I want to start with Spirit Walk.
I just can't imagine playing a WD without it. It just has so many offensive and defensive uses. The defensive ones are obvious - it breaks snares and lets you run the hell away from trouble like a frightened child - but I also love it for offense to jump into the middle of a giant pack and pop off a 5-stack Soul Harvest. In fact, Spirit Walking into giant pack when really low on health can save your ass if you use it to pop Soul Harvest with the Siphon Rune for heath recovery. It's both offense, and defense, and sometimes both at once. Such incredible utility. More than a few times I've found myself overwhelmed and in a bad state of low health, low mana, and surrounded by angry mobs and totally turned the tables by Spirit Walking (with Honoured Guest) into a pack of mobs and using Soul Harvest (with Siphon) to put myself back into battle shape and throw around a few angry Zombie Bears.
This leads me to Spirit Vessel, because I can't talk about Spirit Walk without also talking about Spirit Vessel.
I talked above about the Spirit Walk/Soul Harvest synergy, and how I use/abuse them for both offense and defense. It's interesting to note that both Spirit Walk and Soul Harvest have a 15s cooldown. I'm sure that's no accident, judging by the way that I've learned to use both in sequence. Spirit Vessel lowers that cooldown by an additional 2 seconds, and in my mind that would be enough to use this Passive.
But wait there's more! Spirit Vessel also gives you a "get out of death free!" card. Spirit Walking into giant angry packs of mobs like I do can sometimes be risky, so Spirit Vessel is here to save your bacon. If you mess up and take deadly damage, you instantly go into Spirit Walk form and can run away like a frightened child to safety again and pretend it never happened. It gives you a 90s debuff during which Spirit Vessel can no longer save you from death, but that 90 seconds is enough time for you to stop and think about how dumb you were for almost-dying in the first place.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=pla...tY0#t=106s
Edit: I couldn't get the video-linker to display the above properly, so just click on it and pretend I did.
Quote:Cost: 49 Mana
Cooldown: 15 seconds
Leave your physical body and enter the spirit realm for 2 seconds. While in the spirit realm, your movement is unhindered.Your link to the spirit realm will end if your physical body sustains 50% of your maximum Life in damage.
I just can't imagine playing a WD without it. It just has so many offensive and defensive uses. The defensive ones are obvious - it breaks snares and lets you run the hell away from trouble like a frightened child - but I also love it for offense to jump into the middle of a giant pack and pop off a 5-stack Soul Harvest. In fact, Spirit Walking into giant pack when really low on health can save your ass if you use it to pop Soul Harvest with the Siphon Rune for heath recovery. It's both offense, and defense, and sometimes both at once. Such incredible utility. More than a few times I've found myself overwhelmed and in a bad state of low health, low mana, and surrounded by angry mobs and totally turned the tables by Spirit Walking (with Honoured Guest) into a pack of mobs and using Soul Harvest (with Siphon) to put myself back into battle shape and throw around a few angry Zombie Bears.
This leads me to Spirit Vessel, because I can't talk about Spirit Walk without also talking about Spirit Vessel.
Quote:Reduces the cooldown of your Horrify, Spirit Walk, and Soul Harvest spells by 2 seconds. In addition, the next time you receive fatal damage, you automatically enter the spirit realm for 3 seconds and heal to 10% of your maximum Life. This effect cannot occur more than once every 90 seconds.
I talked above about the Spirit Walk/Soul Harvest synergy, and how I use/abuse them for both offense and defense. It's interesting to note that both Spirit Walk and Soul Harvest have a 15s cooldown. I'm sure that's no accident, judging by the way that I've learned to use both in sequence. Spirit Vessel lowers that cooldown by an additional 2 seconds, and in my mind that would be enough to use this Passive.
But wait there's more! Spirit Vessel also gives you a "get out of death free!" card. Spirit Walking into giant angry packs of mobs like I do can sometimes be risky, so Spirit Vessel is here to save your bacon. If you mess up and take deadly damage, you instantly go into Spirit Walk form and can run away like a frightened child to safety again and pretend it never happened. It gives you a 90s debuff during which Spirit Vessel can no longer save you from death, but that 90 seconds is enough time for you to stop and think about how dumb you were for almost-dying in the first place.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=pla...tY0#t=106s
Edit: I couldn't get the video-linker to display the above properly, so just click on it and pretend I did.