Trinkets for the Packrats
In the comments section a couple of days ago, Xeppe asked me about the trinkets I use, since I noted that I tend to swap them out depending on fight. I've been wanting to make a gigantic trinkets post since the beginning of this blog and I just never got around to it. This is me still not getting around to it.

I will, however, list out the trinkets I carry with me everywhere, and talk about them a bit.

I absolutely love trinkets. I know that most people tend to stick two trinkets in their character screen that have the best ranking on the Ultimate Trinket List and forget about them, but not me. So many trinkets are unique and whimsical in their usage that I prefer to mix them up and try them out in different scenarios.

Once upon a time, I hated using trinkets with a "use" effect, because I am truly terrible at remembering to actually use them enough to make them worth it. Then Paolo walked into my life and taught me to bind my trinkets to my most commonly used heals, and I felt the warmth of a whole new world opening up to me.

Having multiple trinkets allows me to customize my gear for a specific fight, or a specific strategy. Nowadays, since we've been running ICC with the buff, I haven't been playing around with my trinkets nearly as much, simply because everyone's health pool is larger and my heals are so much more powerful that it's pretty much a moot point. But back when the fights were fresh and new and challenging and there was actually the chance I would run out of mana or not heal fast or big enough, my trinkets got a lot more use.

Case in point: When we were learning the Blood Prince Council fight, we tried a lot of crazy strategies. At one point we even tried using three tanks just to try and get some of the mechanics down. With three tanks, not only did the fight go on for a very long time, but we also lost our source of replenishment since our ret pally switched to his tanking spec. I guarantee you I got a lot of use out of my trinkets during those attempts, because it was the first time in a long time where I used every mana return ability I had and still my blue bar went empty.

So, here's a list of the trinkets I keep on me at all times for healing:

  • Ephemeral Snowflake - This trinket is summarily hated by theorycrafting priests all over the internetz. If you run the numbers, that 11 mana per heal is not very impressive. Maybe it's great for druids with their constantly ticking HoTs, but for a Disc priest who runs with a Druid and therefore never even bothers with Renew, it's pretty lackluster. However, I like the 20 second haste buff on fights where I will be spam healing the tank (i.e. Festergut). Truthfully, this is also one of my higher iLvl trinkets, so when I want to log out with my highest score possible on WoW-heroes (so that I can preen proudly at my toon), I equip this. Mostly just to give Paolo a heart attack though.
  • Talisman of Resurgence - I carry this trinket around mostly for my shadow set actually. But for disc, the Intellect on it is very nice, especially for fights where I will be bubbling a lot and I want a higher return of mana due to Rapture. The spellpower proc also means that my bubbles will be bigger when the trinket is used, however, see below for why I rarely use this trinket on my Disc set out of pure annoyance. To be totally honest, I don't find much use for this when healing.
  • Je'Tze's Bell - Of course I carry this with me all the time. I had to have this trinket, and saved up a long time to buy it on the AH. Hello, my name is Jessabelle. Now, all that aside, this is a good default trinket if you have nothing similar that does a better job. It has a solid full-time spellpower boost (so no problems with overlapping bubbles), and the mana regen occurs often enough in the background to give me around 30 mp5. I don't use this trinket very often anymore due to the fact that I have better ones, but I refuse to DE it, and I carry it around because IT'S MY DAMN BELL.
  • Ancient Pickled Egg - This is actually the same thing as The Egg of Mortal Essence which you can get with badges (this is something I picked up from Coren Direbrew). It cannot be DEd either, so it sits in my bags making everything smelly for the most part. I like the solid spellpower boost which is always a good option when there is no need for anything particularly special for certain fights. I will occasionally use this trinket when I have absolutely no mana concerns in a fight. Because there is no "use" ability, it's pretty much equip and forget. The haste proc is nice, but since it is a proc, and not a use effect, and therefore I cannot bind it to a spell I cast when I need the haste and therefore direct its use, I don't equip this trinket for any fights that would give me a particular challenge.
  • Majestic Dragon Figurine - This is one of my favorite trinkets, though I haven't used it at all in ICC, since I'm running Disc. I love this trinket for Holy, and even use it on occasion when I'm running around in Shadow. When I use this trinket as Holy, I always keep an eye on how many stacks of the buff I have, and I always try to maintain my 10 stack. It gives me a nice little 25 spellpower boost (around 30 with kings) as well as some good solid mana regen. And I find it fun, and a nice little challenge to keep it fully stacked. I like fun trinkets.
  • Spark of Hope - I was really lucky to get this trinket, and it is a very good one, especially for Holy Priests. Love that spirit, always! It's still good, even for a Disc Priest, even though we don't get nearly as much use out of Spirit. Fights that have wonky mana debuffs are perfect for this trinket. The best example I can think of is Vezax, but if you ever run into a fight where there is some form of mana burn, this is great for that fight too (such as those nasty mana burn spots on the ground in Valithria). When no amount of mana regen is regenning fast enough, the absolute reduction of mana cost for your abilities is always a great thing.
  • Sliver of Pure Ice - That spellpower is delicious. There are two ways to use this trinket. You could use it as a second mana pot - put it right next to your mana pot button, or make some kind of macro that will attempt to use this first, and if it is on cooldown, use a mana pot (I'm terrible with macros, so if someone knows specifically how to write that up, I'd appreciate it). Or, you can do what I do, and simply bind it to a spell you use quite often (I use it with Prayer of Mending). Use it when you come back from a battle rez. Use it when you oopsed into the mana burn spot in Dreamwalker. Or, if you prefer to get maximum usage out of it, even if not always at the best time (and therefore consider it more of a background mana regen device), bind it to a spell.
  • Purified Lunar Dust - This is essentially an upgrade to Je'Tze's Bell. For maximum standard spellpower and regen increase, I will on occasion equip them both. Unlike my bell, however, you can purchase this one with 60 frost badges.

