Youngblood

Hmm.... as soon as the darn armory updates I'll post a link to my profile. Or you can just search for Youngblood on EU Dunemaul. Admittedly my gear is sub par compared to some other prot paladins (I blame work, IAAL >_< ) but it should not be so noticable for the healers imho.

PsiVen, those changes you posted are excellent news. However, I have no idea how they will stand up to harder bosses, or how they will compare to other tanking classes. But lets hope they are not changed back...

Yes, I fully intend to try tanking raid instances. Actually, Vinsents explanation was so good I'll just leave it at that. And sadly, druids got nerfed.

Why should that be? Why should there even be a tanking tree if it's only meant as a gimmick? A paladin loses so much healing and PvP viability when going deep protection. Any result less than a fully competitive raid main tank would make specing prot pretty damn useless.

And why should Blizzard say that we are healer/tank hybrids if they only really mean us to go for one of these two options? With the right spec warriors can dish out a lot of damage, and with the right spec paladins can heal very well. So why tie paladins to healing only, thereby forcing warriors who want to DPS into tanking? That makes no sense.


Oh, and before the official EU forums went phooie yesterday the thread there got some blue attention. Of course, that doesn't exactly mean anything, but at least its been passed on. I'm still hoping for a result.

Clicky to cardplace.com

EDIT: Typo

 

PsiVen

That ring is very similar to three epic tanking rings of higher ilvl, but all of the other rings have armor eating away their item value. If you anticipate getting ahold of the Shermanar Great-Ring, Violet Signet of the Great Protector, or Ring of Unyielding Force, you are likely to be choosing between sidegrades to accompany the amazing Elementium Band of the Sentry ( http://www.thottbot.com/?i=59584 ). I'd sell it, as you'll need the money.

 

◊ Cathela

Well, the thing is that it's a much bigger deal with "sub-par" gear than it is with better gear. That's why I asked if your gear removes crushing blows when you have Holy Shield up. Until you reach that point, yeah, your healers are going to notice a huge difference between you and a warrior. Once you get rid of crushes, you start looking much better to your healers.

My comrades are my weapons, and I am their shield.

 

Antarius

Well admitedly I don't think it's even possible to have the avoidance necessary to prevent crushing blows without redoubt also being up.

But that being said, it's almost impossible to NOT have enough avoidance when both are up.

If these changes to Tier 4/5 are true, I may consider respeccing from my current 41/20/0 build to a more raid-tank friendly 20/31/10 build. (although granted, I'm still in mostly Righteous Armor equivilent stuff now.

A) I still need to be able to heal, sometimes, and without 20 points in holy you're fucked.
B) You need Holy Shield to be viable at removing crushing blows.
C) 5% mitigation from speccing 10 retribution is more beneficial for tanking imo than 10% extra damage and 50% at 20% and lolcaptainamerica.

 

Nite_Moogle

As the people right above this mentioned, until you can reliably get rid of crushing blows without relying on a proc there's no realistic fashion in which you can tank single boss mobs and do it as well as a warrior can. For content that isn't bleeding edge a Paladin will make a fine tank, and a heavy prot build makes you nigh impossible to pull aggro of off when you're free to consecrate spam, but to try and believe that you're going to tank as effectively as a warrior both from the standpoint of equal mitigation and threat generation just isn't a realistic view of the game right now. It's pretty clear from the last two rounds of druid changes that Blizzard does not intend to have 3 interchangeable tank classes, and they intend to keep warriors at the top of the boss tanking list.

 

Youngblood

I am (and was) fully aware of this, but that is not what the original post is about. What you just wrote is equally true for a warrior. Until a warrior can reliably get rid of crushing blows he will not be a viable main tank either.

Right now, emphasis added. No, exactly. I know that currently paladins have very good threat generation compared to the other tanking classes. However, with the upcoming 2.0.10 changes I fully expect the warrior to become as good, or better than, the paladin at producing threat. And threat generation is of very little use once the paladin goes splat and falls over. A dead tank is worthless.

But, that is the "right now" part I am trying to focus on, and change. As I wrote in the Executive Summary, right now its not possible for a paladin to compete with warriors and druids due to lack of HP and mitigation. But my contention is that paladins should be able to compete with those classes. We should have the same possibility of viable main tanking if we choose to spec deep protection.

