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Priest

The Priest keeps its vanilla shape: Discipline and Holy heal, Shadow does ranged damage over time. Forever re-dealt the racial spells so that Fear Ward and Devouring Plague belong to every Priest at 20, added Shadow Word: Death as a baseline spell, gave Discipline Penance and Divine Aegis, gave Holy Prayer of Mending and Binding Heal, and let Gnomes roll the class. Two official stat changes reshape healers: hit and crit are unified stats, and +healing now also grants one third as much +damage, which is why every healer guide treats +healing as the stat that also feeds Smite, Penance and Holy Fire. verified

Why play it in Forever

Section titled “Why play it in Forever”

Priest is the healer with the widest toolkit and the one class where the “which race” question got dramatically simpler. In vanilla, raids wanted a Dwarf for Fear Ward; that rule is dead. changed in Forever Discipline is a shield-and-Penance tank healer that turns crits into absorbs. Holy is the raid healer with Prayer of Mending bouncing across the group and Spirit scaling through Spiritual Guidance. Shadow is a proper ranged DoT class with a Shadowform that finally fixes its mana problem, and it is where the balance argument is happening right now.

Primary data source for this page: the talentsforever.com CC BY 4.0 JSON export, generated 09-20 from beta client 1.60.1.69876 (the later 69977 build changed no talents). Its own caveat is that numbers “can lag live tuning”. verified

What changed from vanilla

Section titled “What changed from vanilla”

The racial-spell shakeup

Section titled “The racial-spell shakeup”

Vanilla gave each race two Priest-only spells. vanilla baseline Forever re-dealt them: verified

Spell Vanilla Forever
Fear Ward Dwarf only Every Priest, level 20, 3 min CD, ward lasts 3 min
Devouring Plague Undead only, 3 min CD Every Priest, level 20, ranks 20 to 60, 1 min CD, Rank 6 848 damage over 24 sec, heals the caster
Divine Spirit Disc talent Trainable at 30, 1 hour duration
Lightwell Holy talent Trainable at 40, 5 charges, 10 min CD
Shadow Word: Death did not exist New baseline at 32, 15 sec CD, Rank 4 444 to 472, 10% max-HP backlash if the target survives
Desperate Prayer Human and Dwarf JSON says Dwarf racial; foreverchanges says “available to all races”. Conflict, unresolved

Per-race Priest spells in the beta client: verified

Race Spell 1 Spell 2
Human Divine Grace: instant, 10 min CD, heals an ally under 50% HP for 1,285 to 1,513 and removes Weakened Soul. Not self-castable Feedback: 3 min CD, 15 sec anti-magic shell burning 105 mana per spell hit
Dwarf Chastise: 2 min CD, 272 to 306 Holy damage plus 2 sec root, Humanoids only, very low threat Desperate Prayer: instant self-heal 1,285 to 1,513, 10 min CD
Night Elf Elune’s Grace: 5 min CD, 50% melee and ranged miss chance for 15 sec or 3 misses Starshards: channeled 1,800 Arcane over 6 sec, 30 sec CD (vanilla had no CD and did 936)
Gnome (new) Confounding Flash: 0.5 sec cast, 2 min CD, confuses up to 5 enemies within 8 yd for 3 sec, breaks on damage Contingency Plan: 10 min CD ward; when the ally drops below 35% they get a 926 absorb and 670 heal over 15 sec (Rank 5)
Undead Dark Sacrifice: 10 min CD, trade 1,600 HP over 15 sec for 1,600 mana (Rank 5) Touch of Weakness: next melee hit on you deals Shadow damage and cuts attacker AP by 204 for 2 min
Troll Hex of Weakness: minus 204 AP and minus 20% healing on the target for 2 min Shadowguard: Shadow bolt reflect

Gnome Priest spells are confirmed by Wowhead and the demo per wowclassicforever.info and an Icy Veins snippet. verified Contingency Plan is widely called “Guardian Spirit-like”. unverified wowforeverbuilds’ Disc guide lists Dark Sacrifice as a trainer spell for everyone; the JSON puts it under Undead. The JSON is primary.