A lot of these trinkets share certain aspects in common, and depending on your Priest spec, they may be more annoying than useful.

  • Use effect that increases spellpower: I'm sure lots of people love this, and for Disc priests, spellpower is king. However, I personally hate spellpower procs, due to the bubble breakdown I've mentioned before. There is nothing more annoying to me than trying to put a fresh bubble on someone, and being told that I can't because a "more powerful spell" is in effect - even though usually that is blatantly untrue. Theorycrafting wise, these are probably still best, but personally, if the fight is a stressful one, this can set me off into a very undisciplined rage, if you catch my drift. Therefore, if you're disc, you probably don't want to bind the use ability to a spell you use a lot if you will get as frustrated as I do. Bind it to a spell you use when you need a burst of throughput, such as Pain Suppression, or Power Infusion. For Holy, anything goes, and I'd recommend binding it to an often used spell to maximize its usage. Otherwise, you could throw it in with something like Guardian Spirit, though that might be overkill for most normal encounters.
  • Use effect that increases haste: As a tank healer, I really like these kinds of procs. When my trinket goes off, I shield the tank and cast a greater heal. However, unless it is a fight where I really need to be spamming a single player, the proc will usually go to waste. The best way to use this kind of trinket is to bind it to something that you use when you really need to cast fast. For instance, if you ever use Greater Heal, particularly for tank healing, that is likely the best heal to bind it to. Other options might be Power Infusion, if you use that on yourself. Power Infusion + haste trinket might be more speed than necessary. Similarly for Holy, you could bind it to Guardian Spirit, but again, this may be overkill. You might try binding it to Prayer of Healing instead. I'd recommend trying it with a few different spells, and see which ones give you the most benefit.
  • Chance on spellcast or heal to increase mana regen for xx seconds or return mana: This basically works as a background mana regen feature. The shorter your general casting time, the more likely you will get a solid benefit from this. You can run the numbers for yourself, but trinkets like this are really great for long fights that will require... well, longevity. Using a trinket like this also means that you can swap out some of your other gear for better throughput stats. This is always a good default for healers, as far as I'm concerned.
  • Reduction of mana cost vs Return of mana every cast: There are a few trinkets that have one of these abilities (see Spark of Hope and Ephemeral Snowflake). Reduction of mana cost is superior if it applies to all your heals. It is always better for your mana to spend less of it in the first place than to get some back after you've spent it.

