Which old Priest race restriction is gone?
Blizzard’s September 30 deep dive gives Fear Ward to all Priests at level 20. Devouring Plague also becomes available at that level regardless of race. You no longer need to repeat an old Classic race choice just to obtain either spell, although separate racial Priest abilities remain.
| Race | Distinctive tool | Restriction worth considering |
|---|---|---|
| Gnome | Contingency Plan | Triggers an absorb and HoT below 35% health; can coexist with Renew and Power Word: Shield. |
| Dwarf | Chastise | Damages and briefly immobilizes Humanoids, rather than all enemy types. |
| Human | Divine Grace | Heals a friendly target below half health and removes Weakened Soul; cannot target yourself. |
| Night Elf | Elune’s Grace | Protects against melee/ranged hits until its duration ends or three attacks miss. |
| Troll | Hex of Weakness and Shadowguard | Listed as unchanged in the deep dive. |
| Undead | Dark Sacrifice | Trades your health for mana over time, improved by Spirit. |
Gnome’s other spell, Confounding Flash, briefly confuses nearby enemies until damage breaks the effect. This is a comparison of jobs rather than a power ranking: saving an ally, protecting yourself and restoring mana address different problems.
Source / rights
Fear Ward and Devouring Plague become available to every Priest race. Discipline gains Penance, Holy gains Binding Heal and Prayer of Mending, and Shadowform permits more spells. October 8 changes Penance’s mana costs and healing by rank.
How do Discipline and Holy healing choices differ?
Discipline invests in shield interactions. Soul Warding lowers Power Word: Shield’s cost and cooldown. Renewed Hope improves critical chance for certain heals on targets with Weakened Soul, and those heals shorten that debuff. Divine Aegis creates an absorb from critical healing, but its effect does not stack with itself.
Holy gets Binding Heal at the 16-point milestone, healing both you and the selected ally. Litany of Light refunds some mana when the healing spell has a different name from the previous one. Alternating tools and repeatedly casting one spell therefore have different resource implications.
| Situation | Tool to consider | Targeting detail |
|---|---|---|
| You and an ally are injured | Binding Heal | Heals both recipients. |
| A particular party is injured | Prayer of Healing | Heals the target’s party and pets instead of only your own party. |
| Healing that follows incoming events | Prayer of Mending | Jumps to another nearby party or raid member after using a charge. |
| Absorbing damage | Power Word: Shield and Discipline talents | Consider Weakened Soul alongside the shield itself. |
Prayer of Mending heals up to five times. Both damage and non-periodic healing can trigger it. Only one can be active on a given target, which differs from the updated Renew rule allowing effects from several Priests to coexist.
What happened to Penance in the October 8 build?
Penance is the 21-point Discipline spell, channeling for two seconds with a 12-second cooldown. It damages an enemy or heals an ally. The beta had been treating it as a three-second channel; correcting that lowered its damage and healing values.
Mana costs were then adjusted to maintain a consistent efficiency advantage over Heal and Greater Heal. Rank 1 costs 50% more mana, while healing increased on ranks 2 and 4. Those are separate rank changes, not one uniform percentage that can be applied across the spellbook.
What changes for Shadow Priests?
Shadowform allows all non-healing spells, halves Shadow spell mana costs and increases the critical damage bonus. Shadow Weaving benefits only your own damage. Devouring Contagion can transfer Plague to a nearby enemy with its remaining duration when the current target dies.
Shadow Word: Death becomes baseline at level 32. If it fails to kill the target, you take damage equal to 10% of your maximum health. Do not assume Early Demise is active against healthy enemies: October 1 fixed the bug applying it without the low-health condition. That build also fixed Devouring Plague’s ability to crit; October 8 adjusted progression through lower Smite and Heal ranks.
Divine Spirit is baseline at level 30, freeing the buff from its former talent requirement. Fade’s threat reduction is doubled, but it remains a threat-management tool rather than a replacement for a tank’s control. Those class-wide changes matter whichever healing or damage tree you choose.
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