Shadowlands Holy Priest Guide

Basic Information

Holy Priest in Shadowlands does not have monumental changes to the playstyle and structure. Holy is often regarded as the classic healer, offering a flexible healing style that mixes Heal over Time effects with powerful direct healing abilities in our Holy Words. Any sort of healing that is required, Holy is able to adapt and respond to it well enough to keep the group healthy. They are often viewed as the "Jak of all trades, master of none" for this reason. While they lack a specific niche, they make up for it in great raid oriented tools and cooldowns, which has only grown in Shadowlands with the addition of Circle of Healing to the baseline kit.

What's changed in Shadowlands?

With the second expansion in a row with minimal changes, Holy Priest should feel right at home for many returning players who have experienced it in Legion or BFA. There will be some talent adjustments that we will list below but the gameplay will continue to revolve around Holy Words and working to utilize them to the fullest.

New Abilities for Holy Priest in Shadowlands Pre-Patch

Holy Priest has received some talent adjustments and GCD improvements:

• Circle of Healing - Is now a baseline ability and used about on cooldown whenever there is damage to heal as usual.
• Renewed Faith - Replaces Enduring Renewal on the 15 talent row and is a potential 5 man focused option to better support your tank. During pre-patch, this can be a strong option for extremely fast boss kills where you want to further optimize raw throughput and don't need the mana return of Enlightenment.
• Prayer Circle - Replaces Circle of Healing on the level 40 talent row in pre-patch offering faster heals after using Circle of Healing.
• Apotheosis - Now instantly resets the cooldowns of your Holy Words when pressed solidifying this talent as the top Mythic+ pick on the row.

It has also received some returning abilities shared across all Priest specializations:

• Mind Soothe - Offers a very useful tool for skipping trash enemies in Mythic+ and while questing. You cannot run straight through these enemies but you can be significantly closer to them than before without having them attack you.
• Power Infusion - Off-GCD haste increase for yourself or an ally.
• Power Word: Shield - Situational use when on the move and the ally needs instant healing.
• Psychic Scream - Now baseline.
• Shadow Word: Death - More shadow abilities now made available to Holy.
• Shadow Word: Pain - Now baseline.

Holy Priest Strengths

• Specializes in multi-target healing, with all direct healing abilities causing a Healing Over Time effect afterwords.
• Has flexible single target and aoe oriented healing abilities in Holy Words.
• Raid oriented cooldowns that can restore health or mana to the group.
• Can heal through death for a short period of time with Spirit of Redemption.

Holy Priest Weaknesses

• Lacks many mobile or instant cast abilities and can be impeded on specific encounters with high movement requirements.
• Thrives in stacked encounters where Holy Word usage can be maximized, can struggle when players are more spread.
• Lower defensive and survivability tools.

What makes Holy Priest Special

• Fantasy: Healers that worship the power of the Light, Holy Priests use powerful healing spells to keep themselves and their allies healed through dire situations.
• Races: All races except Orc and Highmountain Tauren can be Priests.
• Resources: Holy Priests use mana as their resource for spells.
• Damage Reduction: Focused Will is a passive personal damage taken reduction from melee hits.
• Healing: Holy Word: Sanctify as well as Holy Word: Serenity are the Holy Priests bread and butter. Use other healing spells such as Prayer of Mending and Flash Heal to reduce the cooldown of your holy words.
• Basic Rotation: Holy Word: Sanctify and Holy Word: Serenity should be used as often as possible. Prayer of Mending on cooldown, utilizing AoE and Single Target healing to reduce your Holy Word cooldowns via Serendipity.
• Mobility: Angelic Feather provides Holy Priests with a on-demand sprint.
• Healing Cooldowns: Apart from your Holy Words, Divine Hymn is your main healing cooldown as well as Apotheosis if talented.
• Armor: Intellect Cloth
• Flavor: Priests have a variety of vanity glyphs:
  • Glyph of the Heavens to float your Levitate targets on clouds
  • Glyph of the Sha to change the appearance of your Shadowfiend
  • Glyph of Shackle Undead to change the appearance of your Shackle Undead spell
  • Glyph of Ghostly Fade to have a more spectral looking Fade!
  And some toys as well:
  • Thaumaturgist's Orb: Summons holy orbs or ravens. Sold by Quartermaster Miranda Breechlock in Light's Hope.
  • Scarlet Confessional Book: effect of old Glyph of Confession. Sold by Cravitz Lorent in Dalaran.

Best Holy Priest Racials

Horde

• Blood Elf - One of the most common races for Priests. Blood elves receive additional Critical Strike rating,Arcane Acuity, as well as the immensely useful Arcane Torrent ability. Offering mana regen and a Dispel Magic effect (Purge) to all enemies hit by the ability. While Priest already has Dispel Magic and Mass Dispel, utilizing Arcane Torrent can save mana and time, allowing the Priest to spend more time healing or dealing damage as needed.
• Goblin - Strong passive bonus haste (Time is Money) and extra, much needed mobility with their Rocket Jump.

Alliance

• Human- Offering bonus secondaries through The Human Spirit and a stun escape in Every Man for Himself, Humans are a solid overall selection.
• Void Elf - The Allied Race offers a decent mobility/escape tool in Spatial Rift and a solid passive effect in Entropic Embrace for damage and healing.
• Night Elf - Depending on the time of day you will receive bonus Haste or Critical Strike with the Touch of Elune passive. In addition, Shadowmeld has a wealth of uses in high level keystones, leading away mobs from the party so they can cross a part of the instance (like Volkaal in Atal’dazar) to later Shadowmeld and drop combat.