Siege of Orgrimmar Fight-Specific Tips (Part 3/4)

So, remember what I said last time about the second wing not being strategically complex? Say good bye to that, because here in wing 3, the fights are entirely about their unique mechanics. This section will test your raid's ability to preform under seriously unusual conditions.

[Updated: Added Heroic section and a note about Spectral Guise to Thok.]

• Malkorok
• Spoils of Pandaria
• Thok the Bloodthirsty

All-In-One Priest Level 90 Talent Macro

Vaguely symbolic of a macro.

Is anyone else tired of swapping the button on your bars every time you switch your level 90 talent out? Just kidding, of course you are. Courtesy of some priest on some forum somewhere, (sorry, I really don't know who I originally got it from,) I have a macro for you all that will make button swapping a thing of the past.

Siege of Orgrimmar Fight-Specific Tips (Part 2/4)

Welcome to the second wing. Here's where Blizzard starts to turn up the heat. These fights aren't strategically complex, (except maybe H Shamans,) but they do demand a decent level of raid awareness and output.

• Galakras
• Iron Juggernaut
• Kor'kron Dark Shamans
• General Nazgrim

Siege of Orgrimmar Fight-Specific Tips (Part 1/4)

Hey, everybody. Since my fight-specific tips series was so popular in Throne of Thunder, I thought I'd do it again for Siege. I'll be breaking these down along the Flex/LFR groupings, but all my tips are primarily for normal-mode, with some heroic notes on the fights I have done.

• Immerseus
• Fallen Protectors
• Norushen
• Sha of Pride

[5.4] Discipline Healing Basics

Penance: It's what's for breakfast.

Remember last week when I promised a Discipline basics post? Well, here we are.

Contents

1. Gearing
2. Enchants
3. Gems
4. Glyphs
5. Talents
6. Rotation
7. Buffs

[5.4] Discipline Healing Changes

Hey, everyone, long time no see. I fell into a bit of a rut, and, well, as you can see, I haven't been writing. But anyway, I'm back for 5.4, and it's one hell of a patch.

In case you've been healing all along, here's a quick rundown of what's changed. On the other hand, if you're new to Disc, I should have a new Discipline Basics guide up next week.

Throne of Thunder Fight-Specific Tips (Part 3 of 4)

Eye sea how you died there?

Welcome to the "experimental stuff" wing, where most fights are no longer about everyone independently doing their own thing correctly, and increasingly about coordinating as a group to handle mechanics that no single person can deal with alone. Don't worry, that's actually a good thing; get the mechanics right and it's hard to miss the output checks.

Throne of Thunder Fight-Specific Tips (Part 2 of 4)

Hit 5 koopas with one
shell to get a 1-up!

Whoops! This was meant to be up last week, but it looks like I failed to hit the Publish button. I guess it's convenient though; I should probably give my guild time to clear Iron Qon-Lei Shen before I go advising about them. I'm just gonna push back parts 2 though 4 by a week.

Throne of Thunder Fight-Specific Tips (Part 1 of 4)

This fight is fun for Atonement.

So, a short warning before we begin. I have not been Shadow since two weeks before 5.2. So while I claim to know some things about DPS, I may be missing the shadowy elephant in the room on some or all fights. My Atonement DPS advice should be pretty sound though.

Atonement DPS Guide - Basics

Penance: It's what's for breakfast.

Due to a series of buffs, nerfs to mainstream Disc healing, and the t14 4-piece bonus, Atonement healing is now a competitive raiding spec. It's not really DPS, and it's not really healing. It's the first true hybrid spec. This guide outlines an approach to Atonement focusing on dealing maximum possible DPS.

Contents

1. Gearing
2. Enchants
3. Gems
4. Glyphs
5. Talents
6. Rotation
7. Buffs

Lolsmite First Impressions

As I mentioned last week, something caused almost all of the healers in my guild to quit all at the same time. Because of this, I'm now Atonement spec. Soon™ I'll have a basic DPS guide for Discipline priests up. For now though, I'm still learning the basics myself.

