The Rise of the Ret Pally in BC - Page 2

Farstrider · 09/04/06, 6:50 AM

Originally Posted by Rz

Nice subject/verb agreement. Next time try "to claw out his own eyes."

To think I worked so hard to try and ensure that didn't happen. Ah well. Still, not nearly as bad as prolly.

Kharzaljim · 09/04/06, 8:12 AM

Hi. Former paladin here, used to be holy before I quit WoW. We're going to do a bit of theory crafting now.

I'm going to make a few assumptions here, regarding gear and hopefully none of the mechanics have changed in the time I've quit WoW. Feel free to ask any questions or correct any mistakes I may end up making.

Assumptions. 1750 AP, 40% crit rate, Might of Methenil weapon (3.8 speed,) 100% vengeance uptime, no glancing blows, no enemy mitigation. Should skew the results higher than reasonably attainable, both with somewhat unrealistic gear, and missing negative effects.

A = Listed dps on character sheet, weapon included. Critrate not included.
W = Weapon Speed.
C = Melee critical rate.
P = Average number of SoC procs per minute. I believe it's 7.
B = SoC damage on swing modifier. Listed on talent as .7.
V = Vengeance modifier. 1.15%.

(A*(1+(P*B/(60/W))))*(1+C)*V = Autoattack DPS running SoC with no spellpower.

(220*(1+(4.9/(60/3.8))))*1.4*1.15

(220*(1+(4.9/15.8)))*1.4

220*1.31*1.4*1.15

~464 = Autoattack DPS with SoC, and no spellpower gear. Does not include Judgement DPS. Note, I'm ignoring the efffect of spellpower and JotC on SoC procs because I can't remember the coefficient for SoC beyond it not being particularly high, and you're not going to have much spellpower with those stats anyway.

Judgent of Command, at L60, hits for ~110 every 8 seconds. Fully talented, JoC has a crit rate of 55%. 110/8*1.55 = 21.3

Total DPS = ~485.3 This is disregarding enemy dodge rate, enemy armor rating, glancing blow damage loss, 100% vengeance uptime, and any minimal boost from spellpower. Also, stats are, if not currently unattainable, atleast high.

Conclusion: From scanning the sustained DPS thread, 485 dps is hunter dps, without pet. Also, it's not using several boosting factors, such as no glancing blows and Kel'Thuzad loot, but is based on real world achieved results. The gear and raid-slot for a "DPS" paladin could be much better spent on a real dps class. Autoattacking your way to victory (ok, slight exaggeration) is not a viable raid role.

Caveat: This is solely in regards to the playstyle of a retnoob in a raid situation. In my opinion, the only real raid useful talents for healing, stop at 20 points in holy. Several of the talents beyond Illumination are quite nice, but for the most part are not necessary on every paladin your raid brings. So, if a paladin wanted to spec 41ret/20 holy for usability outside raiding, they could still provide a benefit to the raid force as long as they focused on healing, and only attacking enough to keep the crusader buff up against the target.

Vazu · 09/04/06, 8:18 AM

In a 25-man raid with 10 healers, how many Retnoobs are guilds gonna want?

I'm gunna go with exactly zero.

Rz · 09/04/06, 9:25 AM

Originally Posted by Vazu

In a 25-man raid with 10 healers, how many Retnoobs are guilds gonna want?

I'm gunna go with exactly zero.

Thank you for your utterly pointless assertion.

The fact is that in a 25 man raid, if instead of taking a straight damage class, a "Retnoob" can give every damage class +2% crit and make up the remaining damage gap themselves, in addition to providing an aura to a group and emergency healing, then the answer is probably "always 1."

Judia · 09/04/06, 10:16 AM

When will paladins learn that Paladins will never be a dps class.
Please stop trying to say "Well if I do 90% of the dps of a rogue I should be brought to dps". The minute you start thinkign of your paladin in terms of being a one-dimensional class, or that your role will be "Do as much damage as I can and nothing else" you are underplaying your class.

