Paladins and 1.9

[MongoJerry]

If you can get a group like that, if decursive still works, if. if. if. if. if.  Sorry Mongo but each time you throw another "if" on there just takes you one step away from this "real" pvp you always seem to harp on.  Everytime you bring up the power of the paladin you always fall back on a proof that happens in some overly-controlled situation.  nobodys arguing that in these types of situations paladins can't be powerful.  What we are saying is that these situations are not prelevant in, nor can be extrapolated to cover, "real" pvp, in any shape or form.

The times you are playing with a warrior is an extraordinary situation? Warriors are one of the most common classes in the game and nearly every battleground you enter will have at least one if not three or four. Pick one to be your partner and go with him or her. I do this with my priestess and it works very well -- until I, being a priest, die of course. A single paladin with a single warrior alone is a powerful two-person combination. Instead of an unusual situation, this is the situation you should *always* be in if you are a paladin. If you think that PvP is running around by yourself, then no wonder you're having problems in PvP.

Then, my further comment is that after you get used to the paladin-warrior combination, try the more advanced tactic of working with a fellow paladin. The paladin-paladin relationship takes more practice as it requires trust between the two partners (for example, trust that your teammate will dispell you so that you don't burn your trinket or shield). This may sound like a strange and unreasonable "if" statement to some, but I have this funny idea that Lurkers are social people who tend to hang out in guilds with other players. And I don't think it's a stretch to imagine a Lurker paladin whispering to a fellow guildie paladin to say, "Hey! Let's team up in some battlegrounds!" Once you get the paladin-paladin relationship right, then getting warriors to work with you is easy. Even pickup warriors will jump at the chance to be in a group where they'll get heals and dispells. However, again, I have this odd notion that Lurkers tend to hang out in guilds that have warriors in them, so it doesn't seem like a stretch to imagine that they could convince a couple of guildie warriors to go with them. But heck, if you really can't find any warriors to play with you, try partnering up with a rogue or two. Paladin-rogue combinations can be pretty good.

I consider "real PvP" to include situations where people are working together toward a common goal. In these situations, paladins are one of the most powerful -- to the point of being overpowered -- classes in the game. This is true no matter what battleground you're in or even in open field PvP. If you consider "real PvP" to only be those situations where no one in the battleground is listening to each other and where everyone is running off on their own, then it really doesn't matter what class you're playing, because you're going to lose. And, yeah, I suppose in those situations, I'd rather have shaman, since they're better solo fighters. But since you should be working together in groups, in "real PvP," the paladin is a dominatingly overpowered class.

Regarding Decursive, first, Decursive still works. Second, I played on a PvP server for eight months without it and managed to dispell my groups just fine. You have a full second of global cooldown after casting a spell during which to target the next person and then cast your next spell. Decursive makes things easy -- way too easy -- but I suspect that if it didn't exist, you'd adapt just as people who played before Decursive became popular did.

I wish I had the vaulted survivability attributed to my class so often. When Sharanna pvp's I find myself CC'd early if I pop out of it with a shield (don't have the trinket yet) then I find myself dying shortly thereafter due to focus fire. The ONLY time I've been able to stay alive for any length of time is when the horde is dumb enough to ignore me and let me heal someone else. 9 times out of 10 I am targetted for destruction before any other class. If I use my shield then to heal through it then I can count on being sheeped/seduced as soon as it wears off.

Tal, you definitely need to get that trinket, and since it's one of the first things you can get as a PvP reward, it's not a hard thing to get. Paladins who bubble the first moment they get sheeped do get laughed at on the Horde side, unless it's a desperate situation where it is actually important that they bubble. I suspect that the reason you don't see the survivability attributed to paladins is due to simple inexperience in PvP. All classes play differently in PvP than in PvE. I ended up rearranging my hotkey bars, when I realized that my original setup which was so good for PvE was not helping me at all in PvP. This is one reason why I was so saddened that so many Lurkers went to PvE servers rather than PvP servers, because I think people have missed out on experiencing a whole different side of their characters because of it. Yes, I know that you can PvP on PvE servers, but unless you're practicing your skills and learning PvP skills and tactics from others on a regular basis -- and playing against people who are passionate about PvP (who tend to congregate on PvP servers) -- , you're not really going to get to experience the richness of PvP in WoW.

One small tip I have for you is that you don't have to necessarily trinket or bubble out of the first sheep you get hit with. Let's take as an example (Note: This is an *example* to demonstrate the general principle. This is not the only case where this works) the situation where you are defending an AB flag with two other people. A party of five enemies comes at you and a mage immediately poly's you. If you trinket out of it immediately, the mage will just poly you again for eight seconds. If you bubble, you'll have wasted your valuable shield. However, there is a third choice: just sit there. Your teammates are at full health and probably are using whatever tricks they have to stay alive themselves and keep the enemy from tapping the flag while calling for reinforcements. They don't necessarily need you in those openning seconds. So, you can sit there and watch the action unfold and decide what's best to do.

