#0 - Oct. 31, 2008, 7:50 p.m.
PvP:
1) Dispersion. Some call this the 'self cyclone.' In other ways it's very similar to a mage's Ice Block. It's basically a self-cast trinket that regens some mana (some even call it a glorified mana pot.) It was supposed to address being a focus target in arenas. In this form, we still take damage and are unable to cast. We can still be CC'd and dotted up. As soon as Dispersion ends, everyone gets back on us again and basically we get blown up.
The argument here is that it really hasn't added much to Shadow Priest survivability. While it's nice, it's still not a great solution. Perhaps allow us to at least cast through it. More ideally is to give us better overall base survivability.
2) Being Dispelled. Our buffs our are lifeline. Without them, we drop very hard. All it takes is a Shaman to cast a few purges and we are out of inner fire, shadow protection, fortitude, and in some cases spirit. Lately I've found that all Shamans dispel you right off the start then you either have to spend time reapplying while in combat with GCD up or else you're pretty much dead. Especially if you have Inner Fire dispelled and there's a melee class on you - having that armor removed is a death sentence.
It's not only the problem that Shammys can purge, but also other classes - even mages can spellsteal from us.
Most of us spec (both Disc and Holy) into 3/3 Silent Resolve (which is supposed to reduce the chances of hots/dots (buffs???) being dispelled by 30%. To be honest, it doesn't even seem to be working.
Other classes have buffs which are permanent. Mages and warlocks for example. Some of their buffs are situational and also cannot be removed. I feel that priests are so vulnerable right now that they need a solution.
a. Possibly making Inner Fire more permanent.
b. Doubling the Silent Resolve coefficients or fixing them in case they are not working properly.
c. Allowing our Shield to prevent dispels.
3) Dispelling resistance. I've been up against a few mages that cast Slow. I noticed that in several instances I've gone to dispel it from myself and it still sticks. Last night I battled a mage and Dispelling Slow got resisted 3x in a row. If that procs against us, it is a death sentence.
As for dispelling others, it seems like our dispels have a 50/50 chance of succeeding. However, I NEVER see this problem when Shamans go to Purge.
4) Hymn of Hope is useless in Shadowform. It costs us a lot of mana because it forces us to drop Shadowform then we need to spend mana to get back into form. It doesn't even regenerate much mana to begin with. Plus it's channeling so we need to be out of combat. It's a very risky spell as shadow with little to no returns.
5) Dropping shadowform to heal. Again, there is a severe mana penalty when we are forced to heal. All our healing casts cost a lot more plus we take on added damage and do less damage. While I'm fine with this increase/decrease aspect, I think the mana cost of switching forms needs to be removed entirely.
6) No real burst damage. The only thing we have as instants that really do burst are:
a. Shadow Word:Death
b. Penance (if you're Disc)
In PvP, Priests really don't base their overall damage around critting. Our current gear doesn't reflect spell critical strike. We also have a maximum low cap on crit rates. The one real instant 'burst' that we have as Shadow is Shadow Word:Death. Even this has a self-inflicted damage penalty - if we have no shield up it damages us. If we do have a shield up, it reduces the strength of our own shield. I believe I've read some WOTLK forum posts where the self-inflicted damage aspect of this has been removed.
While removing SWD penalty should help us a little, it still doesn't give us any 'real' burst/crit. I think the CD on SWD needs to be lowered slightly.
As for Penance, I really like this spell. However, we cannot self-cast and it's also currently target-faced bugged.
7) Current Vampiric Touch is useless. You reduced the mana regeneration so raids are less reliant on Shadow Priests in order to run instance. The damage from this is negligible at best. It also NOW requires Mindblast to proc a very low mana regeneration. The cost of casting this now is more than the amount you will see returned. It not only has a 1.5 second cast time but also forces you to cast a timed Mindblast. Rank 5, 935 damage over 15 seconds is also pretty weak. I'd almost say double the damage or cut the 15 seconds in half. Most of the burst damage in an arena is seen within the first few seconds of an opener. Usually within 15 seconds, someone is dead with 3.0.2. Better yet, replenish our own mana at a better rate and/or remove the reliance on a MB proc.
