Shadow Priest: A Discussion on Gameplay and Satisfaction

Classes Priest
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Hello everyone, and thank you for taking the time to read this!

Let me introduce myself: I’m a long-time Shadow Priest player and enthusiast since the Battle for Azeroth expansion. The theme and mechanics of this class are irreplaceable to me, but I’ve noticed that I—and many others—have developed an unhealthy relationship with it.

If you’re a Shadow Priest player, I’m asking for a moment of your time, even if you enjoy the current iteration of the class. This post isn’t a rant or a hate post—it’s about finding ways for all of us to have more fun with the class we love.

For those who don’t play Shadow Priest or have only played it casually, I’d appreciate your support in getting this post noticed. This has been an ongoing issue for four years.

To any developers reading this, thank you for your hard work and creativity. Please consider reading this post and discussing it internally. I understand there’s a lot on your plate, but I believe that together, we can find solutions that reduce the stress of reworking this class once and for all.

THE MAIN POINT:

The Shadow Priest community is divided into two macro-groups:

  1. Legion Voidform Lovers: These players loved the no-cooldown, main-spender version of Voidform that replaced Devouring Plague (DP). This version of our rotation is no longer accessible in any form, which leaves a gap that no other class fills.
  2. Current Version Enthusiasts: These players enjoy the current iteration but believe that with a few minor tweaks, they could love it even more. For example, they find Dark Ascension lacking from both a fantasy and gameplay satisfaction perspective, and they feel Psychic Link isn’t as visually satisfying as Shadowy Apparitions.

Many of us in the first group have been struggling to enjoy the class because the solutions the developers have implemented have taken it in a completely different direction and changed its flavor.

Yes, old Voidform had its issues—it required constant balancing and, if not managed correctly, could make the class too strong or too weak. The main problem was its quadratic scaling with haste.

This has already been addressed with the current Voidform, which no longer ramps up stats or damage, but the two-minute cooldown limits options for players who want a no-cooldown spec and prefer using Voidform as the resource spender.

My next point: Shadowy Apparitions are really satisfying and they are widely enjoyed by both macro-groups.

Thank you for considering these thoughts, and I hope we can work together to make Shadow Priest enjoyable for everyone.

FAQ

C: Just play another class!
A: I have a max-level character for every class, and trust me, I’ve tried them all. I keep coming back to Shadow Priest because I love its theme-- its beeh somewhat of a toxic relationship with the class.

C: Old Voidform will never be balanced, so stop asking about it.
A: It’s not just about the old Voidform; it’s about how satisfying and unique it was to not be another class with a cooldown, and how unique of a way it was of spending our resources while also really fitting thematically. I think we should be open to compromises and don’t think the situation is hopeless.

C: What if the developers disagree with your opinion?

A: If the developers have different ideas or disagree with my opinion, that’s okay.
My main goal is to start a conversation about how to make the class more enjoyable for everyone. I respect the developers’ vision for the game and trust that they want to create the best experience possible for all players.

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old voidform was the reason i played the class it was amazing

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I miss old voidform

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I’m disappointed Blizz seem to have given up on Voidform conceptually. There were a lot of cool and less problematic directions it could have gone

I hope they revisit it

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Interesting post on your divide of the specialization player base. Shadow Priest was my first real class where I was into rated PvP and I simply felt I was ready to break the 2200+CR barrier, I didn’t blame the class mechanics and know the class can win even in major tournaments which is always exciting, you can switch the game play so fast which is really unique. Maybe someday I will figure out exactly how to break into the next level of Rated Player Vs. Player. It led me to playing new classes, new specializations and even not playing the game for some time.

It is an extremely demanding class as they require you to really accept that it is not an out ‘n’ out damage specialization, they are not saying you cannot do top DPS or solo a player but they have made it very obvious that Mages and Warlocks will for the most part simply be the better caster to play. When you are skilled enough in any expansion you can beat any class and any player as a Shadow Priest which is again extremely important, as with most competitive games there are situational moments where as I just mentioned, if you are skilled enough… you will win… Even against a super leech DK or Demon Hunter lolz.

[Void Form] like [Void Torrent] are two MAJOR abilities, I was so disappointed when they chose [Void Bolt] as the spell… it just didn’t seem like a good enough ability to use. Quickly fast forwarding into this current expansions and I think it is really important to use this time to try to work with the current mechanics and build the specialization how YOU want within the current available talents etc. Give it a little time and try and trust the developers.

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Frost DK with Remorseless Winter is the closest, but it’s still not the same.

