Priests: Matt Needs Your Help!

My bosses at WoW Insider have commissioned me to write a piece on how Priests will change in Wrath. Specifically, how we can adapt to all the changes that are going on. But, I need your help. I’ve played Naxx and Obsidian Sanctum extensively. I’ve done a few 5 mans. Things have become second nature to me now.

Ask me questions. I’m giving myself 72 hours so I can have this piece for your Sunday morning consumption. 24 hours right now to gather as many questions as possible, another 24 to pick out the ones that I think are the most important, and another 24 to go in game, get the shots, get the techniques, and get the evidence I need to share with you what I’m doing and why.

Paladins, Druids, Shammies sorry, I can’t help you here. But feel free to ask anyway! Maybe you have some questions about synergy between other healing classes. It doesn’t have to be just Priests.

I’ve dedicated myself to helping this community. But I can’t do it alone. There’s no such thing as a stupid question.

I’ll be pulling questions from this Plusheal thread that Doug started and from any comments that I garner from here as well.

16 thoughts on “Priests: Matt Needs Your Help!”

  1. @Rhoelyn: Ask them anyway. It’s meant for healers but I might be able to answer something based on observation or speculation. If not, I’ll gather ’em all up and Fedex ’em to someone who’ll know more than I do.

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  2. How does the holy spec stack up for leveling? Does the spelldamage change eliminate the “lolsmite” leveling spec?

    Is discipline really as useful as it looks – and does it provide the utility that current disc priests really enjoy? How does a solid Disc spec stack up against Holy in terms of handling a 5 man instance? 10 man?

    How many licks does it take to get to the center of a tootsie roll pop?

    Annas last blog post..Resto Shaman vs. Azgalor – A Healing Guide

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  3. Are Shadow priests able to heal 5-mans while leveling?

    Are Disc priests really becoming single target healers? Blizzard has stated that this is the intended goal for the Disc tree.

    With the spellpower change has leveling as holy/disc become easier? I was looking at the possibility of leveling my priest with a smite build, instead of shadow.

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  4. Matt,

    What I would like to see is how Disc Priest healing works in the expansion. I’ve heard that for raiding, the paradigm is proactive healing instead of our current reactive healing. Is this true? Deep disc talents make me think otherwise.

    How imporant is mana regeneration? Deep discipline has some mighty fine mana regen talents. Are they effective for our role?

    When the intelligence-gives-to-mana-regen change whent in, there was a significant change in the way both spirit and intelligence were viewed by the community, spirit now plays an even bigger role for a priest. Some information on gearing would be helpful.

    Is it worthwhile to stick to a standard healing spec and level mainly in instances? Will we loose too much reputation that way?

    Which reputation rewards provide the biggest bang for your buck on the 3 main specs?

    Jays last blog post..AGDC – High Level Take Aways

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  5. Do you see any of the new priest spells or talents coming in and making a big, visible splash the way that Circle of Healing did? (reaction started off slow, but quickly became class-defining). Or will our gameplay be just a refinement of the priestly goodness?

    GoWs last blog post..Game > Lore

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  6. What should we look for in gear?
    Before it was +heals, +spirit, +int and/or +haste… what stats should I look for in gear?

    Is gear going to make that much of a difference between going disc or holy?

    What’s the best way to level? Grind, quests, instances?

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  7. Alright, i have a few questions =P
    (but first things first…love the blog! keep it up ^^

    Its been riding on the wind lately and apparantly Discipline could get close to matching Holy, concidered healingwise…Both Holy and Discpline should be somewhere equal in raiding if you look at total healing numbers only, is this something you have had a chance with to experience this and if so, what is your tought.

