Tips for Disc Priest - Please Help

Classes Priest
1

Hey

I rerolled from resto shaman. I am enjoying priest I like that I can swap to holy or disc depending on my mood and the 2 different healer playstyles. I’m pretty much a healer only.

I feel like I struggle in keys on my disc priest. It really feels like a constant battle just to sustain people, take a lot of focus, and a bit of luck. I’m 438 and I do 16s or 17s.

I have pretty good disc weak auras. I always cast the correct Equilibrium spell. I always build up Harsh Discipline before casting Penance. I keep track of PotW.

I have Cutting Edge from legion, so I have pretty good game knowledge, but somehow I think maybe I am missing something big for Disc. The only time I feel I can breathe is after a Radiance proc.

Wondering if there is anything I am missing, or other tips you can share.

2

disc is a pain of a pain for 5 mans, especially if your group takes un needed damage and doesnt use defensives, catching up is harder for disc than anyone else. …stack lots of haste, i find 30-34% feels good

lenience helps, usually dont run it for raid but in 5 mans its much better, and benevolence and, protector of the frail is also good if you have a squishy tank

not sure if you use an addon but healbot/vuhdo help, then you can target your enemy and use the mouseover for heals and track heals, the built in blizz UI is awful for disc if you ask me, all those addons do is make a graphical interface for mouseover macros.

I also make a macro for PI so i dont need to mess around with trying to target someone to give it too them

3

Yeah I have lots of mouseover help/harm, PI macros; Love Vuhdo

I’ll check out those talents appreciate the tips. Good to know its not just me thats finding it challenging

Turns out I had all those talents

4

Pretty accurate. Im sure snce you have been around along time you have seen the coments that disc is the hardest healer to conquer? Did you expect to just pick it up and romp? :slight_smile:
It does require effort. Some raid night after raid im toasted and just log off because of the concentration needed to do the job.

Which is about what you should be. Thats a good level, no disgrace there my friend.

I feel maybe you are too clinical here. I work my TE but i dont overly focus on it. I will cast penance even without HD. I dont care. The spec is very fluid. I play by instinct. Dont get caught up in WA, or tracking in keys. Work on feel and getting in sync with what your doing.

2 Likes
5

This is from my experience, mostly healing keys.

  1. Practice makes perfect. Just keep at it. It gets better.
  2. Disc is pretty gear dependent. Higher haste is a good thing. I like 28-30% or so. Maybe it depends on you, but I’ve always found generally more is better. The other stats matter, but not nearly so much.
  3. Don’t be afraid to use penance to top people single target. I do it all the time and it works for me and I couldnt care less if that is maybe a waste. Squishy tanks, the deeps that always seems to get in trouble, etc. If you have a proc or even want to pop PotW, that gives you a powerful single target heal. Maybe it is better used elsewhere, but I dunno. In my experience someone low on health is gonna be in your hair as long as they are low, so power heal them up asap and then you can relax a bit. I often use it hoping people will get the message that they are standing in fire or whatever.
  4. Use your Pain Supp charges. Sitting on them forever just in case is not a good way to go. At least use one whenever possible. If I think the tank may be in trouble, I use it. IF a deeps is in trouble, it helps a lot.
  5. Use your power word: barrier as much as you can. I try to use it as much as possible but do forget to use it. If I am in trouble, then I drop it on me, and try to get the tank in, or whoever. The more in it the better. It can save a group in trouble on a boss fight.
  6. If people are toxic about your healing, just put them on ignore and go on your merry way. Disc takes quite a bit of practice to master. If you have to heal lower content until you feel good about it, do it. I got a lot out of making a bunch of disc priests and leveling them all the way up with good gear at bgs and running dungeons. I enchanted BOA gear, making my toons OP, which gave me a lot of wiggle room for mistakes and learning.
  7. Customize your set up and dont stop till your UI is just the way you like it. I used to record my runs on video, and on playback I would think of ways to improve it.
  8. Record your runs on video if you can. Look at them. Especially look at the problem pulls and boss fights. Figure out what happened and change your UI or whatever. In my case I use Grid2 which is highly customizable. I have things like atonement and fight debuffs clearly on my frames along with the time when they will drop. Doing that and always adding and thinking of better ways to customize helped a lot.
  9. Use addons that are helpful for you and your group. I like Cant Heal You and Healer Protection. In lower groups people may tell you to turn them off. I never do and have been using them for years. They message people saying things like “Cant heal you because you are out of range” and there is another message that says your target it out of Line of Sight. Those little messages help me a lot if nobody else. In good groups nobody ever says they dont like those little whispers. In fact some of the best players I have played with said they loved those messages and they are very informative. In my case they help me know what is going on and how to better my game.

