[Warrior Priest] - Need help leveling and understanding this class

[Plainguy]

Hey all,

I am having a weird dilemma with the Warrior Priest.
Hopefully I will make some sense here..

I would like to play the dps healer but I know that is frowned upon and in scenarios sometimes I am the ONLY healer.. Which puts me on the spot as I am not really specced for healing so my Healing is lackluster. I carry a book and hammer and switch to roles in SC but still my spec is not matching and neither is my gear.

The other problem I am having is I notice that my Renown is low when I just heal.

With my Engineer it was easy.. You fight or die at the flag.. No one was expecting anything from me as my Engineer.. But with my WP as it is a healing class, it is clear that HEALING is expected from me. Especially when I am the ONLY healer there..

As I mentioned above, Renown wise my Engineer was always levels above my class level. Whereas with my WP I am levels below in Renown compared to my level..

So I guess I am asking for some advice or suggestions on how to level this class. I do realize at the END when I get to level 40 and RR 40 I can just use the builds I want or as needed.

But to keep changing as I level almost keeps me bound to a city and a career trainer if that makes sense.

So any advice from those that leveled and play a WP on what a good direction and game play style might benefit me.

[SJHarrison4115]

G'day @Plainguy, I'll try to help out where I can, and to begin I'd simply suggest: Play what you want to Play, regardless of expectations.

Obviously that has the caveat that if you play an undesirable spec, you will also need to deal with the consequences of that. However, obviously there are ways to circumnavigate that with guilds, friends, etc.

As it appears that you're leveling at the moment, you could try shield spec. Especially in SC's you do output a pretty massive amount of healing, so long as you're hitting things. This can give you a "Hybrid" playstyle which will allow you to retain a single gear set. Rydiak has a great guide on the Grace WP.

Ultimately, book healing is optimal for WBs and for the majority of your RR and crest gains. Healers & Tanks can struggle more than DPS (Especially rDPS) to gain RR/Crests so as a means to off-set this, and what may appear to be counter intuitive, I'd recommend running the Prayer of Righteousness with the Wrath Tree's Divine Justice. Additionally, consider popping some Smites into the Blob v Blob combat. This will help you get "tags" which will fuel your RR and Crest gains.

Ultimately, I do love DPS Warrior Priest to, and it can be good in niche scenarios at the moment, but only with end-game gear, the earliest of which that is actually semi-decent is Bloodlord. I'd love to see some love to DPS WP and we may yet see it, but It's somewhat doubtful.

Anyways, hope this helps and good luck brother.

[Rydiak]

Thanks for the shout-out, SJHarrison4115!

OP, check out the guide linked in my signature. It should give you some guidance on a playstyle that it sounds like would interest you.

[Plainguy]

G'day @Plainguy, I'll try to help out where I can, and to begin I'd simply suggest: Play what you want to Play, regardless of expectations.

Obviously that has the caveat that if you play an undesirable spec, you will also need to deal with the consequences of that. However, obviously there are ways to circumnavigate that with guilds, friends, etc.

As it appears that you're leveling at the moment, you could try shield spec. Especially in SC's you do output a pretty massive amount of healing, so long as you're hitting things. This can give you a "Hybrid" playstyle which will allow you to retain a single gear set. Rydiak has a great guide on the Grace WP.

Ultimately, book healing is optimal for WBs and for the majority of your RR and crest gains. Healers & Tanks can struggle more than DPS (Especially rDPS) to gain RR/Crests so as a means to off-set this, and what may appear to be counter intuitive, I'd recommend running the Prayer of Righteousness with the Wrath Tree's Divine Justice. Additionally, consider popping some Smites into the Blob v Blob combat. This will help you get "tags" which will fuel your RR and Crest gains.

Ultimately, I do love DPS Warrior Priest to, and it can be good in niche scenarios at the moment, but only with end-game gear, the earliest of which that is actually semi-decent is Bloodlord. I'd love to see some love to DPS WP and we may yet see it, but It's somewhat doubtful.

Anyways, hope this helps and good luck brother.

Thanks for the shout-out, SJHarrison4115!

OP, check out the guide linked in my signature. It should give you some guidance on a playstyle that it sounds like would interest you.

Thank you both..
I just found Rydiak guide and working through it.

@SJHarrison I do get and agree with play what you like but expect appropriate responses..
Overall I want to be a team player. Over time you get to see the same names and such.. I definitely want to have a good rep no matter what side I play..

