Shadowpriest current state PVE

[Tobbx]

Hello fellow priests, I just want so share my current opinion on shadow priest, bear in mind, English is not my mother tongue.

I have played as a priest since tbc, mostly as a healer (discipline). The class has changed beyond recognition. At least shadow and discipline, holy still got the same aura over it.

However, I switched to shadow in the end of Firelands, since I was in need of a change. After all been the last couple of years. I did my fair share of research on shadow, and currently consider myself an “over” average shadow priest. I don’t like to whine, because most the issues people whine about eventually get fixed anyway, so I don’t need to do so. But the current state of shadowpriest is boring in my opinion.

We lost our main cd, archangel, and by that we also lost evangelism. We also lost our mastery, empowered shadow, which was a 15 sec buff that increased our shadow damage. Our mastery was replaced by a simple mechanic that is passive. We currently got our old dot system, with a slightly new mind blast/devouring plague system. New shadow orb generation, I won’t complain there, it was fine as it was, and its fine as it is. I like both of the mechanics.

I am generally complaining about how easy shadow priests currently are to play. And I don’t have a damn cool down except shadowfiend/mindbender, which is just a tap on a button and that’s it. Power infusion isn’t on pair with the other tier talents. I feel like they took away everything from shadow priests that required skill to accomplish properly, and gave them nothing in return. I have to admit that halo can be tricky if you try to get max damage at multiple targets.

How can I say that our old mastery required skill? In dragon soul I have to be fair, the mastery didn’t require squat. But let’s look back to bwd/fl, let say you had something that procced mastery, most likely a trinket (from valiona for those who remember the amazing trinket). If you had a mastery procc, your empowered shadow would give you more shadow damage. Let say the procc lasted 20 sec, if you refreshed your empowered shadow at the end of the procc you got 15 more sec with mastery procc. If you dotted up the target right before the end of empowered shadow you got another 15 seconds with the buff. Overall a 50 sec uptime, but an average player would NEVER to something like this, and that was something that made a gap between the “good” players and the “average” players (hopefully you managed to follow my train of thoughts).

20sec procc (refresh es at the start)
Refresh ES at the end + 15sec
Refresh dots and the end of es +15sec
20+15+15 = 50sec uptime, because YOU made it have that amount of uptime by timing and knowledge.

It sounds kind of simple in theory, but was damn impossible to execute perfect ingame most of the time, due to boss encounters, and you had to take into consideration when your weapon enchant / tailor / engi / other trinket procced. When and where to re-apply dots, etc. Don’t get me wrong, that was op, but it was a mechanic that made the class more enjoyable because with skill you would/could accomplish more.

Now we only re-apply dots trough proccs, which is the current state of “the next level”. That can’t be compared with the old system, and the new mastery is completely passive. Even dark evangelism is removed (10% dot dmg), that was ofc simple to manage, due to the fact that mind flay applied it, but nevertheless something to pay attention to.

If you consider pvp (2,2k player myself in 3s), is it A LOT easier now. The difference between a good and bad shadow priest was huger, but due to the fact of spectral guise an phantasm, is the skill cap still there. But main difference before was mainly the mana control (which I am glad is easier) and the possibility to put out max dps a lot harder. Empowered shadow and dark evangelism was sometimes HARD to manage and maintain uptime on in arena :P

If you read this far, then thanks for your time, and I hope my English was understandable. Just as a note, I am not complaining about our dmg at all, it’s fine as it is. But shadow priest is just straight forward and boring. Dots, mb of cd, devouring when 3 orbs (basicbasic).. repeat

Best of regards
Tobb

[ultimar235]

I find the same problem. It can be interesting when there are 3-5 mobs and your multidotting and trying to priotise your procs but that's it.

I call my priest Mr. 55k cus SW:P, MF, SW, MB, proc MS, VT all do around 55k damage each. It's very steady, predictable dps.

TBH though its a style some people may like and there are lots of other dps classes with different styles. I personally started as shadow and got bored and now it's my offspec.

