COMMENTED OUT FOR NOW. CAN LOOK TO ADD BACK THE BLURBS CLOSER TO SEASON 2/MYTHIC RAID WEEK.Best Covenants for Tank Specs in Shadowlands Patch 9.0.5
Best Blood Death Knight Covenant in Shadowlands patch 9.0.5
For Raid, the best Blood Death Knight Covenant is Kyrian.
Kyrian was the optimal choice for Blood Death Knights in 9.0.2, and the changes made to make this covenant more appealing for the two DPS specs has only made this choice stronger for Blood. With a 15% increase in damage and 3% increase (to 8%) in damage reduction while the effect of
Shackle the Unworthy up, we're looking at an easy winner for most encounters, with the few oddities being too early in the raid to justify changing over. As usual, the damage reduction only applies to effects with the source being the enemy and not environmental effects or similar, so there are cases where this won't actually have much value. That said, even in 9.0, we did not pick it for the damage reduction, or did not play around it.
The
Phial of Serenity remains an additional amazing extra once-per-fight button, which adds a bit of self-healing when needed by functioning as a secondary health potion, and a couple of clutch debuff clears in
Castle Nathria.
For Mythic+, the best Blood Death Knight Covenant is Venthyr.
The choice in Mythic+ is a lot more muddled than the one in raids, with all covenants being close together in terms of raw performance. Venthyr is the preferred pick, thanks to
Swarming Mist, an ability on a short 1 minute cooldown, which, when used on 5+ enemies, yields 145 Runic Power over its duration. That said, thanks to the reshuffling of legendaries, there is a fair chance to see more; after all, with
Crimson Rune Weapon, anybody can have a 1 minute pull cycle!
In fixed, push groups, we've seen a gradual change where the Blood DK in the group may end up being a member of the covenant the rest of their comp would not otherwise be able to bring, with Kyrian, Necrolord and even some Night Fae in the top end of the leaderboard, highlighting clearly that it is less about what you bring, and more about whether you know how to optimize its usage.
Best Vengeance Demon Hunter Covenant in Shadowlands
For Raid, the best Vengeance Demon Hunter Covenant is Kyrian.
Kyrian remains the best covenant for Raid in the 9.0.5 patch. All covenants other than Necrolord had their damage abilities reduced by 10% for Vengeance, while Necrolord was redesigned. Prior to the redesign, Necrolord was worse than not having a covenant, but it is now a fairly competitive option numerically. However, in practice it is unreliable for picking up adds or damage phases due to the randomness of the demon spawn. The damage reduction on
Fleshcraft is nice, but generally unnecessary. While all of them are competitive in raid, Kyrian pulls ahead due to being able to use
Elysian Decree on demand, with a short cooldown that lines up with damage phases and add spawns.
Phial of Serenity is also an extra health potion as well as removing some dangerous debuffs in Castle Nathria, which is currently more useful than any of the signature abilities provided by the other covenants.
For Mythic+, the best Vengeance Demon Hunter Covenant is Kyrian.
Kyrian also maintains its pole position for Mythic+, providing consistent high damage on a short cooldown, while generating souls for self-healing in a limited external healing environment.
Phial of Serenity allows us to remove debuffs without relying on healers or DPS that have specific dispels. While all covenants are fairly competitive, none of them offer the control and snap aggro in a season that still requires kiting often. Necrolord was fully redesigned and is now numerically competitive with the other three covenants, but due to the randomness of spawns and limited use of
Fleshcraft, still remains behind as an option.
Best Guardian Druid Covenant in Shadowlands
For Raid, the best Guardian Druid Covenant is Night Fae.
Right before the expansion launched blizzard buffed Night Fae back up to 16 spells for Guardian which saw it quickly rise to the top pick due to the massive amount of flexibility it provides in a raid environment, whether it be big dps, a massive raid healing cooldown or a huge defensive boost, Night Fae could do it all.
Necrolord is definitely on the rise for Guardian in 9.0.5 due to the buffs it has received, but outside of pure single target damage encounters i believe it will still fall short of Night Fae.
For Mythic+, the best Guardian Druid Covenant is Night Fae.
Night Fae again, it is just incredibly powerful due to the immense flexibility
Convoke the Spirits provides as a covenant ability, the Night Fae Soulbind trees work naturally well for Guardian, always allowing us to get everything we want and there are some huge power boosts in mythic+ like Korayn's
First Strike.
It should however be mentioned that the gap between the other 3 covenants is quite small in mythic+ and the other 3 are definitely viable options which vary in power on a dungeon by dungeon basis.
Best Brewmaster Monk Covenant in Shadowlands
For Raid, the best Brewmaster Monk Covenant is Kyrian.
Brewmaster Monk’s best Covenant option for raiding is pretty simple: Kyrian all day. Oh, you wanted more? Sure. The
Summon Steward’s
Phial of Serenity is extremely helpful, especially in raids. The damage increase and major stat budget provided by
Weapons of Order is excellent, and unlike Necrolord and Night Fae Covenant abilities, which sim competitively, the Kyrian class ability is easy to use, and doesn’t plummet in value when you are forced to move around by bosses like Sire Denathrius, Stone Legion Generals, Sludgefist, Council of Blood, etc. Ultimately, it’s the easiest and strongest choice, and that’s a winning combination.
For Mythic+, the best Brewmaster Monk Covenant is Kyrian.
Brewmaster Monk’s best Covenant option for Mythic+ is also Kyrian. Again,
Phial of Serenity is extremely helpful for removing nasty debuffs, or just simply as a third health potion.
