SHADOW PRIEST FUNDAMENTALS COURSE

SHADOW PRIEST PLAYSTYLE

Welcome to our Shadow Priest damage course for The War Within, which is custom designed to equip you with all of the essential knowledge that's needed to excel in PvP.

Now, in the introduction to this course, we're going to be exploring what to expect from the Shadow playstyle, and we're also going to discuss your most important goals in each and every arena game. Now, you know that character in every video game that just has perfectly even stats?

They're decent at everything, but they're not necessarily the best. Yeah, that's basically going to be Shadow Priest here.

We're truly a jack-of-all-trades in the sleek form factor of a hybrid caster. Now, we have dots, but we're not really an affliction warlock.

We have big bursts, but we're not just a devastation evoker. We have amazing control engines.

We have refined utility, but we're not really like a sub-rogue either. So what are we?

Shadow Priest need to do a little bit of everything. It's a spec with a completely diverse toolkit, having layers of depth that scale with game knowledge and experience.

So we're going to have to warn you here. Shadow Priest definitely isn't the most beginner-friendly spec to pick.

But that's why we're here, to teach you the ropes and make your learning experience. As easy as possible.

All right, since we said Shadow Priest is kind of like an affliction warlock, a devastation evoker, and a sub-rogue hybrid. Let's break down each and every part of this shadowy trinity.

Shadow Priest, of course, have dots, but they're not really a primary source of damage. Vampiric Touch and Shadow Word Pain represent a fraction of overall damage and are minor, quote, builders.

Shadow Priest is a very common skill, being usable at any time, with VT even offering some Dispel protection as well. Devouring Plague, on the other hand, is a Spinder, consuming a secondary resource called Insanity in order to deal some stronger, punchier damage.

Now, one of our main goals is to maintain dots across as many targets as possible due to our mastery, which increases damage done to the target based on the number of dots they have active.

So, by keeping multiple targets dotted, we give ourselves more opportunities to swap around and microburst, which is yet another part of our strength. Now we're at the stage, though, where we're about to see why we're kind of like a devastation evoker, too.

Because every one minute we're going to be able to enter Dark Ascension, increasing our non-periodic damage a ton. Just take note that non-periodic is an umbrella term not just for dots, but also for the ability to increase your damage.

So, by keeping multiple targets dotted, we give ourselves more opportunities to swap around and microburst, which is yet another part of our strength. Just take note that non-periodic is an umbrella term not just for dots, but also for the ability to increase your damage.

But also for our channels of Void Torrent and Mind Flay. Now, outside of Dark Ascension, we're still able to deal consistent damage, though, allowing us to microburst consistently with our team, especially with CC setups.

Which is where Shadow Priest really starts to resemble a sub-rogue.

Shadow Priest is the only caster in the game with both a long-range instant stun and silence effect, which conveniently share the exact same cooldown that can be chained together, either on a healer as part of a longer CC chain, or used as cross-CC, especially in conjunction with Psychic Scream.

These instant CC options really give us the ability to do goes every 45 seconds, offering a short window to get huge value out of our burst. Now, in a perfect world, we would be able to get dots out easily and do regular goes with maximum burst.

But this isn't a perfect world, and the reality is that Shadow Priest is more often used as an instant stun. and the reality is that Shadow Priest is more often used as an instant stun. and the reality is that Shadow Priest is more often used as an instant stun. more often than not, gonna be the kill target, especially when up against melee DPS.

And this is why as a Shadow Priest, we need to develop our defensive skills side by side with our offensive skills, while also mastering some PVP fundamentals like fake casting and positioning.

Now we also need to remember that we are a hybrid DPS and that our utility needs to be woven in between our damage but don't worry here, cause we're gonna be covering all of this later on in the course.

So just to recap, being a Shadow Priest will come with a ton of responsibilities, but together we're gonna master each and every part one by one. All right guys, be sure to stick around because in the next video, we're gonna be outlining the game winning goals that you need to be following in every arena game.

SHADOW PRIEST GOALS

In this next section we are going to give you some basic damage goals that you can safely follow in every arena game in order to maximize your output. Now by far our most important damage goal is to keep dots up across multiple targets.

Now as we mentioned in our playstyle video, Shadow Priest is both a dot spec and a burst spec and in order to make our burst truly matter we need to let our dots do their job. These days we have tons of options to get our dots out.