The first thing I noticed about Lolsmite (which is what I'm going to call Disco Atonement builds) is that the DPS rotation is really simple by comparison to Shadow. I can literally do full DPS with only two buttons. One's a /castsequence macro with a timed reset to cast Solace if it's up, and Smite otherwise. The other's just a normal Penance bind. Because it requires so very little attention, I'm free to do things like not die in fight mechanics and watch HP bars in case I need to cast a real heal.

Mind Flay Mechanics

I'm not really sure what a naga is doing in the
middle of a forest, but hey, it's Mind Flay.

So, I bet you were all worried about me when I disappeared a week after returning from my winter hiatus. What? No one? Really? I see, you all had faith I'd be back with more advice and theory. Well, there was a bit of a crisis in my guild, but today I do have some theory for you all. It's time to talk about something every Shadow priest should be familiar with: Mind Flay. I've seen quite a bit of ill-informed rambling about it on various priest forums and around the blogosphere in the last few weeks, so it's time to set a few things straight.

As we all know, Mind Flay is the basic filler spell for Shadow. It's learned at level 10 when you pick Shadow spec, and doesn't really change unless you pick Solace and Insanity much later. Mind Flay is a 3-sec channeled DoT dealing a smallish amount of damage every second. For the first half of its duration, you're locked into the spell by the global cooldown, and so you can't cast anything else. After that, unlike most spells, you can cast something else and it'll interrupt Mind Flay. We call this "clipping".

Insanity

See you all in Trollduar.

Hey, everybody, guess who's back. (Hint: it's me.) Unless you've been under a rock, you all know 5.2 is out. As patches go, this one's pretty glorious for Shadow priests. We've all been a little bit on the wimpy side through last tier, and the couple buffs we've gotten are quite welcome.

Shadow Buffs

• Insanity redesigned. Details below.
• Shadowform damage bonus increased to 25%, up from 20%.
• (Not yet live) Shadow Word: Pain damage increased 25%.
• Power Infusion now grants 5% damage while active, in addition to its previous effects.
• Shadowy Apparition pathing is noticeably improved, and the limit is increased to 10 at a time, up from 3. They still fail a lot, but it's a lot less.
• AoE target cap increased to 20. While this effects all classes, it will bring Shadow closer to specs that can apply DoTs in an AoE in very-many-target situations, and greatly increase the healing of Halo in 25man raids.

Shadow Nerfs

• From Darkness, Comes Light nerfed (to the ground, baby!) Proc rate much lower than tooltip listed rate. The Surge of Light portion can no-longer proc for Shadow.
• Healing from Flash Heal, Binding Heal, Renew and Prayer of Mending reduced to 80% of previous.
• Dispersion is a shadow spell, and can be locked by school interrupts. (This has already killed me a couple times in 5mans.)
• Glyph of Mind Spike is now worthless. (Further reducing the value of From Darkness, Comes Light.)

Mind Flay: apply directly to the forehead.

The New Insanity

As promised, let's talk about the new Insanity. The Solace and Insanity talent no-longer grants Shadow priests a spell. Instead, if you start a Mind Flay cast on a foe with your Devouring Plague on it, the cast morphs into Mind Flay (Insanity), dealing +33% damage per Shadow Orb spent. It's an entirely different spell, but I couldn't find it on Wowhead to link it. This bonus damage persists for the duration of the channel, potentially lasting beyond the end of the Devouring Plague DoT itself.

It hits hard. 99% damage may not sound like a lot on such a weak spell, but you can really feel the oomph. Running Solace and Insanity obviously increases the value of Divine Insight, but it also makes sense to use any of the other tier-6 talents with it when they're applicable.

Using Insanity

It is a damage gain (albeit a small one) to prematurely-refresh DoTs shortly before casting Devouring Plague if they would expire during the Insanity period.

Given the option, it is obviously worthwhile to begin an extra Mind Flay (Insanity) immediately before Devouring Plague would expire, allowing you to channel about 2 seconds beyond the end of the effect.