I probably have more tips, but dont want to overwhelm you. That said, if I think of more I may post again. GLHF.

2 Likes
6

In your gear, a very good player can be doing 20s. That’s not to say 16s/17s are bad, but you’re definitely capable gear-wise of pugging up into the 20 range if you practice more. And yeah, it does come down to practice/knowledge and getting comfortable.

16s/17s I was doing pre-nerfs in around 434 gear. I still haven’t pushed 20s on my priest this season (I kinda raid logged starting like 3 weeks in lol), but 18s I do with friends when they need help feel pretty comfy to me right now.

Really with Disc it’s about learning the biggest healing checks and planning for them. A lot of people play the spec and stress about their rotation, but you really don’t have to. Radiance covers a LOT of the standard level of damage in a dungeon. And you can keep renew running on people taking minor damage. The biggest learning curve is figuring out when Atonement will cover for you, and when you’ll need to burn CDs. If you don’t start to feel that out, and sometimes let people sit at 70% health rather than immediately topping them off, it can just feel like constant stress. But that really requires practice.

You mostly need to be prepared for the worst of it. IE: Going into BH first boss you need to know to pre-rapture. Fighting the elephant or spear boss in NL you need to have your Schism on the target and a TE enhanced HD Dark Reprimand ready for the stomp/spear breaks. Etc.

Generally, you only really need worry about Twilight Equilibrium for your highest damage spells. You can put it on PTW before you spread it (and spread a larger dot) as well, but it’s not make or break like missing all your bonuses on a giant penance. Managing TE well 100% of the time is very much a high level optimization thing, but if you’re not pushing 24+ keys or something I wouldn’t worry too much about it. In fact, it might actually be hurting you if you’re casting Smites when damage is happening just to make sure you have light side TE or something.

Standard build disc priest you’ll want to be using Pain Suppression and PW:S on targets that take the strong ST dots (there’s a lot of these in Season 2). But you can also use it pretty liberally when something feels like it’s going to be difficult considering Protector of the Frail gives us 2 charges now and reduces the CD a lot.

Also don’t underestimate rapture. It’s actually a very strong cooldown with Aegis of Wrath/Exaltation and it has a very short CD. Remember that when a target already has atonement, your shields from rapture are going to get mastery bonus. So it can be worth it to Renew the party or Radiance → Rapture blanket if you know something big is coming. For example, in high level Underrot, I’ll renew everyone then rapture blanket just before tantrum and have to do way less during it. Also you can PW:S the same target repeatedly during rapture if you need to, so it’s not just an AoE shield blanket. It’s also very strong ST healing when you need it to be.

1 Like
7

You may be better off asking for tips to specific encounters; Disc’s gameplay lends itself to pre-planning and applying the kit to the boss, and I think is more specific than most other healers (who generally just have a plan based on the damage profile).

8

I give the disc lords credit when it’s due. Never had the patience to learn disc, it’s got a 5head skill ceiling.

I’ll just stick with holy priest lol

1 Like
9

These are some of the tips I was looking for!

Did not think about that, think that is going to be helpful!

I am thinking your right, sometimes I will run out of MB charges with a shadow TE and I kind of freeze lol.

2nd boss UR (tantrum)
1st boss NL (shatter)

Anyone have any other bosses they know of to prep for?