Often the sheep will break early due either to your resistances or due to a careless attack by the enemy (a badly placed aoe attack, for example). But if not, at worst you'll be sitting there for 15 seconds, knowing full well that you can break your sheep at any time. If the situation requires you to break your sheep, then you can trinket out of it. By this time, the mage will likely be targeted on someone else, so you can probably get a spell or two off (maybe stun the mage!) before you get cc'd again. Then, if necessary, you can break that cc with your shield, heal a teammate if you can or toss an EZ-thro dynamite at the flag. Hopefully, by the time your shield wears off and by the time you've used all your other tricks to stay alive, reinforcements will arrive and/or have rezed up.

However, I sometimes find that I can go ahead and let the full 15 seconds go. Mind you, this is a little easier as a priest, since I can let a teammate's health drop pretty low, since I can shield instantly and use Flash Heal to heal in 1.5 seconds after I get out of my sheep. But, if I am able to do this, then I'm in a good position. If the mage then sheeps me a second time, I can just trinket out of it. If the mage sheeps me a third time, diminishing returns will have kicked in and it'll only last like three seconds.

[Frag]

I know this may seem like an obvious statement, but I've seen it glossed over and it bears being on a forum as opposed to our guildchats.

Paladins, by design mechanics and historical background information from Azeroth, are superior to warriors. Paladins, in lore, are warriors who have advanced beyond the skill of normal men through faith and devotion. They are fully trained knights who then are bestowed additional power from The Light ™.

Ergo, the Paladin is a fully functioning warrior, with the ability to shield himself and continue to damage his opponents, smite those who aren't of his PoV, and heal himself of any and all conditions (along with his teammates). As the "shock troop" for the Alliance, the paladin is supposed to embody everything his opponents DONT want to face on the other side of the field.

Needless to say, this doesn't translate into the game well unless you make Paladin a "Hero" class, let it's godlike status stay as is, and call it a day. Well, the devs didn't take that path...

So, what's the point? I don't think that Blizzard has ever had a clear, balanced approach to the Paladin Archtype, as it is inherently an unbalanced AT. It was never supposed to be balanced, and they have tried various ways to make the paladin a class on it's own with only the vaguest of concepts to follow while still trying to preserve said balance.

Shifting the talents around in a shuffle does feel to me like they're stalling, trying to keep people happy with the class without changing anything significant (perhaps it is because feel that they can't). A lot of the class changes came from playerbase for the rest of the classes that were evalutated. From what I've seen, ALL of the paladin talent/skill changes were directly from the boards, each one seems to be in direct response to the pacification of a complaint.

As it stands, as a former Fury warrior, I feel your pain, specifically, about your gear. It's very frustrating to have your class changed, for better or worse, and then have to go out and redo all of your phat lewts because of it.

Best of luck,
~Frag :huh:

[Tal]

Tal, you definitely need to get that trinket, and since it's one of the first things you can get as a PvP reward, it's not a hard thing to get.  Paladins who bubble the first moment they get sheeped do get laughed at on the Horde side, unless it's a desperate situation where it is actually important that they bubble.  I suspect that the reason you don't see the survivability attributed to paladins is due to simple inexperience in PvP.  All classes play differently in PvP than in PvE.  I ended up rearranging my hotkey bars, when I realized that my original setup which was so good for PvE was not helping me at all in PvP.  This is one reason why I was so saddened that so many Lurkers went to PvE servers rather than PvP servers, because I think people have missed out on experiencing a whole different side of their characters because of it.  Yes, I know that you can PvP on PvE servers, but unless you're practicing your skills and learning PvP skills and tactics from others on a regular basis -- and playing against people who are passionate about PvP (who tend to congregate on PvP servers) -- , you're not really going to get to experience the richness of PvP in WoW.[right][snapback]96631[/snapback][/right]

I'd love to get that trinket but between raiding two nights a week, putting together 5 mans on another night, working every thursday night and a family I have very little time left for PvP. The offtimes I can pvp I tend to sit in the queue for longer than I have time for.

One small tip I have for you is that you don't have to necessarily trinket or bubble out of the first sheep you get hit with.  Let's take as an example (Note: This is an *example* to demonstrate the general principle.  This is not the only case where this works) the situation where you are defending an AB flag with two other people.  A party of five enemies comes at you and a mage immediately poly's you.  If you trinket out of it immediately, the mage will just poly you again for eight seconds.  If you bubble, you'll have wasted your valuable shield.  However, there is a third choice: just sit there.  Your teammates are at full health and probably are using whatever tricks they have to stay alive themselves and keep the enemy from tapping the flag while calling for reinforcements.  They don't necessarily need you in those openning seconds.  So, you can sit there and watch the action unfold and decide what's best to do.

Often the sheep will break early due either to your resistances or due to a careless attack by the enemy (a badly placed aoe attack, for example).  But if not, at worst you'll be sitting there for 15 seconds, knowing full well that you can break your sheep at any time.  If the situation requires you to break your sheep, then you can trinket out of it.  By this time, the mage will likely be targeted on someone else, so you can probably get a spell or two off (maybe stun the mage!) before you get cc'd again.  Then, if necessary, you can break that cc with your shield, heal a teammate if you can or toss an EZ-thro dynamite at the flag.  Hopefully, by the time your shield wears off and by the time you've used all your other tricks to stay alive, reinforcements will arrive and/or have rezed up.