I've read that Mind Blast is higher priority than Mind Flay (Insanity), but by my math, the damage you lose by delaying Mind Blasts (and also the resultant Insanity phases) is approximately equal to the damage you gain from greater Insanity utilization right now. Even so, I believe you should use Mind Blast if it comes off cooldown; the Devouring Plague damage makes that a small damage gain.

Do not cast DoTs during Insanity, and use tier-7 talents only if you would lose the opportunity to do so if you delayed them (for example, AoE targets no-longer clumped for Halo if you wait.)

Discipline priest buffs.

(Source)

So, Discipline just got some more buffs via hotfix earlier this week. I was surprised; I was already dominating the healing in early Heart of Fear. While this may have been (mostly) due to ideal fight mechanics, I still shudder to think what the healing meters will look like this weekend. Just from shifting Divine Aegis from 30% to 50% (base; pre-mastery) I should gain about 17% healing output, and a bit of mana, as I can stop casting on the raid after Force and Verve sooner. The Rapture change from 150% to 200% should ensure that my mana won't run low before the boss dies anymore.

All-in-all, I'm feeling vindicated about my feelings earlier this expansion regarding Discipline balance. Now if only Mistweaver monks had nerfs in the pipe instead of more buffs.

Shadow Priest Level 90 Talents

So, unless you've been living under a rock, I'm sure everyone knows that priests got a new set of talents when we hit level 90. This talent tier has a host of problems and intricacies that any good priest needs to be aware of. Today, I'm going to analyze the level 90 talents from a Shadow perspective.

[MoP] Shadow DPS Guide - Basics

So, I'm sure you were all expecting this post a month ago when 5.0 hit. Well, better late than never. Here's a Shadow basics post, updated for patch 5.0.

• Freshly updated for level 90!

Shadow Priest Glyphs [Mists]

Prime glyphs are gone.

With Mists less than two months away (and no recent Shadow changes), I think it's high time to start theorycrafting for Shadow in 5.0. One of the big things that'll strike right when 5.0 drops is the new glyph set. We'll probably need to buy mostly all-new glyphs, as a lot of the old item IDs no longer refer to valid glyphs. Unlike before, it's hard or impossible to say what will be the best ahead of time. Very few glyphs, if any, offer any sort of damage increase, and the ones that do are extremely situational and minor. Probably, the "correct" glyphs will vary on a per-fight basis, and we'll need to swap glyphs between every encounter. To that end, you may want to buy and learn more than just what you plan to use immediately.

Pre-Expansion Lull - Levelling as Holy

Like many players, I've been playing less in the last couple weeks than I usually do. The guild is done progressing (for real this time; we went back and hit H Rag and Sinestra, the two we still didn't have,) even though we're still farming Dragon Soul, it doesn't even fill a single raid night, and interest in alt runs is down. Lots of people in my guild have been leveling alts, doing PvP, and preparing for Mists.

I expect that I'll likely level primarily as a healer in Mists; last time around, dungeons were much faster XP than questing, at least until 83 or so, when it became more even. On that note, I rolled a second priest, so I could learn Holy properly. Long-time readers - or people who just went digging in the archives - may already know that I used to play Holy back in the first half of Wrath of the Lich King. Well, I was never very good at it to begin with, and it has changed a lot with the addition of Chakra and Holy Words.

One thing I'm noticing about the Holy talents, is that they're not really made with leveling in mind. If they were, they would either be useful for solo questing (damage) or 5man dungeons (tank heals/mana). As is, some of the "strongest" talents are -0.5 seconds to Renew GCD, (yes, because I really need to blanket a raid with Renew,) Desperate Prayer (right, I need a personal cooldown when nothing hits me ever), +30% Spirit Regen in combat, (there's barely any spirit gear to be had,) and Lightwell, (no one uses it.)

On the other hand, I'm really digging having an interrupt. Holy Word: Chastise may have a long cooldown, a mana cost, and not actually be an interrupt, but in a world where most specs don't have anything that can interrupt at all, and lots of foes burn their spell cooldowns at the start of the cast time instead of the end, it's actually quite useful. It's miles ahead of having precisely nothing to work with as Shadow. I'm almost dreading hitting level 51 and getting Revelations, because it will mean I lose access to Chastise.

