Holy Priest 8.2

A Holy Priest is a true Holy power healer. They possess the biggest arsenal of healing spells as compared to other healers.

Introduction

Let’s take a closer look at the weakest and the strongest aspects of this specialization:

Advantages:

• Powerful continuous healing;
• A simple healing model – all the healing is carried out instantly, the share of the over-time healing has barely any effect on your gameplay;
• 2 strong saves with a long cd

Disadvantages:

• Extremely low mobility;
• AoE spells are very peculiar about the group/raid’s positioning;
• Relatively low survival due to the absence of personal defensive cooldowns;
• Weak single target healing

Basic information on the spec:

A Holy Priest, like any other healer in this game, utilizes one key resource – Mana. Mana is spent on the majority of healing spells, and on some auxiliary ones, too.

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Glossary

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Main abilities

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Talents

General information. On achieving several new levels you’ll get access to new talent ‘Tiers’. Talents may have different effect on abilities: add new features, replace old ones, modify passively different effects and spells. Talents can be changed in Sanctuaries or any recreational zones. However, if you don’t have any of those places nearby you can use the Codex of the Tranquil Mind which allows you to switch channels within a minute. You can’t change talents in combat. You can’t change a talent if the talent you’ve picked in the last Tier is on Cooldown. You’ll have to wait until it’s restored first.

Tier 1. Lvl 15

• Trail of Light. Flash Heal restores 35% of the current healing to the previous target of Flash Heal.
• Enduring Renewal. Single target healing spells renew the action of Renew.
• Enlightenment. Mana restores 10% faster.

* Your default choice would be Enlightenment as the simplest – and most reliable – raid option.

Trail of Light is perfect for Mythic+ since you have only 5 people in your group, and you’ll often have to heal them one at a time with potent spells.

Enduring renewal–  a pretty expensive talent to be used, requires constant usage which is not profitable when it comes to mana cost.

Tier 2. Lvl 30

• Angelic feather. Places a feather at the target location, granting the first ally walking through it 40% increased movement speed by 5 sec. Only 3 feathers can be placed at one time. The spell  3 charges. 20 sec cd. .
• Angel’s mercy – Damage you take reduces the cooldown of Desperate Prayer, based on the amount of damage taken.
• Perseverance. When you cast Renew on yourself, it reduces all damage by 10%.

* Since mobility is the main Holy priest issue it is recommended to use Angelic feather allowing you and allies to move faster.

Perseverance is a good variant for a constant received damage reduction when you don’t need increased movement speed.
Angel’s mercy is too random even when you do not need movement speed.

Tier 3. Lvl 45

• Cosmic ripple. When Holy Word: Serenity or Holy Word: Sanctify finish their cooldown, you emit a burst of light that heals up to 5 injured targets for (30% of Spell power).
• Guardian Angel. If your Guardian Spirit is over, and the death prevention effect has never been triggered, the remaining restoring time of your Guardian Spirit shrinks to 60 secs.
• Afterlife. Increases the duration of Spirit of redemption by 50%.

* Cosmic ripple is the only raid choice currently because it allows to increase overall healing in combat.

Guardian angel – is a good mythic+ talent for single target healing.

Afterlife – a pretty weak talent in this tier, should not be used anywhere.  

Tier 4. Lvl 60

• Shining force. Crates a burst of  light around a friendly target, knocking away nearby enemies and slowing their movement speed by 70% for 3 sec.
• Censure. Holy word: Chastise stuns the target for 5 sec. Damage breaks the effect.
• Psychic voice  – reduces the cooldown of Psychic scream by 30 sec.

Totally optional choice, depends on the situation

Tier 5. Lvl 75

• Surge of Light. Using Smite or any other healing spell grants you an 8% chance that your next Flash Heal comes Mana-free and instant. At least, 2 charges.
• Binding Heal. A Mana-cheap spell, it restores medium HP to you and one of your allies within the range of 20 m. Triggers the effect Serendipity to each spell for 3 secs.
• Circle of healing . Heals the target and 4 injured allies within 30 yards of the target. 15 sec cd.

* Circle of healing – for raids

Surge of light or Circle of healing for mythic+

Binding heal  was the best talent before 8.1.5 patch, after nerf its weaker than other 2.

Tier 6. Lvl 90

• Benediction. Prayer of Mending generates 25% probability of tagging every healed target with Renew.
• Divine Star. For a small amount of Mana, it releases a star that flies 24 m forward. All the allies on its way restore Health, and all enemies take Holy damage. Once the star makes the whole distance, it goes back the same way – healing the allies and damaging the enemies. CD 15 secs.
• Halo. For a small amount of Mana, the spell creates a ring of Holy energy which expands around you until reaches the radius of 30 m. Allies receive healing, enemies take Holy damage. CD 40 secs.

