SWP ticking. After that, use Blast and Death when they're up, and fill in the rest with Flays. I also generally keep VE up at all times. If you're having aggro problems, drop Death and/or Blast out; same with mana problems. Get a good DoT timer (I recommend ClassTimer) and get used to watching it religiously while still paying attention to the fight.
Get Quartz Casting Bar and set up macros like this:
#showtooltip
/stopcasting
/cast spellname
That's an incredible way to boost your DPS once you get used to it; it basically forces the spell off on server time rather than client time (the spell is done server-side but not client-side, and forces it to end early but still go off client side, counteracting most latency above about ~50ms).
Get lots of mana pots, and get used to getting and using them. Use them when they'll first give you the max amount (as soon as you're down 3000 mana). I spend about 120g of mana pots a week, plus about 200g in flasks and another 100g or so in other consumables.
We can and do outdamage other classes up until SSC/TK at least, though as others get geared and spec into pure raiding builds we start to fall. I'm usually top 3 on damage in Gruul, behind a lock or two, but then again some of our mages are a bit stubborn about keeping their PvP specs. In Kara it really depends on the fight; I have yet to actually live through Big Bad Wolf and Attumen, and fights like Shade and Illhoof and Maiden favor certain classes, Prince is hard on spriests, though we're great on Curator and especially Netherspite (2900dps wtf?!).
Oh, one other thing. Try and keep Blast and Death on cooldown, but be very aware of fight mechanics with Death. Use it very carefully on Curator (evocation, especially if you were just Hateful Bolted), Prince (enfeeble and axes), Netherspite (blue beam + SWD crit = 34000dmg on yourself :D), Shade (Arcane Missiles), Magtheridon (cube clicks/banishes), and so on.
Edited, Oct 19th 2007 11:56am by lsfreak
Your #1 priority is to keep VT and SWP ticking. After that, use Blast and Death when they're up, and fill in the rest with Flays. I also generally keep VE up at all times. If you're having aggro problems, drop Death and/or Blast out; same with mana problems. Get a good DoT timer (I recommend ClassTimer) and get used to watching it religiously while still paying attention to the fight.
Get Quartz Casting Bar and set up macros like this:
#showtooltip
/stopcasting
/cast spellname
That's an incredible way to boost your DPS once you get used to it; it basically forces the spell off on server time rather than client time (the spell is done server-side but not client-side, and forces it to end early but still go off client side, counteracting most latency above about ~50ms).
Get lots of mana pots, and get used to getting and using them. Use them when they'll first give you the max amount (as soon as you're down 3000 mana). I spend about 120g of mana pots a week, plus about 200g in flasks and another 100g or so in other consumables.
We can and do outdamage other classes up until SSC/TK at least, though as others get geared and spec into pure raiding builds we start to fall. I'm usually top 3 on damage in Gruul, behind a lock or two, but then again some of our mages are a bit stubborn about keeping their PvP specs. In Kara it really depends on the fight; I have yet to actually live through Big Bad Wolf and Attumen, and fights like Shade and Illhoof and Maiden favor certain classes, Prince is hard on spriests, though we're great on Curator and especially Netherspite (2900dps wtf?!).
Oh, one other thing. Try and keep Blast and Death on cooldown, but be very aware of fight mechanics with Death. Use it very carefully on Curator (evocation, especially if you were just Hateful Bolted), Prince (enfeeble and axes), Netherspite (blue beam + SWD crit = 34000dmg on yourself :D), Shade (Arcane Missiles), Magtheridon (cube clicks/banishes), and so on.
Edited, Oct 19th 2007 11:56am by lsfreak
Well.. On trash my dmg output usually quite sucks (cant burst long enough for them to go down and substained dps takes too long to exceel on trash, usually.) however, on boss fights I very often am on the top.
Currently we do gruul and 1-2 karas every week... Gruul it's straightout: I haven't been beaten on dps meters the past 4 weeks or so.. especially the 2 last goes. I keep on scoring somewhere from 50-200 dps more than the 2nd placed.. it's almost stupid. Also I'm always in top 5 of healing meters too xD makes it just so much more fun. The fact that I return such a hugeass amount of mana the best part thou.
If you don't get on top but score into the top 3 (10-man) or top 5 (25-man) just look at it like this: Afterall you are returning mana and health to your group. Topping the dps meters might be a nice bonus, but it's not necessary for you to be a nice addition to the raid.
In kara you should focus on having ur target shackled on trash btw :P And even more on moroes. Recast shackle early (like every 10-15 secs), use a macro for it if u want to save some hazzle.
Currently we do gruul and 1-2 karas every week... Gruul it's straightout: I haven't been beaten on dps meters the past 4 weeks or so.. especially the 2 last goes. I keep on scoring somewhere from 50-200 dps more than the 2nd placed.. it's almost stupid. Also I'm always in top 5 of healing meters too xD makes it just so much more fun. The fact that I return such a hugeass amount of mana the best part thou.
