PvE Shadow Priest Basics Vanilla WoW
Didn't see such thread on the old forums nor on these here, so I decided to compile one containing the basics.
1. General
The Shadow Priests are probably the best utility specs in vanilla WoW. Not only they bring additional Power Word: Shield and Dispel but their 15% shadow damage debuff is great for the warlocks and it's usefulness grows exponentially depending on the number of warlocks in the raid. Both classes complement each other with the Shadow Weaving and Improved Shadow Bolt debuffs. Your job as a Shadow Priest is to keep the debuff up, not go out of mana while still do some damage and most importantly - not die because you are the lone wolf of the raid and dying in the beginning or the middle of a fight just devaluated your raid spot by 100%. Be aware that some guilds bring Shadow Priest to their raids, some do not, which mainly depends on the raid composition they usually go with.
The writings below are simple basic information on the shadow tree of the Priest class. Not only I am not a Priest guru, but I think we all can agree that guides should just give you the general idea of certain class or spec and it's up to the player to figure out what's missing, what can be improved and how he or she can tackle a fight better. Otherwise said, "feel" out the class.
2. Race
PvE
Horde: Undead is the better choice because Will of the Forsaken and Cannibalize are really handy on a couple of fights. The extra shadow resistance is always good even if it's just 10. Troll's Berserking affects only Mind Blast which is 1.5 seconds cast spell and this will throw you into a Global Cooldown halt.
Alliance: Dwarf is the superior choice here because of the infamous Fear Ward. Sadly, you will have to drop out of Shadowform to use it and thus gimping your already low DPS. Stoneform is great on poison based boss fights or trash packs. The 5% bonus Spirit as a Human matters only by a tiny amount if you are fully buffed. Humans' Feedback ability has no application in PvE to my knowledge. Night Elves have extra nature resistance and Shadowmeld which is cute but makes almost no difference in PvE. Starshards can be used on Arcane damage based fights.
PVP
Horde: I have little PvP experience but I would put my dibs on Undead because of the immunity of fear, charm and sleep abilities. Devouring Plague is insanely good, only downside is it costs way too much mana. Touch of Weakness can be nasty if it makes a Blackout proc. Troll's Hex of Weaknessand Shadowguard have their places in PvP but hardly outmatch Will of the Forsaken and Devouring Plague.
Alliance: Dwarves being the better PvP race due to Fear Ward and Stoneform. I haven tried Humans' Perception on Nostalrius but if it works properly it's a great ability for detecting invisible units. Feedback is decent versus mana users, proccing Blackout too, but costs good amount of mana even at Rank 1. Night Elves have better usage of Shadowmeld in PvP, namely the Drink/Eat into Shadowmeld macro and being able to ambush with it.
3. Specializations
Beginner/Low gear - http://db.vanillagaming.org/?talent#bVRhsVZZxGxzcxot - This spec is mostly for beginner shadow priests to become aware of the class or players that don't have big enough mana regen and mana pool to keep up the Shadow Word:Pain application. The 1/5 Silent Resolve is on purpose because you won't be using Mind Blast that much and won't have that much spell power to overaggro. Useful for progression raids as well when you are learning and still accommodating to the fights where your damage output won't matter much.
Standart - http://db.vanillagaming.org/?talent#bxgosZZxGxucxot - The spec I use at the moment. Enables you to do the usual MindBlast->2xMindFlay->MindBlast rotation while still having Improved Fortitude for buffing. Lacks reduced mana cost on instant spells such as Dispel and Shadow Word: Pain but as shadow priest you're only helping out with dispelling (god forbid, curing) on just a few fights.
High end - http://db.vanillagaming.org/?talent#bxxosZZxGxtcxot - This spec requires full consumables usage and good gear. You'll probably need an Innervate or Mana Tide Totem to make it work to full extent. But even if you get all of the aforementioned stuff and use all your consumables properly you unavoidably will go out of mana on long fights.
Questionable talents - These are talents that are either rarely used, or might be picked just because they look good at first sight.
Improved Vampiric Embrace - The only fight this talent is a must is Loatheb in Naxxramas. Vampiric Embrace in combination of Mind Blast generates a lot of threat even if you are specced into full threat reduction. It eats up a debuff slot, too. Do NOT use this spell on Nefarian. Even if there is no Priest class call at the moment.
Improved Fade - At first glance this talent looks really good; reduces the cooldown of your ability to drop aggro for certain amount of time but it's not really worth it. Not only it's additional spell to cast but you gain the aggro back after it's effect wears off. The only time you'll be using Fade is if you screw up on pulls, the tank misses or something like that.
Improved Psychic Scream and Silence - Both are PvP talents. Silence is useful on small amount of trash packs and one fight in ZG but you need to waste 2 talent points to get it. You have tons of interupts and disables supplied by other classes.
