WoW Forever Shadow Priest — Guide (Beta Test)
viewsAbout the Class
This guide is based on the World of Warcraft: Forever beta and covers gameplay up to level 20. The talents and combat tips are starting recommendations built on the spells and talents available in the beta. They will be refined as testing continues.
Shadow Priest is a vampiric damage specialization: the more Shadow damage you deal, the more you heal your allies. The kit is built around damage over time. While Holy and Discipline follow the path of the Light, Shadow Priests have rejected it and strike at the enemy's mind with the dark arts.
In Forever, the specialization received several changes. The biggest one: 
Devouring Plague is now a baseline spell. On top of that, 
Shadowform reduces the cost of Shadow spells by 50%, 
Silence is now a full-fledged interrupt for a single talent point and is no longer locked behind Improved 
Psychic Scream, and Shadow Word: Death turns into a true execute with a new talent.
Strengths
- Damage over time lets you handle several enemies at once.
- Healing through damage and
Power Word: Shield make leveling safe. 
Spirit Tap restores Mana on kills, cutting downtime.- Silence — a full-fledged interrupt for just one talent point.
Weaknesses
- The main cause of death is running out of Mana while the enemy is still alive.
- Multi-target damage costs a lot of Mana.
- Many key talents unlock after level 20.
- Base spell damage was lowered in Forever, with coefficients raised in return, so your damage drops off without Spell Power on your gear.
Stat Priority
- 1Spell Power
- 2Critical Strike
- 3Hit
- 4Intellect
- 5Stamina
In Forever, base spell damage was lowered, but spell coefficients were raised and the amount of Spell Power on gear was noticeably increased right from the earliest levels. This has almost no effect on leveling speed as long as you keep up with Spell Power upgrades.
Talents
Talent Notes
Wand Specialization 2/5 — damage for your wand, which you use to finish off almost every enemy.
Twilight Focus 2/2 — a chance to avoid being interrupted by damage while casting spells.- Spirit Tap 5/5 — Mana and Spirit restoration after a kill, the main leveling talent.
Improved Shadow Word: Pain 2/2 — extends Shadow Word: Pain.
Ability Priority
- If your buffs have fallen off, refresh
Power Word: Fortitude and 
Inner Fire - Cast Power Word: Shield to avoid taking damage
- Open the fight with
Smite - Then
Mind Blast - Then Shadow Word: Pain
- Finish the enemy off with your wand
Finishing with your wand is almost always the right call, unless something urgent comes up — for example, the enemy is running off toward other enemies nearby. This is exactly how Priests die most often: you're out of Mana, and the enemy is still going strong.
Multiple Targets
In a group, or if you feel like taking a risk, you can put Shadow Word: Pain on several enemies. This costs a lot of Mana, especially if you don't manage to land the killing blow and don't get Spirit Tap.
Important Abilities
Best in Slot (BiS)
For the beta, the Shadow Priest community is already putting together a list of level 20 items. The main sources are Tailoring (including patterns from crates and from drops), Shadowfang Keep, and world drops. The list will be expanded as the test goes on.
In Forever, caster gear has changed a lot, so the main rule is simple: grab Spell Power upgrades as soon as you come across them.
Enchants, Gems, Consumables
ConsumablesBest Race
For the Alliance, the best choice is Night Elf; for the Horde, Undead.
Currently the strongest race for a Shadow Priest thanks to the new racial ability Elune's Light: +10% Critical Strike chance with all spells and attacks for 15 seconds, which makes for an excellent burst window. Forever has no stat snapshotting at the moment of application, so damage over time is recalculated on the fly and gets the bonus too.
- Grace of Elune — reduces the chance for melee and ranged attacks to hit you by 50% for 15 seconds or until three attacks miss.
- Starshards — showers the target with starshards, dealing Arcane damage over 6 seconds.
- Shadowmeld — works in combat too, but the cooldown then becomes 2 minutes.
Cannibalize quickly restores Health once every 2 minutes and is great for cutting downtime, while Touch of the Grave gives a small passive damage boost.
Best Professions
You can learn up to two primary professions and all of the secondary ones.
The traditional Priest choice: Tailoring provides cloth armor, while Enchanting lets you enchant your items and disenchant spare gear from quests, dungeons, and your own crafting. These professions don't compete for materials: enchants require drops from regular enemies.
If you need potions and elixirs, take Alchemy, with Herbalism for the materials.
Whatever you choose, it's worth picking up Cooking, Fishing, and First Aid.
Author
Fouren
Fouren has been playing World of Warcraft for over 15 years. He is an active player with 12 Cutting Edge achievements under his belt, and has reached the top 1% and 0.1% multiple times on various classes. His main classes are healers, particularly Holy Paladin.
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