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With all the preliminary work laid out, this week we’ll be finally be getting started on the actual leveling aspect of my multi-part leveling guide. This week we’ll be covering abilities, rotations, talent builds, and gear upgrades for the first 40 levels of the priest class. So if you dream of smiting your enemies with divine fire, and giving yourself a small tan in the process, hit the jump!

Before I get started, I want to provide a few disclaimers that should be considered while using this guide. This is not a speed leveling guide. It will not tell you what quests to do, what zones to go to, nor will it attempt to calculate the most effective way to level as a priest. Frankly, unless you’re being power leveled by a higher level character, I don’t believe that one method of leveling is superior to another. My own personal experience tells me that, in terms of experience per hour, using the random dungeon finder is abysmal in comparison to questing. Yet I have had many people tell me their experience is the opposite, and they find RDF faster than questing. Who’s right? It doesn’t matter. Whatever holds your attention is what you should do. This guide will try to accommodate that.

Another thing you should take to heart is that this guide accompanies Fox’s shadow priest leveling guide, meaning my goal is to assist you in leveling a priest using the discipline or holy tree, not the shadow tree. This means I won’t discuss dipping into the shadow tree (much) but if you are soloing and want to, don’t let me get in your way.

Got all that? Let’s get started.

Priest abilities
The following is a list of the spells you’ll be getting as you level up and my thoughts on them from a leveling perspective.
Lesser Heal — Level 1 — This will be your most cost effective heal at lower levels.
Power Word: Fortitude — Level 1 — A party buff you should keep on yourself and party members at all times.
Smite — Level 1 — This is your go to damage spell until level 10, so just keep spamming it without hesitation. The mana cost is low in the early levels, and you can work on your complexion in the process. (Just turn down your graphics settings if you start to burn.)
Shadow Word: Pain — Level 4 — Using DoTs while leveling can be very efficient way to deal damage, or be very wasteful. Be thoughtful about applying them. Are you opening with a DoT on a single enemy target and then casting offensive spells until it collapses? If so the DoT probably isn’t ticking its full duration which means you’re wasting mana. On the other hand, if you are fighting two enemies, you can place a DoT on one while offensively casting at the other. This will usually lead to the DoT ticking its full duration and will be the most efficient. On the other hand, some players like to be less efficient in order to kill things faster (apply DoTs to everything, cast them down, mana be damned) and then drink for longer between pulls. It’s up to you how efficient you choose to be, just make sure you’re aware of alternatives.
Power Word: Shield — Level 6 — The effectiveness of Power Word: Shield is varied while leveling at low levels. As far as raw absorption goes, the shields aren’t too strong early on. Later when you can spec into discipline, it still takes quite a while before our shields are absorbing anything close to the damage a heal mends. That said, when soloing a shield provides some protection against pushback and should be viewed more as a utility. You don’t need to always wear a shield, but if you’re facing multiple mobs it’s a good idea to use one. When healing others, you can use it to quickly stabilize incoming damage and use the time before the shield breaks to heal yourself or ally up to full.
Fade — Level 8 — You won’t need this if you’re soloing, but in any party situation you’ll need to use this early on to drop healing aggro.
Renew — Level 8 — Much like DoT application, make sure that your HoT application is conscientious. You don’t need to top players off with HoTs the way meter hogging healers do at level cap. If you need heals on yourself of another player but need to be doing something else (direct healing or damage) then use a HoT as a way of multitasking. You can use it to help steady your falling health when you’re fighting multiple or hard hitting enemies, but you probably won’t find many occasions at the lower levels where you need a HoT plus direct healing to keep someone alive.
Mind Blast — Level 10 — Mind Blast is an ability that will shift up and down as far as being the most effective DPS spell for you to cast. The quick cast time and cooldown makes rather ideal as a finishing move, though if you choose to simply use it whenever it is off cooldown you won’t be alone.
Resurrection — Level 10 — You’ll find use for this in groups, hopefully. Obviously if you’re dead first … well you get what I mean.
Inner Fire — Level 12 — Another buff, you’ll want to keep this up on you at all times, especially when soloing.
Cure Disease — Level 14 — Many new players don’t often think to dispel, so break that trend by keeping this ability on your bars. Make sure you pay attention to debuffs on yourself and your allies and you can often stave off a lot of damage in the process.
Psychic Scream — Level 14 — A utility that can save you or kill you. While leveling, this spell is a good way to escape a situation when you’re overpowered by enemies, or when you just need to buy yourself more time (more time to bandage!) Just try to avoid using this spell if you’re in a spot where it will aggro even more mobs.
Heal — Level 16 — In the long run, this spell replaces Lesser Heal. When you first get it, you can continue to use Lesser Heal (since Heal restores quite a lot more health than you usually need) but eventually you can switch to just using this one.
Dispel Magic — Level 18 — You won’t have many uses for Dispel Magic at lower levels (much like Cure Disease) but on the occasion you do it’s a good practice for healing later. Dispelling is just as important as healing, in many cases.
Devouring Plague — Level 20 — This powerful DoT is only usable on one target at a time, but despite this it towers over Shadow Word: Pain in terms of damage done. Always keep it up on an enemy target if you’re soloing, especially since it heals you in addition to dealing damage.
Fear Ward — Level 20 — Fear Ward will absorb one fear effect on your target, but at low levels it doesn’t have much purpose. There will occasionally be bosses or mobs that fear you, but only if you’re dying to those enemies repeatedly will you usually find usage for this spell. I always find if I get feared, then put it up, the fear effect never gets used again.
Flash Heal — Level 20 — Flash Heal is a quicker version of Heal that is technically supposed to cost more in mana resources. This isn’t always true, but it’s good to view this spell as an emergency heal for when you need to catch up or stay ahead on healing.
Holy Fire — Level 20 — Your best and most powerful damage spell as a holy or discipline priest is Holy Fire. The cast time puts it between Mind Blast and Smite, but the mana cost really makes it worth it. As soon as you get this spell, anticipate using it every time you can.
Holy Nova — Level 20 — Your first AoE spell has a decent damage and healing component. If you want to glyph it, it’s even stronger. This spell is ideal for when you want to heal or hurt multiple targets, and since it heals while damaging, it’s quite handy if you’re in a bad situation with multiple adds. You can quickly burn through your mana spamming it though (as it’s instant cast) so just remember that the fewer targets you have in the radius of your spell, the less effective it is.
Mind Soothe — Level 20 — You can use this to sneak by certain mobs, or to try and reduce the likelihood that you’ll chain pull extra enemy mobs when engaging. Don’t underestimate this ability, it’s very powerful in vanilla content.
Shackle Undead — Level 20 — This spell won’t be much good to you unless you’re questing or partying in a zone with undead mobs. In such a situation though, crowd control is an ideal way to control incoming damage.
Mind Vision — Level 22 — When questing this is a good way to find quest mobs. When in a dungeon it’s a good spell to scout ahead with or find out what way you might need to go in the maze-like vanilla dungeons.
Mana Burn — Level 24 — You won’t use this spell too much, but it’s there.
Divine Spirit — Level 30 — This buff should be quite handy toward improving your mana regeneration at low levels, so be sure to keep it up like Power Word: Fortitude and Inner Fire.
Mind Control — Level 30 — Like Mana Burn, you won’t use this spell much either.
Prayer of Healing — Level 30 — Prayer of Healing is an incredible 5-man dungeon spell, but it’s quite costly as well. Make sure that when you use it, you actually need to collective firepower of this spell for your party. If you don’t heal at least 3 players, you’re better off healing players individually.
Shadow Protection — Level 30 — Just another buff you can keep up, though this one is only necessary if you are facing enemies that use shadow damage.
Abolish Disease — Level 32 — This is the updated version of Cure Disease. For the most part you can just replace Cure Disease with this on your bars, since the instances where you’d need to spam Cure Disease are not ones you’ll be running into leveling up.
Levitate — Level 34 — Make sure to pick up a glyph for this spell so you can utilize it. Especially if you’re soloing, this spell is really helpful for getting around and making escapes.
Efficiency and “rotations”
Mana efficiency is going to be the most important thing you can learn while leveling. You will drink a lot and priests don’t even get free water! If you’re soloing, even as a disc or holy, I suggest you drop your first few points into Spirit Tap. If you’re questing with a friend as a pocket healer or holding up the group in the dungeon finder, mana will be a bit of an issue starting out. It will be a while before you have enough points in disc to take Meditation, or if you’re holy, Improved Healing, so until then be prepared to stand around doing a lot of nothing or sit around afterward doing a lot of drinking.