Spirit Tap vs. Blackout - Both have little to no usage in raiding. Blackout is useless since bosses are immune to stun and it can do you more harm than good on trash packs with stunning a mob before the tank has gained enough rage to use his skills and enough threat on the target. Spirit Tap has small usage on fights with adds like Nefarian and some Molten Core encounters.
Unbreakable Will vs. Wand Specialization - I chose Unbreakable Will over Wand Specialization in all specs but the first mainly because I never wand. Mind Flay Rank 1 with enough gear outdamages every wand in the game and keeps the damage flowing and it has small mana cost. The additional 15% resist on stun, fear and silence effects comes in handy on few boss fights, some trash mobs and in world PvP while farming. Feel free to replace Unbreakable Will with Wand Specialization if you feel like it.
4. Consumables
Soft consumables:
Wizard Oil/Lesser Mana Oil - While applied to target weapon it increases spell damage by up to 24/restores 8 mana to the caster every 5 seconds. Lasts for 30 minutes. Choose one of those depending on your mana pool, gear and mana management.
Superior Mana Potion/Combat Mana Potion - Restores 900 to 1501 mana. (cooldown 2 min). Use those on shorter fights or on trash packs if you're doing a speed run so you don't burn your major potions.
Night Dragon's Breath - Restores 394 to 457 mana and 394 to 457 health. (cooldown 2 min). Shares cooldown with runes. You can get these by cleansing Night Dragon flowers in Felwood after completeing this quest. For short fights or trash packs as well.
Major Mana Potion - Restores 1350 to 2251 mana. (cooldown 2 min). This and the runes below will be your drugs that you can't live without. You'll eat them like cookies.
Dark/Demonic Rune - Restores 900 to 1501 mana at the cost of 600 to 1001 life. (cooldown 2 min). Another thing you won't be able to raid without. Be careful with these. Gluth's Decimate #neverforget.
Sagefish Delight - Easy to fish, not really expensive on AH and gives you 6 mana per 5 seconds food buff. Doesn't stack with Nightfin Soup. Unavailable untill patch 1.9.
Kreeg's Stout Beatdown - +25 spirit, -5 intellect. You buy those from Stomper Kreeg in Dire Maul North after completeing a Tribute run. Price is just 15 silver each and you can have as many as you want in your inventory.
Hard consumables:
Greater Arcane Power Elixir - Increases spell damage by up to 35 for 1 hr.
Elixir of Shadow Power - Increases spell shadow damage by up to 40 for 30 min.
Mageblood Potion - Regenerate 12 mana per 5 sec for 1 hr. This becomes available with ZG patch.
Nightfin Soup - Gives you 8 mana per 5 seconds food buff. A bit of hassle to fish Raw Nightfin Snappers and they're somewhat expensive on AH.There is no shool of fish for this specific fish. I catch mine in the waters of Azshara. Doesn't stack with Sagefish Delight.
Brilliant Wizard Oil - While applied to target weapon it increases spell damage by up to 36 and increases Spell Critical chance by 1% . Lasts for 30 minutes. Unavailable untill patch 1.9.
Spirit of Zanza - Increases the player's Spirit by 50 and Stamina by 50 for 2 hr. Used mainly for speed runs since it costs 3 Zandalar Honor Tokens to get (3 coin sets returned or 3 bijous destroyed). After ZG patch.
Cerebral Cortex Compound - Increases Intellect by 25 when consumed. Effect lasts for 60 minutes. A potion rewarded by finishing The Basilisk's Bite/Infallible Mind (Repeatable) quests in Blasted Lands. Requires Vulture Gizzard x 2 and Basilisk Brain x 10 that can be either farmed near the quest NPC or bought from AH. Used mainly for speed runs. Stacks with Arcane Intelligence.
Flask of Supreme Power (Distilled Wisdom) - Increases damage done by magical spells and effects by up to 150 for 2 hr. You should flask up only on progression raids or speed runs. If you have severe mana problems, you may want to use Distilled Wisdom one but I wouldn't recommend it.
Survavability consumables:
Limited Invulnerability Potion - Imbiber is immune to physical attacks for the next 6 sec. Eventhough you're not a hard DPS spec, bringing few of these every raid is a must. Cheap to make and it'll save you for that one time where Fade is not enough.
Heavy Runecloth Bandage - A consumable every raider should have. Helps out to relieve healers.
There are few more survivability consumables that I didn't mention as they're mostly situational/optional. You can check taladril's full consumables list here.
5. Items
The pre-raid list may differ a bit for 1.3 patch players. This is a list for 1.6 patch.
Pre-raid best in slot:
Head: Crimson Felt Hat
Felcloth Hood
Neck: Dark Advisor's Pendant
Anastari Heirloom
Shoulders: Burial Shawl
Felcloth Shoulders (Tailoring craft)
Cloak: Archivist Cape of Shadow Wrath
Amplifying Cloak
Deep Woodlands Cloak - Horde only.