Ignore the numbers and understand that using less than 1/3rd of your class abilities means you are not contributing as much as someone who manages to use 100% of his class.

Paladins, Druids, Priests, Shaman will never be a dps class. They will always be brought because of everything else their class offers, because every single class in wow can deal damage, and therefore it is all the abilities OUTSIDE of your damage that makes you worth bringing.

Rz · 09/04/06, 10:26 AM

Originally Posted by Judia

When will paladins learn that Paladins will never be a dps class.

I am not and never have been a paladin.

Originally Posted by Judia

Please stop trying to say "Well if I do 90% of the dps of a rogue I should be brought to dps". The minute you start thinkign of your paladin in terms of being a one-dimensional class

The irony here is that this is exactly what people are trying to do. They are trying to figure out if it is possible contribute damage effectively and provide buffs, and heal in a pinch, or if this is mathematically feasible.

Originally Posted by Judia

Ignore the numbers

I think this is your cue to leave these forums.

Originally Posted by Judia

and understand that using less than 1/3rd of your class abilities means you are not contributing as much as someone who manages to use 100% of his class.

Healbot Holy paladins don't use their Ret abilities. Please explain.

Mendoza · 09/04/06, 10:44 AM

Originally Posted by Judia

Paladins, Druids, Priests, Shaman will never be a dps class. They will always be brought because of everything else their class offers, because every single class in wow can deal damage, and therefore it is all the abilities OUTSIDE of your damage that makes you worth bringing.

It seems to me that you're being as short sighted as the people you're criticising. Ignoring the dps a hybrid can bring to a raid is as bad as focusing purely on dps. It seems pretty clear from the new talent trees that Blizz is really trying to give each tree a role in a raid environment (hopefully to the point where the most diverse raids are the most effective).

Is a ret paladin inferior dps to a pure dps class. Of course. Hopefully by a large margin if it's balanced. But whilst they're doing their sub-par dps they're also boosting overall raid dps with their talents, providing blessings and an aura, and can heal / tank / use their other abilities as required. This should make their overall raid contribution as strong as any other class / spec. This is however, all dependant on using their large range of abilities intelligently and at the correct time. I expect all the healer hybrids expecting to be always dpsing once they spec ele / ret etc will be in for a shock, but that dps will still form a significant proportion of their raid activity.

Rho · 09/04/06, 11:21 AM

The important things a pally brings to a raid remain constant regardless of spec, just like most other classes. You still have the important blessings and auras no matter what tree you go down. It's really just a simple question, is the dps of your raid more important or is the healing(probably changes based on encounter). No a pally isn't a pure dps class. But they could do decent dps, boost raid dps, and still give devotion/kings/wisdom/salvation/all the things you bring a pally for. They're just not tweaked to support as much as a holy pally is.

Fizil · 09/04/06, 11:40 AM

A Paladin having to generate 70% of the DPS of normal DPSers to be viable is simply wrong. You are assuming that the 41-point Ret Paladin completely ignores all their other class skills, in favor of DPSing. Keeping Crusader judged is not a fulltime job. This Paladin SHOULD be in hybrid gear, keeping an eye on the health of other melee and spot healing, cleansing, making sure Blessings are refreshed, etc... Of course, going 41-points in Ret means he gets to do this while hitting the mobs.

The question isn't whether the Paladin should take up a DPS slot, but whether it will make sense to have those sort of Hybrid slots in the raid. Does the damage the 41-point Paladin add to the raid make up for the loss of efficiency and focus on healing.

Eej · 09/04/06, 11:44 AM

I think the main problem is you're saying that 2% crit is the end all damage debuff (it's not) and that for some reason, a Paladin would be allowed to just autoattack and recast Seals/Judge the boss. Maybe many fights will require you to be spamming cleanse and heal other people, that will cut into your autoattack timer. Maybe there will be fights with 20% enrages which requires DPS to burn... what's a Retardin gonna do then? As long as they don't have proper styled attacks and a decent haste ability, Paladins are going to be substandard dps.