However, I sometimes find that I can go ahead and let the full 15 seconds go.  Mind you, this is a little easier as a priest, since I can let a teammate's health drop pretty low, since I can shield instantly and use Flash Heal to heal in 1.5 seconds after I get out of my sheep.  But, if I am able to do this, then I'm in a good position.  If the mage then sheeps me a second time, I can just trinket out of it.  If the mage sheeps me a third time, diminishing returns will have kicked in and it'll only last like three seconds.
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You assume of course that I would bubble or trinket out at the first opportunity. I try to wait as long as I can until I can either unsheep naturally or out when a teammate is in imminent danger of dying. The last couple of times in BG I've been teamed with a warlock, a rogue and a mage for defense. They tended to take a lot of focus fire damage while I was sheeped.

[Chesspiece_face]

You assume of course that I would bubble or trinket out at the first opportunity. I try to wait as long as I can until I can either unsheep naturally or out when a teammate is in imminent danger of dying. The last couple of times in BG I've been teamed with a warlock, a rogue and a mage for defense. They tended to take a lot of focus fire damage while I was sheeped.
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Monjo likes to assume a lot of stuff. and if things don't work out that way you must be doing something wrong.

getting back to MJ: If you read my posts you will notice I NEVER argue that the paladin is lacking these abilities you state. I'm fully aware of them and use them as often as possible. What i will say from my side of the fence, however, is the amount of times that i'm able to freely exploit these abilities isn't as often as you would make out.

my normal pvp group i run with is myself, a warrior, and a rogue. it was just me and the warrior untill we realized that i was getting counterspelled way too often and needed to bring in someone that could have more luck against the mages. And it all comes back to that. I can always tell if i'm not facing a group that is our level if my shield is on cooldown and i'm not getting counterspelled/kicked/etc. Paladins really have the ability to take a losing battle and turn it into a winning one, but it's on a 5 minute timer and the next 4-5 encounters you have after you use it up you're relying completely on luck or the ignorance of your opponents.

Sorry, but to use your own tact against you: if you are going up against paladins and 3-4 out of 5 times you aren't able to nullify their casting maybe you're doing something wrong.

[Brista]

my normal pvp group i run with is myself, a warrior, and a rogue.  it was just me and the warrior untill we realized that i was getting counterspelled way too often and needed to bring in someone that could have more luck against the mages.

I'm mainly playing a Warrior now and I would absolutely love a mage to stop and cast counterspell on the Paladin while I'm lining him up. Each class has counters against each other different classes, once you add more players in then you get a unique tactical array against a different challenge with each same size group you face

Paladin Warrior and Rogue is a very good threesome for PvP. If you are getting slaughtered by Mages you perhaps need to look at your tactics. A Rogue can cc 3 at once (Sap, Blind and Gouge). If you are getting slaughtered by Mages when out-numbered well that's normal, 5 of any class played well beats 3 of any class played well.

If I can offer one tip from pvping as a healer then it's keep your range. Polymorph is a fairly short range spell. Possibly you can still heal your Warrior while being out of Polymorph spell range. You certainly don't need to rush in on the front line. If you are getting cc-ed a lot then play more as a full out pansy healer rather than a fearless melee/healer hybrid.

I've tried Mage in PvP and I would have problems against a paladin keeping back with a Warrior near me. If I sheep the Warrior the Paladin can run in, dispel and run back out before I can sheep him (unless I POM sheep). Warrior charge/intercept can often stop polymorph. If I'm fighting someone else and a Rogue ambushes I'm almost always killed

Perhaps it would help if you described the tactical situation in more detail. Does your threesome lose to enemy threes in isolated fights like AB mine/mill? If so tell us what are the three classes and what skills do they use to win the fight

Sorry, but to use your own tact against you

Small nit: tack not tact. Tack is a line a boat sails along, which has come to mean a line of argument

[Brista]

Can this one get stickied?

Perfect post, Gnollguy.

I agree, another excellent post Gnollguy

Thanks for your explanation

[Drasca]

I'd love to get that trinket but between raiding two nights a week, putting together 5 mans on another night, working every thursday night and a family I have very little time left for PvP. The offtimes I can pvp I tend to sit in the queue for longer than I have time for.[right][snapback]96633[/snapback][/right]

Ouch. I never knew how hard it is to find *any* pvp on PvE servers. On my PvP server, there was usually enough action on the way to instances to obtain the rank 2 trinket. Everyone would fight on the way, or queue up BG, and then go out in to the world to gather/grind and look for action. Perhaps next time you're on a rep grinding or resource gathering run, you might want to consider pairing up with a friend of like mind and leave yourself flagged for PvP and queued into one of the battlegrounds. That is my suggestion. There may or may not be 'enough' for you, but at least it is on your way.

