I am looking forward to Season of Discovery. Nice job Blizz! Runes across all classes look great and brought life to many dormant specializations.
Checking on my favorite spec, Disc Smite Priest, PvP and PvE. You may have plans for this past level 25 already.
Any plans for some Smite love to make it more PvE DPS viable? We could use spell hit as Shadow Focus is for shadow spells only. Additionally, even if Shadow Focus gave spell hit to all spells, our talent build involves a ~32/19/0 build and we will not be taking any points in Shadow. We could also use more mana sustain for longer fights.
A PvE Smite build in Classic was really only viable with very high end BWL/AQ/Naxx spell hit gear.
Can you look into adding some Runes for Smite please? Again, you may already be doing so. If so, thank you.
Thank you for the consideration. Nice job on Season of Discovery!
Cheers,
-Long time Blizzard enjoyer
5 Likes
Its a good spec on Era, just not a PVE spec. Its strong in PVP similar to Shaman in that youâre an offensive healer. If youâre playing it in Era you lean on burns, bubbles, bombs and helping land kills.
100% Smite Priest needs some love, Penance is a âgood startâ but yall do need that time to go boom boom. Itâs a fun spec for those that just love throwing around Holy Fire.
1 Like
While I pray more comes, but from the Q&A she mentions youâll lean into Shadow runes to help out on dps rather then double downing on HolyâŚ
But I dream of a viable Holy Caster dps spec in any form of wow.
Watch from 58 min in⌠someone asked. âMix and matchâ⌠being a hybrid with holy and shadow runes basically and vice versa a shadow priest with penance.
4 Likes
Iâd rather play fast cast shockadin spec myself. But the best version of it ever only existed in late WoTLK.
Would love to see more runes focused on Holy DPS. If I were playing alliance I would totally try to make it work. SotC is just too important for the spec.
Thank you! I missed this Q&A.
The last (6) talents in the Discipline tree, can be considered DPS talents.
Smite is the only direct damage spell in Discipline or Holy that has no cooldown. Hence if you are a Disc or Holy Healer, you need to use Smite to do damage in any solo content.
Would be cool if they reinvisioned smite priest with monk inspiration, or scarlet crusade monks rather. A rune to allow the priest to melee with their fists with higher attack speed but all the auto hits are holy damage, give them a few melee striking abilities, maybe a new holy damage spell and the physical strikes allows them to weave in instant cast smites and holy fires or buffed up holy novas. If not instant cast .5 sec casts. Discipline tree makes sense for this as well. Add some unique utility, like hymns, or some other regen, defensive, or offensive buff and have it synergize well with prot and ret paladins. Might need to have power word shield, weakened soul for them have shorter CD and mobility for surviving melee range. Maybe this melee priest PI can work for their whole group or 1 other member and themselves
This might be viable for real, 20years too late
I would love to see this, because it would add some versatility in the PVP scene for an offensive healer, which is how I enjoyed playing discipline in cataclysm and mop
1 Like
I made a hypothetical build 0/25/26âŚwith the Surge of Light Rune causing instant smites off critical spells⌠you also run âmind spikeâ rune because it gives up to 90% chance to crit mind blast(causing more surge of light props)âŚSO. I put talents down to âshadow reachâ for extra shadow damage (since youâre running both shadow and holy damage).BUT. I stop here and go into holy with the last 25 talents⌠because 10% shadow damage increase is minimal compared to 25% overall spell damage increase based off spirit from âSpiritual GuidanceââŚalso. Since the gear in sod has so many stats you generate more spell damage from the spirit bonus then the shadow damage bonusâŚmy only concern is 1 talent in mind flay in the rotation and if its necessary vs spamming mind spike for more critsâŚif you dont talent into âMindflayâ you can spend the last point 2% shadow damageâŚBiggest problem with the build is mana/spell rank way too mana intensive to be viable in pve still.
Also, obviously, its a crit build not a hit build, never was. The classic era zg gear set gave you extra range +talents you can smite from outside most other classes damage range. Thatâs why itâs so pvp viable. In sod combining instant crits with a 40% range bonus on smite/flash heal will be wild in pvp, they wonât be able to touch you. And hit/crit gear for pve isnât really an issue anymore since they supply us with so much juicy loot. + world buffs crit will come very easy.
