Elune's Disciple (33/11/7 Night Elf Priest)

[Roxanne Flowers 15]

Elune's Disciple (33/11/7 Night Elf Priest)
An experimental Discipline/Holy/Shadow spec for Night Elf Priests who want to maximize support for their Starshards racial spell.



Disclaimers:

I played World of Warcraft in the 2005-2007 time frame before moving on to other games, so I do have experience with playing all 8 Alliance classes to Level 50 or so a decade ago. I played on a PvE server then and I'm playing on Darrowshire now, since PvP does not interest me.

This is not intended to be a bleeding edge DPS optimized raiding Priest spec that will put everything else to shame. If anything, it is intended to be a viable DPM efficient Priest spec to be played for FUN as a soloist and in 5 man groups in PvE content.

I have been lurking these forums for weeks already, and am well aware of the "Play Shadow!" exhortations that have been made repeatedly for leveling builds, particularly for those who are interested in speeding through to 60. I am not interested in speed running to 60 and will be taking my time to enjoy the game, therefore I have no problem with "being slower" than alternative build strategies in terms of XP per hour.

The primary purpose of this build is to explore the possibility of a potential off-meta spec which I have not seen anyone show (enough) interest in (yet) to post an actual build for. This post is basically an answer to a question of mine ... which is that IF you were going to design a build to support use of Starshards as your primary damaging attack spell, then HOW would you go about selecting Talents to support that objective? Since Starshards is a Night Elf Priest only racial spell, this question is only relevant to Players interested in playing Night Elf Priests (who seem to be a decided minority of Alliance Priests, for somewhat obvious reasons of hardened Conventional Wisdom). I have to wonder if Night Elf Discipline/Holy Priests are even rarer than Moonkin Druids ... and if so, that notion only increases my desire to follow through on this experiment so as to share my conclusions and experiences with this community.

I also know that the prevailing opinion for Mages is "lol arcane" and that what I'm presenting here is in many ways a functional "Arcane Missiles by Priest" sort of build strategy by alternative means, which no doubt plenty of people will look askance at.



Talent Tree:

http://db.vanillagaming.org/?talent#bVgGs0VqobxuZxM

Discipline (33 points)

Wand Specialization - Rank 5/5
Increases your damage with Wands by 25%.

Silent Resolve - Rank 5/5
Reduces the threat generated by your spells by 20%.

Improved Power Word: Fortitude - Rank 2/2
Increases the effect of your Power Word: Fortitude and Prayer of Fortitude spells by 30%.

Improved Power Word: Shield - Rank 3/3
Increases the damage absorbed by your Power Word: Shield by 15%.

Martyrdom - Rank 2/2
Gives you a 100% chance to gain the Focused Casting effect that lasts for 6 sec after being the victim of a melee or ranged critical strike. The Focused Casting effect prevents you from losing casting time when taking damage and increases resistance to Interrupt effects by 20%.

Inner Focus - Rank 1/1
When activated, reduces the Mana cost of your next spell by 100% and increases its critical effect chance by 25% if it is capable of a critical effect.

Meditation - Rank 3/3
Allows 15% of your Mana regeneration to continue while casting.

Mental Strength - Rank 5/5
Increases your maximum Mana by 10%.

Divine Spirit - Rank 1/1
Holy power infuses the target, increasing their Spirit by 17 for 30 min.

Force of Will - Rank 5/5
Increases your spell damage by 5% and the critical strike chance of your offensive spells by 5%.

Power Infusion - Rank 1/1
Infuses the target with power, increasing their spell damage and healing by 20%. Lasts 15 sec.

Holy (11 points)

Healing Focus - Rank 2/2
Gives you a 70% chance to avoid interruption caused by damage while casting any healing spell.

Holy Specialization - Rank 5/5
Increases the critical effect chance of your Holy spells by 5%.

Divine Fury - Rank 3/5
Reduces the casting time of your Smite, Holy Fire, Heal and Greater Heal spells by 0.3 sec.

Holy Nova - Rank 1/1
Causes an explosion of holy light around the caster, causing 28 to 33 Holy damage to all enemy targets within 10 yards and healing all party members within 10 yards for 52 to 61. These effects cause no threat.

Shadow (7 points)

Spirit Tap - Rank 5/5
Gives you a 100% chance to gain a 100% bonus to your Spirit after killing a target that yields experience. For the duration, your Mana will regenerate at a 50% rate while casting. Lasts 15 sec.

Improved Shadow Word: Pain - Rank 2/2
Increases the duration of your Shadow Word: Pain spell by 6 sec.



Starshards:

http://db.vanillagaming.org/?search=starshards

Rank 1: 84 arcane damage over 6 seconds for 50 mana
Rank 2: 162 arcane damage over 6 seconds for 85 mana
Rank 3: 288 arcane damage over 6 seconds for 140 mana
Rank 4: 414 arcane damage over 6 seconds for 190 mana
Rank 5: 570 arcane damage over 6 seconds for 245 mana
Rank 6: 756 arcane damage over 6 seconds for 300 mana
Rank 7: 936 arcane damage over 6 seconds for 350 mana

Damage Per Mana: 1.68 / 1.906 / 2.057 / 2.179 / 2.327 / 2.52 / 2.674 at 6 seconds of channeling with no buffs, talents or spell power and not including 1 "free" tick of mana regen thanks to the 5 second rule (which I'm not including into this DPM benchmarking).

