7.3.5 Discipline Guide

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7.3.5 Discipline Guide

by Djriff » 06 Dec 2017, 18:21

Introduction
A Discipline priest is a very unique healer. It relies on a couple of things from the player to perform optimally. First and foremost you need to know when you are going to heal. Disc is a very proactive spec and shines greatly when you can prepare for the damage ahead of time and heal at the exact second of damage. Secondly, proper use of cooldowns, along with timing them properly, is what separates an average disc priest from a great one. After reading this guide you should have a basic understanding of how disc works, and how to play it optimally.

Click the + to see the section.



[+] Talents
Talents
Cheat Sheet


Row 15
Twist of Fate - This is typically used for all progress content.
Castigation - This is ran when you are using Soul of the High Priest or you don't think you'll proc Twist of Fate often
Schism - This is ran when you want to do more DPS, usually only in open world content and low end Mythic +.

Generally speaking, Twist of Fate is the default choice for all encounters.

Row 30
Angelic Feather - This is always ran, regardless of scenario.
Body and Soul - This is usually not ran due to the uncontrolled speed burst you can give someone else.
Masochism - This talentis largely useless to us as a healer.

Usually take Angelic Feather

Row 45
Shining Force
Psychic Voice
Dominant Mind

This row is largely up to you, it doesn't really impact your healing regardless of choice. Most people run Shining Force since disc doesn't have an interrupt.

Row 60
Shield Discipline - This talent smooths mana management and is great for longer fights. Typically the default pick for progression.
Mindbender - This talent is taken for an extra healing CD, the mana return for this talent is inferior to Shield Discipline.
Power Word: Solace - Is inferior to both of the other talents, making this the worst pick.

Mindbender when the cooldown of Mindbender lines up well with abilities or in mythic +,Shield Discipline otherwise.

Row 75
Sanctuary - Default talent.
Clarity of Will - Good in high mythic + or on fights where you can cheese a mechanic with a large absorb shield.
Shadow Covenant - Good for mythic + for the on demand healing, should be used outside of combat between trash packs to quickly top people off before you drink.

Sanctuary can be run in all content, otherwise select the talent that best suits your situation.

Row 90
Purge the Wicked - Default choice
Divine Star - Rarely chosen due to mana concerns.
Halo - Rarely chosen due to mana concerns.

Technically speaking, Divine Star and Halo do more healing than Purge the Wicked, however since Purge the Wicked spreads to other targets on casting Penance, does more damage, and is cheaper than Shadow Word: Pain, this makes it the default pick.

Row 100
Power Infusion - Inferior to Evangelism in terms of raid healing, however is a great pick for DPS in mythic + or open world content.
Grace - Generally picked for mythic + due to the reduced effectiveness of Atonement healing due to a smaller group and a greater need for direct healing.
Evangelism - The default choice for raid content.

If you are healing a raid you should take Evangelism, otherwise choose which talent best suits your situational needs.


[+] How to heal as Disc
How to heal as disc
Disc is a very proactive healer, relying on getting Atonement our before the damage occurs and then DPS'ing to heal those with Atonement on them. Disc lacks in strength at healing unexpected damage, and can very easily be caught flat footed if people unexpectedly take damage. Thankfully, we aren't completely without tools to deal with this. If you find yourself in a situation where several people have taken damage, Power Word: Radiance followed up by Penance for a quick burst of healing. If there isn't any damage coming up anytime soon, you can use Plea and just let your damage from your dot and smite heal them up. Otherwise, disc can be split into two phases of healing.

Preparatory Phase
During this phase you should start putting out Atonement around 12-13 seconds before the damage is about to occur. You should do this by using these spells in this order of priority:

Around 3 seconds before the damage is about to hit, you should cast Power Word: Radiance, preferably twice on targets that don't have Atonement on them.

This will mean you have anywhere from 15-20 applications of Atonement out. It's at this time you'll want to use Evangelism to keep your Atonement active for a lot longer.

Damage Phase
Now that you have your Atonement out, you'll move into the damage phase. You'll want to use this spell priority during this phase:

Special Mention Shadowfiend/Mindbender are best used before you cast Power Word: Radiance. This will ensure you don't waste a Penance during damage phase. This is also when you would use an on use damage trinket such as Terminus Signaling Beacon or Tarnished Sentinel Medallion

Non burst healing/between bursts
Sometimes you'll find yourself healing an encounter that does not have a lot of burst damage or has a lot of steady ticking damage. In Antorus, Varimathras is one such fight.

When approaching this kind of fight, you'll have to heal it a bit differently. When you are going to use your cooldowns, you'll want to begin prepping for damage much like you would an incoming burst of damage, and try to keep your Atonement rolling as long as possible. Naturally this will cause some mana concerns and these types of fights are where Shield Discipline and items like Carafe of Searing Light or Darkmoon Deck: Promises shine.