That all said, I thought it would be a good exercise to sloppily toss around some simple math and determine what spells do the most damage or healing for the mana cost at level 10, 20, 30 and so on. With each level, you acquire new spell ranks these efficiencies would change, so I’ve just written things up for you to see at the end of each bracket. You’ll notice certain spells swap around a lot, and that has to do with when new ranks are learned. For two levels, one spell might be better than another (Flash Heal and Heal/Greater Heal go back and forth a lot, for example) and that will last until the next rank of the other spell is learned. On the other hand, certain spells are always more efficient than others (like Holy Fire for damage) and those spells should sit at the beginning of your priority.

Please take note: these are not rotations, they’re more like efficiency guidelines; just some things to consider so you don’t get stuck using the same rotation of spells from level 1 to 80. I say this because I often feel like players get stuck in rotations based on the order we get spells, as opposed to what is actually best for us to use. Still, if a situation calls for you to use one thing versus another, you should go with your instinct.

Level 10 (1-10)
Not long ago Blizzard made leveling through the first 10 levels of every class easier by lowering the energy costs and cast times of many class abilities. Smite and Lesser Heal are the most buffed spells we’ve received. For this reason you shouldn’t find too much trouble getting through the early content, even if you’re playing solo.

Damage: Shadow Word: Pain > Smite > Mind Blast

Again, keep in mind whether you’re using Shadow Word: Pain efficiently or not. Smite is extremely mana efficient in the first 10 levels so it’s only trumped by Shadow Word: Pain if your DoT is ticking its full duration. Mind Blast will arrive pretty late in this first bracket of spells but it’s not very effective in comparison to the buffed up Smite.

Healing: Lesser Heal > Renew > Power Word: Shield

Lesser Heal will easily overcome Renew and Power Word: Shield in output so if you’re healing yourself or a friend, reserve the latter two for situations when you’re using them as utilities instead of heals.

Level 20 (11-20)
You’ll see your first AoE spell at level 20 with Holy Nova, but you’ll need to keep in mind that the efficiency of such a spell goes up with the more targets the spell affects. For both healing and damage, Holy Nova is not more effective than the spell before it unless it damages or heals at least 3 targets. For healing, Holy Nova is limited since it can only heal 5 people at most. For damage though, the amount of enemies you can hit is infinite, so if you round up enough mobs it can be extremely efficient for dealing damage.

Damage: Holy Fire > Devouring Plague > Shadow Word: Pain > Mind Blast > Smite > Holy Nova

Devouring Plague is an incredibly strong spell, so strong I actually recommend using it even if you don’t foresee all the ticks going off.

Healing: Flash Heal > Heal > Renew > Power Word: Shield > Lesser Heal > Holy Nova

Like I said, Flash Heal trumps Heal on efficiency as soon as you get the first rank of it, but in another two levels (level 22) when you get the next rank of Heal, it will beat out Flash Heal again. In these situations, since good healing is a lot more about just getting the heal to the player who needs it at the right time, you should decide what you’re going to use for your bread and butter spell and just stick with it. If you go with Heal you’ll probably need to precast and cancel more though, but that will be good practice for Cataclysm!

Level 30 (21-30)
Once the third bracket is measured, you start get a better idea of the best spells to be using by efficiency. Holy Fire is always on top for damage to mana. Devouring Plague is never too far behind. Heal and Flash Heal continue to be at odds while Renew and Power Word: Shield linger in the middle.

Damage: Holy Fire > Smite > Devouring Plague > Mind Blast > Shadow Word: Pain > Holy Nova

Healing: Heal > Flash Heal > Renew > Power Word: Shield > Prayer of Healing > Lesser Heal > Holy Nova

Prayer of Healing follows the same rules as Holy Nova: it is only effective to use if you’re healing three or more players. If you’re just healing two people, it’s better to individually heal them.

Level 40 (31-40)
There aren’t too many new spells by this level so it becomes a lot more about juggling the different ranks.

Damage: Holy Fire > Mind Blast > Devouring Plague > Smite > Shadow Word: Pain > Holy Nova

Healing: Greater Heal (Heal) > Flash Heal > Renew > Power Word: Shield > Prayer of Healing > Holy Nova

One thing to make note of is that the moment you get Greater Heal you should never cast Heal again. The spells have identical mana costs yet one heals for much more.

The general “rotation”
Begrudgingly, I do feel somewhat inclined to give you a demonstration of something you might kind of, sort of be allowed to call a rotation. Based on the patterns of efficiency I’ve already listed above you should be able to form your own rotation or priority system, but in case you didn’t here is one you can generally stick to for the first 40 levels:

Damage:

Holy Fire > Devouring Plague > Mind Blast > Shadow Word Pain > Smite

Healing:

Greater Heal or Heal > Flash Heal > Renew > Power Word: Shield > Lesser Heal

Keep in mind a rotation usually sets out with a goal to maximize something. In my case, I am maximizing mana efficiency because I feel mana is the biggest concern to a leveling priest. Other things like cast time aren’t weighed in. If you absolutely hate casting anything over 2 seconds, then find something that works for you; it won’t do you any good to try an level a priest if you’re falling asleep. We all play this game for different reasons.

Rotations and priorities generally take a back seat in times of crisis or panic anyway, so it’s not like you won’t be occasionally breaking from this anyway. Again, if you need something different for a given situation (like AoE) you should use it.

Talents
As I mentioned earlier, my shadowy colleague Fox has been working on a leveling guide for shadow priests and I am doing a disc and holy guide. This, unfortunately, leaves me without a clear path for how to best approach the leveling process since depending on what you’re doing, there simply is no best way.

However, I am inclined to give you some sort of a talent guide, even if I’m not particularly thrilled about giving you a generic or specific build when I don’t know what you’ll be doing. If you have something very specific that you want to do and want help, please feel free to leave a comment and I’m certain the commenters and myself can draft something up for you. Until then, take a look at these builds to get started:

Discipline: Random Dungeon Healer: The focus behind this build is threat reduction, mana regeneration and spell cost reduction. Improved Power Word: Shield and Twin Disciplines will buff the amount absorbed by Power Word: Shield but it’s not anywhere close to the shields you might have seen other priests use at level 80.
Discipline: Solo questing: Keeping a shield up on yourself as a solo disc priest will help you with interrupts and reducing incoming damage. Like a healing spec, this build does take disc’s mana efficient talents like Meditation and Mental Agility (the latter which, by the way, will aid your DoTs as well as your shields and HoTs.) The big difference though is that by taking Reflective Shield, all the talents you put into improving Power Word: Shield will improve how much damage you do back to mobs.
Holy: Random Dungeon Healer: In the random dungeon finder your focus will be on healing your party and not yourself. You shouldn’t need push back reduction, even if the tank’s threat is questionable (remember to use Fade!) Inspiration won’t necessarily do you a lot of good at low levels because you don’t have a lot of critical strike rating, so if you want to swap those talents around a bit, feel free.
Holy: Solo questing: You may choose to swap out a talent to Surge of Light, since a free Smite is a free Smite. However, like I said about Inspiration about, you won’t have much crit to activate the talent to begin with. Also, feel free to stick the talent points in Spell Warding into Improved Renew if you want to HoT yourself up while you Smite spam.
Gear Upgrades
While I am not going to break down all the gear upgrades you could possibly chase down through questing (or professions), I thought I’d go ahead and assemble a list of respectable upgrades acquired from 5-man dungeons. I am under the impression that a priest choosing to level in as a healer would be inclined to run a lot of dungeons, so knowing which dungeons to run for gear seems helpful.