Chest: Bloodvine Vest (Tailoring craft) - After ZG patch.
Robe of Winter Night (Tailoring craft)
Wrist: Sublime Wristguards
Weapon: Blade of the New Moon or Scepter of the Unholy
Off-Hand: Tome of Shadow Force - Requires AV exalted.
Drakestone of Shadow Wrath
Umbral Crystal
Swampchill Fetish
Wand: Dragon Finger of Shadow Wrath
Skul's Ghastly Touch
Bonecreeper Stylus
Hands: Felcloth Gloves (Tailoring craft)
Gloves of Shadowy Mist
Waist: Thuzadin Sash
Oddly Magical Belt
Legs: Bloodvine Leggings (Tailoring craft) - After ZG patch.
Skyshroud Leggings
Feet: Bloodvine Boots (Tailoring craft) - After ZG patch.
Maleki's Footwraps
Finger: Maiden's Circle
Underworld Band
Eye of Orgrimmar
Ring of Demonic Guile
Trinkets: Briarwood Reed
Mindtap Talisman - Get two of these if you can. Great for dispel/cure heavy and longer fights.
Burst of Knowledge - For short fights.
Pre-AQ patch best in slot:
Head: The Hexxer's Cover
Mish'undare, Circlet of the Mind Flayer - Short fights.
Neck: Choker of the Fire Lord
Shoulders: Mantle of the Blackwing Cabal
Cloak: Cloak of Consumption
Cloak of the Brood Lord - If you get 1% hit elsewhere.
Chest: Jade Inlaid Vestments - World boss drop, hard to get.
Robe of Winter Night (Tailoring craft)
Wrist: Bracers of Arcane Accuracy
Weapon: Lok'amir il Romathis
Off-Hand: Tome of Shadow Force - Requires AV exalted.
Wand: Touch of Chaos
Hands: Ebony Flame Gloves
Waist: Firemaw's Clutch
Legs: Fel Infused Leggings - World boss drop, hard to get and you'll need 1% hit elsewhere.
Bloodvine Leggings (Tailoring craft)
Feet: Snowblind Shoes - World boss drop, hard to get.
Betrayer's Boots
Finger: Band of Dark Dominion
Band of Forced Concentration
Trinkets: Neltharion's Tear
Talisman of Ephemeral Power
Zandalarian Hero Charm - For multi-dot fights.
Items worth noting:
Anathema - One of the best looking staves in the game, both versions. Didn't fit in either list, this is more of a honorable mention as it's the best you can get for shadow priests before Lok'amir.
Shard of the Scale - Great trinket for really long fights like Nefarian. 960 mana over 5 minutes? Sounds good to me.
Champion's Investiture - Priest PvP set gives good mixture of spell power and mp5.
Zanzil's Seal - Good ring to have if you're missing spell hit.
Zanzil's Band - If you have both it's even better.
Ring of Blackrock - Good mixture of spell power and mp5.
Bloodtinged Gloves - Spell power and spell hit gloves.
Jin'do's Bag of Whammies - Good to have if need the spell hit.
Darkmoon Card: Blue Dragon - Use this only if you are extremely lucky with the procs. Shard of the Scale outperforms this trinket since it doesn't rely on 2% chance.
Enchants:
Head: +8 Healing and Spell damage from this quest that has this as pre-quest.
Shoulders: +18 Healing and Spell damage. Requires Exalted with Zandalar Tribe. If no ZG patch - Argent Dawn shoulder enchant by choice.
Cloak: +5 All Resistance or +10 to specific one. After AQ enchants are in game get Subtlety on your cloak even if it's just 2% threat reduction.
Chest: +100 Mana or +4 Stats.
Wrist: +7 Intellect or 4 Mana per 5 seconds.
Weapon: +30 Spell Damage.
Hands: Minor Mount Speed Increase untill AQ enchants get in the game. +20 Shadow Damage once AQ hits.
Legs: +8 Healing and Spell damage from this quest that has this as pre-quest.
Feet: Minor Speed Increase. Some people prefer the +5 Spirit one. No big difference.
6. Stat priority
Spell Hit > Spell Power > Mana per 5 sec. > Intellect > Spell Crit >= Spirit
Spell Hit - You will need 6% from gear to get hit capped if you are specced 5/5 Shadow Focus which gives you 10% already. However, even then you will have 1% chance to miss a spell. Getting maximum hit is your biggest priority because shadow priests have big mana issues especially on longer fights and one resisted spell = mana down the drain. Keep around spell hit items even if you're not using them and keep yourself hitcapped.
Spell Power - The more the better. Start stacking this after you get hit capped.
Mana per 5 sec. - Really good stat to have but don't overdo it in exchange of spell power. Use Mp5/SP mixed items on long fights.
