Desperate Prayer where art thou?

[Dyntheos]

Thottbot lists a priest spell "Desperate Prayer" as rank 2 at level 18, but I have not seen it on offer in Darnassus where I go to train every two levels.

Is there somewhere else I should be looking for this spell, and are there any other Priest spells that aren't on the common list that I would have to travel to distant lands to possess?

On a side note and not really wanting to make another thread. The Shadow Word: Pain talent that inceases the duration of the spell, does this keep the current damage per tick, and extend it a few more seconds effectively causing more damage over a longer time, or does it keep the damage of the spell as listed and spread it out, over further time, doing less damage per tick?

I know it sounds a little silly that it would be the second option of keping the same damage but spreading it out over a longer time, but it doesn't specifically state how it works so i thought I'd throw the question in.

[Bolty]

Desperate Prayer is a race-specific spell - only Humans and Dwarves get it.

http://www.worldofwarcraft.com/info/classes/priest.html

-Bolty

[MongoJerry]

On a side note and not really wanting to make another thread. The Shadow Word: Pain talent that inceases the duration of the spell, does this keep the current damage per tick, and extend it a few more seconds effectively causing more damage over a longer time...

Yes, it works like this, making it a useful talent to have. It effectively improves the mana cost of the spell by making it so that you don't have to cast it as often as you would otherwise want it to. That is, it improves the mana cost, if the mob lives for the full duration of the spell. If a mob lives less than 15 seconds, then you're not getting any benefit from it. Or for that matter, if it lives like 30 seconds, where you'll end up casting Pain twice anyway, again you won't get any benefit.

My favorite use for Improved SW:Pain is in PvP situations where those extra two ticks of damage can often be the difference between winning or losing -- or the difference between only me dying and both of us dying simultaneously. There are few things as satisfying as seeing some guy who ganked you croak a few seconds later due to a last second SW:Pain you refreshed on them right before you died.

[Lissa]

Yes, it works like this, making it a useful talent to have.  It effectively improves the mana cost of the spell by making it so that you don't have to cast it as often as you would otherwise want it to.  That is, it improves the mana cost, if the mob lives for the full duration of the spell.  If a mob lives less than 15 seconds, then you're not getting any benefit from it.  Or for that matter, if it lives like 30 seconds, where you'll end up casting Pain twice anyway, again you won't get any benefit.
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It's very efficient as you said, it's actually one of the few talents that taken to it's maximum gives you outright a 25% efficiency boost on the spell, it's like casting 4 unimproved SW:Ps for the price of 3. For 2 talent points, this is one of the true gems that Priests get.

[MongoJerry]

It's very efficient as you said, it's actually one of the few talents that taken to it's maximum gives you outright a 25% efficiency boost on the spell,

Well, not really, as I said above. If the mob lives less than 18 seconds, then you had no increased mana efficiency at all. Similarly, if the mob lives, say 30 seconds, you'll still have to cast SW:Pain on it twice whether you have Improved Pain or not, so again there's no improved efficiency. There's some increased mana efficiency here, but in real life it's much less than 25%. My two favorite uses for Improved SW:Pain is on mobs that are running away and on PvP situations where you want to damage someone running away or want to damage someone about to kill you as a last desperate act.

[Lissa]

Well, not really, as I said above.  If the mob lives less than 18 seconds, then you had no increased mana efficiency at all.  Similarly, if the mob lives, say 30 seconds, you'll still have to cast SW:Pain on it twice whether you have Improved Pain or not, so again there's no improved efficiency.  There's some increased mana efficiency here, but in real life it's much less than 25%.  My two favorite uses for Improved SW:Pain is on mobs that are running away and on PvP situations where you want to damage someone running away or want to damage someone about to kill you as a last desperate act.
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Actually, if a mob looks that close to death after the first SW:P wears off (where only 2 ticks of SW:P would kill it), I usually do not bother with a second. I would rather take a couple more seconds and just finish it off with Melee in that instance than cast another spell to complete the kill faster. Besides, if I skip casting a follow up spell to kill it, that means I'm regenning mana already before the mob dies and if I have Spirit Tap, as soon as it dies my mana regen rate will double.

In truth though, most of the time I see mobs last about 20 to 25 seconds or last 40 to 50 seconds. In those cases, Improved SW:P is very nice over the normal SW:P.

[Artega]

But that would never happen against someone with First Aid or a healing spell :P

[MongoJerry]

But that would never happen against someone with First Aid or a healing spell :P

Bandaging gets stopped when the person administering first aid or receiving first aid gets damaged. So, no, bandaging would only give a small blip of health. Characters with healing spells could live, but if we're talking about a close battle, there's a good chance that that person is out of mana, so a last ditch SW:Pain can work even on them, although less often than on characters who don't have a healing spell.