Poll: Do you regret maining shadow priest for this expansion?

[FelPlague]

When it comes to ramp up time, SP is comparable to affliction (agony stacking vs. void form stacking - the latter actually taking longer but that can be alleviated to some degree with chain pulling in dungeons) minus having a tool to apply some DoTs in an AoE (seed of corruption) minus having any AoE whatsoever (sow the seeds + soul flame is huge for mythic+ and any big pulls in general) minus having a tanking pet to allow you to pull a lot of stuff together (only an issue for solo play but still an issue).

If affliction wasn't somewhat undertuned for single target, they'd easily be better than SPs outside of S2M in every way - with S2M only being usable during some raid encounters and extremely impractical outside of raids altogether.

i was talking more about demo, where you have to
Demonbolt
Demonbolt
Hand of guldan
Demonbolt
Dreadstalkers
Demonic empowerment

before you can even start doing damage

and to do aoe you have to have a pet on the target, then cast, and it does horrid damage

[Sluvs]

The spec is in a pretty shitty place right now numberwise(although it's not my main) , BUT numbers change if you complain enough and provide good feedback. Kuckily yous guys got insanity which is a pretty sick game mechanic. So if the only problem is that your numbers are low, you really shouldn't regret maining it. Although I will admit, AoEing it's pretty boring.

[GT4]

i was talking more about demo, where you have to
Demonbolt
Demonbolt
Hand of guldan
Demonbolt
Dreadstalkers
Demonic empowerment

before you can even start doing damage

and to do aoe you have to have a pet on the target, then cast, and it does horrid damage

Ramp-Up: What's your definition of "doing damage"? If you go by "doing any damage", you'll start doing damage with your very first demonbolt as well. If you go by "doing somewhat competitive damage", SP without bloodlust (since your 1.5 seconds figure is without bloodlust as well) at 10k haste takes ~20 seconds to enter first void form at which point you start doing some damage.

E.g. taking a simc report without bloodlust (using default profiles), demonology is already at a spike DPS of ~537k at 17 seconds and stays at a consistent >250k DPS afterwards. SP is barely at 270k DPS at 17 seconds and takes another 16 seconds to spike for 386k DPS (end of first void form) after which it drops down to <200k DPS and as low as 160k DPS until two minutes later. It only starts catching up to demonology after popping S2M roughly five minutes into the fight and finally catches up to be even by the very end of the 7.5 minute fight.

By any definition of the term ramp-up, that'd make SP significantly worse than demonology.

AOE: Demonology can spec into Implosion to lose ~7% single target DPS (which is still way higher than SP without S2M) and become one of the strongest AoE specs in the game. Aside from that, demonwrath actually has the exact same spell power coefficient as mind sear (30% SP per tick), demonology can spec into automatically applying curse of doom in an AoE and they have some built in cleave with legion strike (felguard), immolation aura (infernal) and hand of gul'dan.

Honestly, have you actually played both specs at 110? I'd suggest doing so before arguing here.

[Deleted]

To make S2M work, do you need a certain haste %? because on dummys i cant keep up the insanity, and die. Do you live if the go thru the 3 minutes?
And i am not entirely sure how to play it in raids, do you dot the adds, and then you lost asap the insanity and die, or how do you use it?

[Deleted]

To make S2M work, do you need a certain haste %? because on dummys i cant keep up the insanity, and die. Do you live if the go thru the 3 minutes?

Nope. And sadly that's pretty much the point of it.

And i am not entirely sure how to play it in raids, do you dot the adds, and then you lost asap the insanity and die, or how do you use it?

Keep your DoTs up with Void Bolt. Also you need to time your StM just right, so that the boss dies the moment you can't keep up voidform anymore. Activate it too early and you die before the encounter is over, too late and you've wasted damage.

Lag spike or simple screw up? -> dead on the floor. Unfortunately it's the only talent worth taking in its row and the one thing that makes us competitive on single targets....

[justflayin]

i was talking more about demo, where you have to
Demonbolt
Demonbolt
Hand of guldan
Demonbolt
Dreadstalkers
Demonic empowerment

before you can even start doing damage

and to do aoe you have to have a pet on the target, then cast, and it does horrid damage

Spriest ramp up is comparable. It takes us several GCD's just to get to voidform where we do our damage which from there has to ramp up. Warlocks are not the only dps spec with large ramp up time.

