On behalf of Paladia @ Stormscale, EU:
All my points, concerns and suggestions are regarding the very end game only, I've found Priests fine until then.
Lack of scaling progression
Priests are very used to having static numbers on their abilities, Inner Fire and Power Word: Shield are good examples. These abilities are excellent as you level up, as you gain new ranks of them which increases their efficiency. When you first reach level 60 these abilities are very balanced against others who just did the same. However, as your gear improves and you face others of equal gear, you notice more and more that your abilities are not on par.
With every new gear with +agility, attack power, strenght, spell damage and hp, the Shield suffers an indirect nerf. So while the damage output of classes more than double, the shields efficiency is reduced by more than half. Due to many of the Priest abilities being like this (and a couple of other reasons), Priest is the class who progress the least from equipment. A practical example of this is having two characters who recently reached level 60 face each other, one class is a Priest and the other is any other class. The Priest will fare pretty well. Now give both of them the best possible equipment in the game, the Priest will fare much much worse against all classes with the possible exception of Druids. If you wish, apply the same scenario to a group situation.
Since progress is what makes us continue playing and having fun, this is a major problem. Another example of this is that the Priest gear all consists of + to healing, which means most of our spells (those with a damage portion, or the mentioned static spells) does not improve the slightest. One might argue that Priests only heal, true as it may in raid situations, why would the Priest not improve overall when the other classes does?
I will use the recently announced nerf to the Aegis of Preservation as an item example of how our class does not improve. Currently, this is what it does:
Aegis of Preservation
Binds when picked up
Unique
Trinket
Classes: Priest
Requires Level 60
Use: Increases armor by 500, and heals 35 damage every time you take ranged or melee damage for 20 sec.
Cooldown: 5 min
Before the nerf, it got a benefit from + to healing gear. Someone who has five piece of the upper tier set (Transcendence) and three piece of the lower tier set (prophecy) as well as Benediction which is the best possible combo you can get in the game now, will have roughly +350 healing. (using my own equipment as an example:
http://wow.allakhazam.com/profile.html?158443 ). Though it is unlikely anyone would have the Aegis for anything but PvP, in which case Anathema is the logical choice. This means +250 healing which would perhaps need to be adjusted, but still should be considered for a drop of this magnitude.
The important part of it though, is that as it is before the nerf, it actually scales a bit according to our gear, just like the abilities of other classes. Such as the Warrior trinket for instance, which heals and increases hp by 15%. 15% will always be 15%, and will always be good since it scales according to the character.
While the Aegis of Preservation is an Epic loot from one of the end bosses on Blackwing Lair, healing you for 35hp for 20 seconds as you get hit by physical damage, physical damage which is often around 1k per hit by someone who has equal gear to a Priest who beats the end bosses in BWL. Does it in that form have any use what so ever? The answer is no, and the scaling of abilities and spells has to be reconsidered, on casters in general and Priests specific. I was really hoping that Blizzard was going the right direction with scaling progressing on all classes, but the upcoming nerfs it is the other way around.
The + to Healing stat and how it is severely misvalued.
Currently, in accordance to the Blizzard itemization formula, 100 Points of "Increases healing done by magical spells and effects" is worth 52 points of "Increase damage and healing done by magical spells and effects" ( 192% of the value). For a Mage to double his efficiency on the most commonly used spell in end game PvE encounters, he needs 520 + to spell damage. For a Priest to double his efficiency on Flash Heal or Greater Heal, he needs 2400 + to healing. Here, the system has a major flaw, since when the Mage will have + 520 damage and healing in accordance to his itemization, the Priest will have 998 in accordance to the current healing itemization. As seen here, the value of + to healing is set way wrong. Another thing to take into account is that the damage gear for a Mage improves most of his spells, while + to healing will only improve a few spells for a Priest (namely the direct healing spells), making the rest of his spell lack severely behind. Changing this would only set Priests on par with the Mage itemization on a few spells, Mages, who are also falling behind in terms of progression.
If a Priest does receive + to damage gear, his current damage spells also has a very little benefit from it. Mind blast receives a 42.8% benefit of it, even though it has a long cooldown (but a 1.5s cast time), Shadow Word: Pain receives the full benefit but over a very long duration. Mind flay only receives 50% of the benefit, even though it is 3 second channeled spell. Blizzard has stated that this is because it has a slowing debuff. This isn't consistent though, since Frost Bolt also has such a debuff but with that added benefit of that it lasts longer, allows you to move while the enemy has the debuff, longer range and does not stop the entire cast if you are hit.
To double the efficiency of Mind Flay you need + 852 in damage gear (something that is not obtainable through the game). To double it on Mind Blast you need + 1202 in damage gear. To double it on Shadow Word: Pain you need 852, the same as Mind Flay. Since the original spells were balanced with their effect, damage and cooldown into consideration, why wouldn't they all scale in the same fashion? If a Mage doubles his with 520 spell damage, so should the Priest. However, right now, to double the efficiency of a Priest through gear you need 2400 healing and roughly 1000 damage gear, though this will still not improve your spells such as Power Word: Shield. Something like this is of course totally unobtainable for a Priest but the counterpart to double the efficiency of for instance a Rogue or a Warrior is very much obtainable, and more so. For the system to work in a perfect scaling faction is pretty easy, instead of the currently flawed + damage and healing, simply making it "Increases direct spell effects by x%" which would include most spells, such as Mana Shield, Power Word: Shield, damage spells, healing and so forth. However, I very much doubt Blizzard will take this route until it is too late.
Intelligence and Spirit
According to the Blizzard itemization formula, one point of every stat is worth equally much on an item, this means that one point of Spirit is worth just as much as one point of Agility. Agility that translates into attack power, armor, critical hit chance and dodge all in the same stat, while Spirit very slightly increases mana regeneration while you are idle. Making these to stats be of equal value on items is not accurate, since their value in reality is extremely different. For a caster in the end game, both Int and Spirit are of very little use, only stamina gives a noticable boost for all casters, and + spell damage for the damage casters. To make it more on par with the other stats, I suggest that one point of Spirit would give +2 Healing, 0.25 spell damage, +1 wand attack power and for every 30 points of spirit 1% increased chance to hit with spells. One point of Int should gives 0.5 Damage and Healing as well as spell crit at 30 points instead of 100, on top of what it gives now. At least then they both would be useful in end game.
For a Priest or a Druid, you are left with pretty much nothing to increase your efficiency. We are currently at the end boss in BWL and I never have any mana problems, the + to healing is barely noticable due to the previously mentioned flaw and my other spells do not improve at all (all gear should have both spell damage and healing to begin with). This has made both Druids and Priests disregard all new loot, not one single person in my guild of these classes actually plays or enjoys the game anymore, they only participate in raids and then only because of their call of duty. I've talked with the other top guilds in both Europe and the US and they all experience the same situation with their healers. Raiding for half a year and still having the exact same efficiency as you did when you first reached level 60, while you see other classes more than double or even triple theirs is simply not fun. What isn't fun in a game, isn't played.
Paladia, Lead Healer, Nilbog, Stormscale (EU)
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