Talk:Priest builds

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Hey guys,

I'm trying to clean this page up a bit. I'm focusing on making it brief rather than complete. I think this will be more useful. Apologies if I deleted something you added. Some good arguments got cut!

Lampros 22:23, 5 August 2006 (EDT)

Gave this page a serious rework. Wtf, Silent Resolve in a PvP build? Salaskan 12:56, 11 August 2006 (EDT)

Silent Resolve has uses in PvP. Many priest on priest or priest on shaman fights come down to purgefests and silent resolve means you keep your buffs while the opponent loses their mana. Kollins 18:59, 7 August 2007 (UTC)

For the end game priests there should be a Holy/Disc build and a Disc/Holy build that is fairly standard --Caeryn 18:44, 22 September 2006 (EDT)

Builds need reworking... I fixed the 1-49 talent builds, but 50+ could use some work. I might get to that soon.

Qii 15:03, 7 December 2006 (EST)

Contents 1 40 - 49 and 50 - 59 2 Bad Link 3 Shadow Focus: Least Useful? 4 Arena builds 5 Support 40-Man Raid Healer 6 Respec required between level 39 and 49 builds 7 General Purpose Shadow Build

40 - 49 and 50 - 59

Sections http://www.wowwiki.com/Priest_builds#Levels_40_to_49 and http://www.wowwiki.com/Priest_builds#Levels_50_to_59 have a small difference.

The first one has 5 points in Shadow Power and 4 points in Misery, while the second one switched those two around. So, what's the correct one?

Bad Link

The section as follows:

 Level 50 - 59
 
 Instance Healing
 Concentrates on healing efficiency while retaining Shadow spec for grinding and PvP.
 
 http://www.wowhead.com/?talent=rZf0xZxMgtMtRht 

contains a link to a shadow build...

That's the point of the build. You keep Shadowform, but gain some healing bonus for healing 5-mans. Stijnherreman (talk) 15:44, 29 May 2008 (UTC)

Shadow Focus: Least Useful?

I notice the levelling builds specify Shadow Focus, but I've also noticed that similar affliction warlock builds don't include their parallel, which reduces the chance an affliction spell will be resisted. Is the reduced resistance really that effective on higher-level mobs? --Darth603 23:16, 19 July 2007 (UTC)

It is especially useful on higher level mobs, as it basically increases your damage by roughly the same amount it increases spell hit; the higher the level difference is, the more spell hit you need. The best thing you could do is take a look at the list here, which tells you how much + hit chance you need in order to hit the cap (99%). There is another popular reason to take Shadow Focus: it perfectly complements tier 2, as the two points in Improved Shadow Word: Pain are a quasi-must-have, and you need three more to get access to tier 3. I suppose the reason why many Affliction Warlocks don't put points in Suppression is that it rivals with a much more important talent--Improved Corruption. --bfx 17:10, 20 July 2007 (UTC)

I disagree. In levelling, the three points in Shadow Focus are much more useful when put in Blackout. And there is no reason to put 3 points in Shadow Focus when levelling; there is a 5% chance for same-level mobs to resist spells, reduceable to 1%. Spending talent points to achieve a 6% reduced chance for your spells to be resisted is pointless against mobs the character's level or below, which are the majority of what you are going to fight while levelling – unless you specifically seek out quests that are higher than your level. But in my experience levelling several characters, probably 70-80% of the quests I do (and thus the mobs I fight) are green.

Don't get me wrong, putting 3 points in Shadow Focus is absolutely essential – for a 70 shadow priest. But when levelling, the Blackout proc is much more useful, if only for damage mitigation, which reduces downtime. And after you get Mind Flay, I'd advise rounding Blackout to the full 5 points.--Scrotch 23:21, 4 August 2007 (UTC)

I personally find Blackout procs annoying in many situations in PvE. When it procs while pulling, you are out of Mind Flay range, which makes it worthless. The damage mitigation provided by Blackout is too small to make a real difference (if you find yourself casting all the time, you'll probably need to drink at some point--then, you can simply eat as well; if you do a lot of wanding, you cannot proc Blackout, anyway). Eventually, with Vampiric Embrace, damage mitigation isn't an issue any longer. 2 points in Shadow Focus are indeed enough, but essential. I find it much more important to be able to rely on spells to hit; this does not only increase your DPM (and hence, your efficiency), but it also limits the risk. --bfx 09:26, 5 August 2007 (UTC)