Using Fisher's benchmarks for basic rotations for Holy (1.51 damage per mana) using Holy Fire + Smite x3 and also for Shadow (2.55 damage per mana) using Mind Blast plus Shadow Word: Pain plus Mind Flay x2 ... the Starshards chain of 2.674 damage per mana at max rank (so as to make an apples to apples comparison) would seem to compare relatively favorably to the output of Shadow and be superior (before Resists) to Holy (which isn't resisted, or at least shouldn't be resisted).

The real kicker though would appear to be that Starshards, being a 6 second channeled spell, ought to reap maximal benefit from Spell Power while also being extremely favorable to the "5 second rule" of mana regeneration, provided that there is no loss of channeling time due to damage taken. Using napkin math, this would appear to make Starshards possibly the most "efficient" damage spell available to Priests which can be chain cast repeatedly (there is no cooldown in the patches we're playing in) until going OoM. However, unlike the Holy and Shadow rotations, use of Starshards is "slow" enough to permit a far greater mana recovery while channeling than use of a Holy or Shadow spell rotation short of pure Wand usage, which invalidates the comparison.

Holy Fire and Smite, as well as Mind Blast, Shadow Word: Pain and Mind Flay all have a casting time under 5 seconds, so if you're casting your way through a rotation with these spells, you're never not casting for 5 seconds until you start using your Wand, so these rotations are "5 second rule" unfriendly. Repeat casting of Starshards, however, being a 6 second channel is very "5 second rule" friendly, allowing you to recover mana while maintaining the channel of the spell to the point of repeated chain casting (you just need to not take interrupt/pushback while channeling).

These factors combined to make me ask the question ... why is no one Theorycrafting a Starshards optimizing build strategy for a very high Damage Per Mana output Priest playstyle?

Oh ... right. Starshards does Arcane damage, and it requires the caster to channel for 6 seconds, which is a "SO SHOOT ME NAO!" taunt in PvP ... and most of the realms we have available to us are PvP realms. But in PvE ... this shouldn't be (as much of) a problem ... so ...

Oh ... right. Priests either play healbot or they melt faces (using Shadow but not Holy), but never both and they CERTAINLY never attack with ... Arcane? And Arcane is for Mages (who don't know any better, supposedly), so ...

Which then begs the question, as alluded to earlier ... if you're going to build around Starshards for an efficient Damage Per Mana build, what would that look like?

Well I'm glad you asked!



Elune's Disciple (33/11/7)

The first thing to do is to look for ways to prevent interruption while casting damage spells. That basically leads directly into the Discipline tree, since neither Holy nor Shadow has any sort of prevention of interrupt/pushback while spellcasting built into them. There are basically two (and three-quarters?) things you can "do" to mitigate Interrupt/Pushback on spellcasting:
Power Word: Shield
Martyrdom -> Focused Casting
Silent Resolve
Wand

Power Word: Shield prevents casting time loss.
Martyrdom enables Focused Clearcasting for 6 seconds which prevents loss of casting time.
Silent Resolve reduces Threat generated by ALL of your spells, not just the healing or just the damage spells, reducing the likelihood you'll attract aggro in groups (obviously).
If you're getting beaten on and taking damage, use your Wand in the absence of Focused Clearcasting.

However, to embrace the Goddess Elune as a true disciple, you need to accept the duality of both Light and Shadow. This means being judicious in your selection of talents and optimizing your build for what the talents offer as benefits to your build.

http://db.vanillagaming.org/?talent#bVgGs0VqobxuZxM

The Shadow tree offers two talents that are of use to a Starshards oriented build:
Spirit Tap
Improved Shadow Word: Pain
Spirit Tap is (thankfully) "agnostic" as to what types of damage can proc the buff, so this talent synergizes particularly well with use of Starshards, particularly in light of the interaction between Starshards' channel duration and the "5 second rule" of mana regeneration, especially when soloing or to a lesser extent in 5 man groups. Improved Shadow Word: Pain simply extends the duration of the spell by adding additional damage ticks, but with 2 talent points invested here you can extend the duration from 3x Starshards durations up to 4x Starshards durations, which isn't a bad investment all things considered, although an alternative would be to instead spend those two points on Divine Fury in the Holy tree.

Speaking of Holy, there are four talents which would seem most relevant to a Starshards oriented build:
Healing Focus
Holy Specialization
Divine Fury
Holy Nova
Healing Focus is interrupt avoidance caused by damage while casting. I honestly recommend taking these two talent points first at Levels 10-11 before investing in anything else, so as to be able to heal (self or others) while taking damage in as reliable a manner as possible. The mix of Holy Specialization and Divine Fury investment could be anything from 5+3, 4+4 or 3+5, assuming you aren't pirating 2 points from Improved Shadow Word: Pain to get 5+5 in both. I chose to maximize Holy Specialization over Divine Fury due to the interaction with Holy Nova. Holy Nova benefits from increased critical hits, but does not benefit from reduced casting time (since it is already instant). The other point is that since a Starshards optimizing build is oriented around Damage (rather than Healing) Per Mana for a single target Arcane spell, the value of Divine Fury for damage output is reduced in practice. The reduction in casting time for Heal and Greater Heal still has value, of course. Finally, Holy Nova is essentially the main area damage AND simultaneous area heal spell available. Although Holy Nova won't be used terribly often, it could prove decisive in circumstances where it does get used in situations of overrun in PvE, so spending 1 talent point here is worthwhile.