I'm not so sure I have interpreted the signals from Blizzard the same way as you have. Yes, Blizzard has (through Tseric) confirmed that warriors are supposed to be the "primary choice for tanking" and that the druid and paladin threat generation capabilities "should not be exceeding the capabilities of warriors". Tseric continued to say that if that happens druids and paladins will "probably get reigned in some". (Clicky to quote.) I am still interpreting that to mean that these classes should be equal at tanking. None should be superior when compared to the others.

Fine, lower the threat generation capabilities of protection paladins then. As long as its kept on the same level as the warriors, and the protection paladins HP and mitigation is increased, I'm fine.

You can call me naive if you want, but I still hope it will happen. As it is, it's quite useless speccing prot if it can't ever be used for end game tanking, and its useless holding aggro if you die every time you do.

 

Nite_Moogle

I had more to say but the fact you mention these two sentences in the same paragraph shows me that you're still doing this:
Protection is far from a worthless spec, but it is not good enough to make Paladins a better tank than a warrior on any encounter where you need to hold threat on four mobs or less. I'm fine with that, because I can still tank instances effectively when there isn't a warrior around and I believe that's how they intend for things to be. After two years of not having any tanks that weren't warriors for any level of content, it is a tremendously welcome change to be able to use both druids and paladins in the content that we split in to small groups for while maintaining good non-tank-role effectiveness when we all join up for raiding content.

 

◊ zeidrich

Very subtle difference, and someone speaking as a spokesperson would not make this mistake.

He said "Warriors have always been intended to be a primary choice for tanking."
He did not say "Warriors have always been intended to be THE primary choice for tanking."

The difference is huge.

This was in response to someone saying that "There are lots of people sayiing that Bear Druids or Paladins or both hold hate better than Warriors, period...Protection or non-Protection."

The accusation was that warriors and druids were consistantly better tanks and warriors were not an option.

The defense was that warriors have always been a primary choice to tank.

That does not preclude the notion that there have always been other primary choices for tanking, namely druids and paladins. In fact, since release druids and paladins have had threat increasing talents, and aggro holding abilities. They've just been ill-thought-out.

Pre-expansion itemization for those roles were non existant. For the longest time Blizzard wanted to ensure that pallies and druids were hybrids, so they gave us garbage hybrid sets like lawbringer and judgement. Sets that made us suck at all of our potential roles. It wasn't until tier 3 that they finally gave us a set that actually was half decent for a single role. Unfortunately that role was solely healing, but with the raid encounters of that time, it was expected that you have like 15 healers in a raid.

They are trying to allow paladins and druids to explore the other facets of their class, and I'm pretty sure they've learned some lessons from 1.0, but they're still making mistakes. Namely, in itemization. But to me it looks like they're taking steps to correct them.

Crushing blows, I think, are something that they don't even want warriors to be able to prevent. I bet if you were to ask the class designers directly, they would tell you that they never intended for crushing blows to be preventable. It's just a flaw in the way they are using their table based combat system. The fact that you must have 100%+ block rate is a boundary case that wasn't explored when they designed the crushing blow concept. I believe a block was meant to mitigate a set amount of damage based on your block value, not completely remove a core mechanic versus higher level targets.

I wouldn't be surprised at all if in one of the patches down the line something was altered so that blocks would no longer completely remove crushes, perhaps you might see "Soandso hits you for 5030. (Crushing) (307 blocked)" But in the same way that weapon skill was removing the risk of glances, I believe that blocks weren't intended to always remove crushes.

The crushing blow aspect is really the #1 thing that is making this large gap for druids and paladins tanking skull bosses.

 

Antarius

And still, if you give a boss a 1.0 attack speed or faster, the paladin instantly becomes the better tank at pushing off crushing blows.

Neither can prevent the crushing blows completely, But a Paladin can keep up 100% Avoidance for significantly longer periods of time than warriors.

Sure, you COULD tank Twin Emps with 2 warrior tanks, but it was far from optimal. 2 warlocks and 2 warriors just worked a whole lot better.

 

PsiVen

I really don't want to see this turn into another warrior/druid/paladin debate. The assumption is that we have a tanking role in endgame content. The only question in my mind is, where will Blizzard's itemization take us? The new T5 has a lot of block rating, which is good not only for AoE tanking but for pushing off Crushes on bosses. Once the dust settles on the changes, we should be able to see more accurately where we stand.