Blackout procs and Shadow focus are a player choice thing. What it seems to come down to is Blackout can be a liability if you often pull mobs away from their spawn point to kill them and shadow focus will be more or less useful depending on the level of MoBs you grind on. If a player pulls everything and seldom PvPs they may hate blackout. If a player grinds out lots of easy quests on green MoBs then Shadow Focus will be nearly useless. Kollins 18:59, 7 August 2007 (UTC)

Arena builds

i am missing Arena builds for Holy, Shadow and maybe disciplin. Looking at the mages i would suggest putting up 3 common builgs for holy / shadow /disc as main and later show variants - as those variants maybe usefull as well. -- Essmene 02:01, 31 October 2007 (UTC)

The build that was up there for disc/holy PvP was complete trash. The one I replaced it with has its judgment calls, but avoids some of the nonsense of the build listed before. --Gimil 16:17, 28 November 2007 (UTC)

Support 40-Man Raid Healer

Can we just get rid of this build as it is pretty much defunct because of new talents being added and Blizzard not making any more 40-mans?

Respec required between level 39 and 49 builds

Going from the level 39 Full Shadow Weaving (more PvE) build to the level 49 Full Focused Mind (more PvE) build requires a respec. Is this intentional?

Specifically, Shadow Focus goes from 5/5 points at level 39, to 3/5 points at level 49, and Improved Mind Blast goes from 5/5 points to 4/5 points. --Baineasag 02:19, 18 April 2008 (UTC)

I suppose the reason for this is that multiple person have edited the article. It would certainly be helpful to have a single build that evolves. --bfx 13:23, 18 April 2008 (UTC)

5/5 Shadow Weaving is really for PvP or if your the only shadow priest in a raid guild that kills stuff insanely fast. Even for solo Pve 4 points is enough. About dropping points in Shadow focus...you should only really have 3 points in there anyways while leveling unless you're running with higher level people and attacking mobs that are quite a bit higher than you(4+ levels or so). From personal experience, I've found that Imp. Mind Blast is rather a mana sink, even with Focused Mind, and it's only really useful if you put 1 or 4 points into so as to not completely disrupt your spell "rotation". I'll play around with those posted builds and see what I can make that should be more...consistent. Acecow 13:25, 18 April 2008 (UTC)

Ok, so I revised the lvl 39 and 49 builds to be more streamline, dropped Imp Scream and Silence from the 49 build(while useful, it can be picked up later, while taking talents that improve damage right then) Got heres the 39 build [1], dropped 2 points from Shadow Focus and and 1 from Shadow Weaving and put them into Focused Mind and then 5/5 Darkness. Here's the 49 build [2] Acecow 20:22, 20 April 2008 (UTC)

Looks fine. These builds are what I consider the best pure PvE builds at the respective levels. --bfx 10:15, 19 April 2008 (UTC)

General Purpose Shadow Build

While this list seems to have plenty of holy/disco builds, it is short on shadow options. I have found the following build quite useful in solo, group, and raid PvE situations.

http://www.wowhead.com/?talent=bxMhzhZZxGgzrtRhtVo Key talents:

-Blackout, while seldom proc'ing in groups, allows me to complete dailies quickly. 
-Improved Fade and Shadow Affinity in the shadow tree are necessary for any group work due to the threat generated by
 Vampiric Touch and Improved Vampiric Embrace. 
-Silence and Improved Psychic Scream, while useless against bosses, can save a potential wipe when a trash pull goes wrong.
-Shadow Weaving by increasing damage also increases the mana returned by Vampiric Touch.  

Remaining points are spent in the disc tree:

-Improved PW: Fortitude and Improved PW: Shield for yourself as well as when in groups without another priest. 
-Meditation and Inner Focus are excellent in longer combat situations such as boss fights. 

In practice, I have found the most effective casting rotation with this build to be Vampiric Touch, SW:P, Vampiric Embrace, and a repeated Mindflay-- stopping to reapply your vamp spells or sw:p as needed. Mindblast should be avoided due to the mana usage and cast time compared to the damage done. Gear-wise this build is dependent on +spell damage gear, for the increase in mana returned by Vamp Touch.

--Sunergos 06:39, 1 May 2008 (UTC)