After a while, you may play your class for so long that you may think you know all the tricks there are to know. Use SW: Death to bounce Prayer of Mending? yawn. Use Inner Focus before a mana-free spell to get the crit benefit to TWO spells? Yeah, Blizzard figured that one out, too. Fixed in 2.3 . For me especially, it can feel like I know everything there is to know about Holy Priests. But even after leveling two of them, the class still manages to surprise me. Here are a few of my favorite odd-ball ideas. Feel free to share your own!
Unusual uses for spells:
Mind Vision:
Can’t find someone that needs a heal and is out-of-range in a spread-out venue like Mt. Hyjal? Mind vision them really fast to find them, and you can run over and patch them up.
MV also works great when someone is lost running back through the instance. This way you can give them first-hand directions!
If you can MV a Rogue in a PvP situation before they stealth, you’ll be able to see them. Personally, I just like to throw Pain on them and keep them from stealthing in the first place, but that only works if they’ve burned Cloak.
Got an opposing faction flag-carrier hiding somewhere in the BG? Check their name at the top of your screen, target them manually, and Mind Vision away. Suddenly, they’re not so sneaky anymore.
Wonder if it’s worth getting an epic flyer? (It is.) MV a buddy while they’re riding theirs. Zoom!
Holy Nova:
Priests either hate this talent (Matt) or love it (Me) – but once you get used to pain-pulling 6 or 7 mobs and Nova-ing them down, it’s hard to do without it.
Don’t have an AoE DPS in Magister’s Terrace? Shield, Renew, and ProM yourself, and let someone pull the Mana Wyrms to you before the 2nd boss. You can Nova the whole room in two pulls. (remind your group that it won’t cause any threat, so they should just sit tight and let you handle it.)
Rank 1 Nova is WIN for finding stealthies before they’re ready. When I re-rolled from my Human to my Troll, I missed Perception at first: now I know better!
Okay, so the output isn’t that great, but Nova HEALS and DAMAGES with NO THREAT. If you’re pulling aggro, but about to die, and you have to run (i.e. you can’t binding heal, which is low-threat) pop a couple Novas. It’ll burn some serious mana, but it’ll get you a bit of health back, too, without getting you skewered. And anything burns less mana than DYING.
PW:Fortitude:
Everyone has someone same-faction that they can’t stand. (or is that just me?) If you ever have the opportunity, this can be really fun:
When your good buddy is about to jump off a high ledge (high, but not deadly. Think Scryer Tier or the Zepplin tower in UC) throw them a Fort right after they leap. Since fall damage is a % of total health, increasing their health pool causes them to take MORE damage when they hit the ground. Max-rank Fort is usually enough to make them go splat, just don’t forget to Levitate down yourself!
Mind-control
Most of us know that you can MC someone from the opposing faction, and buff them with anything insta-cast. This means a Fort, S.Prot, Renew, or PW:Shield. You can also let your buddies buff them. Did you know you can toss them a leather ball?
You may know this already, but in many instances, you can MC the mobs, and BUFF your own party. Try it with the Physicians in the Mechannar.
Shadow Fiend
The little guy takes a lot of crap for only lasting 15 seconds. If you find you’ve pulled more than you can handle (even with Nova!), DON’T DPS one of the targets – just set your fiend on him, and watch the little guy tank. He doesn’t generate a lot of threat, so be careful, but he might just buy you enough time to get yourself healed up.
If you have a Pally that’s open to it, get him to throw a might on your Fiend. He gets a lot of mileage (and you get a lot of mana!) out of buffs. Those scrolls of strength or agility you may randomly get and vendor? keep ’em. He likes those, too.
Fade:
Fade is pretty misunderstood mechanically. It’s not a threat-dump, it simply reduces your threat on the aggro table by 1,500 for 15 seconds. Anything you do in those 15 seconds adds threat normally, (be nice if it was threat-free, wouldn’t it? HEY BLIZZARD!!!) and at the end of the time, the 1,500 you lost comes right back. What you might not know is that if you fade and don’t do anything else…. the mobs won’t pay attention to you again until you DO something, even after the 15 sec are up. If you’re running for your life on a boss reset, pop a holy nova or two to get a little no-threat healing in, and then Fade. THEN DON’T DO ANYTHING UNTIL YOU’RE SAFE. It won’t save you the repair bill every time, but it works often enough to be worth trying.
SW:D
This one is pretty well-known, but bears repeating: a well-timed SW:D can break you out of some types of CC (like Polymorph). Make sure you cast it right as they’re finishing up their cast – the backlash damage will knock you out of sheep!
Racial: Hex of Weakness (Troll)
Okay, so reducing damage dealt by 35 is pretty worthless. But reducing healing taken by 20% is pretty win. ANY boss that gets healed should have this thrown on them. Because it’s a curse, I especially like to toss it on arena teams with a Paladin or Priest healer. Just another reason Troll Priests are more than a pretty face.
Levitate
Sure, Shamans can walk on water, but we don’t even get our toes wet. You can fish, summon your flying mount, eat or drink, and do just about anything but jump this way. Very handy when wanting to fish deep water or farm Primal Waters uninterrupted.
