The Insidious Nature of Dual-Specs.

Am I the only one spending more time on my secondary, rather than primary spec?

Jana was, is and continues to be my main. I've gathered gear in the stated desire to Raid as Ret, but I haven't been able to Raid as often as I'd like and probably not stamped my identity as a DPSer on the Guild. But of course I still want to Raid, and acquire gear which will improve my raid performance (even though we're nothing like a front-line hardcore guild). How do you get gear outside of Raids? You guess it, Heroic and their associated Emblems. But DPS are a dime a dozen in our guild like many others, so what do I do?

Yep, I volunteer to tank.

"What could it hurt?", I rather naively said to myself. "I'm still Ret, and this Secondary PvP spec isn't exactly seeing much use." I had bought the Dual Talent ability with a spare 1k gold I had lying around but hadn't gained a huge amount of use from it. Also like many others I abstained from PvP until Druids were banned for being unkillable. Healing was out of the question, not only because I hate healing on my Paladin but also because I ritually destroy all healing gear I come across.

(by 'ritually destroy' I of course mean 'sell to the nearest Goblin'. Sure, I hate the very idea of Paladin healing, but I have to fund my desire for whelplings somehow!)

It started innocently enough - a quick Violet Hold run. No drama, no deaths, all good. Utgarde Keep was next, and predictably it was a walk-over. Heroic after Heroic followed, and pretty soon I was tanking more than I was DPSing. I even volunteered to off-tank an alt and emblem run in Naxx-10. Suggestions from well-meaning guildmates to make tanking my main spec didn't help my state of mind and annoyance. The one saving grace, and the reason why I'm not tanking in Raids that I do attend, is that tank gear requirements are relatively high and that you don't need to take 5 tanks to a 25-man.

Other Paladin guildies who run as Primary - Prot, Secondary - Holy are being pushed into the Healing role because of a relative lack of Healers on at odd times. They're treating it with good-natured joviality but I feel guilty every time I ask one of these guys to heal as I tank a Heroic.



Dual Talent Specs are a frustrating feature for hybrids. On the one hand, it gives the purchaser a huge amount of added flexibility and convenience, but on the other you can very easily be pressured into a role not to your preference. So it is with me. Be very careful when buying the ability and make sure that the secondary spec is one that you can live with, you may be using it more often than you'd like.

Embracing Your Inner Gnomish Army Knife: Ret Utility Talents in 3.2.

Imagine the scenario: 3.2 has dropped... doesn't take much imagination, does it? Your talents have reset, and you just don't know what you should be speccing into. Well, I hope to take you through a few of the available options for a 3.2 PvE talent spec.

The Retribution Base Spec.

Retribution has always been both blessed and cursed with a really, really simple base build. Dump all your points in the DPS increasing talents and you've got 14 talent points to play with. Well, in 3.2 you'll be down to 9:

3.2 PTR Ret Base Spec

All that's changed is taking 5/5 in Seals of the Pure, which increases the DoT, Proc and Judgement damage of your Seal of Vengeance/Corruption. When SoV is firing on all cylinders the talent really is a quite considerable DPS increase, and also has the happy coincidence of also improving SoR to a generally better level than SoC. Until you hear differently, always take this talent in your PvE build.

So, there are 9 Points to spend and two major routes to go down: Holy or Prot... putting all of your 9 spare in Ret isn't really necessary. So, what should you go for?

Variant One: Lay On Hands and Aura Mastery (13/5/52 + 1)

Buried away there in the patch notes is the change to Improved Lay on Hands. Rather than increase Armour by 25/50% for 15secs the talent now reduces physical damage taken by 20%. This is an improvement from 3.2 for all classes with less than 16700 (~Shaman + Shield) or greater than 36600 Armour. 3.2's Imp LoH is a maximum of 1.7% effective damage reduction worse than the 3.1 incarnation (at 33k unbuffed armour). The value of this talent is therefore lower than you would like as LoH is typically for tanks, but has some breathing room for Mail and lesser wearers in PvE vs adds.

Aura Mastery hasn't had much impact in the PvE landscape, but the resistance to spell pushback and uninterruptability has been a lifesaver in many an Ulduar hard-mode. The temp boost to Resistance Auras isn't nearly as useful as I'd hoped it would be, but overall it's well worth grabbing if you traverse down the tree that far.

