WotLK Shadow: mana management in BGs

[Shred92]

* Dispersion is a defensive cooldown, so it's a bad idea to use it merely to regain mana.
* Replenishment is a joke, and with t10 4p mind blast is worse than mind flay. Plus if you are in a big group you will have Replenishment on you all the time anyway.
* Shadowfiend is unreliable: enemies die, move around, peel it... and the glyph is bad, 5% might as well be nothing.
* Hymn of Hope is 12% and because of its cooldown it cannot be considered.
* Darkglow is useless: 400 mana on a 45 sec cooldown.

So... go with spirit gear? In that case, what is the minimum spirit one should have?

[Mercy]

While Dispersion you may want to consider that it's a defensive, it has a fairly short CD. Especially with the glyph. Furthermore, as is the nature with BGs, you'll have a lot of down-time. If you're standing in the back of your team's groups, you may need it less often than you think. Don't forget that you can also sit and drink if you really need to. But Dispersion really is the go-to.

[Shred92]

With 0 resi you die in a couple hits (literally) and Dispersion is vital.

Also there's not much you can do in a long fight... like one of those 5-minute fights that rarely occur in WSG. After 1 minute you will be oom and pissed off.

It seems an important shortcoming of the class to me. Mages suffer in a similar way.

[Bastardbottle]

I guess you dot every moving thing that you see rather than focusing kill targets, nothing can be done. If they focus you, you can dispercion one time and die after with full pve.

[Mercy]

If you're playing with 0 resilence, that's kinda on you. If you're in a fight every second of the bg and you have nobody around to peel for you, that's also on you.

[Shred92]

Well I didn't mean for this to turn into a discussion of gameplay!

Bastardbottle, I think the entire point of a dot class is to dot everything. Single-targeting seems suboptimal, especially in big fights, and is generally much better done with a pve hunter. (Which, btw, has much better tools to deal with mana...)

Mercy, granted, there's always room for improvement in how you position yourself, which is very important for ranged classes and especially those who play with pve gear. Unfortunately I have to rely on Dispersion/nitro boosts as an emergency button for several situations such as when a DK grips me or a rogue cheap shots/garrotes me, and no amount of peeling from teammates can help with that. A well-geared rogue (or one who knows where the Cold Blood button is) can kill me in two seconds (believe me, I've counted).

In any case, I will try to use Dispersion as soon as every fight is over and the coast is clear and during long fights I will continue to clench my fists.

[higorzinho01]

NICE: "Unfortunately I have to rely on Dispersion/nitro boosts as an emergency button for several situations" !!!!!

Perfect, man !!

[dccct]

It's tough to play smaller BGs as PVE caster. Against decent opponents, you will get noticed and singled out quickly. It might be a good idea to swap gear a few times mid BG depending on the situation. Maybe that will keep your opponents on their toes and discourage them from tunneling you all the time.

[Bastardbottle]

Well I didn't mean for this to turn into a discussion of gameplay!

Bastardbottle, I think the entire point of a dot class is to dot everything. Single-targeting seems suboptimal, especially in big fights, and is generally much better done with a pve hunter. (Which, btw, has much better tools to deal with mana...)

Mercy, granted, there's always room for improvement in how you position yourself, which is very important for ranged classes and especially those who play with pve gear. Unfortunately I have to rely on Dispersion/nitro boosts as an emergency button for several situations such as when a DK grips me or a rogue cheap shots/garrotes me, and no amount of peeling from teammates can help with that. A well-geared rogue (or one who knows where the Cold Blood button is) can kill me in two seconds (believe me, I've counted).

In any case, I will try to use Dispersion as soon as every fight is over and the coast is clear and during long fights I will continue to clench my fists.

Whats the point of dotting everyone if not killing anything? Especially when you have pve power, your only advantage is your burst, put dots on one/two target, cc/silence others and destroy one. You are not boomkin that can press 1 button and unleash hell, applying dots take 1 gcd for each person.

[Mercy]

Mercy, granted, there's always room for improvement in how you position yourself, which is very important for ranged classes and especially those who play with pve gear. Unfortunately I have to rely on Dispersion/nitro boosts as an emergency button for several situations such as when a DK grips me or a rogue cheap shots/garrotes me, and no amount of peeling from teammates can help with that. A well-geared rogue (or one who knows where the Cold Blood button is) can kill me in two seconds (believe me, I've counted).

Death is technically a mana refill, I did forget about that. But of course you would prefer to not be dead, which I understand. Best I can tell you is manage your spell usage and your regen cds. Multi-dot, for example, will kill your mana in no time at all, and I wouldn't advise it unless you really need to blanket a group with VTs because the enemy healer is dispelling everything and it's an issue. I understand you may not have wanted this to come down to a gameplay discussion, but I don't know what else to say. Priest life ain't easy.

[Shred92]

dccct, honestly, I am surprised by the fact that I don't spend most of the time dead. It follows reason that everybody will be focusing healers and pve dps, right? Well, as we all know that doesn't usually happen.

Bastardbottle, I do it because I want to maximise my damage, put pressure on everybody, and protect all debuffs with Vampiric Touch. As I said previously I think it makes sense to do so with a dot class. If I want to tunnel somebody I can play my hunter which has much better burst and is therefore more appropriate in this meta because, barring some plates, everybody dies in seconds. It is irritating when you put all your dots on someone and you only get 1 or 2 ticks before they die - THAT is a waste. A hunter or a ret do most of their damage in the beginning and are better for tunnelling.

Mercy, I was going to say that in my previous message: in big battles - especially in wsg where there is a short run back to where the fight is - after being oom for minutes I start thinking "I wish they would kill me" just so I could get all of my mana back.

[Icyheart]

Why dot everything when you can just spam Mind Sear to win :D

Joke aside, some min-maxing one can do is to weapon swap inbetween fights or when running to another point and having a whole spirit set to swap also helps.

[Bastardbottle]

How come killing people is a waste just because you want to pad meters lol. Well good luck doing whatever you do.

[Shred92]

Really that's how you summarise what I said? :P

[Blkunxpd]

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