More importantly it makes AoE really boring and causes balancing problems between ST/AoE (which makes balancing raid vs M+ basically impossible). Apparitions are a better designed AoE mechanic because they have their own SP scaling instead of being tied to the ability that triggers them.

Completely agree, but the bigger issue is that the way the game works really heavily favors burst, so not having any just makes a spec bad. Some of this is still present even in current Shadow in the form of requiring some setup time. Part of this is M+, but it’s bled into raid quite heavily as well.

Now for my own onions:

Distorted Reality. This needs to get out of ST builds. Tie the DP damage amp to having multiple DPs up or something, just make sure it’s never correct to use on ST, because it completely removes the mastery/DP/Insidious Ire minigame which is core to how the spec plays. Whether you think the minigame is “maximize uptime” (how Mind’s Eye plays) or “ensure DP is up for your big spells” (very brief period during SL before gear got out of control) is a separate discussion, but Distorted Reality ruins both versions on ST.

Misery. Same thing as Distorted Reality really. It removes a core aspect of ST/low target count DoT gameplay by essentially deleting SW:P from your spellbook. It also means we lose a very good movement GCD every ~18 seconds. It might be necessary for the spec to function on AoE with how fast paced the game is nowadays, but on ST it’s actively detrimental.

Dark Ascensions. Incredibly boring CD, and the cast time just feels bad. The one saving grace is that it typically pairs with Mindbender/Inescapable Torment which is the most fun CD the spec has.

Voidform. Fun CD but it lasts too long to be functional at what a DPS CD is meant to do (burst), which is particularly problematic in “low” keys.

Mental Decay. Somewhat similar to Misery. It weakens DoT gameplay on ST while being completely unnecessary. Meanwhile it doesn’t do anything on AoE, the one place where it could actually be justified as “necessary”.

Silence. Put it in the class tree, stop being silly. Make it a choice node with something healers really want for PvP so it’s a difficult decision for them, but they should have access to it. Having to drop Mental Fortitude for it sucks.

The idols. They’re all pretty uninteractive and lame. C’thun generates some resources, but the others actually just do nothing. This is disappointing.

*Power Infusion. Delete it.

Okay idk why this is the character it defaulted to on EU forums. Should’ve been Voidshuffle-LaughingSkull.

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Man do i want to see Power infusion gone…

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THey could have given it the bestial wrath treatment, where an ability of yours (e.g. devouring plague) reduced it’s cooldown and then you’d be in it for a flat time and then drop out of it.

No more scaling issues.

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Of course the game favours burst, even an Affliction Warlock does its highest damage output during burst windows ^_^. Shadow Priest simply doesn’t feel as burst or melty as it should.

[Misery] is a tough one, it’s a must have talent and has taken the requirement to cast [Shadow Word: Pain] completely out of the rotation, it can still be used to dot ads and while moving which is useful though. Three dots in two casts…and with another option in [Damnation] (no longer a talent???) to apply all three in one instant cast. Making every Shadow Priest’s lives a little easier. They answered some AoE questions with [Shadow Crash] yet [Shadow Word: Pain] is once again a tricky one… manual application is down to the player to min/max their own damage output.

I will not go into some of the other talents/abilities you have discussed but if you want my comments on them give me a quick message.

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Not at all, keep the ability. The talk of giving us a Heroism isn’t something I would say no too…However, [Twins of the Sun Priestess] is a strong enough ability to keep it within the game. In PvP it is huge, a game winning or game saving ability. Any class in PvP get’s a boost with it, to remove it would say… let’s just let every class have the haste buff as their own 20% haste increase ability which is wrong. Maybe that is why they are releasing single player dungeons and possibly single player raids within the triple-threat expansion. I mean solo shuffle may not have actually been other players, when I was in some queue’s they certainly seemed a little …we are testing your knowledge of the game based.

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Make priest not be constantly on 20% health each pull they do.

also

just make shadow spells like DA VF instant cast and halo too then give us casting while in dispersion like paladin bubble there fixed pvp and pve for you.

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I feel like these are minor QoL changes that would fit the second category of players, but not the first, who saw their class identity completely removed from one patch to the next.

I feel that while your suggestion would most likely solve the balance issues, it would still be demeaning to the identity of the class.
We used to have one way to spend our resources, and that was void form.

The issues arise because it is intrinsically tied to haste and haste is such a tricky stat to balance classes around, whereas I feel like the most satisfying part was not the haste, but the cooldown reduction and the amount of shadow apparitions spawned.