[KaPe]

Even though I don't main Shadow, it is the first expansion when I can comfortably have a DPS spec without constantly respecing or neglecting the healing ones. I thought it would be great - finally some decent dps for world questing, maybe some fun dpsing an instance or two...

How wrong I was. Sure, as long as I keep Sol with me, it's not all that bad outdoor, but the difference between 0 insanity and voidform is incredibly annoying. Things either have random stuns, knockbacks, silences or other annoying mechanics that make it harder to keep up with insanity drain. And if not, it drops anyway before I reach the next pack. I can't just burst some random mob up, even with high Mass Hysteria stacks it takes a while, because nothing is front loaded. AOE is horrendous, with Mind Sear being unable to take care of random 300k trash mobs which you'd normally one shot with some instant cleave.

Boss damage is mostly fine, or pretty good with S2M... but that talent is a horrible balancing mess. Probably the most powerful selfbuff in the game, which is why it's so incredibly limiting to play without it - either because I don't have it, or because it's on cooldown. Nothing else even comes close. And if it ever gets too far ahead, it will get nerfed anyway. Casual PvP also felt horrible, since it's almost impossible to even enter voidform without getting interrupted and killed, with no escape tools at hand.

All in all - it's a mess. If I were to actually play Shadow as a main, I'd probably consider rerolling. Maybe a moonkin, whose dots feel far more convenient to use - if only due to aoe component in one of them. Yeah, I'd give up that supposed boss godmode with S2M, but I'd be able to do everything else without gritting my teeth.

[FelPlague]

Ramp-Up: What's your definition of "doing damage"? If you go by "doing any damage", you'll start doing damage with your very first demonbolt as well. If you go by "doing somewhat competitive damage", SP without bloodlust (since your 1.5 seconds figure is without bloodlust as well) at 10k haste takes ~20 seconds to enter first void form at which point you start doing some damage.

E.g. taking a simc report without bloodlust (using default profiles), demonology is already at a spike DPS of ~537k at 17 seconds and stays at a consistent >250k DPS afterwards. SP is barely at 270k DPS at 17 seconds and takes another 16 seconds to spike for 386k DPS (end of first void form) after which it drops down to <200k DPS and as low as 160k DPS until two minutes later. It only starts catching up to demonology after popping S2M roughly five minutes into the fight and finally catches up to be even by the very end of the 7.5 minute fight.

By any definition of the term ramp-up, that'd make SP significantly worse than demonology.

AOE: Demonology can spec into Implosion to lose ~7% single target DPS (which is still way higher than SP without S2M) and become one of the strongest AoE specs in the game. Aside from that, demonwrath actually has the exact same spell power coefficient as mind sear (30% SP per tick), demonology can spec into automatically applying curse of doom in an AoE and they have some built in cleave with legion strike (felguard), immolation aura (infernal) and hand of gul'dan.

Honestly, have you actually played both specs at 110? I'd suggest doing so before arguing here.

hand of guldans aoe capability is very minor, and yes i use hand of doom, but its rare for mobs to live for more then 15 seconds for it to even go off... and really? "one of the strongest aoe specs in the game" do you have sims for this? cause implosion is ok, but nothing near what unholy or fire have..., and ok i dident know what mind sears SP value was, and no one when dpsing uses infernal...

[GT4]

hand of guldans aoe capability is very minor, and yes i use hand of doom, but its rare for mobs to live for more then 15 seconds for it to even go off... and really? "one of the strongest aoe specs in the game" do you have sims for this? cause implosion is ok, but nothing near what unholy or fire have..., and ok i dident know what mind sears SP value was, and no one when dpsing uses infernal...

For AoE, you should be using infernal. In addition to that, yes I do have sim values for my claim. Without any further adjustments aside from changing to implosion (aka not optimized talents overall), the default pre-raid profile arrives at 1.266m DPS against 10 targets - that's in the top 3 of all specs (the other 2 being pre-nerf havoc and pre-nerf WW).

I'm certain most profiles aren't optimized for AoE yet but I know that e.g. BM is fairly optimized, is widely regarded as one of the strongest AoE DPS specs and it's significantly below demo at ~1m DPS.

[justflayin]

hand of guldans aoe capability is very minor, and yes i use hand of doom, but its rare for mobs to live for more then 15 seconds for it to even go off... and really? "one of the strongest aoe specs in the game" do you have sims for this? cause implosion is ok, but nothing near what unholy or fire have..., and ok i dident know what mind sears SP value was, and no one when dpsing uses infernal...