Lightwell is busy living up to its reputation. It heals a potential 17k total for a paltry amount of mana, exceedingly rapidly: about 300 HPS per target. To compare, on an intense multi-pack fight, I can heal about 40k with a full mana bar and a mana potion, at about 400 HPS. So on the one hand, it's unbridled awesome. That would be like a Disc priest having a shield that absorbs 1.5M at level 85. On the other hand, no one ever uses it. I typically only use it when I'm worried I might not be able to heal the fight otherwise, and people would deny me 30% of my healing longevity? Rage. I could use that Glyph of Lightspring from the Mists beta right about now. Also, asking people to use it is completely fruitless. Oddly, I can explain fight mechanics and expect people to obey ("If you stand close to him, he can't charge you.") but clicking on a glow-y bowl is too hard for everyone ("OOM! Use the Lightwell or die.")

It's kinda strange, Renew actually being useful. I'm used to it being horribly wimpy, and a huge waste of mana. As Holy, it's par with GHeal for mana efficiency and HpET. Both are only slightly behind Heal in terms of mana efficiency, but have dramatically higher HpET. Once I get Chakra (and 12.5% haste) it will jump up even more. You'd think that a previously worthless spell becoming a staple would take some getting used to, but I've actually already made the switch, and it wasn't very hard.

All-in-all, it's not very different from Disc (yet.) Instead of micromanaging Rapture all the time, you micromanage Renew on the tank all the time. Once I get Chakra and Revelations, it should morph into something a bit less familiar.

Shadow Priest Healing: When and How

Beta update: Blizzard put up a new talent calculator as of June 14. Link. That's my tentative build. It doesn't look like they're done balancing it yet, so I chose the mechanics I think would be fun (mathematically, a lot of what I marked was very weak.)

---

It's a well-known fact that Shadow is a fairly unusual spec, in that one of our utilities is healing. Most DPS specs bring utilities such as shared raid buffs, CC, burst DPS, or interrupts. Our most widely-used heal is Divine Hymn, a raid-wide healing cooldown. This is a utility we share with only one DPS spec: Balance druids (feral has it too, but it's like peeing into the ocean). We also have Power Word: Shield, which does not strip us from Shadowform, and a full healing toolkit which does. The healing kit and our mana regeneration is strong enough to permit Shadow to heal 5mans, although you would always be better served by a similarly-skilled healing spec.

Shadow Word: Insanity Mechanics

Archangel is no longer a talent option (probably because it was garbage for Holy). It has been replaced with Power Word: Solace, which deals a pitiful amount of Holy damage (or Shadow damage in Shadow spec) and restores 2% max mana. If you shift into Shadowform, however, it morphs into Shadow Word: Insanity. Its tooltip lies; see below.

Straight from Ghostcrawler (Source) :

"The damage scales based on the percentage of ticks that have already gone off from the spell (specifically, for each DoT, the damage is increased by (# ticks elapsed / (total ticks – 1)) * 100%, so for a base SW:P which would tick 6 times, SW:I gains 20% damage per tick elapsed), the tooltip should reflect this in a future build. The intention is that you can use Shadow Word: Insanity in solo combat when a mob is getting low to help push them into Shadow Word: Death range, or before your DoTs fall off on a raid boss to eek some more damage out of them. The damage increase based on duration is there to avoid a situation where the right way to play is to apply your DoTs and then blow them up, which we don’t consider fun gameplay."

It's obviously IMBA for PvP, but its PvE uses are less obvious. For narrow bust windows, if any, it may be useful. Depending on its base damage and SP-coefficient, it may also be rotational if/when your DoTs all run low at the same time. If our mana income is too low, then the talent also gives us the option to leave Shadowform to spam Mind Siphon. Frankly, I would be surprised if the talent comes anywhere close to viable when compared to the other options on that tier, but I haven't run the math yet.