Weapons of Order really helps Brewmaster deal burst damage on large pulls, and it provides another defensive cooldown layer, as well. It doesn’t have the short cooldown of Necrolord’s
Bonedust Brew, or the sustained DPS potential of Night Fae’s
Faeline Stomp, but it’s a bigger, stronger, and more reliable cooldown that fits better into the way that Mythic+ dungeons are typically handled than the smaller, less reliable alternatives. Ultimately, it’s the easiest and strongest choice, and that’s a winning combination.
Best Protection Paladin Covenant in Shadowlands
For Raid, the best Protection Paladin Covenant is Venthyr.
Ashen Hallow is the highest DPS covenant class ability for Protection and works best in raid situations. The ability scales very well with the number of targets and can serve as a healing cooldown when needed. Additionally, General Draven is a very powerful soulbind for progression raiding because he has a couple traits, namely
Service In Stone and
Hold Your Ground that greatly increase survivability when a Protection Paladin needs it most. With
Door of Shadows for some extra mobility, this combination puts Venthyr above the rest.
For Mythic+, the best Protection Paladin Covenant is Kyrian.
With Kyrian comes
Divine Toll, which is a very strong ability for snap threat, utility and resource generation.
Divine Toll interacts well with legendaries and talents that will perform better in Mythic+ making it that much better to use in that environment.
Phial of Serenity is just icing on the cake for all the bleed mechanics in Shadowlands Dungeons or even just as another healing consumable. Soulbind wise, Pelagos is a very strong soulbind as going into a pull with
Shield of the Righteous and
Combat Meditation can provide a high amount of safety increasing the time you can face-tank a pull.
Best Protection Warrior Covenant in Shadowlands
For Raid, the best Protection Warrior Covenant is Necrolord or Kyrian.
In raids, Protection Warriors have a choice: The good of the group, or the good of yourself. Necrolord is the best group-oriented choice for Protection Warriors in raids. It is contingent upon having a good, organized group to perform competitively. Under the ideal circumstances, with skilled DPS players who you can overlap your
Conqueror's Banner with their major offensive cooldowns, it’s the best overall choice. If you’re not playing with organized groups, then its value can suffer considerably, and Kyrian’s
Spear of Bastion will be a more reliable personally-useful skill. Ultimately, the choice between Necrolord and the other covenants is one of group composition and the level of organization at which you’re playing.
For Mythic+, the best Protection Warrior Covenant is Necrolord, Kyrian, or Night Fae.
Again, in Mythic+, Protection Warriors have to make a decision between a personal burst DPS cooldown or a major stat buff to apply to other players while they are using their offensive cooldowns. Necrolord is the best group-oriented choice for Protection Warriors in high-level Mythic+ pushing groups, but you are reliant on other players performing well to maximize its value. Under the ideal circumstances, with skilled DPS players who you can overlap your
Conqueror's Banner with their major offensive cooldowns, it’s the best overall choice. If you’re not playing with organized groups, then its value can suffer considerably, and Kyrian’s
Spear of Bastion and Night Fae’s
Ancient Aftershock will be more reliable choices that offer more personal value and more CC. Ultimately, the choice between Necrolord and the other covenants is one of group composition and the level of organization at which you’re playing.
Best Covenants for Healer Specs in Shadowlands Patch 9.0.5
Best Restoration Druid Covenant in Shadowlands
For Raid, the best Restoration Druid Covenant is Night Fae.
Night Fae's
Convoke the Spirits provides a fairly consistent and potent 2 minute burst healing cooldown and does so without any mana expenditure. Because it casts Restoration Druid-specific spell, there's a lot of synergy directly built in from legendaries or talents such as
Soul of the Forest and
Swiftmend. Add in the fact that we can get 1-3
Wild Growths out of every cast and on the rare occasion a
Flourish and we're looking at a very strong covenant ability overall that puts the others to shame.
Necrolord's
Adaptive Swarm received a 25% buff both to the spell power coefficient and the HoT increase. While it definitely makes Necrolord more appealing than it was previously especially with the changes to
Fleshcraft, it still kinda falls flat in raid simply because the additional healing is relegated to a single target.
Our Venthyr covenant conduit
Endless Thirst received a 60% buff to the amount of crit per stack of
Ravenous Frenzy. While this does give some extra oomph to a conduit that was just okay before, this still doesn't bring enough extra throughput to
Ravenous Frenzy to unseat Night Fae's
Convoke the Spirits.
Ravenous Frenzy must be used simultaneously with
Incarnation: Tree of Life in order to not be too far behind in terms of throughput gain. Used separately to fill gaps in throughput it quickly falls off in value. Having to pair it with another cooldown to be meaningful means this one is inflexible and has some larger issues.
For Mythic+, the best Restoration Druid Covenant is Night Fae.
For all the same reasons Night Fae's
Convoke the Spirits is good in raid, it's good in Mythic+. What really makes
Convoke the Spirits shine is its versatility. Even if we don't necessarily need the healing in Mythic+, we can shift to our affinity shapeshift and use
Convoke the Spirits as a fairly potent damage cooldown giving us one of the few ways to cast the high damage AoE
Starfall as a Restoration Druid.
Necrolord's
Adaptive Swarm buff is way more meaningful for Mythic+ simply due to the shear amount of single-target healing required for tank healing. If you're looking at solely prioritizing healing in Mythic+, then Necrolord will be a strong option, but if you're prioritizing damage even in the slightest then you'll generally get more mileage out of
Convoke the Spirits simply because
Adaptive Swarm still only provides single-target damage.
Best Mistweaver Monk Covenant in Shadowlands
For Raid, the best Mistweaver Monk Covenant is Necrolord.
With the updates to
Fleshcraft in 9.0.5, Necrolord has taken over the top spot in terms of covenant choices. While Kyrian and Necrolord have always been close in terms of overall output and usefulness, with the changes to
Fleshcraft Necrolord now overtakes Kyrian in terms of a recommendation. With no other changes to Mistweaver covenants in 9.0.5, this would be the only impacted change to the rankings.
