Shadow Priest DPS Nerub-ar Palace Raid Guide — The War Within (Season 1)

This build is the default single target build for Shadow Priests. Archon is suggested by default as it is 1-2% ahead in most cases.

• Ulgrax the Devourer (More Boss Damage)
• Sikran
• Nexus Princess Ky'veza

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This build is nearly identical to the single target build but picks up Shadow Crash and Whispering Shadows to give you the ability for easy DoTing of many adds without compromising your single target damage much (less than 2%). I would start with Archon as it is about 1% ahead of Voidweaver variants

• Ulgrax the Devourer (More Add Damage)
• Bloodbound Horror
• Rasha'nan
• Broodtwister Ovi'nax
• The Silken Court
• Queen Ansurek

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• Consider using a defensive for Venomous Lash.
• If an add hits you during the intermission, you might need a defensive if your stacks of Disembowel get too high. You can also use things like Stoneform to get rid of this bleed.

• When the boss hits 0 energy as he will phase out of the encounter, and you will just be dealing with adds. Do your best to keep all the adds debuffed with Vampiric Touch and focus your damage on ones with larger health pools. If you decide to talent into Shadow Crash it will be helpful in this phase only.
• You will get your 2-minute cooldowns back during intermission. You want to hold these cooldowns for after the phase ends once the boss becomes vulnerable to damage again (after his immunity falls off). If you reach the second intermission you might want to pop them on the adds if the boss will not have much health after it ends, but only do this when you know the immunity will get broken quickly.
• Depending on your kill time if you know you will get your 3rd set of cooldowns at ~4 minutes you can save your Shadowfiend cast to line up with that set. If you are taking Mindbender continue to send on cooldown or hold if you are casting Void Eruption soon.

• If you are rooted by Stalker's Netting, you can use Dispersion to get out of it, but this does waste a costly defensive, so avoid these at all costs. You can also use this root to avoid being pulled into the boss during Carnivorous Contest.
• During the intermission phase you can use Dispersion, Power Word: Shield, and Angelic Feathers to help speed you up when carrying Chunky Viscera to the boss.

By default I suggest using the Single Target build. The add spawns are pretty chaotic and they do not live very long until you get to Mythic. If you want more add damage feel free to use the Shadow Crash build.

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• Keep track of Crimson Rain and use Desperate Prayer to help heal this off if needed.

This fight will break your group up into two groups. This denotes which set of adds you will be killing and, therefore, your cooldown timings. You have some buffer with your in-between casts of Halo. Try to sync these with damage taken events like Crimson Rain for more raid healing.

Note that these are roughly estimated timings but will be slightly off, based on the cooldown of Halo gradually de-syncing with the rest of your cooldowns.

If you can, try to get assigned to Group 1 as this lines up with our cooldowns much more naturally.

Being a member of Group 1 you can cast your cooldowns on pull and still have them rolling for part of the first wave of adds. Delaying for the actual add spawn is usually not needed.

• 0:00 - Full Cooldowns
• 0:20 - Gruesome Disgorge #1
• 1:00 - Halo and Mindbender
• 2:15 - Full Cooldowns (Can pop slightly early but delaying a bit helps sync with add group)
• 2:30 - Gruesome Disgorge #2
• 3:15 - Halo and Mindbender
• 4:20 - Full Cooldowns
• 4:35 - Gruesome Disgorge #3
• 5:32 - Halo and Mindbender

If you are assigned to Group 2, you are at risk of losing your last use of Void Eruption and Power Infusion if the fight ends before you finish your 3rd set of cooldowns around 5:30. If you know the fight will end up being shorter, you can try swapping the order and following group 1 cooldowns, but this means you will only have Halo and Mindbender for the add sets.