The last couple of times in BG I've been teamed with a warlock, a rogue and a mage for defense. They tended to take a lot of focus fire damage while I was sheeped.

Hmm. Ideally, the lock should have a felhunter out since you're the only healer/dispeller. I admit its not always possible or probable, but that is what I would do with with shards and time to prepare summon / target tal-pal macro / devour magic.

Edit: Sacrificing grammar demons

[Chesspiece_face]

Small nit: tack not tact. Tack is a line a boat sails along, which has come to mean a line of argument
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And how do you know i wasn't referring to MJ's ability to belittle others without sounding overly offensive?!?! :P thanks.

oh. And i don't have any real trouble with mages now, that was the whole reason for getting a friend with a rogue to come along on our adventures.

[savaughn]

Pally thoughts on the changes?  Note, I've only ever seen one person use Repentance.  Nice little spell sometimes, I guess.
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Honestly?

I love them.

Lets talk about why. Repentance in and of itself isn't brilliant. A 6 second incapacitate gives you enough time to throw another heal on yourself under 1.8 and gives the pally another "life". Also cuts down on running that kind of thing.

Under 1.9 it's an entirely differnet story. Look at the whole retribution tree now. The 11 point talent (Seal of Command) is enhanced by the 21 point talent (sanctity aura) and triggered by the 31 point talent (Repentance). That's right - you can get the high bonus damage on SoC judgement from Repentance.

What does this mean?

A paladin with engineering (should be all of them) can now pull off the following combo:

- SoC
- Hammer of Justice
- Judge
- SoC
- Grenade stun
- Judge
- SoC
- Repentance
- Judge
- Hammer of Wrath

It works differently and it's on a significantly longer cool down, but Paladins can get shock level damage now in retrib.

So we have nice synergy for Holy Warriors. Holy Power enhances divine favor and illumination (and stacks with divine intellect) so we have synergy in the Holy tree for Clerics. Lastly, we have redoubt, Sanctuary, and Holy Shield stacking in Protection. This gives a lot more focus to the trees than they've had before.

Now, Holy and Retrib are fine as they are. The problem is that there's no compelling reason for a Pally to wear a shield most of the time. No snap aggro means no effective tanking or off tanking (and note: pallies have lost the snap aggro that judging seal of fury generated so they can't really off tank that well anymore) and the lower DPS means it's not great PvP.

Paladins need a justifiable reason to wear that shield in a raid (I'd say they need a taunt on a long cooldown) and in PvP (imagine something like Eye for an Eye but requiring a shield). Put those two pieces in place and the Paladins are fixed and it's time to talk about Holy Priests and improving Divine Spirit.

[savaughn]

This is true. 
However, I'm farily certain that MJ is discussing a case where you have two teams with :
~equally (high) skilled players
~equally (epic) geared characters
~equally (good) game plans
and
~equally (good) communication
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Not really. One of the examples I've heard him pull out is the Blizzcon travesty.

See, at Blizzcon, they had it set up so everyone could pick any class/race combination, and get dropped into BG at level 60 in their top rank PvP epics. What a great idea, right? But the alliance won virtually every game. WTFBBQ - obviously the Alliance is overpowered, right?

MJ has said point blank he thinks this is because of the Paladin. I disagree. I'd say it's because nearly every single person who logged in on the horde side picked Warrior or Shaman because popular wisdom says these are the two best classes for PvP. The problem is ... if everyone on your team has the exact same weaknesses and you run up against a balanced opposing force -- you're going to lose.

If you bring characters who a) don't have the greatest CC and B) play against people who's CC they can't deal with... well, you end up outnumbered and stomped. And that's pretty much exactly what happened.

[Rinnhart]

Honestly?

I love them.

Lets talk about why.  Repentance in and of itself isn't brilliant.  A 6 second incapacitate gives you enough time to throw another heal on yourself under 1.8 and gives the pally another "life". Also cuts down on running that kind of thing.

Under 1.9 it's an entirely differnet story.  Look at the whole retribution tree now.  The 11 point talent (Seal of Command) is enhanced by the 21 point talent (sanctity aura) and triggered by the 31 point talent (Repentance).  That's right - you can get the high bonus damage on SoC judgement from Repentance.

What does this mean?

A paladin with engineering (should be all of them) can now pull off the following combo:

Because a class being completely dependant upon a tradeskill is cool. We shouldn't NEED to be goddamn engineers to be a functional class.

- SoC
- Hammer of Justice
- Judge
- SoC

wait 8 seconds

- Grenade stun
- Judge
- SoC

wait 8 seconds

- Repentance
- Judge
- Hammer of Wrath

Fixed it for you.

It works differently and it's on a significantly longer cool down, but Paladins can get shock level damage now in retrib.

Yeah, except if a shock is resisted, it sets back the shaman six seconds instead of halving their offense. The "stun build" is flawed on a basic level due to it's dependance upon cooldowns. Even assuming nothing is resisted, we still can't force anyone to stay in combat with us. You stun, drop your judgement, the rogue gouges, walks swiftly away, and binds wounds. The mage eats your grenade combo, polymorphs you, and has a snack. The warrior withstands the full force of your fury- and outdamages your 20 second combo with a MS and a regular hit.