Thanks to a passive called Misery, Vampiric Touch will automatically apply Shadow Word Pain, so as long as we can manage to cast VT at least once we've now gotten closer to achieving our goal of keeping dots spread.

But even when we're under pressure we'll still be able to get dots out on multiple targets with Shadow Crash which applies VT to our target. Pain can be used to dot targets within its radius.

This spell can even be used to dot targets out of LOS since its AOE effect will wrap around pillars. And anytime we have the opportunity to do so, we're going to use Shadow Crash to bring us closer to 100% dot coverage across the enemy team.

Spreading dots across multiple targets gives us more flexibility on who we can burst thanks to our mastery. Before entering any of our microburst windows, we want to have our dots rolling first since they're going to increase any downstream damage.

We want to avoid situations where we're trying to do a go with our burst and need to waste time applying dots first since these precious seconds give our opponents more time to react. And speaking of which, our second goal is to press our CC intentionally.

Any damage, especially burst damage, is twice as effective when combined with calculated CC. And as the only caster with not one, but two instant ranged CC options, we have a lot of agency when it comes to creating the strongest burst windows.

Our win condition depends on syncing up big damage with effective CC regularly and it's nearly impossible to score kills without doing so. In a perfect world, we're going to chain 6 CCs with our best CCs.

We're going to be using our best CCs to get the most damage we can. And that's what we're going to be doing this time.

We're going to chain silence, stun, and fear on the enemy healer every time we can while syncing it with our burst. Now, of course, you're going to need to adapt your CC chains based on the situation.

If you're getting trained by two melee and mobility is going to be limited, it might be hard to land those fears. Sometimes just a stun silence is the only thing you got and that's totally fine.

If we want to take this step even further, though, we're going to aim to sync our CC chain with our partner's CC. our partner's burst too. So by using Omni CD or any other addon to track offensives, we can act as an accessory to our partner's burst which elevates their kill window with our instant CC.

Now whatever we do, we just need to be really intentional with how and when we use our CC. Our third goal will help us while getting trained and it's to use our offensive dispel often, but maybe not too often.

Unfortunately we are one of the few remaining casters that truly need to cast. Between Vampric Touch, Void Torrent, Mind Flay, Insanity and more, we're going to be opening up our Shadow School a lot which makes interrupts super punishing.

Now fortunately we have what might be the strongest workaround to this problem which is Dispel Magic. It's on a completely empty card.

So we're going to be using our Shadow School and we're going to be using our Dispel Magic. And it's on a completely empty card.

So we're going to be using our Shadow School and we're going to be using our Dispel Magic. If we're under pressure, tanking interrupts.

This is going to be our number one priority global, aiming to remove buffs, hots, shields or even dispelable defensives from the enemy team during each lockout. It might seem minor, but if you can remove a shield or a few hots during a lockout you are building effective pressure.

Even when you're not getting trained you should still be weaving in your Dispel to remove high priority buffs, but just be careful not to run yourself OOM. Now, aside from Dispels, our next goal is to weave in Utility too.

In order to play Shadow Priest to its true potential, we need to constantly look for opportunities to use our Utility.

There are so many ways we can help our team that have nothing to do with damage, like life gripping our partners away from danger, off healing when someone's under pressure, or recognizing when an upcoming CC chain is coming and being ready to MD our healer quickly.

In high pressure situations, we even need to make some last resort CD traits, spot moments to life swap to prevent a loss. These can all be game defining plays, and we should always be on the lookout to use them.

Our last goal is a bit more advanced, and it's to shift our role according to game states. What this means is recognizing when it's time to transition from defense to offense, which starts by abusing any freedom we have when we're not the target.

If we're not under pressure, we need to think about harassing the enemy healer, zoning them out with the threat of a Psychic Scream by positioning ourselves in between them and their teammates, which will make it harder for them to position properly.

But when we're the ones under attack here, we need to make sure we're able to let our partners play the role of goalie.

This can mean drawing the enemy DPS away from their healer and out of LOS, which can force them into vulnerable positions, drawing their healer away from the safety of a pillar for our partners to harass with their CC.

So anyway guys, for now that wraps up our five biggest goals when playing Shadow Priest inside of Arena, but be sure to stick around because in the next video, we're going to be teaching you steps, step by step on how to maximize your damage.