If you make good use of your trinkets, they can really help you in "edge" encounters - this could mean heroic fights, or fights where you feel your gear is not really up to par, or where you are missing essential buffs (i.e. Replenishment). Trinkets give you the ability to tailor yourself to a fight or to a group makeup - use them wisely and with lots of thought.

When it comes to bindings (Clique is fantastic for this by the way), here are some tips to help you better organize trinket swapping:

  • When you write your macro for using a trinket at the same time as casting a certain spell, instead of writing "/use Sliver of Pure Ice" into your macro, type "/use 13" for the upper trinket, and "/use 14" for the lower. (I think that's right - please correct me if I'm wrong)
  • If you set your macros this way, try to always equip a similar trinket in the same slot. For example, you might choose to have your upper trinket slot saved for throughput pop trinkets. Then, whether you use a trinket that increases your haste or spellpower depending on the encounter, you are less likely to need to change the macro, since you would probably bind it to the same spell anyway.
For instance, let's say on one fight, I am going to equip my Ephemeral Snowflake to give me some added tank healing burst on Festergut. I want the haste instead of the spellpower, because I'd rather have faster smaller heals than larger slower ones. In another fight, I might want to use a trinket that has a spellpower pop effect instead. When I swap the trinkets, I just make sure they are both in the upper slot, and the same macro will work - I don't have to make any annoying macro changes.

Perhaps I'd keep my lower slot for mana trinkets, such as Sliver of Pure Ice which has a use effect, or in another fight Purified Lunar Dust, which does NOT have a use effect. I bind the use of that trinket slot to Prayer of Mending, and then throw in a suppression to my macro so that I don't constantly have to hear about how that item isn't ready yet when Sliver of Pure Ice is on cooldown. Or, for that matter, due to the fact that there is no use effect for Purified Lunar Dust.

Copied and Pasted directly from Wowwiki article on macros:

No Error Text or Sound (Improved Again)

This is just like the one above but with an added tooltip that matches the original skill, and doesn't disable sound for the skill's error messages. Sound and error messages for the trinket use are still suppressed though. If you set the name of the macro to a blank space, you can't even tell it's a macro. This one is designed more for trinket use than anything else, but it's here for when you only want to silence one of the two skills this macro uses.

#showtooltip ExampleSpell1
/run sfx=GetCVar("Sound_EnableSFX");
/console Sound_EnableSFX 0
/use ExampleTrinket2
/run UIErrorsFrame:Clear()
/run SetCVar("Sound_EnableSFX",sfx);
/cast ExampleSpell1

If you're running low on characters and you're using this for a trinket, you can replace the use command with "use 13" (for upper trinket) or "use 14" (for lower trinket).

  • Credit: Vandalite of Feathermoon, and Xaeros of Shadowmoon for the macro this was based on.
  • Use: Replace "ExampleTrinket2" and "ExampleSpell1" With your cooldowns and abilities, then drag to your bar like a normal macro.
  • Works in 3.3.2

I should note that I am pretty much useless at macros, so I may be incorrect on some of my assumptions here. I know there are lots of folks who are much better at Macroing than myself, so if you see any errors, please correct me in the comments, and I will change this. Some of the things I've recommended are things I've been thinking about doing myself but haven't yet done, so if you have problems with it, again, please let me know so I can make the relevant changes. People who help me correct my stupid mistakes in comments are my heroes.
11 Responses
  1. Shintar Says:

    For Holy, anything goes

    Except that you then get the "a more powerful spell is already active" messages when you're raid-healing with ProM and Renew. I don't consider it a big deal myself, but occasionally my ICC rep ring's proc does annoy me...


