Priest Guide for TBC Anniversary

Priest Guide for TBC Anniversary Quick Summary:

• A list of new talents and abilities and changes to the pre-existing ones.
• Short guide on how to play as a Priest.
• Two popular builds: CoH Holy Priest and Discipline Priest for PvP.
• Best stats and attributes for both specializations are described in the article.
• BiS Gear list for Holy Priest.
• The best professions for a Priest are Enchanting + Tailoring. They complete each other and provide great gear with bonuses for the Priest’s stats.

If you’re having trouble finding the best gear for your Priest, you can buy it off the Auction House. Lacking gold? Not a problem. Check out our TBC Classic Anniversary Gold for a player-friendly price.

Priest Changes in TBC Classic Anniversary

As with all classes, Priest has seen some balancing changes, as well as a plethora of new abilities and talents that make him even more prominent. In general, his healing potential is increased, and he also gets a very powerful ability for PvP in the form of Mass Dispel. Here’s a list of all changes for Priest in TBC Anniversary:

Priest eats good in TBC, as he only received buffs to his kit. They even tried doing something with Shadow tree, but it’s still not good enough to make Priest go for the DPS route.

Priest Pros & Cons

Anyone can tell you that the main downside of the Priest is not having enough utility, compared to Shamans and Paladins. However, where they lack in utility, they compensate in healing potential.

Pros:

• Kit Versatility
• Outstanding AoE Healing and Buffs
• Best PvP Healer by a Landslide

Cons:

• Utility is Lacking
• Easy to Kill

Let’s go over each point in a bit more detail. Priests have the best versatility in their healing options, which can be seen as both a good and a bad thing. I think it’s not a downside, as some paint it, as you can find a spell to adapt to any situation at the cost of it being less potent than with classes that specialize in certain categories. Seems more like a tradeoff. The AoE healing is bar none, easily. Circle of Healing is crazy good. With changes and new abilities introduced in this expansion, Priest becomes the #1 supporting class in Arena.

The utility is truly lacking, as Priest’s kit is 90% healing. If you compare it with other supports, like Paladins or Shamans, it’s just not on their level. But once again, I wouldn’t treat it as a big downside. It’s more like you know that this class tries to go for one thing and do it well. The ultimate downside is that Priest can die from a wind blow. You have to be extra careful during raids and PvP, as any trash mob or sneaky rogue can end your life in a second.

How to Play Priest in TBC Classic Anniversary

I struggle to write anything but “Heal” here. Nah, jk. Priest is the ultimate raidhealer if we’re taking the Circle of Healing build as a gold standard. Your role is to pick the right key to a lock, basically. You need to rotate between healing over time and burst healing, depending on damage spikes. Here’s how to play Priest in TBC:

• Prayer of Mending before damage hits.
• Flash Heal for fast healing.
• Greater Heal for heavy damage.
• Circle of Healing for party recovery.

The positioning is what makes Priest somewhat challenging. The range of healing options in the Priest’s arsenal is limited. Always try to stay as close as possible while being out of harm’s way. Manage overhealing and avoid spamming spells with long cd when damage is low.

Priest Best Race in TBC Classic Anniversary

Good news, if you want to play Priest, you’re not tied to a certain race. Almost all races can easily become decent Priests. Depending on the race, your playstyle will change a bit to include new racials. Almost all of them are good, and you can even gain some much needed util. Below is a full list of best races for Priest in TBC Anniversary:

Out of 10 races, 6 offer good bonuses for playing Priest. Some people also recommend taking Night Elf, but it feels kinda weird, as racials aren’t that good for Priest, imo. Like, I can see how it is useful for Shadow Priests, but who plays Shadow Priest in TBC?

Priest Stat Priority

Playing Priest in TBC is mostly about being a healer, unless you want to be off meta and play Shadow Priest and never go into any raids ever. The following stat list is for properly geared Priests. Mp5 is placed fifth here, as I assume you use consumables, but if you still experience mana problems, consider raising its priority to at least 4th position:

1. Spell Haste Rating
2. Healing Power
3. Intellect/Spirit
4. Spell Critical Strike Rating
5. Mp5 (Mana per 5 seconds)
6. Spell Power

This stat priority has a big skew into the Holy Priest talent tree. Spell Haste Rating lowers the cast time and GCD (global cooldown). Increasing it helps lower the cost of mistakes you make and generally makes you more efficient. Healing Power is self-explanatory. Intellect and Spirit raise the mana pool and mana regen of your character, respectively. Spell Crit is essential for your CoH. Mp5 is important for all casters, obviously, and Spell Power for your spells works as Healing Power, but is weaker. You can consider leaving it out on higher levels when you get good rolls on your gear. Now let’s look at the Attributes for Holy Priest: 

• Spirit: To avoid a complex explanation, the general consensus is to go for Spirit > Mp5 if stats are equal overall.
• Intellect: In TBC, Intellect is a good overall stat for increasing Mana, Mp5, and Spell Crit Chance.
• Stamina: Important, as you’re squishier than a foam toy.

