Priest Changes Coming!

[Professor Frink]

Why don't you exaggerate some more?  Killed before getting out of stunlock?  Rogues, which are the fastest attackers in the game, could get rid of this buff in 20 seconds in the best case scenario.  That won't happen that often, especially since executing a proper stunlock means not attacking at times.  I've never seen a stunlock last 20 seconds, so guess what, when you get out of the stuns, you'll have more life now.
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I was referring to how the buff would be likely be off when I get jumped, since it'll be too expensive to maintain all the time now.

-- frink

[Tal]

Let there be light!

Some of the other items which we're going to focus on over the next few patches relate specifically to the Paladin's ability to tank in groups, and the overall interactivity of the Paladin in raids.

I find it quite funny that they claim they are overall happy with the Paladin changes from 1.9 all the while admitting that there's more changing in 1.10 (and later). Because, you know, every other class got changes after it's review. They're admitting they screwed up, but they don't want to completely admit it.
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I'll believe it when I see it. Part of the problem is inherent in the way that paladins are set for tanking and itemization - we rely upon our mana for tanking and very few items have both Int and + to defense and stamina. So if we want to have the same survivability as a dps specc'd warrior we have to go with a very small mana pool which gimps our ability to tank. Its sad that Sharanna tanked a LOT better back when we did the crazy Scholomance runs than she does today.

They're going to have to look at items and the manner in which paladins hold aggro to make us effective. Hell it would go along way if devotion acted like defensive stance on a paladin only.

Pretty much thought it was used in both non-tank and tank groups to keep folks alive.  That's what Aleri did when I was brought in however many times to help "inspire" all the warriors.  But of course there's always the possibility that Bolty has tweaked the healing strats since then. ;)
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I know Shal likes feeling inspired around the Twins™. :)

Aleri and Cleoboltra you sick bastards. I tell you...minds in the gutter. ;)

[lemekim]

Keep in mind that holy nova doesn't trigger inspiration.
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I would also like to point out that new Holy Nova is likely to cost about double that of current Holy Nova (comparing the cost of rank 1 spell in the new talent calculator seems to indicate that double the mana cost is roughly accurate).

At 900-odd mana a pop, you might actually run out of mana trying to spam that, even with the Essence of Red on you!

And considering that in Vael fight the biggest problem with using Prayer of Healing was the constant interruption from AOE damage ticks, the new Healing Focus will make PoH quite usable in this situation even without having PW:S on. This will give PoH a better HP/sec healing and better mana efficiency then Holy Nova, so in the end using Prayer of Healing still might be the best way to go. =(

BTW, since I have never used Holy Nova, could anyone tell me if the spell heals the caster as well as his party members? I was under impression that it doesn't, so that might pose another issue to using Holy Nova during Vael - the priests must also heal themselves!

[Kevin]

BTW, since I have never used Holy Nova, could anyone tell me if the spell heals the caster as well as his party members? I was under impression that it doesn't, so that might pose another issue to using Holy Nova during Vael - the priests must also heal themselves!
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Holy Nova heals the caster as well. You heal everything in the party.

[lemekim]

Holy Nova heals the caster as well.  You heal everything in the party.
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Ah thank you. *Imagines a 35 priest 5 warrior raid on Vael*. That's the stuff!

[Arnath]

Soo, I think we can just require all of our mages/warlocks to roll priests now and we'd be fine. Both of the -threat talents got improved, which is a little ridiculous because a well geared dps-ing shadow priest is VERY capable of topping damage meters in MC and especially BWL, where threat is even more of a big deal (I know this from experience, talk to LucidityAxel from the Basin). I mean, I'm really happy for the priests, but a little bitter at the same time.

Arnath

[Wiz]

Sanctity Aura will be more popular now, I expect. Paladins can be buff/cleanse bots AND aura pimps! :D

[Tal]

Sanctity Aura will be more popular now, I expect. Paladins can be buff/cleanse bots AND aura pimps!  :D
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We're not now?

[castille]

Soo, I think we can just require all of our mages/warlocks to roll priests now and we'd be fine. Both of the -threat talents got improved, which is a little ridiculous because a well geared dps-ing shadow priest is VERY capable of topping damage meters in MC and especially BWL, where threat is even more of a big deal (I know this from experience, talk to LucidityAxel from the Basin). I mean, I'm really happy for the priests, but a little bitter at the same time.