Talent-tree changes (beta 1.60.1)

Section titled “Talent-tree changes (beta 1.60.1)”

13 new talents: Power in Light, Twin Disciplines, Holy Precision, Soul Warding, Penance, Renewed Hope, Divine Aegis (Discipline); Binding Heal, Litany of Light, Prayer of Mending (Holy); Improved Mind Flay, Devouring Contagion, Early Demise (Shadow). 34 changed. 7 removed: Unbreakable Will, Improved PW:Fortitude, Force of Will, Improved Prayer of Healing, Improved Vampiric Embrace, plus Divine Spirit and Lightwell moved to the trainer. verified

Milestone rows (our derivation from row position; Blizzard has named no 16-point talents). Row 3 (11 pt) = Inner Focus / Holy Nova / Mind Flay. Row 4 (16 pt) = Soul Warding / Binding Heal / Vampiric Embrace. Row 5 (21 pt) = Penance / Spirit of Redemption / Silence. Row 7 (31 pt) = Power Infusion / Prayer of Mending / Shadowform. verified A wowforevertalent summary listing “Inner Focus / Divine Fury / Improved Mind Blast” as the 16-point row collapsed rows and is contradicted by the JSON.

Key Discipline numbers: Wand Specialization 2 ranks, 13/25%. Improved PW:S 7/14/20%. Meditation 17/33/50% regen while casting. Mental Strength +3 to 15% Intellect. Improved Inner Fire adds armor and charges. Soul Warding: PW:S cooldown minus 4 sec, mana cost minus 15%. Penance: 100 mana, 12 sec CD, three ticks of 81 damage or 184 healing. Renewed Hope: +2 to 10% crit on heals into Weakened Soul targets and shortens Weakened Soul. Divine Aegis: 5/10/15% of crit heals as a 12 sec absorb. Power Infusion requires Penance. verified

Key Holy numbers: Twilight Focus (was Healing Focus) 23/47/70% pushback avoidance on all spells. Spiritual Guidance +5 to 25% of Spirit as healing and +1 to 8% as damage. Spiritual Healing 3 ranks to 10%. Inspiration fires from any non-periodic crit heal. Improved Healing covers Penance and Prayer of Mending. Searing Light +2/5% Holy damage and Holy Fire ticks can make Holy Nova free. Litany of Light refunds 5/10% base cost when you alternate heal spells. Binding Heal heals target and caster 236 to 284 at the datamined rank, low threat. Spirit of Redemption 15 sec. Prayer of Mending instant, 10 sec CD, 5 jumps within 20 yd. verified

Key Shadow numbers: Shadow Focus is now +1 to 5% Shadow hit. Shadow Weaving is a personal buff (2% per stack to 5, 100% proc at 3/3) and no longer buffs Warlocks. Improved Mind Flay +10/20% damage and +5/10 yd range but a weaker slow (35%/20%). Mind Flay base 63 (was 75). Vampiric Embrace moved up to the 16-point row, now 30 sec duration on a 1 min CD, can trigger Spirit Tap when VE’d enemies die. Devouring Contagion cuts DP cost 25/50% and spreads remaining duration on kill within 5/10 yd. Early Demise +15/30% SW:Death crit under 20%. Shadowform: +10% Shadow damage (was 15%), minus 50% Shadow mana cost, +100% crit damage bonus, minus 15% physical taken, blocks healing spells (vanilla blocked all Holy), and Smite and Holy Fire are castable in form. Silence is now a real interrupt: 5 sec silence plus 3 sec lockout, 45 sec CD, no longer gated behind Improved Psychic Scream. verified

The three trees

Section titled “The three trees”

Discipline

Section titled “Discipline”
  • Role: healer, single target and absorbs.
  • Playstyle: shield the tank pre-pull, Penance on damage, Heal or Greater Heal into Weakened Soul targets for the Renewed Hope crit, Divine Aegis converting crits to absorbs, Power Infusion as a raid cooldown. verified as published
  • Strengths: the tank healer. Shields are cheaper and faster with Soul Warding. Power Infusion for caster burn windows.
  • Weaknesses: thin raid-wide healing, Weakened Soul gating, Divine Aegis needs crit gear, Penance values pending balance.
  • Verdict: primary tank healer in any raid size. expcarry rates Priest “S tier, #1 among healers” but calls Holy vs Disc “no clear winner yet”. verified (boost shop, 09-21)