[Deleted]

The more gear i get in pve, the weaker i think my class is...Went on meljarak the other day and I just want to die We are so not competitive against any melee class or demo locks/esham it sickens me. Plus I am on MD watch, which basically means one gcd down every 15sec. Has anyone tried full mastery for multidoting/mind sear on this fight? Because being stuck a 140k when everyone seems to be pulling higher is so fustrating...

[ThrashMetalFtw]

Multidotting as SP right now, is more challenging than anything you ever did as a SP in Cata, and that includes the Maloriak 6-target multidotting. And that's multidotting over 20%.

Get in execute range, and the current version of SP, both single and multi-target, is in a league of it's own in difficulty compared to Cata.

[Deleted]

Agree with TrashMetalFtw.

I remember people saying at the end of Cataclysm that MoP rotation is easy and multi dot is easier too due to not having Empowered Shadows and Evangelism. But if you ever walked into Mogu'shan Vaults or Heart of Fear, you will realize that this is not the case.

If you multi dot you have to really be careful of your GCDs. With our old rotation Mind Flay was usually used more during multi dot and that gave you time to think about what to do next. However, now you are constantly casting either VT, SWP. Mind Blast or FDCL. All those are one second casts. There is no filler when you multi dot now.

Stone Guards would be a joke with our old rotation, basically keep rotating VT on two targets, Mind Blast on cooldown and then just use Mind Flays. With our current rotation, you have to watch for DI procs, FDCL procs, manually refresh SWP at last seconds, refresh VT normally and use Mind Blast on cooldown.

Same goes for fights like Spirit Kings, Elegon and Will of the Emperor.

[Deleted]

The main problem about multi doting its that its not rewarding for the effort you put in. if we compare ourselves to a melee class that's cleaving we are just too far behind when the guy has just one button to press. I don't understand why multidoting was nerfed to the ground when cleaving is just as powerful as before.

[Tobbx]

Agree with TrashMetalFtw.

I remember people saying at the end of Cataclysm that MoP rotation is easy and multi dot is easier too due to not having Empowered Shadows and Evangelism. But if you ever walked into Mogu'shan Vaults or Heart of Fear, you will realize that this is not the case.

If you multi dot you have to really be careful of your GCDs. With our old rotation Mind Flay was usually used more during multi dot and that gave you time to think about what to do next. However, now you are constantly casting either VT, SWP. Mind Blast or FDCL. All those are one second casts. There is no filler when you multi dot now.

Stone Guards would be a joke with our old rotation, basically keep rotating VT on two targets, Mind Blast on cooldown and then just use Mind Flays. With our current rotation, you have to watch for DI procs, FDCL procs, manually refresh SWP at last seconds, refresh VT normally and use Mind Blast on cooldown.

Same goes for fights like Spirit Kings, Elegon and Will of the Emperor.

If you read my thread, I was comparing shadowpriest in bwd/fl. DS was without doubt the easiest raid of them all as a shadow priest. You are talkin about the simpleness of the old system, I am talking about how much you could do with it. If you perhaps had a mastery trinket or proccs, you could take advantage of that.. And trust me, multidotting and keeping the buff up (aka doin the most dmg), was A LOT, and I really mean A LOT harder when you had to take ES into consideration with how much your current mastery where at, and when the buff fall off and re-apply dots if multi-dotting. That was HARD to execute really good. I dont get what is so much harder now, you do not have to take into consideration es when multidotting, so the dot dmg will be the same. Of course you have to think about your proccs, but you had to do that as well before.

The old system was a lot harder to master properly, which the current is way to easy. Multidotting now could be messy if a lot of ms/mb proccs at the same time, but a lot less punishing if you fail a gcd. Since 1 fail in gcd with the old es could mean that you just lost 13-15% dmg for 30 sec.

---------- Post added 2012-11-02 at 05:40 PM ----------

Multidotting as SP right now, is more challenging than anything you ever did as a SP in Cata, and that includes the Maloriak 6-target multidotting. And that's multidotting over 20%.

