Shadow Priest DPS Battle of Dazar'alor Raid Guide — Dragonflight 10.2.5

This page will be a rough outline of the bosses and mechanics in Battle of Dazar'alor. Recommendations on this page are based on personal experience and on what other people are doing, and will focus on what you can do as a Shadow Priest in order to optimize your DPS. This is not a full guide for each individual boss. As more data becomes available, this page will be updated continuously to make sure it properly reflects what is optimal.

Shadow is looking to be in a pretty good spot for Battle of Dazar'alor, just based on the way the fights have been designed. They fit the damage profile of Shadow much better than those in Uldir, which is encouraging. However, as always, how strong a spec ends up being ultimately comes down to numbers tuning and that has not really happened as of yet.

This fight should more or less be treated as a single-target encounter despite the fact that there are always adds present. Talents such as Misery, Dark Void or Shadow Crash are not worth taking here.

• Do not spend a lot of time on keeping both DoTs up on the adds, as this is more or less useless damage outside of when the boss is affected by Seal of Reckoning.
• Try and position yourself so that you do not face the Darkforged Crusader when it casts Blinding Faith, as it will disorient you if you do.

Grong is a fairly simple single-target encounter, with the occasional add you need to burn down. The talent setup recommended is therefore the standard build.

• On Heroic or higher difficulty, Grong will cast Ferocious Roar every so often. This fears you if you are not close to another players, so position yourself accordingly. In the event that you do get feared, you can use Dispersion to stop your Insanity draining during it.
• Try and position yourself as close to the middle of the area as possible to make it so you are more likely to be within range of the add when it spawns.
• Be liberal with your Dispersion usage during Tantrum/ Death Knell as this is the most likely thing to kill you in the fight.
• Use Vampiric Embrace after a Tantrum/ Death Knell has gone off to help top up the raid again.

Jadefire Masters is a fight where, most of the time, you will be attacking both bosses at the same time. At first glance this makes a talent like Misery seem attractive, but Twist of Fate is more useful overall.

• If someone soaks a Magma Trap who does not have a slow-fall effect, you can use Leap of Faith to save them.

Once Phase Two starts, every minute or so, the main boss will spawn small adds on top of him that have to be killed as soon as possible. As such, the recommendation here is to go for Dark Void. Legacy of the Void and Dark Ascension are both fine here, with Dark Ascension having a bit more burst potential on the small adds should the timings line up that way. However, considering the movement in Phase One, Legacy of the Void is a safer option.

• If you get the choice, you will want to pick up the Opal jewel once you are in the jewel room. The Emerald jewel is the next best.
• During Wail of Greed, you can use Vampiric Embrace to help heal up the raid. This is also a good time to use Dispersion if you are low on health.
• In Phase Two, save your Dark Void solely for when the adds spawn. After you get your Dark Void off, use Mind Sear until they are dead.

Even though there are always at least two targets available to hit at all times, this fight must be treated as a single-target fight primarily as Shadow does not gain single-target damage from keeping DoTs up on both targets. Occasionally raptors will spawn spread out across the room, which is a perfect scenario for Misery, but Twist of Fate is better for the other parts of the fight. It is up to you what you want to be better at in the fight, but they are both entirely viable picks.

• When you are targetted by Kimbul's Wrath at the same time as Pa'ku's Wrath is going on, use Dispersion and move outside of the safe zone underneath Pa'ku's Aspect to prevent hitting multiple people with Kimbul's Wrath.
• When Akunda's Aspect casts Mind Wipe on several people in the raid, try and help out your healers by hitting as many affected players as possible with Mass Dispel.
• When Gonk's Wrath happens, multidot all the raptors that spawn and help out controlling them using Psychic Horror.
• Do not keep your DoTs up on the boss you are not currently trying to kill. This is not a single-target damage increase and so is completely useless damage.
• The best time to use Vampiric Embrace is during Pa'ku's Wrath since this is the period where the most raid-wide damage is going out.

Although there are occasionally adds that need to be focused when they spawn, there are not enough of them and they do not spawn frequently enough for Misery to be worth it. Moreover, the ability to execute that Twist of Fate gives you is very useful in the last phase, on top of being able to proc it multiple times before that as well.

• In Phase One, also keep your DoTs up on King Rastakhan, as any damage done to him gets evenly distributed to his three allies.
• If you get to pick, stay in the Living Realm during Phase Three, as there is a lot of movement going on in the Death Realm. In addition, your multidotting makes you way more useful in the Living Realm, as three adds will spawn there, as opposed to the Death Realm where you only fight Bwonsamdi.

Mekkatorque is a pure single-target encounter, so the standard talents are recommended here.

• When you are targetted by Gigavolt Charge, you have to hide behind something to make sure you are not in line of sight of the rest of the raid. In order to lose as little DPS to this as possible, stutterstep towards the object you have chosen to hide behind, as you have a good amount of time to do this. Then, use Dispersion once you are not able to hit the boss anymore and wait in Dispersion until your Gigavolt Charge has exploded. This stops your Insanity from draining and also protects you from the Gigavolt Charge damage.
• Do not put your DoTs up on the small robot adds, as this does damage to you and also does not increase your single-target damage at all, making it completely useless.

Although there are relatively frequently spawning adds in Phase Two, they do not occur often enough for Misery to be a worthwhile pick.

• Use stutterstepping to deal with many of the abilities in Phase One, such as Sea Storm and Voltaic Flash.
• In Phase Two, plan ahead for Sea Swell if you can. Ideally, you will have a Void Bolt global to deal with the movement, but Shadow Word: Pain is also an option - just always be casting something!

Jaina is a fight that is mostly single-target, and occasionally has you swap to one, or at most two, priority targets. This means that the standard talents are the way to go here.

• In Phase One, you can use Mind Control on the Kul Tiran Marines and walk them off the boat to kill them.
• Use stutterstepping to avoid getting hit if you are targeted by Avalanche.
• When targeted by Siegebreaker Blast in Phase Two, get as far away from the raid as possible using your available speed boosts, Dispersion and Body and Soul.
• You can use Mass Dispel to dispel the root Jaina applies to the raid with Ring of Ice, which is useful in the case that there is no patch of fire close to the raid when she casts it.