The priest laughs and heals up unmolested because you burned all of your interrupts.

There's also no alliance race with a 25% chance to resist shocks.

So we have nice synergy for Holy Warriors.  Holy Power enhances divine favor and illumination (and stacks with divine intellect) so we have synergy in the Holy tree for Clerics.  Lastly, we have redoubt, Sanctuary, and Holy Shield stacking in Protection.  This gives a lot more focus to the trees than they've had before.

Good thing Sanctuary + Holy Shield does the same damage as a pre-nerf Judgement of the Crusader + Holy shield, and consumes your blessing slot.

Now, Holy and Retrib are fine as they are.

I can only hope the Shaman revamp goes so well.

[Riot]

Hmmm, I see Mongo's still the big-mouthed windbag he was in beta. :P

I thought I'd drop in to say just this about the paladin revamp. Pre 1.09 paladins are boring to play. Post 1.09 paladins will be boring to play.

And that is the key problem. No one wants to sit in queue and jump into a BG and have to beg people to duo with them or tell them to wait for you. I know when I PvP I just want to jump into queue and do some killing and make something happen. I don't really care about how bad Shaman mana efficiency is. I know it's bad. It's fun to see people die though.

I'm a pretty good player - I've played a Paladin and Warrior for a long period of time, and I'm proficient in playing a Druid and Priest too. As a druid, I can go have fun chain rooting people and take them completely out of a battle and enjoy high mobility and form flexibility. As a Warrior, I can go kill people - I have a high chance of dying too, but I can take you down with me. As a Priest there's a bunch of tricks I have up my sleeve, the best of which is running up to the mill and Mind Controlling someone and jumping them off. As a Paladin I get to sit at a node, because that's what I'm most effective thing I can do. A skilled player playing a Paladin doesn't have much to do. I can recite to you the length and timers of multiple silence/interrupt spells. I fake-heal all the time baiting with the furbolg rod. But there's a certain lack of depth and detachment to the Paladin class that also frustrates me.

Whatever kind of arguments you want to throw at the class and talk about how imbalanced it is in PvE, or how much Shamans suck in the raid-game, realize that no Paladins are asking for PvE buffs or nerfs to Shamans. Paladins wanted gameplay to be more fun.

End of story. Gameplay should be fun for both classes.

Hopefully one day Blizzard fixes PvP, because right now it's a moronic dps-fest where healers get their faces pushed in thanks to newer and better weaponry.

Riotous - Death and Taxes, Shattered Hand

[Tal]

Hmmm,  I see Mongo's still the big-mouthed windbag he was in beta.  :P
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I may not always agree with MJ but I do still respect the man. I'll ask you to extend the courtesy you would any other poster on the site and refrain from insulting him.

[oldmandennis]

Hmmm, I see Mongo's still the big-mouthed windbag he was in beta.

This is probably supposed to be a joke, but it's a bit strong for your first post here.

realize that no Paladins are asking for PvE buffs or nerfs to Shamans.

:blink:

Really? You must be talking to a very reasonable set of paladins. Also, the "raid buff" thing goes way past convienence to a substantial PvE buff.

Paladins wanted gameplay to be more fun.

End of story.  Gameplay should be fun for both classes. 

Some people think that slow gameplay that powerfully helps their teammats is fun.

Go play WC3, people. I think they have done an admirable job of bringing the feel of the WC3 pally into a MMORPG. In WC3, pally's ran around with knights, and had crappy dps. When one of the knights started going down, you healed him. When your opponent got tired of that and FF'ed you, you shielded and ran, then went back to healing. It is really powerful, but maybe not fun for everyone.

And if you don't like the Pally game play, WHY DID YOU DO IT? It was the same for 60 levels. It just boggles my mind how you people stuck with something that is "broken, boring, stupid" for probably upwards of 240 hours /played.

I tried a Pally, and think that it is dull solo but pretty fun trying to save everybody in a group. I just flat don't play him solo, its not fun so I don't do it.

The problem here is the "woe is me" crowd keeps bringing up the same points. Sooner or later somebody says how much PVP sucks. MJ rants about good organised paladins. People write dissertations about how unrealistic that is. Blah Blah Blah.

Can we have a reasonable discussion about the changes without going round and round in circles?

Hopefully one day Blizzard fixes PvP, because right now it's a moronic dps-fest where healers get their faces pushed in thanks to newer and better weaponry.
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Moronic is a strong term. There are teams out there that heal, use cc, use tactics, fearbomb, etc. And the bigger the weapons, the better it looks to have a paladin doing the healing, as opposed to a priest.

[Kevin]

Really?  You must be talking to a very reasonable set of paladins.  Also, the "raid buff" thing goes way past convienence to a substantial PvE buff.
Some people think that slow gameplay that powerfully helps their teammats is fun.

