Shadow, What am I doing wrong?

[Joels]

I've recently decided to start playing and gearing my priest as shadow and over the past week or so I have been running heroics and havn't seen much improvement on my DPS as shadow. I have read up on the rotations and what gear and gems I need but I can't ever seem to break 16k on single target boss fights.

My rotation goes as: Vampiric Touch, Devouring plague, Shadow Word: Pain, Mind Flay until I get A Shadow Orb, Mind Blast then repeat keeping my dots refreshed as they run out and using Mind Blast on Cooldown and Shadow Word: Death when below 25%. Also, am using Arch Angel and Shadowfiend when available/needed.

My armory is: http://us.battle.net/wow/en/characte...itter/advanced

I'd like to get some advice, if anyone's willing to give it, on how I can improve my DPS before I embarrass myself in A Raid Pug. I also realize my Chest is for healing(originally thought I would just heal on this toon, but shadow was too fun) and My doll trinket is a pos but its better then the 316 blue one i had.

[Dathorize]

Copy this profile for gemming/reforging/enchanting: http://chardev.org/?profile=208905

Without better gear and DI, even though DI will not get you to the next haste plateau it is still a major DPS increase, your DPS will not get to far above 16k on a single target fight. 16k isn't bad since all the old raids got nerfed, they're fairly easy now and you'd most probably get a lot of upgrades if you ran a few.

You're most likely to get the most out of shadowfiend/dark archangel popping it right after you re-apply your DoTs after your first ES, before you start mind flaying again.
Also, since your alt isn't enchanting is the 40 int on your first ring still active? (Never seen or thought about this before)

[Joels]

Alright, I appreciate your response and makes me feel A bit better for how I'm doing.

The ring enchant doesn't work for me since I'm not an enchanter, My druid is though and that's how the enchant got in there in the first place.

[Deleted]

get the spirit/int leg enchant
shoulder enchant
Power torrent on your weap
40 int on off hand
scrap your two proffessions and get JC/enchanting

do the above and that should give you at least 2k dps

[Deleted]

Ok, I'll point out a few things.

You have some unenchanted items. I'm sure you know this.
Don't always go for socket bonuses, if the socket bonus is worth less than 20 int it's generally not worth going for.
Take your gloves for instance: you're choosing 20 int + 20 haste + 10 mastery over 40 int, int is worth ~2 times as much as the secondary stats.
Mining and skinning aren't really great spriest profs but you do what you want there. I would swap mining for engineering or tailoring.
Get hit capped and use a better leg enchant.
And like you said, your doll isnt exactly awesome. Do some dailies and get the MWC or try to o BoT once a week, Theralion's Mirror is great.

About the playstyle It's hard to tell without actually seeing it in action but here's a few pointers:
Unless you can time it well with encounter specific buffs and/or bloodlust, archangel and shadowfiend should be used on cd and preferably when trinkets/ power torrent procs.
If you have the mana for it, clipping mind flay isn't a bad thing.
When running you can spam Devouring Plague for some extra dps (same here, only if you have mana for it).

Can't think of much more, keep practising and you'll get better. Mastering shadow isn't done over a day

[Arlee]

Changing profs would have a minimal affect compared to all the other stuff listed, and you really only should worry about it if you are really trying to min/max. If you like those profs for whatever reason, you should keep them.

[Chillin D]

If you're running out of mana in fights I would recommend starting with SW:P, and then flay until you have an orb. Once you have the orb, MB and then VT, DP, and flay again to renew the SW:P. By then I usually have 5/5 arch and I pop my wings then just flay and roll DoTs as needed (mind blasting only with orbs). Flay clipping might be one of the issues, too. Other than that, 16k isn't too awful bad for your current gear. I would just try altering the rotation minutely.