Get in execute range, and the current version of SP, both single and multi-target, is in a league of it's own in difficulty compared to Cata.

You didnt multi dot adds on malo, you werent haste capped at that point, so mind sear gave more dmg. And you killed the adds in green phase, so they died way to fast to multi dot the,. Unless you are thinking of black phase, but still there mind sear was more powerfull

[Deleted]

If you read my thread, I was comparing shadowpriest in bwd/fl. DS was without doubt the easiest raid of them all as a shadow priest. You are talkin about the simpleness of the old system, I am talking about how much you could do with it. If you perhaps had a mastery trinket or proccs, you could take advantage of that.. And trust me, multidotting and keeping the buff up (aka doin the most dmg), was A LOT, and I really mean A LOT harder when you had to take ES into consideration with how much your current mastery where at, and when the buff fall off and re-apply dots if multi-dotting. That was HARD to execute really good. I dont get what is so much harder now, you do not have to take into consideration es when multidotting, so the dot dmg will be the same. Of course you have to think about your proccs, but you had to do that as well before.

The old system was a lot harder to master properly, which the current is way to easy. Multidotting now could be messy if a lot of ms/mb proccs at the same time, but a lot less punishing if you fail a gcd. Since 1 fail in gcd with the old es could mean that you just lost 13-15% dmg for 30 sec.

---------- Post added 2012-11-02 at 05:40 PM ----------



You didnt multi dot adds on malo, you werent haste capped at that point, so mind sear gave more dmg. And you killed the adds in green phase, so they died way to fast to multi dot the,. Unless you are thinking of black phase, but still there mind sear was more powerfull

Even Shadow in BWD/BoT/ToFW was easier than current. It was not even 100% confirmed that delaying Mind Blast was a DPS gain. And multi dot in tier 11 wasn't easy, yes. Doing everything perfect in t11 when multi dotting was hard, yes. But please show me a video/log where you multi dot on Stone Guard, Elegon or WotE and you do it close to perfectly. You won't.

And you wouldn't lose 13-15% damage cause of one fail GCD. You have to remember if you extended ES with a proc, you couldn't Mind Blast for its entire duration. 1 fail GCD with current sytem could also mean a loss of 15% damage for 15 seconds. I don't see your point. It is just not only messy now, it is difficult and it forces you to think ahead a lot more than before.

Saying our current state is "easy" to play is just wrong. There isn't a single priest that is even close to playing our class at its full potential at the moment. But since you are saying it is easy, I'd love to see your performance, either through logs or videos.

And you did multi dot adds on Maloriak pre-Mind Sear buff. Maybe you didn't play Shadow back then but multi dotting was the way to go until Mind Sear got buffed and you could faceroll. And as far as I recall correctly, there weren't any haste caps people were obsessing about in T11.

[Tobbx]

Even Shadow in BWD/BoT/ToFW was easier than current. It was not even 100% confirmed that delaying Mind Blast was a DPS gain. And multi dot in tier 11 wasn't easy, yes. Doing everything perfect in t11 when multi dotting was hard, yes. But please show me a video/log where you multi dot on Stone Guard, Elegon or WotE and you do it close to perfectly. You won't.

And you wouldn't lose 13-15% damage cause of one fail GCD. You have to remember if you extended ES with a proc, you couldn't Mind Blast for its entire duration. 1 fail GCD with current sytem could also mean a loss of 15% damage for 15 seconds. I don't see your point. It is just not only messy now, it is difficult and it forces you to think ahead a lot more than before.

Saying our current state is "easy" to play is just wrong. There isn't a single priest that is even close to playing our class at its full potential at the moment. But since you are saying it is easy, I'd love to see your performance, either through logs or videos.

And you did multi dot adds on Maloriak pre-Mind Sear buff. Maybe you didn't play Shadow back then but multi dotting was the way to go until Mind Sear got buffed and you could faceroll. And as far as I recall correctly, there weren't any haste caps people were obsessing about in T11.