I'm actually calling for some shaman buffs, especially to restoration, and some changes to some skills in the other trees as well. They have some completely useless talents on the order of the old hunter 31 point survival .6 DPS bleed talent and they have some issues with game play as a hybrid though not on the paladin scale.

Go play WC3, people.  I think they have done an admirable job of bringing the feel of the WC3 pally into a MMORPG.  In WC3, pally's ran around with knights, and had crappy dps.  When one of the knights started going down, you healed him.  When your opponent got tired of that and FF'ed you, you shielded and ran, then went back to healing.  It is really powerful, but maybe not fun for everyone.

And play WC2 and see that this isn't the paladin. :) Blizzard still doesn't know what the paladin is in my book.

And if you don't like the Pally game play, WHY DID YOU DO IT?  It was the same for 60 levels.  It just boggles my mind how you people stuck with something that is "broken, boring, stupid" for probably upwards of 240 hours /played.

Several reasons. At times I like the simple play, or course I will play my warrior that way at times too, just letting auto-attack do most of the work and hitting a big rage use skill every now and then. I do it with my hunter at times as well. I won't touch my rogue, mage, or warlock when in a mood like this. I'm not a huge fan of soloing a class that can't self heal because even if the combat takes longer I'm not a huge fan of banage or eat/drink after a fight. Blizzard has promised change for a long time as well so I didn't want to shelve him until those got around. As you mention later group play with a paladin can be quite fun. I also am taking every class to 60 at some point (got 4 there and 3 more over 30 the rest over 20). I also have roleplay reasons behind every character I have except the mules and those helped drive me too.



As to the changes. Well they are still hard to talk about as they keep changing them. What is on the test realm today isn't current either as they said BoK was going to move to a new spot and it still hasn't.

Is the class more interactive now? Somewhat. Do I have more control on my DPS? A little. Do I tank as well as I used to? No. Do I heal as well as I used to? Depends on the spec. Is my DPS better or worse? Burst DPS is better, DPS + downtime is a little worse with the 2 builds I've tried on test and I don't see much in the way of items to help it. I do have more builds to test.

I like the new judgement system, though it is generally wisdom that is judged so that I can keep up mana levels. But not having to refresh the judgement on the mob while solo is nice. The change to the range on judgements is nice helpful change that removes some frustrations I used to have with that. Seal of Command and Seal or Righteousness deliver pretty much the same damage over time regardless of weapon choice from what I've seen. This includes judging them more frequently. The damage scaling by weapon speed on righteousness and command on weapon damage seem to make them basically the same skill now. It is not clear that one is better on a faster weapon than another to me anymore.

A 33 retribution/18 holy paladin plays pretty much the same as 31 holy/20 retribution paladin. The holy paladin has more control over damage though.

My 31 ret/20 holy build in 1.8 holds about 135 DPS in Tyr's hand with 0 down time (If I'm low on mana I just mana up on the next mob and do less damage). The 32 retribution/19 holy build holds about 145 DPS but has much more down time as I lost several of my healing and mana regen tricks (no free crit heals, 6 mana per 5 from no more imp blessing of wisdom) I was not able to mana-up on a mob as effectively as I used to be able to mainly because I couldn't get a free crit heal when I wanted. A 31 Holy/20 retribution held about 110 DPS with 0 downtime. I'm still planning on doing some 3 tree builds and a heavy prot build as well.

Raiding with a paladin still makes you a buff bot/healer. I don't mind that only the holy paladins will be judging the seal of light/wisdom on boss mobs in MC because you don't want to be meleeing on many of them which other builds without the talent would need to do to keep the judgement up. I can live with a paladin not tanking there because a shaman can't either. A shaman will still offer more in the DPS department it seems and their healing isn't much different. Paladins sill offer more with their blessing and the judgements than a shaman did with totems as well. But I've always felt the paladin offered more to a raid than a shaman. That hasn't changed.

A holy and a retribution pally still play pretty much the same, the trees don't differentiate play style that much right now, though again I haven't tested protection yet. Some of that may have been because both my test builds had holy talents though. I can still make self heals uninterruptable from damage.

The changes do feel like they point you to a raid build or a PvP build.



Edit: Well I just refreshed the talent calculator http://www.worldofwarcraft.com/info/classe...s2/talents.html and it now reflects the changes to kings and repentance they had mentioned earlier.

[Rinnhart]

This is probably supposed to be a joke, but it's a bit strong for your first post here.
:blink:

Really?  You must be talking to a very reasonable set of paladins.  Also, the "raid buff" thing goes way past convienence to a substantial PvE buff.
Some people think that slow gameplay that powerfully helps their teammats is fun.

Oh, yes, having a class do anything but buff the entire raid is madness.

Go play WC3, people.  I think they have done an admirable job of bringing the feel of the WC3 pally into a MMORPG.  In WC3, pally's ran around with knights, and had crappy dps.  When one of the knights started going down, you healed him.  When your opponent got tired of that and FF'ed you, you shielded and ran, then went back to healing.  It is really powerful, but maybe not fun for everyone.