If you don't get on top but score into the top 3 (10-man) or top 5 (25-man) just look at it like this: Afterall you are returning mana and health to your group. Topping the dps meters might be a nice bonus, but it's not necessary for you to be a nice addition to the raid.
In kara you should focus on having ur target shackled on trash btw :P And even more on moroes. Recast shackle early (like every 10-15 secs), use a macro for it if u want to save some hazzle.
Scholar
21 posts
I am grateful for the tips all. Atleast now i see some directions on how to use my priest. Maybe my spell rotation was wrong i guess from what i have read here. Will work on that.
Thank you all once again and have a good weekend.
Thank you all once again and have a good weekend.
Yea, trash can be hard. I'm to the point where I only top meters on bosses, not on trash, because our burst is getting a lot better. Anything that goes down fairly quickly I remove SWP and VE from, so the humanoids on the way to Attumen, sometimes the horses, the single pulls before Moroes, the groups of shades or the little mana elementals before Shade of Aran, and so on.
If you're placing *that* high on the DPS, you need to bug your other DPS about not sucking >.> I've got a few locks who are finally competitive with me (they don't get along too well, but that's good for their damage output :D), all three of us usually place about 850dps on Gruul and just under or over 1000dps on Maulgar (plus one of the lock's enslaved felpuppies... :P). Everyone else, however, is a ways down on the list of damage, sometimes a full 20% below us, which should NOT be happening. Makes me sad D:
On shackling: Get a spell timer, that helps a lot, and put it in a place you can't miss it (my focus portrait and debuff tracker for shackle are fight in the middle of my screen). So far I've had shackle break early twice on Moroes in the last 5 months of doing him, and another time or two where it got dispelled by the priest add. I can refresh it when Moroes vanishes and not have to any other time. I'm hit capped against bosses plus a little, and I'm thinking doing beyond the normal hit cap *may* have an effect on heartbeat resist rates, but it's just a feeling. I usually have the most dangerous add - either ret pally or arms warrior - so I make sure to stand a ways away from them so that if they do break early I have some warning and don't just die outright.
If you're placing *that* high on the DPS, you need to bug your other DPS about not sucking >.> I've got a few locks who are finally competitive with me (they don't get along too well, but that's good for their damage output :D), all three of us usually place about 850dps on Gruul and just under or over 1000dps on Maulgar (plus one of the lock's enslaved felpuppies... :P). Everyone else, however, is a ways down on the list of damage, sometimes a full 20% below us, which should NOT be happening. Makes me sad D:
On shackling: Get a spell timer, that helps a lot, and put it in a place you can't miss it (my focus portrait and debuff tracker for shackle are fight in the middle of my screen). So far I've had shackle break early twice on Moroes in the last 5 months of doing him, and another time or two where it got dispelled by the priest add. I can refresh it when Moroes vanishes and not have to any other time. I'm hit capped against bosses plus a little, and I'm thinking doing beyond the normal hit cap *may* have an effect on heartbeat resist rates, but it's just a feeling. I usually have the most dangerous add - either ret pally or arms warrior - so I make sure to stand a ways away from them so that if they do break early I have some warning and don't just die outright.
Arg I hate hearing about "Can I outdps the class?", especially in raid situations.
Only time max dps is important is when you are soloing or PVPing.
Otherwise, your focus should be in between DPs and Utility at all times.
Only time max dps is important is when you are soloing or PVPing.
Otherwise, your focus should be in between DPs and Utility at all times.
True... but the degree of our utility is based on how much damage we do. So it's not that bad of a question in the case of shadow priest.
Quote:
Get lots of mana pots, and get used to getting and using them. Use them when they'll first give you the max amount (as soon as you're down 3000 mana). I spend about 120g of mana pots a week, plus about 200g in flasks and another 100g or so in other consumables.
QFT
This is, unfortunately, how you will end up topping damage meters.
RuinatorVek wrote:
Arg I hate hearing about "Can I outdps the class?", especially in raid situations.
Only time max dps is important is when you are soloing or PVPing.
Otherwise, your focus should be in between DPs and Utility at all times.
Only time max dps is important is when you are soloing or PVPing.
Otherwise, your focus should be in between DPs and Utility at all times.
I don't see how this comment makes sense. All of our utility in a raid comes from the damage we do. Therefore, more damage = more health/mana back to the group = good. If you aren't trying to max out your damage in a raid setting while keeping up your DoTs and debuffs, you aren't doing your job. There is nothing wrong with topping the damage meters if you are capable of doing so. :D
/agree with Khalene. Our utility is directly based on how much damage we put out, with the exception on one extra GCD every 1-2 minutes (depending on how safe you want to be). Of course, fulfilling fight requirements (running out if you have Wrath of Solarian, getting out of Orbs, away from each other during Ground Slam) is more important than dps/utility.
