Method Discipline Priest Guide - Playstyle And Rotation

Playstyle & Rotation

In this section of the guide we will talk about how you actually want to play Discipline Priest. Important things to pay attention to, what your general rotation looks like as well as how your actual ramps look like in raid will all be covered here.

Rotation Altering Talents

In the new talent tree you will find many talents that change how you perform your rotation. One of these is Twilight Equilibrium. While you have this talent you’ll always want to weave between casting holy and shadow damaging spells, as it yields you a 15% damage buff that transfers through Atonement. While preparing for damage events you can use Twilight Equilibrium to buff your Purge the Wicked or Shadow Word: Pain by 15% so that your DoT will tick harder and also put out more healing through Atonement.

Harsh Discipline is a talent that requires some preparation in order to use. For raiding you’ll want to prepare ahead of time with 4/8 Smite, Power Word: Solace or Mind Blast casts before performing a ramp depending on if you have one or two points in this talent. You will have to do this to be able to activate Harsh Discipline, which will carry through to your ramp as it has a 30 second duration. In dungeons however usually this buff will happen naturally through gameplay, but try to actively prepare the buff ahead of time if you know a hard hitting mechanic is coming in.

Expiation and Inescapable Torment are both spells that interact and push you towards more aggressively casting Mind Blast and Shadow Word: Death. When playing with Expiation you want to make sure that you always have more than 3/6 seconds left on your current Purge the Wicked before casting Mind Blast or Shadow Word: Death so you can gain the full damage from the talent. While using Inescapable Torment you should always look out for moments where you can cast Mindbender right as an enemy drops into the 20% execute range. This is due to the fact that you can utilize Death and Madness to get an extra hit from Inescapable Torment which results in some extra damage and potential healing.

Wrath Unleashed pushes you towards casting Smite a lot, which nicely synergizes with Harsh Discipline. When playing with Wrath Unleashed you’ll look to squeeze as many Smite casts into the 15 second window as possible, but still using high value cooldowns like Halo during ramps.

Train of Thought allows you to more frequently cast Power Word: Shield and Penance. This facilitates some changes in your ramp up rotation, as well as possibly allowing a second Penance during ramps using some talent setups.

When playing with Shadow Covenant and not having the talent Embrace Shadow you’ll want to make sure that you almost only cast shadow spells during your Shadow Covenant buff. Due to the low duration of baseline Shadow Covenant you can prioritize casting shadow spells rather than focusing on Twilight Equilibrium during Shadow Covenant, as the 25/35% buff to shadow spells is larger and more important than the 15% from Twilight Equilibrium.

Raid Ramps

In the overview we spoke briefly about what a ramp is and how in general terms you will want to execute it. Now it’s time to dive a bit deeper and see what your actual ramps look like. We will look at the order in which you’ll want to cast your spells to put out the most amount of healing within your Atonement window.

With the new 4-Piece set bonus introduced in Patch 10.1 you’ll always want to save up two charges of the instant cast / mana cost reduction buff for Power Word: Radiance. This is so that you can be entirely mobile during your ramp up window essentially protecting you from getting hindered and having to delay your ramp due to mechanics.

In Shadowlands it was common practice for most of the patches to combine Rapture and Evangelism into one ramp. With Dragonflight, this is now changing, and the default situation will be to split these as you’d like to spread out your healing, and usually then gain from splitting them up is larger than combining the two into one big ramp.

Something that is important to note is that different talent builds change which order you’ll want to cast your spells, as spells like Twilight Equilibrium and Expiation and many other talent choices require you to change your rotation in order to reap the full benefit of these talents.

Important note about Flash Heal + Binding Heals: When you cast Flash Heal on another target with Binding Heals talented, which will be the default for all builds, you will apply Atonement to both yourself and your target. For that reason you always want to avoid applying a single-target Atonement to yourself through the use of Power Word: Shield or Renew while ramping so you don’t waste the extra Atonement.

