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These are some old Discipline Priest notes from when Cataclysm was new a we were still trying to figure our shit out.

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Spells ∞

• Penance is the go-to spell when it’s off cooldown. I’m experimenting with _not_ glyphing to reduce the cooldown. So far it’s awkward.
• Flash heal is now obsolete
• Binding Heal is only good on heroc trash at the initial pull because of its low threat
• Heal

• Greater Heal

  • .. I’ve never used Heal or Greater Heal and I won’t start now. Special builds can take advantages of oddities.
• Prayer of Mending should always be bouncing if there’s enough group damage to warrant it. Otherwise it’s a panic extra heal.
• Renew is excellent to keep up on anyone who is currently hurt and is expected to take more damage soon.

• Prayer of Healing is your new god.

Three things have completely changed the way Discipline Priests operate.

• Spell: Prayer of Healing — A powerful prayer heals the friendly target’s party members within 30 yards for 5535 to 5739.
• Talent: Divine Aegis — Critical heals and all heals from Prayer of Healing create a protective shield on the target, absorbing 30% of the amount healed. Lasts 12 sec.

• Glyph: Glyph of Prayer of Healing — Your Prayer of Healing spell also heals an additional 20% of its initial heal over 6 sec.

Why is flash heal basically dead?

• Flash Heal – 1.5s cast / 5800 mana / 10k heal

• Prayer of Healing – 2.5s cast / 5300 mana / 5.5k heal of up to 5 targets, plus 30% shield, plus 20% hot

The 30% shield which Prayer of Healing grants stacks! It can be cast and re-cast and kept alive and will continue to build up. This means a disc can build a huge buffer against occasional damage.

So here’s how I’ve been doing things:

• Pre-shield the tank before the pull (if done too late, fade asap)
• Always keep a shield up on the tank.
• Renew on the tank when damage begins to appear.
• Prayer of healing when the tank begins to take damage, or even before then.
• Penance the tank when it’s off cooldown. It’s very mana efficient. Shield yourself to avoid losing a tick of the penance if you’re damaged. A bit of haste may help this.
• Pop trinkets and other powerups often. An undocumented macro change denies multiple abilities from being chain-activated as was possible. Two trinkets cannot be used one after the other thanks to a new cooldown.
• Blow pain suppression often.
• Cast Power Word: Barrier a lot. People need to get used to standing in it. If they see it every few pulls maybe it’ll sink in.

• Prayer of Mending is a gamble unless a few people are taking enough damage to destroy a shield. It’s a reasonable thing to toss onto the tank in harsh situations.

• Treat dps like a tank if they pull threat. Sometimes penance on the dps instead of the tank. dps are squishy and the tank might be able to keep up for longer without penance.

Remember that once your shield gets blown away, it’s a sure sign that you need to pay attention to that unit. Your unit frames addon needs to be tweaked to show both the shield and its debuff. (and prayer of mending imo) and nothing else but dispellable debuffs.

I will also display and highlight the frame for specific boss debuffs.

Stats ∞

My use of Prayer of Healing changes a lot of things.

– Its 2.5s cast time makes haste valuable.
– It doesn’t rely on crits to proc its shield.

• Spell Power – You can’t remaster to spell power, so this should be the highest concern for weapons. It’s not available on other Cataclysm gear.
• Spirit – Good for healing specs and for shadow.
• Int – Int’s mana pool benefit is worthless, it’s the spell power you want from it.
• Mastery – I think it’s a tie between int and mastery. This really depends on your play style. A bonus to shielding really is excellent but with a prayer of healing build raw int is more useful overall.
• Haste –

• Crit – Not important compared to other stats because your crit rate is improved on people with the weakened soul debuff. (to check/edit)

Reforging ∞

It’s a balance between spirit and int. Once comfortable with regen, go heavy on int. Haste isn’t entirely an afterthought, but it should be present.

I have not played with reforging yet, but I have four sets of gear I’ve been collecting in order to have variety to play with. I do actually have a bunch of +hit stuff for some reason that I ought to either reforge or vendor.

Gems ∞

Gem for the socket bonus. The priorities to me are:

Spirit > Int > Stamina > Mastery > Haste

Int vs Spirit is based on your confidence / mana handling.

Stamina is based on your general handling and survivability. I end up with Stamina on gems because it’s the go-to stat on dual-colour gems.

Mastery vs Haste is based on your needs and timing, and the preference for shields or prayer of healing.

There’s only the one meta gem that matters. (to edit)

Spec ∞

I used a dps-discipline spec for levelling, which was fantastic. I’m a boring pure-discipline spec which ignores the evangelism cooldown ability. When trying it, it appears to be completely worthless.

(to edit)

Trade Skills ∞

I have no idea. I’m unskilled.