Intellect - Nice stat for short fights where mana regen or mp5 is not that important as it boosts your mana pool and spell crit.
Spell Crit - Almost useless stat on shadow priests. The only spell it affects is Mind Blast which is mana inefficient and causes extra threat. Also, shadow priests are stuck with the 1.5 multiplier when it comes to crits and there's no way to improve it by talents.
Spirit - You shouldn't aim for this stat because you're always casting and the 15% mana regeneration from Meditation talent is pretty low due to lacking Spirit stat on most of your BiS gear.
7. Spells, rotations and spell coefficients
Spells:
Shadow Word: Pain: Arguably the strongest ticking Damage over Time spells in the game. Deals good amount of damage even if it costs almost 500 mana without 5/5 Mental Agility. It's your primary source of DPS and as such you should reapply it every time it's down.
Mind Flay: Mediocre channeling spell but once you get more and more gear, combined with Shadow Word: Pain's ticks, you can keep up a steady 400 DPS even without using Mind Blast. It gets pushed off somewhat easily if there are too many debuffs on the boss but the damage is still ticking as the debuff itself is just the Slow effect.
Mind Blast: 1.5 second cast spell sounds great but it has 8 seconds cooldown, it has threat multiplier by 1.5 and it's mana inefficient for the 1.5 crit damage multiplier it has. Best critical strike I've gotten so far is around 2,000 with 470 spell power. Sounds good but it really is no match to pure DPS specs' crits.
Vampiric Embrace: Very situational spell. It has it's uses on Vaelastrasz the Corrupt and Hakkar to some extent. Watch your threat generation and avoid using Mind Blast on cooldown when using this spell. If the raid leader or your class leader don't require you to use it, then don't. It'll just harm your DPS output and the overall raid DPS due to a lost debuff slot. Do NOT use Vampiric Embrace on Nefarian, even if there is no Priest class call at the moment.
Devouring Plague: Do not use Devouring Plague in PvE raids. It's fine in dungeons. Two reasons not to use in raids: extremely mana inefficient spell worth almost 1000 mana and deals low damage (you'll probably have to use it with Inner Focus on and waste two 3-minute cooldowns) and it has the lowest debuff priority which means it'll be pushed off almost immediately. You can use it on multi-dot fights at your judgement.
Starshards: It's not commonly used because it doesn't benefit from Darkness, Shadowform and Shadow Weaving percentage bonuses among other debuffs. Starshards can be used on arcane damage fights, such as Chromaggus and Ahn'Qiraj Anubisath trash mobs.
Rotations:
As Alliance having Blessing of Salvation will help you out when it comes to the opening. As Horde you will have to keep it down a bit at the start of a fight but all in all the rotation should look something like this:
Short fights: Trinket if you have+SW:P>Mind Flay>Inner Focus+Mind Blast>Mind Flay x2>Mind Blast>reapply SW:P if it's down and so on.
If you're confident with your tanks and/or you are Alliance you can start with SW:P>Mind Blast...
Use Fade as you see fit but remember that you will regain the aggro you "lost" after it's effect fades. Threat lost with Rank 6 Fade: 820 for 10 seconds.
Long fights: SW:P Rank 1 x4>Trinket if you have+SW:P Rank 9>Mind Blast>Mind Flay x2...
On longer fights it's thoughtful to not use Mind Blast that much due to mana cost. Just keep Shadow Word: Pain up and keep Mind Flaying. When you get out of mana/low mana start using Mind Flay Rank 1 or just wand if you don't have the gear to regen 45 mana every 3 seconds. Play around with Inner Focus as well. This way in long fights you should have a cooldown for every 1 minute. Obviously Inner Focus + Mind Blast will have the best outcome but I suggest using Inner Focus for Shadow Word: Pain on longer fights as it is really mana expensive.
Rule of thumb is synchronizing your % mana with boss HP%.
Use your rune on 1700 mana missing and your mana potion on 2500 mana missing.
Spell coefficients:
Shadow Word: Pain: 1
Mind Flay: 0.45
Mind Blast: 0.43
Devouring Plague: 0.48
8: Addons
GridEnhanced or LunaUnitFrames - You still need to watch your raid's HP even if you are a semi-DPS spec.
eCastingBar - Cast bar addon that adjusts itself to your latency. Most cast bars do that, I prefer using this one.
ClassicSnowFall - Makes your spells being cast on button press, not on button release.
Chronometer - DoT timer.
OmniCC - Counts down cooldowns with nice, white numbers right onto your icons.
KLH/KTM meter - Threat meter, you'll need it.
TheoryCraft - Addon that shows you how your gear affects your spells, stats, mana regen in and outside combat, etc. Really useful when you want to min-max your character.
This is the first guide I've ever made, I hope I haven't missed something and everything is coherent and comprehensive. Feel free to discuss, correct and suggest.
