Priest builds

[bhodi]

Sadly, in the PvE healing arena right now it's

Paladin > Druid >> Priest > Shaman

The PoH coefficient nerf, the inclusion of a CoH cooldown (admittedly needed) and the holy concentration rework really REALLY hurt priests.

The additon of the beacon of light and the holy light splash glyph (even nerfed) means that a paladin can basically do double or tripple of what a shaman or priest can do on a target heal, as they get to heal two targets at the same time for 10-15k. Druids are reigning kings of HoTs and none of the other healers even come close. They can keep rejuv consistently on 5-10 people and are critically needed for smoothing out damage spikes on tanks.

The 2pc T10 set bonus which gives a HoT component to all flash heal crits may give priests a much needed boost.

I dunno WTF about shaman except they've got one chain heal thing they use and it's fairly effective but must be god awful boring to play (just like paladins).


Healing classes in general are seeing a steady and consistent decline; not many folks are playing them (or want to play them). It's extremely stressful and boring at the same time; blink, turn your head, get a drink for one second and you may have wiped the raid.. you don't get to look at all the pretty scenery because your eyes are fixed on your grid/healbot/whatever. Plus, it almost requires loads of addons to be effective.

[caladein]

Nah, Druids have been outperforming priests in healing for a long, long time - since at least early BC.  The only time priests begin to catch up is when CoH is bumped.. which gets nerfed to hell in the update patches following.   With all the toys buffs and removal of penalties being thrown at druids you'd think they were grossly unpopular.

Druids and Holy Paladins are going to out-HPS both Priests specs any day of the week.  Since the current meta-game is to minimize the amount of healers you bring and stick them in strict assignments Priests are just designed "wrong".

That said, I had a blast raiding Wrath content as a Disc Priest and it was probably the most fun I've had healing PvE MMO content.  Shield spam, Penance, and BT are just worlds more interesting than what I got from my Holy Paladin (or Resto Druid way-back-in-the-day).

[Fordel]

Gear and skill are almost never actually equivalent so I tend to throw that out the window for anything but the most theoretical of discussions. For all of elemental shamans overall weakness on paper, when I actually bring mine to our raids I'm typically very competitive on dps, the same thing should apply to a well-played shadow priest.

I guess second place is still competitive   


/rawrhoot

[Dren]

For what it is worth, I have lvl 80 chars in all healing classes and have done it with all of them.  By far, Disc Priest is the most fun to heal with given all the tricks they have that aren't just direct healing.  They may not top the charts for healing, but that is misleading.  A good DPriest will be using shields to prevent damage on non-tanks mostly, but sometimes tanks if there is time.  They can stick and move and still do Hots, shield, bounce an autohealer around the room, etc.  Their buffs aren't anything to laugh at either.  I like to hit the BGs sometimes and just go nuts healing everyone.  It is amazing how you can turn the tide of any fight.

SPriest is fine, but as said here, not the best DPS class.  I'm sure that will change again.  They will be melting faces once more soon.  For PvP?  Get to know mana burn...

HPriest are great healers, but not the best and that style is almost as boring as Pally healing.  Pally healing is so much better, might as well roll Pally if you want that route.  They get 5x the good drops in raids anyway it seems like.  My main is a Pally, so I should know (it is sick sometimes.)

[Delmania]

As somone looking to make a healer when I get the heirlooms items, which class is best for PvE and PvP? 

[Selby]

As somone looking to make a healer when I get the heirlooms items, which class is best for PvE and PvP? 

Druid, hands down (right now).

[Zetor]

For reference, I played a shaman and priest at 80, I played a holy paladin extensively at 70, and I'm leveling a druid atm.