For Mythic+, the best Mistweaver Monk Covenant is Necrolord or Kyrian.
The balance in Mythic+ is still close in terms of covenant choices. While the updated
Fleshcraft does provide an additional damage reduction, Mistweavers are already fairly tanky healers in terms of available cooldowns. Kyrian and
Weapons of Order still benefits from a solid synergy with
Invoke Chi-Ji, the Red Crane, so they are by no means a poor choice in this scenario.
Best Holy Paladin Covenant in Shadowlands
For Raid, the best Holy Paladin Covenant is Kyrian or Venthyr.
Venthyr provides slightly less healing, but significantly more damage and can be harder to coordinate/use correctly. However Kyrian provides a much more steady flow and higher healing potential. Venthyr’s
Ashen Hallow can be used as a very powerful raid cooldown, and if other healers play around this (do damage, or don’t use their cooldowns) can keep a raid group safe for prolonged period of time. Kyrian is good, due to how frequently useful 1min burst healing is. Being able to pool to 5 holy power, spend it,
Divine Toll, spend again gives you a large burst healing window on a frequent basis.
For Mythic+, the best Holy Paladin Covenant is Kyrian or Venthyr.
Similar to the logic of raiding, both Venthyr and Kyrian are viable here. Venthyr in a coordinated group can be used to great success and open up new buff options if you do not already have a Venthyr. Kyrian provides you with an on-demand burst healing cooldown that is up very frequently which makes up for paladins greatest weakness (healing outside of wings).
Best Discipline Priest Covenant in Shadowlands
For Raid, the best Discipline Priest Covenant is Venthyr.
Despite the nerfs
Spirit Shell, Venthyr's
Mindgames ability is still the top play to maximize the size of your shields. It is a simple massive single target damaging ability that converts into
Atonement healing (therefore
Spirit Shell shielding) and also reverses some of the damage that the affected enemy deals. Mass absorb events are still incredibly overpowered and the
Spirit Shell nerfs don't change the fact that preempting and absorbing incoming damage is often better than healing it.
Mindgames is still the top choice for raiding Covenant because of how well it synergizes with your ramp up windows and how low-GCD intensive that it is to perform.
For Mythic+, the best Discipline Priest Covenant is Night Fae.
Prideful enemies often have a heavy amount of health and deal increasing levels of aoe damage to the group. The
Fae Guardians can give huge damage reduction (20%) to one ally with the most recent buffs with very high uptime. This alone is incredibly valuable, as Discipline expends a considerable amount of mana sustaining the tank through
spam, quickly eating away at your mana reserves. Extra damage reduction with high uptime saves a ton of mana, allowing you to spend more time dealing damage to heal through
Atonement. You also get cooldown reduction for a DPS like a Mage's
Combustion so they can more consistently kill the
Prideful's rapidly and the Wrathful Faeries give substantial mana returns which is excellent on higher level dungeons.
Whether you are in a Pick Up Group or a coordinated team, I believe Night Fae will be the most optimal play for covenant selection for PRIMARILY Mythic+ focused Discipline Priests in 9.0.5 saving substantial mana with damage reduction frequently for your tank, more consistent mana regen from Wrathful Fairies and better cooldown reduction for your damage dealers to kill off enemies faster.
Best Holy Priest Covenant in Shadowlands
For Raid, the best Holy Priest Covenant is Necrolord or Night Fae.
The Necrolord's
Unholy Nova has been a strong mainstay for Holy Priest's and 9.0.5 will bring buffs to
Fleshcraft giving the spec a more effective defensive. The soulbind in Emeni gives a strong Intellect boost with
Lead by Example offering 13% bonus intellect on demand when casting
Unholy Nova. This can be ideal for pairing with
Holy Word: Salvation or
Divine Hymn.
The patch however will also add more competition to the covenants with slight raid buffs to the Night Fae covenant.
Divine Hymn is receiving buffs offering stacking healing increase from consecutive ticks of
Divine Hymn and lasting longer which is the ability reduced by
Fae Guardians for Holy Priests. While
Fae Guardians's cooldown reduction is staying the same, the damage reduction is getting doubled to 20% (from 10%) and the Wrathful Fairy will now automatically jump to a nearby enemy when
Fae Guardians is cast on an ally. The damage reduction will be excellent for self-defense value or for additional tank support (a weak spot for the spec in raids) and the automatic jump will save a global or two in having to apply said Wrathful Fairy before getting value from it, making for more consistent mana returns. Couple this with
Flash Concentration gameplay that can efficiently consume excess mana for additional throughput, you have a power synergy building between resources. My recommendation would be to select Night Fae though I don't think the gap between Holy covenants is so vast as to be punishing.
For Mythic+, the best Holy Priest Covenant is Night Fae.
As discussed above
Fae Guardians is receiving some buffs with 9.0.5. While extra damage reduction will have situational value in a raid with the wealth of external cooldowns a 20 man raid group can have, in a dungeon environment that damage reduction is absolutely nuts. Being able to grant your tank 20% damage reduction for 20 seconds and have the flexibility to swap it to another ally if they are taking extra damage is incredibly insane, shoring up a key weak point of the spec, saving mana, making
Prideful enemies safer and easier. The cooldown reduction already saw play in the Mythic Dungeon International with the the support given to Mage players but it can always be used on a variety of specs, even tanks to get their defensives back more easily as well. While Holy Priest is very mana efficient in general in keys, having that backup of additional mana returns is never a bad thing, especially for the players who frequently use LFG for their key groups where DPS love to cleave each other during
Prideful, making the healer's job that much more strenuous. Night Fae is the way.
Best Restoration Shaman Covenant in Shadowlands
For Raid, the best Restoration Shaman Covenant is Necrolord.
