Penance Priest

Discipline Priest Blog

So I got me to thinking the other day: why the hell am I in mostly quest blues? Gearing up to entry-level epics has been nothing short of frustrating. I don’t have many heroics I’m interested in running…I’m not badge farming…reputation farming…what gives?

Rewind: The road to 70

Within an hour of hitting level 70, I had eight epics.

That’s right: three BoP primal mooncloth items. Two BoE whitemend items. And I had saved up enough honor for three more PvP epics, including the healing mace, cuffs, and a ring. All enchanted and ready to go.

Snap your fingers, and I went from 69 to uber.

Buying your way to uber

All those level 70 starter epics came without ever having to worry about a random drop. There are four ways to get gear that are non-random:

  • crafted items
  • faction rewards
  • PvP honor gear
  • Badge/emblem gear

Yay Blizzard…giving people ways to work for upgrades that don’t require raiding. And even if you do raid, you can neutralize the sting of the RNG with these purchasable epics.

Stats for discipline

Refresher course: Disc loves crit.

Oh, and mp5 please. We get no bonus from spirit like holy priests, so point for point, mp5 is usually superior, if only by a little. And while Rapture rocks the house, and Replenshment, well, replenishes it, you still need your own regen.

Haste? Sure. After everything else is filled, I won’t reject haste. But it’s last on the list.

Here, my friends, is the perfect discipline item. If I could wear Lattice Chokers all over my body, I would. Until I can get all the items on this list. Unfortunately, most of them require running 25-man raids, which I really don’t enjoy.

Oh, and no, I’m not planning to drop 8k gold on the Signet of the Kirin Tor. If that’s for you, awesome.

Window shopping

Let’s see what non-random upgrade gear we priests can wear, shall we? With one exception, I’ve omitted anything with hit rating.

-=-=-=-=-=- PAOLO’S THREADS -=-=-=-=-=-
Epic gear crafted while-u-wait

Moonshroud robe, gloves. Spirit.
Spellweave robe, gloves. Haste, spirit.

-=-=-=-=-=- IVRENNE’S EMBLEMATIC EMPORIUM -=-=-=-=-=-
Exclusive gear for heroes. Hours by appointment.

Lattice Choker of Light (neck). Crit, mp5. Woot!
Elegant Temple Garden’s Girdle (belt). Spirit, mp5, yellow socket.
Handbook of Obscure Remedies (offhand). Haste, spirit.
Ward of the Violet Citadel (offhand). Crit, hit.
Egg of Mortal Essence (trinket). Haste.

-=-=-=-=-=- CHAMPION’S HALL -=-=-=-=-=-
Gladiator survival gear
(Closed until further notice.)

-=-=-=-=-=- LOYALTY REWARDS PROGRAM -=-=-=-=-=-
You show us love, then we’ll sell you the goods.

Belt of Dark Mending (belt, Ebon Blade exalted). Haste.
Robes of Crackling Flame (robe, Kirin Tor exalted). Haste, mp5.
Sandals of Crimson Fury (feet, Wyrmrest exalted). Haste, blue socket.
Signet of Hopeful Light (ring, Argent Crusade exalted). Haste.

See a pattern?

There is exactly one piece of crit gear for healers (Lattice Choker). The Ward of the Violet Citadel, with its points in hit rating, is clearly aimed at dps casters, but I will still probably get it because of the lack of other viable options for that slot.

All I can say is that I hope this list is terribly outdated very quickly.

But for now, I will continue to grind heroics hoping for the right drops. And Naxx of course, but that will be much slower.

In which he digressed radically from the stated mission of priesting, and veered into the more interesting territory of leadership and integrity.

Ah, the craziness that is raid leadership. There is too much to say to capture it all in one post. Or one blog, devoted entirely to raiding. Or one blogosphere.

Failure #1: “We don’t take pugs”

I spent several months in a casual guild. More accurately, “a casual guild that raids.” Ok, so failure is built right in, but let’s ignore that for now.

One time in TK we had to pug a healer. Twenty four guildies, one pug. It seemed that folks kind of knew him, so he wasn’t a complete stranger. Loot reaver drops T5 shoulders, and because we had a pug, our GM said that anyone who needed it (guild or pug) should roll, rather than using DKP. Pug priest wins the roll, and the guild’s main tank, who had been saving DKP for months for those shoulders, seethes, since it was a warrior/priest/druid item.

After the raid is over, seething turns into full-on hissy fit. Spreads to other guildies. GM turns hissy fit turns into new guild policy: No. Pugs. Ever.

“Wow,” I said to myself. “How come this only became an issue after the pug won? Shouldn’t loot rules have been clearly articulated and acknowledged by all beforehand? Maybe even discussed, before the GM announced a final policy? Shouldn’t our MT have been ticked off before the run? At the policy, not the result? Or shouldn’t he at least have accepted the fact that loot rules would be different because we needed to pug a healer to do the run?”

Failure #2: “No, we really don’t take pugs”

Fast forward a month. Casual Guild that Raids is having a hard time filling SSC on Saturday night. Really hard time. Nineteen…ok, now twenty…twenty-one…and that’s it, we hit the ceiling of people that even vaguely qualify for SSC. And this is not a raid on farm, or an easy-mode post-nerf walk through the park. Twenty-one is not enough. Desperate phone calls to offline guildies commence.

I’ve been politely whispering to the RL that I have two friends I play with a lot, a mage and a hunter, who are not only geared enough for the raid (far more geared than most guildies), but are skilled players. Team players. Know how to run out of the fire. Have offered to pass on loot, just willing to help. I believe I had enough clout to make my recommendations carry some weight.

“I’d rather take some half-dead guildie than wipe ‘cause of some pug.”

Hard to describe the amount of spit required to say the word “pug” in that sentence as it came thru on vent.

Okies…begin planning an exit strategy from Casual Guild that Raids.

Alternate Universe: This time, with Leadership

Original TK raid goes down without a pug. We can live with 24.

Or – we get a pug to fill slot #25. GM announces that, like it or not, we need to fill a slot with a guest healer, and therefore they have a right to roll on loot, within certain reasonable and stated bounds. This is the price we must pay to make this happen. Guildies surrender, because they want to do the raid rather than not.

Loot reaver drops T5 shoulders. GM acts on the stated policy, allows priest to roll. And lo, the pug priest wins. Grats from all, perhaps even with an acknowledgement that in some way he deserved such good luck for helping us out. Main tank bites his tongue, hopes for better luck next time.

GM gives two epic gems to the top DKP, the one who would have won the shoulders, as a consolation. The warrior, while not as happy as he would have been with shoulders, realizes that the GM did the best job under the circumstances.