I know there's a number of topics around about this at the moment but finally being able to try it out myself. I got in a few games of 3v3 and a few games of 2v2 in a number of different comps:
Disc / Rogue
Disc / Moonkin
Disc / Lock / Rogue
Disc / Mage / Rogue
Disc / Mage / Moonkin
And thought I would share my thoughts about what I had seen.
*all of the matches were played in bloodthirsty gladiator's blue gear, which came premade with the character. Some offpieces (such as ones with haste or crit, I'd like to have changed. I reforged most of my off-stats to spirit where possible. I ran with as little mastery as possible. The only PvE pieces I had were Weapon, Offhand, Wand and Trinket 2 (http://db.mmo-champion.com/i/59500/f...-mortality/))*
Self-buffed stats were:
120375 HP
102694 Mana
7857 Spellpower (with inner fire), 7325 Spellpower (with inner will)
3.72% haste
4.27% hit
12.21% crit
9.09 mastery (base mastery is 8 of that)
178 spell pen (undercapped I presume, haven't had time to check)
1623 Combat Regen
2217 Out of Combat Regen
2822 Resiliance
Spec and Glyphs used:
http://wowtal.com/#k=smHaukPT.a8t.priest.-0DZEH
Finally, I'd just like to add as a disclaimer that I realise the opponents I was playing against mostly probably weren't the best, mostly between 1600-2k MMR, its just to give some idea of what's happening
Strengths Otherwise known as
What didn't seem quite as bad as people were making out
Healing others isn't quite as bad as it seems
While I'll be the first to admit that disc priest coefficients are in dire need of a change (which seems to be coming, according to this blue post:
http://blue.mmo-champion.com/topic/1...3277-yeah-baby).
However, in both the 2v2 and 3v3 I tried on beta, it seemed that as long as I abused pillars and my partners used their escape mechanisms I could keep them up around 80% of the time with a simple PWS -> Penance -> Healx2, then PWS back up with the talent "strength of soul".
Of course, when someone would take a beating I'd be more tempted to throw a flash heal or two. I've macroed inner focus into flash heal and greater heal so they're not
always bad buttons to press, but having that up really helps.
Against teams with spread pressure (such as affliction warlocks) prayer of mending typically works marvellously, as usual.
Mana burn has the potential to be more powerful than ever
Although the actual opportunities I had to use it were very slim, I did manage to get quite a few off in 2v2 and believe me: it can absolutely destroy a mana pool very quickly. It costs 2882 mana for a priest, and typically would burn about 8k + off an enemy healer. I also found it very useful for taking hybrids out of the game completely (shadowpriest, moonkin, elemental shaman). I faced all of those 3 classes at least once and their mana regen was terrible, meaning that if I burned them it just helped to keep them oom.
Saying that, I did manage to get a resto shaman 100% oom (at the expense of about 70% of my mana pool) only for him to be able to out heal my boomkin's damage because the moonkin was running low as well, which was slightly depressing.
Offensive dispell is still awesome
It costs just under 3k mana with inner fire and just under 2.5k with inner will, which I will admit is a lot, but it's ability to rip through a number of classes - druids in particular, to leave them utterly defenseless is completely worth the mana cost.
Weaknesses Or
What is rightfully being moaned about and needs improving
Purge will finish us very quickly
Similar to the way I can completely destroy a resto druid with offensive dispells, we're utterly defenseless against dispells ourselves. In particular I found that mages could rip me apart very easily with a few good spellsteals (I didn't meet any enhancement shamans). For example, we met an MLS whose mage cleaned me of buffs at the very start of the match and then managed to land an insta-spellsteal, in 1 go, on my freshly placed fear ward as his lock was casting fear, and I died in the subsequent feared out into the open -> deathcoiled -> deep freeze. Sure, it was good play on their part, but I timed my fear ward as late as I possibly could and it still went.