Make em do what they're best at, which is keeping JoW up, cleansing and healing people with their infinite mana supply. Oh, and I guess off-tanking in the xpack.

Savos · 09/04/06, 11:45 AM

10 Heal, 15 DPS/Tank?

I'd guess 8 (or even 7 healers), 2 Tanks and 15-16 DPS for your generalized group. ZG and AQ20 are good with 7 healers in pretty gimpy equipment. Scaling it up to top end stuff you can get by with the same number, and with the current DPS > * sort of encounter design you will probably be hurting yourself if you bring too many healers.

Rz · 09/04/06, 11:59 AM

Originally Posted by Eej

I think the main problem is you're saying that 2% crit is the end all damage debuff (it's not) and that for some reason, a Paladin would be allowed to just autoattack and recast Seals/Judge the boss. Maybe many fights will require you to be spamming cleanse and heal other people, that will cut into your autoattack timer. Maybe there will be fights with 20% enrages which requires DPS to burn... what's a Retardin gonna do then? As long as they don't have proper styled attacks and a decent haste ability, Paladins are going to be substandard dps.

Make em do what they're best at, which is keeping JoW up, cleansing and healing people with their infinite mana supply. Oh, and I guess off-tanking in the xpack.

Eh, Judgment basically is a proper styled attack. And with Empowered Judgment it's free.

No one is saying that Paladins are going to be doing rogue-style dps or that 2% crit automatically means every raid will have a Ret paladin slot. Instead we are trying to figure out what level of DPS a Paladin would have to do in order to be effective.

What's interesting is that the new core skill Consecrate by itself does base 74 dps (81 with Sanctity Aura, which has definite raid potential even outside of Paladin DPS) and is about 40% more DPM efficient than the old, talented Consecrate. And don't forget Avenging Wrath, though it's something of a bandaid.

One paladin DPS problem is threat generation - paladins get no aggro shedding skills (unless you count Divine Shield, maybe?) so the fact that they can impute a large portion of "their dps" to other classes by adding a major debuff is a good thing.

If you accept the idea of DPS paladins at all, which I'm not sure I do. I don't see how it would come up from a design perspective if you've already decided to make paladins major offtanks and major healers.

Judia · 09/04/06, 12:20 PM

Originally Posted by Rz

Instead we are trying to figure out what level of DPS a Paladin would have to do in order to be effective.

No, the OP is trying to work out what level of DPS he needs to attain to justify him doing nothing but DPS in a raid.

The argument goes
"I do 70% of the dps of a rogue, and I add 30% of another rogue through my judgement. Therefore I provide 100% of the damage as a rogue and justify my role in the raid by doing nothing but dpsing full time."

This is the same argument used for LotP or OOMkin: "Hey look I do 85% the damage of the rogue and I add 4% to 4 more damage classess" (1% crit is a bit more than 1% damage)

You will never justify your position in a raid by focusing entirely on your dps output as a paladin. I could spec 41 ret and keep up the judgement wearing healbot gear, I dont question you dcould keep the jdugement up, autoattack a bit, clense, buff and heal at the same time but that isnt what the OP is trying to argue. He is argueing that if he wears nothing but str/agi/crit gear and does 70% of the dps of a rogue he has justified his place in the raid to do nothing but DPS.

Hence my original reply.

Demetrius · 09/04/06, 12:53 PM

Let's look at this more wholistically:

Should I have 1 of my 3 pallies (who are providing the pally raid buffs of kings, might/wisdom, light/salv) also provide sanctified crusader? He would also spec for improved sanctity aura ... so he would be giving the entire raid a 2% crit increase and the MT group a 6% healing increase. He could spec 20 points in healing and be a decent healer when needed and contribute to dps when needed. I think the answer is ... yes. Now the question is ... what shall I have him doing while swinging at the main target at least every 10 seconds.

