08-13-2007, 10:06 AM
I have a little baby paladin who I plan to raise to be a 5-man tank (normal and heroic). I have pretty much no aspirations to going on raids with him, though I suppose if he did go he could at least offtank something. So with that in mind I've been considering talents and what build to go with. Several options seemed interesting to me so I thought I'd go over them. First I'll go over the talents individually that I think could be useful to consider and then I'll go into specific builds.
Protection Talents
Redoubt: Damaging melee and ranged attacks against you have a 10% chance to increase your chance to block by 6%/12%/18%/24%/30%. Lasts 10 sec or 5 blocks.
Pretty clearly a tanking talent. I've heard it can be less useful when you have good gear and holy shield, but I figure its still better than imp devotion aura.
Toughness: Increases your armor value from items by 2%/4%/6%/8%/10%.
Pretty standard tanking talent and good to climb the tree with anyway.
Precision: Increases your chance to hit with melee weapons by 1%/2%/3%
I hear +hit is hard to come by on tanking gear so this could be good. I figure a pally tank gets most of his threat from holy damage though so its not as good as it seems. Still, seals proc on hits that connect and so +hit does help them and so is still good.
Anticipation: Increases your Defense skill by 4/8/12/16/20.
A solid tanking talent. The issue is that you can probably cap your +defense with items and so the points could be put to better use in other places. If you are having trouble capping your +defense though, this can help.
Shield Specialization: Increases the amount of damage absorbed by your shield by 10%/20%/30%.
Paladins block alot and so a shield absorbing more should be a good thing.
Improved Righteous Fury: While Righteous Fury is active, all damage taken is reduced by 2%/4/%6% and increases the amount of threat generated by your Righteous Fury spell by 16%/33%/50%.
Less damage + more threat. Pretty much a perfect talent for a tank.
Blessing of Kings: Places a Blessing on the friendly target, increasing total stats by 10% for 5 min. Players may only have one Blessing on them per Paladin at any one time
I figure this isn't really going to be used that much, but if you don't need anticipation then one might as well pick this up.
Blessing of Sanctuary: Places a Blessing on the friendly target, reducing damage dealt from all sources by up to 80 for 5 min. In addition, when the target blocks a melee attack the attacker will take 46 Holy damage. Players may only have one Blessing on them per Paladin at any one time.
I figure this is the pally tanking blessing. It reduces damage some while adding damage and threat.
Reckoning: Gives you a 2%/4%/6%/8%/10% chance after being hit by any damaging attack that the next 4 weapon swings within 8 sec will generate an additional attack.
More swings = more seal procs = more damage and threat
Spell Warding: All spell damage taken is reduced by 4%.
Spells cut through armor and this helps stop the pain some.
Sacred Duty: Increases your total Stamina by 3%/6%, reduces the cooldown of your Divine Shield spell by 60 sec and reduces the attack speed penalty by 50%/100%.
I figure the extra stamina is the main reason to take this.
One-Handed Weapon Specialization: Increases all damage you deal when a one-handed melee weapon is equipped by 1%/2%/3%/4%/5%.
Usually I would consider this a good talent, but I'm thinking that a tanking paladin probably uses a low damage weapon that has +spell damage on it. If thats the case then increasing the melee damage may not be as useful as it would normally be.
Holy Shield: Increases chance to block by 30% for 10 sec and deals 155 Holy damage for each attack blocked while active. Damage caused by Holy Shield causes 35% additional threat. Each block expends a charge. 4 charges.
key paladin tanking ability. More blocks, more damage, more threat.
Improved Holy Shield: Increases damage caused by your Holy Shield by 10%/20% and increases the number of charges of your Holy Shield by 2/4.
More damage=more threat and more charges means it can be kept up easier.
Ardent Defender: When you have less than 35% health, all damage taken is reduced by 6%/12%/18%/24%/30%.
Could potentially save you if the healers get behind. Its a "things are going wrong" ability though which means that it could also not matter at all. It all depends on if you end up dead without it or not.
Weapon Expertise: Increases your weapon skill with all weapons by 2/4/6/8/10.
Everybody seems to say that weapon skill sucks right now. I don't know if I should believe them or not. Especially when the choice may be between points in this and points in 1H Spec with a low dps weapon. This might add at least some +hit which I've already discusses as being useful for seals.
