What made you playing a priest as a main?

[Ins0mnia]

The question is simple! Why are you playing a priest?

For me, I rerolled from rogue in the first few weeks of vanilla to priest. As a true n00b, I've levelled as holy and by god this took long. Not to mention dying so much. However hitting level 60 was a major achievement!

My first completed set was tier 0 and my first ever epic was Darkmoon Card : Blue Dragon. Kept DMC till deep into Naxxramas, the regen bonus of this trinket was amazing.

These days I'm holy with shadow as offspec. Holy is my prime spec, always have been but it is really nice to swap to Shadow to do some solo play.

[Deleted]

Oh it's this thread again!

4.0, Halfus Wyrmbreaker. "Hey I'm back! In need of any specific class for heroic progress?"
5.2 Horridon "Hey I'm back! In need of any specific class for heroic progress?"

[Natrii]

Prayer of mending and SWD caught my heart early.

[Danner]

I tried a shammy back in 2005. Levelled a trial account and generally had lots of fun. I learned important concepts like "don't you dare trust an enchshammy when he says he can tank" and "where is mankirk's wife anyway?". But I hit the level cap for non-subscribing customers (ie, 20) a few days later, and considered myself done with the game.

Then... december 2006 I had a relapse. Combined with finishing university. Well, mostly. I was drained, and needed something mindless to play.
I knew it was a mistake to buy the game, but I did it anyway.

I liked the restoshaman, but I wanted to try something else. Maybe mage? But I liked healing. I tried a troll priest, and liked the mental magic aspect. And maybe I was drawn to the weaksauce playstyle of smiting down enemies; I seem to always pick the weakest class by intuition in these kind of games. I think I just like to be support. A healing priest was a perfect fit for me, really. More so than a shaman.

I got to lvl 12 or so again quickly. But ... ugh, the barrens still sucked. So badly!
I couldn't even bear to play in it. My friends suggested I move to tirisfal, and I maybe should have. But I was and am a completionist. I wanted the "pure" experience of moving from zone to zone in a natural progression as I encountered them. either way, christmas hit, limited connectivity back in those days, and... yeah. the game stopped for a while.

A month later, TBC came out and I just rerolled blood elf. Because it had a better starting area. It was awesome actually.

Never ever considered switching from priest. As they say, once you go priest, you don't go back.

[healme]

10 years ago without knowing anything about the game, I rolled a rogue, got him to 60. Then the very small guild I was in then had 0 healers, so running dungeons we had to rely on the server pop (which made you meet new people - which was good) but after a while I just decided to roll a healer, so priest it was. Shadow for 8 years now though and I have to say, kinda hate what shadow has become.

[Goshko]

We had too many shamans, I didn't like druids, paladins were not an option at the time (despite the fact we had enough Lawbringer pieces to equip a few if they showed), that left priest. That's pretty much it.

[Kilee25]

My initial decision to roll a priest was ingrained in my general philosphy on RPGs that dates back long before WoW. I have always loved the idea of a class that becomes a force multiplier. A priest to me would be a class that would help those around them continue to do their best. I also loved how people wanted me in their groups, and guild members seemed genuinely happy to see me every time I logged in. There was always something for me to do and always someone wanting me to do something with them. I loved healing for this reason. There was a perfect storm of feeling like I was part of a team, doing an important job, while also feeling needed.

In BC, I joined a new guild that had too many healers, and was asked to go DPS instead. I disliked it and fought with it for a long time, although I always tried my best. I switched back to healing for a short time, but realized shortly after doing this that I'd been helping the group more as a DPS than a healer. I realized at a certain point that the game had shifted from a model where fights could be outhealed, to a model that relied on personal responsibility and meeting base DPS requirements. After I realized this, I went back to DPS, and have been so ever since.

I've no plans to leave my priest, but I've played many alts over the years, and enjoyed all of them. I think that I probably could've played and enjoyed any class I wanted.

[Athonel]

I find this thread intriguing. I am currently a rogue pushing through the early parts of mythic. My guild has one raiding priest, and I have opted to switch to shadow as my main for next expansion.