Shout out goes to Meledyne @ Warsong who answered every small or big question I had about shadow priests few years ago and made me understand the spec better.
1. General
The Shadow Priests are probably the best utility specs in vanilla WoW. Not only they bring additional Power Word: Shield and Dispel but their 15% shadow damage debuff is great for the warlocks and it's usefulness grows exponentially depending on the number of warlocks in the raid. Both classes complement each other with the Shadow Weaving and Improved Shadow Bolt debuffs. Your job as a Shadow Priest is to keep the debuff up, not go out of mana while still do some damage and most importantly - not die because you are the lone wolf of the raid and dying in the beginning or the middle of a fight just devaluated your raid spot by 100%. Be aware that some guilds bring Shadow Priest to their raids, some do not, which mainly depends on the raid composition they usually go with.
The writings below are simple basic information on the shadow tree of the Priest class. Not only I am not a Priest guru, but I think we all can agree that guides should just give you the general idea of certain class or spec and it's up to the player to figure out what's missing, what can be improved and how he or she can tackle a fight better. Otherwise said, "feel" out the class.
2. Race
PvE
Horde: Undead is the better choice because Will of the Forsaken and Cannibalize are really handy on a couple of fights. The extra shadow resistance is always good even if it's just 10. Troll's Berserking affects only Mind Blast which is 1.5 seconds cast spell and this will throw you into a Global Cooldown halt.
Alliance: Dwarf is the superior choice here because of the infamous Fear Ward. Sadly, you will have to drop out of Shadowform to use it and thus gimping your already low DPS. Stoneform is great on poison based boss fights or trash packs. The 5% bonus Spirit as a Human matters only by a tiny amount if you are fully buffed. Humans' Feedback ability has no application in PvE to my knowledge. Night Elves have extra nature resistance and Shadowmeld which is cute but makes almost no difference in PvE. Starshards can be used on Arcane damage based fights.
PVP
Horde: I have little PvP experience but I would put my dibs on Undead because of the immunity of fear, charm and sleep abilities. Devouring Plague is insanely good, only downside is it costs way too much mana. Touch of Weakness can be nasty if it makes a Blackout proc. Troll's Hex of Weaknessand Shadowguard have their places in PvP but hardly outmatch Will of the Forsaken and Devouring Plague.
Alliance: Dwarves being the better PvP race due to Fear Ward and Stoneform. I haven tried Humans' Perception on Nostalrius but if it works properly it's a great ability for detecting invisible units. Feedback is decent versus mana users, proccing Blackout too, but costs good amount of mana even at Rank 1. Night Elves have better usage of Shadowmeld in PvP, namely the Drink/Eat into Shadowmeld macro and being able to ambush with it.
3. Specializations
Beginner/Low gear - http://db.vanillagaming.org/?talent#bVRhsVZZxGxzcxot - This spec is mostly for beginner shadow priests to become aware of the class or players that don't have big enough mana regen and mana pool to keep up the Shadow Word:Pain application. The 1/5 Silent Resolve is on purpose because you won't be using Mind Blast that much and won't have that much spell power to overaggro. Useful for progression raids as well when you are learning and still accommodating to the fights where your damage output won't matter much.
Standart - http://db.vanillagaming.org/?talent#bxgosZZxGxucxot - The spec I use at the moment. Enables you to do the usual MindBlast->2xMindFlay->MindBlast rotation while still having Improved Fortitude for buffing. Lacks reduced mana cost on instant spells such as Dispel and Shadow Word: Pain but as shadow priest you're only helping out with dispelling (god forbid, curing) on just a few fights.
High end - http://db.vanillagaming.org/?talent#bxxosZZxGxtcxot - This spec requires full consumables usage and good gear. You'll probably need an Innervate or Mana Tide Totem to make it work to full extent. But even if you get all of the aforementioned stuff and use all your consumables properly you unavoidably will go out of mana on long fights.
Questionable talents - These are talents that are either rarely used, or might be picked just because they look good at first sight.
Improved Vampiric Embrace - The only fight this talent is a must is Loatheb in Naxxramas. Vampiric Embrace in combination of Mind Blast generates a lot of threat even if you are specced into full threat reduction. It eats up a debuff slot, too. Do NOT use this spell on Nefarian. Even if there is no Priest class call at the moment.
Improved Fade - At first glance this talent looks really good; reduces the cooldown of your ability to drop aggro for certain amount of time but it's not really worth it. Not only it's additional spell to cast but you gain the aggro back after it's effect wears off. The only time you'll be using Fade is if you screw up on pulls, the tank misses or something like that.
Improved Psychic Scream and Silence - Both are PvP talents. Silence is useful on small amount of trash packs and one fight in ZG but you need to waste 2 talent points to get it. You have tons of interupts and disables supplied by other classes.