Avenger's Shield: 1 sec cast/30 sec cooldown/30 yard range
Hurls a holy shield at the enemy, dealing 494 to 602 Holy damage, Dazing them and then jumping to additional nearby enemies. Affects 3 total targets. Lasts 6 sec.
With the 1 second cast this can't really be used in combat. Its a range pulling option that establishes initial multi-target threat though.
Holy Talents
Improved Seal of Righteousness: Increases the damage done by your Seal of Righteousness and Judgement of Righteousness by 3%/6%/9%/12%/15%.
This seal is probably used alot by a tanking pally and so increasing its damage is a good thing. Its tier 2 though and so requires taking a talent below it. The talents below are less useful, but not bad
Retribution Talents
Benediction: Reduces the Mana cost of your Judgement and Seal spells by 3%/6%/9%/12%/15%.
A tanking pally probably judges and casts seals alot. Less mana cost means the pally can hold threat longer.
Improved Judgement: Decreases the cooldown of your Judgement spell by 1/2 sec.
Judging more often means more threat = a good thing. It does use more mana though.
Improved Seal of the Crusader: Increases the melee attack power bonus of your Seal of the Crusader and the Holy damage increase of your Judgement of the Crusader by 5%/10%/15%.
Crusader is probably a good initial judge seal for the holy damage increase. So improving it might not be a bad deal.
Deflection: Increases your Parry chance by 1%/2%/3%/4%/5%.
It would help you push crushing blows off the table. Less important in 5-mans, but not a bad thing to do anyway.
Vindication: Gives the Paladin's damaging melee attacks a chance to reduce the target's Strength and Agility by 5%/10%/15% for 10 sec.
I don't know how often it procs and so its hard to judge how useful it is. It also is single target and so not as useful for multi-mob tanking. It is still a way of limiting incoming damage though and could be especially useful on boss fights where you are mainly focusing on one mob.
Eye for an Eye:All spell criticals against you cause 15%/30% of the damage taken to the caster as well. The damage caused by Eye for an Eye will not exceed 50% of the Paladin's total health.
It could be helpful for holding ranged caster adds. They shoot you, they get damaged returned, you gain threat on them.
Improved Retribution Aura: Increases the damage done by your Retribution Aura by 25%/50%.
In most cases I'm thinking devotion aura won't really be needed and so retribution could be the main aura. The damage from it should help hold any adds that are hitting you. So increasing that damage may not be a bad thing.
Sanctity Aura:
Increases Holy damage done by party members within 30 yards by 10%. Players may only have one Aura on them per Paladin at any one time.
I'm curious if this could be better than retribution aura. it would increase the damage done by consecrate on multi-mob pulls and it would increase your single target threat by increasing the damage of your seals and judgements. I've not done the math though to know in what cases it would be better and in what cases it would be worse. It could be somewhere you use retribution on trash and sanctity on bosses. I just don't know, but its interesting anyway.
Improved Sanctity Aura: The amount of damage caused by targets affected by Sanctity Aura is increased by 1%/2%.
2% to all damage the party does isn't a bad thing. It increases your damage/threat as well as your party's damage.
Sanctified Judgement: Gives your Judgement spell a 33%/66%/100% chance to return 50% of the mana cost of the judged seal.
I'm assuming a pally tanks seals and judges alot and so getting mana back would increase how long he could keep doing such. The question is: do fights last long enough to warrent it?
So I figure those are the interesting tanking talents that I'll be using in the builds below. Lets move right along to those builds. I see two basic paths to choose from here: 41 in protection and 33 in Protection.
41 in Protection
Redoubt Rank 5
Toughness Rank 5
Precision Rank 3
Shield Specialization Rank 3
Blessing of Kings Rank 1
Improved Righteous Fury Rank 3
Reckoning Rank 5
Blessing of Sanctuary Rank 1
Spell Warding Rank 2
Sacred Duty Rank 2
Holy Shield Rank 1
Improved Holy Shield Rank 2
Ardent Defender Rank 5
Weapon Expertise Rank 2
Avenger's Shield Rank 1
There is a choice of 2 points in Expertise, 1H Spec, or some other talent, but otherwise it seems pretty straight forward to me. The other trees are questions though.