• 0:00 - Halo and Mindbender
• 1:15 - Gruesome Disgorge #1
• 1:15 - Full Cooldowns
• 2:11 - Halo and Mindbender
• 3:25 - Gruesome Disgorge #2
• 3:25 - Full Cooldowns
• 4:25 - Halo and Mindbender
• 5:30 - Gruesome Disgorge #3
• 5:30 - Full Cooldowns

• Make sure to position yourself so that when you soak Gruesome Disgorge, you are in a good position to hit as many adds as possible.
• While you are in The Unseeming, be sure to be within range of all adds and that Vampiric Touch is active on each one. If you are out of range, Psychic Link will not work.
• The boss is still targetable while you are in the downstairs phase. Even though you should be prioritizing adds in this phase, you can still get good Psychic Link damage onto the boss. Be sure to refresh Vampiric Touch right before you go down into the add phase.

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• Be prepared to use a defensive when targeted by Decimate.
• Cosmic Shards will likely start ticking quite hard, so you should always use at least Fade for each cast.

• No specific guidance, use your cooldowns on cooldown.

• Positioning on this fight will be key; you want to move as little as possible. The best way to accomplish this is to position yourself close enough to where you might need to move for mechanics like Decimate or Phase Blades so you shorten the required distance.

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• Depending on your strategy, if you are breaking multiple Sticky Web debuffs, you should press a defensive. If you are targeted by this, you can use Dispersion to break this quickly.
• During Erosive Spray, you will gain a stacking DoT that deals heavy damage. Be sure to use a defensive for this mechanic.

• Make sure you have Shadow Crash ready for Infested Spawn. This will not DoT every single add but will at least get you some extra funnel onto the boss. Do not bother manually casting Vampiric Touch on any adds; they will not live long enough for this to have been worth it. If all of the original adds die and there are still some active, you can apply Shadow Word: Pain to them to continue to refresh your Twist of Fate buff if the boss is still above 35% health.
• If you know that Infested Spawn are coming soon you can choose to hold casts of Halo ( Archon) or Void Torrent ( Voidweaver) just be careful not to de-sync this too much so that you do not lose any overall casts during the encounter.

The following is rough timings you can use for the encounter:

• 0:00 - Full Cooldowns
• 1:00 - Halo + Mindbender
• 1:01 - Infested Spawn Adds #1
• 2:10 - Full Cooldowns
• 2:25 - Infested Spawn Adds #2
• 3:10 - Halo + Mindbender
• 3:35 - Infested Spawn Adds #3
• 4:10 - Full Cooldowns
• 4:15 - Infested Spawn Adds #4
• 4:35 - Infested Spawn Adds #5

• Positioning for Halo as Archon is very important as the return Halo has a dead zone that is about 0-10 yards from your player, so be sure to not be right next to the adds or the boss when using this ability.

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• No specific guidance.

• Keep track of when adds will spawn so that you have Shadow Crash ready. Watch timers for add spawns so that Shadow Crash hits the clump of spiders as soon as they spawn. (see below)

Be sure to pay attention to the egg that looks like this, when this is broken the AoE adds will spawn directly on top of where the egg was. You can use this to aim your Shadow Crash to land right as the add spawns (about 1 second before timer ends on your boss mod).

• When talented into Phantasm you can use Fade to break Sticky Web. When you break this it will apply to anyone around you so be sure to run out first.

This build uses the standard Archon Single Target + Shadow Crash build but picks up Phantasm in the class tree.

Depending on how much your group is struggling with add damage you can consider taking a more AoE oriented build. This will cause you to take a dip in raw single target damage but if you are facing adds most of the fight in higher difficulties this might make more sense for your group.

This fight does have uses for Silence but because this is either a DPS loss (dropping 1 point in Mind Devourer) or a Defensive loss (dropping Mental Fortitude) it is not suggested by default and is best covered by other members of your raid.

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• Use at least a small defensive for Queensbane. If you get multiple stacks, you might need something stronger.

• No specific guidance.

• Like most bosses, your positioning here is crucial. In particular, you want to keep an eye out for the position of each Nether Rift and place your character equidistant between all of them to minimize how much you get pulled in.