Don’t feel like you need to get every item on this list. it’s just a loose guide for

Dungeons Upgrades
Item Name Slot Required Level Source
Crystalline Cuffs Wrists 13 Ragefire Chasm
(Taragaman the Hungerer)
Robe of Evocation Chest 13 Ragefire Chasm
(Jergosh the Invoker)
Gold-flecked Gloves Hands 17 The Deadmines
(Sneed)
Corsair’s Overshirt Chest 19 The Deadmines
(Edwin VanCleef)
Robe of the Moccasin Chest 17 Wailing Caverns
(Lord Cobrahn)
Serpent Gloves Hands 18 Wailing Caverns
(Lord Serpentis)
Slime-encrusted Pads Shoulder 20 Wailing Caverns
(Mutanus the Devourer)
Bloody Apron Chest 18 Shadowfang Keep
(Razorclaw the Butcher)
Belt of Arugal Waist 20 Shadowfang Keep
(Archmage Arugal)
Robes of Arugal Chest 20 Shadowfang Keep
(Archmage Arugal)
Feline Mantle Shoulder 21 Shadowfang Keep
(Wolf Master Nandos)
Ghamoo-ra’s Bind Waist 20 Blackfathom Deeps
(Ghamoo-ra)
Gaze Dreamer Pants Legs 23 Blackfathom Deeps
(Twilight Lord Kelris)
Leech Pants Legs 24 Blackfathom Deeps
(Aku’mai)
Death Speaker Mantle Shoulder 25 Razorfen Kraul
(Death Speaker Jargba)
Death Speaker Robes Chest 26 Razorfen Kraul
(Death Speaker Jargba)
Batwing Mantle Shoulder 27 Razorfen Kraul
(Blind Hunter)
Acidic Walkers Feet 27 Gnomeregan
(Vicious Fallout)
Electromagnetic Gigaflux
Reactivator Head 28 Gnomeregan
(Mekgineer Thermaplugg)
Spidertank Oilrag Wrist 28 Gnomeregan
(Electrocutioner 6000)
Embalmed Shroud Head 30 Scarlet Monastery
(Fallen Champion)
Bloodmage Mantle Shoulder 30 Scarlet Monastery
(Bloodmage Thalnos)
Blighted Leggings Leg 30 Scarlet Monastery
(Azshir the Sleepless)
Mantle of Doan Shoulder 33 Scarlet Monastery
(Arcanist Doan)
Robes of Doan Chest 33 Scarlet Monastery
(Arcanist Doan)
Inquisitor’s Shawl Shoulder 36 Scarlet Monastery
(High Inquisitor Fairbanks)
Whitemane’s Chapeau Head 39 Scarlet Monastery
(High Inquisitor Whitemane)
Deathmage Sash Waist 36 Razorfen Downs
(Mordresh Fire Eye)
Robes of the Lich Chest 37 Razorfen Downs
(Amnennar the Coldbringer)
Revelosh’s Gloves Hands 35 Uldaman
(Revelosh)
Stoneweaver Leggings Legs 35 Uldaman
(Ironaya)
Flameseer Mantle Shoulder 40 Uldaman
(Galgann Firehammer)
Grimlok’s Tribal Vestments Chest 40 Uldaman
(Grimlok)
Gemburst Circlet Head – Sunken Temple
(Hakkar)
Rainstrider Leggings Legs – Sunken Temple
(Jammal’an the Prophet)

PvP Upgrades
If you’re hitting up the battlegrounds to level, you can grab some really nice upgrades from the battleground supply officers. To find them you’ll have to trek out to your faction’s supply officers for each battleground.
Item Name Slot Required Level Source
Defiler’s Cloth Boots
(Highlander’s Cloth Boots) Feet 28 Arathi Basin Supply Officer
(300 honor)
Defiler’s Cloth Girdle
(Highlander’s Cloth Girdle) Waist 28 Arathi Basin Supply Officer
(300 honor)
Defiler’s Cloth Boots
(Highlander’s Cloth Boots) Feet 38 Arathi Basin Supply Officer
(300 honor)
Defiler’s Cloth Girdle
(Highlander’s Cloth Girdle) Waist 38 Arathi Basin Supply Officer
(300 honor)
Dryad’s Wrist Bindings Wrists 40 Warsong Gulch Supply Officer
(500 honor)

I want to take a spot of a breather from Cataclysm information just for this week. Mostly because I’m slightly frothy at the mouth, which I’ve been told isn’t a good health sign, but more so due to the fact that so much is in the process of being changed right now that going into an in-depth discussion on a topic that’s likely to have every scrap completely altered tomorrow is silly. Perhaps silly is the wrong word, after all that’s never been something to stop me before, so let’s just consider this to be an isolated case — promises that next week will be a real Cataclysm discussion. In light of that, if there’s anything specific that you’d like to see covered, shoot me an email and I’ll see what I can do for you.

Focusing on the here and now, which is actually what this article is about, I’d like to quickly go over the more recent raiding addition Ruby Sanctum. Although I’ve seen mixed reviews of the instance from others, I at least think the instance is a nice little dash of refreshing. It doesn’t hold the same sense of urgency, the same notion that you’re going to be stuck in here for hours upon hours, days upon days (even though many guilds, particularly those working on hard mode, will be) that I get from going into ICC. RS is a nice little cooldown raid; it’s light, fun and refreshing like a cool glass of lemonade. To start us off, we’ll take a quick look at the shiny loots, since that’s what everyone really wants, and then we’ll look into a brief little guide on how to slay the giant purple/pink dragon at the end.

10-man drops

Changling Gloves There are a rather decent pair of gloves that you can pick up which, surprisingly, don’t have hit or spirit on them. It’s like a July Christmas wish or something. Sadly for balance druids, the Tier 10 gloves that do have hit on them are generally going to be a part of your BiS list, but that’s the funny thing about BiS lists, you really don’t have to pay much attention to that note. The reality is, if these are an upgrade for you and you can get hit from another slot of equitable ilevel, then chances are you’ll want these gloves. Particularly for 10-man loot, a lot of stuff on it has hit these days, so it may be rather difficult to find yourself a full set of gear that doesn’t put you skyrocketing over the hit cap if you are in a 10-man exclusive guild, which makes these gloves perfect.

Misbegotten Belt I’m only mentioning this because it happens to drop in the instance and you can use it as a balance druid; however I really wouldn’t suggest it. If you’re a more fresh 80 or merely an alt, then this can be a great item to snag, but for a vast majority of players, picking up the Emblem of Frost belt is the better choice.

Saviana’s Tribute This is a decent ring if you happen to find yourself lacking in the hit department, but chances are that you aren’t considering, as I mentioned before, there’s an overload of hit on all ICC 10-man gear. If you can make use of the hit, then go ahead and grab it, the ring isn’t bad at face value, but there are much better options out there.

25-man drops

Phaseshifter’s Bracers Ahh, the eternal question: to leather, or not to leather? In the case for these bracers, which are beyond amazing, the reason why balance druids constantly ask this question is rather clear. You see, there are a pair of cloth bracers that are almost identical which drop in 25 as well; almost identical. Technically, the cloth bracers are better itemized and have a better gem slot than the leather bracers, making them the stronger choice; however, given that a raid will have far more cloth wearers aiming for those, and eventually we’ll be getting a mastery bonus for wearing all leather, there really isn’t a reason to not stick with the Phaseshifter’s in this case.

Cloak of Burning Dusk It’s pretty much a replica of the Frostbinder’s Shredded Cape out of ICC, but the higher ilevel attached to it makes it a better choice. If you can get this cloak, than do so, but if you already have FSC, then I wouldn’t be too gung-ho about getting it.

Charred Twilight Scale Even though haste is a bane of our existence, this is still the best trinket that you can get at this stage of the game. It’s basically another version of the Dislodged Foreign Object out of ICC, yet slightly upgraded with a better proc overall. You’ll want this trinket — but so will every other caster in the raid.