10

I made a list at the start of the season when I was still pushing a bit in S1 gear:

I haven’t updated that thread in a while, and I might approach the fights differently now (Disc has had buffs since then, and the fights have gotten nerfed) but reading through it quickly it’s all still pretty solid advice boss-by-boss.

Fortunately I was only playing Disc at the time so it’s pretty much disc specific advice.

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11

1st Boss NL: Have good teammates who kill the spiders quickly. Get your 4 piece and save an instant Radiance for the shatter.
2nd boss UR: Hug the wall until tantrum. Stay centered and let the dps stomp leeches, you’re too vital to be moving. Rapture prior to first tantrum. Unfortunately, PW:Barrier is not helpful at all on this boss fight, and Luminous Barrier isn’t strong (and you’ll want PW:B for the 4th boss). Psychic Scream if any leeches spawn and agro you. Pool your Schism/Shadow Cov/Harsh Discipline Penance/Radiance procs, particularly for the 2nd tantrum, as that’s the one that seems to be the most trouble (after panic sets in from a mishandled 1st tantrum/leeches). If you have Angelic Feathers, spread them throughout room before the tantrum, to help grub-stompers. Body and Soul PW:S can also help speed stompers around. Pain Suppression is probably best reserved for yourself, you can pop it to let you focus on the team, and also survive a random Charge in the middle of the chaos.
It hurts, but these two bosses are very reliant on having good dps teammates. As I’ve gone up the keys and generally got good dps pugs, these bosses have given me less and less trouble. Others, like 3rd and 4th NL, are getting comparatively nastier.

1 Like
12

I wouldn’t put so much focus into Equilibrium or Harsh Discipline, I rarely think about either of those things to be honest, in certain situations you will want to track Harsh Discipline but not always, sometimes I use Penance purely for spreading my Purge the wicked and even cancel the cast after the first tick. Things I tend to focus on are keeping my Purge the wicked on 5+ targets, using my Surge of light procs as much as possible to keep the 10% damage reduction on myself and another big thing is timing your Power Infusions so you’re using it on someone in your party the moment the press offensive CDs to maximize their dmg. OmniVD addon is good for this, theirs also weak auras that can help

13

Hi OP here. Ever since I upped my crit chance disc feels much better in higher keys.

I think when I made this thread I was at 9% crit, 34% haste. I had a lot of haste/mastery stuff so I can easily swap shadow.

I got some crit stuff and I feel a huge difference. Now im at 16% and i’m using Screaming Black Dragonscale.

Hey speaking of crit, can someone tell me how atonement crits work? Is it based on the damage spell crit? Or are their two “rolls”? Phrased another way, can atonement crit if the triggering damage spell does not?

14

I haven’t actually tested in depth but I’m pretty sure it doesn’t double dip on Crit, so I think that the heal component that cannot crit, it will show as Crit when the damage spell did.

Now that I think about it that’s probably why Details was showing “Atonement” healing as two different instances, one for non-crits and one for all crits, the game probably treats them as different spells or with different IDs or something…

**As a side note, there’s a setting in details for merging them which I think makes it better for reading it, or at least I like it more that way.

15

Atonement crits when your damage crits - it doesn’t double dip, it’s still based off your damage, it’s just based off of your crit damage.

16

Rapture can be a great spell to cast in a bind. In my case, I often use it for emergencies when I have no Radiance up. It can buy you time that way, so that your group can survive something tough until you can radiance.

I also use it for a tank in trouble if penance isnt up. I will spam rapture over and over on them until I can hit them with a defensive penance, or even rapture with a Pain Suppression in a real bind. This week can be crazy bad on a higher key if the dps are failing and killing mobs one by one so that Bolstering is building up to the point that tanks can be one shot. That is a good time to use the above combination when trouble is mounting.

17

/targetenemy [noharm][dead]
/cast [@target,help][@targettarget,help] Power Word: Shield

Use that in all of your healing spells.