This build would leave 1 spare point to place into any talent of your choice which strikes me as a very expensive investment, mainly because the 5 of the 8 points are pretty much worthless. The build is somewhat less than ideal considering that most of the remaining utility talents in range are 2pt talents.

Variant Two: Divine Sacrifice (5/11/52 + 3)

In the past I've been grossly unfair to this skill. My initial criticism still stands: an AoE damage redirection skill is too dangerous with the amount of damage thrown out in many encounters, and in other encounters the damage redirected would be too trivial to matter. However, I've moderated my opinion slightly in one particular set of circumstances: when the talent is used in conjunction with Divine Shield.

One of the quirks of damage redirection such as DiSac and HoSac is that they do not bypass the immunity provided by Divine Shield. Hence, if you DiSac just after DS damage is still redirected but not inflicted; there is no risk of insta-gibbing.

In 3.1, Divine Sacrifice whilst under the effects of Divine Shield was pretty much uncapped, leading to the term 'Raid-wall' being coined to describe DS's 30% raid-wide damage reduction for 10 seconds at the cost of 2 GCD's and a 5 min cooldown. Theorycrafters don't have a solid understanding of why this happens; it has been by turns ascribed to server timing issues, bizarre interaction with immunities or the buff continuing to redirect damage from all raid members until one has redirected an amount totaling 150% of the Paladins health, at which time the effect fades from all raid members. That it's buggy is the only firm conclusions which can be made

Unfortunately, this talent continues to be buggy and opportunities to test it have been few and far between. The best intelligence so far is that it's even more buggy, and may last the full 10 seconds or may break early. If the skill hasn't been changed then it is far and away the best raid-wide mitigation talent in the game, but if the damage redirected is properly capped even under the effects of DS its' value is significantly diminished. I'll repost on Divine Sacrifice as/when I know more, but given how good it's been in 3.1 it seems churlish not to give it a go in 3.2.

Update: Barrelroll in comments states that it is fully capped at 150% of the Paladin's Health, meaning that its been nerfed hard and probably isn't raid viable. Better to use DS and HoSanc as a single-target shield wall when absolutely necessary and spend the points elsewhere.

Taking DSac leaves 3 talent points spare, 4 if you only take 1pt in Pursuit of Justice (not recommended!).

Variant 3: Other Utility

Divine Guardian, a great talent investment and mainstay of 3.1, is no longer reachable in PvE builds. The improvement to Flash of Light and higher Ret GCD use makes this a double-blow. On the other hand Vindication is now a viable PvE talent, so at least there's still something to invest in.

Depending on the build you choose somewhere between nine and one talent points are left over, and your options are a little sparse between.

Improved Blessing of Might - +62.5AP per point, max 2 points.
Vindication - -287AP per point, max 2 points. Now works on Boss Mobs.
Divinity - Increase healing done to you by 5% and healing you do by 5%.
Guardian's Favor - Reduces HoF and HoP cooldowns by 8 and 120 seconds respectively.
Divine Purpose - HoF generates a stun break.

Vindication should probably be your first investment choice for your remaining talent points. It doesn't stack with Demoralizing Roar/Shout, but its' effect is as strong as the fully improved version of these two abilities. As it procs from Divine Storm the -AP proc can be distributed amongst multiple enemies in situations where more than one target is in melee range. It also doesn't require a GCD to refresh, and that's quite important for Ret's GCD-heavy rotation. Protections Paladins will probably take this ability, so consider it if you are rolling with Druid, Warrior or Deathknight tanks.

Imp. BoM is Imp. BoM, the spell hasn't changed and still rocks your raid. Holy Paladins seeking the improved mana efficiencies of a Ret build will probably pick it up though, and even a Tankadin may well have at least 1 point in it. This should be second place in priority after Vindication.

Divinity isn't as strong in 3.2 with the nerf to JoLight's healing power. It makes reasonably useful filler for getting down to Divine Sacrifice or for left-over points, but otherwise it's not really powerful enough to warrant the points.

Divine Purpose and Guardian's Favour are both exceptionally dependent on the encounter mechanic. At times they may be extremely useful, in other circumstances the abilities that they affect may not even be hotkeyed. Shouldn't normally be a part of your PvE build.

Paladins interested purely in doing DPS should have rolled a rogue and happy to pass up raid mitigation talents in Prot and Holy could choose the following build (or some variant): I'm a Fighter, Not a Lover build.