    Is Greater heal still an effective heal to use like in instances, with no more use of downranking its said to heal so massively it might only would be good on tanks and large heals requirement situations. So…How does it feel to be using Flash heals and Binding heals when you keep your raid alive, as with the new surge of light talent you can heal your party with flash heal and when it procs wich is most likely to happen each 3 spells, you get a free instant flash heal…But you can save it for later and continue onwards with binding heal wich also has a big chance to proc clearcast…wich means priests will gain some cool, bit more luck based…possibilities to keep up our wonderfull Mp5. How do you feel with these 1.5 sec casts wich will be even faster with new clearcast proc…does it “feel” better then Tbc mechanics? And have you experienced these changes as positive?

    ive heard rumors on prayer of healing being a spell you can put on someone in the raid to heal his/her team…Tough i have found no conferms on it….can you clearefy this and aswell why is there being so much hassle on the 6 second cooldown of CoH…Is it back in or is it not…i have friends telling its not…and yet you can heal all priests whine…so whats the deal on that?

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  8. How will disc priests fare when it comes to healing tanks, specifically warrior tanks? I’m afraid that due to all of the shields in the Disc tree, they will not become viable as tanking healers like Blizz would like to see us become.
    I am also afraid of the healing thru-put for a Disc Priest due to all of the talents that boost total healing power are in the Holy tree, out of reach of that deep disc priest. When I say boosts total healing power, I’m looking at Imp. Healing, Spiritual Guidance, Spiritual Healing, Empowered Healing, and Divine Providence. I’m ignoring the increase to healing granted by Guardian Spirit cause it only lasts 10 sec.
    Disc only has Imp. Divine Spirit and Focused Power.

    Gl on the article, look forward to reading it.

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  9. Another question, looking at the Holy tree, I dont think I’m going to be able to get all the talents I want if I want to continue to get the Imp. Fort, Inner Focus, and Meditation. How will this effect us (having to choose so many Disc talents to remain raid viable) and out of the holy tree, what talents would you skip?
    I am in the opinion that this will be come your typical holy raid build: http://talent.mmo-champion.com/?priest=500320213000000000000000000023305103030115253004331331000000000000000000000000000

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  10. More of a general healing question: Is there really that much more “Raid Damage” in WotLK 5 man instances than in BC? Which then leads to: Will healers who focus on single target healing (i.e. Discipline Priests, non- Bacon of Light Pallys) be at a disadvantage?

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  11. Will there still be such a thing as a mostly Holy Priest who specced for Imp DS (i.e. 23/48)? How “good” is Guardian Spirit? Situational? Excellent on high RNG boss fights? An unnecessary crutch?
    How’s Penance?

    And try to be honest here. The changes to racials, how much do they affect effective healing, if at all?

    Euripedess last blog post..Design-A-Raid

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  12. How about the new emergence of crit rating as a real priest stat? Both disc and holy feature talents that crit helps and its all over ‘healing’ gear in wotlk. How good would you consider crit and should we be actively seeking it out on gear in wotlk?

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  13. I am DESPERATE for answers to Anna’s questions. Please address the ease with which non-shadow (specifically healy-type) builds are able to go about their daily business. (See what I did there?)

    I LOATH having to do anything solo on my holy priest. She is terrible, terrible, terrible, and terrible when not supported by a cohort. Did I mention that she is terrible?

    I certainly don’t expect to top raid DPS meters or tank Gruul, but I really, really, really, *really* do want to be able to kill non-elite mobs within two levels of myself without ooming after every two pulls. Being able to manage three nasties at the same time (on occasion) would be really nice too!

    Perhaps the new toys in the disc tree will allow my ragtag disheveled priesty to heal 5-mans and solo effectively*

    *feel free to substitute efficiently here too.

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  14. I know this is late, but nevertheless a question im seeking an answer to. Im really hard considering playing a priest(holy) in WOTLK. As i like the healing part of the game. I healed on a paladin pre-tbc, but left it when tbc came, as I was a bit tired of that I only had 2 buttons to push.
    How is the priest compared to that, do you have more buttons to push ? Also now that downranking and such is removed from the game ?

    Hope you can understand where im getting at here… 🙂

    Poshspices last blog post..More ideas for the recruitment video

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