SHADOW PRIEST VOIDWEAVER DAMAGE PRIORITY

Welcome back. Now that you have a broader understanding of both the playstyle and the goals of a Shadow Priest in the arena, the next step is learning how to deal damage effectively with the Voidweaver Hero Tree.

Now for this, we're going to start with a clear-cut damage priority, not including any cooldowns, serving as the cornerstone of this entire course. Now to be crystal clear here, this is not a rotation, but rather a priority list that you can follow throughout your game.

Your top priority is going to be keeping dots active on your main target. There's a couple ways to do this.

You can hard cast Vampiric Touch, or you can opt for Shadow Crash. Shadow Crash is usually going to be preferred when enemies are stacked or when you know getting a cast off isn't going to be realistic.

If fake casting feels too risky, leaning on Shadow Crash can definitely help keep up time on your dots without the hassle of getting interrupted. Now after that, your next priority is Shadow Word Pain.

When Catharsis is fully stacked, this is one of your hardest hitting buttons, and sitting capped wastes potential damage which could seriously add up over the course of the game. Your third priority is Void Blast as long as you can safely cast it.

The ideal timing is while Devouring Plague is active on your target, since that lets you take full advantage of your mastery. Now that said, don't hold it too long.

If your Void Rift is about to expire, you should use Void Blast even without Devouring Plague up. Wasting cast during a rift is a bigger loss than missing the mastery bonus.

Next up is Devouring Plague. Whether your cap is 100 Insanity or 150 Insanity with Void touched, the rule is going to be the same here.

Any time you're close to capping, you should be dumping Insanity with Devouring Plague on your main kill target. And after that, we have Void Torrent.

This is the ability that activates your hero tree, so you're going to want to use it on cooldown with one important exception. should be paired with Dark Ascension. That means you should first pop Dark Ascension, then follow up immediately with Void Torrent to maximize your damage.

Next is Mind Flay Insanity. Every two casts of Devouring Plague will turn your next Mind Flay into Mind Flay Insanity.

This version hits significantly harder, and it provides a strong burst of damage when you can get it off. Then we have Shadow Word Death, which should be used either when you get a Death Speaker proc or if the target is in Execute range.

Now it may seem surprising that it's this far down in the priority list, and I get that, but the reality is that Shadow Word Death isn't as strong compared to your other abilities. Up next is Void Volley.

This is a new addition to the kit, but overall it's fairly, honestly, underwhelming. After casting Void Torrent, you gain access to Void Volley for 20 seconds, and while it does provide some extra bit of damage and generates a little bit of insanity, but it's still a good option.

It's a good option to use when you're playing with a lot of different characters, and it's a good option to use when you're playing with a lot of different characters, but it's certainly not strong enough to prioritize over your other abilities. And finally, we have Mind Blast.

This ability serves as a filler, and a filler only. You're going to occasionally get instant procs throughout a fight, but outside of those, Mind Blast is generally your weakest button and sits at the bottom of your priority list.

SHADOW PRIEST VOIDWEAVER BURST

This is the video that you have been waiting for, as in this next section of our Shadow Priest course, we're going to be breaking down the exact sequence you want to be following in order to set up the highest burst damage possible. Before you burst, you want to make sure that you have your dots on the target.

This can be applied with Shadow Crash or a hard cast at Vampiric Touch, and you'll also want enough Insanity for at least one Devouring Plague cast.

Your Insanity and ability to get your cast off can fluctuate somewhat on the opener depending on Dispels, available interrupts, and even CC so you may not always be able to follow the sequence perfectly. In those cases, do your best to stick to the priority since you have a 20 second Dark Ascension window.

To start, you'll use Shadow Fiend. Then if you're talented into Halo, you want to use it here.

Halo can still do a lot of damage even as Void Weaver, but it doesn't have all the great benefits that Archon gives us. Next you'll cast Dark Ascension with Power Infusion.

After that, use Devouring Plague into Void Weaver. Then you'll use the same Torrent to summon your Entropic Rift.

Once the Rift is out, you'll want to use Void Blast. Then you'll use Devouring Plague again into Mind Flay Insanity.

After that, if you have enough Insanity, use another Devouring Plague into another Void Blast. Finally, you'll close out your burst with Void Volley before going back into your sustained priority.

This is a good start.