--

So, there are your options.

Seal Switching To AoE In 3.2; Seal of Command's Limited Range.

A lot of the debate in the past week or so has centered around Seal of Vengeance's single-target damage, and rightly so. Because of the controversy another component of damage in a raid context has gone largely overlooked: AoE damage. Seal of Vengeance is obviously unsuited to applying AoE damage, and with that in mind this post looks at the other options available.

The Old - Seal of Blood.

The staple Ret Seal of 3.1, SoB's proc of 48% weapon damage on all weapon swings leads to very significant front-loaded damage in multi-target situations. Divine Storm itself is effectively a Whirlwind which proc's SoB, and Consecration is usually ticking even in single-target encounters. Aggro could sometimes be an issue, but when the risks involved in stealing aggro from the tank are minimal SoB allowed considerable burst AoE without necessarily interrupting a DPS cycle on the main target.

3.1 will probably be looked back upon as the golden age of Ret DPS... farewell Seal of Blood, you will be missed.

The New...ish - Seal of Vengeance

Seal of Vengeance largely replaces SoB in 3.2, but is only suited to single-target DPS situations due to the difficulty of stacking Holy Vengeance on secondary targets. Tab-targetting may allow you to spread the Holy Vengeance debuff around a little, perhaps to as many as 3 targets reliably under optimum conditions and with no avoided swings. Unfortunately, an encounter with up to 3 targets all in melee range that last long enough to make it worthwhile is an exceedingly rare beast. Spreading the debuff to 2 targets will be the likely limit of SoV functionality, and enough of a juggling exercise for most players.

The Alternative - Switching Your Seal

Rather than go through the rigmarole of tab-targetting there is another option: switching your Seal. Both SoCommand and SoRighteousness allow a damage proc from Divine Storm, but as a consequence lower damage will be inflicted upon the main target. Using Command or Righteousness is not something you want to be doing all the time, but when you absolutely positively have to do as much AoE damage as possible they are valid options.

SoR has a much smoother distribution of damage as proc damage doesn't vary and cannot crit. This can be of great benefit in situations where drawing aggro is a worry. On the other hand the size of the damage proc is almost always inferior to that of Command, especially when considering that Command procs may crit. If aggro isn't a problem, either because you're comfortable with the damage 4 adds beating on you may cause or very happy with your tank's ability to hold threat (yay Pally and DK Tanks!), SoC represents significantly higher multi-target DPS.

But, there's a catch with Seal of Command: You need to be in melee range, i.e. within 5 yards, for the attack hitting the target to proc it.

Seal of Righteousness - Proc at Range

Seal of Command - No Proc at Range

You may be thinking that this isn't a problem, but Judgment and Divine Storm have a range of 10 and 8 yards respectively and you may miss a surprising number of procing opportunities. Seal of Righteousness and Vengeance proc's don't suffer from this problem thankfully.

The maximum range of Commands proc issue may well rear its' ugly head again in any PvP discussions given the otherwise weak nature of Judgment damage.

The Cost

Mana. - Casting a Seal spell still costs 14% of base mana, and if you want to adapt to encounter phases you'll be doing it multiple times in a battle. Even the most frugal Ret Paladin will soon see this eat into their mana pool, especially in 10-man raids where mana buffs are thin on the ground. Throw a little Holy Wrath into the mix and you'll be reaching for the mana potion injector more often than House pops a Vicodin. And with less panache.

Somewhat mitigating this is the new Glyph of Seal of Command, which restores 8% of base mana on Judgement. The opportunity cost of this Glyph is high as it replaces one of your three Major's, probably GoJudgment.

Incidentally, '75% Mana Cost Reduction For All Damaging Seals' would make a great idea for a Minor Glyph.

Talent Points. - By choosing to take SoC you by necessity spend a talent point that could be spent on utility such as Vindication, which incidentally works great in AoE situations as it procs from Divine Storm. If you have taken neither Divine Sacrifice nor Imp. LoH the trade-off is trivial, but with either of these powerful cooldowns some hard decisions need to be made.

Main Target Damage - Taking either option will greatly reduce DPS on your main target, if one exists. If DPS on a single, static target is essential then Seal swapping is unnecessay - rely on your raid members with greater AoE capability to do the job and stay in the role that you do best: single target AoE.