10/41/10: http://www.worldofwarcraft.com/info/classe...000000000000000
10 Holy
Divine Intellect Rank 5
Improved Seal of Righteousness Rank 5
10 Retribution
Benediction Rank 5
Improved Seal of the Crusader Rank 3
Improved Judgement Rank 2
Thats one way a paladin could go. It assumes you judge Crusader on a mob then cast Righteousness and judge/recast as cooldowns allow. Both seals get improved in damage and cost and judgement gets its cooldown lowered.
0/41/20: http://www.worldofwarcraft.com/info/classe...002200000000000
20 Retribution
Benediction Rank 5
Deflection Rank 3
Improved Seal of the Crusader Rank 3
Improved Judgement Rank 2
Vindication Rank 3
Eye for an Eye Rank 2
Improved Retribution Aura Rank 2
This path assumes the same basic attack pattern, but doesn't bother to improve Righteousness. Instead it improves Retribution aura, grabs Vindication and Eye for an Eye, and picks up a little parry as well.
Which of these builds is better though? It seems like the first one would do better on single targets with improved Righteousness, but the second would do better on multi-target fights with Improved Retribution Aura and Eye for an Eye. The second one does gain some single target help from Eye for an Eye and Vindication though. So maybe the second one is more well rounded. If the first one can hold the extra mobs though, then I'm not sure it needs the added multi-target help and so might be better. I really don't know which route is better.
33 in Protection
Redoubt Rank 5
Toughness Rank 5
Precision Rank 3
Shield Specialization Rank 3
Blessing of Kings Rank 1
Improved Righteous Fury Rank 3
Reckoning Rank 5
Blessing of Sanctuary Rank 1
Spell Warding Rank 2
Sacred Duty Rank 2
Holy Shield Rank 1
Improved Holy Shield Rank 2
You lose Ardent Defender and Avenger's Shield mainly. I'm not sold on Ardent Defender being required. Sure its nice to have and can maybe save the day sometimes, but I'd like to think that one wouldn't get in those positions in the first place. Things do go wrong though. The loss of Avenger's Shield makes pulling tougher and initial threat more of an issue, but I'm a blood elf and so mana tap helps some with pulling and hopefully initial threat will be fine anyway. So then the other trees become:
10/33/18: http://www.worldofwarcraft.com/info/classe...001200000000000
10 Holy
Divine Intellect Rank 5
Improved Seal of Righteousness Rank 5
18 Retribution
Benediction Rank 5
Improved Judgement Rank 2
Improved Seal of the Crusader Rank 3
Deflection Rank 2
Vindication Rank 3
Improved Retribution Aura Rank 2
Eye for an Eye Rank 1
So VS the split tree 41 build you lose Ardent Defender and Avenger's Shield, but gain Vindication, Imp Retribution Aura, some parry, and 1 rank of Eye for an Eye. I'm not sure if this one is worth it or not. It greatly depends on how useful the two talents that are being given up are and I've not had access to them yet to really have a clue.
33/28: http://www.worldofwarcraft.com/info/classe...002200120300000
28 Retribution
Benediction Rank 5
Improved Judgement Rank 2
Improved Seal of the Crusader Rank 3
Deflection Rank 5
Vindication Rank 3
Improved Retribution Aura Rank 2
Eye for an Eye Rank 2
Sanctity Aura Rank 1
Improved Sanctity Aura Rank 2
Sanctified Judgement Rank 3
This one I find especially interesting. Thats not to say I think its better (I have no clue), but just that some of the options are interesting. It gains Sanctity Aura and its improvement while maintaining Improved Retribution Aura. So a pally could switch back and forth depending on the makeup of the pull. This could be entirely pointless though as one of the auras could just beat the other in all situations. I don't know enough to judge that though. The build also gains Sanctified Judgement which is the big bonus of only going 33 in protection. Since I'm assuming that a pally tank would be judging everytime the cooldown is up, getting mana back from each judge could extent how long the pally can maintain threat by quite a bit. Is it necessary though? I really don't know. It could be that a pally can last long enough anyway and so 41 in prot is better.
Anyway, those are the builds I'm toying with. Like I said at the start, my pally is only a baby. This means my actual paladin experience is very limited and thus I'm working completely theoretically. So some advice from people with actually experience would be a great help as would just general thoughts and comments.
