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A Holy Disc Priest's thoughts on the new Priest glyphs

Matt Low
Updated ·7 min read

A list of tentative Priest Glyphs have been released into the recent beta for Wrath of the Lich King. Since I am no expert in Shadow, I'll defer an examination of those Glyphs to the resident WI guru. All I can say for the most part is that these Glyphs show promise. I'll go over the Glyphs that affect the healing Priest (Discipline or Holy) and discuss their application raid environments, PvP environments and otherwise.

Alex Ziebart published his initial review of the Shadow Glyphs earlier today so be sure to give that a read after this one.

Glyph of Lightwell - Increases the amount healed by your Lightwell by 1 to 6%

So here is Lightwell as it is currently in the Wrath beta. As you can see, a level 80 max rank unbuffed Lightwell offers 4620 health over 6 seconds. Let's assume that lady luck is with you today and you managed to hit a 6% increase. Your Lightwell now heals for a whopping, jaw dropping, fear inducing 4900 healing (give or take). Now is that really worth a Glyph? I don't think it's worth a Glyph slot. But before we judge too quickly, lets move on down the list.

Glyph of Renew - Increases the duration of your Renew by 3 sec.

I won't go into too much detail on this one. I suspect that this would be a staple glyph of choice for both Discipline and Holy Priests. It reminds me of having the 4 set T5 bonus but without the actual T5. Out of all the Priest set bonuses in the game, I have to admit that this was one of my favourites. Glad to see it return in a Glyph form.

Glyph of Circle of Healing - Your Circle of Healing spell heals 1 additional target.

Wow. Now here's a Glyph. An additional player for Circle of Healing to hit at no additional cost other than a Glyph? Where do I sign up? I'd consider this to be a huge asset to CoH Priests everywhere. If picking Glyphs were anything like fantasy hockey drafts, then this would be my first round pick overall.

Glyph of Dispel Magic - Your Dispel Magic also heals your target for 3% of maximum health if it removes a damaging effect.

Now this Glyph in particular seems to be catered towards the PvP crowd. Assuming your friendly target is being loaded up with DoTs by opposing Warlocks (or something), then a Dispel should restore 6% of maximum health if it removes 2 damaging effects. I think that's a fair ability to add considering Dispel consumes 14% of base mana. You are getting more bang for your buck, it would appear.

Glyph of Fear Ward - Reduces cooldown and duration of Fear Ward by 30 sec.

I'm not sold on this one yet. The PvP uses of this Glyph are obvious. The duration of Fear Ward isn't going to matter much. But the 30 second cooldown reduction can be advantageous. As for how well it will operate in a raid environment, that is going to largely depend on the upcoming raid encounters. If this Glyph were in action right now on the live servers, I would most likely pass over it. My guild paid extra for stance dancing warriors anyway.

Glyph of Flash Heal - Your Flash Heal has a 50% chance to reduce the cast time of your next Greater Heal by 0.3 sec

Who would've guess Blizzard would have given our bread and butter heals unorthodox Glyphs? I don't care what anyone else says. Flash Heal and Greater Heal will always be tried and true staples of Priest healing whether it's in a traditional dungeon, PvP or raid environment. Personally, I thought they were going to pass out increased healing coefficients but this mechanic might not be such a bad idea. For Flash Heal to have a coin toss of a chance to reduce the spell cast time of Greater Heal is a plus. Priests, no matter how they are specced, are not constantly AoE healing all the time. When the raid is not sustaining copious amounts of raid damage, then we are busy supplementing main tank healing or general raid healing. I can't help but wonder if adding a Rank 1 Flash Heal to your bar in order to repeatedly cast it and maintain this Glyph buff is what we'll be doing in a few months. Actually, that does sound too complicated. Anyway, the thought of having a 2.2 second Greater Heal as an option is something worth considering adding to your arsenal.

Glyph of Prayer of Healing - Increases the radius of your Prayer of Healing spell by 5 yards.

This is another situational Glyph to use and it is going to largely depend on the nature of Wrath raids and instance encounters. In other words, whether or not this Glyph is for you to use is based upon how often you intend to cast Prayer of Healing. If you don't have Circle of Healing, then this you might want to consider this Glyph.

Glyph of Holy Nova - Your Holy Nova spell heals for an additional 30% but deals 1 to 0% less damage.

The 3 AoE healing spells given to Priests have the option of being buffed. It's up to you to decide which one you want to use the most. Compared to the CoH Glyph and the Prayer of Healing Glyph, I'd probably rank this last only because I don't see myself using it that often in order to heal my own party. I could easily accomplish the same thing with Prayer of Healing and Circle of Healing.

Glyph of Spirit of Redemption - Critical heals cast while Spirit of Redemption is active increase the remaining duration of Spirit of Redemption by 4 sec.

I could not have said it any better than fellow WI Priest colleague Alex and he would be absolutely right:

Spam Circle of Healing, be dead forever. At least, in theory.

Glyph of Inner Fire - Your Inner Fire has 10 additional charges.

I don't like this Glyph. In PvP, Inner Fire will get purged anyway at some point. In PvE content, you're not expected to really tank anything for a while. The initial charges you get should be enough to keep you alive for you to be saved by nearby players. Your healing buff from Inner Fire should not be affected by the number of charges remaining.

Glyph of Shackle Undead - Extends the range on Shackle Undead by 5 yards

It's a situational use spell for PvE. Even then, I'm hoping there are other classes besides the Priest in the group that can crowd control the necessary mobs. 5 yards isn't much of a gain here. Maybe if the Glyph allowed players to shackle Dragonkin in addition to Undead mobs or something. What do you think? How could this Glyph be improved?

Glyph of Mass Dispel - Reduces the mana cost of Mass Dispel by -20%.

Unless my understand of percentages and math is horribly wrong, this means that Mass Dispel will only cost 13% of overall mana instead of 33%. This is a solid utility Glyph to pick up whether it be used for PvE or PvP.

Glyph of Smite - Increases the chance you'll resist spell interruption when casting your Smite spell by 50%.

If I can pick this Glyph for leveling, I will gladly do it. This may also be useful for Arena Discipline Priests who plan to dish out some pain in addition to healing.

Matt's Top 4 Picks

If these Glyphs were in the game right now, here's what I would choose:

  • Glyph of Renew

  • Glyph of Circle of Healing

  • Glyph of Flash Heal

  • Glyph of Mass Dispel

What are your thoughts? If you could modify one of these Glyphs in some way, which would it be and how would you do it? If these Glyphs were in the game right now, which ones would you pick out for your Priest?
Don't forget to check out Alex's Shadow Glyph overview!