Disciplinary Action

Disc Priest Cataclysm Gear: The Beginning Raider

Please see also
Patch 4.1: New Gear For Discipline Priests
Patch 4.2: The Intermediate Raider – Firelands & The Avengers of Hyjal 
ABOUT THE LEVEL 85 BEGINNING RAIDER

So you’re a level 85! Now what?

Once you hit 85 and you’ve gotten yourself mentally prepared to start running raids and Heroic versions of instances, your old 80-85 leveling gear isn’t going to cut the proverbial mustard any more.

The first raid you’ll look at running will most likely be Bastion of Twilight, Throne of the Four Winds, or Blackwing Descent, and this guide will get you ready to run it using Heroic instance drops, high-cost purchases, and even one or two raid drops (hey, you’ve got to run it a few times just to get the feel for the thing, right?).

We’re still maximizing:
Spirit > Intellect > Critical > Haste > Stamina

ENCHANTING RAIDING GEAR

Though you may be considering shucking off your newly-acquired low-level raiding gear for mid-range gear quite quickly, do consider good enchantments to be a non-optional part of gearing for raiding at any level. You’ll need the boosts enchantments give you, particularly regarding mana return, too much to miss out on their benefit regardless of cost.

Remember: You’ve gotta spend money to make money!

BEST DISCIPLINE PRIEST GEAR AND ENCHANTS: LVL 85 Beginning Raider

CHEST

Best In Show: Heroic Robes of the Burning Acolyte

Alternative 1: Heroic Shadowblaze Robes
Alternative 2: Heroic Mercurial Vestment
Alternative 3: Robes of the Burning Acolyte
Alternative 4: Robes of Embalmed Darkness (H)

Enchantment: Scroll of Enchant Chest – Powerful Stats or Scroll of Enchant Chest – Super Stats

Gems: Artful Ember Topaz and Zen Dream Emerald (best with H-Shadowblaze and H-Mercurial Vestments), or else 2 x Artful Ember Topaz

LEGS

Best In Show: Flame-Ascended Pantaloons BEST BUY!

Alternative 1: Heroic Mercurial Legwraps
Alternative 2: Heroic Legwraps of Astral Rain
Alternative 3: Heroic Mercurial Leggings
Alternative 4: Mercurial Legwraps
Alternative 5:  Breeches of Mended Nightmares BEST BUY!

Enchantment: Powerful Ghostly Spellthread, Powerful Enchanted Spellthread, or Brilliant Spellthread

Gems: Artful Ember Topaz x 2

FEET

Best In Show: Heroic Einhorn’s Galoshes

Alternative 1: Heroic Treads of Liquid Ice
Alternative 2: Einhorn’s Galoshes
Alternative 3: Treads of Liquid Ice
Alternative 4: Heroic Hekatic Slippers
Alternative 5:  Heroic Corpse Rompers

Enchantment: Scroll of Enchant Boots – Icewalker,  Scroll of Enchant Boots – Surefooted, or Scroll of Enchant Boots – Greater Spirit

Gems: Artful Ember Topaz

SHOULDERS

Best In Show: Heroic Mantle of Roaring Flames

Alternative 1: Meadow Mantle (H)
Alternative 2: Heroic Mercurial Shoulderwraps
Alternative 3: Heroic Mercurial Mantle
Alternative 4: Mantle of Roaring Flames
Alternative 5:  Heroic Mantle of Loss

Enchantment: Greater Inscription of Charged Lodestone or Lesser Inscription of Charged Lodestone

Gems: Artful Ember Topaz

WRIST

Best In Show: Heroic Bracers of the Bronze Flight

Alternative 1: Heroic Bracers of the Dark Mother
Alternative 2: Bracers of the Bronze Flight
Alternative 3: Heroic Armbands of Exiled Architects
Alternative 4: Vicious Gladiator’s Cuffs of Prowess (I know, I know!)
Alternative 5:  Heroic Bracers of the Burningeye

Enchantment: Scroll of Enchant Bracer – Superior Spellpower, Scroll of Enchant Bracers – Greater Spellpower, or Scroll of Enchant Bracer – Healing Power

Gems: Artful Ember Topaz

HANDS

Best In Show: Heroic Mercurial Gloves

Alternative 1: Flamebloom Gloves
Alternative 2: Mercurial Gloves
Alternative 3: Heroic Mercurial Handwraps
Alternative 4: Hands of the Twilight Council
Alternative 5: Gloves of the Painless Midnight (H)