I suppose I should also say that I am aware that there is a holy/protection build as well. I have a 70 priest already and thus I'm deliberately choosing not to give the pally any healing option. Basically I have a dps class and a healing class so the paladin is going to be my tanking class. Its all he is aiming for.
Protection Talents
Redoubt: Damaging melee and ranged attacks against you have a 10% chance to increase your chance to block by 6%/12%/18%/24%/30%. Lasts 10 sec or 5 blocks.
Pretty clearly a tanking talent. I've heard it can be less useful when you have good gear and holy shield, but I figure its still better than imp devotion aura.
Toughness: Increases your armor value from items by 2%/4%/6%/8%/10%.
Pretty standard tanking talent and good to climb the tree with anyway.
Precision: Increases your chance to hit with melee weapons by 1%/2%/3%
I hear +hit is hard to come by on tanking gear so this could be good. I figure a pally tank gets most of his threat from holy damage though so its not as good as it seems. Still, seals proc on hits that connect and so +hit does help them and so is still good.
Anticipation: Increases your Defense skill by 4/8/12/16/20.
A solid tanking talent. The issue is that you can probably cap your +defense with items and so the points could be put to better use in other places. If you are having trouble capping your +defense though, this can help.
Shield Specialization: Increases the amount of damage absorbed by your shield by 10%/20%/30%.
Paladins block alot and so a shield absorbing more should be a good thing.
Improved Righteous Fury: While Righteous Fury is active, all damage taken is reduced by 2%/4/%6% and increases the amount of threat generated by your Righteous Fury spell by 16%/33%/50%.
Less damage + more threat. Pretty much a perfect talent for a tank.
Blessing of Kings: Places a Blessing on the friendly target, increasing total stats by 10% for 5 min. Players may only have one Blessing on them per Paladin at any one time
I figure this isn't really going to be used that much, but if you don't need anticipation then one might as well pick this up.
Blessing of Sanctuary: Places a Blessing on the friendly target, reducing damage dealt from all sources by up to 80 for 5 min. In addition, when the target blocks a melee attack the attacker will take 46 Holy damage. Players may only have one Blessing on them per Paladin at any one time.
I figure this is the pally tanking blessing. It reduces damage some while adding damage and threat.
Reckoning: Gives you a 2%/4%/6%/8%/10% chance after being hit by any damaging attack that the next 4 weapon swings within 8 sec will generate an additional attack.
More swings = more seal procs = more damage and threat
Spell Warding: All spell damage taken is reduced by 4%.
Spells cut through armor and this helps stop the pain some.
Sacred Duty: Increases your total Stamina by 3%/6%, reduces the cooldown of your Divine Shield spell by 60 sec and reduces the attack speed penalty by 50%/100%.
I figure the extra stamina is the main reason to take this.
One-Handed Weapon Specialization: Increases all damage you deal when a one-handed melee weapon is equipped by 1%/2%/3%/4%/5%.
Usually I would consider this a good talent, but I'm thinking that a tanking paladin probably uses a low damage weapon that has +spell damage on it. If thats the case then increasing the melee damage may not be as useful as it would normally be.
Holy Shield: Increases chance to block by 30% for 10 sec and deals 155 Holy damage for each attack blocked while active. Damage caused by Holy Shield causes 35% additional threat. Each block expends a charge. 4 charges.
key paladin tanking ability. More blocks, more damage, more threat.
Improved Holy Shield: Increases damage caused by your Holy Shield by 10%/20% and increases the number of charges of your Holy Shield by 2/4.
More damage=more threat and more charges means it can be kept up easier.
Ardent Defender: When you have less than 35% health, all damage taken is reduced by 6%/12%/18%/24%/30%.
Could potentially save you if the healers get behind. Its a "things are going wrong" ability though which means that it could also not matter at all. It all depends on if you end up dead without it or not.
Weapon Expertise: Increases your weapon skill with all weapons by 2/4/6/8/10.
Everybody seems to say that weapon skill sucks right now. I don't know if I should believe them or not. Especially when the choice may be between points in this and points in 1H Spec with a low dps weapon. This might add at least some +hit which I've already discusses as being useful for seals.
Avenger's Shield: 1 sec cast/30 sec cooldown/30 yard range
Hurls a holy shield at the enemy, dealing 494 to 602 Holy damage, Dazing them and then jumping to additional nearby enemies. Affects 3 total targets. Lasts 6 sec.
