The New Priest Talent Tiers

[Deleted]

Disc:
T1: Hmm, probably tendrils, Psyfiend also tempting but need to find out if it works with glyph
T2: Body and Soul, though I expect they will nerf it slightly (to 40% or something)
T3: Either star or AA, personally not a fan of the RNG in FD,CL
T4: Depends on fight
T5: Again depends on final numbers, with current numbers PI
T6: Totally depends on the fight, though Vow looks a little weak

Shadow:
T1: Tendrils
T2: Phantasm (lots of people are undervaluing this I feel, I spam Fade like it's going out of fashion in raids)
T3: Divine star cos it's shiny.... and glowy... and ooooh
T4: Final prayer
T5: PI with current numbers
T6: Depends on the fight

[Marraphy]

I'd use this for healing, probably:

http://www.wowhead.com/mists-of-pand...calculator#pXI

Although most of these are highly dependant on the fight. For instance Body and Soul is better when other people may need speed boosts, while Path of the Devout gives you a very solid movespeed increase (which could be combined with Inner Will and a boot enchant to just speed past everything)

Divine Star probably will never change though, as the way I see it it's a lot better than the other two. I probably wouldn't change Vow of Unity either since you can use that to basically be extremely awesome at tank healing. Void Shift would be better for an emergency and Vampiric Dominance looks like a raid healing talent.

[Urge]

The Void Shift is going to be SO abused in PVP BG's I am going to love it! They are going to have to build in some safeguard to prevent me from swaping health with a full teammate just as I am about to die from say Dots while they are at full health!

[Deleted]

Please, do they honestly NOT EXPECT me to take Body and soul?

exactly what i was thinking. body and soul is awesome and clearly better than the other 2 talents.

was wondering, is vampiric embrace removed? or will you be able to use both vampiric embrace and Vampiric dominance?

[Arlee]

Honestly Phantasm would be really useful in PvP, and would probably be more worthwhile than Body and Soul since that doesn't remove movement impairing effects. They would have to make some changes to how levitate works for Path of the Devout to be useful.

I'll rewatch again, but I think he said that Vampiric Dominance would replace VE.

Honestly though guys, it's really hard to tell what will be useful and what talents are a complete waste yet because we don't know how the spells/abilities that go with them will be changed.

---------- Post added 2011-10-25 at 09:45 AM ----------

So rewatching the stream I noticed on the topic of archangel he said that evangelism is a core ability and everyone will have it.

On Vamperic Dominance it sounds like we would still have VE, but this would be a more powerful version. So you might have both, but I doubt you would be able to have both up at the same time. hard to say though.

[bypass]

For me, this whole issue with blizzard trying to get rid of "cookie cutter specs" is a massive joke. There is NO way they will ever get rid of it regardless of what choices they give us because for a given type of playstyle there will ALWAYS be best options - which the majority of people will take. For example. The priest tiers as we have seen them so far (and yes I know they're likely to change but I'm betting not THAT much)
From my perspective (PvE Shadow)

Tier 1: Definitely void tendrils - AoE root ability? yes please. This one is fairly obvious as I can't think of a time when fearing mobs in a PvE environment actually helped anything (maybe worship on cho'gal)

Tier 2: Body and Soul 100% on this one. If levitate didn't break on the slightest damage it might be a contender for speeding up groups etc. Phantasm currently gets rid of so few pve snares that it just isn't worth thinking about.

Tier 3: This tier is between surge of darkness and archangel. The only reason there is any confusion is the wording on surge of darkness insinuating that mind blast will now COST shadow orbs in some way. Personally I think the talent is just badly worded and that surge is going to be a pvp choice to help prevent the ever present interrupt issue that shadow has. Even if that isn't the case then archangel is still the choice I would go with as it is the better overall dps increase in a PvE setting AND it doesn't consume evangelism any more if you believe the talent text.

Tier 4: This tier is all about the surviving and for me Desperate Prayer is the pick of the lot. Angelic bulwark is pretty pointless against most raid damage as it is relatively unpredictable for the most part. Likewise final prayer is somewhat lacklustre as raid damage that takes you to that low health will either be a one shot deal and therefore waste the shield proc or will be continuous (ie you did something wrong) and kill everyone anyway. Better to have the one off reactive heal and macro it to healthstone for the king of all oh shit buttons (once dispersion is on cooldown ofc :P).