The two phases aren't strictly followed by one another, it's ok to weave damaging spells between Atonement applications if people are taking damage. No guide can cover every situation you may run into, and it is up to your best judgment on how to heal the incoming damage. The best way to do this is plan ahead and be proactive with your spell choices.


[+] Cooldown Usage
Cooldown Usage
Baseline disc has the following cooldowns:

We can get the following cooldowns through talents, legendaries, or trinkets:

Generally you'll rotate between 2 sets of cooldowns. Usually you will pair Evangelism with Velen's Future Sight. Doing so allows you to put out less applications of Atonement and still put out a ton of healing while saving mana.

Likewise you can pair Velen's Future Sight with Light's Wrath and achieve the same effect as above. However, you should try and time your usage of Evangelism to take advantage of the extended duration of Atonement.


Special Mention You should never macro Velen's Future Sight with anything as it's far better to have control exactly when you pop it and is often a mistake new players make.

Power Word: Barrier should be used at points where the raid will be stacked up while taking damage and you'll have a lot of Atonement out. While it's not necessary to have a bunch of Atonement out, it allows you to do double the healing to those inside of your Power Word: Barrier.

Rapture should be used during a ramp up phase where you're expecting a big hit, or between burst phases where there is a lot of little damage coming. This is best used frequently when talented into Shield Discipline as you barely spend any mana providing all your Power Word: Shield is fully aborbed.

Shadowfiend/Mindbender should be used before you cast your back to back Power Word: Radiance to ensure maximum uptime and healing. Likewise, you should use your damage trinkets the same way, just not in the same damage phase as you used Shadowfiend/Mindbender. You shouldn't do this if there is no healing to be done and instead save it for after your ramp up phase.

Power Infusion is only taken when you want to do extra DPS and as such should be used on CD without regard to healing.

Pain Suppression should be used on tanks or raid members who are taking a lot of damage over a period of time. Thanks to Tyranny of Pain it also heals the target for 33% of the damage taken.


[+] Stats
Stats
Stats as disc are fairly easy to calculate as you'll mostly go for the highest item level pieces you can get. To get exact stat weights for your character, use the disc healing sheet.

Haste is a unique stat for disc as it doesn't directly provide more healing, but allows you to apply more Atonement in a shorter amount of time and also increases the tick rate of Shadow Word: Pain/Purge the Wicked. Generally speaking you want to get anywhere from 25-35% haste from your gear without sacrificing item level or intellect.

The minimum haste required to be able to use evangelism to refresh 20 applications of Atonement is 26.67%. This is not a breakpoint or something to shoot for, just something to keep in mind when you're healing.


[+] Tier Bonuses
Tier Bonuses

Tier 19
Unless you get an absurdly high titan forge, you can largely ignore this tier bonus entirely.

Tier 20
  • The T20 2pc is quite valuable. It is worth roughly 1500 int (100 ilvls on cloak/helm/gloves or 70 ilvls on chest/shoulders/legs). You'll want to keep this as long as possible.
  • The T20 4pc on the other hand is RNG. While the proc chance is 15%, it's off a spell we usually use every 6 seconds, meaning it can proc quite often. When you use Rapture you are almost guaranteed a proc.

Tier 21
  • T21 2pc allows you to use Power Word: Radiance more frequently, meaning you have a shorter time between bursts. This favors the fast paced damage patters of Antorus quite nicely.
  • T21 4pc boosts our healing from Penance even more so.

    Tier 20 2pc and Tier 21 4pc
    It's best to use this combination for as long as possible. Ideally you'll want to farm Tomb of Sargaras to try and get high item level pieces.


[+] Trinkets
Trinkets
While disc has loot eligibility to all healing trinkets as well as DPS trinkets, only a handful of trinkets are good for us. Unlike DPS, proc trinkets are generally not good for us as they can proc at the wrong time and not contribute anything to our healing, or heal when we don't need it.

This is a list of which trinkets are good for us, this does not contain every trinket, just the very good ones.


[+] Legendaries
Legendaries
Unfortunately most of the legendaries for disc suck, however thankfully the shared legendaries we have access to more then make up for it. Below is a list of legendaries sorted into different tiers, S being the best, C being the worst.

S tier
  • Velen's Future Sight - As stated above, this is our BIS trinket, as well as our BIS legendary. The sheer amount of stats it brings in addition to the on use healing effect make it a very strong trinket for disc and our healing style. While it is a great boon to the spec, it is not mandatory to have and you can heal without it just fine.