For tier 1 of Discipline, in a PvE context, Wand Specialization is more useful than Unbreakable Will to a Starshards oriented build, in my opinion. I say this because resorting to use of Wand while taking damage would seem to be a prudent course of action that may occur more often than being the victim of a Stun, Fear or Silence effect in PvE play.

For tier 2 of Discipline, I recommend taking all the talents and filling them up to full, which may not be ideal for everyone. For those who feel that Silent Resolve is "wasted talent points" an easy alternative option would be to spend all those points on Mental Agility in tier 4 (which I skipped entirely). Improved Power Word: Fortitude falls into the Nice To Have rather than being Absolutely Necessary, and the Improved Power Word: Shield directly contributes (some) to protecting yourself from incoming damage that would interrupt/pushback your channeling of Starshards. As a side benefit, both of these talents will directly improve the survivability of both yourself and any party members, so it's hard to argue that these talent points are wasted. Martyrdom is something that I see few builds bothering with, but the Focused Casting effect looks like it will synergize particularly well with Starshards since both have a 6 second duration. Martyrdom therefore offers a backup means of preventing loss of casting time when taking damage above and beyond the protection offered by (Improved) Power Word: Shield.

For tier 3 of Discipline, Inner Focus and Meditation are fairly "standard" picks for almost any build, so I'll not belabor the point here.

In the build that I am presenting here, I decided to skip tier 4 entirely, which I don't see on a whole lot of other builds, since most will take Mental Agility to get past this tier. As previously mentioned, if Silent Resolve is not to your liking, those 5 talent points could easily be reallocated to Mental Agility. Alternatively, either Improved Power Word: Fortitude and/or Improved Power Word: Shield could be dropped to spend those talent points in Mental Agility if that is preferred.

For tier 5 of Discipline, Mental Strength is maximized to unlock Power Infusion in tier 7, and Divine Spirit is taken to buff Spirit (and consequently Meditation and Spirit Tap) even further in a Starshards build that is oriented around optimizing not only Damage Per Mana but also mana regeneration every 5 seconds from Spirit, which also increases health regeneration into the bargain, reducing the need/demand for self-healing and the mana costs that incurs.

For tier 6 of Discipline, full investment in Force of Will provides a maximal benefit to spell damage and critical strike chance for offensive spells, further enhancing the Damage Per Mana efficiency of Starshards.

And tier 7 of Discipline is, of course, Power Infusion, as already alluded to.

The sum total of all of these disparate parts would appear to create a most unusual combination ... of an Arcane Night Elf Priest who is extremely mana efficient at producing sustained damage pressure on a single target, and with some ability to apply damage to multiple targets simultaneously. The irony of course being that this is a Priest build instead of a Mage build, and Night Elves are hardly renowned for their ... aptitude ... for the Arcane, having turned away from their arcane studies after the Sundering in a bid for survival. And yet, here is a build that combines Arcane, Holy and Shadow together in what feels like a rather viable balance in, of all things, a Priest.

And once I "evolved" the build into the form that I'm presenting to you here, the name just manifested itself before me. This is a talent build that (probably) only an Elune's Disciple could love and follow on the Darrowshire server. Fortunately, that's where I am, standing for the Goddess in the place between the Shadow and the Light.

/pray

/cast Starshards

[Deathlace 2]

We need more posts like this. Enjoyed reading it!

[Roxanne Flowers 15]

I appreciate the support.  It's been fun watching the Read counter go up all weekend (now at 184) with nary a comment made.  That is, however, only to be expected, since as I mentioned I'm pretty sure that Disc/Holy Night Elf Priests are even rarer than Moonkin Druids are, so this is DEFINITELY not a talent spec that will have broad appeal ... and that's even before considering that it isn't exactly a raiding spec either.

At this point, my Priest is only Level 15 ... mainly because I'm playing all 8 Alliance classes in parallel, so it's going to "be a while" before I can start getting really deep into the talent trees.  Right now, I've got 2 points in Healing Focus (as advertised) and am working my way towards Meditation.  Once I've got Meditation I'll take a pause on Discipline to put 7 points into Shadow (as advertised) before resuming my advancement to the end of the Discipline tree.  I'm planning on saving the remainder of the Holy tree for the 50+ stretch.

Without a Wand, use of Power Word: Shield and Starshards is pretty efficient at taking down single targets in the low teens.  Now that I've leveled my Enchanter to the point of making Greater Magic Wands (and had the resources to do so) I've switched over to just Wanding everything for the time being, since the DPS is comparable while the mana cost of Wanding is nil.  I figure that dynamic will vary and shift over time, particularly as Starshards increases in Rank every 10 Levels.

Perhaps the biggest hurdle to playing this spec (other than the choice of Racial) is the fact that it leaves the (well) beaten path of Shadow and Holy to wander into terra-incognita, where the Conventional Wisdom™ says there is no refuge or advantage to be found.  That may indeed prove to be true, but I'd like to test the proposition first because I'm suspecting there is an Island of Viability out here in this Sea of Possibilities, and I'm the type of Player who likes to explore off-meta specs to find new potentials.

So it's going to be a while before I have more to report/say on this subject, which will probably happen once I get my Priest past Level 20 or so, but I am certainly committed to seeing where this build will take me on Darrowshire.

