How to fix SP pvp

[Skrumpcious]

i actually saw a spriest killing a rogue after having killed a hunter, and when their vampiric touch get dispelled they gain mana back.. just saying

[Abandon]

You'll be disappointed to find out UA isn't all that it's cut out to be anymore. even if they dispell it, the crit happens, and the silence happens, most the healers I've fought in both arena and battlegrounds will be topped off as soon as the silence effect is over.

Being a warlock, and not a shadow priest, I can't help you, but I agree PvP for you guys could be tweaked a bit, but I don't think adding a dispell-this-happens effect will help

Well, I understand your point, but imagine if Unstable Affliction did less damage and didn't have a silence. The silence at least gives you time to apply it again or cast a CC like Fear or Seduce without them being able to do anything for a couple of seconds.

To the above poster, congratulations on finding an AFK rogue and Hunter. When VT is dispelled, it doesn't restore mana, unless you put three talent points into the threat reduction talent Shadow Affinity.

Honestly, I cannot even imagine a situation where a Shadow priest could kill a rogue and a hunter unless they were on about 10% health at the start of the fight, or had absolutely no cooldowns.

edit: Great avatar by the way, Jamie Hewlett is awesome

[Syonide]

Just wanted to throw in the fact that every class has to get 5% hit for PvP, you're not the only ones. This can be easily obtained if you gear correctly with the offset pieces, or throw a 20hit enchant on your gloves instead of SP. 5% is pretty low and doesn't take too much to get there, so you;re whole argument of having to get hit is null.

[Abandon]

Where did I mention spell hit?

[Abandon]

Ah, well every caster needs to gem for the same amount of hit, usually, since most classes have a +3% hit talent that they can pick up so I agree with you on that point.

[syanid]

I really think it would be awesome if we were able to throw Dispersion on someone else and to have the regen bonus left for us. That way we can crowd control like some other classes and lower the burst on us.

Problem is that Dispersion would own if this was TBC. However, in WotLK burst is the king and it the longer the match is, the burst doesn't stop. What sucks is that the shadow priest needs to play with brains while some other classes don't and they achieve the same. The design fails, they should have done a special tree made for pvp only or finally balance the damn arena and get some people with brains to design the classes in such way that you need to think what to use and not just "oh what happens if I press Strangulate on priest" tactics.

[trexxo]

Imo shadow is almost there, but there are still things that we need to become viable. Here are a few things i thought of:
*dispellers are an obvious problem, as dots make up for 50%+ of our damage..
Add a new 1p talent:
"whenever any of your dots are dispelled, the dispeller instantly takes damage equal to 25% of the total damage of the spell. If a DoT is dispelled it horrifies the dispeller after 3sec, causing them to cower in fear for 2sec per DoT dispelled during these 3sec." (means a total of 6sec if the dispeller is retarded. And btw the old VT dispel damage would be replaced by this.)

*unlike other casters, we lack an offensive cd (shadowfiend is arguably one yes) something like:

Apocalysm: "when activated, increases your DoT damage done by 10% per stack of shadow weaving active. Lasts 12sec, 1min 30sec cd." (NOTE: i know this might be OP for pve, but this is just rough ideas and i will not take pve into account.)

*we are locked down by melee far too easy. We are designed to be tanking, not kiting, but atm i don't know what they want with SP. We are weak, yet we can't escape.
On my point though, a suggestion to allow us to do something with a melee up our ass.

Add into improved shadowform, eventually:
whenever you take physical damage you have a 10/20% chance to reduce the cast or channeling time of your next damaging shadow spell by 1/2 sec.

*as already mentioned, improved fade is not enough. Add a 3sec immunity to movement impairing effects when used.
Also a 15% move speed increase while in shadowform would be requestable. If that would be too OP, at least let us move 15% faster while faded.

*for the love of god make dispersion regenerate 36% of our hp as well.. Seriously.

*just on a side note, make psychic horror hit the target instantly ok? Just like any other cc.


Okay guys, this is about what i can think of atm. Feedback is welcome, and if you find any of my points invalid, don't go "yo that ain't right brah11", just tell me what's wrong in your opinion.

I haven't thought everything out, just thought i'd share my ideas.
Good night fellow shadow priests and don't give in! :P

[Evilmoo]

Apocalysm: "when activated, increases your DoT damage done by 10% per stack of shadow weaving active. Lasts 12sec, 1min 30sec cd." (NOTE: i know this might be OP for pve, but this is just rough ideas and i will not take pve into account.)

add "but increases mana cost of all spells by 50%" and it's balanced.

[Abandon]

I really like the suggestions being posted, been thinking of a couple myself:

Add a talent to give SW a 2 second stun or root effect. It already damages us almost as much as the person we hit with it, it may as well have some utility outside occasionally being able to time it to break a sheep, which any priest can do.

