Priest or not Priest?

[iLive]

Hi people...

I have fallen in love into the Priest class (again) after some time with the patch notes and talent calculators. I really think this class is getting it's uniqueness back, as it once had. Blizzard really made it great with the changes for Holy and Discipline, that it really looks promising! I just play Restoration Druid, and I am fully satisfied with being one, but I am really getting an interest for this class! Of course I should pick what enjoys me most, but that's the problem. U Help!

Druid or Priest?

[Sayna]

P

[Saint]

Priest.

bias much? lol.
mmo > Forum > Classes > Priest: ("Hmmm I wonder what class is most likely to troll this part of the forum?")

[Leprodigy]

lol, great question for priest forums, priests ROCK.

go priest.

[Spurlij]

He should post in druid forums and see what they say. :P

[iLive]

Why do you think, I posted here? Besides, I expect the same anwers as you, if I join a Druid forum: "Why do you write in here and not there?"

[Avalar]

I play a druid, but man, we both rock.

Its just style of play that you like better, Hotting or Bursting...

however druids in 3.1 are pretty much bursters too with that nourish buff and regrowth nerf

[Aureliana]

I like my priest because your really have to think about what you're casting, expecially after the coh rightful nerf. I've never played a druid though.

[Greid]

basically, what do you like as the dual spec...I feel that's more important

If you're going to a raid, why not be able to heal and dps/tank in a way you want.

Personally, I like healing on a priest much more, (druid healing can literally be done with healbot and a good mouse imo), but i dont know about if i like shadow over moonkin or feral. Take that into consideration a lot because you wont want to be healing forever...do you like spamming wrath and starfire or watching a dot timer while fitting AS MANY MIND FLAYS AS POSSIBLE...its just a style preference

[Skade]

I've tried all the healing classes now and I must say Priest is the one that I fell inlove with.
Priest throughout tbc was awesome because they were so versatile.
You could wtfpwnd both AOE and Singletarget healing. And not just the constant spam hot, or FoL or Chainheal etc. As priest you have loads of spells to play with great burst and great sustained healing.

The only downside in this expantion has been that it has been to easy. I mean on patchwerk 25man i did a try i spammed gheal from we pulled till he was down, never stopping. popped my fiend at 30% or something and using my spirit trinket and innerfocus earlier in the fight. I finished the fight with 60 or 70% mana. Same goes for just about every single fight you can't run oom unless you really really put an effort into doing it.
It's just to easy, I miss the days where you would downrank and chainpot to keep your mana up, having to really work to be able to keep your mana up.

So hopefully with the mana regen changes in the next patch there will once again be atleast some form of challenge in keeping your mana up for the entire fight. Hate to say this but I'm acutally looking forwards to manaregen getting nerfed.

And we are also in the 3.1 patch getting our AOE healing buffed up so looks like the healing class I love the most will get its flare fully back in the next patch so my vote definately goes for priest

[Deleted]

Well i got a "similar" situation. The guild im in lost a couple of healers, and i proposed to reroll to a healer. Now i got a 80 priest, but thats the class which just doesnt have issues (in our guild) getting guild members to raid.

Im discipline after being holy in BC, and i really enjoy the spec.. Yes you get the occasional nub saying your HEALING SUCKZ!!oneone... but : ok find a better one... bye! /leaveparty usually solves that. The other healing classes seems so less versatile with spells they can choose to heal people.

My options are : 73 druid a 70 shaman and a level 22 pally... While a druid is most versatile of the latter 2, im not just sure on what to reroll if the priest CL decides the priest class is full.

on a side note, the guild has 3 holy priests, but no disc priests. So that could get me a spot.

p.s. sorry if you feel im hijacking your thread

[Aureact]

Thing with both priests and druids is that we have much versatility when it comes to builds and abilities.
Druids and Priests both have very different ways to heal, where priests are all about throwing fat and pre-emptive heal together with damage preventing shields, and Druids are all about stacking HoTs, and what I like to call 'reactive patching'. What I mean is that druids have many tools to toss swift heals and 'patches', which makes them awesome for saving lives when things get critical. This is also why they rock in PvP.