If I can ask Rydiak, do you have any suggestion on leveling up.. What type of gear I should be looking at picking up. Meaning should it be all willpower gear and then put armor talisman in each slot?
Or should it be a mix of gear, again, armor should be all willpower and hammer and shield strength. Then all armor should have armor talisman and weapons and shield should have strength talisman ?

Should I just be slotting into grace constantly until I max out then over to wraith ?

[Dackjanielz]

Yeah i agree with this dilemma - it is one i feel all the time.

I personally think a healer should have 3 healing specs and tanks should have 3 tank specs.

Some classes do a good job in this regard, Knight for example is a brilliant 2h spec tank, his damage is not that impressive but thats not the point, his utility and survival however is very good, Destro players often AVOID my knight when im using this and rightly so.

But warrior priest is not one of them im afraid to say, Wrath priest sucks to be blunt, it is somewhat "enjoyable" but performance wise it is simply lacking...

Your damage is lesser than DPS classes, you have no utility, no survival, no healing....Yeah...

Runepriest on the other hand - now THATS how you design a good healer.
All three mastery paths can do both healing and damage, brilliant in my opinion.

You COULD do a grace build priest, the healing and dmg is not bad here but this spec only works in scenarios, it wont work in open RVR so if you're happy with that then up to you.

Good luck!

[Plainguy]

Yeah i agree with this dilemma - it is one i feel all the time.

I personally think a healer should have 3 healing specs and tanks should have 3 tank specs.

Some classes do a good job in this regard, Knight for example is a brilliant 2h spec tank, his damage is not that impressive but thats not the point, his utility and survival however is very good, Destro players often AVOID my knight when im using this and rightly so.

But warrior priest is not one of them im afraid to say, Wrath priest sucks to be blunt, it is somewhat "enjoyable" but performance wise it is simply lacking...

Your damage is lesser than DPS classes, you have no utility, no survival, no healing....Yeah...

Runepriest on the other hand - now THATS how you design a good healer.
All three mastery paths can do both healing and damage, brilliant in my opinion.

You COULD do a grace build priest, the healing and dmg is not bad here but this spec only works in scenarios, it wont work in open RVR so if you're happy with that then up to you.

Good luck!

I will agree when I see the numbers in scenario boards, I am not high on anything.. I'm middle, if not low in DPS AND HEALING..
Again I am leveling and only 21, but at least with the Engineer I was on top or top 5.

[Rydiak]

The main issue is you aren't able to obtain Sigmar's Radiance until level 30. Once upon a time it was changed to level 20 to be in line with every other healer's group heal, but after the "ability rework" it was reset to level 30 and not changed back, while the other healers had their group heals lowered even further to level 17. I am hoping this gets addressed in the near future.

[SJHarrison4115]

Hello again Plainguy!

Just wanting to put my 2 cents in again, though, fair warning, there are absolutely better/more experienced players than me out there.

The leveling experience can be the absolute most fun you'll have as a Warrior Priest as you can do some things that just aren't viable at end-game.

For my part, I leveled exclusively through PVP in SCs especially and I found that rather counter-intuitively, if you run 2H whilst investing in Grace and Wrath semi-equally, you can output some insane healing and very very reasonable DPS.

With Strength gear you can slot armor tali's and you'll end up being very, very robust (as WPs are naturally). The strength gear is important if you want to get amongst the fight as your lifetaps are based off your damage dealt.

Divine Assault is your bread'n'butter skill to keep people alive and if you get good at target switching you can top healing boards in SCs before 40. You can switch your defensive target mid channel and spread the healing out. Which when you're doing some biiig crits can be really high.

Look- Wrath isn't in a great space right now, but it's not terrible either and you need to understand something that is overlooked constantly. "You cannot deal damage if you're dead." This is less obvious in SC's where dying and rejoining the battle is expedient, but in RvR it's very, very evident.

You are the ultimate brawler as a Warrior Priest, your survivability if you play correctly is unmatched. You're able to bash in with anyone and you make a vital Combat Resser.

You don't play to top DPS charts, you play because you have something no-one else does. Versatility. Runepriests and Archmages are great and can deal quite decent damage along with toping healing, but whilst they're running away as soon as anything gets in their face, you're swinging a big f**kin hammer at whoever dares to get in your space.

In terms of gearing, it can be hard, as most gear is indeed tailored towards willpower, I'd recommend just avoiding spending War Crests as much as possible. Take any of the PVE sets that offer strength scaling (Beastlord is a good start at 40 whilst you move towards Bloodlord).

If you want to play Wrath, you'll need to try obtain Sov/Warlord as quickly as possible that means hording your crests.