In the 3 pally configuration, the only class that gets blessing of light is warriors. Does it make sense to have Paladins healing the raid without blessing of light or do you want your pallies focussing on healing the warriors? The paladin will be losing +115 on flash of light or +400 on holy light at lvl 60, maybe more at lvl 70. I have seen some analysis that says with the Paladin's increased mana efficiency and decreased time to cast holy light (from 2.5 to 2.0 sec) that the paladin is now the most mana efficient AND is competitive in healing/second on a single target ... so perhaps you may want to put 2/3 paladins on single target healing of the MTs while the priests and druids are spread out in healing the party and helping with the MT healing. What do you want to do with the 3rd paladin? He can either heal at 2/3 of the capacity of the holy pallies or he can dps at 2/3 of the capacity of the dps classes ... perhaps have him switch back and forth as needed? He has to focus on one role or the other in his talent selection. So does this pally go 20/0/41 and heal or go 5/11/45 and dps? It seems to me it is worth exploring the idea to have him max out dps since he has 41 points in the paladin dps tree!

Some more questions: Will Blessing of Sanctuary get a buff? If so, will we want to work that buff into the mix? Will paladin tanking really be needed? If so, will the 41 point talent be required?

I think raids will be more challenged to think these things through with 25 man raid caps and 9 classes instead of 8 classes. This will cause the hybrid classes to step it up in terms of healing/dps/tanking in certain encounters ... or it will reduce the need for hybrid classes ... it all depends. However, the paladin's raid wide blessings will be needed so I would think you will need 3 paladins in every 25 man raid... and paladins will need to learn to be more focussed on their role (dps, healing, tanking) if they are going to make an impact... for the efficiency of the pure dps/tanking/healing classes will go up.

I think some of you need to expand your thinking, and think ahead a bit. Noobs. ;) Feel free to comment and correct my thinking... that is what I am here for.

Rz · 09/04/06, 12:57 PM

Originally Posted by Judia

Originally Posted by Rz

Instead we are trying to figure out what level of DPS a Paladin would have to do in order to be effective.

No, the OP is trying to work out what level of DPS he needs to attain to justify him doing nothing but DPS in a raid.

The argument goes
"I do 70% of the dps of a rogue, and I add 30% of another rogue through my judgement. Therefore I provide 100% of the damage as a rogue and justify my role in the raid by doing nothing but dpsing full time."

This is the same argument used for LotP or OOMkin: "Hey look I do 85% the damage of the rogue and I add 4% to 4 more damage classess" (1% crit is a bit more than 1% damage)

You will never justify your position in a raid by focusing entirely on your dps output as a paladin. I could spec 41 ret and keep up the judgement wearing healbot gear, I dont question you dcould keep the jdugement up, autoattack a bit, clense, buff and heal at the same time but that isnt what the OP is trying to argue. He is argueing that if he wears nothing but str/agi/crit gear and does 70% of the dps of a rogue he has justified his place in the raid to do nothing but DPS.

Hence my original reply.

Yeah, because when a Paladin starts dpsing he automatically turns off all his auras and can't use any blessings and loses his lay on hands and can't heal if someone asks him too.

Look, you're stuck a mindset that might not be relevant anymore come the expansion. If you have 3 each of 9 classes (minus two of any) you're going to have AT LEAST 10-12 combined Druids, Priests, Shamans, and Paladins. They don't all need to be healing nonstop. Some of them can actually be doing other things!

So you're going to say, then why bring them? Why not bring 4 Rogues and 2 Paladins instead of 3 Rogues and 3 Paladins?

Well, if it turns out that 2 Holy Paladins, 1 Ret Paladins and 3 Rogues is more DPS than 4 Rogues and 2 Holy Paladins, then maybe you should bring a Ret paladin. And I think Blizzard is trying to make exactly that happen.

So stop being so shortsighted about this topic. It's a valid question to investigate.