Conclusion

Seal Switching will only be an option in a few boss fights, but could have a significant impact if certain variables are in place. Your default position on any given encounter should always be one of running Seal of Vengeance but stay mindful of these tools in your arsenal. Given that Seal of Command requires a talent point invested and has limited range Righteousness is the Seal that I would favour. Your mileage may vary.

If you're fighting trash, go crazy ;).

As a more general point, the idea of Seal switching presents a good opportunity for Blizzard to tailor Seals to different encounter types and introduce another test of skill to differentiate relatively good Ret Paladins from bad ones. That said, it requires quite a lot of development time invested into finding and balancing a niche for each of the damaging Seals. At the very least, Command and Righteousness need to be more distinct than they are.


EDITING NOTE: Seal of Corruption is the Horde version of Seal of Vengeance, and it procs the Blood Corruption debuff. In all ways the two Seals are functionally identical.

Paper Over the Cracks: Glyph Choices for Ret In 3.2.

With 3.2 due out in early August and some stability in class mechanics over the last few builds it's time to start nailing down the impact of 3.2 on gear and playstyle. This is the second part of a 3.2 Retribution Paladin Primer.

Major Glyph Mainstays - The New Seal of Vengeance Glyph

Things have changed in 3.2: no more Seal of Blood. Nope, you don't have it any more, no use crying over it. But wait, all is not lost. The replacement is much better and it's called Seal of Vengeance - a direct damage proc and awesome DoT? Yes please!

We're here to discuss Glyphs though, not Seals, and the new SoV gives you one extra option, the imaginatively titled 'Glyph of Seal of Vengeance'. But what's lacking in naming pizazz misses little in power as it still gives you a whole 10 Expertise. Not 10 Rating, 10 Expertise. That's -2.5% chance for the boss to dodge or parry your attacks.



But lets not get carried away. For one Expertise is a capped stat, any more than 26 (214 rating) is totally wasted and so the effectiveness the Glyph is directly limited by your gear, perversely having the potential to get worse as your gear improves. For another, there are also three other totally serviceable glyphs on offer which provide a meaningful DPS boost. A quick reminder:

Glyph of Judgement - The workhorse of any Ret Glyph selection, it generates 10% more Judgement damage.

Glyph of Consecration - CD Conflict Resolution and greater Mana Efficiency, there's nothing not to like about this Glyph. Except the name, it really should be called 'Glyph of Double D', a truer reflection of how awesome it is.

Glyph of Exorcism - 20% more damage on your Exorcism... Good, but is it good enough?

It turns out that Exorcism's Glyph is kinda like your Prom Date: not your first choice, nor your second, but just attractive enough if you squint at them in a crosswind. And unfortunately, like all horse-faced rejects of the goblin race they've been upstaged by the new girl on the block.

The SoV Glyph isn't quite as good as Judgement or Consecration from a DPS POV, but works well enough all the same and is better than Exorcism's. However best in slot gear may cap Expertise, in which case it's time to turn back to old cross-eyed Mary and be thankful that she's not as picky as you.

For reference, the 131.16 Expertise Rating is the cap for Ret when Glyph of SoV being used.

The Wildcard - Holy Wrath

Good-bye GoSoB, hello Glyph of Holy Wrath. This new addition in 3.2 reduces Holy Wrath's cooldown from 30 seconds to 15 seconds. That's a 15 sec cooldown 10 yrd AoE with 3 sec stun, but only usable against Demons and Undead, which at 20% base mana goes through your mana pool faster than I scoff a packet of Jaffa Cakes. It's hard to imagine an encounter where this would be useful (*cough*Crusader's Coliseum*cough*) but even in optimal conditions the trade-off is high. When your Raid Leader suggests it, which they will, sic your Mechanical Yeti on 'em.

Mechanic Yeti - Strong Against Raid Leaders

Minor Glyphs

Nothing has changed in this score. Nothing. You'll still be using exactly the same ones you've used in the past 6 months of the game. That means Glyph of Sense Undead, Glyph of Lay on Hands, and Glyph of It Doesn't Really Matter, Probably BoMight, The Minor Glyph Concept Sucks Anyway.