And if you don't like the Pally game play, WHY DID YOU DO IT?  It was the same for 60 levels.  It just boggles my mind how you people stuck with something that is "broken, boring, stupid" for probably upwards of 240 hours /played.

Because the WoW paladin is faster playing than the EQ paladin.

I tried a Pally, and think that it is dull solo but pretty fun trying to save everybody in a group.  I just flat don't play him solo, its not fun so I don't do it.

The problem here is the "woe is me" crowd keeps bringing up the same points.  Sooner or later somebody says how much PVP sucks.  MJ rants about good organised paladins.  People write dissertations about how unrealistic that is.  Blah Blah Blah.

I'm convinced MJ logs on and ABs for the singular purpose of picking out encounters to bitch about.

Can we have a reasonable discussion about the changes without going round and round in circles?

The only people locked in a circular discussion are MJ and everyone who bothers arguing with him.

The class was fine in PvE (except in our ability to tank). It has been buffed further in PvE (except in our ability to tank, which has, for the most part, been nerfed), for whatever reason. The class is not fine in PvP due to the simple fact that we are forced into a support role with no other option. Shamans, Druids, and Priests all have the choice of playing support or of actively fighting, and no one is going to start screaming "OMG NEWB LRN2PLY." Paladins have just been handed a half-assed attempt at a combat system that might have given us that choice, but instead just heightens an awareness of the class' shortcomings.

Moronic is a strong term.  There are teams out there that heal, use cc, use tactics, fearbomb, etc.  And the bigger the weapons, the better it looks to have a paladin doing the healing, as opposed to a priest.
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Moronic is a perfect term for Blizzard's PvP system as a whole. You know they were planning a death-match style BG before AB, the Zul'Gurub Catacombs? The reason it never went anywhere was because caster classes were so horribly underpowered for massed free-for-all combat and were insta-gibbed every match.

[oldmandennis]

Oh, yes, having a class do anything but buff the entire raid is madness.

And heal and dispel. What do I do in a raid? Buff and heal. Hmm.

The class was fine in PvE (except in our ability to tank). It has been buffed further in PvE (except in our ability to tank, which has, for the most part, been nerfed)

I have heard that people have tanked all the 5 man and most of the 10 man stuff with pallys. Will that no longer be the case? I think that's sufficient. As you get to the 15-40 man stuff it can safely be assumed that you have some sort of class balance. That's why Garr pretty much mandates a few locks and Domo some mages. As a healer, I can solo live strath, but would think it funny to try the core with NO priests.

Shamans, Druids, and Priests all have the choice of playing support or of actively fighting, and no one is going to start screaming "OMG NEWB LRN2PLY."

Bzzt. I always heal first, damage second. It makes a huge difference when the other shamen think the same way. The pro teams I've run with don't put up with healers that don't heal, I'd have no doubt I'd not be asked back if I decided not to heal. I'll grant you that its easier for me to warm up a chain lightning or throw off a quick shock before going back to healing then it is for you to run up and whack something before healing.

You know they were planning a death-match style BG before AB, the Zul'Gurub Catacombs? The reason it never went anywhere was because caster classes were so horribly underpowered for massed free-for-all combat and were insta-gibbed every match.
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1) Very interesting. I hadn't heard that. Any kind of evidence out there? SS? Fraps?
2) It changes nothing. The caster itemization thing will be improving starting next patch. The fact that they aborted a BG does not mean that the 3 they have are not fun, don't need tactics, and can't use every classes abilities.

[Rinnhart]

And heal and dispel.  What do I do in a raid?  Buff and heal.  Hmm.

I worded that wrong, but you've always seemed to underestimate how long it takes and how repetitive it is for paladins with no addon help to buff and keep a raid force buffed, so I'm not sure why I bother to attempt the point, anymore.

I have heard that people have tanked all the 5 man and most of the 10 man stuff with pallys.  Will that no longer be the case?  I think that's sufficient.

I have tanked it all, 5 man. I would never do it again if a decent warrior was available. We're inefficient, time consuming tanks, and the "better" geared we get, the worse tanks we become.

The existing "ten man" content can be tanked with a trigger happy mage.

As you get to the 15-40 man stuff it can safely be assumed that you have some sort of class balance.  That's why Garr pretty much mandates a few locks and Domo some mages.  As a healer, I can solo live strath, but would think it funny to try the core with NO priests.

Why the hell shouldn't we be tanks? We're described as a tanking class, we have abilities obviously intended with tanking in mind, what fricken reason do we have to be pleased with being a distant third in line for tanking ability?

Tanking is a class role that blizzard has a bizarre issue with allowing more than a single class to be good at. Everything else has always been "we want multiple classes to excel at it in different ways".

Bzzt.  I always heal first, damage second.

You have the option of dealing damage- meaningful, controllable damage, at the press of a single button. And that, sir, is my #$%&ing point. What other class has to jump through so many fricken hoops just to kill someone? What reason is there for it to be this way?

So that no one looks at my comments and says "you want to be able to tank, heal, and do damage. No class does all three, without a trade-off, even druids."

