WotLK Priest leveling guide - Best Shadow talent spec and glyphs for Classic

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September 26, 2022: Wrath Classic launches today!

Are you looking to get into World of Warcraft's latest Classic expansion, Wrath of the Lich King Classic? Does the fury of the elements call to you? Well, our WotLK Priest leveling guide should help you quite a bit!

Leveling in World of Warcraft is a pretty lengthy process. Regardless of what class you play, knowing what the best spec, talents and even professions that you roll with can make that process much smoother. Our guide will cover all those details and more as you venture into Northrend.

While you're here, if you're interested in other Wrath of the Lich King Classic content, then check out our DPS Tier list, our Healer Tier list and our Tank tier list. You might also be interested in our dungeon guides, such as our guide for Utgarde Keep.

Best Priest leveling spec for Wrath Classic

First off, we're going to look at the different specs that Priest has to work with. We'll talk about the pros and cons of each, and have a recommendation for you at the end.

Discipline

  • Pros
    • High raid demand
    • Easier to gear
    • Good at early levels
  • Cons
    • Mana issues
    • Proactive healing is hard to learn

Holy

  • Pros
    • Great healing kit
  • Cons
    • VERY mana hungry
    • End game scaling issues
    • Lots of competition for gear

Shadow

  • Pros
    • Good Defensive tools
    • Solid DPS
    • Good utility
  • Cons
    • Slower early leveling experience

Based on this, you have a couple options. The simple way to go about this is to level straight Shadow. Your early levels will be a bit slower, but you don't have to worry about respeccing mid leveling. The other option is to start in Discipline, and then swap into Shadow when you get towards level 50. We're going to detail the easier route, going Shadow the entire time.

Shadow Priest leveling tree
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WotLK Shadow Priest talent tree

Now we're looking at the leveling tree. This one is pretty straight forward. From Level 1-60, take everything that you see in the Shadow Tree, except for the last three ranks of Improved Mind Blast and the four ranks of Shadow Power. Here's what you'll take from Level 61 on.

Level 61 - 80

  • Level 61 - 65: Twin Disciplines (all ranks in Discipline tree)
  • Level 66 - 67: Improved Power Word: Fortitude (both ranks in Discipline tree)
  • Level 68 - 70: Improved Inner Fire (all ranks in Discipline tree)
  • Level 71 - 73: Meditation (all ranks in Discipline tree)
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  • Level 74 - 76: Improved Mind Blast (ranks 3-5)
  • Level 77 - 80: Shadow Power (4 ranks)

Best Priest leveling professions for WotLK Classic

For professions, we have a few recommendations. For gathering professions, you can take Skinning for crit, Mining for a Stamina boost, or Herbalism for an extra healing spell.

For crating professions, Tailoring and Enchanting are top picks for Priests. Enchants are great for getting your own gear enchanted, but also can be a great way to make a bit of extra gold.

Best Priest glyphs for WotLK Classic

For glyphs, we have three major and three minor slots to consider. Here's our recommendations for those.

Majors

  • Glyph of Mind Flay
  • Glyph of Shadow
  • Glyph of Dispersion

Minors

  • Glyph of Shadowfiend
  • Glyph of Levitate
  • Glyph of Fortitude

For our Majors, Glyph of Mind Flay and Shadow are both damage boosts for us. Glyph of Dispersion reduces our cooldown on Dispersion, which is one of our best defensive skills.

For our minors, Glyph of Shadowfiend gives us a chunk of mana back if it dies from damage. Glyph of Fortitude and Levitate are more quality of life glyphs but are nice to have.

And that's all that we have for you! The Priest is a class that starts off strong from a DPS perspective this expansion, but it's a great healer for end game content if you can learn Disc. While you're here, definitely check out our Wrath Classic PVP tier list, as well as some other dungeon guides, for the Nexus, and the Culling of Stratholme.

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