I do disagree with you, so let's agree to disagree. But how about single-target fights, you cant tell me you think they are harder.. It feels like I am doin the same fro start to end, nothing to pay attention to.. just open your rotation, every 3 min pop your damn shadowfiend. Its almost hypnotic.

[Skandulous]

I do disagree with you, so let's agree to disagree. But how about single-target fights, you cant tell me you think they are harder.. It feels like I am doin the same fro start to end, nothing to pay attention to.. just open your rotation, every 3 min pop your damn shadowfiend. Its almost hypnotic.

the majority of fights in MSV mindbender is way better than FDCL for dps as theres no way unless your a robot that your gonna use all your FDCL procs ontop of MB on cd or proc and keeping up dots on multiple targets either your gonna waste a proc or your gonna let a higher dep spell slide to cast them. I have DMC trinket and Light of the Cosmos and both line up good with Mindbender so he Hits like a mack truck and melles like lightning every minute and i basically on most fights with adds i just swp them and only vt main target as with my mastery and haste i get MB procs out the yahoo and its my top damage spell on he fight and i dont even use FDCL anymore in MSV

[Sakamae]

And you did multi dot adds on Maloriak pre-Mind Sear buff. Maybe you didn't play Shadow back then but multi dotting was the way to go until Mind Sear got buffed and you could faceroll. And as far as I recall correctly, there weren't any haste caps people were obsessing about in T11.

Ariadne is correct. You DID multi dot adds on Maloriak because Mind Sear was in the crapper. If you weren't, then you were not maximizing potential on that fight. I ended up healing for my guild on Cho'gall, because AoE was out of the question when every other ranged class was far superior (not to mention stupid OP solar cleave with shrooms from boomkins).

If you are only taking Mindbender and ToF, then I can see where a lack of complexity might come from. As Ariadne has said, the rotation becomes much more complex when you add in the need to plan out DoT refreshing and procs. You still need to be refreshing DoTs on trinket/enchant procs like always, so when you say "nothing to pay attention to.. just open your rotation, every 3 min pop your damn shadowfiend", that sounds like someone that doesn't give a crap about maximizing their play, so the whole point of arguing complexity is moot.

the majority of fights in MSV mindbender is way better than FDCL for dps...

Do you have numbers to back up this claim? I have found this to be quite the opposite from analyzing logs.

[ThrashMetalFtw]

The old system was a lot harder to master properly, which the current is way to easy. Multidotting now could be messy if a lot of ms/mb proccs at the same time, but a lot less punishing if you fail a gcd. Since 1 fail in gcd with the old es could mean that you just lost 13-15% dmg for 30 sec.

---------- Post added 2012-11-02 at 05:40 PM ----------



You didnt multi dot adds on malo, you werent haste capped at that point, so mind sear gave more dmg. And you killed the adds in green phase, so they died way to fast to multi dot the,. Unless you are thinking of black phase, but still there mind sear was more powerfull

Read what I wrote. THe new system is 10x harder when multidotting because of FDCL procs and MF no longer refreshing SW:P, and still having to generate the max amont of Shadow Orbs with MB/SW, as opposed to using MB to keep Emp Shadow up back then (with more than 2 targets.

And to your comment about Maloriak. Mind Sear on Maloriak, in t11? Lol nice way to get yourself kicked from any half serious HC guild.

t11 SP stat prio: Int > Haste (as much as humanly possible)> Hit> Crit> Mastery. How did you play on Maloriak? SF and AA were used as Mana CDs rather than Dps CDs because of the insane mana usage. You had to keep VT and SW:P up on like 6 targets (black adds and boss), while sniping SWs when any adds got low for more mana. Before green phase, you would dot up all of the "other" adds with VT, and as many as you had time for with SW:P, ThEN when green phase started, you spammed Mind Sear on the adds while your Dots made rape. All while keeping Emp Shadows up, ofc.