So what exactly are you debating here? That warlocks have a lot of ramp up? I don't think anyone is refuting that. We're just trying to figure out why no one notices ours.

[Alex Gaigen]

I don't know why people are complaining about spriest. I started as a Demon Hunter since I didn't know what I wanted to play. When I reached 110 I regretted it and went back to my old main priest and I am loving shadow priest.

[PenguinChan]

I don't know why people are complaining about spriest. I started as a Demon Hunter since I didn't know what I wanted to play. When I reached 110 I regretted it and went back to my old main priest and I am loving shadow priest.

Because some people absolutely hate the performance their class is doing, and / or the way they play in 90% of their content level. It's not always about play style, but efficiency. Shadow Priests aren't great in dungeons, this is just fact and everyone knows it. On bosses they do just fine, because they start to live longer and their DPS starts to roll out. The same could be said for any mob pack that tends to live longer, allowing them to start rolling out more DPS onto their ass instead of watching them die with you still applying DoTs.

Different classes and specs will always attract people for different reasons. From World content, to Dungeons, to raids, to PVP, so and so forth.

[Yhcti]

There's a reason every top guild currently has 4-6 shadow priests being geared (they're going to be amazing in raids with outlaw rogues)

[Talleh]

I don't main shadow but I absolutely enjoy what they have done to the spec. I see the negatives, but if they did improve on what they have done I can see the spec going places.

[Deleted]

i was talking more about demo, where you have to
Demonbolt
Demonbolt
Hand of guldan
Demonbolt
Dreadstalkers
Demonic empowerment

before you can even start doing damage

and to do aoe you have to have a pet on the target, then cast, and it does horrid damage

I don't think juggling arguments who has it worse leads to anything.

Damage of both Demo Warlock without demons and Spriest without Voidform is negligible, both share similar problems. Peace.

[FelPlague]

I don't think juggling arguments who has it worse leads to anything.

Damage of both Demo Warlock without demons and Spriest without Voidform is negligible, both share similar problems. Peace.

I was more of saying it cause they we're saying they have the worst ramp up time. The issue is even when we are ramped up we aren't. A new target appears. Your in voidform. You can switch. Dots. Dps it's going down. We need to swap. Build up shards. Hand of guldan. More shards. Dreadstalkers. Empower. Yes our old pets are still attacking the old target. But demo is the worst specs (affliction at least has ways to copy their dots) for switching targets... And tied with shadow for just normal single target ramp up time. Shadow is not the worst. It's tied. Affliction and deko both have the ramp up issue as really they are basicly the same spec with different visuals. And slightly different play style. Current demo. Is basicly wow affliction. Build up dots. And empower them

[Deleted]

Ok honestly , so many whining posts about SP , do you people even know how to play your own class ..it's bloody amazing and best it's been for a very long time..
Omg we can't aoe and nuke trash , we must have the worst spec ever..
Try popping STM in dungeons and play with it..you'll have the others QQ'ing they want SP nerfed..
And don't bother saying the other dps are afk or crap , heard it all before.
It's. Fun and enjoyable and just needs some TLC and you will reap the rewards xD

[Rumex]

Ok honestly , so many whining posts about SP , do you people even know how to play your own class ..it's bloody amazing and best it's been for a very long time..
Omg we can't aoe and nuke trash , we must have the worst spec ever..
Try popping STM in dungeons and play with it..you'll have the others QQ'ing they want SP nerfed..
And don't bother saying the other dps are afk or crap , heard it all before.
It's. Fun and enjoyable and just needs some TLC and you will reap the rewards xD

Try run a heroic dungeon with a Fire Mage/BM Hunter/WW/DH. It is really not fun when bosses dies in 30 sec and u can't even get your dmg up because the Mage and Hunter just burst 800k at the boss. Last night i did VoW, we had so much dmg that the boss with the owl beam thingy didnt even go into that transistion. But i agree with you on longer fights, shadow is really strong and will be one of the strongest specs in raiding. I just dont really think shadow is that perfect now, we need lower cd on shadow crash, and lower cd on StM, and maybe rework some of the talents so we can get a bit more bursty, maybe like how we bursted in Dragon Soul with Mind Spike or something.

I tried StM in dungeons, it is really good on bosses etc. But i really think the cd is too long, some dungeons u can't use it on everyboss, and then u try to respecc and you can't because StM is still on CD. Blizzard need to make this so the CD resets on every boss, they HAVE TO or make it 5 min cd.

[Karei]

S2M needs to go as a talent. It casts a shadow over the other talents