Shadow Priest PvP Guide

PVP

First of all, is PvP the thing for you? If you choose to play on a PvP server, be prepared to be killed by other people at times you don't want to be killed. Be prepared to be embarrassed. Be prepared to spend a lot more time doing the quests that you wanted to. Be prepared to be killed on your way to popular instances or in neutral towns. In short, be prepared to be very frustrated from time to time.

Otherwise, PvP can be very fun. In battlegrounds, arena, and other pvp, it is a great test of skill and often a challenge. However, it requires a different mindset than PvE.

Why Priest?

Priests are a somewhat versatile class in the game if specced Holy/Disc, as they can heal and do reasonable dps. However, they can also be a potent offensive class in PvP, thanks to the Shadow Tree. Shadow priests can usually be distinguished by their purplish colour, thanks to Shadowform.

Why Shadow Priest?

Priests, arguably, had been one of the most powerful PvP characters overall, although less so as of present. Priests specced Shadow (most talents assigned in the Shadow tree) can do impressive amounts of damage in a short period of time, but have some survivability problems. They have one or more powerful DoT spells (up to 3), various healing spells (while out of Shadowform), including an instant HoT spell, a shield, some limited crowd control (along with an instant cast AoE fear spell), great buffs, two or more powerful blasts, and optionally the most mana-efficient-per-damage channeling spell in the game. They also have Shadowform, which increases damage output by 15% and decreases physical damage taken by 15%. At the moment, Shadow is less suited to the arena in the majority of lineups than disc/holy.

Pros and Cons of being a shadow priest:

Pros:

High damage, which is sustainable over moderately long periods of time
No lengthy cooldowns, highest being Silence which is 45 seconds (excluding racial/talented abilities)
Decent passive healing thanks to Vampiric Embrace, available through talents.
Can Silence opponents
High melee reduction, around 35%, which is almost as good as mail armor (using Shadowform and Inner Fire)
Possible to dispel many beneficial spells from enemies and harmful spells from yourself and team members
AoE fear on a relatively short cooldown (26 secs with talents)
Can slow enemy's movement speed with Mind Flay

Cons:

Whilst in Shadowform (vast majority of the time), it is not possible to cast any holy spells, such as heals.
Very susceptible to pushback, most spells having a cast time.
Priests are often targeted early in PvP situations.
Shadow Priests are deprived of any form of damaging AOE which hampers their use as a mage replacement.
Shadow Priests, and priests in general, are very buff dependent, leaving a purged shadow priest vulnerable (and rebuffing costs are massive).
Whilst in shadow form, a priest spell class silenced (counter spell), has nothing else to do but wand & wait.