Opinion about Shadow Priest rework (CE raider, 13 years gameplay experience)

Classes Priest
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Hello everyone!

Now that we have Shadowlands live and the Shadow priest rework has “baked” a little, I would like to express my feelings and most importantly, my opinion about it.

As the name of the tittle says, I play WoW for a very long time and all of my time, I have played priest. I used to main heal for many years and around time of Mists of Pandaria, I swapped to Shadow as a main - so I went from the Shadow Orb phase through Legion and through BFA up untill now to Shadowlands as a Shadow main.

In the beggining (so for me officially in MoP as a Shadow main), I had a lot of fun - the theme of the spec was really nice and fitting and the Orbs felt right in the spot. However, when Legion came on and Void Form was introduced - I was pleasantly surprised with this new playstyle and not this generic builder / spender spec that it used to be. It was SO much fun and I absolutely loved it. Truth to be told, Shadow was overpowered during certain period in Legion, but even after it was fixed, it was still fun because the playstyle introduced something completely new. Arriving in BFA, Shadow was average when it came to numbers, yet still a lot of fun to play.
Now, for those that will say “Shadow was weak in BFA” - trust me, I have done a lot of raiding through my years to know if something feels overwhelming or underwhelming - Shadow was average, not underwhelming, but I digress.
It was on its peak during Eternal Palace and it got even better in Ny’alotha.

However, then the rework was announced - I was fine with it at first, because we, those who really liked Void Form were promised that “Legacy of the Void” talent will be kept in game, so those, who cherish classic Void Form could still play it. I would gladly play it even if it was “underwhelming” , because it was, for me personally, so much fun.
But the promise was not kept and we got deprived of classic Void Form and instead, we received Warlock 2.0 with Void themed abilities.

So to say - I’m disappointed with the rework.
I would LOVE if both sides (Not Void Form and Pro Void Form) could be happy, and it was and still IS achievable, either through adding the classic Void Form talent into the game and putting Devouring Plague into the talent tier aswell, or through dividing priest into two DPS categories - Shadow and Void, or perhaps subspecs … That does not matter now.

I’m not here to hate on anything, I just wanted to share this, because I know many, many people feel the same way. I will keep hoping that one day, we will get back the classic Void Form we like so much, but I guess that has to wait.
It is very sad to see what the spec overall turned in to however - it has no weakness (strong in open world, PvP, PvE, dungeons etc.) and it’s this classical builder / spender generic spec, but most importantly, it does feel indeed just as another warlock, just with “different” flavour.

I hope this can be fixed in the future, because, even though I still play Shadow Priest to this day,it does not bring me that much fun as it used to and because there is no other class I find fun at all, I have to stick with it.

Please, I know the topic of “Void Form” has been always kind of iffy, but again, I’m only sharing my opinion about this, so there is no need for some arguing and hating on something or someone. As I stated above, I would love both sides to be happy, but that is not the case right now.

I would like everyone else who feels the same way, or even differently, to express what they think about the topic overall.

Take care everyone, thanks for reading this !

5 Likes
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I find spriest much easier to play than aff, due to only having two dots to manage. Warlocks got like 5 or so dots to juggle? Ridiculous amount.

Especially when they do like no damage, and only serving as enablers for malefic rapture spam.

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I find spriest much easier to play than aff, due to only having two dots to manage. Warlocks got like 5 or so dots to juggle? Ridiculous amount.

Especially when they do like no damage, and only serving as enablers for malefic rapture spam.

It is not really about the number of dots, it’s about the playstyle itself. Shadow and Warlock have “too much” in common now, as stated before.

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The “no weakness” part is extremely important IMO. Priest only have ONE damage dealing spec, and the way shadow was during legion and especially in early BFA (I quit the game around the time BoD came out), shadow’s weaknesses were a gigantic turn-off to me.

Shadow simply was not well-rounded enough. I found it extremely satisfying in raids during legion, but that was it. M+, and especially solo content, just felt like an absolute headache.

Specs with significant strengths and weaknesses are cool, but not everyone is for that! For most classes, there’s the option to change spec but priests don’t have that option, they only have one! In Legion I would do solo stuff as disc but it feels like Disc damage has been slowly getting lower and lower and lower… if shadow wasn’t reworked idk if I’d have even stuck around for shadowlands to be honest. The rework is one of the primary reasons I came back to WoW.

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The “no weakness” part is extremely important IMO. Priest only have ONE damage dealing spec, and the way shadow was during legion and especially in early BFA (I quit the game around the time BoD came out), shadow’s weaknesses were a gigantic turn-off to me.