Necrolord, mainly due to
Primordial Wave being a fantastic ability. This kind of strong and impactful spot-healing is what I personally look for when it comes to progress raiding, on top of being really fun to play.
Fleshcrafts rework into providing damage reduction helps to round out the covenant.
However with 9.0.5 Necrolord isn't actually far and ahead the best anymore, due to buffs all of Kyrian, Night Fae and Venthyr are now completely viable choices and pretty much even with Necrolord, which means the only reason I'm still putting it as the best is due to the gameplay-changing impact and how it doesn't care about people being stacked or not. You won't be set back by your covenant choice for raiding.
For Mythic+, the best Restoration Shaman Covenant is Any of them.
9.0.5 balancing brought all the Restoration Shaman covenants close together, which means that you can decide on playstyle, how much damage the covenant contributes or on which covenant is missing in your regular Mythic+ group. Healing and damage wise the only difference is how they deliver it -- Venthyr heals people within 20 yards of your target, Night Fae does it within 20 yards of yourself, Kyrian around your totem and Necrolord doesn't really care. When it comes to the offensive side Night Fae has the greatest single-target damage contribution but doesn't scale into AoE (at all), while Kyrian and Venthyr are both at home with AoE and Necrolord can throw a dot every now and then.
Best Covenants for DPS Specs in Shadowlands Patch 9.0.5
Best Frost Death Knight Covenant in Shadowlands
For Raid, the best Frost Death Knight Covenant is Kyrian or Necrolord.
Frost Covenants are generally tricky to rank. They all bring something good to the table and the difference between them often isn't huge. The choice also depends on your weapon choice and talent build, further complicating the issue. For 2H
Obliteration, Kyrian is the go-to raiding choice. It simply brings superior single target throughput. For DW
Obliteration and
Breath of Sindragosa builds, it's much more tricky. Every covenant brings something good to the party, making the choice a lot more about personal preference. Necrolord is solid in every scenario, Venthyr specifically excels in AoE with
Breath of Sindragosa, Night Fae is great for cleave and Kyrian has a small edge in pure single target. If I had to say something, I think I'd go with Necrolord. You might think I'm overstating how close the covenants are but just take a look at the rankings yourself, all covenants are represented at the high-end.
For Mythic+, the best Frost Death Knight Covenant is Necrolord, Night Fae or Venthyr.
Mythic + is similar to Raid in terms of covenant power. I'd say that Kyrian falls behind slightly due to having a covenant ability that's mediocre in AoE. Between Necrolord, Venthyr and Night Fae, the choice is really difficult. Venthyr works really well with
Breath of Sindragosa builds since you can leverage the runic power gain. Night Fae is also really strong due to the cleave, especially with
Obliteration builds but also for
Breath of Sindragosa. Necrolord is again a versatile choice that works well in every scenario.
Best Unholy Death Knight Covenant in Shadowlands
For Raid, the best Unholy Death Knight Covenant is Necrolord.
To start off, Unholy covenants are really well-tuned. There isn't a large difference between the best and worst in most scenarios.
Given this, Necrolord is generally the best Raid Covenant. Picking up Emeni brings both high ST (essentially tied with Venthyr) throughput as well as the ability of buffing your raid with
Lead by Example. I think the 9.0.5 buff to
Fleshcraft will further cement Necrolord as the raid covenant since you'll get an extra strong defensive!
For Mythic+, the best Unholy Death Knight Covenant is Venthyr.
For Mythic+, the meta is slightly different. Venthyr with
Swarming Mist is considered the best covenant here. The low cooldown (1 minute), as well as the large runic power generation from the ability enables big burst on a high frequency. You also deal essentially tied single target damage so there's nothing you sacrifice.
Best Havoc Demon Hunter Covenant in Shadowlands
For Raid, the best Havoc Demon Hunter Covenant is Night Fae or Venthyr.
Both Night Fae and Venthyr provide similar damage increase for Raiding. They will both help our weak single target damage with short cooldown nukes. On demand burst is king in raid as the pressure point of many difficult encounters will be to kill an add or get out of a phase quickly and these cooldown will really shine in these situations.
For Mythic+, the best Havoc Demon Hunter Covenant is Any of them.
The large variance in M+ pathing, group comps, dungeons, affixes make all covenant fill a specific niche. They are all within a small margin and will edge out ahead in specific situations. Kyrian gives us access to an AoE nuke on a short cooldown very valuable for sustained AoE but lacks ST for bosses. Night Fae and Venthyr provide similar damage pattern with a powerful ST nuke alongside with cleave/aoe built in. Necrolord gives us a proc that will provide us with a damage boost that means it will not give us any increased burst per say but rather help our sustained damage throughout the whole dungeon. Overall all of the covenant will provide a similar damage increase but as we discussed all in a different way. If you play with a specific group picking the odd covenant might be the most beneficial as you will gain access to covenant specific powers in more dungeons but if you pug, simply going the covenant you chose mainly for PVP or Raiding will be perfectly fine as well.
Best Balance Druid Covenant in Shadowlands
For Raid, the best Balance Druid Covenant is Night Fae.
For Mythic+, the best Balance Druid Covenant is Night Fae or Kyrian.
Convoke the Spirits is probably superior at lower levels of keys as the on demand damage is easier to manage. This is amplified heavily with the
Prideful buff as well. As for
Kindred Empowerment, the AOE damage is really nice from Kyrian but the issue with Kyrian is that it is just AOE damage and is really nothing exceptional when
Convoke the Spirits is a very unique and exceptional ability.
Best Feral Druid Covenant in Shadowlands
For Raid, the best Feral Druid Covenant is Night Fae.
With 9.0.5 releasing soon and feral getting a couple of changes to covenants, some may be curious on if anything has shifted in terms of what you should be picking! the quick and simple answer is no.