- If they would pick tanking or damage and make paladins actually good at it, I'd shut up and fade happily into the woodwork. But they never have. They've always half-assed the job.

1) Very interesting.  I hadn't heard that.  Any kind of evidence out there?  SS?  Fraps?

I got the name wrong. It was "Gurubashi Catacombs" and it was mentioned in Blizzcon coverage. Google it.

2) It changes nothing. The caster itemization thing will be improving starting next patch. The fact that they aborted a BG does not mean that the 3 they have are not fun, don't need tactics, and can't use every classes abilities.
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You are, in a round about way, defending the Honor System. Why would you do that? WHY WOULD YOU EVER DO THAT?

[Kevin]

My 31 ret/20 holy build in 1.8 holds about 135 DPS in Tyr's hand with 0 down time (If I'm low on mana I just mana up on the next mob and do less damage). The 32 retribution/19 holy build holds about 145 DPS but has much more down time as I lost several of my healing and mana regen tricks (no free crit heals, 6 mana per 5 from no more imp blessing of wisdom) I was not able to mana-up on a mob as effectively as I used to be able to mainly because I couldn't get a free crit heal when I wanted. A 31 Holy/20 retribution held about 110 DPS with 0 downtime. I'm still planning on doing some 3 tree builds and a heavy prot build as well.

Hmm I ran some more tests my numbers were wrong. I was up in Tyr's Hand only killing the stuff by the gates, didn't go inside. Finding a time on live realms to do this was not simple and I plan to try to get some more data for that at odd hours again. These tests were before repenetance and blessing of kings were moved around.

1.8 Ret/Holy - 125 DPS - Never had to stop could play get my mana back at the cost of lower DPS more.
1.9 Ret/Holy - 110 DPS - Had to bandage or drink (one or the other) every 3 to 4 fights as the mana pool was not sustainable.
1.9 Holy/Ret - 110 DPS - Had to bandage or drink (one or the other) every 7 to 8 fights. I could have played the mana regen game more but my DPS would likely have dropped another 5-10 points and then the threat or respawns gets too great at 100 or below. Running Sanctity aura over retribution aura was a loss of 1 to 2 DPS on melee mobs and I broke even on the casters since they would not die before the mana pool was out. Best DPS on them was to run sanctity than switch to retribution when they started swinging.
1.9 Prot/Ret - 100 DPS - Had to banadage or drink every 2 to 3 fights. My one hander is poor compared to my two handers though. The controlled damage from contstantly judging seal of command was nice (repent and HoJ stuns to trigger the extra damage) and the damage that can be returned to foes with Holy Shield/Blessing of Sanc/Retribution aura was pretty fun too.

Judging light is pretty much required on the test realms as I have to judge seals more to keep the damage up and I need mana to do that. On the current realms I only needed to judge light if I wanted to slow the mana leak down.

Now, let's be more fair here. I still haven't learned the builds all that well, but even going with basically the same build (as best I can) that I've had for pretty much 60 levels on live realms I lose DPS in fights though I can control burst a bit better. I can not sustain DPS or combat as well. I meant to time how long it took me to kill the same 15 mobs but I didn't. It was always slower on test though.

I have lower survivability on test. But I still did more damage with a one or two hander on live realms just waiting around for SoC to proc. My crits that were 600-750 fell to 420 to 500 or so. Making up 180 to 250 damage is another normal swing or two (at 2.4 to 3.4 seconds a swing), or a judgement of righteousness or command (on a stunned mob) which you can only do once every 8 seconds. Seal of command without the vengeance and crit backing that I had with the holy/ret build was not made up for by the use of holy shock. All the test builds took more mana.

Again if I knew the tricks better I could probably up the DPS more and even cut downtime more. I was testing fights with SoC or Seal or Righteousness. Lots of judging or little judging. The DPS goes up with more judging and so does the down time. Vindication is nice but not having enough in holy to stop the interrupts on heals hurts I lost judgements a few times on builds without this because the stutter on the heal and a miss and some poor timing on my part when I started the heal. If you give up that much self healing ability you should gain more tanking or DPS than you do. A prot/ret build should be able to tank because their self healing is much worse than any build with points in holy. They just don't get that.

I will need a friend to test how well I hold aggro better but I'm trusting the reports that this got worse.

For me, and I'm still searching out builds, I got worse at soloing and worse at raid healing no matter what I have tried right now. I get better at raid buffing though.

[Kevin]

Tanking is a class role that blizzard has a bizarre issue with allowing more than a single class to be good at. Everything else has always been "we want multiple classes to excel at it in different ways".
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They have to keep the shaman and the paladins tanking abilities mostly equal. The shaman right now has an easier time holding aggro (higher damage more control of the damage more high threat skills) but they can not take a pounding as well, even when spec'd for tanking (getting the ability to parry). A shaman not spec'd to tank is even worse off than a paladin is.

This has to be balanced somehow even with PvP having the other issues each faction should have the same number of tank choices. This is why I want more controlled DPS for paladins and more ways to reduce damage taken (at the cost of dealing damage) for shaman.