Spirit Tap vs. Blackout - Both have little to no usage in raiding. Blackout is useless since bosses are immune to stun and it can do you more harm than good on trash packs with stunning a mob before the tank has gained enough rage to use his skills and enough threat on the target. Spirit Tap has small usage on fights with adds like Nefarian and some Molten Core encounters.
Unbreakable Will vs. Wand Specialization - I chose Unbreakable Will over Wand Specialization in all specs but the first mainly because I never wand. Mind Flay Rank 1 with enough gear outdamages every wand in the game and keeps the damage flowing and it has small mana cost. The additional 15% resist on stun, fear and silence effects comes in handy on few boss fights, some trash mobs and in world PvP while farming. Feel free to replace Unbreakable Will with Wand Specialization if you feel like it.
4. Consumables
Soft consumables:
Wizard Oil/Lesser Mana Oil - While applied to target weapon it increases spell damage by up to 24/restores 8 mana to the caster every 5 seconds. Lasts for 30 minutes. Choose one of those depending on your mana pool, gear and mana management.
Superior Mana Potion/Combat Mana Potion - Restores 900 to 1501 mana. (cooldown 2 min). Use those on shorter fights or on trash packs if you're doing a speed run so you don't burn your major potions.
Night Dragon's Breath - Restores 394 to 457 mana and 394 to 457 health. (cooldown 2 min). Shares cooldown with runes. You can get these by cleansing Night Dragon flowers in Felwood after completeing this quest. For short fights or trash packs as well.
Major Mana Potion - Restores 1350 to 2251 mana. (cooldown 2 min). This and the runes below will be your drugs that you can't live without. You'll eat them like cookies.
Dark/Demonic Rune - Restores 900 to 1501 mana at the cost of 600 to 1001 life. (cooldown 2 min). Another thing you won't be able to raid without. Be careful with these. Gluth's Decimate #neverforget.
Sagefish Delight - Easy to fish, not really expensive on AH and gives you 6 mana per 5 seconds food buff. Doesn't stack with Nightfin Soup. Unavailable untill patch 1.9.
Kreeg's Stout Beatdown - +25 spirit, -5 intellect. You buy those from Stomper Kreeg in Dire Maul North after completeing a Tribute run. Price is just 15 silver each and you can have as many as you want in your inventory.
Hard consumables:
Greater Arcane Power Elixir - Increases spell damage by up to 35 for 1 hr.
Elixir of Shadow Power - Increases spell shadow damage by up to 40 for 30 min.
Mageblood Potion - Regenerate 12 mana per 5 sec for 1 hr. This becomes available with ZG patch.
Nightfin Soup - Gives you 8 mana per 5 seconds food buff. A bit of hassle to fish Raw Nightfin Snappers and they're somewhat expensive on AH.There is no shool of fish for this specific fish. I catch mine in the waters of Azshara. Doesn't stack with Sagefish Delight.
Brilliant Wizard Oil - While applied to target weapon it increases spell damage by up to 36 and increases Spell Critical chance by 1% . Lasts for 30 minutes. Unavailable untill patch 1.9.
Spirit of Zanza - Increases the player's Spirit by 50 and Stamina by 50 for 2 hr. Used mainly for speed runs since it costs 3 Zandalar Honor Tokens to get (3 coin sets returned or 3 bijous destroyed). After ZG patch.
Cerebral Cortex Compound - Increases Intellect by 25 when consumed. Effect lasts for 60 minutes. A potion rewarded by finishing The Basilisk's Bite/Infallible Mind (Repeatable) quests in Blasted Lands. Requires Vulture Gizzard x 2 and Basilisk Brain x 10 that can be either farmed near the quest NPC or bought from AH. Used mainly for speed runs. Stacks with Arcane Intelligence.
Flask of Supreme Power (Distilled Wisdom) - Increases damage done by magical spells and effects by up to 150 for 2 hr. You should flask up only on progression raids or speed runs. If you have severe mana problems, you may want to use Distilled Wisdom one but I wouldn't recommend it.
Survavability consumables:
Limited Invulnerability Potion - Imbiber is immune to physical attacks for the next 6 sec. Eventhough you're not a hard DPS spec, bringing few of these every raid is a must. Cheap to make and it'll save you for that one time where Fade is not enough.
Heavy Runecloth Bandage - A consumable every raider should have. Helps out to relieve healers.
There are few more survivability consumables that I didn't mention as they're mostly situational/optional. You can check taladril's full consumables list here.
5. Items
The pre-raid list may differ a bit for 1.3 patch players. This is a list for 1.6 patch.
Pre-raid best in slot:
Head: Crimson Felt Hat
Felcloth Hood
Neck: Dark Advisor's Pendant
Anastari Heirloom
Shoulders: Burial Shawl
Felcloth Shoulders (Tailoring craft)
Cloak: Archivist Cape of Shadow Wrath
Amplifying Cloak
Deep Woodlands Cloak - Horde only.