There's no "best", really, though druids come close  . Here's my impression of the classes:
- Paladins and druids can offspec to tank, if you want to switch it up in pve (healer/tank dual spec = never spend more than 2 seconds looking for a group)
- Shamans are typically rare (less loot competition + my shaman got into pug raids WAY easier than my priest)
- Priests have two heal trees with fundamentally different healing styles; of the 2, only one is viable for pvp (you do have to make some pretty big talent sacrifices for a pvp spec for all 4 classes, but competitive pvp as a holy priest... yeah, no)
- Healing styles: shamans have a passive HOT, a weak-ish instant heal, and some casted heals; paladins have a stronger instant heal, but use cast-time heals almost exclusively; druids have eleventy billion HOTs and a decent single target heal; priests have everything, but not as "optimized" as any of the other healers
- Do NOT roll a priest if you like to pvp and are alliance, since half of the horde has an I WIN button against your only escape ability
- Druids are very powerful in pvp now, paladins are annoying and good if you support melee damage-dealers, but they have some severe weaknesses; shamans are kinda eh in pvp, and disc priests are decent, but need good gear.
- Damage offspecs: shadow priests are pretty bad (as you can see from this thread), elemental shamans are boring but good ranged damage, enhancement shamans are more involved and melee, ret paladins are also kinda boring and melee, ferals can sorta tank and dps with the same spec (for some loss in efficiency), moonkins are sort of like elemental shamans with less burst and more cc; ret and feral are probably the best for pvp out of all the off specs (yeah, this is very subjective - I know elemental shaman can blow people up in 2 spells)
- Leveling speed is comparable as long as you level as a damage spec; ret paladins are much easier / quickier than the others in my experience though

Heirlooms: if you're undecided and want to see for yourself, you can get away with a 1h spellpower mace, cloth shoulders + chest, discerning eye of the beast and try them all out (this'll allow you to level a shadowpriest or boomkin fine, and even be borderline acceptable for an elemental shaman if you use a shield). However if you want to level a ret paladin, you -will- need the plate shoulder + chest + 2h weapon.


.. and yeah, there's a reason I'm leveling a druid and not playing my priest/shaman. :p

[Fordel]

Resto Druids reek at 5v5, and they aren't anywhere near as dominating in 3v3 as they are in 2v2. They are the undisputed Leafy Gods of 2v2 though.

Paladins have strong if not down right dominate showings in all brackets last I checked.

Disc Priests are still arguably the most powerful Arena healers overall.

Shamans have guaranteed spots on any 5v5 team, and very good showings in 3v3. Don't think they do very well in 2v2 relative to the others.

Holy Priests aren't for Arena for the most part, they don't have the mana or tools really.

All healers are force multipliers in any battleground, so if you don't care to arena, pick which every playstyle you prefer.



For PvE: Resto Druid or Holy Paladin

They are both "The Best" at what they do.

Druid = Raid healing
Paladin = Tank healing

[Delmania]

What does the shaman do well?  I never see too many Resto shamen, and I figure there must be a reason for that?

[Fordel]

What does the shaman do well?  I never see too many Resto shamen, and I figure there must be a reason for that?

For PvE? "Nothing".

They are stuck in generalist limbo. Their old niche of Chain Heal bot is pretty much replaced by Resto Druids entirely. They can single target heal, sorta. They can raid heal, sorta. They don't really stand out anymore.

With that said, I wouldn't kick one out of my bed or anything. If you have a solid Resto shaman it is a boon to almost any raid, the totem buffs and bloodlust are all huge huge things.


They are solid in all aspects of PvP outside of 2v2.

-edit- I should expand on the PvP bit, in that a large reason they are doing well currently is due to the fact they hard counter DKs.

[K9]

So much of this chat assumes that you are in a universally skilled raid group. For the majority of wow players the people they group with will not be skill capped, and as such disparities between the classes really diminish. A good player of any class can do well when compared to the majority of wow, and skill is the limiting factor on performance for most, not class nor gear.

[Cheddar]

Thanks for all the advice.  No one mentioned using a wand; this has cut my downtime as a noob by a LOT.   

[Nebu]

A good player of any class can do well when compared to the majority of wow, and skill is the limiting factor on performance for most, not class nor gear.

I disagree on the gear part.  A bad player gets a whole lot easier to take with good gear.  This is especially the case with overpowered classes where you can use just a few abilities and be effective with good gear.  One of the reasons that I dislike WoW is that good gear plays a greater role than skilled play, especially in pvp.  A purple geared player can roll their face on the keyboard against someone in green gear and win easily.

[K9]

A good player of any class can do well when compared to the majority of wow, and skill is the limiting factor on performance for most, not class nor gear.

I disagree on the gear part.  A bad player gets a whole lot easier to take with good gear.  This is especially the case with overpowered classes where you can use just a few abilities and be effective with good gear.  One of the reasons that I dislike WoW is that good gear plays a greater role than skilled play, especially in pvp.  A purple geared player can roll their face on the keyboard against someone in green gear and win easily.

You are right; I am really only talking about PvE here. Gear is the limiting factor in PvP for sure, but in PvE (which most of this discussion seems to be floating around) gear is far inferior to skill in terms of how it limits your character. This is particularly highlighted by more complex classes (such as SPriests).