So there you have it, distilled down into simplest terms:

PvE Major Glyphs:
1) Consecration
2) Judgement
3)i) Seal of Vengeance until near Expertise Cap, then
ii) Exorcism

Minor Gyphs:
1) Sense Undead
2) Lay On Hands
3) Might


PvP will of course always be a more idiosyncratic choice tuned to your play style. Glyphs of Salvation and HoJ enter the equation, but I pretty much suck at PvP so make up your own mind. ;)

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Baring any unforseen changes, equipement will be the topic of the next part of this 3.2 Ret Primer. I'm now off to enjoy a jaffa cake. Or 20.

The More Things Stay The Same - Ret Changes For 3.2 Distilled

With 3.2 due out in early August and some stability in class mechanics over the last few builds it's time to start nailing down the impact of 3.2 on gear and playstyle. This is the first part of a 3.2 Retribution Paladin Primer.

Ah, so much to say, so much room to say it in. 3.2 is close at hand and we all need to get a grip on the latest class alterations in the new patch. Having had a few weeks to ruminate and cogitate on the ins and outs of 3.2 here is my take on Talents, Seals and Retributions' DPS Rotation, such as it is.

1. Base PvE Talent Build

It would be easy to drone on and on and on about the talents to take, but come on guys this isn't rocket science. There's still only 59 talents which increase your DPS, and taking all the essentials (including JotW) only requires an investment of 62.

Baring a few points shaved here and there this is the cookie cutter talent build most Ret Paladins will be working from in 3.2:

5/5/52 + 9

The only change from the 3.1 cookie cutter build is 5 points spent in Seals of the Pure. Currently, SotP accounts for a little more than 5% increase in DPS as it increases the damage of the DoT, Judgement and Seal Proc of SoV by the listed 15%. Where you place those final 9 points will largely be up to you and your raid composition. Divine Sacrifice is the strongest of all available talents because of the raid-wide mitigation it allows when activated in conjunction with Divine Shield. Other talent choices will largely depend on your raid line-up, with Imp. BoM and Vindication registering as the strongest contenders. I'll be taking a more detailed look at these utility talents in a later post.

2. Seals

Seal of Vengeance/Corruption will be the Seal of choice in the vast, vast majority of cases. The DPS output of this Seal is significantly higher than any alternative, and four seconds to accumulate the 5-high stack requirement for its' direct damage proc isn't a hardship.

The jury is currently out on which of the other two Seals represent the best DPS in the blessedly rarely situations where SoV isn't optimal. Command has a much stronger melee proc whilst Righteousness deals painfully more damage on Judgement. Against AoE Instance Trash Command just about has an edge because of procs from Divine Storm, but otherwise Righteousness /w 5/5 SotP is so close to the damage output of Command that the additional talent point spent becomes somewhat unnecessary. If you're pressured into raid-utility talents ditching Command may be necessary, even if you have to hold your nose and sometimes run with Righteousness.

PTR testing currently puts SoV DPS output at ~25% of total, which may well be looked at closely as finer balancing takes place towards the end of the testing cycle. JoV also hits very, very hard (pre-nerf JoB hard) with AP trinket/libram procs and 5-stack Holy Vengeance, and that may well be dialed down because of PvP and the fact that JoV also procs the Seal.

3. FCFS Priority Rotation, or 'Hulk Mash Buttons!'

You'd be forgiven for assuming that Crusader Strike cooldown reduction and the 'Art of Exorcism' effect had changed our FCFS priority system for DPS. In reality it simply constitutes an increase of 1 GCD spent per 12 seconds and therefore a bit more key pounding but not much more thought required. DPS is generally higher than the 3.1 baseline, but making use of utility skills such as Sacred Shield come at a commensurate DPS loss.

More GCD's used means that the conflict resolution priority each skill has is more important than in earlier patch cycles. A skills position of priority within the sequence isn't down to a simple analysis of damage per cast or stand-alone DPS, a more rigorous methodology to assess the relative DPS cost of using one ability in preference to another is required.

If I prioritise Divine Storm over Judgement once every 40 seconds Divine Storm has an effective cooldown of 10 secs and Judgement 8.3 seconds. If I prioritise Judgement over Divine Storm once every 40 seconds Divine Storm has an effective cooldown of 10.375 secs and Judgement 8 seconds. If Judgement does J damage per cast and DS D damge per cast, which is greater: (J/8.3) + (D/10) or (J/8) + (D/10.375).