How to get the loot

Clearing to Halion himself — yes, Halion is male — isn’t all that difficult. None of the three sub-bosses that are located within the zone offer up much in the way of difficulty nor are their mechanics that complex; honestly, the trash is more difficult than the sub-bosses themselves in this place. Halion is a completely different matter though. He’s a tough cookie, and if you aren’t in a guild of fairly situationally aware players, then you are going to struggle.

As far as boss encounters go, Halion really isn’t all that difficult mechanic wise — heroic is a different matter, of course — where the entire focus of everything is to just pay attention. During phase 1, there will be meteors raining down from the sky, snakes of fire on the ground, and large glowing circles of death to avoid. Peachy, eh? Phase 1 itself isn’t all that bad to be honest, just make sure to stand out of any of the nasty effects and you’ll be fine. Also, keep in mind that the debuff Halion places on players is a magical curse, meaning that it can be removed as either of those subtypes — meaning you can remove it. Don’t automatically remove it and think you’re a hero, but do pay attention and be kind to your healers. Players can get a touch spread out at times and if a player does need to be dispelled and you can do so, then go ahead and do it.

Phase 2 is another matter. The first few weeks that I attempted to do this, I wanted to bash my head against a wall. Phase 2 takes place in the shadow realm, or whatever it’s called, and basically the main mechanic is that the two floating orbs on the outside of the room will eventually become a giant laser of death seeking to cut you in half. This isn’t anything that we haven’t seen before, so avoiding it shouldn’t cause you too much trouble, however, if you plan this incorrectly, then you’ll find yourself moving way too much and spend no time DPSing.

You’ll want to swing your camera around to watch where the orbs are currently circling so that you can be prepared for the moment when they seek to turn you into a magic trick gone awry; try your best not to move during the time when the orbs are merely floating around, you’ll want to spend that time actually DPSing. Every guild is different; my current guild has all of the ranged stacked up near the tank, but obviously out of cleave range, and all of us move at once in the same direction of the tank when the orbs are active. This significantly cuts down on our movement time and it allows for the movement that we have to do to be fairly smooth with everyone moving together instead of a few people winding up in cleave range, or a few others getting tail swiped.

Finally, phase 3 is merely a repeat of one of the first two phases, only some of your raid members will be up with the fire while others will be down with the orbs of death. Ideally, you should be up with the fire, which is the best place for ranged to shine and is really, really easy to manage. Due note though that you have to be really careful on the transition. Sometimes players can have longer phasing times, and it certainly doesn’t take Halion long before he chews through a tank. Right at the transition, it might be in your best interest to pop out and heal the tank until you see that all of the assigned healers are up, active, and have the situation under control; I promise your tanks and healers will thank you for it.

The Care and Feeding of Warriors is about warriors, who hurl themselves into the fray, into the very teeth of danger, armed with nothing more than the biggest weapons and armored with the absolutely heaviest armor we can find. Hey, we’re not stupid, we’re just crazy.

This week, we look at the Cataclysm beta from the inside. If that’s not something that interests you or you’re looking to avoid spoilers, boy howdy, is this not the column for you. Seriously, you probably shouldn’t even look at that screenshot, really.

The first thing to report is, leveling a warrior from scratch in Cataclysm is probably the easiest it has ever been. Part of that is of course the new leveling experiences for the worgen and goblins, but I also started a blood elf warrior to see what that is like, and the streamlining inherent in the new talent and ability system made itself felt there as well. As of the most recent build, warriors start with Heroic Strike instead of Slam. It functions more or less exactly as you’d expect, and it basically serves the same role when leveling that it always did until you get Mortal Strike, Shield Slam or Bloodthirst.

As you can see, the new spell book tells you exactly at what level you can get each new ability. This is in addition to those abilities displaying themselves to you as soon as you hit a level; the interface also informs you when you have a talent point to spend. Since there aren’t ranks of abilities in this new system, some old favorites take longer to arrive and are reasonably changed when they do. Battle Shout, for instance, appears at level 32 and is now functionally identical to Horn of Winter, granting strength and agility instead of pure AP.

Generally speaking, the arms rotation (at 80) feels much the same as it does now. Whether that’s a good thing or a bad thing is up to you. I personally found the attack speed boost from Lambs to the Slaughter a lot of fun but felt it could be tweaked for more real viability. (Basically, while Flurry lasts long enough to do real damage with it, Lambs only lasts until your next hit. With MS on a 5-second cooldown, that means LttS doesn’t feel like it’s up long enough.) The reason I opened this article with a screenshot made directly after a LttS proc was because it’s just so much fun to see your DPS double on the pane between a Wrecking Crew and LttS proc. The new Heroic Strike is actually more useful to arms than it was, as it fills the role of “nothing else is ready to go” if you find yourself having used Overpower and Execute on proc, Mortal Strike is still cooling down, and you don’t want to wait for an Improved Slam short cast time for one reason or another. (I expect you’ll be using it on high-movement fights.)

Fury warriors at 80 will need to unlearn a few habits, but the new HS is actually pretty useful there as well. What’s really hard to do at present (with Impending Victory still in the talent tree, which we know isn’t the plan moving forward) is to unlearn using Whirlwind on single target. Contrary to my own musings, it’s an absolute DPS loss now; don’t do it. I’ve found the best results using Bloodthirst on cooldown, with Bloodsurge Slam and Impending Victory as they proc (whatever new attack comes in will be in IV’s place) and Heroic Strike if you see your rage creeping over the middle point or if there’s no other button to press. On trash waves (there’s a fight in the Kelp Forest of Vashj’ir that is nothing but trash waves), Cleave replaces HS and Whirlwind becomes your new best friend, since it hits everything in 8 yards with both weapons for 50% normal damage. You can WW down a lot of naga this way, especially with the Even the Odds talent. You’ll compulsively use the new Battle Shout as soon as it is up for the rage, and Fury in the Blood tempted me to try and keep either Bloodrage or Berserker Rage on cooldown. In the end, once we have the issue of “What’s our other melee attack?” straightened out for single-target rotations, fury might well end up a very engaging high-DPS spec again. I didn’t really feel my rage generation was low in either arms or fury. I missed certain talent synergies, but not terribly so.

It’s very strange to effectively only use HS as a prot warrior when there’s absolutely nothing else or you are just swimming in rage; it takes some time to unlearn the muscle memory demanding that you spam the ability. In my limited experience (running exactly half of one dungeon before chain-disconnecting), I found HS useful when I was simply loaded to the gills with rage I wanted to get rid of. Tanking on the warrior didn’t feel massively different. It was nice putting Rend on every bear in a 40-yard radius with Blood and Thunder; don’t get me wrong, I know I was rending their best friend, but it’s still a weird thing to be doing. With mastery bonuses not fully implemented yet, it’s hard to know what stuff like Vengeance will end up doing in the finished product. Losing defense was less painful than I’d imagined, but I do find it a bit jarring to have to tell people when to CC mobs. (To be fair, in Blackrock Descent I didn’t really even get around to it all that much, since we barely got to the first boss before chain-disconnecting.)

We should talk about how gear has changed. Contrary to many people’s expectations (and to be honest, I have no idea why they expected this), current gear doesn’t get sudden stat shifts to match up with greens dropping in the new zones or anything like that. What happened is, some stats are gone and others have replaced them; in some cases, stats have been shifted upwards to compensate.

As one example, we’ll look at Neverending Winter on live and on beta. Things you’ll notice immediately is that armor on shields has dropped. It’s not just shields, either. Armor across the board seems to have less armor in Cataclysm, at least on pieces that had bonus armor on them. If you’re stacking armor above all else, expect to take a hit. (You’ll also notice there’s still defense rating on the legs of the 277 set, which I assume is simply an oversight. It’s not there on the 251 set.)