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• The fight will progressively get more and more mechanics, so as it goes on you will need to be more liberal with defensive usage.

• Keep track of Call of the Swarm so that you have Shadow Crash ready. These adds will fixate on the closest player on spawn, so be sure to leave this to more mobile ranged specs.
• You should save cooldowns if they are within 10-20 seconds of Reckless Charge. Right before this goes off you should refresh your Vampiric Touch on both bosses and be ready to focus damage into Anub'arash. You can bank up some Insanity for this phase as well if its within a few seconds.
• You will typically want to save cooldowns for Shatter Existence and Spike Storm phases so that you can quickly break this shield.

• You might be asked to use Mass Dispel to help move Stinging Swarm around. Be sure to ask ahead of time and be prepared to use this on the raid.

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• You should track how many stacks of Frothy Toxin are incoming, if this is more than 2 stacks you absolutely need to use a defensive. The more stacks above 2 the bigger of a defensive you need to use.
• If you are one of the assigned players to soak Reactive Froth you can consider using Dispersion to quickly move out of the group before you explode.

You are very pressed for time to get your cooldowns off without losing casts, particularly in the first phase. Do your best to use Mindbender, Halo, Void Eruption, and Power Infusion on cooldown. You should use all cooldowns on pull. You can consider using Halo earlier than usual to line up better for the first Silken Tomb set but this typically does not actually matter in terms of overall damage. You need to get this sequence done quickly so that you do not need to interrupt Void Torrent when Liquefy is cast.

Queen Ansurek casts Silken Tomb 3 times in Phase 1 at 1:00, 1:50, and 2:05 roughly. Use the below to help indicate what spells you should be using for these line ups. Note that for the first one it is highly likely that Halo will not come up until after the Tombs spawn. If this happens be sure to at least have Shadow Crash land when they trigger and cast Halo as soon as you can to get it on cooldown. Shadow Priest is one of the worst classes at killing these adds, we are only interested in tagging them for Twist of Fate uptime and you should focus on boss damage.

1. 1:00 - Mindbender, Halo, and Shadow Crash.
2. 1:50 - Shadow Crash
3. 2:05 - You should plan to use your Full Cooldowns here. The Halo you cast into cooldowns will be the only AoE spell used on the adds as Shadow Crash will not be up yet.

If you are phasing at optimal timings you will be able to use your second set of 2 minute cooldowns as soon as they are available before you phase into the first Intermission. This should last for the first part of the intermission but also give you strong boss damage before you phase. As a Shadow Priest saving your full 2 minute cooldowns for the Intermission is likely overkill and you will end up wasting some of this as the shield should phase quickly.

• Try to save 1-2 instant casts before you trigger the jump for Reactive Froth so you have meaningful spells to press while you are mid-air. After landing it can look chaotic but as long as you are on the boss the other raid members that triggered Reactive Froth should move out of the raid group so you do not need to move.
• Do your best to be clumped with the group near the boss for every cast of Silken Tomb. The faster you get broken out the faster you can pre-position for upcoming mechanics. Note that Phantasm does NOT work for this mechanic.

Intermission starts when the boss moves to the center of the platform and gains Predation.

• Be sure to use a defensive as you transition into the Intermission as there is quite a lot of up-front damage when this is phasing. You can then use a small one for each cast of Wrest.

Ideally you use your cooldowns before the Intermission and have them carry into the first part of the phase. This will give you the most optimal timings for the rest of the encounter.

• During the intermission you should still be able to deal almost full damage even while being pulled in. Every single instant cast spell you press should be coupled with movement and pre-positioning so that you do not need to interrupt your rotation to dodge waves.

Phase 2 starts after you finish off Ansurek's shield and move onto the add platforms. The faster you can dispatch the adds teh fewer mechanics your group as to deal with that could cause issues.

