Juli

Similarly you can use a heal to fake an interrupt when you want to land a mind control or mana burn and have health to spare.

Often when a warrior is on me and separated from his support I will get all my instants on cooldown (pom/pw:s/renew) and then start a gheal, intending for it to get pummeled, then mind control him. If intercept is on cooldown, he doesn't back out fast enough to intercept me, I resist the intercept stun, or I do it with a mystical skyfire proc, thats up to 10 seconds of me not taking any damage, MS can fall off, hamstring can fall off, and depending on positioning I may be be able to run him to the opposite side of a pillar I'm standing next to. Using a heal to bait interrupts to mana burn is more straightforward.

Update: I decided to make my buff tracking mod public. It has been VERY helpful for timing fears around berserker rage/death wish/COS, and keeping freedom/bop/divine shield/barkskin etc dispelled. PurgeIt | World of Warcraft @ Curse

 

wutdaheck

Would there ever be a circumstance where i would want to dispel unstable affliction and take the hit? I saw someone post about it in another thread but this choice just seems mind-boggling to me.

 

Howard Roark

I dont think so. The "nuke" part of UA has like a 180% dmg coefficient. I never dispel it so I have no idea how much it hits for from an arena geared warlock but it must be like 1500 + 1000 + 800 ish?

 

Borland

Everyone out there that has a team having both priest+mage - make your mages get imp amplify magic and put it on both.

Priests die mainly from melee dmg and having buff that does +360 healing is realy a big differance.
Its actually like giving mages ability to put fel armor on his teammates.

 

Juli

Not sure if this has been posted elsewhere, but for anyone wondering about the new Chastise for dwarf priests:

* The spell damage coefficient is 14.217% for all ranks (no downrank penalty) based on my testing.
* Rank 1 is the same duration (2sec) and costs 50 mana, versus 300 mana for max rank
* 20 yard range
* 30 second cooldown
* 0.5 second cast time
* Not castable in shadow form
* Locks out holy school if interrupted
* Works only on humanoids (so much for helping your partner catch druids)

To get the coefficient, I cast max rank chastise on troggs in Gol'Bolar Quarry for a while with 1041 spell damage until I got 2 hits that were 60 damage apart (the base damage is 370-430, 60 apart). I had no talent points spent. Max was 578, min was 518. Checking for downrank penalty was similar (and easier because the min and max are only 6 damage apart), 195 min, 201 max with rank 1.

 

Calantus

Does WotF break it?

 

• caladein

It's an Incapacitate like Gouge so I don't believe so. Berserker Rage would work though.

 

Rockstar

Considering it's classified as a "Gouge effect" (i.e. disorient), then no, WoTF will not break it.

edit: Beaten to it.

 

Juli

Yeah, the same things that break gouge will break it. I did test berserker rage and it did break it, forgot to mention that. Haven't tested what happens when you cast it on a warrior that already has berserker rage up. I would imagine that it does the damage but the incapacitate portion gets immuned.

 

Deadhands

Something that has been causing me trouble lately is running into teams in the 2v2 bracket with a good mana burner. My partner is a rogue and our general strategy so far has been in a healer/dps setup to work the healer while I tank/kite/LOS their dps class and in a double dps setup to work the perceived weakest dps class. With the exception of MS warriors I can usually survive against most other classes while my partner finishes off one of the two. The bad situations are usually ones where she isn't killing one of them fast enough and I'm getting drained down while healing myself which usually results in me dying quicker than I generally should. Should we be putting more pressure on mana drainers than a healer or is it just a matter of LOSing and kiting more?

Some of the more recent ones I can think of were,

MS war / priest combo, MS war went on her while the priest burned me, I ended up getting tapped out of mana fairly quickly healing her through MS and getting burned.

Hunter / SPriest, I had the viper sting on me almost constantly while they kept her kited/cc'd. The SPriest was also tossing in burns while she was feared. I think the error in this fight was her going for the SPriest over the hunter.

Warlock / healer setups where the lock is dead on with fear/coil/DoTs and draining me in between each.

 

moowalk

I've started taking my rogue/priest team a bit more seriously. From my (limited) understanding, the general idea is for the rogue to 'tank' the dpser. This forces the opposing healer to come out and heal, which allows you to mana burn them.

It's a little counter intuitive I guess, since rogues like killing healers.

I found manaburning the lock amazingly effective in lock/healer teams too.

 

Shinho

I have found that my survivability peaks and pits. I have never been able to say "I can stay alive" or "I'm going to die" for certain. With the original posters gear and spec, there is a much large peak chance than there is pit chance. Warriors in particular will always sit on me as the teams healer. If I see the Warrior, then I know I need to prepare for him. Alone you will never be able to stand toe-to-toe with a Mortal Strike Warrior, and you should never try to tackle him alone. Some things I do to stay alive:

Communicate with your team. Let them know that the Warrior is on you, and if he hasn't engaged yet, tell them if he is targeting you.