Holy

Section titled “Holy”
  • Role: healer, group and raid.
  • Playstyle: Prayer of Mending on cooldown, Binding Heal when you and an ally are both hit, Litany of Light alternation, Spiritual Guidance scaling with Spirit, Prayer of Healing and Holy Nova for stacked damage. verified as published
  • Strengths: raid-wide throughput, Spirit scaling, the cheapest mana per heal when you keep Litany refunding.
  • Weaknesses: less single-target burst than Disc, no absorbs.
  • Verdict: the raid healer, natural in the 20 and 40. Nothing tested at 60.

Shadow

Section titled “Shadow”
  • Role: ranged DPS.
  • Playstyle: SW:Pain always up, Vampiric Embrace up, Devouring Plague on cooldown, Mind Blast on cooldown, Mind Flay filler, SW:Death under 20%.
  • Strengths: spell pushback protection, 36 yd Mind Flay, Shadowform’s 50% cost cut and 100% crit bonus, SW:Death plus Mind Blast burst, strong PvP.
  • Weaknesses: single target only, one persistent DoT plus a 1-minute DP cooldown, VE only 30 sec uptime, same mana issues from 1 to 39.
  • Verdict: see the dispute below.

Leveling 1 to 60

Section titled “Leveling 1 to 60”

Where beta data stops: only beta 10 to 20 exists (cap rising to 30). Everything past 30 is theorycraft.

Consensus cap-20 build 6/0/5: verified

Levels Talent
10 to 11 Wand Specialization 2/2
12 to 16 Spirit Tap 5/5
17 to 19 Twin Disciplines 3/5
20 Improved PW:S 1/3

leprestore’s variant is 2/0/9 with Improved SW:P (boost shop). verified

Why Disc wand, not Shadow, early: wowforeverbuilds’ leveling page says “Low-downtime wand leveling while Shadow waits for fixes”. That is the site’s opinion, not a Blizzard bug acknowledgement. Concretely: at cap 20 to 30 there is no Shadowform, Mind Flay (11 points, about level 20) does less than a wand, and Disc rows 1 and 2 (Wand Spec, Twin Disciplines, Improved PW:S) beat Shadow rows 1 and 2 except Spirit Tap. verified

Rotation 10 to 30: PW:S, SW:Pain, Smite or Mind Blast if mana allows, then wand. Use the Spirit Tap window after each kill to pull again instead of drinking. Psychic Scream on adds. “Your wand is your weapon. Get one by level 5 to 10 and upgrade it before anything else; Enchanters can craft wands from level 5, and wands now scale with spell power.” verified

Spell arrivals: Devouring Plague, Fear Ward, Holy Fire, Flash Heal at 20. Divine Spirit 30. SW:Death 32. Lightwell 40. verified

Theorycraft paths beyond 30 (wowforeverbuilds, labeled Theorycraft, 09-15 to 09-16): verified as published

Path Order
Shadow 10 to 60 Wand Spec 2 (10 to 11), Spirit Tap 5 (12 to 16), Improved SW:P 2 (17 to 18), Shadow Focus 3 (19 to 21), Mind Flay (22), Improved Mind Flay 2 (23 to 24), Improved Mind Blast (25 to 26 and 31 to 34), Vampiric Embrace (27), Shadow Weaving 3 (28 to 30), Silence (32), Shadow Reach 2 (35 to 36), Darkness 5 (37 to 41), Shadowform (42), finish Shadow Focus and Blackout (43 to 49), Disc filler 50 to 60
Disc wand 10 to 40 Wand Spec, Spirit Tap, Improved SW:P, Twin Disciplines 3, Improved PW:S 3, Twin Disciplines to 5, Meditation 3, Mental Agility 2, Soul Warding (32), Mental Strength 5, Penance (38), Mental Agility 3, Inner Focus (40)
Holy Smite 30 to 60 Holy Specialization 5, Divine Fury 5, Holy Nova, Twilight Focus 3, Searing Light 2, Holy Reach 2, Blessed Recovery 3, Spiritual Guidance 5, then Disc Power in Light 5 and Holy Precision 3. Open Holy Fire at max range, then Smite while it burns

