This first tier is one of debate among the shadow community. There are people that say Psyfiend is a must and people who say Void Tendrils can't be beat. Most people don't bother much with Dominate Mind unless they just want a bit of fun. What ever your opinion, this tier is very much up to you. Play style will dictate what works best for you and that may not be the same as someone else. My initial thought was that Psyfiend was great and Void Tendrils had some bug issues. Over time I've come to really enjoy Void Tendrils though. That's not to say that Psyfiend isn't good, but there are some nerfs coming.
As of now Void Tendrils is my favorite just based on play style. There is nothing better for getting a train of melee off of you in a battleground. Psyfiend is great against a single target or a caster, where Void Tendril is kind of useless against casters. Blizzard is going to be changing Psyfiend in the upcoming patch 5.1. The cast time of the pets fear will become a 2 second cast meaning you get less fears during it's duration. They are also lowering the pets health. Rather than 30% of your max health, the pet now only gets 10% of your max health. This will make it extremely easy to kill and could cause it to be very ineffective.
A common tactic I've seen to combat Psyfiend recently is warriors using mass spell reflect when they see one. This way the pet will fear itself. Once your Psyfiend is feared it's as good as dead. Also, in patch 5.1, warlocks and paladin's will be able to cc your psyfiend. Paladin's can use Turn Evil on them and Warlocks can use Banish. This along with the pets lowered health pool will greatly drop it's effectiveness in the next patch which is why I think I'll be sticking with Void Tendrils.
The second tier is a bit more clear. Once again you have a play style choice to make, but it's an easier one. Some people like to use the speed buffs from the first two talents while most players prefer the trinket like effects of Phantasm. This removes all movement impairing effects and makes you untargetable by ranged attacks.
While the speed can be nice, Phantasm is useful in far too many situations to pass up. It's great against melee who are slowing you and it's great against casters. You can use it as an interrupt to stop casters from being able to hit you. This is far to useful to miss in my opinion so I say use Phantasm hands down.
This tier has uses for different specs and situations in my opinion. For the battlegrounds, "From Darkness, Comes Light" is amazing. The procs you get allow you to deal large amounts of damage. You can also use it in arena but you may not get as many procs. This is dependent on being able to use Vampiric Touch a lot.
Mindbender is great for arena. With a 1 minute cooldown, you get a nice mana regen as well as help with your burst from a pet that does decent damage. This can really help in smaller fights when your not able to get many procs from your Vampiric Touch.
Power Word: Insanity (shadow version) is great in duels. You'll get a guaranteed big hit every time your shdow word pain gets below 5 seconds. This is not good in battlegrounds because you can only use it on the target with the 5 seconds remaining. When you're dotting multiple targets, it can be hard to keep track and find that target again. However, in a duel when there is only one target, this can be great.
From left to right on this tier you're going from large battles to smaller battles, battlegrounds to duels. Keep that in mind when deciding what to use here.
I'll keep this one quick because once again it's a play style choice you have to make. All of these are great abilities and all of them will work in multiple situations. My choice for this is Angelic Bulwark because of it's passive nature. I love anything passive because you don't have to think about it, it just works. Again, any of these will work well so just find what works best for you.
This is also a quick one for a shadow priest. Twist of Fate is too difficult to manage most of the time and Power Infusion can work but is better geared toward healers. As a shadow priest, Divine Insight is the only way to go.
Your most important spell as a shadow priest is Devouring Plague which uses shadow orbs to cast. Mind Blast generates shadow orbs so, the more Mind Blasts you can cast the more Devouring Plague's you can cast. This makes Divine Insight crucial to success as a shadow priest.
This tier is a mix of play style and game type. When in arena, Halo is a great choice for getting rouges out of stealth. This can be game changing by not allowing them to have an opener. Halo also does great damage but only if the target is at max range and at a huge mana cost. This is also what makes it not as useful in my opinion for battlegrounds.
In battlegrounds Cascade is my choice. You get nice damage, a short cooldown and low mana cost. This makes it a great ability to use on cooldown, but it does have a draw back. You can't control where it bounces. This means you could break important cc in a fight and make things far more difficult on yourself.
Divine Star is similar to Cascade but does not do as much damage. That's not to say the damage is bad, it's still decent. This decent damage along with very low mana cost and a super fast cooldown make it great for constant use. Another perk to this is that you control where it goes, meaning you can avoid breaking cc with it.
This is a hard one to call. In the arena, go with Halo. When you're in the battlegrounds either Cascade or Divine Star will work. Just find what works best for you and what you find the most fun. I personally enjoy Cascade but I do change it up from time to time and use Divine Star.
I hope this guide was able to help you make some decisions on what to do with your shadow priest. Please leave a comment with any other suggestions you may have and want to share with everyone. Also, be sure to check out my YouTube channel for more Shadow Priest PvP info.
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