Plan ahead. Depending on the team size and team members you may (or may not) have someone who can help you out. Utilize Blind, Hammer of Justice, Curse of Exhaustion, Blessing of Freedom, Blessing of Protection, Frost Shock, Earthbind, Concussive Shot, Frost Trap, Hamstring, Crippling Poison, Cyclone, Entangling Roots, Fears, and anything else that slows your opponent, or otherwise help you get away.

Understand the Warriors abilities, and limitations. If you see the Warrior with 0 Rage before he engages you, dot him before he gets his charge off. This will prevent him from charging, force him into Berserk Stance, and force him to use Bloodrage. Know the cooldown of Pummel, Intercept, Death Wish, and Berserk Rage.

If you need to heal your team, get him to burn pummel. I often cast a Flash Heal and then cancel it, or cast Mind Control. A usual gut reaction is to pummel Mind Control, so use it.

As a healer I am rarely the first kill target, and it can be difficult to keep your teammate up when he is getting trained and you are getting beat down by a warrior. I usually burn my Psychic Scream early, and even if the Warrior uses one of his cooldowns to remove it, it's enough time to keep up your teammate. Use renew, PoM, and Shield as much as possible. I have a +heal use trinket so I pop that right away and it helps with keeping teammates up while you're fighting off a Warrior.

The key method is understanding you cannot stand toe-to-toe. Coordinate help from your team, and you can keep alive.

 

Herrera

Your only trouble should be warrior/paladin teams and warrior/druid (unless the druid is dumb and doesn't LoS mana burn). Going for the SP in the SP/Hunter combo is the right decision. A rogue is able to lock down a priest better than anything else. You should easily heal thru the hunter dps and he shouldn't drain all your mana in the time a rogue kills a shadow priest. Help your rogue with dispelling the priest. You will be strong against many good combos (warlock/healer, warlock/sp, anything/mage etc.) Warrior/healer will give you trouble, but not warrior/priest. Priests live longer with warrior on them than a rogue.

 

roosevelt

I tend to agree with your advice, however, on the last point, any smart warrior will jump the rogue and force you (the priest) to heal him rather than jumping you. At that point if the opposing priest can manage to get away (stoneskin/trinket/fear/etc.) it forces the rogue on the warrior, which is almost always a losing proposition.

Luckily, it's rare to see warrior/priest past 2k, as warriors seem to synergize better with the 3 other healers. On the other hand, it's the easiest matchup for rogue/priest vs war/healer to win (all the rest being very slim) so maybe it's not lucky.

 

Mem

Playing a 2:2 with a priest I agree. You chances to win against priest/warrior playing priest/rogue slim down once the rogues has to blow his cooldowns. If the priest from the priest/warrior team is still standing after the rogue has used his last snarebreaker he can be easily kited by the priest, creating a straight rogue - warrior matchup where the rogue is severely handicapped by having only evasion left to tank the warrior.
Also you won't be able to cast a lot of burns due to the fact the the rogue will constantly eat the damage from the warrior while going for the priest while having no avoidanc at all (most attacks will come from behind). If you spend to much time on burning the priest your rogue will just die.

 

Demosthenes

I play a rogue/priest 2v2 combo and at first around the 2k rating the teams that were giving us troubles were the healer/warr combo's. My teamate, the rogue, got a couple PvE upgrades that increased his DPS considerably(he's mut spec) and so we decided to try a conservative approach to healer/warr combo's. It actually worked, the rogue gets on the warr, and through shields/renews/prom's and some GHeal 7's now and then I can keep the rogue up longer then the warr.

Now at 2192 the only teams that give us troubles are shaman/warr where the shaman just purges me to hell and the warr wrecks me with WF and good gear(IE ToD or CE). Druid/Warr can be a hassle sometimes, but as long as I get the innervate and make sure to keep the pressure up on the druid we normally beat them. One thing that wreck's us are gib combo's that run around in the 1900 bracket and take 27 points. Like 2 rogues that can sap/double blind my rogue partner and they have a good 20 seconds uninterrupted on me(of course their UD ) or a good spriest/rogue team with lucky mace stuns.

So to other rogue/priest teams out there, for pally/warr | Druid/warr keep at it, you'll figure out what works for you sooner or later, though if you ever figure out how to survive a shaman/warr please tell

 

Tinweasele

I am sorry if i am helping contribute to turning this into a "help me in pvp thread" but im actually here on behalf of my spriest partner in 2v2s. i run a feral druid and we JUST got back to 1500 after 80 games 0_o. it seems like he isnt capable of killing or surviving ANY class except pure healers that wont hit him at all. we are exceptionally good at killing endurance teams war/healer or rogue/healer, but it seems like ANY dps/dps team of any variety it ends up being me vs 2 others. it would be ok if i could just chain cyclone a dps and then he could kill the other dps but he loses to EVERY SINGLE CLASS. zhaeve is his name (should be the only one in US armory). i have no clue what to tell him anymore and hes getting frustrated and fed up with arena and pvp in general.

