Shadow Priest PvP Guide For 3v3

The War Within Season 2

Based on 50 Characters

From 2093 to 2530 Rating

Updated 9 hours ago

Welcome to Murlok.io's PvP guide for Shadow Priests in 3v3 Arenas. This guide covers the best stats, races, talents, gear, embellishments, enchantments, and gems for Patch 11.1, based on data from the top 50 Shadow Priests in The War Within Season 2 across the US, EU, KR, and TW regions. This includes Crazykoala (Stormrage US) , who is currently the highest-ranked with a rating of 2530.

Updated every 12 hours with the latest data from the Battle.net API , this guide also examines each character's recent playtime, specialization frequency, and equipment choices for greater accuracy.

Top Shadow Priests

Stat Priority

Stats are crucial attributes that influence a character's power in World of Warcraft. They determine the character's strength and overall playstyle. Stat bonuses can be found on various equipment pieces, consumables created by Alchemy, certain foods, some enchantments, and gems.

Each stat experiences diminishing returns once its equipped bonus reaches +20%. Optimizing a character's performance involves finding a balanced distribution. Here is the optimal way to balance Shadow Priest secondary and minor stats for 3v3:

Secondary Stats

+76

5% Critical Strike

+16492

26% Haste

+1574

5% Mastery

+15988

20% Versatility

Haste
Versatility
Mastery
Critical Strike

Minor Stats

+18

0% Avoidance

+609

1% Leech

+80

6% Speed

Leech
Speed
Avoidance

Class Talents

Talents are the main element defining a character's build, significantly influencing playstyle by adding, modifying, and enhancing abilities and behaviors. They are crucial in shaping how a character functions in battle.

Class talents represent a common tree shared across all Priest specializations. These talents provide foundational skills and enhancements essential to the Priest class. They offer a range of abilities that lay the groundwork for a Priest's overall capabilities. The following tree reproduces the in-game class talents disposition as a heatmap. Each color represents the usage frequency and general recommendation level of the talents:

Most frequently used talents, highly recommended for optimal performance.
Widely used talents offering flexibility for alternative choices or personal preference.
Less commonly selected talents, typically chosen to fill necessary slots for advancing to the next tier.

Specialization Talents

Specialization talents provide Shadow Priests with unique abilities and enhancements tailored to their combat style. The following tree reproduces the in-game specialization talents disposition and shows the best talents as a heatmap:

Most frequently used talents, highly recommended for optimal performance.
Widely used talents offering flexibility for alternative choices or personal preference.
Less commonly selected talents, typically chosen to fill necessary slots for advancing to the next tier.

Hero Talents

Hero talents allow deeper customization of the Shadow Priest class fantasy, enhancing character builds. The following trees show the Voidweaver and Archon hero talents as a heatmap, highlighting the most effective choices:

Most frequently used talents, highly recommended for optimal performance.
Widely used talents offering flexibility for alternative choices or personal preference.
Less commonly selected talents, typically chosen to fill necessary slots for advancing to the next tier.

Voidweaver

Archon

PvP Talents

PvP talents are tailored for player-versus-player combat scenarios. Activated in arenas, battlegrounds, and the open world with war mode enabled, these talents optimize a Shadow Priest's performance in PvP encounters. They provide specialized enhancements that give players an edge in combat against other players, reflecting the unique demands of PvP gameplay. The following shows the best PvP talents as a heatmap:

Most frequently used talents, highly recommended for optimal performance.
Widely used talents offering flexibility for alternative choices or personal preference.
Less commonly selected talents, typically chosen to fill necessary slots for advancing to the next tier.

Best In Slot Gear

Gear consists of items that directly determine a character's power level. It can be acquired from various sources: dungeons, raids, world drops, crafted through professions, obtained from PvP vendors, or chosen as rewards from the Great Vault.

Each piece of gear significantly boosts a character's overall strength and capabilities. Here are the top items for Shadow Priests in 3v3, tailored for each equipment slot:

Head

Neck

Shoulders

Back

Chest

Wrist

Hands

Waist

Legs

Feet

Rings

Trinkets

Main Hand

Off Hand

Embellishments

Embellishments are unique effects associated with crafted items, either as predefined elements in a recipe or added with an optional embellishment reagent, creating embellished gear. These enhancements diversify and amplify characters' capabilities.

Given that only a maximum of two embellished items can be equipped at a time, here are the best embellishments for Shadow Priests in 3v3:

Enchantments

Enchantments provide minor yet valuable enhancements to various items, including Back, Chest, Wrist, Legs, Rings, Feet, Main Hand, and Off Hand.

Most enchantments are crafted via the Enchanting profession. However, Legs enhancements are crafted by Leatherworkers.

Enchantments are usually available at the auction house, making them accessible for upgrades. Here is a list of the top enchantments for Shadow Priests in 3v3, essential for optimizing combat effectiveness:

Back

Chest

Wrist

Hands

Enchant Gloves - Shadowlands Gathering

1

Legs

Feet

Ring 1

Ring 2

Main Hand

Gems

Gems are crafted stones from the Jewelcrafting profession that provide stat bonuses to improve gear and fine-tune character stats. These gems can be socketed into various item slots, including Head, Neck, Wrist, Waist, and Rings.

While the availability of sockets on these items is generally random when they drop, Head, Wrist, and Waist items can have a single socket added using the Nerubian Gemweaver , which costs 6 Algari Token of Merit obtained from the Great Vault.

Additionally, for non-PvP Neck and Rings items, sockets can be added with the Magnificent Jeweler's Setting . This item, crafted by Jewelcrafters, can increase the number of sockets to 2 for Neck and Rings slots.

Available through both the auction house and the crafting order system, the following are the top gem choices for Shadow Priests in 3v3:

Citrine Gems

Citrine Gems are a new type of gem socketed into the Cyrce’s Circlet : a powerful ring introduced in World of Warcraft’s The War Within 11.0.7 patch. These gems provide a versatile range of effects to enhance performance in battle.

Obtained through various activities on Siren Isle, Citrine Gems are a compelling choice for adventurers wielding the Cyrce’s Circlet. Here are the best Citrine Gems for Shadow Priest in 3v3:

No Thunder Citrine data yet.

No Sea Citrine data yet.

No Wind Citrine data yet.

Races

Each race in World of Warcraft has unique traits that enhance abilities or improve in-game quality of life. Although these racial traits offer minor advantages, they can provide a competitive edge in certain scenarios.

With Night Elf currently being the top race for Shadow Priests in 3v3, here are the other races that also stand out due to their advantageous traits:

Night Elf

24
Void Elf

11
Human

5
Dark Iron Dwarf

3
Undead

2