It can take awhile to hit the benchmarks in this build, but obtaining Grace of Sigmar helps your lifetap output signficantly (this was WAAY better when it was obtainable earlier, but oh well.) Prior to getting Grace of Sigmar, you can consider running Greave of Sigmar, a Toughness Buff and DeBuff is quite significant and can assist your outputs by a massive margin.

Leading the Prayer (w/ Prayer of Devotion) is super important for this one, as with the changes to the internal cooldown, this gives you a truly insane amount of self-heal based off the actions of your allies.

You want the extra crit from Fanaticism as all you're Renown points will be spent on defences.

https://builder.returnofreckoning.com/c ... ,8290,8293

Go forth my friend and embrace the mantra of "Do not go quietly into that goodnight, rage, rage against the dying of the light."

(Disclaimer: Yes, I do understand that compared to traditional paths this can absolutely be considered to be unviable or off Meta, however prior to CR40 it worked for me in a big way where I was routinely top 5'ing DPS charts and Healing in SCs.)

[Plainguy]

Hello again Plainguy!

Just wanting to put my 2 cents in again, though, fair warning, there are absolutely better/more experienced players than me out there.

The leveling experience can be the absolute most fun you'll have as a Warrior Priest as you can do some things that just aren't viable at end-game.

For my part, I leveled exclusively through PVP in SCs especially and I found that rather counter-intuitively, if you run 2H whilst investing in Grace and Wrath semi-equally, you can output some insane healing and very very reasonable DPS.

With Strength gear you can slot armor tali's and you'll end up being very, very robust (as WPs are naturally). The strength gear is important if you want to get amongst the fight as your lifetaps are based off your damage dealt.

Divine Assault is your bread'n'butter skill to keep people alive and if you get good at target switching you can top healing boards in SCs before 40. You can switch your defensive target mid channel and spread the healing out. Which when you're doing some biiig crits can be really high.

Look- Wrath isn't in a great space right now, but it's not terrible either and you need to understand something that is overlooked constantly. "You cannot deal damage if you're dead." This is less obvious in SC's where dying and rejoining the battle is expedient, but in RvR it's very, very evident.

You are the ultimate brawler as a Warrior Priest, your survivability if you play correctly is unmatched. You're able to bash in with anyone and you make a vital Combat Resser.

You don't play to top DPS charts, you play because you have something no-one else does. Versatility. Runepriests and Archmages are great and can deal quite decent damage along with toping healing, but whilst they're running away as soon as anything gets in their face, you're swinging a big f**kin hammer at whoever dares to get in your space.

In terms of gearing, it can be hard, as most gear is indeed tailored towards willpower, I'd recommend just avoiding spending War Crests as much as possible. Take any of the PVE sets that offer strength scaling (Beastlord is a good start at 40 whilst you move towards Bloodlord).

If you want to play Wrath, you'll need to try obtain Sov/Warlord as quickly as possible that means hording your crests.

It can take awhile to hit the benchmarks in this build, but obtaining Grace of Sigmar helps your lifetap output signficantly (this was WAAY better when it was obtainable earlier, but oh well.) Prior to getting Grace of Sigmar, you can consider running Greave of Sigmar, a Toughness Buff and DeBuff is quite significant and can assist your outputs by a massive margin.

Leading the Prayer (w/ Prayer of Devotion) is super important for this one, as with the changes to the internal cooldown, this gives you a truly insane amount of self-heal based off the actions of your allies.

You want the extra crit from Fanaticism as all you're Renown points will be spent on defences.

https://builder.returnofreckoning.com/c ... ,8290,8293

Go forth my friend and embrace the mantra of "Do not go quietly into that goodnight, rage, rage against the dying of the light."

(Disclaimer: Yes, I do understand that compared to traditional paths this can absolutely be considered to be unviable or off Meta, however prior to CR40 it worked for me in a big way where I was routinely top 5'ing DPS charts and Healing in SCs.)

Thank you for further insight.
I sort of did the whole leveling in SC with the engineer..
I am doing it with the WP now.. But I can see I am a bit behind on the RR compared to levels as I mentioned in a previous post here.

I was thinking the same with the crest as I realized I did buy good gear with my engineer and I am in decent gear at 40.. But I can see I would have had at least a few better pieces now..

So I can see where great hammer is nice for the heal vs damage vs crit hits. So a nice crit would equal a nice heal. But having a shield helps a well. I do notice the DPS difference without a doubt when going from one to another..

Regardless thank you again for clarity and insight..