Despite buffs to both Venthyr (via
Endless Thirst) and Necrolord (a normal buff) Night Fae continues to remain supreme. All of the issues that currently and previously existed for the other two conduits still exist. For raiding, they're just numerically worse options, that also have worse damage profile set ups. When Necrolord, the sustained single target option, loses in both AOE and single target to a Burst option it will never be a viable choice. Venthyr for raiding continues to just be Night Fae but worse, or Kyrian but worse, while also being one of the only covenant abilities in the game to have an active downside.
For Mythic+, the best Feral Druid Covenant is Night Fae.
For Mythic+ it's much the same.
Adaptive Swarm would have to be so MINDNUMBINGLY better in single target due to how it works for it to a reasonable option that when it continues to just be worse it's not a real option. Venthyr buff simply isn't large enough for it to be a good option for Mythic+, it's certainly better in M+ than raiding but not by enough to make it an option.
Best Beast Mastery Hunter Covenant in Shadowlands
For Raid, the best Beast Mastery Hunter Covenant is Night Fae.
With patch 9.0.5, Night Fae still reigns supreme as the go-to raiding Covenant for Hunters. Even with the recent buffs to other Covenants,
Wild Spirits is just too impactful and important of a cooldown to opt out of for
Castle Nathria. The most difficult encounters in the raid are designed such that bigger cooldowns carry you through the most difficult parts of the fight. Night Fae is also still the best single target Covenant, although it is closer now. More buffs to the other Covenants will not change anything however, as the current raid meta values cooldowns too much for it to change, so we will need to wait and see how the new raid in 9.1 plays out.
For Mythic+, the best Beast Mastery Hunter Covenant is Night Fae.
Night Fae and Kyrian are both quite strong choices, but Night Fae is still the optimal choice if you are looking to do the most damage possible.
Wild Spirits is an incredible burst cooldown that will allow you to slam the big pulls in a way that
Resonating Arrow cannot match. Again, Kyrian is still a strong Covenant choice, but Night Fae is now numerically better than Kyrian in almost all situations.
Best Marksmanship Hunter Covenant in Shadowlands
For Raid and Mythic+, the best Marksmanship Hunter Covenant is Night Fae.
Night Fae simply does the most damage and offers the highest burst damage for both single target and AoE which is crucial for fights such as Stone Legion Generals and Denathrius.
For Mythic+, the best Marksmanship Hunter Covenant is Night Fae or Kyrian.
Despite the
Serpentstalker's Trickery bug fix, Night Fae remains the best option. That being said, the
Surging Shots buff paired with the
Serpentstalker's Trickery bug fix closed the gap significantly and made Kyrian on par with Night Fae. We might start seeing more Kyrian Hunters that are focused on Mythic+ as it offers slightly less overall damage, but more frequent consistent damage which may be desired in certain situations.
Best Survival Hunter Covenant in Shadowlands
For Raid and Mythic+, the best Survival Hunter Covenant is Night Fae.
Has access to generally strongest soulbinds for PvE in both Raids and M+. Venthyr and Necrolord changes still fail to address any kind of AoE scaling, and thus are still not competitive.
Best Arcane Mage Covenant in Shadowlands
For Raid, the best Arcane Mage Covenant is Night Fae or Venthyr.
Arcane's best raid Covenant is technically Venthyr, as
Mirrors of Torment was buffed to provide
Clearcasting on proc instead of mana. However, that really only applies to single-target fights; and while that does form the majority of raid encounters, it's not the only type of boss that exists in Castle Nathria:
Huntsman Altimor and Stone Legion Generals are good examples.
The Necrolord and Night Fae are very viable alternatives. I would put the versatility of the Night Fae's
Shifting Power ahead of the pure damage
Deathborne adds to the rotation.
For Mythic+, the best Arcane Mage Covenant is Night Fae.
Mythic+ focuses around frequent multi-target; even on Tyrannical weeks, trash take up the majority of the time. With that in mind, the Night Fae are still our best Covenant for dungeons.
Shifting Power's low cooldown lines up with most trash packs and also brings our other spells up faster. While
Deathborne might seem stronger on paper, it's limited to three targets and the long cooldown means it's normally only up once or twice between boss fights.
Best Fire Mage Covenant in Shadowlands
For Raid, the best Fire Mage Covenant is Night Fae.
The cooldown reduction of
Shifting Power is beneficial for Fire since it has multiple short cooldowns, such as
Fire Blast,
Phoenix Flames,
Rune of Power, and
Dragon's Breath. This benefit becomes more impactful as the amount of targets is increased. With fights in
Castle Nathria like
Sludgefist, classes with cooldowns up every minute are at an advantage. Without
Shifting Power,
Combustion is very hard to get down to the minute marker. None of the other covenant abilities have as much synergy with the spec as Night Fae.
With 9.0.5 Venthyr and Necrolord both narrow the gap significantly in Single Target, bringing them both within 3-4% of Night Fae. Kyrian also gains ground, but not as much as its peers.
For Mythic+, the best Fire Mage Covenant is Night Fae.
Same as raid. Night Fae becomes stronger as targets increase so the gap widens at higher target counts. Necrolord has gained a lot of value in 9.0.5 due to the
Deathborne buff, but long cooldowns like this are not ideal in the Mythic+ environment.
Best Frost Mage Covenant in Shadowlands
For Raid, the best Frost Mage Covenant is Venthyr.
Frost Mages who are purely focused on raiding and don't plan to switch specs should go for the Venthyr Covenant.
Brain Freeze is an incredibly strong proc in Shadowlands and
Mirrors of Torment guarantees three uses (as long as the target lives long enough to activate all three stacks - about 20 seconds). The Kyrian, with
Radiant Spark significantly beefing up the power of
Brain Freeze procs, are also a decent choice. Neither Covenant ability enhances cleave or AoE, but they reign supreme in priority damage, which is the majority of raid content.
