Shadow Priest DPS - Mind Spike and rotation

[Salk]

This post is for struggling shadow priests. I'm not looking to be flamed or debate every subtle nuance or usage of Mind Spike.

My advice would be not to use Mind Spike AT ALL. At best, its use is situational, at worst, it severely gimps you. Only real place I use it is on low hp adds (like Ripsnarl adds). I posed the question on Mind Spike on trade the other day. I got back all sorts of answers except the correct one. I got back that it should be cast 3x during Archangel, then MB, 3x, MB til Archangel falls off. Uh, wrong. I got back that it should be used as an opener 3x, MB, then VT, SWP, DP. Uh, wrong. MB sucks without any orbs up and doesn't proc empowered shadow. The old Shadow rotation is only slightly modified. It should be: VT (as tank charges in), SWP, DP, Shadow Fiend, Mind Flay 2x, Archangel, MB... then on to dot refreshing and keeping empowered shadow up. Thats it. I sometimes cast SWD right after DP while strafing to give me an extra GCD of movement to proc the shadows and for the mana return. Also, you should be strafing during all instant cast spells.

Also, in Heroics, Mind Control on trash pulls as often as possible. Its a great tool.

[MeleeSpriestDK]

Mind sear and mindspike are just way sub-par. Your much better off to MB,DP,VT,SWP,MF and cast MB every time its up keeping VT,DP,and SWP up all the time on a boss or if multiple adds dot up each one then start the MB and MF rotation till its dead then switch. Mind Sear unless there are MANY low hp adds will put you at the bottom of the dps chart

[Zephriel]

I have not done much PvE as shadow, but it seems the ONLY use for mind spike is for PvP. When you are going up against a class taht can dispel all your dots off useing a combo of dots on target A to force a dispel then a mindspike spam on the other target. This will not allow most CC's until the dots are totally dispelled, but it does put a lot of pressure on the healer. Mindspike in a PvE situation... I just dont see it.

[Jugzwei]

I use mind spike when questing or farming. I think its use in dungeons and bosses is very limited. I have at times used it when a boss is about to go down. MS x3 and MB and SW with hopes to crit him to death, but that is as far is it goes when actually doing something significant.

[rikkken]

only use it in raids when a friendly gets mc'd by something, just a lil love tap


i do use it questing. 3x mind spike, mind blast, mf, sw:d usually dead by than

[ItachiZaku]

Every situation where I thought Mind Spike would be a good choice was very much not. Such as pod duty on Ammune or Vapor adds on Ripsnarl.

[Famine]

It's burst dps for low/medium HP mobs.

It's situational, yes, but highly useful since prior to mindspike we shadow priests lacked anything to fill this gap. Dots are not burst and very inefficient to bother applying to a mob that will live for maybe 2 ticks, mindblast had/has a cooldown, and mindflay is gimp city on its on.


Edit:

Every situation where I thought Mind Spike would be a good choice was very much not. Such as pod duty on Ammune or Vapor adds on Ripsnarl.

I'm not sure why you think this because these are 2 examples of where I think its great. Those adds need to die faster than dots will handle and since the buff to the cast time (not the crit chance I realize) is on you, even if your target dies in 1-3 mindspikes, that still leaves you with a quick/instant mindblast to cast on the next add or boss, depending.

[Docta]

It can be situationally useful in a few fights if you are trying to clear dots to wait for a transition (ie chimaeron waiting for a feud to push p3, Omitron defense system as an add is about to hit 50 energy as to avoid breaking its shield)

[Arlee]

It can be situationally useful in a few fights if you are trying to clear dots to wait for a transition (ie chimaeron waiting for a feud to push p3, Omitron defense system as an add is about to hit 50 energy as to avoid breaking its shield)

This... also it pretty much guarantees you have a fresh empowered shadows buff up when you are dotting up the next boss. Just be smart about it and you will find all kinds of different ways to use MS. No it's not a standard part of rotation, but it does some nice things which are helpful.

[Thrayne]

With my gear I can do about 10k dps with mindspike spam, it is great for heroics and it doesn't oom you if you SWD. I don't use MB with MS because it hits so weak and is a bit of mana.

If I have a Boss <35% and I have Dark Arch angel available MS spam with SWD on Cd does well to 15-18k dps. I think if it was reworked a bit it would be more useful, but I wouldn't say it is useless in it's current state.

They promised for it to be a shadowfrost school so when we were kicked/counterspelled we could cast something but that was never implemented. with that change I believe would make shadow priests much stronger in PvP.