For burst, a spell that consumes all of your current DoTs on the target and does damage based on that would be nice. To get the best damage it would mean having all of your DoTs stacked before use, so it wouldn't be stupidly powerful.

[Rymezz]

Add into improved shadowform, eventually:
whenever you take physical damage you have a 10/20% chance to reduce the cast or channeling time of your next damaging shadow spell by 1/2 sec.

I really like that idea, but it should be higher chance, other's we'll still have to take much hits untill we can cast something serious, but i like the other idea's aswell and maybe they should reduce the backlash on SW to 10% or something if you use it allot it's killing you :\.

[Ananan]

Here's some more random ideas. Keep them coming - they're fun to read if nothing else.

- Add a Silence glyph that makes the target take 25% more shadow damage from you during the silence.

- Change the Shadow:Word Death glyph to instantly make Mind Blast come off cooldown when you use SW. That would allow for some MB-SW-MB bursting.

- Make a talent add a 2 second root effect whenever one of your dots is removed or ends on a target. (Should preferably be non-magic so it roots if the removing effect is Cloak of Shadows too.)

- Add to a talent to make Devouring Plague root the target for 1 second every time it ticks.

- Add to a talent a chance on taking melee damage to make your next Shadow Wordeath stun the target for 3 seconds.

- Make a talent add a Mortal Strike effect to Shadow Wordeath. (I mean it.)

- Add to a talent to make the last Mind Flay tick snare the target for 4 seconds (-50% speed as usual, it would just stay on for 4 seconds longer after a full-duration Mind Flay).

- Add a levitate glyph that makes Levitate add 30% to your run speed for 5 seconds when cast on yourself in Shadowform, but adds a 25 seconds cooldown. Something like that.

There must be something you could do with Mind Soothe...

[Benner]

I never play PvP since it´s not fun to always be the stun locked punchin bag.
But its a fun to read to see peoples ideas of how improve SP in PvP.
It seems shadow is fine against other casters but the main problem is melee.
What do we do when melee closes in on us, disperse, spam fear and hope our buddy can get them of our back.
(i suck at pvp so dont flame me cuz that might suck to do)

Id suggest a root of some sort, perhaps Mind Freeze to replace Mind Soothe.
Paralyzes the target for 2-3 secs rooting them in place, the target can still attack and cast spells while rooted, and the 15% run speed while faded sounds quite nice.

[Abandon]

Here's some more random ideas. Keep them coming - they're fun to read if nothing else.

- Add a Silence glyph that makes the target take 25% more shadow damage from you during the silence.

- Change the Shadow:Word Death glyph to instantly make Mind Blast come off cooldown when you use SW. That would allow for some MB-SW-MB bursting.

- Make a talent add a 2 second root effect whenever one of your dots is removed or ends on a target. (Should preferably be non-magic so it roots if the removing effect is Cloak of Shadows too.)

- Add to a talent to make Devouring Plague root the target for 1 second every time it ticks.

- Add to a talent a chance on taking melee damage to make your next Shadow Wordeath stun the target for 3 seconds.

- Make a talent add a Mortal Strike effect to Shadow Wordeath. (I mean it.)

- Add to a talent to make the last Mind Flay tick snare the target for 4 seconds (-50% speed as usual, it would just stay on for 4 seconds longer after a full-duration Mind Flay).

- Add a levitate glyph that makes Levitate add 30% to your run speed for 5 seconds when cast on yourself in Shadowform, but adds a 25 seconds cooldown. Something like that.

There must be something you could do with Mind Soothe...

Honestly, they should make a talent that gives SW a 3 second stun. Or a root, something to keep someone away for a few seconds. Not a proc, just a talent that adds it to SW. It would hardly be overpowered if it shared DR with other stuns/roots, and it would mean the second stun would be 1.5 seconds at most. It hurts us and doesn't do much damage, please let it be useful, and on a deep shadow talent disc wouldn't be able to get it.

[cynical]

I used to think mobility/survivability were our major issues, but the main reason I'm quitting my spriest is that most classes can shrug off my damage. No pressure at all...

[Mirzawy]

shadow priests are fine i think the thing they need is lowering their disarm to 1min cd

u can remove magic thus chain of ice = kitting dk to some limit
u can break snares every 15 sec

priests are not suppose to be kiters they are suppose to endure pain and pressure thats why u have shields and can heal and have dispers

i think their only problem is dispell but again only limited classes can dispell

i still dk why there is no shadow priest affliction teams ? i think they would own

[talrob]

shadow priests are fine i think the thing they need is lowering their disarm to 1min cd

u can remove magic thus chain of ice = kitting dk to some limit
u can break snares every 15 sec

priests are not suppose to be kiters they are suppose to endure pain and pressure thats why u have shields and can heal and have dispers

i think their only problem is dispell but again only limited classes can dispell

i still dk why there is no shadow priest affliction teams ? i think they would own

Kiting...a...dk? You are aware that they have undispelable backup slows that they can keep on you permanently?