Enchantment: Scroll of Enchant Gloves – Exceptional Spellpower or Scroll of Enchant Gloves – Major Spellpower

Gems: Artful Ember Topaz

HEAD

Best In Show: Heroic Mercurial Hood

Alternative 1: Heroic Power Generator Hood
Alternative 2: Heroic Crown of the Twilight Queen
Alternative 3: Mercurial Hood
Alternative 4: Power Generator Hood
Alternative 5: Heroic Crown of Burning Waters

Enchantment: Arcanum of Hyjal, Arcanum of Burning Mysteries, or Arcanum of the Dragonmaw

Gems: Ember Skyflare Diamond and Artful Ember Topaz

WAIST

Best In Show: Heroic Belt of Arcane Storms

Alternative 1: Incense Infused Cumberbund
Alternative 2: Cord of Raven Queen
Alternative 3: Belt of Arcane Storms
Alternative 4: Dreamless Belt BEST BUY!

Enchantment: [The best Belt Buckle you can buy]

Gems: Artful Ember Topaz

BACK

Best In Show: Heroic Shroud of Endless Grief

Alternative 1: Heroic Shadow of Dread
Alternative 2: Ritssyn’s Ruminous Drape
Alternative 3: Shadow of Dread
Alternative 4: Heroic Periwinkle Cloak
Alternative 5: Heavenly Breeze

NECK

Best In Show: Heroic Valiona’s Medallion

Alternative 1: Valiona’s Medallion
Alternative 2: Lightning Flash Pendant (A) / Yellow Smoke Pendant (H)
Alternative 3: Eye of Many Deaths BEST BUY! (with Artful Ember Topaz)
Alternative 4: Heroic Pipefish Cord
Alternative 5: Heroic Pendant of the Keep

FINGERS

Best In Show: Heroic Signet of the Fifth Circle

Alternative 1: Ring of the Boy Emperor
Alternative 2: Signet of the Fifth Circle
Alternative 3: Twined Band of Flowers
Alternative 4: Ring of Warring Elements BEST BUY! (with Artful Ember Topaz)
Alternative 5: Spirit Creeper Ring

Enchantment: [Enchanters Only]

TRINKETS

Best In Show: Darkmoon Card: Volcano (for SmiteSpec users only)

Alternative 1: Soul Casket
Alternative 2: Mirror of Broken Images (H) / Mirror of Broken Images (A)
Alternative 3: Heroic Blood of Isiset
Alternative 4: Heroic Sorrowsong
Alternative 5: Heroic Tendrils of Burrowing Dark

WEAPON (Staves Only)

Best In Show: Heroic Chelley’s Staff of Dark Mending

Alternative 1: Chelley’s Staff of Dark Mending
Alternative 2: Staff of Sorcerer-Thane Thaurissan
Alternative 3: Staff of Ammunae
Alternative 4: Insidious Staff (H) / Insidious Staff (A)
Alternative 5: Heroic Emberstone Staff

Enchantment: Scroll of Enchant Weapon – Black Magic, Scroll of Enchant Staff – Greater Spellpower, or Scroll of Enchant Staff – Spellpower

23 comments

  1. I had friends telling me already just how quickly the new greens and blues are actually gonna be purple, so this list comes really handy! =)
    and I agree spi all the way before all else at this point, all the mana-starving posts about priests lately have left me worried to say the least.

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  2. A couple items slipped from your list that might be worth note:

    Belt of the Depths (Tailoring Recipe, requiring 4 Dreamcloth)
    +233 Int, +380 Stam, +152 Spirit, with a blue gem socket; 152 haste on Equip

    Relatively cheap, if you don’t mind plying a little effort/time in gathering or dropping a bit of coin on materials – and a nice little piece of equipment you can drag with you through heroic level dungeons and use as an entry level raid piece of equipment.

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  4. I am putting haste further up the list now (haste>crit)with the way that Divine Aegis has been changed to always proc with prayer of healing. I’m using prayer of healing now much more often than PW:S. Not sure what lvl 85 is like, but I am sure it must be fairly similiar in terms of which spell gives better throughput.

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    • You crazy thing, you! Actually, I probably prioritize Haste over Crit myself in my current (read: 4.0.3a patch) build, but I’m sure we’ll be tossing that baby out with all manner of bathwater soon.