For Mages who like to spec-swap, the Venthyr are also good for Fire Mages, but the Night Fae are by far the most versatile of any Covenant; great for single-target and AoE Fire and Arcane, as well as AoE Frost. Single-target Frost is the only situation where the Night Fae aren't our top choice due to
Shifting Power not being worth pressing specifically against a single target.
In 9.0.5 Necrolord is now our second best covenant due to the change to
Deathborne.
For Mythic+, the best Frost Mage Covenant is Night Fae.
Shifting Power's ability to lower the cooldowns of
Blizzard,
Frozen Orb and
Rune of Power is really strong against multiple enemies, even if it is weak on a single target (like
Tyrannical bosses).
The Venthyr are a reasonable Mythic+ choice, as most packs have a large mob that will live for the duration of Mirrors, especially on Fortified weeks. The Necrolord are also reasonable, with Emeni's strong
Lead by Example trait and a class ability (
Deathborne) that buffs our cleave. However, the cooldown is very long and you'll rarely get more than one use between bosses.
With the changes coming in 9.0.5 Necrolord is gaining a lot of value in AoE. I don't think it will be enough to shift the meta but it will perform much better in sims. Long cooldowns like this are not ideal in the Mythic+ environment.
Best Windwalker Monk Covenant in Shadowlands
For Raid, the best Windwalker Monk Covenant is Kyrian.
For Mythic+, the best Windwalker Monk Covenant is Kyrian.
The best Covenant for Windwalker in Mythic+ remains Kyrian in 9.0.5. Although a Covenant like Necrolord can use its ability,
Bonedust Brew, more often, the 2-minute cooldown of
Weapons of Order can be easily utilized by semi-coordinated groups that allow players to line up their abilities, or stagger them, for maximum efficacy.
Weapons of Order allows the Windwalker to pump out a lot of
Spinning Crane Kick in a short window on trash and provides the highest burst damage to a single target for bosses.
Best Retribution Paladin Covenant in Shadowlands
For Raid, the best Retribution Paladin Covenant is Kyrian.
Divine Toll is a versatile cooldown that works well in Castle Nathria, especially on later more difficult bosses like Sludgefist. It performs great in either single target oriented burst builds paired with
Execution Sentence and
Final Reckoning, or on AoE since its Holy Power generation scales with extra targets hit.
Divine Toll has no real weaknesses or drawbacks and can work with multiple different talent builds depending on the situation.
For Mythic+, the best Retribution Paladin Covenant is Kyrian.
Similarly as in Raid,
Divine Toll can be used either in combination with
Final Reckoning for strong AoE burst every minute or just as an extra AoE and on demand Holy Power generation ability. Its cooldown is short enough that it can simply be used on cooldown and still be available when burst AoE is required, and it's very easy to get a lot of additional Holy Power out of it without requiring much extra forward planning.
Best Shadow Priest Covenant in Shadowlands
For Raid, the best Shadow Priest Covenant is Any of them.
In much the same way as before
Castle Nathria, Shadow’s Covenant choices are still open-ended enough that you can make any of the four work without putting yourself at a significant disadvantage. Whilst one may prove the best in an individual fight for one reason or another, it won’t be by much, and it won’t be all fights.
That being said though, Night Fae has seen a considerable rise in play and looks to remain strong in 9.0.5. The mobility provided by
Soulshape, as well as mastery from Niya’s soulbind trait
Grove Invigoration are strong reasons to play Night Fae. The Night Fae Priest ability
Fae Guardians has also received a defensive buff that might make the third component of the spell more appealing. While it’s not currently the case, there is also always the potential for niche strategies to emerge which incorporate
Benevolent Faerie to reduce the cooldowns of key players in the raid.
Necrolord has also received a selection of defensive and quality of life buffs to its signature spell
Fleshcraft. Necrolord was a strong contender for its raw damage output before 9.0.5, and this remains the case, but again nothing is strong enough to be considered the universally best choice for raiding.
For Mythic+, the best Shadow Priest Covenant is Necrolord or Night Fae.
Shadow Priest has two major contenders for best Covenant in Mythc+, Necrolord and Night Fae, though Venthyr and Kyrian are not significantly behind. Necrolord continues to offer an effective out of the box AoE ability in
Unholy Nova which doesn’t struggle to pick up value in multi target, and Night Fae has risen in recent weeks due to the value of
Grove Invigoration, and
Fae Guardians providing additional
Voidforms on trash.
Night Fae, as seen in the MDI, also opens up unique strategies involving
Benevolent Faerie to reduce a teammate’s cooldowns. While this is effective in coordinated and practiced groups, it’s much worse for the majority of keys being done by players and should generally not be taken into consideration.
Best Assassination Rogue Covenant in Shadowlands
For Raid, the best Assassination Rogue Covenant is Venthyr.
With the rework to the
Flagellation covenant ability and the big buff to the
Lashing Scars conduit, Venthyr is looking to be the numerically strongest single target covenant as we go into 9.0.5. This should be the theoretical best for raids. That said, any covenant is fine and 9.0.5 makes the differences even smaller than they were before.
For Mythic+, the best Assassination Rogue Covenant is Night Fae.
Night Fae continues to be the best looking covenant for M+ situations. It's not that the alternatives are bad, but Night Fae soulbinds offer a good package and Korayn's
Wild Hunt Tactics and
First Strike are really good for typical dungeons.
Best Outlaw Rogue Covenant in Shadowlands
For Raid, the best Outlaw Rogue Covenant is Night Fae.