Arnath
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Hell, I know this from experience because I talk to -me- ;)

Topping? I'm not sure about topping. I scare the rogues a little, but the amount of AoEing and the very fact that rogues aren't reliant on mana means that if I don't push that envelope to the very max -- like I did in Saturday's MC -- I drop behind. I did stay in the top 10, I think, however. I even tried things I didn't ever want to try, and only grabbed aggro (and paid for it) once. I tossed a SWP/VE/MB on the mob at first taunt. Not even a sunder. This was my fault, and I ran it back halfway to the tank before final wafflestompage occurred. But that's only because I didn't want 2 more seconds for a sunder to get in. Every other fight, I did much the same thing, but waited for the first sunder to go on, then I went nuts. I am a well geared shadow priest, though we need a bit more until I begin to 'buff' my gearing with the requisite Nef drops, and it's working out quite well. Shadow Affinity and Silent Resolve are awesome together, and now that I'll get a further drop on my healing portion, too, I'm so happy. I probably won't gain VE aggro anymore.

[MongoJerry]

Big giant nerf.

I already have 2072 armor with the 1.9 improved inner fire.  The current inner fire costs almost nothing but remembering to cast it every three minutes, which I do religiously.  An extra 700 or so armor would be handy, but only working for 20 hits... wtf?  Right now the only class that can remove my armor buff and cares how much armor i have is shammies, and being dispelled in PvE generally doesn't happen, right?  Now any class that i get an inner fire benefit against, and every physical damage mob try to solo, has the ability to remove said buff for no extra effort in the process of killing me, and the increased mana cost will prevent me from re-applying it like I do after being purged.  The increased duration is a cruel joke--with the 20-hit rule, it won't last 3 minutes, let alone 10.  Now I'll probably spend most of my time with 644 armor, and having made a lot of enemies on the horde's rogue squad, i see a lot of being jumped and killed before getting out of stunlock in my future.

What are you talking about? The increased armor is a huge upgrade and having it only last for 20 hits is a decent sacrifice for the improved armor. They said that there's an increased mana cost to Inner Fire, but they didn't say it was "omg! It's the same as PW:Fort" level of mana cost. It's true that if you're actively farming mobs, you might have to cast Inner Fire twice as often to keep it up. But in the meantime, you'll be taking less damage from those mobs. And in PvP like you mentioned? The new Inner Fire is a godsend. If you manage to live past 20 hits in a fight, the only reason you'll have done so is because of the extra armor that the new Inner Fire provided for you. I'm quite excited about this change.

[MongoJerry]

Soo, I think we can just require all of our mages/warlocks to roll priests now and we'd be fine. Both of the -threat talents got improved, which is a little ridiculous because a well geared dps-ing shadow priest is VERY capable of topping damage meters in MC and especially BWL, where threat is even more of a big deal (I know this from experience, talk to LucidityAxel from the Basin). I mean, I'm really happy for the priests, but a little bitter at the same time.

The trouble with shadow damage is that shadow spells only get 42% benefit from +damage gear and other than Mind Blast, they can't crit. In addition, a shadow priest runs into mana difficulties quickly during a long fight that mages and warlocks don't run into. A well geared tier 2 epic mage will always (or at least *should* always) out dps a similarly equiped shadow priest quite easily.

However, the new holy/disc trees look pretty yummy for damage dealing. If I wanted to be a pure priest damage dealer, I'd go with this spec:

Holy Damage Build

This gives +15% damage and +10% crit to all holy spells, reduces the cast time on Holy Smite by .5 seconds, reduces threat by 16%, and gives the priest a boatload of mana. In addition, Holy Reach combined with a three piece ZG priest set would let Holy Smite's range reach to 41 yards -- a range often needed in big ranged fights. With enough +damage and +crit% gear, it's easy to conceive of a holy priest out dps'ing a shadow priest this way -- and oh yes, be able to dispell and heal without changing forms.

Late addition: Ah, Jeez, I guess shadow priests have gotten a good boost when it comes to their mana pools. Just playing around trying to build a shadow damage priest build, I get:

Shadow Damage Build

With Inner Focus and Meditation moved so far down the Discipline tree, shadow priests are going to have a lot more mana to work with than they had before. This build also has -16% threat. Not bad.

[castille]

Late addition:  Ah, Jeez, I guess shadow priests have gotten a good boost when it comes to their mana pools.  Just playing around trying to build a shadow damage priest build, I get:

Shadow Damage Build

With Inner Focus and Meditation moved so far down the Discipline tree, shadow priests are going to have a lot more mana to work with than they had before.  This build also has -16% threat.  Not bad.
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I would take that point out of Mental Agility, put it into Silent Resolve -- My personal build is going to have full spirit tap, as well, and I will be able to squeeze out full Blackout, too. . . I'm giving up Improved mind Blast, because lag pretty much takes up that 8 second cooldown with two mind flays -- I can be a little more loose with Mind Flays, too, to make up the MB cooldown..

[MongoJerry]

I would take that point out of Mental Agility, put it into Silent Resolve -- My personal build is going to have full spirit tap, as well, and I will be able to squeeze out full Blackout, too. . . I'm giving up Improved mind Blast, because lag pretty much takes up that 8 second cooldown with two mind flays -- I can be a little more loose with Mind Flays, too, to make up the MB cooldown..