Chest: Bloodvine Vest (Tailoring craft) - After ZG patch.
Robe of Winter Night (Tailoring craft)
Wrist: Sublime Wristguards
Weapon: Blade of the New Moon or Scepter of the Unholy
Off-Hand: Tome of Shadow Force - Requires AV exalted.
Drakestone of Shadow Wrath
Umbral Crystal
Swampchill Fetish
Wand: Dragon Finger of Shadow Wrath
Skul's Ghastly Touch
Bonecreeper Stylus
Hands: Felcloth Gloves (Tailoring craft)
Gloves of Shadowy Mist
Waist: Thuzadin Sash
Oddly Magical Belt
Legs: Bloodvine Leggings (Tailoring craft) - After ZG patch.
Skyshroud Leggings
Feet: Bloodvine Boots (Tailoring craft) - After ZG patch.
Maleki's Footwraps
Finger: Maiden's Circle
Underworld Band
Eye of Orgrimmar
Ring of Demonic Guile
Trinkets: Briarwood Reed
Mindtap Talisman - Get two of these if you can. Great for dispel/cure heavy and longer fights.
Burst of Knowledge - For short fights.
Pre-AQ patch best in slot:
Head: The Hexxer's Cover
Mish'undare, Circlet of the Mind Flayer - Short fights.
Neck: Choker of the Fire Lord
Shoulders: Mantle of the Blackwing Cabal
Cloak: Cloak of Consumption
Cloak of the Brood Lord - If you get 1% hit elsewhere.
Chest: Jade Inlaid Vestments - World boss drop, hard to get.
Robe of Winter Night (Tailoring craft)
Wrist: Bracers of Arcane Accuracy
Weapon: Lok'amir il Romathis
Off-Hand: Tome of Shadow Force - Requires AV exalted.
Wand: Touch of Chaos
Hands: Ebony Flame Gloves
Waist: Firemaw's Clutch
Legs: Fel Infused Leggings - World boss drop, hard to get and you'll need 1% hit elsewhere.
Bloodvine Leggings (Tailoring craft)
Feet: Snowblind Shoes - World boss drop, hard to get.
Betrayer's Boots
Finger: Band of Dark Dominion
Band of Forced Concentration
Trinkets: Neltharion's Tear
Talisman of Ephemeral Power
Zandalarian Hero Charm - For multi-dot fights.
Items worth noting:
Anathema - One of the best looking staves in the game, both versions. Didn't fit in either list, this is more of a honorable mention as it's the best you can get for shadow priests before Lok'amir.
Shard of the Scale - Great trinket for really long fights like Nefarian. 960 mana over 5 minutes? Sounds good to me.
Champion's Investiture - Priest PvP set gives good mixture of spell power and mp5.
Zanzil's Seal - Good ring to have if you're missing spell hit.
Zanzil's Band - If you have both it's even better.
Ring of Blackrock - Good mixture of spell power and mp5.
Bloodtinged Gloves - Spell power and spell hit gloves.
Jin'do's Bag of Whammies - Good to have if need the spell hit.
Darkmoon Card: Blue Dragon - Use this only if you are extremely lucky with the procs. Shard of the Scale outperforms this trinket since it doesn't rely on 2% chance.
Enchants:
Head: +8 Healing and Spell damage from this quest that has this as pre-quest.
Shoulders: +18 Healing and Spell damage. Requires Exalted with Zandalar Tribe. If no ZG patch - Argent Dawn shoulder enchant by choice.
Cloak: +5 All Resistance or +10 to specific one. After AQ enchants are in game get Subtlety on your cloak even if it's just 2% threat reduction.
Chest: +100 Mana or +4 Stats.
Wrist: +7 Intellect or 4 Mana per 5 seconds.
Weapon: +30 Spell Damage.
Hands: Minor Mount Speed Increase untill AQ enchants get in the game. +20 Shadow Damage once AQ hits.
Legs: +8 Healing and Spell damage from this quest that has this as pre-quest.
Feet: Minor Speed Increase. Some people prefer the +5 Spirit one. No big difference.
6. Stat priority
Spell Hit > Spell Power > Mana per 5 sec. > Intellect > Spell Crit >= Spirit
Spell Hit - You will need 6% from gear to get hit capped if you are specced 5/5 Shadow Focus which gives you 10% already. However, even then you will have 1% chance to miss a spell. Getting maximum hit is your biggest priority because shadow priests have big mana issues especially on longer fights and one resisted spell = mana down the drain. Keep around spell hit items even if you're not using them and keep yourself hitcapped.
Spell Power - The more the better. Start stacking this after you get hit capped.
Mana per 5 sec. - Really good stat to have but don't overdo it in exchange of spell power. Use Mp5/SP mixed items on long fights.
Intellect - Nice stat for short fights where mana regen or mp5 is not that important as it boosts your mana pool and spell crit.
