We need a rune, or runes, for critting SW:P and Mindflay, improved spell power scaling on SW:P/MF/MB, and reduced spell costs and improved mana regen. Plus Vampiric Touch for self and party mana regen.
Spriests just don’t scale in vanilla, almost not at all from crit, and less than half as much from spellpower than a fire mage does.
As someone who mained SP through classic. Shadowform won’t help that much. There needs to be more tuning. Even spamming mana pots helped with mana problems in the raids. It’s a damage issue at the core.
RIP my favorite class spec
Priests are healers. That’s how I feel.
Then play Mage or Warlock. A Priest should always fill some support capacity.
I am content being like Feral Druids too, top damage and bringing Spell Windfury. But I don’t want to lose the spirit of supporting the party and raid from a group-centric class.
Until shadow gets insanity as a resource it’s more or less dog. The amount of adjustment shadow would need to be able to do comparable dps would require buffs to almost all abilities across the board and mana costs nearly eradicated.
Many ways to do it. Will they do it before P2? Probably not.
This is one of the most boomer takes I’ve seen all week.
Just ignore 1/3 of what the class offers. The classic community is truly wild.
Even landing a kb or two mid fight, I still had worse mana than all other party members as shadow. Im talking full thirst mode for kbs and I was mad oom. Spirit is my highest stat
Correct. Retail already exists once. Repeat that mistake, or don’t.
It’s only headspace that Shadow != Healing. How can they do both? Think… think…
“Shadows watch over you.”
This wouldn’t surprise me. Its 15 second of 50% mana regen from spirit so you won’t be getting a ton back, and MB costs a ton for what it does.
This is why they need the constant mana return of VT. Not only for the mana but also for the fact VT has always been one of if not their strongest DoT during the specs lifetime.
Seriously 5 simple steps that would instantly put Shadow in not the best place but a better place, this is for phase 1.
For those unaware of Masochism in Cataclysm - When you take a damaging attack equal to or greater than 10% of your total health or damage yourself with your Shadow Word: Death, you instantly gain 10% of your total mana. Help instantly in PvP and PvE.
But that’s Shadow Priest fixed, Void Plague is used for Tagging mobs solo, or multiple DoT for AoE. Twisted Faith is more your Single Target funnel with Mind Flay being a free filler, SW:Death passively gives mana when hit heavily and when we cast it every 12 seconds.
Seriously mana issues is addressed but not entirely fixed, simply it just adds a little extra mana in the tank every so often to keep going, We still will be Wanding or Mind Flaying a majority of the time simply for MP5.
Another suggestion I’d like to throw out is a unique interaction Shadow Weaving could have with Penance, when Talented into Shadow Weaving, Penance becomes Dark Penance, essentially it’s the same spell just a Shadow Version and Visual. The important thing is when used offensively each of the 3 hits has a chance to apply Shadow Weaving, this will help us get and maintain our unique debuff especially in Phase 1 also would work with Shadow Focus basically future proofing the Rune in phase 2 when Shadow Form is unlocked which doesn’t allow us to cast Holy Spells.
In phase 2 if things are considered too good re adjust, but I highly doubt any of the suggestions is going to make Shadow a must have more so just put Shadow in a spot where we are not a liability to to group.
Alternative Mana Fixes,
Honestly anything is better than what we currently have.
I hate Homunculus AI. And I love that I hate it. There’s something charming about those little whipper snappers going off and trying to kill that level 28 elite minding its own business by themselves. “Boys will be boys…” I tell my party on our run back.
Also, thorns damage kills them just as fast and for the cooldown, it sucks to see them murder themselves on Anacondra’s Thorns when they just came up.
Making it so their aggro table is only for creatures in combat with them is a good start. Making it so their aggro table is only targets with Shadow Word Pain is probably better (4s decay). Watching them sprint toward a healer who just managed to top their aggro table is a little funny though. Hint for all you PvPers–follow the Homunculi!
Maybe i’m wrong about this, but i have played a lot of shadow priest in classic and imo they need a bit of a class rework. Shadow damage scales horribly on priest, mind flay and shadow form feel clunky to use, Mind flay range being only 24yd means on most boss fights you literally can do nothing but keep your shadow weaving stacks up. Dont know how much runes can save those kinds of issues but im sure they can fix the mana issues at least. I hope im wrong because i LOVE shadow priest and the priest class as a whole.
Shadow Priests need serious help right now. Absolute bottom of the barrel dps, even below tanks.