[Deathlace 2]

Definitely post an update later on. Next time I level a priest I'd like to try. My current priest is already too far into 60 on the new server, but I'll always level another!

[Roxanne Flowers 15]

Something to report about Starshards (rank 1, specifically) which I wasn't expecting to find and can only assume it's a bug.

I have never seen Starshards (rank 1) EVER Crit.

My Wand, now that I've got one, will critically hit relatively frequently ... but Starshards (rank 1) has never done a single critical hit.  Since I'm still below Level 20, I've only got access to rank 1, but the spell hits for 14 damage 6 times (total of 84, as advertised) VERY CONSISTENTLY and it NEVER seems to land a critical hit while doing damage.  Not even once.

I'm thinking this has to be a bug of some kind.

@Pottu would you be so kind as to pass a word to the QA Team to request a verification of my findings that Starshards (rank 1) simply never lands a critical hit ... ever?  If QA testing reveals this observation to be true, I'm thinking that a follow up of all ranks of Starshards to determine if all ranks are similarly programmed to never critically hit would be wise.  Hopefully, this should be something relatively easy for your QA Team to test.

If there are any other Night Elf Priests reading these forums, I'd appreciate any testimonials concerning the Crit Rate of Starshards, and what ranks you've been seeing those results for, added to this thread to assist the QA Team should such independent verification be necessary for QA.  I'm hoping that this behavior is a result of something as simple as a misplaced pointer which only afflicts rank 1, but verifying that will require testing and observation.

For those who are interested, my Night Elf Priest is currently Level 17 and it may be a week or two before I reach Level 20 with her owing to the fact that I'm playing all 8 classes in parallel on the Alliance side on Darrowshire.

[Dispril 0]

Channeled spells and dots do not critt in vanilla. This is blizzlike.

[Roxanne Flowers 15]

Weird.  I could have sworn I've seen Arcane Missile crit mutliple times on my Mage, and that's a channeled spell ...

I can certainly believe the point that DoTs won't critically hit, but to my mind that means things like Shadow Word: Pain and the like.  So just to verify, this means that Mind Flay won't crit either, right?  Mind Blast would, but Mind Flay would not, correct?

[cryofsorrow 5]

I've also heard from mages that Arcane Missiles is critting, no clue if that's how it's supposed to be. Mind Flay however doesn't crit, that's correct.

[Asherdoom 5]

i would not put 2 shadow points in improved SWP due to debuff liits here in vanilla: instead put on  Shadow affinity: mind blast is too much a big nuke to transcurate in rotation and removing some aggro from it helps tanks especially in dungeons.

 

i confirm: DOT and CHANNELED started crit from WOTLKCATA era, in vanilla all periodic effect DO NOT CRIT.

From WOWWIKI

Quote

patch 4.0.1, all DoTs can crit, and all spell DoTs and some physical DoTs innately scale with haste. Unlike prior implementations of DoT haste scaling, DoTs do not lose duration when affected by haste

other than that interesting spec :)

[Rafale 6]

I'm sure i saw arcane missiles crit on nostalrius...

[cryofsorrow 5]

4 hours ago, Asherdoom said:

i would not put 2 shadow points in improved SWP due to debuff liits here in vanilla

You mean you don't allow your shadow priest to put SW:P up on the boss? That's a miss then.
SW:P outdamages every other DoT in the game and that's why I believe it should be up there.

[Roxanne Flowers 15]

5 hours ago, cryofsorrow said:

I've also heard from mages that Arcane Missiles is critting, no clue if that's how it's supposed to be. Mind Flay however doesn't crit, that's correct.

Yeah, I figured I wasn't seeing things while playing my Mage.  My Mage will crit on Arcane Missiles about as often as use of Wand, so I figured that was the "correct" behavior rather than an outlier.

My guess is that the "proper" or, if you prefer, "intended" behavior ought to be to allow channeled spells of ALL kinds to spell crit while being channeled, whether they be healing spells (Tranquility anyone?) or damage spells (Arcane Missiles, Starshards, Siphon Life, Hurricane, Mind Flay, etc.).  Damage Over Time AFTER CASTING HAS BEEN COMPLETED however should NOT be allowed to spell crit ... so things spells like Corruption's DoT, or a Mage's Fire DoT that "burns" after the casting is done, or Shadow Word: Pain's DoT that do damage on "ticks" after casting should not spell crit.

The dividing line here would be whether the caster can engage in other actions/movement/spellcasting while the DoT ticks away.  If it's a "fire and forget" type of DoT that ticks while the caster can do other things, including casting other spells, it shouldn't spell crit on the DoT ticks.  If it's a "maintain casting" type of duration based effect for ticks, such as a channeled spell, then that spell should spell crit on the sustained casting ticks ... whether that be healing or damage.

Note that this means that the "initial hit" from something like a Fireball or a Moonfire spell would still be able to crit on the direct damage hit on "impact" ... but because the caster is free to do "other things" while the DoT effect ticks away, the respective DoTs for these spells shouldn't spell crit.

Or at least, that's the way I'd set things up in case anyone is asking.  Hope that clarifies my presumptions on the matter.

5 hours ago, Asherdoom said:

i would not put 2 shadow points in improved SWP due to debuff liits here in vanilla: instead put on  Shadow affinity: mind blast is too much a big nuke to transcurate in rotation and removing some aggro from it helps tanks especially in dungeons.

Um ... what?  I'm taking Silent Resolve for 5 talent points.