*Divine Star is a good mythic+ choice and an optional choice for raiding.

Halo  is a universal choice for raiding but it is pretty difficult to use it mythic+.

Benediction  looks weaker than other 2 after nerfs.

Tier 7. Lvl 100

• Apotheosis.Increases the cooldown reduction to your Holy words  by 300%, and reducing their cost by 100%. 2 min cd.
• Holy word: salvation – One of the strongest healing abilities in the game with 12 min cooldown. Heals all allies, and applies Renew and 2 stacks of Prayer of mending each. Cooldown reduced by 30 sec when you cast Holy word.
• Light of the naaru. The cooldowns of your Holy words  are reduced by 33% when you cast the relevant spellsк.

* Holy word: salvation – is definitely the best choice for raids in this tier. It is a good additional save for your raid.

Light of the naaru  or Apotheosis can be used in mythic+ in different situations. Apotheosis  fits burst moments in the fight where you need to maximize healing in 20 sec.

So, we can boil it all down to the following builds:

Raids:

1. Enlightenment
2. Angelic Feather
3. Cosmic ripple
4. Shining force
5. Circle of healing
6. Halo
7. Holy word: salvation

Mythic+:

1. Trail of Light
2. Angelic Feather
3. Guardian angel
4. Shining force
5. Halo
6. Divine Star
7. Apotheosis

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Azerite traits

Outer rings

S Tier:

• Word of mending – A great trait with a high priority. You should have at least 1 of it in your azerite armor.
• Prayeryful litany – A good trait that improves Prayer of healing.

A Tier:

• Promise of deliverance – An average trait for raids but a  good trait for mythic+ that grants you non-stacking effect of an additional cooldown reduce on Serenity and stacking effect to increase healing from Heal and  Flash  Heal.
• Swirling Sands– a good passive increase of minor stats
• Blightborne Infusion  – analogue of Swirling sands with minor stats increase
• Blessed sanctuary– A good healing increase mainly for raids.

B Tier:

• Permeating glow–  A good trait for mythic+ but not really good for raids.
• Blood Rite – In raids it will be difficult to keep up buff uptime but this trait could be good in mythic+.
• Meticulous Scheming – A pretty bad trait for raids, but could be useful in mythic+ where haste is a priority stat.
• Unstable Catalyst – A situationally good trait in case you can afford minimum movements during the fight.

С  tier:

• Everlasting light – Not a bad heal increase. But in overall it is pretty weak and rarely used when it is required to heal a lot.
• Seductive Power  – Unfortunately it is hard to keep up in raids or mythic + when Bwonsamdi appears. Even with good management this trait is still worse than its analogues from Battle for Dazar’alor.

Middle ring

S Tier:

• Synergistic Growth – a good trait for  haste increase when you need it. In 8.1 “snapshot” mastery problem was fixed so this trait looks really good now.
• Concentrated Mending – a really good HoT that increases during its duration
• Blessed Portents – A great trait for getting into raiding and mythic + because has an ability to heal when “it’s required” but loses its potential once the content is fully known and often farmed
• Blood Siphon –  additional mastery and self healing

A Tier:

• On My Way – -a  constant stats increase
• Ephemeral Recovery – A situational trait that is good only if you can use a few times during the fight otherwise it’s pretty average.
• Earthlink – Pretty good stats increase but its not stable so won’t really grant even average boost when it is really needed
• Savior – a good trait if the players need to survive with low hp

B Tier:

• Заклинатель ран – Good haste buff
• Overwhelming Power–  A pretty good Haste proc that loses efficiency while it lasts
• Not that good in raids and has average potential in mythic keys.  
• Bracing Chill –  A trait with a good potential but because it requires to keep up its procs makes it worse than others.

Inner ring

S Tier:

• Resounding Protection -Good constant healing increase.
• Impassive Visage – Constant healing. Grants more healing than shields, so it is less effective since shields let you survive lethal mechanics.

A Tier:

• Sanctum – A strong absorb when using Fade. Worse than the previous traits because can  be triggered only manually.
• Gemhide – A good survivability trait. Especially good against physical damage.
• Vampiric Speed –   A situational trait, mostly good in mythic+
• Longstrider – Some movement speed increase
• Twist Magic – A pretty strong trait if there is something to dispel.

B Tier:

• Azerite Fortification – A situational trait, mainly for PVP
• Bulwark of the Masses – Another situational trait, weak for raiding but pretty good for m+.
• Self Reliance – A pretty weak trait because requires certain positioning

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Essences

Gameplay

• Single target healing:

With weak or medium incoming damage on the target, your Renew and Heal should suffice.