Tier 5: This one is a genuine toss up between power infusion and twist of fate. Will have to look at the numbers but I can guarentee that one of them will be noticably better than the other. Might be dependent on boss health pool.

Tier 6: Vow of unity might be a niche cooldown thats worth taking if we ever see a boss that hits for med-larg amounts really really fast, but lets face it, we haven't seen that since brutallus. Even then, the 30% hp cutoff makes it very dodgy to use. Void shift on the other hand is bloody awesome as a "save that person" cooldown. Also good for a stand in the lava till 5% - void shift - grip trolling tool. That isn't to say that vampiric dominance wouldn't be good. Its just that it heals for such a small amount these days that its barely worth it.

So yeah, from what initiallly looks like a lot of choices there really aren't that many to be made. Probably because they're lumping all the pve choices in with the pvp ones as well as mixing the dps and healing ones. If it was expanded to 4 or 5 choices per tier they might end up giving some actual options. That said, this is something that affects the hybrid classes particularly badly. I can see rogues and mages for example being perfectly happy with 3 to choose between.

[Madam]

It's a shame that so far the community is showing such a negative reaction to the changes in trees.

This summer when raiding in WoW was slow I had the time to play RIFT to max level. The talents seemed endless, new and fresh. At that time damage meters were not in game (this has since changed) and players could pick "fun" talents or build hybrid classes. Players seemed to enjoy grouping just for the pure fun of the game. You didn't hear all the banter about how bad someones DPS was, or for having the wrong spec.

The trouble is like many have stated already, number crunchers will soon figure out the "best" spec for DPS/HPS, but is that really all anyone cares about?

I have to say after seeing the options it will be fun to mix things up per fight, it will feel new and fresh, just hope that as a community we can get away from watching the meters less and enjoy the game play more.

[Arlee]

Honestly... My impression is that of course there will still a "best" spec... but the differences will be so close as they won't really matter and what the best will be, will be rather situational depending on your playstyle, your group you are playing with, and the fights you are doing.

but like I said... everything depends on what other changes they make so we will see

[nobodysbaby]

Finally I see some tiny room for real choices. Aoe healing vs single target CD, CC vs movement, and so on, and I can see us changing talents depending on tasks/abilities of boss. I don't put too much time into analyzes yet, cause these "trees" will change a lot I am sure, but I got my hopes up this will be kewl.

[[-Spiritus-]]

Again... "best" has shifted. Instead of a "cookie cutter" being "best" for an expansion or build... it'll be "best" for an encounter.

For example, for shadow, some fights will favor PI, while others will favor having an execute period.

The question is, if you are changing your talents from fight to fight for "best," is it really still "cookie cutter?" It's a semantic question for sure, and you can really make an argument either way. I think Blizzard is comfortable with making the argument that as long as you aren't "setting & forgetting" for tiers/expansions at a time, it isn't "cookie cutter."

[TheTrueM4gg0t]

The question is, if you are changing your talents from fight to fight for "best," is it really still "cookie cutter?"

Don't know the exact definition, but let's assume it means "the best build".
As we can switch talents on a fight to fight basis, it menas the best build "for a fight" rathern than "in generall" as it used to be (where you could only chose in between your two speccs)

In MoP, there will be "cookie cutter" speccs for each fight, just as it is now.
Need add CC? Void Tendrils. is there an AE slow ability? take Phantasm, otherwise B&S,
Is it a fight, with a soft enrage kill phase? Take Twist of Faith. Need good burst above 25%? Take PI.
Are you DD? Take Final Prayer. Are you raidhealer? Take Vampiric Dominance.

The only situation where I would see 2 players with the same specc, but different talents could be in PvP.

But hey, in a PvE environment, where you theoretically always know what is going to happen, you will prepare yourself accoredingly.
And setting your talents belongs to that.
At some point every player will notice whats best, and that's when we start talking about cookie cutting...
Sorry, if you have talents, that have an influence on a PvE fight, they will ALWAYS be susceptible for optimisation, theres nothing you can do about it!
There will ALWAYS be cookie cutter builds in PvE, no matter how many talents you get rid off...
(especially DPS classes! there's just nothing you can do, appart from making talents that don't affect your gameplay whatsoever, haha...)