Tips: do not DoT mobs that die in five seconds; wand them. Pull the next mob while Spirit Tap is active instead of drinking. Undead Cannibalize now restores mana too, which is a real leveling quality-of-life win. If you run dungeons as the healer, the wand build still heals fine to 30; swap to a Holy or Disc healing layout when your group starts pulling harder.

Endgame builds

Section titled “Endgame builds”

All three are theorycraft from the beta client (09-17). None has been played at 60.

Discipline 33/18/0

Section titled “Discipline 33/18/0”
  • Talent build: Twin Disciplines 5, Improved PW:S 3, Soul Warding, Penance, Divine Aegis 3, Renewed Hope 5, Power Infusion; Holy Specialization 5, Divine Fury 5, Inspiration 3. verified as published
  • Priority: shield the tank pre-pull. Penance on damage. Heal or Greater Heal under Weakened Soul. Renew filler. On raid damage, shield the lowest then Prayer of Healing.
  • Stats: +healing, Intellect, mp5 (mana per 5 seconds) and Spirit, crit, Stamina.
  • Consumables named by the guide: Major Mana Potion, Demonic or Dark Runes, Mageblood, Brilliant Mana Oil. Vanilla item names copied by a fan guide. vanilla baseline Potion cooldowns and elixir slots for Forever are unpublished. See Alchemy.
  • Sets: claimed Tier 1 “Vestments of Conviction” (2pc +10 Spirit, 5pc minus 1 sec Penance CD) and pre-raid “Vestments of the Devout”. unverified beyond that one site.
  • Raid fit: primary tank healer in the 10, 20 and 40. Power Infusion for caster burn windows. See Raids overview.

Holy 18/33/0

Section titled “Holy 18/33/0”
  • Talent build: the Holy talents the spec is built on (Prayer of Mending, Binding Heal, Litany of Light, Spiritual Guidance, Prayer of Healing and Holy Nova support) plus Meditation 3, Inner Focus, Mental Strength 3 from Discipline. verified as published
  • Priority: Renew on tanks. Prayer of Mending on cooldown. Heal routine. Greater Heal for spikes. Flash Heal only in emergencies. Binding Heal when you and an ally are both hit. Alternate spells to keep Litany refunding. Prayer of Healing or Holy Nova on stacked damage.
  • Stats: +healing, Spirit, Intellect, mp5, crit. Spirit weighs more for Holy than Disc.
  • Consumables: same vanilla names as Disc. vanilla baseline
  • Raid fit: raid healer, natural in the 20 and 40. In a 10-man with 3 healers, one Holy Priest covers the group while a Disc Priest or Shaman takes the tank.

Shadow 18/0/33

Section titled “Shadow 18/0/33”
  • Talent build: Shadow Focus 5, Improved Mind Blast 5, Darkness 5, Shadow Weaving 3, Devouring Contagion 2, Vampiric Embrace, Shadowform, plus Disc mana talents. leprestore’s 14/3/34 is a near duplicate. verified as published
  • Priority: SW:Pain always up. VE up. Devouring Plague on cooldown. Mind Blast on cooldown. Mind Flay filler, clipped only for Mind Blast. SW:Death under 20%.
  • Stats: hit to cap (Forever’s cap is unpublished; vanilla’s 16% spell cap is vanilla baseline), Shadow and spell damage, crit (Shadowform doubles the crit bonus, so crit is worth more than in vanilla), Intellect, Stamina.
  • Consumables named: Elixir of Shadow Power, Greater Arcane Elixir, Flask of Supreme Power, Brilliant Wizard Oil. vanilla baseline
  • Raid fit: one Shadow Priest is a luxury pick, fine in the 10 and 20 with friends, contested in a 40. unverified (inferred from the forum threads). Keep a healing set for off-healing outside Shadowform.

