I started playing WoW in Legion, so I never played Vanilla. I would like to play Holy Priest, both during leveling and at end game, on a PvP server. I will be leveling with my brother who is going to play a Warrior (both Night Elves).
I’ve heard that you should level as Shadow, but since I’ll be with a Warrior and healing in dungeons, I think Holy should work out fine. What do you think? (I’m also aware you can do hybrid specs in Vanilla, unlike modern WoW).
You can do disc fine, or holy. Just make sure you get shadow tap ASAP in the shadow tree it helps a ton bud. Also remember you get Starshards at level 10, and it’s considered an Arcane spell, great for fake casting.
Any tree honestly works out fine for leveling as a priest. You can heal in shadow just fine as well, you just get more healing in disc / Holy tree (Also holy tree has more dps + for your holy spells) Disc does offer you + wand dps, which YOU WILL BE WANDING A LOT in vanilla it’s pretty good.
Thanks Pintero!
It depends how you want to play. Like leveling a bit faster or being better in groups. I would mostly just advise getting wand specialisation as Holy. Cast a big opener, cast shadow word pain, then wand things until gone. use renew and shield as required.
I did Holy for a while, it’s fun because you feel more useful when your healing skills are needed in groups 
It is fully possibly to level as Holy, even without someone else, but it’s not for the weak of heart. (I did it on this gal, and it is slower and sometimes painful.)
If you don’t ever expect to be leveling alone, you can definitely go a Holy build. In fact, the common advice of taking Spirit Tap is ONLY useful if you play solo, because it requires being the one to kill an enemy. As soon as you add a party member who does damage, your odds of getting the killing blow sink to single digits.
You can look for raiding builds and talent based on the end result you want, or you can look for the talents that make the most sense for the way you and your brother play. I’d recommend the latter, as you’ll only need to respec at 60. (When I did it, I took talents that reduced spell pushback, decrease cast times of offensive spells, and increased damage, but I was trying to solo. You’re trying to maximize usefulness and healing.)
One thing to be forewarned about - don’t throw your PW: Shield on your brother’s warrior at the start of pulling enemies. He will need to generate Rage, and that can prevent it.
You can heal every single dungeon while leveling, as a dps spec. There is no benefit at all to leveling as a healing class besides the rare occasions you get ganked and you have a dps with you. Besides that you may as well just level as shadow.
I would very much recommend shadow while leveling. You can still heal effectively enough for dungeons as shadow. When you hit max level then Respec to whatever healing spec.
Just my advice.
Open with Holy Fire, SW:P, Mind Blast, then Smite spam if mana isn’t low, and then wand when they get roughly low. I leveled up as Holy and just remember that Surge of Light is your friend, especially with the instant smites.
Also, if you want to really be mana effecient, you can spam the 3.5s Holy Fire, since its dirt cheap.
This. Just level as shadow so dungeons go even faster as you can add some DPS and shadow heals perfectly fine while leveling. When you and your warrior buddy are duo questing you will want the DPS of shadow as the warrior will not require the healing necessary in dungeons.
Disagree. A holy priest leveling with a warrior will tear stuff up! With the heals from the priest the warrior can keep killing mobs and it’s more efficient than if the priest was shadow.
In reply to the post above, if the warrior doesn’t need as much healing as a dungeon he’s not pulling enough. Once cleave and whirlwind or sweeping strikes are an option the rage generation, and therefore potential DPS, only increases the more that they pull. It’s definitely one of the highest duo leveling comps.
He said instant smites lol
Shadow is better at 40/45. Prior to that, Disc/Holy is largely better as Smite is more efficient than Mind Flay, and you want to just want most things to death. Respec to Shadow at 45 ideally for Shadowform and wand specialization.
Solo, sure. It’s not worth it though when you’ve got a warrior to kill stuff for you.
Leveling 0-60 as Holy in vanilla is extremely painful. I know, because I was naive and I did it back in the day. Having said that, you’ll probably be an amazing healer at 60.
Did not know that. I do remember how amazing it was running dungeons with Spriest healing as their DPS made the runs go much faster. This was after level 40 of course.
It’s not though. While leveling you get no benefit from leveling as a healer that you don’t as dps. Period. There is no argument to be had here.
If your questing, it’s quicker with shadow. If your doing a dungeon shadow is just as fast as holy. If you have a group quest a shadow does more damage while also keeping the warrior alive. There is no benefit to level as a healer. If you want to just because that’s cool, but you aren’t being optimal in anything.
Except finding a group might be easier as Holy, and you’re less dispensible.
Holy is about the same efficiency as shadow until level 40… someone did a big write up on it ages ago.
I did it all the way to 60 in vanilla(If you get wand specialization, and the mana regen)… and it was fine… I was a big fan of doing dungeons so it wasn’t a big deal to me.
There is even a holy dps spec you can level with…which will give you better healing talents for dungeons.
You couldn’t really stay in Shadowform when you are healing, but you could throw out some damage. Holy is still better for healing - and Smites are solid. Mind Blast is high threat.
How would finding a group be easier though? You literally just say ‘invite heals’ and you get invited, no one is going to ask if your holy and you can’t see specs in vanilla.