A quick comparison between the 251 tanking set on the beta and live reveals that while most stats stay the same, armor drops by 1,357, dodge nearly doubles, parry remains the same. Strength, stamina, hit, expertise and sockets are unchanged. So there are clearly no “catching-up” changes; if anything, ICC gear becomes slightly less desirable at present. (Again, let us repeat the mantra: This is beta, and all things are subject to change. Right now, for instance, we know that block is way too low on the beta.)

For DPS gear, armor penetration is gone, baby. It seems to change into either haste or crit rating, depending on the original piece of gear. Ramaladni’s Blade of Culling on test has critical strike and expertise instead of armor penetration and expertise. But on pieces with crit and ArP (like most of the Ymirjar Lord’s Battleplate), the ArP turns into haste. As you can see in the above screenshot, that’s enough haste rating to give you almost 15% haste, which reduces the swing speed of a 3.4 weapon down to 2.96 seconds. With increased swing speed and the new rage normalization, rage generation does indeed seem to be positively affected by haste, although I haven’t done enough testing to determine if we’re actually also just plain getting more rage with more haste in any sort of linear fashion. I’ve stacked str instead of crit or haste so far on both my arms and fury warriors and seem to be getting solid results for it.

And yes, my XP is crazy, but with leveling I expect that to change. It’s not like I actually had much choice in terms of what gear to wear, really.

In general, there’s really a lot to take in, and I’ve barely had a chance to do more than scratch at the surface. With design elements still lacking or being changed, and gear being tweaked, we can say that all three specs are in transition (with fury feeling the most altered at the moment). It’s definitely playable and won’t really throw any experienced warriors off too badly. HS spam is finally, joyfully dead. Armor penetration is gone. There’s haste on everything. Cue me yelling, “It’s a madhouse, a madhouse!” over and over again.

However, despite all the changes, the new streamlined leveling and the talent tree revamp does make for some easy leveling. If you’ve always been curious about a warrior, Cataclysm is definitely a good time to jump on.

Do you feel fine?

In the final days of the countdown to server merges in Aion this Wednesday, a mixture of emotions are on display on both sides of the battle. While some are feeling excitement, others are cautious, yet bridled with apprehension, and others still are simmering with discontent about the upcoming changes in Atreia. Some apathy has even reared up, as participation in fortress battles wane and the Balaur slowly re-establish their grip of power. Many simply feel a mixture of different emotions at different times (depending which side of the most recent ganking they came out on).

Although the physical make-up of the land is not going to change like it will when patch 2.0 goes live and the Balaur homeland is introduced, the landscape will still be changed. The player base — the very atmosphere — of each new server will be markedly different. The population explosion, the economy, abyss rankings, and even tracking reputations will all be affected by the merges. No question about it, life in Aion is going to be altered for every player — though for better or for worse may be more at the discretion of each individual player, their own attitudes, and preparation.

Take a moment of silence then wander past the cut to see what the last days look like, and prepare yourself for a smoother transition into the morning after.

Baby Boom

Tired of having that one blasted daily quest dogging your journal forever because you can’t find enough enemies in the right area to vanquish? Count your blessings, because all other negatives and apprehensions aside, the greatest hope of players accompanying this drastic transmutation is that the enemy population will boom for each new combined server. And unlike new players coming in at low levels, every single level range will receive a boost, bringing new targets — I mean, players — into the different regions. Greater numbers will allow for more participation on sieges, in random Abyss warfare, and in both rifting and patrolling homelands in defense. In short, PvP will be more readily available.

However, PvP will not be the only mechanic to benefit from an increased population; PvE grouping should be much easier. Now, (theoretically) you can finally grab a group and complete those pesky campaign quests. There should even be more players available during non-peak times, which are the hardest to find groups for.

On the flip side, this same boon of more PvP is also a curse; moving unmolested through any PvP-open land is going to be more difficult. The introduction of more enemies has some Daeva worried about attempts to gather and complete spy quests in hostile lands. Some players are already lamenting the impending loss of soloing and gathering in their homelands. Competition for world bosses will also be fiercer.

And he shall be called…

Whether you are a role-player or a power gamer, names tend to be very important; your name is the most visible representation of your identity within a game, and many players take their names very seriously. The loudest gripe heard throughout Atreia is the possibility of losing one’s name, and in essence, identity. We shared NCsoft’s explanation of name changes last week and the promise of free Character Name Change tickets for every Daeva, which has prompted some players to vow they are taking time off work in order to log in the moment servers are brought online to secure their name. Sadly, some have been talking of using this (hopefully jokingly) as a way to grief another player, by threatening to take their name.

Also, some players are not looking forward to the impending clash of personalities and egos, and LFG chat ought to prove very, shall we say, interesting. While you knew who to ignore (both friend and foe) before the merge, and who to count on, there will be a whole new slew of personalities to get to know all at once. After all, the enemy you know is better than the enemy you don’t…

It’s in the mail

As we reported a couple of days ago, mail and attachments should transfer to the new server without any trouble. However, NCsoft encourages players to empty their mail and store all attachments in their cube or warehouse –just in case. If you are anything like me, this statement made your heart skip a beat; after all, the mail system is a very cheap expansion to your warehouse. Personally, I have so many items sitting in my mail on each character that it would be impossible to make room for them in my cube. I join with all who are praying for a bug-free mail transfer.

Atreia recession watch

Shugos will be apparently packing-up and moving all broker items to the new broker, without any additional assistance needed by Daevas. However, as each individual server has a different economy, players will want to go into game and check prices relative to their goods an adjust accordingly. It is difficult to predict how the combining of economies will pan out in the long run, but a short-term bumpy ride is almost assured. What is sure to be a boon for some will no doubtedly be a heartache to others. The proliferation of more goods could help drive down prices and make hard-to-find items potentially more available. Conversely, servers that had lower item prices on the average will be hit with sticker-shock if they find they are combining with economies that sell at significantly higher rates.

A new beginning

Although often feared and usually hard, change is not always bad. Server merges are offering a different kind of benefit for Daevas — the chance for people to make a fresh start without rerolling. If you are tired of the drama in your community, now is the chance to find a new group to play with that better matches your play-style and goals. Have a reputation that you want to leave behind? Use your name change voucher and create a new persona. While it is true that people could track you down using the Shadow Court Archives, it involves making the effort outside of game. If all that doesn’t work, or you find the new community just doesn’t suit your needs, each Daeva will have the opportunity to transfer up to six times for free.

Be prepared

Chaos and anarchy are not on tap for some during this transition; in preparation of the mergers, some legions and individuals are taking steps to minimize the disruption to their favorite game. For three of the servers, top leadership has already met together and elected who will be the siege warfare commander for the new server, allowing them to jump right into play without floundering while looking for direction. Some individuals are spending their last days harvesting everything they can while they can, while others are focusing on the rarer petals from hostile territories (yours truly is hording as many vinna petals as she can get her hands on). Players are stockpiling goods, either to be sure to have their own adequate supply, or in hopes of making a killing in the market. A number of Daevas have been seen trying to complete spy quests.

In all, server merges do not have to spell doom-and-gloom as some decry. Instead, it is an opportunity to make a more vibrant community — if you choose to take it that way. Of course, there will be glitches, and things that really, really annoy, but overall, the players and community can make the best of the situation and even come out ahead.

I salute you all and will see you after the worlds end a new ones begin.

Over at Mordor or Bust, Lord of the Rings Online’s new executive producer Kate Paiz sat down to talk about what’s on every hobbit’s mind: the transition to LotRO’s free-to-play version this fall. Paiz took the reins of LotRO just as the F2P change was announced and is bringing her experience from DDO Unlimited’s transition over to LotRO’s team.

In the interview, Paiz spends a considerable amount of time both praising the community and reassuring it that these changes will benefit the game as a whole. One of the issues she addressed was the lack of Player versus Monster Player (PvMP) combat for non-subscribers, saying that it was necessary for now, but that may change in the future: “While we plan to introduce [PvMP] at some point in the future to the rest of the playerbase, we wanted to first focus on delivering the quality PvE game that we have to players in a way that continued to drive great interest and fun in the game.”

