Torn Shaman or PriestFollow

I prefer shaman (mine is 70) over priest (highest is 32). I never liked leveling my priest. Shaman was AWESOME once I hit 40; really a dream to level. Before that it was slow, but I bet it's better now with water shield available.

I wouldn't worry so much about which one is more entertaining to level. Leveling, after all, is not terribly difficult no matter what you play and will eventually end, leaving you with a character at the end-game that will require a lot of time, sweat, blood, and tears to gear and play properly. That's what you want to be planning around.

Priests are more in demand than Shaman are nowadays thanks to a couple Naxx encounters that require them. They're more dynamic healers, capable of both strong raid healing and strong tank healing as well as being (in my humble opinion) tied with Druids for the strongest five-man healer since they're so well-rounded.

Shaman are more specialized healers. They're capable of single-target healing but are very poor at it when compared to the other three healers in the game. They're exceptional raid healers, though unless there is a constant output of high AoE damage (on fights such as Sapphiron) they're honestly not any better than Holy Priests or Resto Druids. To their credit, they do still bring several nice buffs, and although some can be brought by other classes, a few can not.

Another thing you might want to consider is which class' off-spec you find more appealing. Shaman are capable of either a melee or caster DPS off-spec, while a Priest is limited to a caster DPS off-spec.

That's about as objective a breakdown as I can provide. When it comes down to it, the only one who can really decide which class will be more entertaining to level and play is you since "fun" is so subjective a thing and changes from person to person.

While I fully agree wtih what Gaudion had said, on our server, priests are 'meh' on the "In demand" category. So many people are making priests they're not really needed anymore (per se).

And quite honestly, as a shammy healer, the only type of healer I cannot ever get above on the healing charts are druids. I may get lucky on the occassion crappy one, but other than that, I'm usually second on the charts. For some reason, every priest healer I've run with seem to lack in heals when it comes down to bosses, and I mean lacking big time.

As I said, it could just be our server, as every one is different.

Now don't get me wrong, because what Gaudion said is quite correct, just speaking of my experience with each type of healer. I've got a priest right now at 48 and am loving it (though I'm shadow).

A suggestion is that you can play your shammy while with your friends and if they're not on, you can play your priest. This way, you can get a feel for each one and in the end decide which you like better.

Some people like healing on shammies, others like healing on priests. It's all a matter of opinion. An example is the fact that I completely hate healing on my pally, but I love it on my shaman.

Good luck!

(and very nice response Gaud).

I have not played my priest for some time and this thread has reminded me to try again , as it has been some time i guess all the changes have made priests easier ( others can answer that better ) i am finding Shammy a great deal of fun and pretty easy to level more so than my priest ever was , i say go for both if you have the time as one will start to be much more fun and from what i have seen there are far less shammys at higher levels so that is also a bonus point in their favour.