Slippery and wholesome, devious and pure, the every contradictory Priest is an amalgam of good and evil. This uncomfortable dichotomy can be traced back to the days of their elder, Voltan the Incorruptible, who, righteous and holy, remained unwavering during strife-filled times when shadow magic ruled the hearts and minds of men. Clad in plain cloth armor, bearing protective holy shields, and wielding a single blunt mace, the Priests of today strive to emulate the goodness of Voltan, but still remember the ancient, seductive powers of the dark.

• Strong single target healing potential
  
• Long range
  
• Powerful shielding and protection
  
• AOE healing ability

• Low damage
  
• Reliance on spirit reserves

Whether healing their allies with powerful restoration spells, or defending their comrades with unwavering holy shields, this noble group of priests will never slaughter, maim, or attack, rather they seek only to protect the lives of others. Holy Priests hold life sacred, and choose to impede their enemies, not through force, but through the tending and safeguarding of those they love. Virtue such as theirs is truly mightier than the sword.

Holy priests are the light clad healers of the Seven Realms. Using both divine healing powers, and righteous zealotry, holy priests can save their allies from almost certain death as well as smite the dark denizens of the world into ruin.

Holy priests have a wide array of holy spells at their command that can each be used to change the flow of battle for the better. Casting powerful heals, shields, blessings, and cures, holy priests are able to enact preventative spells, as well as reactive spells.

There are a lot of spells available that allow the holy priest to stop evil in its tracks before it gets a chance to do a thing. Knowing which spells are available, as well as understanding the tactics of the enemy are the only ways to ensure maximum protection of ones allies.

If you are in a situation where only the main tank is going to be taking damage, then ‘absorb shield’ is the way to go. Absorb shield is a spell acquired from the talent tree that places a protective blessing on the priests’ target. The shield has a set amount of strength, and while that strength holds, the blessed player takes zero damage from all sources. However, each bit of damage taken during the duration of the shield begins to weaken its power, and it will eventually fail. When the shield fails, the allied party member will resume taking damage as normal. The shield is a great way to protect a party member from damage or death.

‘Bless’ is another great spell that can benefit the target of the priest. Bless provides a burst of healing as well as a 15 second buff (a positive effect) on the priests target. The bless effect grants a certain amount of protection (depending on the rank of the spell). While absorb shield protects from all damage, bless adds to the players protection, meaning each attack against the blessed player is less effective.

And here is the kicker, these effects STACK. In Villagers and Heroes, all damage calculation are calculated before absorbs and shields are calculated. This means that the spell bless essentially empowers absorb shield, making it better!

Another great preventative spell is mass absorb shield. As the name suggests, this is basically a form of absorb shield that is applied to all friendly allies in the area. The spell is great to cast right before a boss launches a powerful attack, for example Karackus’ immolate spell. The mass shield will absorb much of the enemies AOE damage, allowing you to continue focusing on healing and protecting the players that require aid.

Often times, even after shielding and blessing their targets, the priest will need to react to the situation at hand; mainly with healing.

As enemies inflict damage on your allies, the role of the holy priest is to keep everyone alive. There are a variety of healing spell to choose from, each a little different, and helpful in different situations.

As mentioned above, bless is a great heal to start the fight, as it also applies the bless effect. Additionally, ‘restore’ is a good spell that heals your target over time (sometimes shortened as a HoT). Instead of healing with a large burst, restore heals over the course of 10 seconds. This allows the priest to either cast it on a secondary target, letting the healing happen slowly, or put it on your primary target to increase your overall healing per second.

The priest’s bread and butter healing spell is the elegantly simple ‘heal.’ This spell is a holy burst of light that infuses the target with a large burst of healing. With a variety of boosts and buffs, the heal spell can easily heal an allied player from almost dead to full life instantly.

Beyond healing, there is also curing. ‘Cure’ is a spell that removes negative effects from the priest’s target. These can be things like enemy DoT effects, stat debuffs, curses, etc. With the simple wave of the priest mace, these effects are cleansed, and the target is ready to head back into battle.

A common misconception is that healing does not produce aggro (aggravate the enemies). Healing does in fact pique the interest and threat of your foes; not quite as much as damage dealers or tanks, but it certainly does. Here are a few ways the priest should be careful of while healing comrades.

If the priest throws out a heal right as combat begins, before the tank has an opportunity to 'pick up' the mob, the priest will surely pull aggro. This essential creates a large spike of threat against the healer, since the mob doesn’t have much more than on sight aggro to begin with.

If the priest is having to constantly spam heals, over and over again (most likely because the warrior isn't able to mitigate enough damage), then there still will be a chance for the healer to pull aggro.

If the priest is healing when heals do not need to land (e.g. casting a heal on an ally that already has full health) then the excessive healing could generate enough threat to pull aggro.

If the tank is not using aggro boosting abilities, such as defender gear, pummel, challenge, and thunderous call, there still will be a good chance for the healer to pull agro – particularly if the warrior is running 'Swift Gear' which actually reduces the amount of aggro generation the warrior has. This of course isn’t the fault of your holy priest, but it might be time to have a little talk with your tank.

Soloing as a holy priest can be done, but is a bit more difficult; at least with a fully spec’d holy build. While focusing on healing and protection, the holy priest doesn’t have much room for offensive abilities. However, there are a few spells that will help the holy priest take down mobs on their own.

Holy priests can spec into holy bolt or judgment. These two spells deal holy damage, which is effective against all enemies, but particularly effective against undead enemies. Additionally, holy priests can also spec into smite, which is a melee boosted strike with the priests mace. This spell can deal a fairly large amount of bonus damage to help take down the enemy.

Along with smite, the priests melee auto attack (hitting enemies with their mace) also can deal fairly good amounts of damage. Holy maces have the same base damage as a shadow mace, so the physical auto attack damage can help you keep up decent damage per second against your foe.

Lastly, a solo priest’s best friend will be protection. Every healing and protection spell that can be used on allies can also be self-cast. Spec’ing into absorb shield, bless, reinforce, zealotry, and divine wisdom can all help the holy priest boost their defense so they can take the extra hits. With the large arsenal of heals and shields, it is actually fairly easy for a holy priest to withstand much of the damage that is thrown at them by their enemies.

The holy priest makes a wonder addition to groups of various sizes. Their healing spells, protections, and shields can easily change a loss into a victory. So what are you waiting for? Create a priest and let the Seven Realms shine under your holy light. Customize the build to your play style and liking, and then share your build with others!