[[-Spiritus-]]

I think the argument [that I'm expanding for Blizzard at this point for the sake of it], is that when you conjure the image of "cookie cutter," it means that one build will produce equally good results in all situations. So, for example, if you have a cookie cutter, and some dough, and you cut out 6 cookies, and bake them, functionally, it will not matter if you bake them in July or December, in France or in Brazil, in a brick or gas oven. The result will generally be the same, equally desirable cookie, assuming that the dough is the same.

In MoP, in order to have the "best" cookie for all situations, you cannot use one cutter. You need many different shapes for each situation to obtain equal and best. Again, the counter analogy is you could just weld all the cutters together into one big cutter and say "See! Everyone's the same again!," but as I said previously, I bet the "clarification" that we'll eventually get from Blizzard is "Yes, on specific fights, there may be a "best" theoretical build for a spec, but since the previous fight demanded a different build, there no longer is one cutter that can make a "best" cookie for all situations. Hence, we have abolished the cookie cutter build."

Or, to put it another way, when Blizzard says "Cookie Cutter" they mean "Set It and Forget It."

[Mazi]

Thanks Spiritus, now I want some cookies.

I hear "C" is for cookie. That's good enough for me. [-Spiritus-]

[TheTrueM4gg0t]

In MoP, in order to have the "best" cookie for all situations, you cannot use one cutter.

Well yes, you will be changing talents based on fight, ie no one super cookie cutter.
but I had to switch between my 2 heal speccs (disc/holy), does that mean there were no cookie cutter builds for me in Cata? :-)
(truely spoken: no there weren't! I had many variations of speccs both as Disc and as Holy)

[kombucha]

exactly what i was thinking. body and soul is awesome and clearly better than the other 2 talents.

was wondering, is vampiric embrace removed? or will you be able to use both vampiric embrace and Vampiric dominance?

I'm assuming it was absorbed into VD. It would be odd to have two stacking effects that do the same thing.

Also I don't get "good at everything" from "cookie cutter." I get "everyone who's good at raiding runs 8/0/33"

[Afflictid]

Brick or Gas ovens can changed how cookies cook!

[Torch068]

Not sure if you guys caught on, but it's implied Mind Blast will be shadow only.

Also, it was stated that ALL priests will have Evangelism, it's just a class ability.

In regards to Power Infusion versus Twist of Faith, keep in mind it's purely fight dependent. Let's assume Shadow (all fights are assumed to be Heroic): Vaelastrasz, Ragnaros and Sinestra all strongly favor Twist of Faith. On the other hand, Power Infusion would be the clear winner on a fight like Nefarian.

On the same token, Twist of Faith could conceivably be useless for a healing priest if we're to follow a model like Blood Queen Lana'thel, where most of the damage done was periodic damage.

Vow of Unit is going to be an interesting ability and I wouldn't immediately discount it from Vampiric Dominance. However, we're going to need to know two things: how hard do bosses hit and how much health are tanks going to have. For example, if we were to use the current environment Vow of Unity would be surprisingly useful on a Warrior; bosses don't often hit for 70-80k which means it's conceivable to have high Vow of Unity uptime. Added bonus for also using Binding Heal, assuming it keeps its current mana cost.

[Venith]

I get "everyone who's good at raiding runs 8/0/33"

Not necessarily. We're not the most set-in-stone DPS that there is. Even now, we have those two extra points in our spec to do what we will with them, whether it's for the fight that you're on or something you find fun. Personally, I tend to discount some people who are working on heroic Rag (or has him on farm) and don't run 10/0/31. I just find it more helpful to give the healers less damage to deal with, especially on that fight. Much better than having having Phantasm/Psychic Horror/Paralysis on that fight

But I totally agree with what some of you are saying. The PI vs. execute is definitely a fight-by-fight or job-by-job basis. I'm interested to see how the talents play out as development of MoP continues.

[Deleted]

I think the argument [that I'm expanding for Blizzard at this point for the sake of it], is that when you conjure the image of "cookie cutter," it means that one build will produce equally good results in all situations. "

In that case we already don't have cookie cutter specs. Load of specs have a few points left over to put into pvp/highly situational talents which mean that under certain (albeit often uncommon) situations that spec will outperform alternatives.

If Blizz genuinely wanted to make people think about talents and avoid cookie cutters they would have more talent choices, but ones that mattered more, so for example you had to choose between really useful single target, aoe or efficiency talents. Instead we get a system where our choices are slimmed down to 1 choice every 15 levels. Which just kills the feeling that your character develops along a path you choose because of the level of spec homogeneity.

