Mind Spike - Someone please explain why this spell is useful?

[Direshadow]

I'm really wondering what good mind spike is for, to be honest, other then the few times we get school-locked in pvp.

IN PVE - Trash is pointless, and now that our dots scale with crit and haste, casting a few dots on adds during a fight like Death Whisper, and then mind blasting, flaying, and deathing them is often enough.

In PVP - I will almost always resort to mind flay due to the snaring effect. If someone's trinket or snare removal skill is down, I can push out more damage with mind flay simply because they're movement is hindered which also allows my cooldowns like fear, etc, to pop.


To be honest, i'm more interested in the Shadow Orbs mechanic that we'll be seeing. It'll be interesting to see if they use them as a bit of a resource other then mana to do nifty things.

Can someone explain where Mind Spike would be useful? I'm confused...

[Za1k]

Adds during boss fights matter.

Also, it's an instant attack to press while moving, simarly to arcane barrage.

[kailtas]

Dont think you noticed but these changes are set for cataclysm.

[mafio]

Also, it's an instant attack to press while moving, simarly to arcane barrage.

1.5-second cast. 30-yard range. No cooldown.
No.

[Direshadow]

1.5-second cast. 30-yard range. No cooldown.
No.

that


If it was instant then i would understand...

[fabian]

I'm really wondering what good mind spike is for, to be honest, other then the few times we get school-locked in pvp.

IN PVE - Trash is pointless, and now that our dots scale with crit and haste, casting a few dots on adds during a fight like Death Whisper, and then mind blasting, flaying, and deathing them is often enough.

Yes, currently. But in Cata, Haste will not reduce the duration, so if the mob dies before the dot's duration, you're wasting a cast. The ramp up time for MB and MF will be less than MSp, and MSp spam will do similar damage as MF spam.

In PVP - I will almost always resort to mind flay due to the snaring effect. If someone's trinket or snare removal skill is down, I can push out more damage with mind flay simply because they're movement is hindered which also allows my cooldowns like fear, etc, to pop.

A quick damage ability for when MF is too long and MB/SW is on CD?

To be honest, i'm more interested in the Shadow Orbs mechanic that we'll be seeing. It'll be interesting to see if they use them as a bit of a resource other then mana to do nifty things.

Can someone explain where Mind Spike would be useful? I'm confused...

[xxf2dxx]

It's a fast cast spell that does the damage mindflay would do with SW:P up. IE: Cast this when you're in a heroic and shit is dying really fast.

[Abandon]

It will do more damage than Dots + Mind Flay if the target dies within 15 seconds. Lots of things in raids show up and need to die fast. Bone Spikes, Frozen Orbs on Toravon, ect. Plus, it will be good against any mobs with Shadow Resistance.

[Bareno]

It's a fast cast spell that does the damage mindflay would do with SW:P up. IE: Cast this when you're in a heroic and shit is dying really fast.

This, I always wanted to nuke spam as a spriest, and my heroic dps would go up

[Direshadow]

It will do more damage than Dots + Mind Flay if the target dies within 15 seconds. Lots of things in raids show up and need to die fast. Bone Spikes, Frozen Orbs on Toravon, ect. Plus, it will be good against any mobs with Shadow Resistance.

Now that you mention that, I guess it might be useful against warlocks and other priests who have those kinds of protective spells.

If the shadow orbs frequently reduce cast time on Mind Spike, that could be useful in PVP as well.


Edit: Another thing I love about mind flay is for mobs that are constantly moving around, you don't need to worry about facing them in order to get your spell off.. you can just channel mind flay and it'll turn you automatically.

[BlissLeaf]

If you're locked out of shadow, you can still use Mind Spike, since it's considered Shadowfrost damage.

[Tarien]

If you're locked out of shadow, you can still use Mind Spike, since it's considered Shadowfrost damage.

And then someone locks you out of that school too and we're still fucked ;D

Honestly the priest changes, which came at the very ass end of the day, look rushed and lacklustre. This whole preview thing smacks of some boss somewhere going 'Right lets have a public preview, class designers I want your ideas written up by the end of the day for publishing to the masses', and the staff shit bricks as they have nothing major planned for half the classes and end up writing down whatever they can think of.