On 1/26/2017 at 1:38 PM, Roxanne Flowers said:

Silent Resolve - Rank 5/5
Reduces the threat generated by your spells by 20%.

That reduces the Threat generated by ALL SPELLS ... not just the Shadow ones.  Considering the fact that I'm looking towards using Shadow Word: Pain as my "only" source of Shadow damage (typically) and Starshards (primarily) for damage combined with mana efficiency, your proposal amounts to an Overkill Of Unnecessary And Unhelpful.  If I wanted to be playing a Shadow Form Priest, that calculus would change, but since I'm not ...

5 hours ago, Asherdoom said:

other than that interesting spec :)

Well, at least I'm pleased that it has amused you for a short time.  ^_~

1 hour ago, Rafale said:

I'm sure i saw arcane missiles crit on nostalrius...

I'm quite sure I was seeing Arcane Missiles crit on Darrowshire in the past couple of days ... hence the request for corroboration from others, and my confusion at why Starshards doesn't crit on damage ticks while Arcane Missiles does.  In this case, I'm presuming that Starshards is the outlier that ought to be fixed so that it can spell crit (for reasons which I hope I don't need to elaborate).

44 minutes ago, cryofsorrow said:

You mean you don't allow your shadow priest to put SW:P up on the boss? That's a miss then.
SW:P outdamages every other DoT in the game and that's why I believe it should be up there.

Guys ... my Priest is currently Level 17 ... and I'm more concerned with being able to solo self(ish) sufficiently than I am with raid specs for the time being.  At my level, the 16 debuff slot cap isn't really an issue for me (yet), so ...

Heck, I'm still waiting to reach Tier 3 in Discipline before spending anything in Shadow.

[Deathlace 2]

The reason Arcane Missiles can crit is because it is not technically a DoT. In fact, it does not take a debuff slot so it is simply considered x separate spells that hit the target while you remain channeling.

Starshards and Mind Flay, on the other hand, take up a debuff slot. Therefore, they are considered DoTs and cannot crit.

[Asherdoom 5]

14 hours ago, cryofsorrow said:

You mean you don't allow your shadow priest to put SW:P up on the boss? That's a miss then.
SW:P outdamages every other DoT in the game and that's why I believe it should be up there.

debuff limit is 8 on current content (PVE SERVER) which means priority debuffs are: warrior sunder armor, mage ignite (if fire specced) warlock curses. SWP and shadow word pain find no place for now. once the slots increase to 16 i see clearly your point. The reason why i say that is you will pass most of the time trying to refresh SWP when other members overwrite it. your rotation is pretty solid.

 

 

 

[Roxanne Flowers 15]

Arcane Missiles (rank 8)
655 mana
30 yd range
ChanneledInstant
Launches Arcane Missiles at the enemy, causing 230 Arcane damage each second for 5 sec.
(6) Apply Aura #23: Periodic Trigger
Interval: 1 seconds

Starshards (rank 7)
350 mana
30 yd range
ChanneledInstant
Rains starshards down on the enemy target's head, causing 936 Arcane damage over 6 sec.
(6) Apply Aura #3: Periodic Damage
Value: 156
Interval: 1 seconds

Still trying to find the ... *cough* ... EXCUSE ... *ahem!* ... for why Starshards is programmed to occupy a debuff slot AT ALL ... especially since that debuff slot being full doesn't prevent the spell from doing damage (because channeled).  From where I'm typing, it looks like Lousy Legacy Programming.

The only difference I can find between these two spells, functionally, is that one says "Periodic Trigger" and one says "Periodic Damage" and I suspect it's just a programming semantics thing akin to "six of one, half a dozen of the other" since functionally both spells essentially do exactly the same thing (1 hit per second for channeled duration).  Unfortunately, this is a case of "six can crit, but half a dozen cannot" apparently, which makes No Sense™ when viewed objectively.

 

3 minutes ago, Asherdoom said:

your rotation is pretty solid.

If you thought Shadow Priests had a boring rotation, the one for using Starshards is downright narcoleptic.

Shadow: Mind Blast then Shadow Word: Pain then Mind Flay x2 then Wand (if necessary)
Starshards: Shadow Word: Pain then Starshards x4 then Wand (if necessary)

[Deathlace 2]

The DB from vanillagaming is also SORT OF incorrect since it is based on stock mangos(?) and it actually does have Arcane Missiles occupying a debuff slot. However if you ever look at videos from Vanilla WoW, you will see multiple mages using AM on a boss with 8 debuffs already on it. Furthermore, you will notice no debuff icon on a target that you apply Arcane Missiles to.

On the flip side, I believe Starshards does have a debuff icon? It's possible it never took a debuff slot in original vanilla. Honestly, I don't know if it did. I didn't play a Priest back then. But you'd find it next to impossible to find proof to support that claim. It was easy to find Mages using Arcane Missiles in a raid setting. Finding Starshards being used in a raid setting, however....

[Roxanne Flowers 15]

Either way, I'm still of the opinion that Starshards ought to be in the category of spells which can Crit.  At this time, the evidence says that it doesn't.  I figure there's a programming reason behind that, which while perhaps not a "bug" per se is probably more like a case of Blizzard Code Lazy™ and is therefore something that ought to be easy enough to do something about ... once the appropriate staffer has the time.

That said ... expecting the appropriate staffer to have the time to look into this may be something of a tall order, since it isn't exactly a Priority, and Developer Attention is an absurdly precious commodity.

