I actually don’t recall the date I started playing, but it was shortly after the release of the Burning Crusade. I’ve heard many things about how useless the disc priest used to be, and I’m so glad of the changes I’ve heard they made. My first 3 characters were ALL priests, I have this inborn need to support (even though i have a very low tolerance for people)

First undead, then troll, then N-elf (which i finally stuck to)

I chose my first priest as a night elf because the DoT Racial priest skill appealed to me (boy was i disappointed when they removed the racial spells) And i leveled as a pure holy priest, often playing alone. I in fact, did not even attempt playing a shadow priest until i had enough talent points to go right into shadowform, it was an amazing discovery, i never knew playing could be so simple.

And then i discovered discipline…. Awsomeness in priest form. It provided the survivability holy just couldn’t provide, and it let me be an effective healer. Disc is a wonderful leveling spec because it allows versatility, you can fill any role, making it easy to get into groups, and it was also very nice because I didn’t have to respec to change roles (I didn’t have the money anyways)

The disc. spec was…. ok at higher levels, but it lacked any real appeal for a long time. Then PENANCE which renewed my love of disc priests once more.

However, it became increasingly difficult to keep up as a healer as dungeons became more difficult and demanded much more from me, I went holy, and the ride was once more smooth….. then disaster stuck, a patch went through that reduced mana gain through spirit by.. 40% was it? suddenly being holy just wasn’t an option, OOM was inevitable.

the bright side to this reg reduction from spirit. Disc got a SERIOUS overhaul, it’s usefulness shot up so fast, and it was a solid mana regeneration spec as well, more mana for more healing. I stayed as a disc priest until I got 2-3 pieces of tier gear that ONCE AGAIN made holy a more beneficial spec for healing.

I believe that discipline spec is very good for trying to get to where you can be an effective holy priest. Cause until you get that mega spirit gear, holy isn’t going to be an easy ride.

Ok, I figure it goes like this. With the increases in shield strength granted by current talents, a disc priest shield is worth anywhere from 3500-5000 damage mitigation, combine this with the glyph of Pw:shield, which heals the target for 20% of the shields total mitigation (mine happens to heal 1k, so my shield must be around 5k itself) when you take into account that this is an instant cast spell, that when combined with current disc talents, can be cast every second, granted you target someone who isnt under the effects of weakened soul, this is equal value to a 6k healing spell, only instead of the healing going to waste on an over heal, you basically have increased the health of the target by the amount shielded, until broken.

This would mean that the priest has an instant cast spell, as cheap as, and more powerful than a holy priests flash heal. The only drawback is the 15 sec weakened soul downtime, even so, this ability can’t be ignored as extremely useful. along with such, with current Disc. talents, a disc. priest provides a CONSTANT 3% damage reduction to an entire raid as long as shields are cast within 20 seconds of each other, 3%, not a big deal right? But it adds up quickly.

Now, i wouldn’t replace a holy priest with a disc priest if i could only have one, but as a healing support disc priests are absolutely wonderful, a disc priest is the O-SHIZ healer, who can respond Quickly with very potent instant cast abilities that a powerful, long casting skill just cant match up to. The lack of AoE healing capability seems to make everyone undermine the usefulness of the disc priest.

Keep in mind, we don’t have circle of healing, but we still have Prayer of healing, which with the innate increased spell haste disc. get, can still be very useful if used correctly. Yes, overall, holy is much much better at healing a large crowd, their PoH and PoM being much more powerful than the average disc. priest, but even so, the Disc. priest has the Potential to match the strength in both spells by Divine aegis procs, granted these are only occasional, unlike a holy priest spell, if you do heal them all the way, the shield would be more valuable because it isn’t a wasted overheal, it’s a shield.

I raid holy, and i admit it, it’s much better suited to keep everyone alive, but i would very very happily accept a disc to help me, I don’t think people understand, just because a recount chart shows them way below you, it doesn’t mean they arnt keeping everyone alive as well as you are.

Give them little shieldy guys some credit.

Moreover, you should understand your role.

PVP?

You need to be alive, you need to heal and you need to show the other people that you deserve to be their target. You are that thorn in the side of your enemy. 5 people are needed to take you down. But, you don’t stop there, you can be up on the top of the damage charts ( not likely ) and killing blows! Think I am crazy? I thought it was too, but I did it my first BG at 80.

PVE?

What does a disc priest do for PVE? Well, we all know that person who thinks its fun to take aggro off the tank. A little pain suppression will find him at the bottom of the aggro charts for a little while. A tank is taking mass damage during a Heroic bosses berserk? Pain suppression. Need some quick health? Pennance. Your array of different healing and quick reaction spells makes you more versatile than your Holy counterpart, but you aren’t as strong of a healer. Your healing will need to be at the top of its game, or you better have a good tank, because you won’t be getting those heals off at the same rate and strength as before.

Conclusion:

Want to be the best healer on your server, healing your main tank trying to down Arthas the first time? Don’t go disc, because it just doesn’t happen that way.

Want to finally get the title from arena PVP that you always wanted? Find a great partner or two and you will see your rating sore into the 2000′s.

However, having said that, I can recommend always bringing 1 Disc healer to a raid. As far as utility goes, PS isn’t even the best: Disc excells in shielding (huge PW:Shields, and Divine Aegis procs), direct healing (Penance), and mana preservation (Rapture). Apart from that, you have Grace which reduces damage on a tank for another 3%.

Translating this in 2 recent Naxx encounters I expierenced both Holy and Disc (same spellpower) here’s the difference:
On Patchwerk, Disc reigned surpreme, doing an HPS I couldn’t get with Holy overall on the fight, apart from reducing the spike damage with the abilities named above. Not mentioning the security of not even being close to OOM the entire fight.
If you go past frogger to your next objective, Grobbulus, Disc felt like having a bucket of water to try and put out a forest fire. That is definitely the Holy playground.

So to sum it up, Disc is usefull when you actually need MT healers, mostly in 25-man raids. When you need that steady flow of HPS over a 10 minute fight, with some extra damage spike reduction. Apart from that Holy outshines Disc (as you expect in the name of the tree).

Priests typically have a hard enough time getting into end game raids because they simply do not stack well. To think that a subpar raiding spec is going to get in in any case other than a serious healing shortage is foolish.

Disc spec is a pvp spec, it has no place in end game pve.

By switching to DISC+HOLY, I have upped my holy damage quite a bit. I have upped the holy damage by 15% + 10% to 35% of my Spirit. Compared to Shadow DPS, I dont think it is that far behind espeically if I get Power Infusion.

My healing also benefitted as well. Shorter casting time and a bit more healing as well.

Overall, this is the utility build that will benefit any instance/raid run.

I’ve also had a chance to compare with a Holy Priest. I think the DISC+HOLY has slight edge when it comes to mana. If I dps, Holy will have better mana management but if I heal, I will have a slight edge due to the reductions in the DISC tree offers.

I don’t really see this as a bad thing.