While she declined to comment on whether Turbine would be giving refunds for lifetime subscribers who purchased that option shortly before the announcement of the F2P change, Paiz did say they’d like to offer lifetime VIP subscriptions again at some point. Paiz also said Turbine has “a lot of ideas” for additional classes, and it is working with the CDC to get LotRO launched in China.

You can read the full interview over at Mordor or Bust!

There are plenty of contentious issues in the MMO field, but one of the biggest at the moment is microtransactions. Controversy over the C-Store, the $25 “sparkle pony” and subsequent imitators, and the general balance in the burgeoning free-to-play field have made the players of nearly every game form an opinion. But those who detest the practice can take heart — according to Hiromichi Tanaka, Final Fantasy XIV will not be including any sort of in-game store. That’s from a recent interview from JPgames.de, translated by the FFXIVCore fansite community.

According to Tanaka, Square-Enix isn’t necessarily opposed to the idea if the demand is present, but absolutely does not want in-game power to correspond to real-world money. He also confirmed that players will be allowed to pick their server at launch, unlike the server roulette present at Final Fantasy XI’s launch. If the interview isn’t enough to tide you over, the game’s beta has been given a brief writeup from Famitsu (translated from the Japanese), and there’s an excellent gallery of screenshots available here. There are just over two months until the launch of Final Fantasy XIV, and they look to be an exciting ride.

The new 31-point talent trees are now in the beta! More information incoming tonight as we get it in …

Update: The patch is now available to download for beta testers. Just fire up the client and wait for 300 megs of new talent goodness.

BlizzardA first pass on new talent trees has been implemented.

Each specialization has been reduced to a 31-point talent tree.
Players will now get a total of 41 talent points to spend.
31 points must be spent in the primary specialization tree before any points can be placed in additional trees.
Players will be asked to choose a specialization at level 10. Doing so will result in the unlocking of a spell or ability unique to that specialization, as well as one or more passive bonuses.
While this is a first pass on all of the talent trees, death knight, druid, paladin, warlock, Arcane mage, and Assassination rogue trees are not as far along as other specializations.
More information regarding our plans for talent trees can be found on our Cataclysm forum.

The full notes after the break.

Zarhym
World of Warcraft: Cataclysm Beta Patch Notes

Welcome to the World of Warcraft: Cataclysm beta test! Patch notes listed here are not comprehensive and will be changed throughout the testing process.

General

The Alliance starting experience for worgen is available. Venture through the cursed lands of Gilneas to discover your true path! Currently the female worgen character is not available for testing.
The Horde starting experience for goblins is available. Beginning on the Isle of Kezan in a goblin paradise, players will face a treacherous road ahead!
The level cap for all characters is 83.
Players may use our Character Copy feature for copying existing characters to beta realms, or may choose from high-level pre-made template characters.

Zones

Mount Hyjal and Vashj’ir, two new level 78-82 zones, are available for testing. Deepholm, a new level 82-83 zone is available for testing. Players may find their way to these zones by speaking with temporary teleportation NPCs located in any major city.
The level ranges of Gilneas and the Lost Isles are in the process of being adjusted slightly. Creature, quest, and quest reward levels are all being altered so that players finish questing in these zones roughly by level 12. Further fine tuning will continue in future content updates.
Several zones have had quest maps integrated.
Eastern Kingdoms

Arathi Highlands, Blasted Lands, The Cape of Stranglethorn, Dun Morogh, Duskwood, Elwynn Forest, Hinterlands, Loch Modan, Northern Stranglethorn, Northshire, Redridge Mountains, Tirisfal Glades, Western Plaguelands and Westfall are ready for testing.
Kalimdor

Most zones in Kalimdor are available for testing, though work continues on polishing the quest experience and flow, as well as zone aesthetics.

Dungeons & Raids

Teleportation NPCs in Stormwind, Orgrimmar, and Dalaran can transport players to any available new dungeons, including players who are ghosts.
Blackrock Caverns, a new level 79-81 five-player dungeon, is available for testing.
Throne of the Tides, a new level 79-81 five-player dungeon, is partially available for testing.

Classes: General

Ammo has been removed from the game.
The character levels at which classes gain new spells and abilities have changed.
The glyph system is in the process of being altered. Existing glyphs may not be fully supported or functional.
Many item and class stats have been changed or removed.
Rage has been normalized.
Spells and abilities no longer have multiple ranks and now scale with character level.
A first pass on new talent trees has been implemented.

Each specialization has been reduced to a 31-point talent tree.
Players will now get a total of 41 talent points to spend.
31 points must be spent in the primary specialization tree before any points can be placed in additional trees.
Players will be asked to choose a specialization at level 10. Doing so will result in the unlocking of a spell or ability unique to that specialization, as well as one or more passive bonuses.
While this is a first pass on all of the talent trees, death knight, druid, paladin, warlock, Arcane mage, and Assassination rogue trees are not as far along as other specializations.
More information regarding our plans for talent trees can be found on our Cataclysm forum.

Death Knights

A dedicated tanking tree has been implemented.
The way in which runes recharge has changed.

Druids

A new Eclipse mechanic has been added for druids. The feature is functional, but the interface art is still a work in-progress.

Hunters

Five pets can now be stored with the hunter at all times. Any one of these five pets can be summoned via the Call Pet ability.
Focus has replaced mana as a new resource.
Hunters now start with a pet at level 1.
The Stable will now store 20 pets. If a pet is moved into the Stable, its talents are wiped.

Paladins

We are in the process of overhauling many paladin talents, spells and abilities. Expect updates in upcoming patches.

Warlocks

Soul Shards have been removed from the game as items. Instead, they now exist as a resource system necessary for using, or altering the mechanics of certain spells.

User Interface

The ability to use third-party addons has been temporarily disabled for the test environment.
The Arena Teams pane has been improved.
Auto-quests have been added to the game. Players will automatically be given an auto-quest by entering specific areas in the game world. This alert will appear distinctly in the Objectives pane via the Advanced Quest Tracking feature. These quests will still be given to players with full Quest Logs, but will count toward the 25 total allotted quests if the log is not full.
The Character pane has been redesigned. Character stats can now be shown or hidden via the Show All Details/Hide All Details button on the bottom left. When shown, all character stats will be visible in a window to the right of the pane. Stat sections can be reorganized by clicking and dragging them up or down the pane.
The Professions panes now have more filtering and search functionality, as well as buttons to easily link recipes in the chat frame.
Many of the yellow System Messages that would display in the chat frame when leveling up have been removed.
New text animations now alert players as they level up, also providing information on when new talents, spells and abilities are available.
Professions and Class Trainers windows have been altered to more clearly display available and upcoming purchases.
The Spellbook interface has been improved for greater ease-of-use and visual appeal.

Graphics

Experimental support for DX11 (can be enabled by passing ‘-d3d11′ on the command line or adding SET gxApi “d3d11″ to the Config.WTF file).
OpenGL Hardware Cursor support (can be enabled on the Video Resolution Panel).
Improved water and lava rendering system (enabled by the Liquid Detail slider on the Video Effects Panel)

0 = Classic Water
1 = New Water (fake reflections)
2 = New Water (ocean has real reflection for terrain)
These values are likely to change during Beta.
Dynamic Sunshafts effect (enabled by the Sunshafts option on the Video Effects Panel).

Known Issues

Selecting high Liquid Detail when using Geforce 6 & 7 series video cards will currently prevent lava and water from rendering properly. You can temporarily restore liquid to the world by reducing the Liquid Detail setting via the Video Effects Panel, or by typing “waterDetail 0″ in your Config.WTF file.

With the state of pretty much every class on beta in limbo thanks to the forthcoming talent revamp, we’re taking a break from beta stuff to ransack the Ruby Sanctum. Hopefully, we’ll see the new trees on beta in the next week or so, so we have more to work with than speculating on exactly what “signature abilities” everyone will get. In the meantime, we have shiny new loot and a new boss to tackle in the here and now.

