Few questions from a priest coming back.

[g3noz]

Hi so as title says, im coming back to play, haven't really played since Dragon Soul in cata, and im gonna pick my priest back, so if u could take some time to answer some questions it would be really helpful!!

1. Are both specs viable for endgame raiding right now? or is it 1 spec much more dominant than the other?
2. Do discipline priest's shields take into account resistances? as far as i remember in cata they didnt.
3. How much of a difference a cloak makes? what about the meta?
4. Is there any benefit from picking a certain race? i really dig goblins...

And that would be all for now that i can think of.. thanks to whoever answers!!!

[Nestar]

Seeing as you worded it as "both specs" I assume you mean holy vs disc
1. Yes but very few play holy as it currently stands, Disc brings more to the table with less effort.
2. Yes. Whatever damage is going to be taken from your health bar, that's what will be used up of your absorb. Absorb is the last calculation done in terms of damage mitigation.
3. As a healer, its aoe throughput. Free heals where you would have previously wasted some. Not really a reliable proc but when its up it can save lives. On disc its effect is minimal, absorbs cant "overheal" in the traditional sense, so it only procs from base heal. In higher gear 70+% of your healing is absorbs, so it doesn't do much. Holy however its very powerful. Also keep in mind the stats spirit/haste/mastery Fiarly lacklustre for disc, Strong for holy. You will see many disc priests instead op for the DPS cloak, Haste/Crit/Mastery (usually reforging haste to spirit) and take the extra 20kish dps which can be used to proc ToF.
4. Race you choose is a relatively small change either direction. Goblin 1% haste is nice, Keep in mind racials are changing again in WoD for balancing purposes. Blood Elf is getting 1% crit (very useful in disc). There's a complete list around somewhere.

[g3noz]

Thanks dude!! really helped allot, so may rngesus be on ur side.

[Larynx]

An important note about the healer cloak is that it has a much higher proc chance than it does for Holy. When the cloaked is procced, all healing is increased by 5% and this will double dip with Disc absorbs. So while the heal distribution effect is weaker, it procs twice or more as often and Disc benefits more than Holy from the passive boost.

In terms of healing throughput,the healing cloak is still better. It can be anywhere from 5-10% extra healing, compared to the ~1-2% you get from the stats on the caster cloak (and for min-maxers the minor ToF uptime too)