Are Shadow Priests really as bad as people say?

[Dierdre]

At this point of the patch its ridiculous they dont bring you for these fights honestly. I understand if they want to bench you in klaxxi and garrosh, but in thok and siege..

Less than 2% of participating players are farming H Siegecrafter and beyond.

[Deleted]

I can out dps everyone on protectors except the fire mage, and I'm usually just 5-10k behind him (did beat him once). Seeing how the mages (we have two) should be wiping the floor with me on that fight, I just usually want to scream at my screen "See? See this fight? I CAN OUTPLAY YOU. IT'S THE CLASS" whenever someone complains about my "low dps".

Just a general remark, at a certain point your damage ( at least in 25man ) on Protectors seems to be dependent on the number of affliction warlocks you take to the fight and the resulting fight duration. I'm not really satisfied with my best ( 610k @ 5:22 ), but to be honest I'm not doing anything that takes skill in this encounter, it's literally "dot everything" and the occasional mind sear if targets are clumped.

Benching you on Thok seems stupid to me. While a lot of people might say that we suck at this fight, I definitely think Shadow is viable on Thok because of good Divine Star off-healing and actually very competitive damage. Thok in my opinion is a boss where one can really distinguish between SPs that are able to pre-plan their movement/casts to maximize Thok uptime and those that are not, showing a far greater delta between our three SPs than any other fight. If you were raiding at the highest level it was probably better to take other cloth casters, but if you're still progressing on him now a good SP can really turn the tide in this encounter through Mass Dispels, off-healing etc.


@Topic:

Topics like this are opened every month and the discussions and arguments are always the same, yet I'm wondering what people in this community actually want to hear. Yes, Shadow Priests aren't a strong class right now, but every positive argument for SPs is almost instantly undermined and attacked by someone, painting us in an image that's way bleaker than it has to be. Sure, people want to argue and stuff, but what's the solution? Do you want the people that enjoy playing this class and actually like some of the things we have to just do a 180°, agree with you and also celebrate our valuelessness in every aspect of this game?

[buffalowbie]

My group runs with an odd combo of dps. At the moment we have no consistent warlock at all (in the past 5-6 months, we've had a warlock maybe....2 of the months). But my best dps on protectors was 370k at 8min. A ways behind you .

I'm probably not a horribly great spriest. And, I make mistakes. Unfortunately, shadow is one of those specs that if you mess up on your rotation, it takes a while to recover. Accidentally refresh over a strong dot? Kiss that extra dps good bye, mistime your MF:I? Hahahaha. It's just stuff like that. I also raid a pally. I mess up on her probably more than I do on the priest. But her dps is usually second or first in the raid.

Anyways, they've suddenly gotten sort of obsessed with trying to take realm first. And since I've consistently had the lowest dps for months on progression fights (helllo Malk) I'm generally the first to sit, sometimes I even volunteer because I'm tired of listening to whining in vent about wiping (and if I sit, they can't blame me for the wipes). Of course, it doesn't help that on some fights (like shamans) we did things like an 8-2 split with most of the group up the hill. I've wrung my hands over my dps. I've made threads over on h2p to try and get some tips (and I did ).

Not being in on progression fights is not a fight I wish to fight anymore. Does it suck? Yeah. Royally. But, it's really not worth my emotional energy anymore. We have more dps than we need, and if I make a fuss I won't be invited to fights. I figure getting in on the fights a few weeks later is better than not raiding at all. My alternative is to find another group late in the tier (I keep an eye out for groups, but I'm not actively looking).

Now to the other point.

I've felt that way a few times too. Part of me thinks the shadow priest community is just really cynical. However, we've been treated like crap by blizzard for so long it's hard to not feel that way. I think if shadow winds up significantly better next xpac, it will help a lot with the community attitude and therefore people will stop painting us in a bleak way.

[martin89]

It really depends.. Shadow is a lot of fun for me..

[Deleted]

When I PuG I see a lot of shit going on, and I try to help people out if I believe it can grant us a kill. When I see a Shadow Priest I end up looking more into it since I main that, and I end up almost always facepalming hard. Almost all of them do fuck all damage, and since I like pumping out some numbers on my alts I feel like I carry these punks. Just today, I did Malkorok 10N with a SP who did not use Halo at all during the whole fight (he was spec into that) while we had healing issues during stack phase!! Did he switch to DS? Of course not! I mean, why would you! The amount of people who are utterly oblivious to the utility of talents like Divine Star and Spectral Guise is astounding. Normal raider is no excuse, you only need to know a little bit about what those 3 talents do and if that isn't enough you'd think that, with H2P having guides up about our talents in this tier on different content (10N,10H,25N,25H) with the tier being out for 8+ months people would read and learn, but no... when you call them out on it they either utterly ignore you, or they defend their choice with clueless garbage which affirms they have no idea what they're doing. Again, I'm not talking about ToF vs DI or something like that. Oh and obliterating the SP with my shit rogue on Protectors 25H where for some reason he was SWI spec and had 4 more ilvl isn't good either. Especially cause I ended up looking pretty while Sun was on vacation.