PvP notes

Section titled “PvP notes”

Level-60 PvP is not testable in beta. verified Forever runs Warsong Gulch, Arathi Basin, Alterac Valley and the new 15v15 Darkspear Islands with a 14-rank honor track that resets each patch cycle.

  • Shadow PvP 18/0/33: Blackout 5, Improved Psychic Scream, Silence (real interrupt now), Early Demise, Darkness. Open SW:Pain plus DP on the move, Mind Blast into Mind Flay. Stat order Stamina, spell damage, hit, Intellect. verified as published The forum threads agree Shadow is strong in PvP.
  • Disc PvP 31/20/0: keep flag carriers alive with shields, Penance on the move, Dispel, Mana Burn (Improved Mana Burn is now minus 1 sec cast). Weak to Purge and silences. verified as published
  • Racial PvP: Will of the Forsaken is an on-use break without an immunity window. Gnome Escape Artist gives 3 sec immunity. Human Will to Survive breaks stuns. Gnome Confounding Flash is a 3 sec AoE confuse. Troll Hex of Weakness cuts healing taken by 20%. verified

Race choice

Section titled “Race choice”

Priest = Human, Dwarf, Night Elf, Gnome (new), Undead, Troll. No Skyborne Priest on either faction. verified leprestore: “There is not enough level-60 testing for a reliable overall race ranking yet.” Agreed.

Alliance

Race Racials that matter Priest spells Take
Gnome (new) Expansive Mind +5% mana; Eureka! (next 3 spells cheaper and 10% stronger, 2 min CD); Escape Artist (3 sec immunity); 20% fewer Engineering failures Confounding Flash, Contingency Plan Strong healer pick on paper. The Contingency Plan cheat-death ward is unique. Nobody has a level-60 test
Dwarf Stoneform (bleed, poison, disease removal, 10% less physical 8 sec); Mace Specialization +1% crit; Find Treasure; +5% vs Beasts Chastise, Desperate Prayer Fear Ward is baseline now, so the old “Dwarf Priest or bust” raid rule is dead
Human The Human Spirit +5% Spirit (feeds Spiritual Guidance); Sword Specialization +2% crit; Will to Survive; Perception Divine Grace, Feedback Best Holy scaling race. Divine Grace is a strong emergency ally heal
Night Elf Elune’s Light +10% crit 15 sec (3 min CD); Shadowmeld; Quickness +1% dodge, +2% run speed Elune’s Grace, Starshards (1,800 over 6 sec, 30 sec CD) Starshards is now a real Shadow DPS cooldown

Horde

Race Racials that matter Priest spells Take
Undead Will of the Forsaken (charm, fear, sleep removal, no immunity window); Cannibalize now restores 7% HP and 7% mana per 2 sec; Touch of the Grave; Underwater Breathing Dark Sacrifice, Touch of Weakness Cannibalize on mana is a leveling and dungeon quality-of-life win
Troll Berserking +10% cast speed 10 sec (3 min CD, no health condition); Regeneration (10% health regen continues in combat); Rapid Regeneration; Beast Slaying Hex of Weakness (minus 20% healing taken), Shadowguard Throughput racial for either healing or Shadow. Hex is a PvP tool

Eureka! discrepancy: classicwow.gg says “50% less resources”; the talentsforever JSON splits it into 15% less mana for healing spells and 50% less for damage spells. Treat the exact discount as unsettled. verified (both sources)

Professions for this class

Section titled “Professions for this class”

Every source agrees: verified

  • Tailoring + Enchanting for progression casters (cloth crafting, ring enchants). Enchanters craft wands from level 5, which matters more here than in vanilla because wands scale with spell power.
  • Herbalism + Alchemy for mana consumables and Mixology.
  • Mining + Engineering for PvP utility, stronger on Gnomes.
  • First Aid holds healing potions in Forever. verified
  • None of the 600+ new recipes relevant to Priests are documented yet. unverified

