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Hey everyone. I've been asked to level a priest for my guild since well...no one else will do it. I said sure. I'm going to level shadow to level as quickly and painlessly as possible. Even though first 30 levels are gonna be pretty bad :D. Got a 70. So no worries on gold. What I'm asking about is...well I've never ever been to the priest threads until now. I've been reading up on people leveling as holy.

I'm a quick learner and will pick up on the healing abilities pretty fast. Any shadow priests here got maybe a short but sweet leveling build. I noticed in another thread for a holy priest you said first 3 into spirit tap. Same thing for shadow or do I do things a bit different. Hoping to enjoy this class seeing as I played a healer in FFXI for 2yrs and there healing classes and these differ in so many ways. Any help would be appreciated. Going to go mess with talent calc now to see what I can come up with. Again I'm at a brick wall with priest. I started to level a resto shammy until I found out we need a main healing priest in our guild.

We have 3 holy pally's, 2 resto druids and a resto shammy. But no priests....at all. >< Bad juju. We ran kara last night and well pretty much got handed to us by none other then moroes because we lacked the shackle ability. I'll stop rambling and start messing with calc. Any pointers as to stats ect. would be much much appreciated. Thank you

I'm gonna go ahead and disagree with Mozared. I'd go straight up the Shadow tree for Shadowform first before heading off to Disc for Meditation. My personal preference.

Either way, invest in a good wand every time you can get an upgrade. Unlike other casting classes, Priests actually use their wands. Wanding at the end of fights can ensure you're outside of the 5 second rule as soon as Spirit Tap procs, letting you get full benefit from it. With the proper rotation, you can end every fight with full health and mana. I like Mind Blast - Vampiric Embrace (while backing up) - Shadow Word: Pain (while backing up)- Mind Flay x2 - Wand for single mobs myself. Other people will have other favorites. Experiment. :)

Stats: until you can get Spell Power, Spirit is king. Of the Owl and Of the Whale gear is often cheap at the AH and great for low level priests. Once you start seeing gear with Spell Power on it, that is your main stat. Not only for the obvious reasons, but because the more damage you're doing, the more healing you get from Vampiric Embrace.

Enjoy your priest!

To which I say: Pooh. In the most respectful way possible, of course. You learned how to be a good healer by healing. Nothing to do with your spec.

This argument comes up all the time. People who leveled Holy will say, "But I showed commitment, I showed gumption, I didn't take the easy way out, I stuck with Holy all the way from my very first talent point. So by the time I hit 70, I really knew how to heal." And people who leveled Shadow will say, "But I learned to heal the hard way, Shadow specced, uphill, both ways, in the snow, with no shoes. None of those sissy-boy Holy-talent crutches to lean on. So by the time I hit 70, I really knew how to heal."

Healing regular 5-mans is not brain surgery. You can and should do it while leveling to learn the basics of healing. You can do that regardless of your spec. There's plenty of time at endgame for "this spec for this role, no exceptions" efficiency. Leveling is playtime. Do whatever you want.

Edited, Nov 17th 2008 8:12am by teacake

I agree it's a must-have at some point, but I think Shadow Form is more valuable for leveling. With Spirit Tap, mana isn't such an issue (or really an issue at all). I leveled Shadow and I didn't get Meditation until I was into my 60's. It was nice to have once I got it, but it's not like I was ever sitting and drinking before. I'm speaking of solo leveling/questing here, not DPSing in 5-mans.

I'm the odd one out here since I've never specced into Meditation. Never had a reason to go that far into Disc, since I've always had more Mana than I could reasonably get rid of. Shadowpriests today will almost never go out of mana, unless they have never-ending pulls and actually have to 100% nuke over a very prolonged period of time.

Mind Blast > PW:P > Mind Flay > Mind Flay > Wand

You shouldn't need VE and plague that often. The trick is to have the mobs hitting you as little as possible. This decreases time and mana spent healing, eating, shields, etc. Using mind flay and fear are the main things to kite mobs. You won't always be able to pull it off and that's when you use your shield and other abilities. You should be able to increase your dps and decrease your damage intake and become more mana efficient.

Mind Blast > PW:P > Mind Flay > Mind Flay > (Fear > Mind Flay etc as needed) > Wand