Mists of Pandaria Classic Holy Priest Spell Summary

Holy Priest has a wide arsenal of spells available to them. Knowing your important spells and when they are best suited to be used is a key part of performing well in any environment. The sections below aim to show you your most important spells by each category and give you a brief example of what each spell does.

Buffs are an important part of any party or raid group as they greatly increase your abilities to tank, heal, and deal damage as a whole. Make sure you keep your buffs up at all times to ensure the highest chance of success in whatever content you are in. Unfortunately we have very limited buffs and don't bring any debuffs.

• Power Word: Fortitude Buffs all nearby party and raid members, increasing their Stamina for one hour.

Holy Priest continues to have the its 3 Chakras, each upgrading the Holy Word spell into something new and granting you a passive buff specific to that Chakra:

• Chakra: Serenity – Holy Word: Serenity
  • Increases the healing done by your single-target healing spells by 35%; you will only use this when you are specifically focusing on tank healing during a high-damage phase.
• Chakra: Sanctuary – Holy Word: Sanctuary
  • Increase the healing done by your area-of-effect healing spells by 35%; this is the main Chakra that you will be using all of the time.
• Chakra: Chastise – Holy Word: Chastise
  • Increases the damage done by your Shadow and Holy spells by 50%, reduces the Mana cost of Smite and Holy Fire by 90%, and gives Smite a 10% chance to reset the cooldown on Holy Word: Chastise. This has very limited uses, but you may be able to swap to Chakra: Chastise and deal some damage if raid-wide damage is low for a bit.

These are your core damaging abilities that you will use frequently, either while leveling or at max level.

• Holy Word: Chastise you can use this when you are in Chakra: Chastise. Deals damage to the target and disorients them; very limited uses, generally you won't use this even if you are in Chakra: Chastise to save the Holy Word cooldown.
• Holy Word: Serenity you can use this when you are in Chakra: Serenity. Instantly heals the target and increases the crit chance of your healing spells on the target by 25% for 6 seconds. Use this often if you are tank healing.
• Holy Word: Sanctuary you can use this when you are in Chakra: Sanctuary. Places a circle of light on the ground, healing allies inside the area. The healing is reduced the more allies inside the circle of light.
• Circle of Healing 10-second cooldown, instantly heals the target and up to 5 nearby party or raid members for a moderate amount. This is great for AoE healing and generally keeping the raid health topped Can increase the number of targets to 6 if you are using Glyph of Circle of Healing.
• Prayer of Mending Whenever the person with this buff takes damage, Prayer of Mending will heal them for a moderate amount and then bounce to another nearby ally. This spell is great when there is constant damage happening to multiple allies.
• Flash Heal A quick, single-target heal useful for healing individual targets that are not missing much health. This should be used often as a way to fill in spots of your rotation. Casting this will grant a stack of Serendipity, up to 2 stacks, reducing the cast time and Mana cost of your next Greater Heal or Prayer of Healing by 20% per stack.
• Greater Heal A slow cast, single-target heal. The long cast time is made up by a very large heal, great for healing tanks and players missing high amounts of health. The cast time and mana cost of this can be reduced with stacks of Serendipity, gained by using Flash Heal.
• Prayer of Healing Heals the target and their nearby party members for a moderate amount. This is your main way of AoE healing, but has a high Mana cost and cast time, meaning you should only use this when your raid group is taking high amounts of damage. The cast time and mana cost of this can be reduced with stacks of Serendipity, gained by using Flash Heal.
• Binding Heal Heals you and a friendly ally for a small amount after a quick cast. Useful if you and an ally are both low health and require a quick heal. Casting this will grant a stack of Serendipity, up to 2 stacks, reducing the cast time and Mana cost of your next Greater Heal or Prayer of Healing by 20% per stack.
• Renew Place a heal-over-time on an ally, healing them every few seconds while the buff is active. Great to keep up on tanks as they will constantly be taking damage and anyone else that is frequently taking damage. While in Chakra: Serenity, single-target healing spells will refresh the duration of Renew, allowing you to cast direct healing spells instead.
• Power Word: Shield Buffs an ally with a shield which absorbs damage and prevents spell push-back while it lasts. Also places Weakened Soul on the target, preventing them from being shielded again for a short duration. This typically won't see much use, but can be used while moving.

Holy Priest has long been known as a healer that brings multiple, powerful cooldowns, and this continues in Cataclysm as you have even more spells at your disposal. Knowing when and how to use these cooldowns will greatly improve your effectiveness as a healer and make you a great asset to any raid group.

• Guardian Spirit 3-minute cooldown. Increases the target's healing received by 60% and acts like a cheat death. If the target dies while buffed by this spell, it instead restores them to 50% health and removes this buff. This is a great cooldown for tanks as you can easily predict tank deaths to mechanics and use this to keep them alive.
• Lightwell creates a Holy Lightwell at the targeted location, which automatically heals nearby allies below 50% health. Has 15 charges and can be killed, so make sure you place it outside of AoE effects.
• Void Shift 5-minute cooldown. New to Mists of Pandara, this swaps your health with the target. After swapping, if either player is below 25% of their maximum health, they will be healed to that amount. This is great for saving someone who is about to die, as long as you are safe too!
• Power Infusion Tier 5 Talent Choice; Can only be used on yourself now; 2-minute cooldown. Grants you a self-haste and mana-reduction buff that also increases your damage dealt.
• Divine Hymn 3-minute cooldown. This is a major AoE healing cooldown and should only be used when your normal AoE healing rotation is not enough to keep the raid alive. Be sure to activate Chakra: Sanctuary before using this to increase its healing by 35%.
• Hymn of Hope 6-minute cooldown. This restores 2% Mana to 3 nearby allies with the lowest Mana overall and increases their maximum Mana by 15% temporarily. Ideally you will want to use this cooldown in conjunction with other Mana-restoring cooldowns, such as Shadowfiend, as the temporary 15% increase to maximum Mana amplifies the effectiveness of abilities that restore a percentage of your Mana pool. Try to coordinate this with your other raid members.
• Shadowfiend 3-minute cooldown. Restores 3% of your Mana with each attack. Use this early and often, you should get several off every fight.

In addition to your main spells and cooldowns, you also have many utility spells that can be game-changing when used in the proper scenario. Make sure you understand each of the spells listed below to fully take advantage of your entire spellbook.

• Leap of Faith Pull the target ally towards your location. A great cooldown to save a group member who is in a bad position or help someone catch up if they are falling behind.
• Purify Our new-and-improved dispel in Mists of Pandaria. Removes all harmful Magic and Disease effects from a friendly target. This will dispel all debuffs, rather than 1 only as it did previously, but now as an 8 second cooldown.
• Mass Dispel An AoE version of Dispel Magic that removes 1 magical debuff from up to 10 friendly targets, and 1 magical buff from up to 10 enemy targets. Can also remove stronger magical buffs that cannot be dispelled in other ways, such as Ice Block and Divine Shield when paired with Glyph of Mass Dispel.
• Fear Ward Makes a friendly target immune to the first fear used against them. Use this whenever you are facing enemies that will use a fear, ideally on the tank or yourself.
• Levitate Allows your target to float above the ground, walk above water, and greatly reduce their falling speed.
• Shackle Undead Shackles an Undead enemy in place, preventing them from moving, attacking, and casting; this crowd control will break if the target takes any damage. Use this if you ever need to crowd control an Undead enemy.
• Fade Temporarily reduces your threat to 0. This is mostly useful when new adds have spawned as they might not have been picked up yet by the tank. Remember that this is temporary and you will regain the threat back after the effect ends.