If you are going for the Discipline Priest, the stat priority for your build will look like this:

1. Hit Rating (3% Cap)
2. Healing Power
3. Resilience
4. Intellect
5. Stamina

Hit is essential, and capping it at 3% is needed to avoid missing with Mana Burn and other offensive spells. Here, the situation isn’t as complex as with Holy Priest. Balance the rest of the stats. No need to stack a single one.

Best Priest Builds TBC Classic Anniversary

There are two very good Priest builds that you can use most of the time, one for PvE and Raiding, and another one for PvP. I’ll show both of them. One of them centers around Circle of Healing and is the most common healing spec. The other one focuses on the Discipline tree, providing utility and debuffs that the PvE Priest generally lacks. Let’s start!

Holy Circle of Healing Priest Build

This build works best when it heals raids or dungeons, where AoE big damage is a regular occurrence. As you can see, we take 5 points into Holy Specialization, as we focus on AoE healing rather than tank healing. We also take Prayer of Mending, as it is an extremely strong GCD, and it should be cast all the time. Other than that, the build is pretty straightforward. As you can see, we also dip into Discipline to take Meditation, as it’s a must-have talent for any Priest, and Mental Agility. There are zero damaging spells in this build, so you’ll have to rely on your trash clearers.

Discipline PvP Priest Build

Discipline tree has a lot of powerful options specifically built for PvP. It’s extremely frustrating to play against a Discipline Priest, as a good Priest will make you feel like you have zero impact in the match. This is thanks to his outstanding talents and abilities:

• Pain Suppression: An absolute must-have to buff your frontline defense.
• Focused Will: Your protection from being one-shotted.
• Improved Mana Burn: Makes Mana Burn super fast and annoying to deal with.
• Silent Resolve: Dispel reduction is great and is extremely important if you go against another Discipline Priest.
• Unbreakable Will: If you’re an Undead, this talent will be just a little less useful for you, but otherwise, it provides great resistances from CCs.

We still dip into the Holy tree to take Healing Focus, Blessed Recovery, and Spell Warding, as they offer even more survivability. The build above is the main PvP meta build for Priests in TBC, but there are variations on it that you can find online.

Priest Best In Slot Gear in TBC Classic Anniversary

And now, gearing. As with the rest of the class guides, I provide the gear for Phase 1, as it’s the most relevant right now. As more phases come out, I’ll update the list to include better gear. For now, though, let’s focus on the BiS Gear for Prist in TBC Classic:

The BiS gear presented above is for the healing Holy Priest. The Discipline Priest won’t benefit from them, as Arena’s gear is different and has a unique stat that isn’t present on PvE gear. Do not use this gear for your Discipline Priest if you don’t want to end up being laughed at.

Best Priest Professions in TBC Classic Anniversary

Priest has three professions he can delve into, each providing its own benefits. I’m talking about main professions, not the secondary ones to pair them with. The best professions for Priest in TBC Classic are:

• Enchanting: You can craft the best ring enchants, which are the main reason people even pick up enchanting. Enchant Ring - Healing Power is what you want to get. You can pick Tailoring as your secondary profession to maximize the profit you can make out of both.
• Engineering: There’s not much use to level up Engineering as of now, unless you want to deal more damage as a healer by throwing bombs. In Phase 2, however, you’ll be able to craft Powerheal 4000 Lens, and in Phase 5, the upgraded version, Powerheal 9000 Lens. Until then, you can try leveling it, but as I said, it’s something to consider for the future.
• Tailoring: This prof is necessary for some of the BiS items you can craft with Mooncloth Tailoring for yourself. As I said before, Tailoring stacks with Enchanting exceptionally well, as you can disenchant items.

My personal recommendation is, of course, pairing Tailoring + Enchanting. For me, it seems like the most obvious best profession combo for Priest. Though Powerheal Lenses are exceptional, you can’t use them in Phase 1, and of course, you want to maximize your usefulness if you’re playing Priest.

Read our other TBC Classic Anniversary guides:

• Warrior Guide
• Warlock Guide
• Hunter Guide
• Mage Guide
• Rogue Guide

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