Often a priest can switch role right on the spot during a fight, simply because we can fill any healing role. We can heal raid, MT, OT or even caster tanks.
Also as a priest, you have many different and unique tools that no other class has, which makes your way of healing very variable.

The main difference you need to look at is that priests as the only class has 2 healing specs, whereas a druid only has 1. So if you're not sure yet what role you want to fill at 80, or just love the way a resto druid is designed (massive amount of hots and swift patching heals, combined with a huge amount of mobility) then you should go druid.
But if you like being more stationary and chaining heals and a great amount of different tools, then priest is the way to go.

Generally resto druids will do better in PvP until you reach a high gear level, whereas it is very equal (yet very different) in PvE.



If you choose to be a priest, but don't know whether you should be Discipline or Holy, here's a few guidelines:

Discipline is very single-target oriented. Unlike a holy priest, a discipline priest has to gear up for loads of critical strike rating and mp5 (instead of spirit), to do really good in any environment. When you've reached around 30% critical strike rating as a Discipline priest, you will be one of the best Main Tank healers of all. If you heal a raid, you will see bubbles popping up to the left and right, proccing together with lots crits everywhere.
Just like a druid, you can as discipline save someone with a PW:S, patch them up very quickly with Penance (awesome spell of awesomeness) and give them some breathing time with a Divine Aegis proc or two from the same spell. Additionally you will keep the raid stable with reducing huge chunks of damage on the tank with your shields, leaving the little amount to heal perfectly suited for your agile and slightly smaller heals.

What you will miss as discipline: AoE healing. You need to rely greatly on Prayer of Mending in an AoE damage situation. And you need to be on the spot if someone takes damage without getting a prayer of mending jump. This is especially where Penance and shield without CD shines, but if you hesitate for just a couple of seconds, you will lose someone. So you will have to be focused at all times there. This can be very intense and tiresome at times, but also very fun and refreshing at others.


A Holy priest is very different in this aspect. Where a Discipline priest is better at topping off or adding quick lifesaving patches, holy is more about AoE healing, throwing instant heal procs to the left and right with no mana cost (finally a solution to lifetapping warlocks ;p), and generally just keeping the entire raid alive by all means possible.
Holy Priests have acess to another AoE heal, which forces you to think fast and prioritize what AoE heal would be for the greater benefit to add first, since this can be a very crucial decision between life and death at times.

Holy priests are usually set on raid healing and maintenance (dispelling, topping players off, etc.) duty, because of their wide variety of tools. So if you're not put on the main tank all the time, don't get worried. It won't be because you suck at healing a tank, but because you rock so much more at doing everything else
Also as a holy priest, the term 'sacrifice' really gets a true definition. Because of your squishiness, you will be more frequent than other healers to sacrifice yourself in order to save a tank or someone else with a Guardian Spirit or instant heal/shield, followed by Spirit of Redemption (holy form ololo) that allows you to help the raid get back on their feet after a critical situation.
Lastly you will also be able to allow DPS'ers to help you heal via Lightwell. So if there's a high pressure on healing, this can really relieve some stress (assuming the DPS'ers have a brain).



Keep in mind that discipline and shadow somewhat shares itemization, so Discipline would be the better way to go if you want to switch a lot between damage and healing.


Sorry for the wall of text, but it is a huge subject to discuss and I don't even think I've covered half of it.
Hence there might be some repetition ^^

Hope it helped.

[Aureliana]

Great post aurea.. totally agree with your analysis

(however, i think that with 3.1 spirit will suck less for disci, so you can easily change spec between holy and disci without changing too much equipment)

[Kelesti]

Great post aurea.. totally agree with your analysis

(however, i think that with 3.1 spirit will suck less for disci, so you can easily change spec between holy and disci without changing too much equipment)

With the coefficient dropping with regen, spirit sucks even more for Discipline then it did before, we still don't get any spellpower or anything else from it.

Int took a hit when they nerfed Rapture, but hey, at least we still get Replenishment.

[Lifestream]

Priest, of course.

[nakamaru]

naka says you are not worthy of the priestly goodness.

[taek]

Priest are great now...but it still won't match when Priests had battle rez back in beta.

/shakes first at druids