[Deleted]

What my choices will be depending on what im doing.

1 >
Void Tendrils as it wont require me to stand up close (also no movement) and only usefull with thight packs i see it mainly as good choice for PvE and depending on how fast them Tendrils will get destroyed in PvP.

This will be my pick for PvE

PsyFiend: Mainly a PvP talent, i rather keep them Hordies at bay then run up close and psyscream.
If theres a similar Glyph like for PsyScream to hold mobs in place it could be good for pve as well.

My pick for RBG's/BG's

Psychic Scream: PvE/PvP PvE with Glyph pvp Without vs those pesky rogue's.
My pick Arena's

2 >
Body and Soul for Raiding (even when shadow) as it brings raid utility and for PvP.
PvE & BG's

Levitate is only good on your self, unless a fight has a Gong like mechanic as atramedes
Situational for PvE fights when there's no kitty/rogue otherwise a lvl'ng/idle City talent.

Phantasm: Extra Trinket on low CD.
Arena/RBG's

3> This Tier is interesting to what to pick as i need more info on certain things.
Divine Star
When im raid healing i guess, if damage is good than for dps as shadow. Dont see this spell work well in PvP unless the hordes allows me to run along in its path.

PvE healing perhaps extra dps on AoE downing adds as healer might be handy.

Surge of Light: 6% chance on getting a free spell. I use it in my current build and it pops up often enough
Not my pick for PvE healing and DPS more for PvP synergize well with serendipity.

PvP Pick

Archangel: I think this will be my pick for both PvE healing and DPS.
Totally depends on how we get evangelism stacks and how good the star will be.

PvE Healing perhaps.
But i will take this one as Shadow.

4>
Final Prayer my pick for PvE

Angelic Bullwark for PvP.

Desprate Prayer could work well as synergy with Void Shift.
Otherwise i dont see this as a good pick.

5> Interesting tier for both PvE and PvP

Twisted Faith: Double dipping possible ? Atonement ? Dunno if i want this, maybe if double dipping is possible for tanks.
DPS Wise for PvE its a interesting choice, go for it or get PI.

PvP wise, its usefull to get ur enemy down just that bit faster as PI time might be wasted when u get silenced/interrupts.
Atonement double dip in pvp perhaps.

PI: Good talent for PvE good for PvP in BG's arena/rbg's might be less good than TF due to interrupts as healer but dps might be less problematic as they tend to go for the healer first.

This will be my pick as PvE healer.
Perhaps as DPS as well depending on TF not certain yet.

Serendipity: Can be usefull in PvP dont see it being usefull for my playstyle in PvE healing and seeing shadow doesnt use mind spike that often.
FH/BH is the heal i use most in PvP and getting a faster GH is always handy Same for Bursting down a Hordie with MS MS MB as shadow.

My pick for all PvP.

6> Another tier that has more than one desirable spell.

Vampiric Dominance atonement double dip ?
Good for Raid healing and tank healing if double dip works or when u assigned to the melee group.

My pick as DPS PvE as it gives more raid utility as dps.

Vow of unity, interesting spell.
Curious how this will work out for PvE as its a Long CD Binding Heal and Pain Suppression in one.
I see uses in PvP but in Arena/RBG's u will prolly be the one they focus on making the spell useless.
But PvE and BG's it can work and as Shadow u can give one a 50% damage reduction while u be save in Dispersion (pvp?).

Also does this trigger final prayer on u as well ? 50% damage reduction is nothing to sneeze at.


Void Shift (dont like the name tho we're no Locks)
Also interesting to play with, PvE wise this can be fun but if u do so all healing going to the tank/dps by other healers will be wasted as he will get ur health pool. But synergize this with desperate prayer and u have a quick big heal on the tank and u will be save, less good in 25man situations.

Also does this trigger final prayer ?

PvP wise together with desperate prayer u have a strong cd at hand not to mention as shadow, Shift > Desperate Prayer > Dispersion if they go for u after the shift.

What to pick as healer in PvE and PvP, mmmm i dont know i see the Shift as a strong spell in 10mans and if it synergizes well with desprate prayer or Final prayer than i can see Shift being worth to take in both PvE/PvP. Shadow PvE i think Vampiric is a no brainer but in PvP there some intresting things to pick for shadow.


Anyways thats my quick take on what to pick for what im doing at the time.