Yours is certainly a very interesting take on the PvP POV, which reminded me of something;

Generally, player bases today for the classes, have this problem that they think their class must be good at everything, whereas I feel like its healthy that its classes have its healthy amount of pros and cons.

Take the start of this expansion for example, everyone is complaining that Shadow doesn’t do enough damage when it’s a class that needs mobs to live long enough to shine, which isn’t the case this early in the game.

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its very pleasant to look at don’t diss it. [quote=“Zuldamar-kazzak, post:1, topic:531576”]
Also I kinda miss mind sear or an aoe spell which you can cast whenever you want…
[/quote]

Worst part they took away from the game was Instant halo and Void form and Dark Ascension. And removing mind sear

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My PvP experience has been as interesting lolz. A lot of experience and not the rating to match, which can be extremely frustrating. Then a lot of boosters who are not better than me is even more frustrating.

Your comment on players wanting their classes to be good at everything is extremely important. The major benefit of playing/having a Shadow Priest in a team is for the utility. When other classes are adapted to give them utility they are creating something which pushes the well-known util-Spriest out of the game. Can the class be a full on DPS spec? maybe… but when the other two specs are healing specs, they have to and will have to share some abilities for the overall class to earn/deserve respect from players (me as a player anyway).

Moving on… [Shadow Word: Death], should be killing targets… how are you finding it in the new exp as a Shadow Priest? Is it killing players or are they surviving when you are finally able to get somebody below 20% HP, especially in 2v2/3v3.

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Exactly what utility do you think Shadow Priest is bring right now, that is not outclassed by half pure DPS classes - and for sure all of the Hybrids.

This take would be fine if the game played like it did 8 years ago, however due to mobility, utility creep Shadow Priest have nothing that’s considered good utility anymore.

We went into this expansion getting major nerfs to Mass dispell, offheals and Dispell.

The only “worthwhile” utility spell SP brings currently is PI - and a lot of classes have something similar.

I dont wan’t SP to be masters of all, but you don’t seem to get the point that for the last 2-3 expansion everybody else have been granted Utility that outmatch what a SP brings.
I’d take a Warlock that does twice SP damage, brings the new healtsthone can set up port plays. Hard peel with spamable fear, is a trilion times more slippery than SP with low CD port/movementspeed. And whom can instantly burst, without the need for ramp up/ casted DPS cooldowns.

Currently all classes are being giving EVERYTHING, because it is needed for Mythic+.
Shadow priest for some reason seems to have gotten nothing - i can mention a trilion new spells/effects on most classes… what exactly did SP get?.. ahh yea, nothing.

  • dont get me wrong, i hate the idea that arms warrior heals more than hybrid classes. Or that all classes ( almost ) have an MS effect, or that what used to be low mobility classes all of a sudden have 20 leaps/teleports, But that is how they design the game RN.

Unless they overtuned our damage like crazy, i don’t see shadow being worthwhile playing ( im still gonna do it because im addicted ) But there is simply no reason to bring Shadow priest - take a Disc or Holy if you need PI ( which is currently the only worthwhile " Utility " ability SP have access to.

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Oh yes the invalid utility argument… imagine revolving whole spec around ability to buff people with extra haste once in 2 minutes. That argument must vanish already. Who in the world thinks that a good gameplay idea?

Hopefully we will get the attention we need because I also like the SP (cant say theme or gameplay…) potential.

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It is part of the reason why I moved (maybe temporarily) away from Shadow Priest as a main, if the game moves away from technical/fun for too long then I will politely move on.

You need to understand that playing against a Shadow Priest isn’t easy, I have played as and against and with = gear/ilvl and a decent amount of versatility the class is a S/A tier level class consistently.

If the healing is not at least >20% per cast of [Flash Heal] then something is wrong.

What do you suggest as a replacement to [Power Infusion], for me it is an important buff and I wouldn’t want it to change, only if it was made undispellable…maybe a full spell damage/intellect increase during [Shadowfiend] or [Mindbdender]…A proc similar to [Damnation] but with increased dot damage and dot tick speed rate?..

For a re-work of Shadow Priest will take time and game ethics of a utility specialization that can OFF-HEAL team mates with [Flash Heal] (something a Warrior / Death Knight / Demon Hunter / Warlock (one Healthstone wow!! / Mage (unsure or what is going on from what i;ve seen of the class this exp lolz) / Hunter cannot do… as well as providing other healing benefits such as [Power Word: Shield], [Vampiric Embrace] or [Void Shift]. Replace them all with damaging enhancing abilities and we could see how people find the class? I hope you guys wouldn’t then create argument of bring back util-Spriest.

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