Covenants are so close that throwing a dart into a covenant wheel of fortune is as accurate as me declaring one the best. Venthyr are looking good for single target but don't carry that momentum into AoE situations. It is the other way around for Necrolord, they look very strong for AoE/add fights but not too special for single target. In my opinion, the best general recommendation would be Night Fae, due to the very flexible package from the entire covenant, as well as with potential multispeccing in mind.
For Mythic+, the best Outlaw Rogue Covenant is Necrolord.
While Night Fae are good for the same reasons as for the other two specs, the reason I'm going with Necrolord here is the 9.0.5 buff to
Serrated Bone Spike's initial damage. It is neat on its own but what makes the difference here is that this strong initial damage is translated into AoE via
Blade Flurry. This gives Necrolord an edge in AoE damage over the others.
Best Subtlety Rogue Covenant in Shadowlands
For Raid and Mythic+, the best Subtlety Rogue Covenant is Venthyr.
With the rework to the
Flagellation covenant ability and the big buff to the
Lashing Scars conduit, Venthyr is looking to be the numerically strongest single target covenant as we go into 9.0.5. This should be the theoretical best for raids. That said, any covenant is fine and 9.0.5 makes the differences even smaller than they were before.
For Mythic+, the best Subtlety Rogue Covenant is Night Fae.
Night Fae continues to be the best looking covenant for M+ situations. It's not that the alternatives are bad, but Night Fae soulbinds offer a good package and Korayn's
Wild Hunt Tactics and
First Strike are really good for typical dungeons.
Best Elemental Shaman Covenant in Shadowlands
For Raid, the best Elemental Shaman Covenant is Necrolord.
Both Necrolord & Night Fae compete quite closely currently. While the buff to
Fae Transfusion is nice, the real strength of Night Fae is in the Niya & Korayn soulbinds. Additionally, while Night Fae does sim higher than Necrolord in most situations the fact that the strength of Night Fae is in those soulbinds is also what hinders it.
Niya with
Niya's Tools: Burrs & Korayn with
First Strike shine on single target & AoE respectively, but when you focus on one Necrolord will outshine them in the other. Necrolord also wins out for funneling damage into a priority target, target swaps, and is generally just a bit more versatile than Night Fae. As such, Necrolord receives the top spot for the moment.
For Mythic+, the best Elemental Shaman Covenant is Necrolord.
Both Necrolord & Night Fae shine here. Necrolord due to the versatility of both the soulbinds and the covenant ability, and Night Fae due to the raw power that the soulbinds provide you. With
Skybreaker's Fiery Demise &
Storm Elemental looking to make a comeback alongside a much more powerful
Chain Lightning in 9.0.5, the Korayn Soulbind on Night Fae shines as
First Strike synergizes extremely well with our burst windows.
Night Fae does fall short to Necrolord a bit as the strength of the Night Fae is more concentrated in the soulbinds, and you must choose whether you're going to focus on AoE strength with Korayn or Single Target strength with Niya. Necrolord provides even strength in both, and a far more versatile covenant ability in
Primordial Wave.
Best Enhancement Shaman Covenant in Shadowlands
For Raid, the best Enhancement Shaman Covenant is Venthyr.
9.0.5 brought buffs to all but the currently dominant Venthyr Covenant in the form of flat gains, bringing them closer to the point of their mechanical benefits being the only deciding factor. Despite that, I would still currently recommend Venthyr (although there are stronger arguments for both Night Fae and Kyrian now, with Necrolord still lagging a bit behind as effectively a worse version of another option).
For Raids, the reasons are as follows:- While there are a lot of single-target encounters, the advantage that Night Fae + Fae Transfusion provides is still contingent on a channel, and many of the burst windows are short enough that the displaced globals inside the still dominant Doom Winds means that it's not as cut and dry.
- Of the final 4 more taxing bosses within Castle Nathria, only one of them gives any room for another Covenant to shine (that being Sludgefist and Kyrian with some clever Vesper Totem pre-casting). On the other hand Chain Harvest is overwhelmingly valuable as a burst tool on Council of Blood, Stone Legion Generals and Sire Denathrius.
- The flexibility given by having an on demand burst, and some fairly simple but interchangeable Soulbind choices keeps Venthyr as a good option despite the much weaker signature skill.
With that said,
Fae Transfusion is now firmly the strongest pure single-target option and also has some better interactions via the Soulbind tree should a
Witch Doctor's Wolf Bones build end up dominating (though this remains to be seen, and relies a lot on how realistic the uptime requirements are on each encounter to capitalize on the recent 40%
Lava Lash buff). Kyrian's
Vesper Totem is a less explosive but more flexible version of
Chain Harvest, but the Soulbind leaves a lot to be desired for raiding choices due to our weak Potency Conduits. Necrolord is sadly just a worse Night Fae in most situations now despite the buff it received, but the gap is less stark than at launch.
For Mythic+, the best Enhancement Shaman Covenant is Venthyr.
9.0.5 brought buffs to all but the currently dominant Venthyr Covenant in the form of flat gains, bringing them closer to the point of their mechanical benefits and utility being the deciding factors for Mythic+. With that said, I would still currently recommend Venthyr (although there is an argument for Kyrian and possibly Night Fae as well here, but Necrolord remains a poor choice).
For Mythic+, the reasons are as follows:- Additional burst AoE is extremely useful, and the sheer strength of the frontloaded damage in each Chain Harvest lets you open strong and layer extra cooldowns for larger pulls.
- Venthyr provides a massive group heal especially for dealing with Prideful, or rough pulls that your healer may struggle with (or allow them to focus more on DPS). Kyrian also brings this to a lesser extent, which is a big reason it's still a fair consideration.
- When it comes to Soulbinds Venthyr has some solid options but nothing exceptional, and is one of the areas it loses ground to Kyrian due to having access to Hammer of Genesis, a strong option to empower your Doom Winds opening.