[Sjofn]

Druid = Raid healing
Paladin = Tank healing

Man, don't fuckin' tell someone to make a paladin healer. Ugh. Life is too short to play a paladin healer.

Disc priests are almost as good for tank healing and roughly a billion times more interesting.

[Selby]

I disagree on the gear part.  A bad player gets a whole lot easier to take with good gear.

While I do agree to a certain extent, bad players are a drag on any raid if there are things that need to be avoided.  Standing next to the dragon and eating cleaves?  Avoiding fire when it is tossed on your hear and starts to burn?  Situational awareness at *all* required?  Bad gear vs. good gear is going to be next to no help.  If someone gets a snobold firebomb on their head and they refuse to move out of it, they die regardless of their gear.

[Sjofn]

I disagree on the gear part.  A bad player gets a whole lot easier to take with good gear.

While I do agree to a certain extent, bad players are a drag on any raid if there are things that need to be avoided.  Standing next to the dragon and eating cleaves?  Avoiding fire when it is tossed on your hear and starts to burn?  Situational awareness at *all* required?  Bad gear vs. good gear is going to be next to no help.  If someone gets a snobold firebomb on their head and they refuse to move out of it, they die regardless of their gear.

Yeah, gear can help brute force a shitty DPSer to decent numbers or help marginally aware people have a bit more of a HP buffer to give them time to notice they're standing in fire, but for the most part, I agree with Selby. If someone straight up sucks at noticing stuff beyond "hit the boss," all the gear in the world won't help them suck less.

[Fordel]

Druid = Raid healing
Paladin = Tank healing

Man, don't fuckin' tell someone to make a paladin healer. Ugh. Life is too short to play a paladin healer.

Disc priests are almost as good for tank healing and roughly a billion times more interesting.

They wanted "The Best", not "The not soul sucking" ! 

[Nebu]

If someone straight up sucks at noticing stuff beyond "hit the boss," all the gear in the world won't help them suck less.

It's ok.  If that happens, they can always download a UI element that will tell them what button to push and when.  Another aspect of this game that really removes a large portion of the skill element. 

[Fordel]

If someone straight up sucks at noticing stuff beyond "hit the boss," all the gear in the world won't help them suck less.

It's ok.  If that happens, they can always download a UI element that will tell them what button to push and when.  Another aspect of this game that really removes a large portion of the skill element. 

No, they still fail and usually just spam the raid with non-sense from their mods. 

[Soulflame]

Druid = Raid healing
Paladin = Tank healing

Man, don't fuckin' tell someone to make a paladin healer. Ugh. Life is too short to play a paladin healer.

Disc priests are almost as good for tank healing and roughly a billion times more interesting.

Them's fighting words!

  

[bhodi]

Not to mention flat out wrong! Don't get me wrong I loved playing a disc priest, but they are no paladin. Not even close. They MIGHT be able to heal burst damage like a paladin, but with beacon of light a paladin is doing that AND healing someone else, too!

[Lakov_Sanite]

Priests have tank cooldowns which can be absolutely essential for hardmodes. Their healing may be subpar but things like pain suppression are almost required on some fights.

[Dren]

I have to agree that Hpally is best for tank healing.  Not only are they doing that, they are raid healing too due to the double hit.  I'm so critted up I can typically get away with spamming flash heal for 5-7k pops.  Big heal needed?  15K+ X 2!  Chance of there being damage to myself?  Put beacon on me and spam the tank!  Never ever die first.  Ever.  Normally comes down to me and the tank being last on a wipe.

When I heal with my pally I'm much more comfortable that I'll be succesful.  With the priest, I'll do well, but there is always that chance that I won't get the right combo of all those necessary spells right, which is really where the "fun" part is for me.  You have to actively do a lot more to be as successful as a pally.  Actually, if you do everything right, you are still going to be sucking wind compared to the pally.  On top of everything, my pally never runs out of mana.

[Fordel]

Holy Paladins are unquestionably the most powerful tank healers in game.

They are also unquestionably the most boring spec in the entire game. Hope you like HolyLight spam! 



You can also do some serious shenanigans with the Glyph of Holy Light.

[Lakov_Sanite]

Well the problem lies in bosses with special abilities that can and will one/two-shot tanks with 50k hp. Without question the healing ability of paladins and druids in pve top priests but priests both discipline and holy have gimmicks that are if not necessary, very much desired in many hardmode fights.  My personal preference though would be to not make such gimmicky cooldowns be what the class specializes in.