Being trained will end the match very quicklyYou need partners who can babysit you or you really will go down like a sack of shit
I realise there's very little change here from what we're all used to, but it really seemed more evident from what I played. In the first match I played (which was RLP, a rubbish setup but I was just trying to get practice) we came up against a TSG that killed me in a throwdown -> strangulate -> charge stun, and I had cast pain sup in the throwdown. If you get trained you have to spam very expensive heals or you'll simply die in 10 seconds, like I did. Except for me it didn't really seem to be "spam expensive heals" more "be controlled having very little control of your character, then die"
Of course, if I'd have had better peels I may have survived, but a fear immune warrior and DK with paladin to dispell them are pretty hard to waddle away from. I understand that this is part of the design goal for Cataclysm (mana war of sorts by making the healer use big heals) but it really just seems to be a Train the healer vs. Train the healer environment and whichever one falls over first is the loser.
It's really not particularly fun to play at all.
Inner Will is a choice I don't ever seem to be able to make
Before I played beta, I really liked the idea of inner will, although suggested buffs for it on these forums. I've got it bound to an easy keybind for me in the hopes that I'd be "stance dancing" quite a lot between the two (they're both 0 mana), but genuinely I never found the time.
We have a great deal of instant casts (PWB, PWS, PoM, Renew, PS, etc. etc.) but most of them require a quick reaction to be used and you can't be spending a global just to have a slightly reduced mana cost on them. The only time I found it useful is if I was going offensive with spam purges. In that respect, it's very nice - but you can only use it when you need to spam purge and you're not being attacked, nor are your team-mates in any immediate danger. Seems like a pretty narrow niche for the ability to be in.
Against melee with snares, I thought it would be "useful" to pop IW and try to get some distance while they were feared, but I never had the time to do anything but heal, pretty much. I was prioritising using heal so I didn't burn my complete mana pool too quickly, then topping off while the fear was ending. But I'd still only find myself with about 70-80% of my health pool by the time he was back from fear. Which was okay, I guess, but in the context of Inner Will it was just another place I could use it.
There is barely any time for offense
In WoTLK I got used to a playstyle of going super-offensive whenever I could to try and get a kill, and that just seems non-existant in Cataclysm. DoT's cost an absolute bomb (4632 for devouring plague), so you can't really pre-dot a target unless you're certain you'll score a kill in the switch. Archangel restores a pitiful amount of mana - like really poor. I don't have it talented at the moment but I seem to remember it restoring a little bit over 5k at 5 stacks when I did have it, which is just over the cost of a devouring plague.
When I duelled a rogue, it was literally just pointless to even try, and it was frustrating to go from a sort of fun way of playing against them to being completely hopeless. With recuperate, there was just no point in sticking dots up, I couldn't really dps him during fears because I needed to heal up, and it ended with me just going oom - although I would note that I made the match last 4+ minutes and managed to get 2 shadowfiends off. The rogue wasn't awesome, but wasn't completely terrible.
It was very evident that I was the healer, with pretty much 0 chance of winning, and I just had to heal myself up until I eventually ran out of mana - which I guess I don't have a problem with, but it's just NOT fun to play like that. I don't expect disc priests will be able to put up much of a fight in duels against any dps class with self heals - which is pretty much all of them these days.
Other things I've noticed
Psychic Scream is a blessing and a curse at the moment.
With the reduction of fear-reducing talents, a psychic scream lasts a full 8 seconds. We've lost the glove bonus but we're able to pick up "Improved psychic scream" if we want (I didn't) and against classes that aren't able to break it - especially melee - it actually seems overpowered. I duelled an assassination rogue and, with a little help from RNG pathing, he spent more than 80% of his time in a fear or running back from a fear.
At the same time, classes who can break fear (mainly warriors) are completely overpowered against us, as it's our ONLY self-peel. The cooldown of berserker rage matching our fear means they can have pretty much 100% up-time on us - and with the damage they can do in a throwdown there's nothing at all we can do.
We're not the only ones with mana problemsHybrid mana is appalling
I noticed it mainly playing with a moonkin, but also against shadowpriests and elemental shamans, they go oom incredibly quickly (especially if their mana cooldowns are negated through dispell / CC) and it leaves them useless in an arena match. I'm not sure if this is how blizzard intend it (presume not) but it seems rather silly.
Biggest essay I've ever written in my life probably, but worth getting off my chest =/