 

◊ Oggie

Just confirming what others have said, T4 looks a little worse (more mana/5, less stam/def), and T5 looks quite sexy now.

Edit:
That is to say, confirming that the patch when hitting live didn't change dramaticly from what people have already said, no big shocker from PTR->Live

 

Shakkha

Talking about Paladin itemisation, may i present you this Magtheridon Drop:

Girdle of the Endless Pit
Binds when picked up
Waist Plate
782 Armor
+28 Strength
+22 Stamina
Red Socket
Blue Socket
Socket Bonus: +3 Resilience Rating
Durability 55 / 55
Requires Level 70
Equip: Improves critical strike rating by 21.
Equip: Increases healing done by spells and effects by up to 40.
Equip: Restores 5 mana per 5 sec.


I'm still trying to figure out what the heck went into the item designer mind when they made this item. The stats on it make no sense, i can't think of any configuration in which i'd want to use this absolute piece of trash belt.

 

• Chicken

The simplest (and most sensible) theory I've heard about it is that it's simply mis-itemized; instead of healing it was supposed to have damage/healing, turning it into a Ret belt. It's not the first time that happens after all, just take a look at the most recent patch notes, especially the "Necklace of Trophies" bit.

Edit:

On the subject of Redoubt, now I haven't actually run the numbers on the ability, but since it's a chance to proc when getting hit and it has a limited amount of charges (And a time limit), doesn't that simply mean that once you achieve a certain amount of incoming attacks the extra blocks provided by it are a simple case of "For every n attacks that hit you, you will block n of them."? After all while the more attacks that hit you, the more you'll proc Redoubt, it's also the case that the more attacks hit you, the faster Redoubt will be used up.

buff /bʌf/ Pronunciation[buhf]
–verb (used with object)
- to reduce or deaden the force of

 

◊ Wraithlin

Change the +healing to +spell damage/healing and it looks to be itemized almost idenitically to how Avengers armour was laid out.

 

Kink

Well, from a druids perspective, surely it is VERY easy to gear up as a pally tank?

Can you simply not mix the same plate defensive gear that a warrior wants, and then add some spell damage via rings/jewelery/cloaks/enchants etc?

A druids has problems because they need leather with defensive stats and ONLY druids need that. A paladin can use the exact same that a warrior can use (barring token sets of course) and there is a substantial amount of craftable/drops that will fulfill that need more than adequately.

You have it easy! At least Blizzard is putting in a lot of defensive plate for warriors which you can nab.

*edit*
As far as the freak itemisation stuff goes, that is how some blizzard designers want us to play our hybrid classes. As 100% hybrids. Look at the druid feral sets, its all +AP and +healing. Quite useless for a full feral who wants to tank. I guess Paladins have the same problem except you also can get normal plate and mix and match making up for your losses in needed tanking stats with enchants/gems.

There is light at the end of the tunnel.
The only problem is, it's often an incoming train.

 

Nite_Moogle

Sure, except those slots are generally contain parrt of what's needed to get +140 defense and crit immune. I could say that stamina, AC, and agility are all a druid needs and that's a gross oversimplification too :P

 

• Vinsent

The problem is not that we can borrow warrior gear, infact thats what most if all paladin tanks are doing, + a spell damage weapon and a spell damage trinket.

The problem comes from class sets, once you break into the teir set range there are no longer random quest drop 001 to keep up. And things become flagged warrior only.

If the warrior only item is +100 stam and +50 def, and the paladin one is +80 stam and 30 def but 10 mana per 5. And they have the same access to trinkets back, rings etc, who ends up being the better tank at the end of the day?

Our sets need to be as good or nearly as good as the warrior tanking sets or reguardless of skill, talents, or anything else we will not be able to keep up.

Oh and inresponse to this:


Girdle of the Endless Pit
Binds when picked up
Waist Plate
782 Armor
+28 Strength
+22 Stamina
Red Socket
Blue Socket
Socket Bonus: +3 Resilience Rating
Durability 55 / 55
Requires Level 70
Equip: Improves critical strike rating by 21.
Equip: Increases healing done by spells and effects by up to 40.
Equip: Restores 5 mana per 5 sec.

