So to summarise how spriest feels in pvp, the below changes should be considered to accurately reflect the spells and how little they do against targets with 7 million hp.
I also don’t think we should have to go through a launch sequence into space just to get our rotation out.
- Shadow Word: Death → Shadow Word: Just Kidding
The ability doesn’t deliver the lethal or impactful damage it should.
- Mind Blast → Mind Massage
Mind Blast feels too soft, as if it’s more of a light touch than a powerful strike.
- Vampiric Touch → Vampiric Tickle
Instead of draining life force, it feels like a minor, ineffective nuisance.
- Void Torrent → Void Interrupted
The channeling ability is often interrupted or doesn’t provide enough time to deal significant damage.
- Shadow Word: Pain → Shadow Word: Scratch
The DoT feels more like a mild irritation than a true source of pain.
- Mind Flay → Mind Caress
The ability feels more like a gentle, ineffective touch rather than a sustained damaging beam.
- Devouring Plague → Devouring Nibble
The ability barely scratches the surface, lacking the consuming damage it should provide.
- Void Eruption → Void Fizzle
What should be a powerful, explosive attack instead feels more like a weak, anticlimactic burst that doesn’t live up to its name.
14 Likes
Mind massage is great. I can’t recall the last time mind blast ever was a threat to anyone. Don’t even get me started on our joke “execute”.
5 Likes
I think shadows damage in bgs is quite good and overall has nice tools for PvP.
I’ve been topping dmg in normal bgs usually hitting 200m damage or higher with a rot voidweaver build.
Moving void torrent feels great. The 46 yard range is also quite nice for positioning and lets you do pump safely. Your spells individually may feel weak but when you stack 3 or more devouring plagues on someone with your other dots, void wraith, a void torrent, rift etc. they melt.
You also have the option to play archon for big burst windows with mind flay insanity which is quite good in arena and viable in bgs too, I just prefer more raw rot dmg with voidweaver.
2 Likes
swp+vt ticks 10k per second. in bg we say you dot 10 people 100k damage per second.
6m damage per minute 60m damage for 10 minutes. and you think its good damage.
10 k ticks for 7 m health pool is nothing
2 Likes
If you think Voidweaver provides rot damage you must be new. Are you running psychic link?
I’ve been playing on and off since vanilla but mainly PvP. I don’t follow guides so maybe it’s not meant for rot but I make my own builds and experiment with what works for me.
Yes psychic link gives me about 6%-10% extra dmg in bgs.
I found voidweaver to do more overall dmg mainly because you have more consistent dmg windows on a 30s cd with torrent rather than 1 minute with halo, the extra insanity generation from void blast, and extra rot from inner quietus 20% dmg buff to vamp touch and pain.
I like void form for more insanity and to spam DPs. Spamming DPs help you rot more with screams of the void. Multi dot, keep the insanity engine going and pump.
For stats I prioritize mastery over haste but I like to play to play oracle disc for arena where mastery feels good. Haste probably is nice too for shadow but a lot of dmg is instant cast so I don’t feel like the lack of haste is that bad. I get some extra haste from mind trauma pvp talent to make up for it.
1 Like
Having played shadow for many xpacs I can tell you that the rot damage is absolutely horrible and team fight contribution has never been worse on shadow. I’m also playing Voidweaver and even with nearly 100% uptime on screams of the void this is the lowest DoT damage I’ve ever had on a priest. I skipped both shadowlands and dragonflight so maybe this has been normal for a while now but it isn’t good damage simply because you’ve adjusted to it.
3 Likes
Yea maybe rot is the wrong word these days but rather pad. Since BFA most classes have been given a ton of self healing + dmg has been moved away from baseline abilities to cooldown windows.
You won’t really feel like you can rot a team alone with your dots, but the extra pad dmg is still meaningful in that when you are actually doing dmg in a void eruption or torrent window your dmg will stick better. Your pad dmg helps counter all the pad healing that exists + psyfiend for the MS effect to secure kills.
That pad is about 1000% lower than it has been in the past and the single target spells are at least 300% weaker. You may still be padding, but it’s not meaningful and feels like we engage in a bunch of meaningless busywork.
2 Likes
This is true for all dps classes these days. All your dmg will kinda “feel” pointless until you pop a cd or you are in arena with deep dampening.
But having good pad is still meaningful in that it drains healer mana and counters passive pad healing.
2 Likes
Ok, and if you buff to the moon all of the abilities you listed then what happens?
If you overbuff fly…mf:i will oneshot ppl. If you buff VT …unfurling darkness will oneshot ppl etc etc
The problem with this spec is that it doesnt have the tools to get the damage rolling if its focused.
Its so hard to balance a spec that does damage if left alone and then does literaly nothing if hard focused.
Shadow needs a completely different design for pvp in terms of tuning utilities and talents imho. Separate the spec from pve completely.
2 Likes
Shadow Priest is looking to be the ASMR specialization. Massages, caressing, whispers etc
3 Likes
Whoever is saying that shadow can rot people doesnt have to deal with healing a team fight. I had 3 SPs in a wsg. Millions of apparations flying, no one dying. I wondered why i was healing them. Our melee were doing the actual kill pressure. T
5 Likes
DoTs used to be enough pressure alone to force healers to operate. That was shadows one niche in bgs. Spread pressure and healer silence to put them on the back foot and tip a team fight. With the removal of DoT damage, there is no advantage to playing shadow anymore. I’m not exaggerating the 1000% missing damage. VT and SWP were enough to bring someone to 50% if untreated.
3 Likes
Don’t forget the clown damage that it is void bolt and it hitting for 300k on 8m HP pools. The biggest juke is that this ability is gated behind a 2 minute cooldown and voidbolt has a 6sec cd.
This ability should be buffed to 700k. Blizz forgets spriest run with single digit crit% for an entire expansion unlike pve.
Btw, nightfall (instant shadow bolt) can hit for 1million and isn’t gated behind a 2 minute cooldown with a 6sec cd, lmao
7 Likes
Spriest damage is great in pvp if you go archon. The only thing I dont like is that spriest is the -only- caster in the game that has to cast their main big CD (voidform and dark ascension). I think thats kinda ridiculous at this point. Too many knocks, interrupts and grips in the game for that to be okay.
4 Likes
With all of your cool downs active, would you even 100-0 someone using 4 mfis in a row?
It’s literally all pad damage and basically inconsequential lol.
Also, the main pvp tools shadow has have basically been the same since wrath/cata (md, stun (formerly horrify/disarm), fear, silence). They are great, but a lot of other specs have moved well beyond.
2 Likes
I mean with them using nothing to stop it yes. No class is 100-0ing through healing/personals being used though, if that happens someone was undergeared or didnt use something to help themselves guaranteed.