The contributing factors to my switch are
1. it's a hybrid. After maining a rogue for the past 2 years (after playing a resto druid for 5 years), I feel the strong need to be able to swap roles to healing if it is required.
2. guild need. there are always going to be instances where a dps priest is going to be required. Mind control can be achieved by a healing priest, but healers need to be healing. While it is not often used, when it is necessary, it is necessary. (ZA trash before third boss, instructor rasuvious, blast furnace etc.).
3. Shadow is ranged. Being in melee range is not always something that is fun. For instance, on archimonde (current iteration), there are times when doomfire can really screw you over. Yes it can be a positioning mistake on my part or on the part of the ranged person behind me, but sometimes you simply can't dps the priority targets.
4. Raid utility. Coming from a rogue, yeah a shadow priest doesn't have as much soaking power. Rogues are second only to tanks (and sometimes better than tanks) in their ability to reduce incoming damage. However, shadow priests offer very strong utility as well. Dispersion can allow you to negate certain mechanics, VE combined with cascade/halo can provide a huge boost in raid healing.
5. Aesthetics. Shadow form is cool as hell. So are shadow form wings (dark angel)

[Deleted]

It was the very first character I ever made when I first got WoW. I've dabbled with alts but always stuck with my priest. It's been through various incarnations difference races, different factions, changed my main spec. But always been priest
Feel quite attached to it, love the lore and flavour behind priests

[Echocho]

Because every spec I try to play gets ruined by Blizzard into:
* Keep skills on cooldown following a priority list
* Watch for cooldown X to reset ahead of time from mechanic Y

Why must every spec play exactly the same? Is actual rotations such a bad thing?
I want to play proactive, not reactive. That's why I play SP.

[Myllior]

My first character (in Cata ) was a Mage, because I've always played the Mage or Mage-equivalent in every RPG I've ever played. I was an atrocious DPS, so decided to try something else; rather than just going for another class to DPS as, I settled on giving healing a try. Knowing nothing about healing, I gravitated towards the obvious healer - a Holy Priest. Levelled up as Holy and, once I started raiding in DS, quickly swapped over to Discipline, which I came to adore once Atonement really came to the front in 5.2. (I've always had a soft spot for Holy's Serenity playstyle though). If I ever start playing again, my Priest will always be my main, as the class is the quintessential healer.

[Moxal]

Priest has essentially been my main since TBC and my primary alt since I started playing in Vanilla. Dwarf priest for Fear Ward!

As for why, originally I think it was the focus on pure healing without too many gimmicks or additional mechanics. Also, Holy reminds me of White Mage from the Final Fantasy universe. Which I played the crap out of FF11 back in the day.

[Shahad]

I was a DK on a very low pop realm with few raiding guilds and I wanted to raid. Only recruiting guild wanted a priest. Three years later here I am.
Also, before rolling a DK my first character was my priest. I was attracted to the healer role, and priests were close to the stereotypical cleric healer so I rolled with that.

[ringpriest]

Leveled a warrior as my very first toon in late vanilla - BC had already been announced, and I was racing to get to 60 before it came out (as it turned out, I had a couple months to spare, it took longer than everyone expected, imagine that ). Leveled via a lot of tanking dungeons and group quests, with friends and their guild - got plenty of good advice and help, but never had really consistent heals. There was never a problem finding someone to heal, but it would be someone's healer alt for a bit, or someone else new healing and then our leveling rates would fall out of sync, or sometimes a pug healer. Then I finally got to 60 and they dragged me right into raiding, as an off-off-tank and dps and I got to see really good healing in action.

So, when BC came out I knew that: 1) I was tired of tanking, 2) I wanted to heal because healers were always in demand, 3) I knew I could do better than most of the healers I had leveling, and 4) I wanted a BE because who didn't? So that left pally and priest. I actually tried pally first - I wanted the flexibility (tank! heals! dps!) but I hated the playstyle. I leveled one to the mid-20s, then gave up on it and rolled a priest and loved it from level 1 on. My BE priest was my main, and I raided through BC, Wrath, and Cata before finally mostly skipping MoP, and when I did come back to MoP, I leveled my priest but just didn't enjoy it much anymore, so went with my lock as my main.