With the 1 second cast this can't really be used in combat. Its a range pulling option that establishes initial multi-target threat though.
Holy Talents
Improved Seal of Righteousness: Increases the damage done by your Seal of Righteousness and Judgement of Righteousness by 3%/6%/9%/12%/15%.
This seal is probably used alot by a tanking pally and so increasing its damage is a good thing. Its tier 2 though and so requires taking a talent below it. The talents below are less useful, but not bad
Retribution Talents
Benediction: Reduces the Mana cost of your Judgement and Seal spells by 3%/6%/9%/12%/15%.
A tanking pally probably judges and casts seals alot. Less mana cost means the pally can hold threat longer.
Improved Judgement: Decreases the cooldown of your Judgement spell by 1/2 sec.
Judging more often means more threat = a good thing. It does use more mana though.
Improved Seal of the Crusader: Increases the melee attack power bonus of your Seal of the Crusader and the Holy damage increase of your Judgement of the Crusader by 5%/10%/15%.
Crusader is probably a good initial judge seal for the holy damage increase. So improving it might not be a bad deal.
Deflection: Increases your Parry chance by 1%/2%/3%/4%/5%.
It would help you push crushing blows off the table. Less important in 5-mans, but not a bad thing to do anyway.
Vindication: Gives the Paladin's damaging melee attacks a chance to reduce the target's Strength and Agility by 5%/10%/15% for 10 sec.
I don't know how often it procs and so its hard to judge how useful it is. It also is single target and so not as useful for multi-mob tanking. It is still a way of limiting incoming damage though and could be especially useful on boss fights where you are mainly focusing on one mob.
Eye for an Eye:All spell criticals against you cause 15%/30% of the damage taken to the caster as well. The damage caused by Eye for an Eye will not exceed 50% of the Paladin's total health.
It could be helpful for holding ranged caster adds. They shoot you, they get damaged returned, you gain threat on them.
Improved Retribution Aura: Increases the damage done by your Retribution Aura by 25%/50%.
In most cases I'm thinking devotion aura won't really be needed and so retribution could be the main aura. The damage from it should help hold any adds that are hitting you. So increasing that damage may not be a bad thing.
Sanctity Aura:
Increases Holy damage done by party members within 30 yards by 10%. Players may only have one Aura on them per Paladin at any one time.
I'm curious if this could be better than retribution aura. it would increase the damage done by consecrate on multi-mob pulls and it would increase your single target threat by increasing the damage of your seals and judgements. I've not done the math though to know in what cases it would be better and in what cases it would be worse. It could be somewhere you use retribution on trash and sanctity on bosses. I just don't know, but its interesting anyway.
Improved Sanctity Aura: The amount of damage caused by targets affected by Sanctity Aura is increased by 1%/2%.
2% to all damage the party does isn't a bad thing. It increases your damage/threat as well as your party's damage.
Sanctified Judgement: Gives your Judgement spell a 33%/66%/100% chance to return 50% of the mana cost of the judged seal.
I'm assuming a pally tanks seals and judges alot and so getting mana back would increase how long he could keep doing such. The question is: do fights last long enough to warrent it?
So I figure those are the interesting tanking talents that I'll be using in the builds below. Lets move right along to those builds. I see two basic paths to choose from here: 41 in protection and 33 in Protection.
41 in Protection
Redoubt Rank 5
Toughness Rank 5
Precision Rank 3
Shield Specialization Rank 3
Blessing of Kings Rank 1
Improved Righteous Fury Rank 3
Reckoning Rank 5
Blessing of Sanctuary Rank 1
Spell Warding Rank 2
Sacred Duty Rank 2
Holy Shield Rank 1
Improved Holy Shield Rank 2
Ardent Defender Rank 5
Weapon Expertise Rank 2
Avenger's Shield Rank 1
There is a choice of 2 points in Expertise, 1H Spec, or some other talent, but otherwise it seems pretty straight forward to me. The other trees are questions though.
10/41/10: http://www.worldofwarcraft.com/info/classe...000000000000000
10 Holy
Divine Intellect Rank 5
Improved Seal of Righteousness Rank 5
10 Retribution
Benediction Rank 5
Improved Seal of the Crusader Rank 3
Improved Judgement Rank 2
Thats one way a paladin could go. It assumes you judge Crusader on a mob then cast Righteousness and judge/recast as cooldowns allow. Both seals get improved in damage and cost and judgement gets its cooldown lowered.