[Klaas 0]

Nice Read,

 

I have also seen arcane missles crit, but also bug alot. (in other ways)

 

As far as it should be dots and channels do not crit. 

 

I would like to explore a holy option of this build that takes Spiritual guidance and focus on spirit as source of dmg and as manaregen with the 6 sec, spirit tap and Meditation

[Roxanne Flowers 15]

13 hours ago, Klaas said:

Nice Read,

I have also seen arcane missles crit, but also bug alot. (in other ways)

As far as it should be dots and channels do not crit.

Thank you.  This has been a fun bit of sideline exploration of mechanics and possibilities for me, as you can probably tell.

Given the "fact" that Starshards is programmatically incapable of landing critical hits ... that kind of makes me think that going all the way to 31 (or 33) in Discipline is not as useful as I was intending it to be.  Why?

Force of Will - Rank 5/5
Increases your spell damage by 5% and the critical strike chance of your offensive spells by 5%.

If there's no critical strike for EITHER Starshards OR Shadow Word: Pain then the value of Force of Will is dramatically reduced, since it then just becomes +5% Damage ONLY for offensive spells, of which Shadow Word: Pain and Starshards become the primary offensive damage spells.  Going 30 talents deep into Discipline for THAT doesn't seem like that wise of an investment anymore due to the lack of help from critical hits.

13 hours ago, Klaas said:

I would like to explore a holy option of this build that takes Spiritual guidance and focus on spirit as source of dmg and as manaregen with the 6 sec, spirit tap and Meditation

Funny you should mention that, since I've been thinking along the same lines, where if I'm not angling for max Damage explicitly via Discipline ... well ... what would that look like instead?  The answer I'm getting back (for my personal preferences) looks decidedly ... non-standard ... to say the least.  Have a look at this 21/25/5 spec ...

http://db.vanillagaming.org/?talent#bVgGc00oZbEp0c0VZx

A lot of "the usual suspects" disappear when you're building for using damaging spells in an efficient Damage Per Mana spec where the spells you're using can't score critical hits.  Things like ... Inner Focus ... which appears in almost every build that gets to 13-14 in Discipline (for what should be obvious reasons).

 

Level 60 Priest (21/25/5)

Discipline (21 points)

Wand Specialization - Rank 5/5
Increases your damage with Wands by 25%.

Silent Resolve - Rank 5/5
Reduces the threat generated by your spells by 20%.

Improved Power Word: Fortitude - Rank 2/2
Increases the effect of your Power Word: Fortitude and Prayer of Fortitude spells by 30%.

Improved Power Word: Shield - Rank 3/3
Increases the damage absorbed by your Power Word: Shield by 15%.

Martyrdom - Rank 2/2
Gives you a 100% chance to gain the Focused Casting effect that lasts for 6 sec after being the victim of a melee or ranged critical strike. The Focused Casting effect prevents you from losing casting time when taking damage and increases resistance to Interrupt effects by 20%.

Meditation - Rank 3/3
Allows 15% of your Mana regeneration to continue while casting.

Divine Spirit - Rank 1/1
Holy power infuses the target, increasing their Spirit by 17 for 30 min.

 

Holy (25 points)

Healing Focus - Rank 2/2
Gives you a 70% chance to avoid interruption caused by damage while casting any healing spell.

Holy Specialization - Rank 5/5
Increases the critical effect chance of your Holy spells by 5%.

Spell Warding - Rank 5/5
Reduces all spell damage taken by 10%.

Divine Fury - Rank 4/5
Reduces the casting time of your Smite, Holy Fire, Heal and Greater Heal spells by 0.4 sec.

Holy Nova - Rank 1/1
Causes an explosion of holy light around the caster, causing 28 to 33 Holy damage to all enemy targets within 10 yards and healing all party members within 10 yards for 52 to 61. These effects cause no threat.

Improved Healing - Rank 3/3
Reduces the Mana cost of your Lesser Heal, Heal, and Greater Heal spells by 15%.

Spiritual Guidance - Rank 5/5
Increases spell damage and healing by up to 25% of your total Spirit.

 

Shadow (5 points)

Spirit Tap - Rank 5/5
Gives you a 100% chance to gain a 100% bonus to your Spirit after killing a target that yields experience. For the duration, your Mana will regenerate at a 50% rate while casting. Lasts 15 sec.

 

It saddens me to think that this spec would lose Improved Shadow Word: Pain out of Shadow, as well as Inner Focus out of Discipline ... but by contrast the build gets stronger defensively and makes for a better second string healer.  With the planned spell rotations, Inner Focus would realistically only get used for either Holy Fire (as an opening strike) or for a healing spell, but the build isn't really structuring itself to combo off critical heals (note the lack of the Inspiration talent in Holy).

Oddly enough, this 21/25/5 build winds up being perhaps the most maximally optimized by buffing Spirit as much as possible so as to not only add +Spell Damage and +Healing but also to maximize "5 second rule" mana regeneration which unlike pretty much almost any other build for a Priest will be very high while using Starshards ... potentially even to "break even" point of being able to cast Starshards almost indefinitely, or even (with sufficient downranking) to rely primarily on +Spell Damage for throughput on target while remaining net mana recovery positive over time while continuously casting(!).  This then creates the decidedly ... odd ... circumstance in which it is possible to have a Priest who values +Spirit WAY more highly than +MP/5 modifiers, to the point of stacking Spirit as a primary stat before even Intelligence in order to do damage (oh, and heal, when that's necessary).