If you're getting full Spirit Tap and full Blackout, where are you taking the extra three points from? Shadow Reach?

[TheDragoon]

After playing around with the talent calculator for a bit, I was thinking about something along the lines of this build for my priest, Silverflail. I like having her be a powerful healing force with good healing endurance.

It's also tempting to try out a holy damage-dealing build like this Power Infusion build or this Spiritual Guidance build which would take advantage of lots of spirit gear to convert to +damage. The downside for those damage builds is that Silverflail doesn't really have much +damage gear (most of it is +healing), so she'd have to go looking for new things before she could really make the best use of it. Of course, the good point of the holy damage builds is that they would also be pretty decent healers which would not have to worry about shifting out of shadowform to heal.

[lemekim]

Late addition:  Ah, Jeez, I guess shadow priests have gotten a good boost when it comes to their mana pools.  Just playing around trying to build a shadow damage priest build, I get:

Shadow Damage Build

With Inner Focus and Meditation moved so far down the Discipline tree, shadow priests are going to have a lot more mana to work with than they had before.  This build also has -16% threat.  Not bad.
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Yes, but Shadow priests cannot get Mental Strength at all now, and would have more trouble getting Mental Agility (it's further down the tree). Looks more like a tradeoff then a buff =P

[Arnath]

A well geared tier 2 epic mage will always (or at least *should* always) out dps a similarly equiped shadow priest quite easily.

A well geared tier 2 epic mage can indeed outdamage a shadow priest in most situations, but raid damage is often a different story because of the power of those 2 -threat talents. A shadow priest can get -45% threat on all damage spells with a pair of tier 2 talents, both of which will be improved in this patch. That allows for a HUGE amount of room with damage dealing in raids, where threat is a really big deal. Comparitively, mages only have Arcane Subtlety which is -20% to arcane spells, and warlocks have master demonology, which is again -20% and requires 25 points in a tree that besides MD, really isn't that great.

Arnath

[castille]

If you're getting full Spirit Tap and full Blackout, where are you taking the extra three points from?  Shadow Reach?
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Actually, I think I'm going to drop either shadow focus or shadow reach out . . shadow focus can be made up for in +hit gear ..

[MongoJerry]

Actually, I think I'm going to drop either shadow focus or shadow reach out . . shadow focus can be made up for in +hit gear ..

Ah, I love shadow focus too much. It makes Mind Control so much better -- much more reliable and the mobs stay controled so much longer. Since MC is one of my favorite skills, I consider it a personal must. I can understand if someone else not getting it if they don't use MC as much as I do, though. However, I personally think Spirit Tap is a waste at level 60. How often do you get the killing blow in a party or raid? Even if you get the killing blow, the mana regeneration isn't big. Plus, f it's at the end of a fight, you can just drink. Plus, the mana regeneration is most important in long boss fights, so it would seem like Spirit Tap would only be useful in those fights where there are lots of small adds and where you're fighting rather than healing. That doesn't happen very often for me. I guess I just don't see Spirit Tap being useful for anything other than solo farming to reduce downtime between pulls.

[ima_nerd]

What are you talking about?  The increased armor is a huge upgrade and having it only last for 20 hits is a decent sacrifice for the improved armor.  They said that there's an increased mana cost to Inner Fire, but they didn't say it was "omg! It's the same as PW:Fort" level of mana cost.  It's true that if you're actively farming mobs, you might have to cast Inner Fire twice as often to keep it up.  But in the meantime, you'll be taking less damage from those mobs.  And in PvP like you mentioned?  The new Inner Fire is a godsend.  If you manage to live past 20 hits in a fight, the only reason you'll have done so is because of the extra armor that the new Inner Fire provided for you.  I'm quite excited about this change.
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The old Inner Fire (improved or not) was plenty for me in ShadowForm to stay full health. I would go days without ever leaving Shadow Form because I didn't need to. This 20 hits thing combined with any sort of mana increase is going to be a pain in the butt. It seems to me that it's a PvP buff but a leveling nerf. Recasting every 3 minutes would be about every 3-4 fights while grinding but now it's going to be every fight and even during the fight if you really want to take full advantage of the armor increase. That extra mana stacks up in the course of a grinding session.

Bar that change to Inner Fire, I love the talent changes. For me, there was never a question of Dic or Holy. I loved Disc (and still do) and laughed at Holy. While I still plan on speccing 31 into Disc for raiding, Holy makes me drool.

[Flymo]

Blizzard's post didn't mention one significant change for the worse for pure healers: you can no longer take both Mental Strength (+10% to mana) and Spiritual Healing (+10% to healing). The new healing talents of use when healing tanks don't add anywhere near as much healing as either of these - Spiritual Guidance is particularly pathetic if you work out what it actually gives you - meaning that in 1.10 the optimum healing build will heal less than it does at the moment before mana runs out. In other words, priests' healing has got worse.