[Joels]

The only times I'm having A mana issue is when I'm Multidotting for AoE. As for the Enchants, I realize now i messed up the legs after I already got it, so that will be fixed and my weapon/OH don't have enchants simply because I feel it would be A waste if I replace them. While it would be an increase to DPS, I don't think it would be enough to make a difference. and my professions are as such because this was my last-ish alt to really care about, so all my others have the professions.

It's good to know that my DPS isn't too incredibly low and that, with more practice and gear, it will increase. I just thought I was completely missing something in my Rotation/spec/gear.

[Saykred]

I don't raid anymore and this was only for 4.1 but try this:

As the fight starts, SW:P and DP as you're getting into position, once you're in position Mind Flay to 5 Evangelism Stacks, HOPEFULLY, you have a Shadow Orb by then, Mind Blast, VT, SW:P, DP, MF... Then as you should know, don't MB without a Shadow Orb, recast dots with <5 secs. Don't forget to reply dots when you gain any trinket procs, buffs, lust, use any CDs, potions, etc.

[erwindra]

So much bad advice in this thread, MB is worth using on CD unless empowered shadows is going to fall off AND you need to reapply dots before the next mind blast would of been off CD. DO NOT reapply dots with trinket procs/buffs or lust. It has been proven to be a loss of dps to do that even before the nerf to dots/buff to direct abilities.

[Zuziza]

DO NOT reapply dots with trinket procs/buffs or lust. It has been proven to be a loss of dps to do that even before the nerf to dots/buff to direct abilities.

This depends on a large number of factors. There is no such good advice that tells to you always do it or to never do it. The factors are:
1) How many ticks are left in each one?
2) Which procs went off? (PT is kinda lame, but Volcano + the mirror? Holy crap, MB+REFRESH!)
3) How MANY procs went off?
4) Did you pop a potion with lust/hero?
5) Are you going to be running around in the next 3 seconds for an extended period of time?
6) Did you lose any procs when these ones came up? (ES in particular)

If you want to find an answer to that, sim your gear to get stats, do your math for damage. Refreshing DoTs costs you either MF or MB, but it's almost always MF. Figure out how much time it takes, how many ticks of MF you lost, and compare the damage gained from MF ticks to the bonus damage on VT/DP ticks. It usually has to be multiple procs (rarely is one enough), but there are certainly situations where it's beneficial. Hell, look at Alysrazor; as you get higher numbers of stacks, you're better off refreshing a bit sooner, particularly when you get the 75% crit buff around 23/24 stacks.

Basically, there are situations where it's worth refreshing early. Don't shoot it down just because you have to do a bunch of math to figure out when it's best for your toon.

[Veiled]

I made a rule for myself when Cata came out that I wouldn't enchant anything with a "GOOD" enchant unless it was at least iLvL 359. That being said, I'd get Hurricane on that weapon instead of Power Torrent. You will replace that old thing soon enough and you'll be glad you didn't spend the gold.

The biggest piece of advice I can give you is this: Get Hit-Capped! You'll find plenty of posts/threads on many websites where this is discussed (and I don't want this to turn into one of those discussion) and you'll see people arguing running anywhere from 15.50%-17%. Take it from me, I tried running at 16% a while back and noticed a difference in my DPS. Sure, you might do better every once in a while running at 16% hit, but overall you will be more consistant at 17%.

Get rid of that trinket. Gale of Shadows is a great starter trinket! Try getting that to replace.

Get a Powerful Ghostly Spellthread for your pants.

I would definitely drop Mining/Skinning. Get Jewelcrafting, Engineering, Enchanting, or Tailoring, IMO.

Put a blue gem in your belt, you need the spirit and it'll match the socket bonus. Put a red gem in your gloves, +10 mastery socket bonus is a waste.

As always, read Kilee's guide, stickied at the top of this forum.

[Hoddie]

So much bad advice in this thread, MB is worth using on CD unless empowered shadows is going to fall off AND you need to reapply dots before the next mind blast would of been off CD. DO NOT reapply dots with trinket procs/buffs or lust. It has been proven to be a loss of dps to do that even before the nerf to dots/buff to direct abilities.