Pre-raid gear philosophy

Section titled “Pre-raid gear philosophy”
  • Healers: +healing first, because it also grants one third as +damage. Then Intellect and Spirit or mp5. Spirit weighs more for Holy (Spiritual Guidance) than Disc (Meditation, Mental Strength). “Vestments of the Devout” dungeon set with a mana proc is named as the pre-raid target; set details are unverified.
  • Shadow: hit to whatever the Forever cap is, then spell and Shadow damage, crit, Intellect. Keep a healing set for off-healing outside Shadowform. verified
  • Wands matter all the way up and scale with spell power. verified
  • No BiS lists exist yet. wowforever.be and woweternity BiS pages are vapor. verified
  • Read the guild loot rules before the first Barrow Deeps run; +healing cloth is a contested slot.

Common mistakes and pro tips

Section titled “Common mistakes and pro tips”
  • Do not roll Dwarf for Fear Ward or Undead for Devouring Plague. Both are baseline at 20. verified
  • Shadowform blocks healing spells. Drop form for emergency heals. Smite and Holy Fire still work in form. verified
  • Do not DoT mobs that die in five seconds. Wand them. verified
  • Holy: alternate heal spells to keep Litany of Light refunding. verified
  • Disc: heal into Weakened Soul targets on purpose for Renewed Hope. verified
  • Devouring Contagion carries only the remaining duration to the next mob, not a fresh DoT. verified
  • Improved Mind Flay weakens the slow to 20% at 2/2, which matters for kiting. verified
  • New spell ranks do not auto-replace old ones on your bars. Cast-by-name macros fix it. verified
  • Pull the next mob while Spirit Tap is active instead of drinking. verified
  • Do not copy the “Shadow Weaving helps Warlocks” line from the level-60 Shadow guide. It is a personal buff in the datamined text.

Addons and macros under the Forever API

Section titled “Addons and macros under the Forever API”

Forever uses the retail (Midnight) addon API, and healing addons are the biggest casualty. See Addons that work.

  • In build 69913, Grid2 errors with “attempt to perform arithmetic on a secret number value”. Grid2, VuhDo and Cell “cannot read it at all”. Blizzard’s raid frames work. Click casting (Clique) is broken because secure snippets fail to compile; the author calls it “probably a bug”. verified
  • Practical launch setup: Blizzard raid frames plus mouseover macros. A built-in “Mouseover Cast” combat option reportedly turns every button into mouseover-else-target. unverified (wiki and EU forum snippets)
  • Working example from a beta player: verified
#showtooltip Renew
/cast [@mouseover,help,nodead] Renew; Renew
  • Pin ranks with (Rank 1) for cheap shields, for example /cast [@mouseover,help,nodead] Power Word: Shield(Rank 1); Power Word: Shield(Rank 1). Cast by name without a rank uses the highest rank. verified
  • HoverCraft (GitHub) generates mouseover macros in game for Forever with friendly, target, boss-target and self fallbacks, dispel and resurrection variants, and rank pinning. It cannot edit macros in combat. verified
  • Threat meters are effectively dead. Use DBM or BigWigs for timers and the built-in damage meter. verified
  • Blizzard’s own words: “players will not have access to those kind of computational add-ons” and no one-button rotations. verified

Unknown as of 2026-09-24

Section titled “Unknown as of 2026-09-24”
  • Desperate Prayer: Dwarf only (JSON) or everyone (foreverchanges). Dark Sacrifice: Undead only (JSON) or trainable (wowforeverbuilds).
  • Priest tier sets (Vestments of Conviction; the DP-cooldown-removal bonus): player-reported only.
  • Whether Blizzard tunes Shadow (DP cooldown, Vampiric Touch requests) before 12-09. No blue post.
  • Level-60 Holy vs Disc throughput: zero evidence.
  • Exact Eureka! discount.
  • Forever’s hit and crit caps at 60.
  • Official names of the 16-point milestone talents.
  • Whether loadstring_untainted returns, which would fix Clique and click casting.
  • Dual spec: strings exist in the client, nothing announced.
  • Level 30 cap raise timing and any 21 to 30 data.

Sources

Section titled “Sources”