by Kate St Clair

Created on: January 05, 2010   Last Updated: January 20, 2010

Leveling a priest is easier using talent points in shadow form. If there is doubt as to which talents to choose, find an impressive 80 on the armory website and copy their talent tree. Leveling shadow will deal more damage and the higher you rise in level, the more you realize your priest can be a beast.

The basic spells for shadow damage are DOTs, Damage Over Time spells. These cause the target to take damage in smaller amounts over a short period of time. They are instant casts and you can move while dotting your target. Progressing in level acquires mind blast, mind flay and mind sear. They require you to stand still during casting time. Mind blast hits once with some major damage, while mind flay is a visual stream that sucks life from the target. Mind sear is an AOE spell, used during trash mobs. The larger the mob, the more damage you deal with mind sear.

One of the talent's shadow spec offers is dispersion. For a period of 3 sec you become a full shadow, damage taken is reduced by 90% and your mana regenerates. So there are two reasons for using dispersion. If you run low on mana and need an instant refill, hit dispersion. If you are close to death; fear the attackers, hit dispersion and run because you can move in this mode, then bubble as soon as you come out so you can heal.

Duel spec is offered at level 40, and if you can come up with the gold to purchase that, you can choose a second spec for healing. Discipline or Holy. Each is in demand in raids. Discipline focuses on tanks, because their spells reduce the damage taken by the tanks altogether increasing chances for staying alive. Holy are decent group healers. They have both instant casts that give lesser heals to the group and there are the larger healing casts that require standing still during casting time.

Priest also have two spells that remove debuffs. They can remove disease from their party which is done to each one individually. And they can remove magic spells cast on party members. There are two spells, one removes individually, the other is mass dispell and can remove it from the party if they are all standing within range of each other.

Priests have buffs to offer other party members. One increases stamina, another increases spirit, and the third is for shadow protection.

When entering an instance as shadow, a priest can still use their healing spells on themselves or other members of the party. Using the spells just shifts them out of shadow form, and this is no big deal since you can click right back into it.

Gear plays a major part in building a good priest. Shadow wants spell power, intellect, and spirit if regen is a concern. Intellect increases your mana and spell critical hit, and spirit increases your health and mana regeneration. When you reach the levels of 70’s its important to look for increases in your hit rating and after reaching 80 you want to increase your haste. Healers want spirit first, since healing uses a good amount of mana, regeneration is a must.

If you choose to play a priest, whether Alliance or Horde, be prepared to be in demand. Healers are an important instance runner.

Learn more about this author, Kate St Clair.
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