Now, granted, going in this direction involves breaking a LOT of "rules" for Priests, and I'm sure that our BiS Raiders will look at this idea and (rightfully) scoff at it as being woefully inadequate in multiple directions simultaneously for end game raiding ... and that's fine with me.  Right now I'm more interested in exploring the unknown territory that this whole idea/experiment represents than I am in following the well worn path of going where EVERYONE has gone before (Shadow Form).  And the best part is, I wouldn't have seriously considered a 21/25/5 spec if I hadn't been willing to go out and test drive the 33/11/7 spec in the first place.  Fortunately, my Priest is still only Level 17 so it's not too late for me to change my plans and switch specs without having to pay for a respec, which at 1g for a new account on a new server isn't exactly cheap when trying to hoard resources to advance professions.

So thanks, Klaas.  Good question.

[Rayaleith 2]

The only problem with this is that you won't get any use of it while leveling, since the "core" of your damage relies on spiritual guidance. So you need to decide which tree to go after first after spirit tap+wand spec which should be the first 10 talent points anyway.

[Roxanne Flowers 15]

To be fair, even with the 33/11/7 spec, I was looking at needing to get to Levels 40-ish before being able to have any access to Force of Will (in tier 6) for +5% spell damage anyway.  As far as I'm concerned, that's all kind of a wash so far as that goes for "haste" of getting there.

Right now, with the 21/25/5 spec, I'm looking at getting up to Meditation before picking up Spirit Tap and then starting in on the Holy tree to get to Spiritual Guidance.  Obviously, anyone who might be interested in following in my footsteps isn't obliged to walk exactly the same path that I am ... since the 21/25/5 spec is "loose enough" in its particulars to permit a variety of build strategies through Discipline and Holy in order to reach Divine Spirit and Spiritual Guidance, and they don't exactly "require" you to reach them in any particular order or sequencing.

Even taking your recommendation into account, if spending the first 10 talent points in Spirit Tap and Wand Specialization, it'll take another 21-25 talent points to reach Spiritual Guidance, meaning Level 40+ (again) ... so it really depends on which "route" you want to invest in most heavily to get the rewards for faster.  Then again, as mentioned in my OP, I'm not exactly "racing" to get to Level 60 in week (or two), so the fact that I won't have access to specific talents at a particular timing sequence is less of a problem for me.  If anyone else wants to try this out for themselves, Your Mileage May Vary (as the saying goes).

Just to clarify ... the reason why I didn't take Spirit Tap as my first 5 points basically boils down to the fact that once I was able to get/craft my Greater Magic Wand I stopped needing to use spells for damage in the teen Levels, since both the DPS and the DPM of using a Wand was superior to Starshards at this time (since the Wand can crit and Starshards can't, mumble mumble fink grumble...).  Concurrent with that, most hostile mobs aren't even managing to inflict enough damage to get through my Power Word: Shield while I'm pouring damage into them, meaning that I'm taking hardly any HP damage and what mana I do use is fully recovered by the time the mob I'm fighting is dead at my feet due to being Wanded to death.  Those two factors combined mean that Spirit Tap is largely superfluous to my solo gaming experience while I play my way through all three Alliance campaigns concurrently (Darnassus, Gnomeregan/Ironforge, Stormwind) where the challenge is to complete quests before they turn grey while gaining Faction Rep hand over fist.  All of which means that at this time I'm experiencing next to no downtime or need to drink even without having Spirit Tap while getting up to Level 17 (so far).

Now, granted, I fully expect the dynamics of that to change, particularly at Level 18 when I can pick up Starshards (rank 2) and finally start getting better DPS than I can with my Wand (162/6=27 DPS vs 17.5*1.25=21.875 DPS) and then Spirit Tap and mana recovery will become "important" again because I'll be casting spells instead of Wanding everything in sight once more ... so you're definitely making a compelling argument on that front.  Guess I'll need to check to see if I've got 1g lying around among my 8 characters for a quick respec once I get to Level 18 so as to switch to Wand Specialization and Spirit Tap just like you're advising ...

As always, standard disclaimer ... everything I'm writing about is very much a work in progress and I'm learning as I go, simply because it feels like (to some extent) I'm blazing a new trail here and I want to share with the community everything that I'm learning along the way as I (lazily) wend my way towards 60.

[Roxanne Flowers 15]

So I scrounged up the 1g for a respec on my Level 17 Priest so as to give her 5/5 Spirit Tap and 3/5 Wand Specialization rather than continuing to follow the 33/11/7 spec plan I'd been working on since the beginning of this thread.  Fair warning to everyone following this topic, at some point soon here I'm going to be making a new thread for the 21/25/5 build I've been working on so as to avoid reduce potential points of confusion.

 

Since i've been playing all three Alliance campaigns "in parallel" on each of my 8 characters (yes. it's a project), it was finally time to head out to Westfall and start gathering up Sacks of Oats and burning down Harvest Watchers and hunting for Goretusk Livers and Red Bandanas and all the rest of the "go here, do this" busywork you're given out in Westfall.  In relatively short order I'd reached Level 18, put another talent point into Wand Specialization, Hearthstoned back to Darnassus and picked up Starshards (rank 2) and Power Word: Shield (rank 3) and then set about getting myself back to Westfall to finish up the questing I needed to do there before heading back to Loch Modan and grinding my way through a lot of the progression questing there ... after which I'm circling back to Darkshore to finish up the progression questing out there too.