When I was playing priest, I was mostly disc, occasionally dipping into holy, but even after dual-spec I'd be more likely to have two tweaked disc specs than anything else. I'm not certain exactly what it was about playing a priest that I liked so much - part of it was the 'game' of matching the right heal to the right damage and right threat level, all while managing mana (which BE gave me an edge on, particularly back when we had our racial priest spells... ). I liked the utility priests brought; I liked PvPing with a reflective shield, back before every class and their pet could heal; I liked juggling fear and MC and shields and PoM; I liked tracking Shackle and weaving it into my casting, (especially on vulnerable DKs - they always seemed shocked); I liked Mind Soothe and Mind Vision, and Consume Magic and downranking and packing a small arsenal of wands so that I could do frost or fire or nature damage if I needed to; and I loved my Benediction and my Dungeon set 2 (plus Crown of Flame) that went so well with it, even if the D2 set made me look like a healing banana.

[nobodysbaby]

I fell in love with Holy priest (rerolled since we needed healers in Kharazan and Priests could Shackle Moroes adds :P) in early BC after playing hunter the first months and been sticking to it since then. I tried all healing classes in raids except Monk (just didn't appeal to me) and by far Holy was and still is the most fun.

[l33t]

Well, I rolled an Undead warlock as my first character back in BC... had a ton of fun, those class quests, enslaving an elite demon in Nagrand and soloing group quests... draintanking affliction <3... first raids, Karazhan and all teh stuff like that...

And then my friends decided horde sucks and we should all reroll Alliance. Changed server too, to get a fresh start. Plan was we are going to create a dwarven-gnome guild only, but it was ruined by some dobby-lovers almost istantly. Everybody wanted to be dwarf warriors, paladins and hunters, so basically all left for me was either priest or rogue. Since I wanted to try a healer, priest was only one choice available, so I've rolled dwarf male priest, you know, your stereotypical red bearded dwarf with "rapeface"©. Leveled him up to level 13, then got blue cloth chest which looked so awful on my dwarf that I've immediately bursted with laugh, and then deleted dwarf and created a Draenei priest instead (since we already had the idea of dwarven-only guild ruined by dobby-lovers). And that's very much it. Totally loved every second of playing my awesome Holy priest; then one day switched to Shadow because my raid needed manabattery, and never turned back. Had a ton of fun in Wrath - which is, in my opinion, the best WoW expansion Blizzard ever made; had a ton of fun raping meters in Cata; had a ton of fun playing smite machine in MoP (not really, I am lying, hated every second of it); and currently I left priest ways and became more proficient with a bow, if you know what I mean *wink*.

Although WoD is the first expansion since BC which made me stop playing my Shadow and play other class instead, I still hope Blizzard will get their shit together for the next expansion and fix SP's damage, because other than damage dealt Priest is my totally favourite class in this damned game. Gameplay-wise, aesthetic-wise it is perfect. Now, just please fix aoe and give burst skill and we're golden, thank you.

[Grumpy Old Man]

Hard to say, I liked the class "style". Also by the time I decided to main a priest I already knew that I liked a lot to play a healer, so a class with two different healing specs had a special appeal to me.
AND also, I find shadow fun to play, even doing it rarely. All in all, it's a class I've felt fun to play since WotLK, thru all changes with expansions, I'm still having fun with my priest.

[Yunzi]

I prefer "pure" classes and enjoy old school D&D with the "classic four" class archetypes of Fighter, Magic-User, Thief, and Cleric. The Cleric translates into a Priest, making it the most classic, "purest" healing class in the game, also the only class with two different healing specs. Back in vanilla I played a Holy Priest, and it was fun to do the math on the efficiency of the different ranks of each healing spell and scientifically determine what was best to cast in every different situation. These were the very early days of theorycrafting where people would just post formulas and such on messageboards. It was far from the well-organized machine of today's WoW's internet presence.

[Vagabond142]

For me, I usually main a Retribution Paladin. I did Holy Paladin in Wrath for a bit, was fun. Guild needed a Paladin Tank, I spec switched. For WoD I started as a fresh Prot Warrior, mained that all the way through BRF, then left the game for a short break.

Now that I'm back, I wanted something new and fresh, and I decided to go Priest because I have never raided, levelled, or played as a Priest before. I am level 98 at the moment, will hit 100 this weekend. I am fairly certain that I may very well main Disc Priest in Legion, because while everyone is going over to Demon Hunter, those DH's are going to need healers, so short queues!

I can't wait to start LFR and Normal raids, just to see how Disc does in raiding. I've heard that it is stupidly strong for MT heals (like Holy Pally was in Wrath), but I will definitely find out soon enough!

[Jabox]

Prayer of mending and the noise it makes! then when it was given a cast time I quit playing