I can out dps everyone on protectors except the fire mage, and I'm usually just 5-10k behind him (did beat him once). Seeing how the mages (we have two) should be wiping the floor with me on that fight, I just usually want to scream at my screen "See? See this fight? I CAN OUTPLAY YOU. IT'S THE CLASS" whenever someone complains about my "low dps".

Its not the class, its the fight. Multidot will do great there, including Shadow. Nobody cares about how good or bad classes are on an irrelevant fight like Protectors. The interesting fights are the last ones. You mention Fire Mage, I don't know about that since ours are Frost/Arcane. A half decent Arcane Mage is going to own you on Protectors WITHOUT requiring any stack tactic (Fire does require that) and with a lot less effort. Warlock? If he's going Affliction he'll own you. Balance should also be very high.

Sure, people want to argue and stuff, but what's the solution? Do you want the people that enjoy playing this class and actually like some of the things we have to just do a 180°, agree with you and also celebrate our valuelessness in every aspect of this game?

In 6.0 our single target damage will be buffed, and our off-healing will be nerfed. Solution is sitting it out till 6.0 (pre-patch) or rerolling till then something you should've done the first week in SoO after they nerfed us once again. On farm, nobody needs Shadow's off-healing so I find Shadow more useless there. On progress I would imagine on tight DPS checks to not take Shadow, and Thok could be considered as such on 10H from what I gathered.

[buffalowbie]

Its not the class, its the fight. Multidot will do great there, including Shadow. Nobody cares about how good or bad classes are on an irrelevant fight like Protectors. The interesting fights are the last ones. You mention Fire Mage, I don't know about that since ours are Frost/Arcane. A half decent Arcane Mage is going to own you on Protectors WITHOUT requiring any stack tactic (Fire does require that) and with a lot less effort. Warlock? If he's going Affliction he'll own you. Balance should also be very high.

I'm well aware protectors is shadow's best fight. My point is the other casters in my group should be wiping the floor with me. The fact I can match one of them in dps and completely blow away the other when all of our ilvls are about the same is what shows, in my mind, that they are only pulling high numbers because of their class and not because they are playing better than I am.

[Deleted]

I'm well aware protectors is shadow's best fight. My point is the other casters in my group should be wiping the floor with me. The fact I can match one of them in dps and completely blow away the other when all of our ilvls are about the same is what shows, in my mind, that they are only pulling high numbers because of their class and not because they are playing better than I am.

Suggest to not conclude based on 1 fight, but on multiple. If you can keep up with your Mage or Warlock on IJ then they're terrible. Time to jump ship.

[buffalowbie]

Suggest to not conclude based on 1 fight, but on multiple. If you can keep up with your Mage or Warlock on IJ then they're terrible. Time to jump ship.

I can keep up with the frost mage on DPS on IJ, but not the fire mage. The lock hasn't raided with us for so long on that fight that I don't have logs to go back and look at. Anyways, it is time to jump ship. They extended the lockout this week for Thok/Siegecrafter and I didn't even get an invite to the raid group. They just don't want shadow while they learn the fight, and didn't want to give my hopes up that I'd be put in.

[Deleted]

I can keep up with the frost mage on DPS on IJ, but not the fire mage. The lock hasn't raided with us for so long on that fight that I don't have logs to go back and look at. Anyways, it is time to jump ship. They extended the lockout this week for Thok/Siegecrafter and I didn't even get an invite to the raid group. They just don't want shadow while they learn the fight, and didn't want to give my hopes up that I'd be put in.

Frost parses lower on IJ. It can't cleave. Fire and Arcane are better choices. I can recommend you join a 25 guild.

[Xkiller9000]

I just boosted my priest to 90 as shadow, they are a ton of fun, and I seem to be pulling OK dps considering im 500 ilvl and dont know the class as well as some of my other toons.

[Clrg]

Frost parses lower on IJ. It can't cleave. Fire and Arcane are better choices. I can recommend you join a 25 guild.

ohh he raid in 10man, yeah you better find a 25 man guild, you are screwed if they already have a priest because mass dispell is a god send for thok, vampiric embrace and the off healing from the start too.

[NickCageFanatic]

Accidentally refresh over a strong dot? Kiss that extra dps good bye

All dots are dynamic updating now there is no more snap shotting dots anymore. Although you still waste a GCD refreshing a dot that didnt need to be refreshed it's not as detrimental a dps loss.

[Deleted]

All dots are dynamic updating now there is no more snap shotting dots anymore. Although you still waste a GCD refreshing a dot that didnt need to be refreshed it's not as detrimental a dps loss.

Shadow dots still snapshot, and will continue to do so until WoD.

