I Am Perplexed...

Last night, our guild cleared Naxx25 in 4 hours. Recount told me I kicked ass and took names.

Recount is apparently a liar, because the WWS for the evening placed the other shadow priest MUCH higher, and placed me at just barely out-damaging the tanks. I just don't understand. The only stats she has that are higher than mine are Hit (she's way over the cap) and Mana Regen. Her gear is good, but so is mine now. I just have to hope that the new pieces of gear I picked up this week will help.

• Cincture of Polarity - Great +hit belt. Added a belt buckle and +16 spellpower gem
• Heigan's Putrid Vestments - More +hit. Need to enchant. I love the name of this though. Puuuutriiiid
• Leggings of Atrophy - Another great name. More +hit. STILL NOT FREAKING CAPPED. Waiting on a tailor to make my pantschant.
• Gothik's Cowl - Got this piece on Monday. Best hat I can probably get for now, and I got it for cheaps.
• Mantle of the Corrupted - Still more +hit, still not capped. Reeeally tryin here. There are a few better shoulder pieces, but I need the +hit.

Otherwise, I have NO idea what I'm doing wrong, and there's really no one to tell me in my guild. The other two shadow priests are... how do you say... unhelpful. I've turned to the theorycraft geniuses at shadowpriest.com, as I'm not very good at it. But seriously. By all accounts, hit for spriests is pretty broken right now, and some report seeing no misses on bosses after 157 hit or so. I just... ugh! I dunno what else to try. My life as a shadow priest is very much a roller coaster with the extremes of frustration and happiness.

Shadow Priests and Endgame Preparedness

I mentioned yesterday that I had doubts about shadow priest raid utility these days. Our guild went to Heroic Naxxramus last night and my damage was actually not too shabby considering I'm still in mostly blues (still carrying green trinkets, ew). Basically I've come to the conclusion that a shadow priest's ability to hold his or her own in a raid is dependent FIRST on spec, SECOND on spell rotation, and THIRD on gear.

1. The spec is easy. There are tons of theorycrafting sites out there that tell you the why, but generally speaking this is the WotLK raid spec of choice.
2. Spell rotation is hotly debated and depends quite a bit on gear and on the kind of fight you're in.
• For soloing, I like to use Vampiric Touch (VT) - Mind Blast (MB) - Devouring Plague (DP) - Mind Flay (MF) or Mind Sear (MS) x 2 - MB if needed, or repeat previous sequence - Shadow Word: Death (SWD) to finish.
• For 5-man heroics, I use MB - DP - SWD - VT - Shadow Word: Pain (SWP) - MF or MS - repeat. I drop Vampiric Embrace (VE) in there if the healing is shoddy.
• For most boss fights, I use VT - MB - DP - SWD - SWP - MF - VT - trinkets - Inner Focus (IF) - MB - SWD - DP - SWP
  


3. Gear is where the fun starts, because it is all about what your goal is. If you're going for a coveted raid spot, my impression is that +spellpower and +hit are tops, followed by +crit and +haste, though the topic is debated. The hit cap is 290, and to be honest, I'm having a hell of a time gearing for that and not losing too many points in other places. I find a +hit weapon, but I lose other stats in the process. Still working out the details on the gear issue. Ugh.
• Example 1: At my current gear level, I could use Flameheart Spell Scalpel + Telestra's Journal, or I could use Staff of Draconic Combat. Quick comparison tells you that the staff is better on Int, Spellpower, and Haste but the dagger+book is better on Crit and Hit. I technically only lose a little bit of spell power, I lose quite a bit on the other stats (I prefer haste to crit for now. Please argue against.)
• Example 2: Rings! I could go Signet of the Malevolent + The Prospector's Prize or Band of Guile + Annhylde's Ring. Both options are fine, but one is hit heavy with way less spellpower and one has no hit at all.

So you can see wherein the problem lies. Next time, I'll go into more detail about exactly why you should put a shadow priest in your raid.