On Kara fights, my overall DPS is lower than other places. I stand out on Curator because I keep DOT's on Curator the whole time, and I eat an entire portal phase in Netherspite. Otherwise, I drop behind on many fights just because of mechanics. Gruul is much different: I'm regularly breaking 1000dps on Maulgar and was just a few points shy of 900dps on our last Gruul. Bear in ZA looks to be a really spriest-friendly fight as well, on our 4 attempts (stupid Attack-Bleed-Bleed-Parry-Counterattack -_-) I was averaging 860dps without a working DoT timer.
At Kara level gear, you *should* be outdamaging other people. A shadow priest is sitting in gear just shy of Tier 6, compared to other casters who are a little better than Tier 4 if they're tailoring, and Tier 4 or worse if they're not. As you get into 25-mans, and multiple stats (i.e. hit/crit/dmg) starts appearing more and more often, spriests don't ramp up nearly as much. Going from Gruul and Kara to Tier 6 is an upgrade of about 150dmg at most, while other casters will be adding *lots* of hit, crit, and damage.
On Kara fights, my overall DPS is lower than other places. I stand out on Curator because I keep DOT's on Curator the whole time, and I eat an entire portal phase in Netherspite. Otherwise, I drop behind on many fights just because of mechanics. Gruul is much different: I'm regularly breaking 1000dps on Maulgar and was just a few points shy of 900dps on our last Gruul. Bear in ZA looks to be a really spriest-friendly fight as well, on our 4 attempts (stupid Attack-Bleed-Bleed-Parry-Counterattack -_-) I was averaging 860dps without a working DoT timer.
At Kara level gear, you *should* be outdamaging other people. A shadow priest is sitting in gear just shy of Tier 6, compared to other casters who are a little better than Tier 4 if they're tailoring, and Tier 4 or worse if they're not. As you get into 25-mans, and multiple stats (i.e. hit/crit/dmg) starts appearing more and more often, spriests don't ramp up nearly as much. Going from Gruul and Kara to Tier 6 is an upgrade of about 150dmg at most, while other casters will be adding *lots* of hit, crit, and damage.
Well geared you can be amoungst the top of the dps'ers in the raid (if not the top). I would even say this extends into SSC (I have a screen shot of a SP as #1 dps on lurker).
If you play your class correctly you can surpass mages and locks who are well known for their ability to shoot up the dps charts through AOE.
Most priests arent aware of their querky aoe capability.
WE CAN BE SHADOW MAGES.
For the aoe packs do tab-sw:p continuously until all the mobs are dotted up. In this respect you will be out of mana by the time the pack is down but have kept up in dps against the mages and locks.
There are some fights that you wont be top on - for example Curator - Locks own that guy (hey with a single shot of 22.5k who wouldnt).
But as others have said above - you are much more special than just a dps class and so if you arent top dont be disheartened - because you are giving so much more back to the raid. Your VE and VT will be greatly appreciated.
If you play your class correctly you can surpass mages and locks who are well known for their ability to shoot up the dps charts through AOE.
Most priests arent aware of their querky aoe capability.
WE CAN BE SHADOW MAGES.
For the aoe packs do tab-sw:p continuously until all the mobs are dotted up. In this respect you will be out of mana by the time the pack is down but have kept up in dps against the mages and locks.
There are some fights that you wont be top on - for example Curator - Locks own that guy (hey with a single shot of 22.5k who wouldnt).
But as others have said above - you are much more special than just a dps class and so if you arent top dont be disheartened - because you are giving so much more back to the raid. Your VE and VT will be greatly appreciated.
33 posts
to kind of counter act the previous posts a shadow prriest is number 2 dps in nihilium second to a lock and ftw nihilium is the best guild on the game cleared bt in the first week it came out they are beasts in everyway imaginable
second to a aff lock btw grrr fing locks
from personal experience i have seen many a spriest top dps charts and altho i am not quite 70 on my spriest i top many a dps charts 8/10 i would say
second to a aff lock btw grrr fing locks
from personal experience i have seen many a spriest top dps charts and altho i am not quite 70 on my spriest i top many a dps charts 8/10 i would say
I'm a shadow priest in raids purely for utility, I don't waste mana on sw:p on AoE trash mobs, not worth it in my opinion.
I chose the mob no one is hitting, vamp touch it, vamp embrace it, and go to town.
Shadow priests are a mana battery, if you don't renew your vamp touch every chance you get, then you fail.
I chose the mob no one is hitting, vamp touch it, vamp embrace it, and go to town.
Shadow priests are a mana battery, if you don't renew your vamp touch every chance you get, then you fail.
On aoe packs i use vamp touch on every mob i can... Thanks to global cooldown it takes the same amount of time as sw:ping everything but instead u put up a dot that doesn't take that long to tick out but also returns mana (then again, does less dmg per tick.. but who cares :P).
Also I usually try to snitch a killing blow for myself with sw:d - love spirit tap^^
Also I usually try to snitch a killing blow for myself with sw:d - love spirit tap^^
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