• Keep an eye out for Gloom Touch debuffs as once dispelled they will deal raid wide damage. It is a good idea to know when these will be dispelled so you can use a smaller defensive beforehand like Fade.

If you are using your second set of cooldowns ASAP at 2 minutes you will most likely be able to use them again around 4 minutes during the add phase. Depending on your timing you will get your 4th set of cooldowns back in time shortly after phasing into the final phase of the fight when the boss is active. If you decide to cooldown the first Intermission you will not be able to fit this in.

• As you land onto the first add platform in Phase 2 use Shadow Crash to DoT both adds as you are landing. As a Ranged player you should then focus your damage onto Chamber Expeller since the melee have a harder time getting full uptime on this add. After the adds die you need to click the two pedestals on either side of the staircase to spawn it in, clicking this quickly allows you to skip any in-progress mechanics.
• During the add platforms in Phase 2 you will periodically be gripped in by Wrest. Similarly to the Intermission you want to ensure that you spend your instant cast spells moving towards the edge of the platform, even before it actually starts pulling you in. Be extra careful and aware of where the beam is being cast so that you are not gripped into that.
• As you transition platforms Spiders will spawn on the bridge. It is typically a good idea to wait for these to be grouped up before casting Shadow Crash for the Twist of Fate uptime similar to Phase 1. If you are confident with landing this accurately I would encourage also pressing Fade to ensure you do not pull threat.

Phase 3 begins once you transition to the final platform of the encounter.

• Use a small defensive before Royal Condemnation is cast. This does falloff damage the further you are away. If you are one of the players that has the debuff and you are stacking this next to the other player you should plan to use Dispersion.

Most kill times will be around 8-9 minutes. For the last phase of the fight you will need to pay attention to the estimated time to kill timer to see if you can fit in 2 sets of cooldowns or just one during this phase. If you can fit in 2 you will need to use this on cooldown more than likely, but if you are working at a fast pace you should hold your only set of cooldowns in this phase to line up with the Summoned Acolyte adds.

Pay attention to casts of Infest on your tank, they will spawn Spider adds as soon as the cast completes and you want to time your Shadow Crash to land as soon as they spawn. This is the only cast you should actually hit on the adds the rest of your damage should be focused onto Queen Ansurek and let Psychic Link do the add damage.

When Royal Condemnation is cast there will be two webs you need to DPS down to break. Unfortunately this happens too soon after the spiders spawn for you to have Shadow Crash available so I would suggest just manually casting Vampiric Touch on these to get damage into them. Depending on your raids damage you might need to change your target to each one, otherwise for most groups just cleaving off the boss with Psychic Link should be enough.

Later into the fight Queen Ansurek will cast Queen's Summons which will spawn 3 Summoned Acolyte adds in the center of the room. Before this is cast consider refreshing Vampiric Touch on the boss to make sure this does not fall off while you are focusing adds. As a Shadow Priest you should cast Vampiric Touch on these adds to get full Psychic Link cleave onto them. If you can get the positioning right you can use Shadow Crash to target two of these and only have to manually DoT the one far one. Most groups dedicate their ranged to focusing the one furthest away from the boss since it is usually not attackable by melee. You should plan on focusing this one down instead of the Boss during this phase.

• After you phase pay attention to the way the boss is facing (you can use the target circle reticle under the boss and line up with the way the arrow is pointing). You should position yourself to not lose damage once the boss drops down.

By default I would suggest playing Archon for Queen Ansurek. There are some absorb shield mechanics on this fight but in my opinion these are not particularly challenging parts of teh fight and Archon is better for everything else in the encounter.

If you are interested in playing Voidweaver to get access to Devour Matter, check out the build below. It is roughly 1-2% behind the Archon version but might give better burst on the shield phases, depending on your timings. If you want even more potential shield damage you can swap Idol of Y'Shaarj for Deathspeaker for a 1% loss in overall but add more shield damage if it procs at good times.

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