Of course, there are a number of potential permutations to go through with the possibility that each priority can affect another skills position in the priority listing. With that said, the following is a good rule of thumb:

Hammer of Wrath > Crusader Strike > Judgement > Divine Storm > Consecration > Exorcism

which of course is conditional on mob health and mobility. You'll crit often enough for Exorcism to always be instant cast unless you have a really terrible crit rate, so nothing has changed on that regard.

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Glyphs will be the next topic in this 3.2 Ret Primer.

Patch 3.0.9... Heh.

Well, that's interesting. MMO-Champion are reporting that there's a new patch due this week, 3.0.9. Boubouille has already extracted the Spell, Talent and Glyph info and they amount to quite a few for most classes. Old time players will laugh at at least one Paladin change ;). See the following link for the full changelog.

MMO-Champion - Patch 3.0.9 on live servers this week.

Here are the extent of the documentable Paladin changes (i.e. those that have been datamined or are in the patch notes):

* The duration on all Seals has been increased to 30 minutes and can no longer dispelled.
* Divine Plea: The amount healed by your spells is reduced by 50% (up from 20%) but the effect can no longer be dispelled.
* Sanctified Seals: This talent no longer affects dispel resistance, but continues to affect crit chance.


Glyphs

* Glyph of Holy Light -- Your Holy Light grants 10% of its heal amount to up to 5 friendly targets within 8 yards of the initial target. (Down from 20 yards, Tooltip text fix, was already hotfixed to 8 yards in game)
* Glyph of Seal of Righteousness -- Increases the damage done by Seal of Righteousness by 10%. (Old - Reduces the cost of your Judgement spells by 10% while Seal of Righteousness is active.) (Source)

30 minute undispellable Seals... you have no idea how long people have been asking for this. Ironically it's something of a PvP nerf for Ret due to the 3/3 Stoicism 2/3 Sanctified Seals setup, but a pretty big buff to Holy and Prot. Sanctified has obviously had its Seal undispellability component removed, and I'd expect Sanctified Seals to gain a further change in 3.1. In 3.0.9 it will be just another '1 talent point for 1 crit', pretty uninspired and a clone of Conviction. Exactly what we will see remains to be, well, seen.

The Divine Plea -50% healing change is in, but the effect is no longer dispellable. This is pretty big balance-wise for PvP and PvE, but in PvP you will now have 100% control over when to pop it and when to get rid of it (via a /cancelaura macro). A Priest or Shaman purging your DP is no longer an issue.

Finally the Glyph of SoR gives a flat damage increase to SoR. The guys at EJ are probably going to go over this one with a fine tooth comb, but right now it's a buff for Holy Soloing and some tanking situations, though Prot would probably prefer to use Seal of Vengeance and hence the SoV Glyph which gives 10 Expertise.

So, quite a few significant changes in this minor patch. We may well get it tomorrow/Wednesday, or it may spend some time on the PTR first. The reaction, especially from Mages and Rogues, should be fun.

WoW Patch 2.4.3 Now On Live Servers.

After what seems like the longest testing period for a mini-patch in WoW history, 2.4.3 has just been released on the Live servers in the US and hence is scheduled for release in the Europe Region tonight. Check out this news post on MMO-Champion for the full list of official and unofficial patch changes, and patch notes should be up on the Official Site soon. While there are quite a few gameplay and levelling changes, only one patch change known significantly affects Paladins as I mentioned last month:

* Dispel effects will no longer attempt to remove effects that have 100% dispel resistance.

PvP Ret Paladins should take careful note of this. It means that Sanctified Seals 100% Resistance may be counter-productive when encountering Dispell-heavy match-ups. The mooted proposition of 20/41, taking 2/2 Stoicism and 2/3 Sanc Seals, gaining 1 talent point and losing 1 crit for 96% effective Dispell resistance on the Seal - and hence the Dispell mechanic not avoiding Seals and going straight to Blessings/ImpRF, looks like the best bet if it wasn't already.

So, have fun. I'm now off to power-level my Shaman to 30 ;).

EDIT: I am sorely disappointed that my idea of Grifta selling 16 slot 'Gigantik' Bags for 50g wasn't taken up by Blizzard. Oh well, can't have everything I guess...


... stop sniggering in the back!

More 2.4.3 Links:

Patch 2.4.3 - End of Raid Herpes by Zanderfin
A Healing Druid's take on 2.4.3 at Resto4Life
WoW Insider's run-down of prominent Patch Changes
Patch 2.4.3 And You by Josh at E4AE.