      I’m frightened.

      Hold me!

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  5. Could you do the world a favour and add Wowhead tool-tips to your page please!!! You have a great guide, and you have already done all the work by adding the base href links. All you need to do is slip the code at the end of this message into the section of the site and you are away 😀

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  7. You mention that Spirit is important, however when I look at your list, and cross-reference the items that I can buy with Justice Points, I see that you Always rank the piece that has 0 spirit, rather than the one that has spirit on it.

    I suppose you could argue that many players didn’t save up Justice points before the expansion, but I have over 4K JP to spend to get raiding quickly.

    So, why aren’t the pieces of gear with +spirit higher (or even on) your list?

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    • I went with the cloth Spell DPS gear instead of the Spell Spirit gear because I find that you can pick up the Spirit you need much more easily from non-JP gear slots- no one’s going to fight you for Spirit boots, for example, in a raid, so most of the gear you’ll get as drops will have Spirit on it (you won’t be fighting the mages). You’ll probably be able to get all the spirit you need from those pieces, and therefore should fill out your other stats with the JP gear.

      But the more and more I play, the more I really think you can get away with less Spirit.

      If you want just the cloth Spirit gear purchasable with Justice Points, those would be:
      – Musk Rose Robes [chest]
      – Gloves of Purification [Hands]
      – Mask of New Snow [Head]
      – Leggings of Charity [Legs]
      – Summer Song Shoulderwraps [Shoulders]
      – Belt of the Falling Rain [Belt]

      Good luck!

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      • Thanks. I just need to make a decision about the priority of spirit before I spend all these JPs. Since I haven’t run a 10 man in cataclysm yet, it’s hard to know. I do tend to need to drink to top off my mana alot in 5 mans, so I’m concerned about regen on the longer 10man bosses. But if you think it’s okay to just get Spirit from drops rather than the JP buys, I like that approach alot. That worked well in Wrath where sprit was useless for Disc. I’m also tempted to run the heroic 5mans a few more weeks before spending JPs, but they’re burning a hole in my pocket, and I’m close to hitting the cap. lol.

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  8. Hey there, impressive guide for the gear list…

    Though, a little worried about you putting Spirit as number one stat compared to the new patch changes incoming as Shields will be absorbing more. So, with this bearing in mind.. Shouldn’t it be Intellect > Mastery > Crit > Spirit > Haste?

    Curious an all

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  9. As a 355ilevel Disc priest doing 25 man raids, spirit is not an issue. I’m sitting at a little over 2000 spirit and I hardly ever go below 50% mana. My stat priorities are:

    Intellect > Mastery > Crit > Spirit > Haste

    Intellect is by far the most important stat for raiding because several of a priest’s mana-back abilities are based on your mana pool. Archangel, Rapture, Hymn of Hope, and Shadowfiend all return back a percentage of the priest’s mana. If the priest utilizes these abilities correctly, he/she should never have mana problems in a raid.

    P.S. Too many priests don’t take advantage of Archangel! It’s such a great buff to healing and a great mana conservation tool. Also patch 4.1 plans to include Holy Fire to work with Evangelism/Archangel/Atonement – so if you don’t have it already I suggest picking it up!

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  10. I’m very confused about your stat prio in combination with the list you made. Also mastery isnt even in your stat prio wich is weird.
    Some have already said something about the spirit not being on your listed items but here an example:
    Wrist slot
    the number 1 vs the nr 5, both heroic.
    (bronze flight vs the burning eye)
    they’re exactly the same apart from bronze flight having 143 mastery for the 143 spirit from burning eye.
    wich leads me to think you prioritise mastery over all else.
    So wich is it? spirit (=> longevity) or mastery (=> throughput)

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  11. Just wondering… your guide is called “The Beginning Raider” and in the intro you say “this guide will get you ready to run it using Heroic instance drops, high-cost purchases, and even one or two raid drops”

    But then a significant portion of the gear you link are 372 drops that you won’t get until you’ve cleared the normal raid, probably several months into your raiding.

    I came here looking for gear to get me ready to raid, and its hard to find it. I know that you can’t do WoWHead pop-ups, but you should add a note for each piece saying where it drops. That way I can ignore the items that are way out of my reach and focus on the things that I can get right now.

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