Yes I mastered it pretty much to perfection, yes it was easier than the current multidotting (not wasting any procs, MB/SW CDs or letting dots fall off under 20% on HC SG, the insane multidotting on WotE, any other multidot fight under 20% aswell...)

[Skandulous]

Read what I wrote. THe new system is 10x harder when multidotting because of FDCL procs and MF no longer refreshing SW:P, and still having to generate the max amont of Shadow Orbs with MB/SW, as opposed to using MB to keep Emp Shadow up back then (with more than 2 targets.

And to your comment about Maloriak. Mind Sear on Maloriak, in t11? Lol nice way to get yourself kicked from any half serious HC guild.

t11 SP stat prio: Int > Haste (as much as humanly possible)> Hit> Crit> Mastery. How did you play on Maloriak? SF and AA were used as Mana CDs rather than Dps CDs because of the insane mana usage. You had to keep VT and SW:P up on like 6 targets (black adds and boss), while sniping SWs when any adds got low for more mana. Before green phase, you would dot up all of the "other" adds with VT, and as many as you had time for with SW:P, ThEN when green phase started, you spammed Mind Sear on the adds while your Dots made rape. All while keeping Emp Shadows up, ofc.

Yes I mastered it pretty much to perfection, yes it was easier than the current multidotting (not wasting any procs, MB/SW CDs or letting dots fall off under 20% on HC SG, the insane multidotting on WotE, any other multidot fight under 20% aswell...)

correct and anything at 4 adds or more your basically GCD capped if specced in to FDCL and DI

[Aica]

and DI

There's your first problem.

Really, though. There isn't a single fight this tier with 3+ targets that don't die quickly enough that you wouldn't want to take Twist of Faith.

[Mogling]

There's your first problem.

Really, though. There isn't a single fight this tier with 3+ targets that don't die quickly enough that you wouldn't want to take Twist of Faith.

Stone Guards, Wind lord, Empress DI beats ToF for multi dotting.

On that note I would also say mindbender is better than FDCL on Wind Lord and Empress.

[Volitar]

While I don't believe that we should be doing more aoe dps for having a more complex aoe rotation but holy shit is if frustrating to work twice as hard as some classes and do less dps. (Working on Wind Lord)

sadface.

[Skandulous]

Stone Guards, Wind lord, Empress DI beats ToF for multi dotting.

On that note I would also say mindbender is better than FDCL on Wind Lord and Empress.

yea i agree i swp all the targets cause its instant cast and i get MB procs out the butt. If you have to vt and swp 3 targets or more it will fall off easily because u have to stop and hit your higher dep spells or your gonna lose dps so theres no way youll keep vt and swp up on those targets

[Aica]

Stone Guards, Wind lord, Empress DI beats ToF for multi dotting.

On that note I would also say mindbender is better than FDCL on Wind Lord and Empress.

I don't see how DI beats ToF on Wind Lord. You've got 4 periods of 15% increased damage and barely enough global cooldowns to cast anything but your dots.

Stone Guardians is essentially a two target fight.

I haven't done Shek'zeer yet, but first impressions looks like you get a number of periods of 15% increased damage.

[Mogling]

I don't see how DI beats ToF on Wind Lord. You've got 4 periods of 15% increased damage and barely enough global cooldowns to cast anything but your dots.

Stone Guardians is essentially a two target fight.

I haven't done Shek'zeer yet, but first impressions looks like you get a number of periods of 15% increased damage.

The way we do windlord we have 3 times where ToF is going to proc and all but the last not very long. Also I think people are doing multi dotting wrong on large numbers of targets. Messing with the prio list on simc I went from 120k dps to 140k. On our Wind Lord kill earlier this week I did about 12k more dps using Mindbender and DI than the priest using FDCL and ToF.

[Aica]

Messing with the prio list on simc I went from 120k dps to 140k.

This doesn't help at all. If you're going to declare something, back it up or at least give some information to help people figure out where you're coming from.

I definitely dropped FDCL on Wind Lord due to the 9 targets at once aspect, and currently waffling on whether MBx3+DP is worth it.