I do understand why this was a turn-off for you, I do. I have the opposite way - I believe every spec must have a weakness and since I always focused on raiding, I was glad that priest can do well in raids and dungeons (they were actually always solid in mythic + , just harder to pull off). If there is no weakness within a spec, which is this case right now, then it is not a “fair” gameplay or so to speak. We have seen this before and it is only a matter of time before Shadow gets gutted. It is in a very strong state right now, but that will not last forever, right.

Specs with significant strengths and weaknesses are cool, but not everyone is for that! For most classes, there’s the option to change spec but priests don’t have that option, they only have one!

This is why I would love to see two DPS specs within the class - “Shadow” for typical dot shadow with Devouring Plague and “Void” with Void Form, so people could choose and be happy.

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i really dislike void form and tentacles and still uhg…cant stand it.

I want orbs back and that’s enough to make more enjoyable my favorite spec.

#remove void form.

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i really dislike void form and tentacles and still uhg…cant stand it.

I want orbs back and that’s enough to make more enjoyable my favorite spec.

#remove void form.

Then you are another person that would benefit from division of DPS specs into “Shadow” without Void Form and “Void” with Void Form.

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i dont mind for it, but nobody would even play void over shadow :slight_smile:

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i dont mind for it, but nobody would even play void over shadow :slight_smile:

Heh, I do not blame you for the lack of knowledge you have about that, but they would, in a hearbeat. Not everyone afterall despises Void Form like you do.

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lol if the choice came down to these, we’d play the set up which performs the best. we all kow that exactly how We recieve content. you will have minorities that “MaiN” one build and a majority who will pick the best one.

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lol if the choice came down to these, we’d play the set up which performs the best. we all kow that exactly how We recieve content. you will have minorities that “MaiN” one build and a majority who will pick the best one.

Of course. But that is a thing of classes and specs - they will never be evenly balanced and surprise - even the “not so favourite” specs can and often tend to be playable even if they are not meta. It’s about mindset too.
But that’s meant to be - all specs cannot be the same and some will be able to perform better in some kind of content than the other and vice versa.

It should be about a choice, really and the choice is not there now (even though it was supposed to be here).

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Idk, other specs have successfully been in the upper third of M+ and raiding since the beginning of Legion.

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Idk, other specs have successfully been in the upper third of M+ and raiding since the beginning of Legion.

I agree with that completely, but as to why it is like that? Who knows, it is hard to say, but we know that when it comes to priest, rather Shadow Priest, it’s always ups and downs. I do not remember really “stable” period of time when it comes to Shadow priest.

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I mean, usually the “optimal specialization” pendulum swings between Frost and Fire, yet Arcane was never removed from the game and there are plenty who enjoy playing it. Sometimes people just want to have fun playing a specialization even if they aren’t top of the pops.

(I think I accidentally replied to the wrong person. Sorry)

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You are definitely right, yeah.

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I also remember kicking arcane mages from my group. sure there are some raid for funn guilds which let you play whatever u like regardless. The Pug Enviroment is highly meta slave, and so is the competitive one so i dont really hand out advice like this because fo that.

i played Shadow priest in BFA
and Survival hunter in Legion

both from a community perspective were not loved in M+ PuG community, its valid… and i wet far with both speccs, but it does make ur life harder trying to push against it… espically if u have other builds / speccs which are considered far more viable in said content.

i like shadow nnow, and i liked shadow in BFA… im not pro or against void form realistically… in a Ideal world we’d get both… but i dont think blizzard would ever go far enough to give us a 4th specc for it.

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I also remember kicking arcane mages from my group. sure there are some raid for funn guilds which let you play whatever u like regardless. The Pug Enviroment is highly meta slave, and so is the competitive one so i dont really hand out advice like this because fo that.

I remember playing with few arcane mages in high keystones and it was solid DPS, at this point, as you mention, it’s mostly about “meta slave” specs indeed. It’s quite sad and stereotypical. People automatically assume that what is not meta is not good.

This is again about meta slave spec more than anything really. People got surprised when they saw Shadow Priest beating hunters and fire mages in mythic + , but even that happened, rarely, but it did happen indeed.

Yeah, pretty much. I hope it will be either 4th spec or subspecs. Subspecs would solve MANY problems, but oh well, gotta wait and see.

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aye dont get me wrong… im aware off meta speccs can defintly work… i played them myself. its a case of trusting a random player to play it however which drives it… when u dont know a player or his/her ability… ur gona base it on something

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s2m legion is the most fun i have ever had with any class in 16 years of playing this game on and off period. Seeing voidform gutted like this where it is just another generic CD for damageboost is really disheartening.

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Tbh I found survival hunter the most fun 🤷 sadly that got butchered. :pensive::pensive:

Legion had some good design. They just flopped on their face once legion ended and we lost the borrowed powers half of the kits were designed upon.