Getting to Level 18 (and now 19) and being able to use a rank of Starshards that can finally outdamage my Wand again (didn't even get to MAKE a Wand until Level 14 due to lack of greens to Disenchant for materials) really produced a sea change in how I'm playing.  It really does come down to making sure I've got Power Word: Fortitude and Inner Fire up on myself before using Power Word: Shield and then proceeding to either just using my Wand (greys) or using Starshards (rank 2) twice followed by use of Wand if necessary to finish them off (if green) so as to proc Spirit Tap and just recover all that mana back in 15 seconds.

Right now, the feeling that I get playing this way is that I'm an almost invulnerable Mage (thanks to the Shield bubble) who is just destroying everything with Arcane (granted, that won't last, but still...).  I can burn 130 mana on Power Word: Shield and 85 mana (x2) on Starshards (rank 2) and with a Spirit Tap on a dead green get all of that mana back (300) inside the 15 second duration of Spirit Tap so long as I'm not casting during those 15 seconds.  I'm not even bothering with Shadow Word: Pain most of the time right now, because the trash mobs I'm fighting don't live long enough to get good use out of the mana cost.  Just about the only time I consider using Shadow Word: Pain is when I need to deal with 3 mobs at once, and even then I won't bother if I'm fighting 3 greys.

At any rate, I can certainly attest at this point that the advice of Rayaleith is sound concerning investing in Spirit Tap at Levels 10-14 and in Wand Specialization at Levels 15-19.  It certainly makes a lot of difference in being able to sustain use of spellcasting and use of your Wand without ever needing to stop to drink.

 

There is, however, a possibility for an interaction of talents that I'd be interested in learning more about, before I commit to it, which I haven't entertained previously.  Specifically ...

Discipline tier 2
Martyrdom - Rank 2/2
Gives you a 100% chance to gain the Focused Casting effect that lasts for 6 sec after being the victim of a melee or ranged critical strike. The Focused Casting effect prevents you from losing casting time when taking damage and increases resistance to Interrupt effects by 20%.

Holy tier 3
Blessed Recovery - Rank 3/3
After being struck by a melee or ranged critical hit, heal 25% of the damage taken over 6 sec.

 

Now, a lot of the advice/recommendations I've read in these forums concerning both Martyrdom and Blessed Recovery basically amount to "don't bother with either of these" in part because there's a lot of assumption that anyone (who is Anyone™) will already be Level 60 and looking for raiding specs, and in the context of 5/10/20/40 man circumstances, you aren't exactly "planning" on having your Priest be taking a lot of aggro/hits and therefore these talents lose a significant portion of their value.  After all, if you're not being hit (because you're not supposed to ever get aggro since that means your Tank is bad) then spending talent points on things that only proc when you take a critical hit make very little sense and offer very little return on investment.

That calculus changes however when dealing with a solo context while leveling up to 60.  When you're the only one with aggro, mobs are going to be attacking YOU, and sometimes they'll be doing critical hits against you with either melee or ranged attacks.

But then ... there's Power Word: Shield and its Absorb function ... which I'm not clear on how that might inter(re)act with being able to proc either or both of these talents.

So I'm wondering if critical hits against the Power Word: Shield that get fully Absorbed will still proc Martyrdom and/or Blessed Recovery ... or does a critical hit need to actually inflict damage upon your Priest in order to proc them?  I figure that Martyrdom "ought to" proc even while the Shield is up, simply because of the wording used in the talent description, but the wording used for Blessed Recovery leaves an ambiguity in the interpretation depending on the nuances.  I'd like to think that Blessed Recovery ought to proc even with the Shield up, but I also thought that Starshards ought to be able to critically hit and it turns out it can't, so ... I figured I'd ask around before finalizing my plans for a 21/25/5 talent spec build.  Why?  Because I'm thinking that combining Martyrdom and Blessed Recovery might be a prudent choice after all, while I'm breaking all kinds of other "rules" about how to build (and play) an ... Arcane Priest?

Anyone out there have experience with getting either Martyrdom and/or Blessed Recovery to proc while Power Word: Shield is still up?

Edited February 19, 2017 by Roxanne Flowers
pytos

[Aethelwulf 12]

The only time Starshards was worthwhile as a channel was in Burning Crusade before they made it an instant DoT in 2.3.0 (it was very useful as an instant DoT though). At that time for a Shadow Priest, Starshards had a higher spell damage coefficient than a maxed Mind Flay (which has a terrible custom coefficient for some reason) so if you didn't care for the slow, you were better off using Starshards. In vanilla, the only real reason to use Starshards is in PvP as a Shadow Priest because you're worried about enemies locking you out of shadow school. With two stacks of Shadow Weaving up, Mind Flay already does more damage than Starshards though. Elune's Grace is also vastly inferior to Desperate Prayer, but at least it's usable in Shadowform. One more problem with Elune's Grace is that if you dodge a Warrior's attack, he will immediately Overpower you (it's an instant attack which they can only use after their enemy dodges, it cannot be dodged, and they typically have the talents to give Overpower +50% crit chance, so it will hit extremely hard).

Ultimately on the Alliance, Dwarves tend to be the best for both PvP and PvE.