DPS, Tanking and UI's - A Reflection on the Week.

Well, having been back playing WoW for a week now I thought I'd share my thoughts on the current state of play:

My Paladin, Jana (apologies for the Welfare Epics), can comfortably perform well enough in a DPS role for Heroics. I've still got to re-learn encounters, especially particular Heroic encounters, but I'm happy that I won't be letting the group down by taking her over my Warlock.

Tanking is still fun in the gear I've collected. I've done a couple of normal lvl70 instance runs now and it's all pretty straightforward. Mana can be something of an issue, but that may be only because of outgearing the instance somewhat. Learning to be a little more frugal may be a good idea. Next stop, better avoidance gear and HP's and then Heroics / Raid Off-tanking

I love Windfury. It can have my grotesque human-totem hybrid babies.

Jana can do well enough in 10-man raids, but I still have a lot to (re-)learn...

What do I have to learn? Well, the most obvious part is the Karazhan encounters from the perspective of a melee character: keeping in the right position behind the target, getting out of range on timed AoE or area effect damaging debuffs etc. Also getting the hang of CC and using the /focus commands would be pretty handy too (yeah, we had 2 priests and no hunters on Moroes, gogo Turn Evil...). But above all what I find most difficult, and probably what separates (proverbially) the men from the boys is dealing with all the information you have coming in at any one time.

At any given time a newish player in a raid may need to make upwards of a dozen concious decisions in some short number of seconds. Those who have been raiding for some time make these decisions automatically and without thinking about it - hear the raid warning, do your special thing, get back to the fold - all the while keeping careful note of swing timers, cooldowns, and their general given roles (DPS/Tanking/Healing etc). It's this, and not the gear gap, which I think is the most significant hurdle to progressing from small group encounters to raids.

So in an effort to improve my performance I'm making a concerted effort to get to grips with custom UI's, boss mods, macro's and the like so as to streamline my decision-making processes. Just downloading and installing the mods isn't enough, you need to understand the numerous visual and auditory clues those mods provide. If a warning isn't necessary on an encounter for your role turn the damn thing off, if it's critical make sure you'll notice when you get the warning.

Now seems like a good time to put in a couple of handy blog links. So I will:

Josh over at Eye For An Eye's take on UI Mods.
Siha at Banana Shoulders, for a Holy Paladin's Take on UI's.

The UI mods available are a great addition to WoW in all areas of the game. Similarly simple action automation is a boon - it's amazing how much effort a weapon-switch or Judge+Reseal macro saves. Players need to be careful though that all the information they get on screen doesn't lead to information overload. Easing your way in, starting with non-standard Unit Frames, ActionBars and Boss Mods and then slowly working your way up towards more complex and information-rich mods such as swing timers and cooldown trackers is probably more sensible than looking at the various sites around and grabbing everything they suggest. Blogs and other informative sites suggesting mods are long-time veterans of the game and hence are well used to all the information coming at them during your typical raid. You, if you are anything like me, won't be.

Paladins Are a Melee Class.

One of the most maddening misconceptions others can have of the Paladin Class is that they are not fundamentally a Melee-based Hybrid Class. The point they most often put forward is that Paladins are most often healers and that some Paladins (usually Shockadins) use ranged spells to do damage. But lets look at the evidence:

Paladins Use Mana

But mana is just a name for a fairly generic power system. What happens if we changed the colour, called it 'Faith' or 'Zeal' or 'Goldfish'? The name of the Power system, or indeed how it works, means very little.

Paladins are Healers

Paladins have all of 2 baseline low-cooldown healing spells, three with talents, that they may use as a matter of course in a given encounter. By comparison they have a huge number of non-healing skills and skills with affect both melee and healing. We don't call dispute that Hunters are a ranged class even though they have a wide range of Strikes at their disposal because the vast majority of the rest of their abilities, and talents, require range. Why do we do the reverse with Paladins?

Paladins have a Holy Tree

This is by far the most perplexing. Yes, we have a Holy Tree, but we also have two (count them, 2) Trees dedicated to performing a function in melee range. Shouldn't this indicate that melee is an integral part of the classes dynamics?