  2. Dharmabhum Says:

    Good write-up and you covered quite the majority of the trinkets out there for healers. However, I do want to add Solace of the Fallen (amazing trinket for both a SP boost and regen) as well as Althor's Abacus (better for holy but still decent for disc) to your list. And add that the Sliver really trails behind in potency unless you pop the mana return on CD every time.

    Also a kind piece of advice: Talisman of Resurgence really isn't very good for anything other than disc (when you really need the INT-based regen, or Vezax together with Spark) or holy paladin. It has no business being used in a dps spec, and in fact the Shard of the Crystal Heart for triumph is great for OS spriests (who can use the hit and the haste is just nomnomnom).

    I know this was based on what trinkets you have, but I just wanted to help fill out the picture for anyone who's looking further :)


  3. @Dharma

    Solace of the Fallen/Defeated does not actually exist. Don't fall for the propaganda. I ran TOC 10 AND 25 every week for months and the damn thing never dropped, so I'm certain the explanation here is that it simply does not exist.

    Regarding Talisman of Resurgence... I keep carrying it around because I refuse to DE trinkets thinking maybe one day... maybe... I will find a good use for it. I sometimes equip it for various things but still, I have indeed found it to be mostly useless compared to the other trinkets I have.


  4. Anonymous Says:

    ^ is flattered


  5. Rhii Says:

    This is such an excellent breakdown, it makes me wish I was a priest! :P

    After having read over it with my new resto shaman eyes, however, I think I'm gonna go out and get me an Egg of Mortal Essence, ASAP. Pretty sure that's one of those ilvl200 trinkets that never gets old.


  6. Docatron Says:

    I fully agree with Shintar. Procced SP increases bug the hell out of me, but as I have nothing to come even close to matching the ICC rep ring I guess I'll have to live with it.

    Currently I have Althor's Abacus and Purified Lunar Dust equipped, but would probably exchange Althor's Abacus for Solace of the Defeated (HC) if it ever dropped and I won it. Getting people (and by people I mean capable people) to do ToC25 is more or less impossible at the moment let alone the HC version. At least it is on my server.

    I am a bit of a magpie when it comes to trinket. "You never know if you might need it some day" ... *shrug*


  7. River Says:

    My soul weeps cause I'm still sporting that Abyssal Rune.


  8. Anonymous Says:

    (I've tried lots of times to post a comment here - hope this one works)
    Thank-you so much for this post!

    I'm a Disc shield spammer and I love my Talisman, have it bound to PW:S with errors and error sounds turned off - so it fires off whenever it is on CD. I never get that error you were talking about - 'more powerful spell' - Healbot shows me when I can cast a new shield on someone.

    Am I missing something?


  9. @Xeppe

    Now that IS interesting.

    Here's what I suspect: You say you have Healbot set up so that it shows you when you can cast a new shield on someone - the question is, what exactly that entails.

    Does healbot show you when Power Word: Shield has faded from someone? And that's when you cast it anew? If so, you won't get the error message, because you are not overlapping the bubble. I'm guessing that is what you are currently doing.

    I often refresh bubbles once Weakened Soul has faded (i.e. as soon as I possibly can) on certain people. This is primarily a habit from tank healing, due to Renewed Hope, which gives an additional 4% crit with flash heal and penance on targets with weakened soul.

    So, if healbot showed when weakened soul dropped off people, and that's when you rebubbled, then you would likely run into the same problem I do with the error messages. If you're shield spamming though, I don't think you really need to worry about maintaining weakened soul on everyone.


  10. Anonymous Says:

    Ahah!
    You are right - I wait til the shield drops off - rather than just waiting for weakened soul to disappear (which Hbot also shows). I have so many ppl to shield, and usually there's a Pally on tanks, so that I've not had reason to run into this problem. I'll try and force it next raid. TYVM.


  11. Jess Says:

    A little late to the party here, but that trick about binding trinkets to heals you cast all the time is so cool! Thanks a lot for pointing out that tip. I definitely don't use my trinkets often enough because I like to save them "just in case" I need them "later" ... which means they are almost never used!


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