[Abandon]

shadow priests are fine i think the thing they need is lowering their disarm to 1min cd

u can remove magic thus chain of ice = kitting dk to some limit

Lets start here. You can remove it, just to get it instantly reapplied, and while waiting for the GCD you are moving at 10% speed while the DK is running towards you. Once he is in melee range there is no way to get out, and even if you do manage to escape for a second you are Death Gripped back in. Oh, and every DK talent tree has a second snare available through talents or a glyph.

u can break snares every 15 sec

That might help more if people couldn't instantly reapply snares, or have snares that automatically apply like rogues and feral druids.

priests are not suppose to be kiters they are suppose to endure pain and pressure thats why u have shields and can heal and have dispers

Please show me all of the healing spells you can cast in Shadowform. PW:S absorbs about 4k damage, so an auto-attack or two, and Dispersion lasts 6 seconds. So, we can not die for 6 seconds, then leave Shadowform to spam heals on ourself that are too weak to outheal the incoming damage, then you die. Sounds great.

i think their only problem is dispell but again only limited classes can dispell

i still dk why there is no shadow priest affliction teams ? i think they would own

Because Shadowpriests need someone with a lot of CC to carry them in an arena team, and any melee character would instantly destroy the double affliction team. Your team have limited CC, take a long time to damage anything, and can't outheal damage.

[Mirzawy]

Kiting...a...dk? You are aware that they have undispelable backup slows that they can keep on you permanently?

if a dk spams chain of ice he will be out of runes and wont do enough dmg to u
and dont forget u got a short cd fear

Lets start here. You can remove it, just to get it instantly reapplied, and while waiting for the GCD you are moving at 10% speed while the DK is running towards you. Once he is in melee range there is no way to get out, and even if you do manage to escape for a second you are Death Gripped back in. Oh, and every DK talent tree has a second snare available through talents or a glyph.

well all classes suffers from the same issue
so the best time to remove the snare is to have a successful fear than remove the snare get some decent space and mind flay , by the time he reaches u he will be almost dead

Please show me all of the healing spells you can cast in Shadowform. PW:S absorbs about 4k damage, so an auto-attack or two, and Dispersion lasts 6 seconds. So, we can not die for 6 seconds, then leave Shadowform to spam heals on ourself that are too weak to outheal the incoming damage, then you die. Sounds great.

u can always leave shadowform and heal u know

the reason shadow looks weak bcz disc is op

[talrob]

They don't reapply chains...they don't need to they have lolskill desecration or icy crutch which makes it impossible to get away. You make it sound like a dk is hard...Once they have the second slow on you, running without a freedom is pointless. I also laugh at you calling disco priests op...disco priests are the first to go oom in a fight and have the least abilities to get away to drink. All you as a lolskill deathknight need to do is hug the priest until he goes out of mana while your 'not overpowered' druid hot's you and you pop one of your many cooldowns to survive.

[Abandon]

if a dk spams chain of ice he will be out of runes and wont do enough dmg to u
and dont forget u got a short cd fear

A DK can get 5 frost runes if he uses cooldowns, that is not counting death runes. And all he has to do is keep you rooted until he gets into melee range, because you will not be able to get out when he does. 24 seconds is not a "short cooldown" when it takes melee 10 seconds to kill you.

well all classes suffers from the same issue

wrong, other classes have ways to get out of melee range or stun the DK, or snare him, or CC him in some way that is not instantly trinketed.

so the best time to remove the snare is to have a successful fear than remove the snare get some decent space and mind flay , by the time he reaches u he will be almost dead

successful fear being a fear that lands, and then is instantly trinketed or broken with Lichborne because Shadow priests have no other defences to save your trinket for. Also, if that happened, Death Grip back into melee. Or pet stuns. Or Anti-magic shell. Or Strangulate. And if you think you can kill a DK with one round of DoTs and a Mind Flay, you are deeply, deeply stupid. And if you get low on health, just pop a tank cooldown and sacrifice your pet for an instant 40% heal.

u can always leave shadowform and heal u know

the reason shadow looks weak bcz disc is op

Leaving Shadowform to heal means you have to stand there spamming heals on yourself for a second or two before you get interrupted or silenced. And even while healing yourself, he is still damaging you and you are doing no damage to him. Shadow does not have the healing power to outheal being focused, and DKs can interrupt casting in about 4-5 different ways.

The reason Shadow looks weak is because Shadow is weak.



If we are still suggesting talents, something that procs instant Flash Heals that don't break Shadowform might help, since we don't have the defensive or offensive capablities to fight people without needing to heal.