There are a lot of these "it's been proven..." statements flying about recently which usually turn out to be nonsense. As Zuziza points out there are plenty of times when refreshing with procs would seem to be beneficial. It doesn't matter how good any sim is, or how long you stand in front of a dummy, you can never simulate a real raid boss fight - and testing any theory for slight differences in a raid environment will prove fruitless - there are simply too many variables outside your control.

[Veiled]

Something that really bothers me lately is that people are looking for a "cookie cutter" way to do everything. Shadow used to be that way and in many ways still is that way... however, now we're in a time where there are multiple ways to do things... different things that people are doing that work and ultimately achieve the same end goal.

Remember that when you're asking for, giving, or reading advice!

[Arlee]

Yea.. there's are many situations where advice that starts with "always do...." are correct. It's more a collection of a ton of "If than" statements...

[Milkshake86]

I've recently decided to start playing and gearing my priest as shadow and over the past week or so I have been running heroics and havn't seen much improvement on my DPS as shadow. I have read up on the rotations and what gear and gems I need but I can't ever seem to break 16k on single target boss fights.

My rotation goes as: Vampiric Touch, Devouring plague, Shadow Word: Pain, Mind Flay until I get A Shadow Orb, Mind Blast then repeat keeping my dots refreshed as they run out and using Mind Blast on Cooldown and Shadow Word: Death when below 25%. Also, am using Arch Angel and Shadowfiend when available/needed.

My armory is: http://us.battle.net/wow/en/characte...itter/advanced

I'd like to get some advice, if anyone's willing to give it, on how I can improve my DPS before I embarrass myself in A Raid Pug. I also realize my Chest is for healing(originally thought I would just heal on this toon, but shadow was too fun) and My doll trinket is a pos but its better then the 316 blue one i had.

Right off the bat your not at 2141 Haste which will bring a noticable dps increase w/ Dark intent. Your not hit capped but your Reforging spirit to other stats....Mastery is quite low it isnt the best stat but again it is noticable.

Rotation isnt correct either

Opener: DP VT SW:P (IF orb MB) MF til orb or 5x Evangelism(if 2 pc T12 release your fiend)

Priority: Refresh VT at 2-3 seconds remaining this will allow it to clip very little or none at all reflex/GCD willing. Refresh DP at 1second again minimal clipping GCD/Reflex willing. Try to hold Mindblast til 3seconds remaining on Empowered shadow trying to accumulate as many orbs as possible w/o dropping ES.

During the execute phase you can 3x Mindspike 1x Mindblast double tap SWD and rinse repeat for a strong closer, alternatively you can run a normal rotation doubletapping SWD as possible.

If your forced to move DP spam w/ a single SWD will keep your dps as high as possible w/o Mindflay

So much bad advice in this thread, MB is worth using on CD unless empowered shadows is going to fall off AND you need to reapply dots before the next mind blast would of been off CD. DO NOT reapply dots with trinket procs/buffs or lust. It has been proven to be a loss of dps to do that even before the nerf to dots/buff to direct abilities.

Incorrect in 4pc t12 MB is worth using on CD regardless of orb or not and monitoring your ES, and even still effectively holding it to atleast 2 orbs will net more dps than just using it on cd. The damage is not a big enough burst at 40k or so w/ no orb where as 50-60k noncrit w/ 4pc t12 w/ a single orb and 80k to 140k crits w/ 1-3 orbs will make a severe difference in your dps. Usually follow a 2gcd rule 2 GCD's after the CD is up cast it unless something else needs to be refreshed.

[Hoddie]

During the execute phase you can 3x Mindspike 1x Mindblast double tap SWD and rinse repeat for a strong closer.

This would only be worth doing if you have approx 30 secs left and a couple of DOTs were due to run off anyway.

[Milkshake86]

You'd be very suprised how much damage can be done w/ that rotation however it nukes your mana extremely bad