Things like raid shielding though can be very important for fights where damage will hit too many people too fast. Hardmode northrend beasts for instance when fighting icemaw. He has a tendancy to do his arctic breath right before a stomp which can insta-gib most people and there simply isn't enough time to flash of light everyone in the raid. druid hots would help here but making sure as many people in the raid are shielded as possible is actually the best solution. 

Again, priests are the best pure healers but they have enough gimmicks that they are nowhere near useless.

[Sjofn]

Druid = Raid healing
Paladin = Tank healing

Man, don't fuckin' tell someone to make a paladin healer. Ugh. Life is too short to play a paladin healer.

Disc priests are almost as good for tank healing and roughly a billion times more interesting.

Them's fighting words!

  

I quit healing on my paladin as hard as I could this expansion. So awful and boring, ugh.

I was assuming tippytop raiding game wasn't necessarily a going concern (I can't keep track of which people on this board are poopsockers and which one just sort of do ten mans). I guess if you're definitely going to be doing hardmodes and shit, you could slog along as a paladin, but I would still personally rather play a disc priest. Let someone else fall asleep on their holy light/flash of light buttons.

[Soulflame]

I'm the GM of a 25 man raiding guild that clears current content, clears most 10 man hard modes (SRS BZNZ AMIRITE) and makes honest efforts at 25 man hard modes.

 

Don't ask.  I'm still sort of stunned about it myself.

And yes, I'm generally the go-to guy for keeping two or more tanks alive.

[Xeyi]

Disc priests were competent tank healers up to a certain point, but a lack of scaling with gear has made healing anything that hits hard rather difficult (Hi to you Gormok hard mode).  Once penance and shield are on cooldown you're left fishing for flash heal crits, and if they don't crit then you're usually in trouble unless another healer helps you out.

I had no problem tank healing back in naxx and ulduar, but now in toc the gulf between a holy paladin and a disc priest is just enormous, not to mention most fights in there are simplified a great deal by beacon (especially in 10 man).  Disc still has a place but it's more of a niche shield spamming role, with the odd penance/prom thrown in to help out.  Really it's more support than healing in a sense.  Disc is loads of fun but I've been holy for the last few months and feel I'm contributing far more.


On a different note my guild put together an Onyxia alt run the other day, so I dusted off my resto druid in her shiny naxx 10 gear and set forth hoping my crappy gear would pull me through...

My first nourish crit for 12k    I know druids lacked a flash heal type heal but it seems pretty crazy to me that a druid with circa 2k spellpower can pull that off.   Of course I don't want nourish to be nerfed, I just want my flash heals to crit for 12k too   

[Fordel]

Nourish is purposefully overpowered when used in it's ideal situation. Partly because of it's setup and relation to the other druid healing spells, partly because Blizzard has spent the entire expansion trying to get Druids to actually *CAST* a heal.

Stack up all your HoTs, Glyph it and toss in the 4 piece bonus for good measure, and you can chain those 12k crits every second if you have Nature's Grace, for at least 4-6 seconds before you have to refresh a HoT on your Nourish target.

Each Crit is also tossing up a Living Seed proc, another 2-4k bonus heal once the target takes damage again.



The issue being is the ideal situation only lasts for that 4-6 seconds before you have to start refreshing HoTs, those GCD's really add up.

[bhodi]

And people wonder why priests and shamans cry so much.

[Fordel]

Healing Priests will continue to cry as long as other classes can still cast heal spells. Doesn't matter where they actually stand, they fight against non-priest healers out of PRINCIPLE.



Shamans on the other hand, went from being the go-to AE Raid healer, with a minimum of 5 per raid for all their various buffs, to generic every-healer that doesn't really have a clear cut job anymore. I'll give them a pass   

[caladein]

Planning on getting back on the horse after a few months break.  I'll be raiding with a few friends on my Disc (probably) Priest or Holy Paladin.  Has much changed in terms of relative utility between the two specs with 3.3?

(I ask because I'd need to transfer the Priest, but it has better gear, cool guy 310% mount, and I kind of hate Holy Paladins.)

[Sheepherder]

Disc priests are nearly essential for one of the Icecrown bosses.  Blizzard is still trying to find ways to get paladins to wear their Mp5 plate.

[Jayce]

Any suggestions?  I just started a new toon. 

Endgame, math, epeen, hard mode, 25 man, Icecrown, omg shamans, gg Blizz