[buffalowbie]

ohh he raid in 10man, yeah you better find a 25 man guild, you are screwed if they already have a priest because mass dispell is a god send for thok, vampiric embrace and the off healing from the start too.

We have a priest healer. I'm the only shadow in my group. I guess I'll see how next week goes, but I don't have high hopes anymore. I would think that two mass dispels would help on HThok, but since I've never been able to be on it, I don't know. I'm sure a vampiric embrace would be nice too. Not much I can do about it except jump ship.

[Setheria]

I raid 10's as shadow with a disc healer and I still found my off heals and dispels useful on H Thok prog.

In good execution pulls sure, it may be overkill, but during prog, you need dispels when your heals are out being chased or someone is derping and not standing in healing rain, etc and needs Div Star heals.

Feathers are also great and can make kiting phases a breeze. I have had many instances of a well placed feather making the difference between someone getting nommed or not if their own positioning wasn't optimal or their speed cd was unavailable.

[Deleted]

Shadow dots still snapshot, and will continue to do so until WoD.

No, they won't.

You want to use your burst like SF, MB, DP, and MFI during procs and keep your dots up all the time. Dot uptimes are going to be more meaningful. You want refresh during no procs so you can use your burst together with procs. You want to try to get full benefit from pandemic. Having max 5 orb is going to make the usage of burst more interesting and flexible. If you want to get an idea about that, do try out playing a ret right now. Pandemic you can test out with Affliction. Lack of dot snapshot you cannot test out right now.

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ohh he raid in 10man, yeah you better find a 25 man guild, you are screwed if they already have a priest because mass dispell is a god send for thok, vampiric embrace and the off healing from the start too.

2 SP is fine. On Thok this means the priest healers don't have to focus on MD which means they can ditch more spirit. DS is also very powerful. If they don't need 2 SP, maybe he can compete with their current SP.

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I just boosted my priest to 90 as shadow, they are a ton of fun, and I seem to be pulling OK dps considering im 500 ilvl and dont know the class as well as some of my other toons.

You won't scale well with gear. Not like classes such as rogue and feral. You'll more scale like classes like retri, ele, and DK. In other words, you'll scale shit.

[buffalowbie]

2 SP is fine. On Thok this means the priest healers don't have to focus on MD which means they can ditch more spirit. DS is also very powerful. If they don't need 2 SP, maybe he can compete with their current SP.

Maybe in 25. But in 10m I think 2 shadow priests would be bad. Like I said, I'm the only shadow in my guild. The other priest on the team is disc.

My guild pissed me off too much last night. I didn't get an invite again, and they brought an off server warlock instead. Yeah, screw cross realm SoO.

[davie]

My guild pissed me off too much last night. I didn't get an invite again, and they brought an off server warlock instead. Yeah, screw cross realm SoO.

Wow! I know we aren't top of the bunch but unless your A) An ass B) Absolutely terrible (I'm sure your neither :P). Then I'd say find a new guild for WoD.

[kenn9530]

No, they won't.

You want to use your burst like SF, MB, DP, and MFI during procs and keep your dots up all the time. Dot uptimes are going to be more meaningful. You want refresh during no procs so you can use your burst together with procs. You want to try to get full benefit from pandemic. Having max 5 orb is going to make the usage of burst more interesting and flexible. If you want to get an idea about that, do try out playing a ret right now. Pandemic you can test out with Affliction. Lack of dot snapshot you cannot test out right now.

what are you talking about, currently now and until the major WOD patch snapshotting is how to get good dps, currently for dot classes the way to maximise dps is to refresh dots with as much procs are possible, if your a dot class and your not taking advantage of empowering your dots with trinket procs, LMG, potions and stuff then your really not playing your class properly. In WoD this is changing so when you get a proc current dots on target will get the benefit without reapplying and will lose the benefit when procs fade.

Shadow is the worst dps spec to play currently as its miles behind all other ranged classes by at least 50k assuming equal gear and skill, while a decent SP will not hinder anything its still a class no matter how good you play you wont even beat any decent ranged class.

[Deleted]

Maybe in 25.

Yes, I was talking about 25. I don't play 10.

But in 10m I think 2 shadow priests would be bad. Like I said, I'm the only shadow in my guild. The other priest on the team is disc.

My guild pissed me off too much last night. I didn't get an invite again, and they brought an off server warlock instead. Yeah, screw cross realm SoO.

Your guild clearly doesn't value you and instead of going for the group's victory is going for their own victory over yours. A good shadow priest wouldn't hold their group back anymore. Not with these ilvls we got now.

what are you talking about, currently now and until the major WOD patch

Sorry I misread I was tired, I was talking about WoD. My comment is obviously about how to handle dots in WoD.

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In WoD this is changing so when you get a proc current dots on target will get the benefit without reapplying and will lose the benefit when procs fade.

Which is why -like I said in the post you reply to- you want to keep your dots up at all time, redot when they benefit fully from pandemic, and use your burst (DP, MB, MFI, all that with 5 orbs max) during procs.