The Ruby Sanctum is ostensibly the last major raid of the Wrath expansion, and as such, ostensibly your last chance to get a few extra pieces of gear and uber yourself out before Cataclysm comes along and replaces everything with level 81 quest rewards. There are definitely some pretty prime upgrades to be had here, including a few straight-up best in slot drops, so let’s get going and check out what you can grab.

As with previous gear guides, try to keep your stat weights in mind, and when it comes to the heroic versions of these drops, unless otherwise noted, it’s usually safe to say the same stuff about the heroic version, except even more so. Also, comparisons here are normal to normal, or heroic to heroic. Heroic versions of ICC loot are, for the most part, probably still going edge out normal Ruby Sanctum loot.

A few notes on DPS stat weights

Before we begin, let’s take a quick moment to discuss what DPS stats you should be looking for on your gear. While we have discussed gear stat priorities before in both our 101 guides and our Icecrown loot guides, things have changed just enough that it’s worth discussing it again, especially in the case of unholy DPS.

Unholy DPS is the one that really needs the most adjusting. Due to the addition of physical damage to Scourge Strike and the rise of the Icy Talons frost sub spec, unholy DPS now does quite a bit of physical damage, which has in turn raised the importance of both armor penetration and haste, eclipsing everything but strength and hit rating to the 8% cap. Essentially, your new stat priority is as follows:

Melee hit > strength > armor penetration > haste > critical strike > expertise

Blood DPS is even more dependent on armor penetration than unholy. In fact, at the highest gear levels, when you’re in mostly ICC gear, armor penetration may become straight-up better than strength for DPS. That said, deciding when armor penetration passes strength is a pretty strenuous science, so if you’re in doubt, it’s probably better to focus on strength. That said, even in that scenario, armor penetration is easily your second goal. Blood DPS’s priority is going to look something like this:

Melee hit > expertise to dodge cap > strength=armor penetration > critical strike > haste

In contrast to its tumultuous early life, frost has been sort of cruising along pretty stably for the past few patches, so you can pretty much keep the stat weights you’ve been using for a while:

Melee hit > expertise to dodge cap > strength > critical strike > armor penetration > haste

On another frost-based note, I’ve seen some people talk about trying two-handed frost DPS again, but if you do, you will not be as good as a dual wield frost DPSer. That’s just the truth. This may change in Cataclysm, assuming they don’t scrap the idea of two-handed frost with the new talent revamp, but for now, you’re still best off grabbing a pair of slow one-handed weapons.

Always remember (and this is true of almost any DPS class or spec), your exact stat weights will change based on your gear level, but if you need a quick rule of thumb, go with the priorities above.

Halion 10-man loot

The Scion’s Treads are a very solid pair of tanking boots. You will be losing a bit of hit rating, dodge and defense over the Scourge Fanged Stompers from Sindragosa, but in return you’ll get a bit more stamina (depending on your gemming choices), as well as a good chunk of parry, strength and a bit armor. If you’re a 10-man exclusive tank, these are likely going to be worth picking up.

Zarithrian’s Offering is incredibly well itemized for DPS death knights, especially blood and unholy death knights, who get a whole lot of use out of armor penetration these days. It’s a very strong upgrade over Rotface’s Rupturing Ring, especially if you don’t need the expertise, and more or less blows the Thrice Fanged Signet out of the water. If you’re 10-man exclusive, you’re pretty safe pairing this with your Ashen Verdict ring.

Halion 25-man loot

Treads of Impending Resurrection are good tank boots. You lose some expertise against Grinning Skull Greatboots and lose some defense rating and dodge, but you make up for it with some extra parry rating and by trouncing them in stamina and strength. You’ll see a pretty substantial boost to your effective health when you upgrade; so as long as you don’t need that expertise, it’s probably worth it to make the upgrade.

The Sharpened Twilight Scale is easily best in slot for blood and unholy death knights, with the incredibly useful armor penetration combined with a solid attack power proc. Pair this with a Deathbringer’s Will for a solid trinket combination that will carry you to Cataclysm with ease. I seriously cannot overemphasize how completely awesome this trinket is. If you get one piece of loot out of Ruby Sanctum, especially as a unholy or blood death knight, make it this one.

Apocalypse’s Advance does have somewhat of a disadvantage over Blood-Soaked Saronite Stompers in that it has no armor penetration. That said, it has a nice chunk of hit rating and a lot more strength, making it easily best in slot for frost and unholy death knights who can swap around their armor to shed hit rating elsewhere. It’s a little bit more iffy for blood death knights, for whom armor penetration is amazingly strong, but it still may be worth it if you need that hit rating.

The Penumbra Pendant is easily another best in slot for more DPS death knights, thanks to just the right balance of stats that it edges out other comers. The only reason not to upgrade is if you still need the hit rating on the Ahn’kahar Onyx Neckguard (and hopefully you’ve solved that by picking up Apocalypse’s Advance) or the expertise on Lana’thel’s Chain of Flagellation.

Every weekend, Dawn Moore enjoys drinking her tea English style and writing Spiritual Guidance to the pleasant sound of birds (this is quite fortunate, since she lives in an aviary.) This weekend however, Dawn’s soundtrack is being interrupted by the sound of explosives. What could be the root of this?! Fox Van Allen must have finally teamed up with goblin engineers to foil Dawn’s Sunday column. How will she write for healing priests with that incessant racket?!

This week I’ll be writing about how to traverse the Ruby Sanctum as a healing priest. I know, I know, I promised you all a leveling guide, but for the sake of being timely we’ll have to push it back a week. Forgive me, please?

In the guide I’ll be covering Halion, as well as the three mini-bosses you’ll have to defeat before you can face him. I will also examine priest appropriate loot in the instance and compare it to a few pieces we’ve seen in Icecrown Citadel. Hit the jump and we’ll get started.

Mini-bosses
The three mini bosses in Ruby Sanctum aren’t much to worry about, to be honest. Just like the three dragons in Obsidian Sanctum, surviving the brief encounters only requires that you know what to expect.

Baltharus the Warborn As a healer all you need to do is hang back and spam heals on the tank. What you heal with doesn’t matter too much, just expect the damage to be a bit spiky. There is a knock back ability Baltharus does, but you should be at range so it won’t matter too much. At 66% and 33% (50% on 10-man) Baltharus will clone himself and the clones will need to get picked up by the off-tanks, and at that point you’ll need to start healing the off-tanks too. Again, it doesn’t matter how. Baltharus has an attack called Blade Tempest where he spins his weapon around and does a pretty hefty sum of damage to your tanks (and any DPS standing in front of the boss.) It will get worse if any players with the Enervating Brand debuff are in range of the boss, which they may well be if you’re in a pug, so be ready to toss out a priest cooldown if things look dire.

Of the three mini-bosses, I would say this one is the hardest, so if you get through Baltharus without batting an eye (it’s quite possible to just muscle through the encounter without properly handling the debuff) then you shouldn’t have any trouble with the other two.

Saviana Ragefire This mini-boss is so easy you’ll forget you fought her. She spends a good chunk of time up in the air spitting fireballs at you. She’ll mark members of your raid with an arrow to cast Conflagarate on them. These players will need to run out of the raid and all you need to do is throw them a few heals. Beyond that the damage on the tanks and raid is forgettable. You could practice your Smite spamming here if you want, especially if your DPS are melee heavy.

General Zarithrian There is some tank swapping required to handle his sunder armor attack, but it’s nothing too strenuous. The major concern you’ll have is the adds, which come from the left and right of where Zarithrian stands. Stand close to the boss so it’s easy for your off-tank (or whoever isn’t swapped in) to pick them up. Keep Fade ready to go in case an add spawn lines up too closely to an Intimidating Roar. Intimidating Roar will incapacitate you with fear for a moment, but it doesn’t last long enough to devastate your tanks, nor even constitute me trying out Fear Ward.

