Priests lead the many faiths spread throughout the disparate lands of the world of Azeroth. In Kalimdor, Night Elf Priestesses revere the moon goddess Elune, while Dwarven priests in Khaz Modan deliver the message of the Light to their people. In the ruins of Lordaeron, the undead priests of the Forsaken, their faith twisted and tainted by their tortured existences, spread a dark interpretation of the Holy Light. Regardless of their faith, however, all Priests share in their ability to manipulate the minds of those who turn to them for spiritual guidance. Here are a few sample spells available to Priests: Sleep - Through training, Priests become masters of manipulating the mind. They are able to lull a creature or person to sleep, rendering them completely immobile -- as long as the target is not disturbed from its slumber. Heal - Warrior and Mage alike can be brought low by injury, but the Priest can restore their health through magic, enabling the injured to return to battle anew. Shadow Word: Pain - Though traditionally benign in nature, Priestly magic has a darker side as well. Through this word of darkness, a Priest can cause excruciating pain to a targeted victim for an extended period of time.

The Priest class is the master of healing, crowd control, and aggro (threat/hate) control. Other classes such as the Shaman, Druid, and Paladin can heal, but not as well as the Priest. The Priest can also resurrect dead players as can the Shaman, Paladin, and Druid. The Priest has some buffs that can help party members, and the Priest is key for crowd control due to the Sleep spell. The Priest can even take control over humanoid monsters at higher character levels.

The Priest is one of the most popular characters to have in the party for healing, resurrection, and especially for Sleep!

Allowable Races: Human, Night Elf, Dwarf, Undead, Troll

Standard Bars: health/mana

Allowable equipment: cloth
Allowable weapons: one-handed maces, daggers, staves, wands

Healing Spells (Holy Magic)

Lesser Heal - Heals your target for X.
Heal - Heals your target for X.
Greater Heal - Heals a single target for X. This is a slow-casting spell.
Prayer of Healing (Group Heal) - Heals nearby party members for X. This is a powerful prayer.
Renew - Heals X damage over X seconds. Since Renew heals over time, it's best to use after a battle or when a tank comes back from pulling.

Holy Word: Shield - Instantly shields the target, absorbing X damage. While the shield holds, spells will not be interrupted by physical attacks. Cast Holy Word on weak targets (like casters) or on tanks before a heal. Good Priests are experts with their Holy Word: Shield usage. They don't have to be asked to use it.

Holy Smite (Direct Damage) - Smite an enemy for X holy damage. This ability is useful against monsters that are weak to holy damage.

Inner Fire (Self-Buff) - Increases damage by X and armor by X for X minutes. Because this is a self-buff, you cannot cast it on other people.

Dispel Magic - Dispels magic on the target, removing X harmful spells from a friend or X beneficial spells from an enemy. This can be used to debuff monsters or to remove negative spells cast by monsters on you or other party members.

Nullify Disease
Target is immune to disease for X seconds and is cured of any existing diseases. This is helpful to counter annoying diseases that have been communicated to you by monsters.

Mind Blast (Direct Damage) - Blasts the target for X shadow damage, but causes an amount of threat. Threat means the monster is going to be very angry and will likely come after you in a party. That makes this a good spell to finish off a nearly dead monster or a good spell to taunt monsters away from other party members.

Shadow Word: Pain (Damage over Time) - A word of darkness that causes X damage over X seconds. Use DOTs such as this when you are going to be fighting a monster for a while. If the monster will be quickly killed, then this spell is wasted because it doesn't have time to complete before the monster's death.

Mana Burn - Drains X mana from a target. For each mana drained in this way, the target takes X damage. This is a useful ability to use against enemy casters with mana. Select the monster and look for a mana bar.

Mind Rot - Drains X mana from the target every tick for X seconds. This is useful against enemy casters you'll be fighting for at least X seconds so that there will be enough time for Mind Rot to work.

Mind Vision - Allows the caster to see through the target's eyes for X minutes. This ability is useful for scouting for pulling purposes or for fun or curiosity.

Holy Word: Fortitude - Holy power infuses the target, increasing their target's Stamina by X for X minutes. Cast this on party members and yourself because it raises your hit points. Ask party members to inform you when it has worn off, or check yourself by running your mouse pointer over their buffs on the left side of the screen.

Holy Protection - Increases the target's resistance to holy spells by X for X minutes. Use this buff if you know you are fighting monsters with holy spells.

Shadow Protection - Increases the target's resistance to shadow spells by X for X minutes.

Sleep - Puts enemy target to sleep for up to X seconds. Any hostile action will awaken the target. Only one target can be asleep at a time. Sleep is one of the most important spells for the Priest in parties. Sleep allows the Priest to do crowd control, which means using Sleep on extra monsters that are pulled on purpose or by mistake. This happens all the time, so Sleep should be used often. Whenever there is more than one monster, it's important to Sleep the extra monsters. Pick good targets for Sleep. Often the most dangerous target should be slept or whichever monster the team is not attacking. Teach your party members to not wake sleeping monsters with a melee attack or area of effect spells. Teach them to use /assist also. If there are multiple Priests in a party, they can put multiple monsters to Sleep.

Brainwash - Removes an amount of threat for all enemies of the target. This spell is useful to make a monster stop attacking someone (for example, you or a weak caster) and transfer their hate (threat) to another target, such as a tank.

Mind Soothe - Calms the target, reducing the range at which it will attack you by X yards. This ability is useful for pulling. The Priest calms one target, then pulls another nearby monster without setting off (waking up) the calmed monster.

Psychic Scream - The caster lets out a psychic scream that causes X nearby enemies to run. This is a good crowd control spell when pulls go bad.