Brought to you by the team that itemized ZG Behold the ZG paladn belt:

Zandalar Freethinker's Belt
Binds when picked up
Waist Plate
446 Armor
+16 Strength
+10 Agility <---crit raiting
+16 Stamina
+12 Intellect <---sockets
Classes: Paladin
Durability 55 / 55
Equip: Increases healing done by spells and effects by up to 26.

 

Snow

There have been many, many items in that vein in raid zones:
http://thottbot.com/?i=53093 <-- Belt from Twin Emps

I think the only point of the +healing is so ret paladins can take it as a healing upgrade :P. Still is mostly a collassal waste of stats, and worse, of the limited amount of paladin items in the game.

What disappoints me is that in Karazhan and beyond, there are no drops that seem like prot paladin drops. There's misbudgeted tier set, as noted, but a quick search of wowhead for +def/+dmg epics:

http://www.wowhead.com/?items=4.4&fi...1;crv=0,0#00cz

The tier sets, then some mostly misguided heroic pieces for your other slots. This to me feels like "lip service" to protection paladins. How can there be no upgrade path other than "warrior" loot? (Arguably, plate with no str, but stam and mitigation is roughly equal in value to either class).

 

levk

Before Naxx role-focused paladin itematization didn't exist in the game. Everybody assumed that the hybrid items were a lesson learned and a thing of the past.

e: clear up

 

Snow

Did we? Look at the druid dungeon 3 set.

I don't even disagree with hybrid items per se, it'd be nice not to carry around so many pieces of gear; but the only way it would work is if the items were purposedly overbudgeted.

EDIT: Really, the tier 4 tanking set seems like an attempt at a healing/tanking hybrid, or... something. Clearly it's not itemized for pure tanking, they can't be that clueless. (just clueless enough to make a healing/tanking hybird set, I guess)

 

Keline

The worst part about playing a paladin really is that now that druids get fixed, we have by far the worst itemization in the entire game. Insufficient stamina on items intended for our tank equipment, mp5 on many healing items are the biggest offenders really

 

levk

Hence why I said paladin hybrid... in any case, every paladin item before tier 3 has been hybrid gear (unless you count non class specific offset typically tanking or DPS warrior plate). The remade rank 13 set was really the crowning moment of paladin hybrid itemization - it had everything you could possibly want, nothing of anything else (like spirit). It was hybrid gear and it was the best but only because it was preceeded by strictly hybrid gear. Now you look at hybrid gear and you don't think of the bag space you can save, but more of how useless strength and melee crit is to your healing compared to this other outstanding item that doesn't have it but has more mp5 and +healing on instead of +dmg/heal to boot and ofcourse loads of it. For hybrid items to work again they have to be better than all the focused items combined.

Druids is the only instance you might get away with some overbudgeting because healing and melee forms are mutually exclusive. I haven't formed an opinion on hybriduty of feral druid gear, I don't play a high level druid so I'm not really qualified to form one.

 

• goss

I realize parry is a valuable stat, but it seems absurdly difficult to achieve (http://www.wowhead.com/?items&filter...s=1,1;crv=0,0). It'd be nice to see it show up every once in awhile on the set pieces (like block rating is scattered around), or even lowering the defense rating of the heroic nonset pieces and adding some there.

 

• Chicken

I'd actually prefer dodge rating over parry rating. The important effect (avoidance) is the same for both, but you need a lot less dodge rating for one percent dodge.

Obviously the swing reset properties of parrying is nice, but it's something I can live without far more than I can live without extra avoidance.

buff /bʌf/ Pronunciation[buhf]
–verb (used with object)
- to reduce or deaden the force of

 

Ragnor

Fascinating post by Megor here:
http://forums.worldofwarcraft.com/th...81959427&sid=1

Protection Warrior vs Protection Paladin mitigation.

Cliff notes:

Comparable level of gear
Many identical items
Roughly same amount of time invested farming/grinding tanking items
Both full protection

Warrior has more:
Parry, Block, Dodge, Defense, Armor, and Health
+ Last Stand, Shield wall, Thunderclap, 4% more mitigation from defensive stance..

Based on current itemization trends the gap will only grow.

Q: Why would you want to spec protection, spend ages gearing up to only consistently be far worse at tanking and not be desired to tank?

The universe is run by the complex interweaving of three elements. Energy, matter, and enlightened self-interest.

www.retpaladin.com