With damage more serious that that you should switch to Flash Heal. But keep in mind that this talent is more Mana-picky.

If the damage is getting to high, use Holy Word: Serenity.

If that’s not enough, you can use Guardian Spirit.

Even though we are reviewing the single target healing section now, there are often other allies at that time which means you shouldn’t forget to use Prayer of Mending per CD. The only exception is when each GCD is crucial for holding up a particular target.

• Group/raid healing:

Prayer of Mending per CD.

With minor incoming damage, use Heal, and talents like Circle of Healing, Divine Star or Halo.

If the damage grows on all targets at once, you should switch to Prayer of Healing and Holy Word: Sanctify. But remember that those spells are Mana-costly.

• Cooldowns:

Divine Hymn is a great healing cooldown. You should try to use it as often as you can when your raid is exposed to major damage. It is also good to know if you have an opportunity to stand where you are for a while as that spell cannot be cast on the go.

Guardian Spirit should be utilized in one of the two cases: in advance on a target that is expected to take damage; or to provide a more successful heal, or as an insurance that they won’t die, or it could be done on purpose to make sure some large scale one-time damage spends the cooldown. The second option is more of emergency help measure when an ally loses massive Health for the same reasons. You should be attentive when to use Holy word salvation, because this ability actually has 4-5 min cooldown and can be used only a few times during the fight.

• Useful tips:

Before starting a combat, it’s recommended you stack both your tanks with Prayer of Mending. Ona target can house up to 10 stacks. It’s extremely beneficial to have it at the beginning of the combat, because that way you’d have enough time to regenerate Mana, and you’d have 20 (!) charges of the Prayer of Mending for the raid. This trick is extremely useful in combats that demands HPS from the very beginning.

Use instant spells when relocating, for example, Renew

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Stats

The basic priority rating for the characteristics is as follows:

Intellect > Mastery  > Crit > Veratility>Haste

The current specialization’s Mastery leaves an HoT from your direct healing spells. The HoT heals by a % of your Mastery for another 6 secs. 40% is an approximate number. With full concentration on one characteristic, its efficiency drops as it does synergize with others. This would be the more or less reasonable ratio – Mastery 40%, Haste up to 15-20%, the rest goes to Critical strike and a bit of Versatility.

Haste reduces GCD, shortens the casts, reduces the CD for your Circle of Healing and Prayer of Mending, and also increases the number of Renew ticks.

Mastery in mythic+ loses its value due to frequent instant healing and Crit+Versatility become priority.

Gems

• Leviathan’s Eye of Intellect
• Masterful Sea Currant 50 mastery

Enchantments

• Rings: Accord of Mastery
• Weapon: Machinist’s Brilliance

Food

• Raid feast for 131 Intellect or Abyssal-Fried Rissole for Mastery

Flasks and pots

• Greater Flask of Endless Fathoms 360 intellect for 1 h
• Superior Battle Potion of Intellect for general use
• If you need to restore mana instantly, use Coastal Mana Potion.
• If you have a time, for overall mana restoration Potion of Replenishment will be better.

* If your gear bears enough Mastery, you can exchange these enchantments for Versatility and Crit.

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Macros

It is a good idea to set mouseover macros for all your healing and defensive spells as well as for Leap of Faith (meaning when you use these macros, the spell is cast upon the target which is at your cursor’s position). For example:

#showtooltip Prayer of Healing /cast [@mouseover] Prayer of Healing

Macros for Angelic feather that allows to cast it on yourself without targeting the spot

#showtooltip
/cast [@player] Angelic feather
/stopspelltarget

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What’s next?

1. Leveling. If your character has been inactive since the previous expansions, the best  option to level up it is by Timewalking dungeons. You will gain a lot of experience, but there is one big disadvantage of leveling this way. Timewalks are available only for one week during a month, but Overgear is always here.
2. Equipment. At high level, the most important thing for you will become your gear. WoW is a multiplayer game, that’s why we recommend for you to play it with your friends, or to find a new friends for mythic+ runs. If you have any trouble with it – Overgear may help you to find not just friends for a run, but a complete well geared and experienced group that also will be glad to trade all the loot you need.
3. Raids. Raids are the top-tier PvE content in the game. That’s why the equipment’s base ilvl is higher than anywhere else. These dungeons require knowing all the tactics and have a good gear to kill the bosses. The possibilities of Overgear might let you skip those criteria.

Azerite. It is also not the best idea to forget about the Heart of Azeroth and not to feed it with more Azerite. Ignoring this won’t make your character stronger. The easiest way to do it – just complete all the world quests with Azerite rewards everyday. You can get extra azerite from Island Expeditions. Companions can be found at Overgear.