Spell Crit - Almost useless stat on shadow priests. The only spell it affects is Mind Blast which is mana inefficient and causes extra threat. Also, shadow priests are stuck with the 1.5 multiplier when it comes to crits and there's no way to improve it by talents.
Spirit - You shouldn't aim for this stat because you're always casting and the 15% mana regeneration from Meditation talent is pretty low due to lacking Spirit stat on most of your BiS gear.
7. Spells, rotations and spell coefficients
Spells:
Shadow Word: Pain: Arguably the strongest ticking Damage over Time spells in the game. Deals good amount of damage even if it costs almost 500 mana without 5/5 Mental Agility. It's your primary source of DPS and as such you should reapply it every time it's down.
Mind Flay: Mediocre channeling spell but once you get more and more gear, combined with Shadow Word: Pain's ticks, you can keep up a steady 400 DPS even without using Mind Blast. It gets pushed off somewhat easily if there are too many debuffs on the boss but the damage is still ticking as the debuff itself is just the Slow effect.
Mind Blast: 1.5 second cast spell sounds great but it has 8 seconds cooldown, it has threat multiplier by 1.5 and it's mana inefficient for the 1.5 crit damage multiplier it has. Best critical strike I've gotten so far is around 2,000 with 470 spell power. Sounds good but it really is no match to pure DPS specs' crits.
Vampiric Embrace: Very situational spell. It has it's uses on Vaelastrasz the Corrupt and Hakkar to some extent. Watch your threat generation and avoid using Mind Blast on cooldown when using this spell. If the raid leader or your class leader don't require you to use it, then don't. It'll just harm your DPS output and the overall raid DPS due to a lost debuff slot. Do NOT use Vampiric Embrace on Nefarian, even if there is no Priest class call at the moment.
Devouring Plague: Do not use Devouring Plague in PvE raids. It's fine in dungeons. Two reasons not to use in raids: extremely mana inefficient spell worth almost 1000 mana and deals low damage (you'll probably have to use it with Inner Focus on and waste two 3-minute cooldowns) and it has the lowest debuff priority which means it'll be pushed off almost immediately. You can use it on multi-dot fights at your judgement.
Starshards: It's not commonly used because it doesn't benefit from Darkness, Shadowform and Shadow Weaving percentage bonuses among other debuffs. Starshards can be used on arcane damage fights, such as Chromaggus and Ahn'Qiraj Anubisath trash mobs.
Rotations:
As Alliance having Blessing of Salvation will help you out when it comes to the opening. As Horde you will have to keep it down a bit at the start of a fight but all in all the rotation should look something like this:
Short fights: Trinket if you have+SW:P>Mind Flay>Inner Focus+Mind Blast>Mind Flay x2>Mind Blast>reapply SW:P if it's down and so on.
If you're confident with your tanks and/or you are Alliance you can start with SW:P>Mind Blast...
Use Fade as you see fit but remember that you will regain the aggro you "lost" after it's effect fades. Threat lost with Rank 6 Fade: 820 for 10 seconds.
Long fights: SW:P Rank 1 x4>Trinket if you have+SW:P Rank 9>Mind Blast>Mind Flay x2...
On longer fights it's thoughtful to not use Mind Blast that much due to mana cost. Just keep Shadow Word: Pain up and keep Mind Flaying. When you get out of mana/low mana start using Mind Flay Rank 1 or just wand if you don't have the gear to regen 45 mana every 3 seconds. Play around with Inner Focus as well. This way in long fights you should have a cooldown for every 1 minute. Obviously Inner Focus + Mind Blast will have the best outcome but I suggest using Inner Focus for Shadow Word: Pain on longer fights as it is really mana expensive.
Rule of thumb is synchronizing your % mana with boss HP%.
Use your rune on 1700 mana missing and your mana potion on 2500 mana missing.
Spell coefficients:
Shadow Word: Pain: 1
Mind Flay: 0.45
Mind Blast: 0.43
Devouring Plague: 0.48
8: Addons
GridEnhanced or LunaUnitFrames - You still need to watch your raid's HP even if you are a semi-DPS spec.
eCastingBar - Cast bar addon that adjusts itself to your latency. Most cast bars do that, I prefer using this one.
ClassicSnowFall - Makes your spells being cast on button press, not on button release.
Chronometer - DoT timer.
OmniCC - Counts down cooldowns with nice, white numbers right onto your icons.
KLH/KTM meter - Threat meter, you'll need it.
TheoryCraft - Addon that shows you how your gear affects your spells, stats, mana regen in and outside combat, etc. Really useful when you want to min-max your character.
This is the first guide I've ever made, I hope I haven't missed something and everything is coherent and comprehensive. Feel free to discuss, correct and suggest.
Shout out goes to Meledyne @ Warsong who answered every small or big question I had about shadow priests few years ago and made me understand the spec better.
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