A Tier

B Tier
  • Xalan the Feared's Clench - This legendary basically means you'll always have Atonement on yourself. This makes it an excellent survivability legendary.
  • Sephuz's Secret - If you can time the haste proc before a burst, you can run less haste and more mastery/crit/vers instead. However, if you find yourself not able to proc it a lot, the legendary is still valuable due to the large amount of haste on it.
  • Insignia of the Grand Army The value of this legendary depends on your T2 traits, at best (Assuming 3 Torment the Weak) it can be decent, however other legendaries will provide a more noticeable benefit.
  • Kam Xi'raff - This legendary has good stats but a meh effect. While majority of the time the mana savings after you cast Light's Wrath will be wasted, as you'll want the during your preparatory phase. A case could be made where this legendary is good on fights with sustained damage and you can get more Atonement out for cheaper.
  • Estel, Dejahna's Inspiration - This legendary let's you run with less haste and more mastery/crit/vers, however doesn't make up for the admittedly poor effect on healing haste has.
  • Skjoldr, Sanctuary of Ivagont - This legendary buffs one of our already beefy healing spells. In addition it reduces the cooldown of Pain Suppression. While not a great legendary, it's slightly better than others in this tier.
  • Inner Hallation - As stated above in regards to proc trinkets, this legendary can be useful or complete trash. The mana savings from Power Infusion are nice, however since you cast Power Word: Radiance at the end of your preparatory phase, the mana savings is wasted as is the extra haste. This legendary can be decent on fights with sustained damage, but there are better choices.
  • Celumbra, the Night's Dichotomy - This crafted legendary provides a ton of personal survivability and an extra 600 of a stat of your choosing due to the 3 gem sockets. This legendary is better than nothing.

C Tier


[+] Relics and the Netherlight Crucible
Relics and the Netherlight Crucible
While all of these selections can be a bit daunting, feel free to use the Disc relic sheet i put together that allows you to just input your relics and traits and will show you the best path to take in the netherlight crucible. Below is an indepth explanation of why the relics and traits are valuable.

Relics
Generally speaking, disc has a few good relics to choose from. You can find the exact values of each relic by using the disc healing sheet found here.

  • Lenience's Reward - While it doesn't translate to a direct HPS increase viewable in warcraft logs, the damage reduction this trait gives each person with atonement is less healing that needs to be done.
  • Shield of Faith - Since Power Word: Shield is one of our best direct healing spells that rarely overheals, it makes this relic quite attractive to us.
  • Confession - Since Penance is mostly used offensively as our main Atonement healing spell, any trait that buffs it damage is quite attractive.
  • The Edge of Dark and Light - This spell benefits both Shadow Word: Pain and Purge the Wicked and the passive healing either of them do make this an attractive relic.
  • Burst of Light - While we don't really care about Power Word: Radiance healing, it can have a very slight impact on overall healing.
  • Vestments of Discipline - This spell lets you take 3.33% reduced damage per rank when you use fade. The majority of damage patterns line up well with fade making this a decent pick over other lower ranked traits.
  • Borrowed Time - This will make weaving damage spells between Atonement during long periods of damage as well as the first spell we cast after our preparatory phase cast faster.
  • The other relics aren't worth more than 200 intellect or provide a worthy benefit of a relic spot. In these cases, the other relic traits are only worth the weapon item level they will increase.

Nether Light Crucible Traits

Damage Traits
The majority of the damage traits really shine for disc on average, due to the nature of our healing style through Atonement. Tthe traits can proc at the wrong time and waste healing. Going through logs, the other damage traits seem to do their fair share of healing, even if at the wrong time, and on the plus side it costs you no extra mana for extra healing.The exception to this is Torment the Weak which acts as a second dot and does a considerable amount of healing.

Concordance Proc Traits
The two concordance traits, Shocklight and Murderous Intent only are active during Concordance of the Legionfall and like damage/healing procs are a bit RNG. While it's never a bad thing to have an extra bit of stat, be cautious when selecting these relics as their value will swing from pull to pull.

Healing Traits
The two healing traits, Light's Embrace and Refractive Shell aren't very good and will only heal you, not other people.

Flat Stat Traits
The two stat traits, Light Speed and Master of Shadows both provide a flat amount of stats, haste and mastery respectfully. Of the two, Master of Shadows is better suited for disc as you can easily get haste elsewhere and the avoidance Master of Shadows brings adds to our survivability.


[+] Enhancements
Enhancements
Enchants

Gems

Food
  • Lavish Suramar Feast - You should always eat this if it is available.
  • Azshari Salad - If you need haste and there isn't a feast.
  • Whichever secondary stat is highest per your stat weights


[+] Resources
Resources

Disc Healing Sheet - A massive sheet that lets you input your own information from logs and automatically updates values of relics/traits depending on your input. It also has a pawn and crucible weight string.

Beginner Mythic + Guide - Just starting as a disc priest and not sure how to heal dungeons? We've got you covered.

ToS Healing Guide - While this was the last raid, it's a good resource if you find yourself going back to it for that juicy T20 and owl.

AtBT Healing Guide - The current raid boss healing guide.

AtBT Gear Guide - A list of gear that can drop for disc.

Haste Breakpoints - A look into the haste breakpoints for disc.

Mana Talent Comparison - A detailed sheet on how different talents compare on mana.

Mana Trinket Comparison - A detailed sheet comparing the mana gains from various trinkets.


[+] Change Log
Change Log
  • 1/11/2018 - Guide Created
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