We’ll break the different ramps into three main categories. Evangelism ramp, Rapture ramp and Mini-Ramps. These different types all have different cast sequences that you’ll want to perform correctly to gain the most amount of throughput that you possibly can. If you have any on-use trinkets you’ll want to use these most likely during your Evangelism ramp to boost its power even more. First let’s look at the first two types, step by step.

For the Default Build after you have cast Schism in your ramp sequence you can mix and match abilities however you would like based on the frequency and amount of healing you have to do for every single global. If the damage is front-loaded you can focus all the strong spells at the start and this is how the baseline ramp sequence is set up. However if the damage is more staggered you can decide to for example move Halo or an execute buffed Shadow: Word Death later into the damage sequence to get a more even spread of damage. You always want to make sure that you get use out of Expiation so try to always have at least 7 seconds of your DoT remaining before casting either Mind Blast or Shadow Word: Death, but other than that you can swap around abilities to better fit what the fight requires.

In some fights you’ll find that it is more beneficial to combine your Rapture and Evangelism into one massive ramp. This is applicable whenever there is a large mechanic happening every 1 min 30 seconds or longer, and the raid is not in any real danger between those mechanics due to fight design or other healers covering the other moments in the fight. In those situations you would follow the Evangelism ramp, but now include steps 1-4 of a Rapture ramp. In basic terms instead of using Renew to ramp you will always use Rapture + Power Word: Shield and finish applying single-target Atonement with a Flash Heal. However this is quite rare as there is almost always something to use your Rapture on between your main Evangelism ramps.

Ramping Tips

Being able to ramp on time for mechanics may seem like a daunting task. However with good practice and some general tips you’ll be ramping like an expert in no time! Personally I like to split how you time your ramps into two categories. Paying attention to Weakauras/Bossmods and paying attention to your surroundings and current mechanics. Whenever I progress on a boss I tend to use both of these methods. When we first get into the boss and I am quite unfamiliar with the fight I will rely on Weakauras and Bossmods to tell me when I am supposed to ramp for an upcoming mechanic. As a rule of thumb in Dragonflight a ramp with 20-30% haste will take anywhere between 16-18 seconds to prepare, depending on your talent set up and how well you execute the ramp. If you’re just starting out I would recommend being on the safer side and being closer to 18 seconds so you have a bigger safety net if you mess up a global or two. As you get more and more haste on your gear you will have to adapt since you’ll require less time to complete a ramp.

As I get more comfortable with the encounter I will start to transition to timing my ramps with mechanics, boss voice lines and other visual or auditory notes. As an example, on a certain encounter I would see a mechanic come out, internally count to three, and then start my ramp. After playing an encounter for a certain amount of time, ramping should become second nature, as you can learn to pay attention to your surroundings to help you consistently hit those ramps on time.

While an Atonement tracker WeakAura is very useful, it isn’t always perfect for ramping situations. Sometimes when you start ramping you already have Atonement buffs out on one or several raid members. To keep track of my “real” amount of Atonement during a ramp (that is the amount that is cast specifically in preparation for the next mechanic) I like to count in my head every single time a spell is cast that applies Atonement. This way you won’t be left at 8 Atonement when you would rather be at 10 because you had two Atonement buffs already out and for that reason though you were already done with applying single target Atonement.

Downtime and Mini-Ramping

How you play during your downtime is another part of Discipline Priest that is important to get right. Outside of your main ramp windows you don’t have a lot of extra tools, so you need to be able to do as much as possible with the limited resources you have available. Most of the time spent during your downtime will be on dealing damage. Paying attention to the raid frames and incoming mechanics can be a great way to help out, as hitting a Power Word: Life or Power Word: Shield at a crucial moment can be the difference between someone surviving or dying.