[harky]

They're giving Shadow a better way to burst adds. It was announced over six months ago. All we learned now is the name and exactly what it does. We've known what it's for and why Shadow needs it for a long time.

[Abandon]

And then someone locks you out of that school too and we're still fucked ;D

Honestly the priest changes, which came at the very ass end of the day, look rushed and lacklustre. This whole preview thing smacks of some boss somewhere going 'Right lets have a public preview, class designers I want your ideas written up by the end of the day for publishing to the masses', and the staff shit bricks as they have nothing major planned for half the classes and end up writing down whatever they can think of.

Locked out of Shadow, locked out of Frost...I'd probably heal or smite

[Weena2]

A few things:
1. "Deals Shadowfrost damage and puts a debuff on the target that improves subsequent Mind Spike damage." It could potentially be that the first hit of mind spike is equal to a MF, but after that it starts hitting for more and more.
2. As mentioned above it can be used when locked out of shadow
3. If its damage is equal to mind flay, it could very well replace it in our spell priorities. Yes, i read the part where it said they don't want to include it into our rotation, but I don't think they ever wanted us to drop Mind Blast and SW from our rotation either. If we could drop mind flay from our rotation, it would allow people that are either average players or have high MS to do more dps in the sense that they won't have to time MF clips anymore.

..but we'll just wait and see i guess.

[Kwickslash]

If you're locked out of shadow, you can still use Mind Spike, since it's considered Shadowfrost damage.

They mentioned multi-class spells not being able to be locked out of.

[fabian]

3. If its damage is equal to mind flay, it could very well replace it in our spell priorities. Yes, i read the part where it said they don't want to include it into our rotation, but I don't think they ever wanted us to drop Mind Blast and SW from our rotation either. If we could drop mind flay from our rotation, it would allow people that are either average players or have high MS to do more dps in the sense that they won't have to time MF clips anymore.

It will be able equal DPS spamming either MF or MSp, but MF has 3 times to crit while MSp only 2 times in the time of 1 MF, so MF will have a slightly higher DPET with no talents.

[Zeuq]

To summarize, here's what I see as the uses:

1. It'll be useful for killing things that have to die quickly, where the ramp up time would normally hurt your DPS, you can switch targets and pop a couple Mind Spikes.

2. Where now in rotations one might use SW, you can use this instead. If it does about the same amount of damage as Mind Flay, then this would be a better choice when you have roughly 1 GCD before having to refresh DoTs and MB is on CD.

3. It'll be useful when locked out of Shadow. Probably won't happen much in PVE, but you'll at least have something to do besides a crappy Smite or crappy Heal that drops Shadowform.

4. Also for PVP, it'll be useful if your opponents have more Shadow resist.

5. It may be useful for Holy and Discipline when we need to nuke in a burn phase or for soloing. It could also be useful for Healers in PVP since now if we're locked out of Holy and Mind Blast is on CD, we really don't have much we can do.

[walexia]

cmon guys, i was a bit skeptical at first BUT hey the potential of this spell is too great to deny ESPECIALLY in pvp.
Most of you shadow priests have noticed that 100% of our dmage spells as shadow priest are in the shadow school so interrupting a shadow priests mindflay channel or VT cast is a great way to shut him /her up.

Having this means we have better survivabilty against interrupt happy melee AND hey it's a new nuke which means it could have some super cool graphics

I know i am over enthusiastic about it , but hey some pretty good changes for spreists happened in wotlk some were not that huge or flamboyantly noticeable but they did in general make better the overall quality of life for spriests and most of the changes so far were'nt so overly OP that they required constant changing which most classes are subject to which would piss the hell out of anyone as other classes cry bloody nerf.

So yeah i would be happy to be able to use some cool looking nuke spell while or after being locked outta my shadow school

[zondura]

This spell is needed for fast-dying trash, and thank god that they finally made a spell for that.