SHADOW PRIEST ARCHON DAMAGE PRIORITY

Welcome back! In this video we're going to be going over the Archon Damage Priority.

Now while it shares many similarities with the Voidweaver playstyle, there are a few key differences to keep in mind. Just like with Voidweaver, you'll want to make sure your dots stay active on the target at all times.

Shadow Crash makes this a lot easier, but if it's on cooldown you're going to need to manually refresh your dots by casting Vampiric Touch. Next up is Catharsis.

The main goal here is to use it often so you don't sit capped for too long. This would waste the potential damage as every hit you take funnels into it.

Next up is Halo, which is unique to the Archon tree. This ability hits insanely hard, it increases the damage your enemies take, it procs Surge of Insanity, and so, so much more.

Make sure to pair Halo with Dark Ascension for maximum damage when playing Archon. After that we have Devouring Plague.

Whenever you're nearing your Inception, you'll want to use it to get rid of the Dark Ascension and the Dark Ascension. If you're nearing the Insanity cap, this is the ability that you want to use.

Next up is Mind Flay Insanity. When playing Archon, this takes priority over Void Torrent, because Void Torrent no longer activates your hero tree, making Mind Flay Insanity your main source of damage.

We then have Void Torrent. Without the Voidweaver tree, it's really just a simple damage ability.

It does deal some damage, but it's not a high priority. And finally, just like in Voidweaver, we round out the list with our three main filler abilities.

Shadow Word Death, Void Volley, and Mind Blast. There's nothing particularly special about these buttons.

They don't interact with the hero tree, but they do generate some Insanity, and they deal some okay damage.

SHADOW PRIEST ARCHON BURST

In this video we are going to be covering how to burst with the Archon Hero Tree. Now it's very similar, but there are a few key differences.

Now as with Voidweaver, the goal is to have your dots up and enough insanity for a Devouring Plague before starting your burst. You'll then cast Dark Ascension with Power Infusion.

After that, cast Halo, followed by Devouring Plague into a Mind Flay Insanity. Next, use Void Torrent.

Void Torrent is a filler ability for Archon, but it still hits pretty hard. You should then have enough insanity for another Devouring Plague into another Mind Flay Insanity.

Finally, if you have any insanity left over, send another Devouring Plague into a Void Volley.

SHADOW PRIEST OPENER

As a Shadow Priest, you want to play aggressively in the opener. Shadow Priest thrives on momentum right away, rotting down the enemy team, forcing trinkets, and keeping them playing from behind the entire game.

The first thing you'll notice the Shadow Priest doing is casting Halo out the gates. They're breaking our rules just a little bit here for two reasons.

One, because the enemy has every CC and interrupt available on the opener, which can make it harder to get your burst off right away. And two, since there's a stealth class, the Halo can hit them and knock them out.

The Halo doesn't get the Feral out, but you're going to see that they're hanging back. This is because they're playing with a Rogue and want to make sure that they can get a sap.

The Shadow Priest gets opened on by the Feral, and you're going to notice they don't trinket here. You don't want to panic trinket, because while Shadow Priest is very tanky, that tankiness comes from the ability to continually rotate cooldowns, like Dispersion, Trinket, Feral.

So you can just trade and swap. Out of the stun, the Priest starts looking to apply Dots, making sure to use their fully stacked Catharsis to avoid wasting any damage and throwing out Shadow Crash for instant Dots.

Because of how fast you build Catharsis in the opener, you may find yourself using this quite often, especially during the enemy team's cooldown. Now the Priest is starting to ramp up their damage, doing what they can to put pressure on the enemy team.

Once all their Dots are out, they fear both DP's and the enemy's DPS. And then silence the healer.

This leads into Dark Ascension. On the opener, you do want to try to CC DPS before casting Dark Ascension, because it's easy for the enemy to continually stop your cast.

Like we mentioned in the burst video, there are a lot of factors that can make it hard to get the ideal burst sequence down. And using CC can help mitigate those.

The Priest goes for a Mind Games, forcing the Feral to trinket kick. While the Priest is locked out during the fight, they manage to get trinkets from both the Feral and the enemy Shadow Priest, with 17 seconds still left on Dark Ascension.

This opener gives us an amazing opportunity to capitalize and force even more cooldowns. At this point, the Priest focuses on executing the rest of their burst during the Dark Ascension window, and follows their sustain priority in between.