Most of the things that are making
Fae Transfusion more appealing are not as vital for Mythic+, largely due to the unlikelihood of
Doom Winds being dethroned as the legendary of choice. The additional healing from the second activation however may save it as an extra group cooldown, but given that Venthyr can just adjust their uses it's unlikely to make it preferrable.
Vesper Totem with the flat damage and healing bump in 9.0.5 makes for a good choice especially in terms of flexibility, but it's simply not as numerically explosive as
Chain Harvest. Necrolord providing no group utility and very niche damage profile gains still sadly languishes very far behind in Mythic+.
Best Affliction Warlock Covenant in Shadowlands
For Raid and Mythic+, the best Affliction Warlock Covenant is Night Fae or Kyrian.
For most raid content, the main benefit of Kyrian's
Scouring Tithe is that it counts as a DoT to increase your
Malefic Rapture's damage, in addition to just being an extra DoT for a class that specializes in DoTs.
Night Fae is almost equally as strong as Kyrian, with the added benefit of a strong movement ability in
Soulshape. Niya's
Grove Invigoration is almost equal in strength to Pelagos'
Combat Meditation. In addition to this,
Soul Rot is way easier to use functionally than
Scouring Tithe, as it's essentially just a cooldown you have to hit every minute, instead of constantly assessing which benefit you want to gain from casting it.
Best Demonology Warlock Covenant in Shadowlands
For Raid, the best Demonology Warlock Covenant is Necrolord or Night Fae.
Despite the adjustment to Venthyr's ability,
Impending Catastrophe, Night Fae and Necrolord are still going to be your primary options for raid. Typically most players will be continuing with Night Fae due to the flexibility it provides to play the other specs. The buff to
Decimating Bolt (base 100% increase from 60%) should give you a bit more of a buffer between the two covenants and if you are looking to play only Demonology the difference between the two is minimal.
For Mythic+, the best Demonology Warlock Covenant is Necrolord or Night Fae.
Best covenant for M+ is tied very closely to the best raid covenant mostly since neither provide a huge benefit overall. You can play anything you want but the best options remain Night Fae/Necrolord.
Best Destruction Warlock Covenant in Shadowlands
For Raid and Mythic+, the best Destruction Warlock Covenant is Night Fae.
Nothing has changed for Destruction in 9.0.5, the strongest covenant for both raid and m+ is still Night Fae. Necrolord has been buffed, but due to the difference in soulbinds and because of
Soulshapes utility Night Fae still looks to be the strongest.
That being said, this does bring both Necrolord and Venthyr much more into play. Specifically Necrolord is a strong option for raids now. The big downside of choosing Necrolord is limiting yourself from then playing Affliction, which looks to be the strongest spec in 9.0.5.
Best Arms Warrior Covenant in Shadowlands
For Raid, the best Arms Warrior Covenant is Venthyr.
Condemn backed by
Massacre replaces a great deal of the rotation, simplifying it, but also adding a great deal of increased damage and defensive value from the built-in damage reduction. Although it has a bit of a low period in between Execute phases, the damage at the beginning and end of the encounter makes it worth while, and Venthyr offers strong Soulbind options for single and multitarget content.
Door of Shadows is somewhat lackluster, as Warriors already have a lot of mobility. When it's useful, it's very useful, but those times tend to be few and far between in raid where the entire raid often needs to move rather than just one person. Generally speaking, any of the others will be better, but that is hardly the primary consideration when choosing Covenants.
For Mythic+, the best Arms Warrior Covenant is Night Fae.
Condemn remains strong in multitarget due to its raw damage output, but loses value in AoE heavy content due to being limited to a single target outside of Sweeping Strikes. On the other hand, Night Fae's
Ancient Aftershock provides the highest multitarget burst and also a good deal of control due to the repeat knockdown - at least against targets susceptible to it. It does have some room for failure however, as the ground target effect can be misplaced or enemies can move out of it, making the Kyrian
Spear of Bastion a weaker albeit easier to use alternative.
isn't particularly strong due to the inability to attack while using it, but can be useful for kiting or running back in areas which you cannot mount. On the other hand, the Kyrian
Phial of Serenity is far more widely useful, and remains the best signature ability across all covenants.
Best Fury Warrior Covenant in Shadowlands
For Raid, the best Fury Warrior Covenant is Venthyr followed very closely by Night Fae.
Condemn is an extremely versatile single target and AoE attack which helps jumpstart the early rotation due to the increased rage generation. The defensive aspect is not quite as useful since Fury cannot spam the ability, but it's a nice supplement to
Bloodthirst healing when considering the amount of raid encounters which incorporate rot damage (G'huun and Queen Azshara both come to mind as recent examples).
Door of Shadows is somewhat lackluster, as Warriors already have a lot of mobility. When it's useful, it's very useful, but those times tend to be few and far between in raid where the entire raid often needs to move rather than just one person. On the other hand, Night Fae's is situational at best due to Warrior's high mobility the inability to attack while shifted, making it a very good pick for a handful of circumstances but often left forgotten on your bars.
For Mythic+, the best Fury Warrior Covenant is Night Fae.
Condemn remains a useful option due to Fury's ability to innately cleave single target attacks with
Whirlwind however Night Fae's
Ancient Aftershock provides the highest multitarget burst and also a good deal of control due to the repeat knockdown - at least against targets susceptible to it. It does have some room for failure however, as the ground target effect can be misplaced or enemies can move out of it, making the Kyrian
Spear of Bastion a weaker albeit easier to use alternative.
isn't particularly strong due to the inability to attack while using it, but can be useful for kiting or running back in areas which you cannot mount. On the other hand, the Kyrian
Phial of Serenity is far more widely useful, and remains the best signature ability across all covenants.