 

Icetro

On nights when I'm playing through bad ping I can catch a UA or two sometimes, and I will confirm that it is indeed 3k+ for any moderately geared warlock.

 

Calantus

I bet $50 his gear is crap, let me look...

Yep. I'd be very surprised indeed if he could do anything at all in that gear. A shadow priest is one of those specs/classes that is entirely powerless without gear. You have 1 fear on a 30 second cooldown and a shield on a 15 second cooldown, and that's it. You can either tank the damage and burn them down before you die, or you can't. There's little tricks, but nothing like something a mage or warlock can do to win bad gear fights. He's just going to get his face plowed in until he gets the gear. Tell him to socket all his temporary gear with stamina (he can switch to damage or w/e he likes once he's geared, not before) and to grind as much honor as he can stand. Until then he's just going to have to accept the beatings.

 

Darkmantle

The main purpose of dispeling UA is to allow you to get at the protected debuffs. For instance against a 2 UA warlock Spriest team if you have a priest chain dispeling their target with a paladin ready to remove the silence then you can strip a lot of those dots off leaving you far more able to heal their target.

Or if your paladin gets a UA + full duration fear and trinket/DS are down then you dispel him and he dispels you. Its better than having the paladin out of action for 10 seconds.

 

Peekaboo

Has anybody done rough calculations of the mana efficency of dispelling warlock/priest dots versus healing through them?

I find a lot of times in 2vs2 and 3vs3s I will sneak in mana burns on their healer/shadow priest while my pom bounces and my renews tick before the dots become a real issue. I am assuming this is a big net gain in mana for my team.

But sometimes if I'm in a hole after the burns and chaining some binding heals to catch up, I wonder is simply staying on top of the defensive dispels wouldn't be better for "winning the mana war". Plus the defensive dispelling, assuming no UA, is a safer (no big health dips) and more mobile strategy.

Of course really "heavy dots" leave you little choice.

 

Calantus

I tend to dispell when I can if I'm the only healer. DoTs don't just do damage, they also aid a burst down with free (doesn't cost cast/gcd time during the burst) damage, so you really don't want the things staying on a target if you can help it. It also lets me stay mobile which I find very important. If it's just 1 warlock's DoTs I usually don't bother though, only when it's lock/lock or SP/lock do the dots become scary enough that I want them to stay off, and yeah I do find ProM much more mana efficient over dispelling if I can afford to bounce it.

 

gia

I'm not really sure what trinket to use in arena (besides the obvious pvp trinket), any advice would be appreciated.

I'm currently using [Alembic of Infernal Power] and I also have a [Scarab of the Infinite Cycle] and a [Lower City Prayerbook].

I see a lot of priests using [Essence of the Martyr] but even if I do save up the badges for it, they might be better spent on a [Pauldrons of Perseverance] when 2.3 is out.

Other possible options:
[Timelapse Shard]
[Darkmoon Card: Vengeance]
[Darkmoon Card: Madness]
[Talisman of the Alliance]
[Violet Badge]

Here is my priest's profile.

 

Juli

I recommend [Essence of the Martyr] for 2v2 and 3v3 and [Pauldrons of Perseverance] for 5v5, but it can depend on your composition for sure. The clicky on [Pauldrons of Perseverance] is not as useful in the smaller brackets; you just really don't get burst hard enough for it to be worth it (but you do in 5v5). [Essence of the Martyr] makes a pretty big difference when you prebuff instants (pom/renew/shield) on your partner with the trinket active right before getting CC'd with your pvp trinket down against a burst team. POM and renew also have great healing coefficients and benefit a lot from the use: effect, and anything that makes PW:S eat more of a warrior's rage is a good thing. The passive defensive stat trinkets like [Alembic of Infernal Power], [Talisman of the Alliance] and [Timelapse Shard] are good when you're undergeared, until you get a full gladiator + honor gear set assembled.

While it's not easy for most pvp healing priests to get one, I personally use [The Skull of Gul'dan]. Nice perk of raiding shadow and respecing healing for arena every week. I use it over the healing trinkets because getting 36 spellhit for the hit cap is basically a requirement and frees me up to use healing enchants, the spell damage is close enough to the +healing on the other items due to ilvl, and the clicky is particularly nice because it's one of the few things that can enhance mana burn (power infusion + heroism + skull + [Mystical Skyfire Diamond] procs, yay).

 

Juli

There's a new update on the PTR's that I figure is worth mentioning here. From mmo-champion:

New discipline talent (same tier as Power Infusion):
Focused Will (1/3)
After taking a critical hit you gain the Focused Will effect, reducing critical damage taken by 10% and increasing healing effects on you by 10% for 6 sec.

Focused Will (3/3)
After taking a critical hit you gain the Focused Will effect, reducing critical damage taken by 30% and increasing healing effects on you by 30% for 6 sec.

Looks like discipline is likely going to be my spec of choice for all brackets if this goes live without changes. I imagine the buff works just like blessed resil as far as procing on noncrits due to resil gear, and is probably a dispellable magic buff. I'll hop on the PTR and check it out soon.