But but but, Shockadins

Yes, it's true, Shockadins do exist as an offensive spec. They take their name from Holy Shock, the 31pt Holy Talent, but unfortunately melee-based (Swing + SoR) damage still contributes more damage than any other source. Further, every source of damage from a Shockadin except for Holy Shock itself requires you to be within 10yards of the enemy. Whether you class an ability as a 'spell' (consecration) or 'skill' (thunderclap) it's the range which is important... Warriors aren't any less melee-oriented for having Thunderclap or Commanding Shout.

Paladins are Spellcasters

'Spellcaster' is a meaningless term, defined more by a predetermined assumption of what constitutes a spell or by the power system used by the class. For example, Repentence is a 'Spell' and yet Blind isn't, even though both work in a nearly identical way. Similarly the scaling of any ability has been arbitrary since Vanilla, for example see old Arcane Shot or multiple Paladin abilities which scale with a pick'n'mix of melee and spell stats. Those calling Paladins Spellcasters are in effect assigning their assumptions and preconceptions to the class rather than logically analysing the skills they have available and the roles those skills encourage.

That Paladins have been pigeon-holed into a Healing role (or before that, a spam-Cleanse role) does not make them less of a melee-oriented class from a design perspective, it simply means that chain-casting healing as a mechanic is too strong (or alternatively Paladin melee abilities aren't strong enough). The vast majority of interactive abilities which are available to a Paladin require melee range to be effective or are designed to keep Mobs in melee range, and so to consider Paladins to be anything other than a Melee class makes no sense. Additionally, I would argue that the most development time and effort should be made to draw them into melee range, not to make Paladin healing more viable in WotLK. Frankly, I'd count it a failure if at least 50% of raiding Paladins aren't engaging encounters in melee range, and even more of a failure if more Druids and Shaman were up front than Paladins.

There, not only are Paladins a melee class but I've laid out my argument for why Paladins should be considered (and redesigned if necessary) as such in Wrath when creating new Skills, extending the talent trees, and creating concepts for where Paladins should be in 5-man, 10-man and 25-man encounters. Don't like it? Well perhaps you should have been playing one of the ranged-hybrids to begin with, there are plenty to choose from.

Paladins and Mana.

Josh over at Eye for an Eye and Klepsacovic at Troll Racials have both made posts in the last couple of weeks about Paladins and the limitations of mana as a combat 'power' mechanic for the class. They're both well worth reading, and with any luck will be a quality retrospective view of the 'bad old days of TBC' in a years time when we are all playing Wrath. I posted my response on E4aE, but here it is for my own blog:

This issue isn't unique to Ret Paladins, Holy Paladins also suffer from the exact same issue and is a reason why many stack Mp5 over Spell Crit (the other being that it is cheaper budget-wise). To a lesser extent so do so Hunters, and whilst I can't recall if AotV mana regen is hugely significant (i.e. beyond that of BoW), I do know that it is a great concern for them. On the flip-side, JoW roxors their soxors, but the comparisons for 10-man and 5-man encounters still hold.

This of course really comes out of Mana being a broken mechanic for Melee, in fact it's tacitly acknowledged by Blizzard in that DK's have a unique power mechanic and Prot Paladin's mana pool has been fudged into a pseudo-rage pool which can still be mana-burnt. Shaman were pretty much always casters, and Enhancement was thrown a huge amount of scaling mana-regen in the form of Shamanistic Rage to compensate. It's only now, with active damage abilities that we're all starting to clue up on how important mana is for a DPSing Paladin.

On a similar note, Mana Burn is an immense problem which needs addressing, and I feel that they need some form of protection from that mechanic, both for PvE and PvP. But... I don't think they are going to change it. In many ways they will probably utilise it to reinforce the concept of DK's being the premier anti-caster tank.

The problem is, I just don't know what Blizzard would be willing to do about this state of affairs. I have the feeling that they want Paladin mana starvation to be downside for the class as a whole (similar to lack of armour, waiting for energy or... erm... what's the downside to rage again?), meaning that we will continue to have to synergise well with other classes in order to fight for over 5 minutes. This is all very well and good in raids, but absolute balls for 10-mans where arguably a Ret Paladin is weakest. If they were to boost our personal mana regen it would probably be through a significant buff to SoW, to the extent that it procs on every hit and regens 5% of total mana per hit. There are many more interesting ways to boost Paladin Regen for both Holy and Ret, but Blizzard have painted themselves into a corner in limiting the mechanics available to Paladins to such an extent that I just don't see them doing it in a way which doesn't compromise their damage or healing to a non-negligible extent.