In your downtime if you are not planning to do any ramping here is a general guideline for a DPS rotation

Make sure Purge the Wicked is up
If there is more than 24 seconds until you are performing a ramp cast Schism
Use small damage cooldowns like Penance, Mind Blast, Shadow Word: Death and Power Word: Solace
Smite

A lot of the time you will be looking to perform “Mini-Ramps” during your downtime rather than just purely dealing damage. The way you do this is that you follow the general guidelines of an Evangelism ramp, but being more sparse with how many single-target Atonement casts you are doing, stick to 3-5 depending on your current mana, no more or you will be trouble in terms of mana. You will want to supplement these Atonement with any spare Power Word: Radiance charges you have left, but make sure you will always have 2 charges for your next Rapture or Evangelism ramp.

Mana Management

Being able to manage your mana will be crucial if you want to be able to complete all your ramps without being left at 0% mana. You will have to be disciplined in the way you cast your spells. Always make sure you have enough mana to perform the main Rapture and Evangelism ramp and only use excess mana to facilitate extra Mini Ramps.

Using your mana potions effectively will be crucial, so make sure you use them whenever possible to gain some mana back. Other than this if you can get your hands on any external mana tools like Innervate or Source of Magic that would help alleviate a lot of struggles in terms of mana and allow you to be more active when it comes to applying Atonement.

With the changes to mana costs introduced in Patch 10.1 as well as our new 4-Piece tier set bonus our mana situation is looking a lot better. You are no longer reliant on tools like Innervate and Source of Magic and they are now bonuses that are great if you wanna be more active outside of your main ramps. You can now be a lot more aggressive when it comes to applying Atonement, so make sure that in this new patch you really push the limits and see how much you can put out on raid fights.

Dungeons

For dungeons playing Discipline Priest becomes a little more simple. You’ll now focus on keeping yourself and other party members alive through the use of mostly Atonement, but also some other tools available in the Discipline Priest toolkit. Power Word: Life can be used whenever your party members drop below 35%, giving them a surge of health capable of topping many classes. Other than applying Atonement, Power Word: Radiance can be used for its potent healing capabilities as it has received a substantial healing buff going from Shadowlands to Dragonflight. Penance can be used either offensively to heal through Atonement, or defensively to deliver really strong single target healing to one of your party members.

If there is an especially dangerous mechanic coming in I would follow this priority list to give you the best chances of survival.

Use Power Infusion on a teammate if it is available to benefit from Twins of the Sun Priestess
Have Purge the Wicked active on at least one target
Place a Power Word: Barrier to reduce the incoming damage by 25%
Preemptively cover your party with Power Word: Shield from Rapture
Cast Shadowfiend or Mindbender depending on your talents
Cast Power Word: Radiance to put Atonement on all party members
Cast Shadow Covenant (if talented)
Cast strong damaging spells like Schism, Mind Blast & Shadow Word: Death, Penance and Divine Star
Use Power Word: Radiance for its healing capabilities
Heal through Atonement with Smite

The list above is pretty extensive, but make sure that if it is a mechanic that will happen multiple times across a fight that you don’t burn all your best cooldowns on one mechanic. As an example think about maybe splitting up Rapture and Power Word: Barrier so you can survive multiple in a row.

When you are not focusing on keeping your team alive as much you’ll want to spread your Purge the Wicked to as many targets as possible, as long as they survive for the duration of the DoT. This can be done manually by casting the spell, or by casting Penance which will give you two extra DoTs if you have talented Revel in Purity. Divine Star is a great spell for both damage and healing, so use it as much as you possibly can. You’ll want to make use of your Mindbender and Inescapable Torment as much as possible, so make sure that whenever you cast Mindbender you maximize the amount of Mind Blast and Shadow Word: Death casts. The longer your Mindbender stays up the more melee swings it can complete which translates into mana and damage.

Discipline Priest Playstyle and Rotation Guide

Playstyle & Rotation

Rotation Altering Talents

Raid Ramps

Default Discipline Evangelism Ramp

Default Discipline Rapture Ramp

Wrath Unleashed Discipline Evangelism Ramp

Wrath Unleashed Discipline Rapture Ramp

Ramping Tips

Downtime and Mini-Ramping

Mana Management

Dungeons

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