0/41/20: http://www.worldofwarcraft.com/info/classe...002200000000000
20 Retribution
Benediction Rank 5
Deflection Rank 3
Improved Seal of the Crusader Rank 3
Improved Judgement Rank 2
Vindication Rank 3
Eye for an Eye Rank 2
Improved Retribution Aura Rank 2
This path assumes the same basic attack pattern, but doesn't bother to improve Righteousness. Instead it improves Retribution aura, grabs Vindication and Eye for an Eye, and picks up a little parry as well.
Which of these builds is better though? It seems like the first one would do better on single targets with improved Righteousness, but the second would do better on multi-target fights with Improved Retribution Aura and Eye for an Eye. The second one does gain some single target help from Eye for an Eye and Vindication though. So maybe the second one is more well rounded. If the first one can hold the extra mobs though, then I'm not sure it needs the added multi-target help and so might be better. I really don't know which route is better.
33 in Protection
Redoubt Rank 5
Toughness Rank 5
Precision Rank 3
Shield Specialization Rank 3
Blessing of Kings Rank 1
Improved Righteous Fury Rank 3
Reckoning Rank 5
Blessing of Sanctuary Rank 1
Spell Warding Rank 2
Sacred Duty Rank 2
Holy Shield Rank 1
Improved Holy Shield Rank 2
You lose Ardent Defender and Avenger's Shield mainly. I'm not sold on Ardent Defender being required. Sure its nice to have and can maybe save the day sometimes, but I'd like to think that one wouldn't get in those positions in the first place. Things do go wrong though. The loss of Avenger's Shield makes pulling tougher and initial threat more of an issue, but I'm a blood elf and so mana tap helps some with pulling and hopefully initial threat will be fine anyway. So then the other trees become:
10/33/18: http://www.worldofwarcraft.com/info/classe...001200000000000
10 Holy
Divine Intellect Rank 5
Improved Seal of Righteousness Rank 5
18 Retribution
Benediction Rank 5
Improved Judgement Rank 2
Improved Seal of the Crusader Rank 3
Deflection Rank 2
Vindication Rank 3
Improved Retribution Aura Rank 2
Eye for an Eye Rank 1
So VS the split tree 41 build you lose Ardent Defender and Avenger's Shield, but gain Vindication, Imp Retribution Aura, some parry, and 1 rank of Eye for an Eye. I'm not sure if this one is worth it or not. It greatly depends on how useful the two talents that are being given up are and I've not had access to them yet to really have a clue.
33/28: http://www.worldofwarcraft.com/info/classe...002200120300000
28 Retribution
Benediction Rank 5
Improved Judgement Rank 2
Improved Seal of the Crusader Rank 3
Deflection Rank 5
Vindication Rank 3
Improved Retribution Aura Rank 2
Eye for an Eye Rank 2
Sanctity Aura Rank 1
Improved Sanctity Aura Rank 2
Sanctified Judgement Rank 3
This one I find especially interesting. Thats not to say I think its better (I have no clue), but just that some of the options are interesting. It gains Sanctity Aura and its improvement while maintaining Improved Retribution Aura. So a pally could switch back and forth depending on the makeup of the pull. This could be entirely pointless though as one of the auras could just beat the other in all situations. I don't know enough to judge that though. The build also gains Sanctified Judgement which is the big bonus of only going 33 in protection. Since I'm assuming that a pally tank would be judging everytime the cooldown is up, getting mana back from each judge could extent how long the pally can maintain threat by quite a bit. Is it necessary though? I really don't know. It could be that a pally can last long enough anyway and so 41 in prot is better.
Anyway, those are the builds I'm toying with. Like I said at the start, my pally is only a baby. This means my actual paladin experience is very limited and thus I'm working completely theoretically. So some advice from people with actually experience would be a great help as would just general thoughts and comments.
I suppose I should also say that I am aware that there is a holy/protection build as well. I have a 70 priest already and thus I'm deliberately choosing not to give the pally any healing option. Basically I have a dps class and a healing class so the paladin is going to be my tanking class. Its all he is aiming for.