Halion
The big baddie of Ruby Sanctum is an adorable pink dragon named Halion. The mechanics for the fight are pretty straight forward, but your raid must be coordinated and aware to succeed. Basic dragon rules apply to Halion: don’t stand in front of him, don’t stand behind him. You can get breathed on or cleaved in front, and from behind you’ll get stunned by Halion’s tail. The stun doesn’t seem so bad, but depending on what part of the fight you’re on, it could be lethal.

Your Role As a priest you’ll find one of the best things you can do this fight is help where help is needed. Your raid will be taking a fair share of damage, and so will the tanks. So, regardless of what your role is, you’ll be raid healing and tank healing in this fight. This means it’s mostly up to you which spec you’d rather play — do whatever feels right. Holy does have an advantage with Body & Soul though, (more on this later.) Discipline’s bubble spamming isn’t as all-powerful in this fight either, just because the damage occurs off and on. This means you’ll want to focus a lot on single target tank and raid healing instead.

The encounter is split up into three phases, a top phase, a bottom phase, and a split phase.

Phase 1 In this phase, the major concerns for healers (and everyone, really) are Meteor Strikes and Fiery Combustion. Meteor Strike will mark a location on the ground (typical void zone mechanic) and you will need to dodge away from the area to avoid the impact. When the meteor lands, arms of fire will spread outward and players will also need to avoid standing in this fire. Simple stuff, really. On heroic mode, the Meteor Strikes will also spawn big and little adds which need to be tanked. Have Fade ready when they show up.

Fiery Combustion is similar to Grobbulus’ clouds in Naxxramas: when you are afflicted you need to move to a safe, designated area and let the debuff tick off or be dispelled from you. When the debuff is removed (one way or another) a big circle of fiery doom will instantly form under you and cause damage to you and anyone else standing in it. Get out quickly! (It does have a knock back ability, so this shouldn’t be too hard.) The size of the circle will depend on how long it takes for the debuff to be dispelled.

Any player with a friendly dispel ability can remove the debuff (it is categorized as both a curse and a magical debuff) but it’s best if just one player is in charge of it, just to avoid early or sloppy dispels.

As a priest you’ll want to be spamming heals on the tanks, and after a Meteor Strike, the raid as well. Holy is strong to react, but if you want to apply some preemptive bubbles you’ll be best selecting targets off your screen based on how close they are to the impact area of the Meteor Strike. If you are on dispelling duty, don’t use Dispel Magic until you are sure that your target is in a safe location. Don’t just count off and expect them to be where they should. Look at your screen and make sure you know where they are when you dispel the debuff. If you aren’t dispelling, make sure to spam heals on the target with the debuff so they stay alive.

Body and Soul comes into play by helping players with Fiery Combustion move to their designated position faster. All you have to do to utilize it is as soon as you see the debuff on a player, cast Power Word: Shield on him. (Just remember that if you’re running with a disc priest to make sure you both discuss shield usage.)

Phase 2 In the second phase your raid will take a portal down to the twilight realm. Whatever you do, DO NOT go into the portal until the tank has gone in first. There is a big scary dragon on the other end of that portal and he will aggro onto whoever shows up first; this is why the tank goes first. Because he’ll momentarily be without heals though, make sure to toss him a Guardian Spirit or Pain Suppression before he goes through the portal so he has some extra survivability while everyone is catching up.

Phase 2 has something called Soul Consumption, which acts nearly identical to Fiery Combustion, but instead of fire damage, it deals shadow damage. Additionally, instead of a knock back, the zone will now slows players caught inside it while deaing damage. This wouldn’t be terrible, except another mechanic exists in phase 2: Twilight Cutters.

Twilight Cutters form when 2 (or 4 on heroic) shadowy balls rotating around the room connect. This occurs periodically, and when it does the cutters will become instant death lasers. You will instantly die if a cutter connects on top of your, you move into one, or if you touch the outer wall when the cutter is active. So now imagine the slowing debuff from Soul Consumption (as well as the tail swipe stun from Halion) and you can see phase 2 is a bit tricky in comparison to the first. Healers will need to be sure that where they dispel a target isn’t soon going to turn into a dangerous spot.

Oddly, heroic is actually a little easier in regards to the cutters. In one respect you have to be more on your toes about avoiding 2 death beams. On the other hand, having 4 floating orbs means you always have a point of reference on your screen to know where the cutter will form. If you’re doing normal, make sure you always have your camera pivoted so you can see at least one shadow orb.

As a priest, keep rocking tank and raid heals. There is ticking shadow damage in phase 2 that you can respond to with Renew or Power Word: Shield spamming; just don’t overwork yourself if you’re bubble spamming, since you don’t want to prevent a Body and Soul from taking effect.

Phase 3 The third phase is a mix of both phase 1 and 2. You will have to split your entire raid up and DPS Halion in both realms (while dealing with the mechanics from the first and second phases.) As long as the DPS is even, the damage should remain similar in both realms, meaning that even if you split up your healers, there shouldn’t be any surprises.

In heroic mode, your raid must place Combustion and Consumption zones carefully because the zones in one realm will also appear in the other.

As a priest you’ll want to continue with the appropriate phase routine, based on what realm you’re in. Keep using Body and Soul if you’re a holy priest and don’t forget that no matter what your job is, you need to watch the tanks. If you stay calm, a kill show be no trouble.

Kinaesthesia’s tip for heroic Halion: If you’re a daring holy priest healing up top and happen to have a paladin or death knight tank, try helping out with adds by using healing aggro to your advantage. Move into the AoE of your tank’s Consecration or Death and Decay, and then as the adds spawn, throw out a Circle of Healing. Circle of Healing produces a lot of threat, so it should direct all the adds to you and then, thanks to your genius position, to the tank. If you do this instead of using Fade, you’ll be helping out any of your fellow healers who don’t have threat drops.

Loot
Below I’ve picked out the drops that may interest you as a healing priest.

Back
Abduction’s Cover (heroic version) — 10-man — This is like a direct upgrade from the Heartsick Mender’s Cloak off 10-man Blood Prince Council in Icecrown Citadel. It’s not much for min/maxing, as MP5 and haste are a strange combo for priests (spirit and haste for holy priests, or crit and MP5 for disc priests would be more sensible if you’re looking for a cloak with regen.) Still, if your cloak is lacking, you’ll definitely be able to utilize the stats on this, regardless of what healing spec you sport.
Cloak of Burning Dusk (heroic version) — 25-man — If you rate item value on spellpower (which I do) this will be your best-in-slot cloak, whether you do or don’t do heroics. With an item level of 271, and 284 on heroic, this cloak will be better (respectively) than the previous best-in-slot: Frostbinder’s Shredded Cape from Valithria Dreamwalker. There is a slight trade between crit and haste, but it’s not going to break anything if you choose between them. Plus, the red gem slot and spellpower bonus make the cloak extra appealing.
Finger
Ring of Phased Regeneration (heroic version) — 25-man — Another regen piece, so not best-in-slot, but the stat combination isn’t too bad for a disc priest who needs a little regen; and the red gem slot pushes it above a similarly itemized ring in 25-man ICC (Incarnadine Band of Mending from Blood Prince Council.)
Trinket
Glowing Twilight Scale (heroic version) — 25-man — The spellpower alone on this trinket is quite nice, but I’m sure many healers will be turned off by the on-use effect over a proc. The range conditional on the group healing effect makes the trinket a little more ideal for a tank healer (melee would always be in range of your target), but if you’re a raid healer don’t give up on it: there is nothing to keep you from using the trinket to focus more heals on clusters of players when there is heavy raid damage.

Binding the use effect will probably lead to overhealing, so in that regard the effect is a bit clunky in comparison to a spellpower buff. Still, you might want to nab it and test it if you don’t have anything better. I still prefer the smart heal of the Althor’s Abacus myself.
Wrists
Bracers of Fiery Night (heroic version) — 25-man — Hello best-in-slot bracers. Dawn pats the bracers affectionately. As you may recall, there were not pure throughput bracers in ICC, just two pairs with spirit on them. Now Blizzard has graced us with a nice pair of crit and haste bracers for priests and clothie casters to fight over. Good luck!