I am very new to Paladins and am still learning how to optimize their efficiency for leveling, but what I am most interested in having is a PvP healer. Something that can outlast anyone else 1v1, but primarily for healing in a group.
This is what I've come up with so far. I have no idea how Righteous Fury would work out, having not had a chance to play around with it. Suggestions/Criticisms?
The paladin ability to outlast anyone else is a bit exaggerated 1v1, assuming you have equivalent gear. A lot of these paladin survival stories are involve paladins in Tier 3 outlasting 3 rogues in blues wailing away on them - well yeah, I wonder why. Now I'm not saying we aren't viable PvP healers or anything, but it is a bit overblown, and I think with some of the changes/gear you see on priests and druids, we might be in trouble. Basically we have no real instant heals (can't use LoH in arenas, and holy shock is too small to be effective), so it is theoretically possible to keep a paladin from ever casting a spell except for the 12 sec bubble window. Druids have swiftmend, rejuv, lifebloom, and NS; shaman have NS; priests have PWS, renew, CoH, and PoM.
As for 1v1, you probably don't want to worry too much about this situation. Let me explain. In these situations (again assuming equivalent gear), you can outlast many rogues, hunters, and warriors, even if you had spent 0 talent points. Against every single other class, it won't be nearly as easy. In other words, if you want to be able to win 1v1s against more than 2 classes, you are going to have to be in Ret gear. But since you are wanting to primarily focus on being the group healer, you are just going to have to live with the fact you are pretty crippled solo but excel in a group. For example:
Healers: If you aren't Ret spec, you can't kill a healer who is vaguely conscious. HoTs will outheal your damage, so you have to try and outlast their mana pool. It's impossible with priests, who will dispel/mana drain you, and pretty hard with druids, who can deal damage without blowing mana. If you just want to survive long enough for help to show up, then you can pull that off, but killing a healer 1v1 is very difficult without melee gear. Even in melee gear it is very reliant on crits.
Casters: Pretty similar to healers. It would seem that you could outlast casters purely by healing, but a good mage can easily kill you during the duration of a counterspell, and same with a warlock/felhunter. Shadow priests are easier since you can dispel their debuffs and they don't have a real interrupt, so they are much easier to outlast. The same applies for elemental shaman - you can heal easily enough between earthshocks that you can outlast their mana pool.
As for your build, you might want to dump a few points out of holy guidance to pick up more Blessed Life, and make sure you get make Imp Conc Aura. If you want to have a little offensive power, you could pick up Reckoning. Otherwise it looks pretty good.
Reckoning is maximized at all speeds 2.0 and slower. At 2.0 you are guaranteed to use all 4 swings, effectively giving you 8 extra seconds of melee damage whenever it procs. Faster weapons also get 4 swings always, giving you speed*4 extra seconds of melee damage. Slower weapons will average out to 8 extra seconds of swing time no matter the speed. For example, a 3.0 weapon will always get 2 swings, and 2/3rds of the time get a 3rd swing, depending on when during your attack cooldown you get hit. 2 2/3 * 3.0 = 8.
I don't want to start developing formulas, but it seems to me that Seal of Blood would be more DPS than Seal of Command if your weapon is 3.4 or faster? Anyone know how it compares to SoC or SoR using faster weapons like 2 to 3 speed?
Also, someone mentioned Defense 'deactivating' while casting, which I don't get. Can you parry or block while casting? If not, that would certainly change my heroic/arena spec:
Unless I am completely misunderstanding the way Reckoning works, it goes off when you get hit, not when you hit them, which means that a 2.0 weapon will practically never get four swings during Reckoning's duration but that is what is continually suggested:
At 2.0 you are guaranteed to use all 4 swings
Originally Posted by CheshireCat
Eh, my nostalgia goggles aren't as good as they used to be.
Swing at 1 second in, 3 seconds, 5 seconds, 7 seconds for example. A 2.0 and faster will always get four swings. A 2.0 and slower will get an average of 8 seconds of double damage.
I'm wondering what would people consider to be the best spec for a raid tanking paladin? We anticipate having one paladin certainly for aoe tanking, and possibly for MT tanking on some bosses (let's say a really aggro sensitive demon/undead boss where pally threat should be crazy compared to anyone else). We're not sure how good a pally is/if we'd want our pally tank to be one of our primary tanks (on lvl with prot wars and bear druids above non-prot wars), but we're planning on making one spec completely for raid tanking and seeing how it goes.
The pally tanking specs seem a bit out of whack to me however, as the 31+ prot talents are more dps then tanking talents. Ardent defender may sound good on paper but I don't know how useful it would really be (if you get taken below 20% to something like 10% I'd think most raid mobs would 1 shot you, 50% less damage or not), and weapon expertise is... silly? Avengers shield looks like more of a 5-man tanking thing then a raid move because of the high CD and cast time, and that you likely won't be tanking more then 1 mob. It's not bad, but worth giving up sanctity aura for? Doesn't seem that way to me.
It seems like the best spec would be something like 31 prot, rest ret to get imp. sanct aura for yourself,increased parry, and all the damage increases that will help your threat. If it turns out that even with such a spec and the right gear pallies are bad MT's I guess we'd go 31 prot/rest holy for an aoe tank+decent healer otherwise, but I'd like to first see how well a pally can tank when he really tries.
Any suggestions on raid tanking in light of all that?
Swing at 1 second in, 3 seconds, 5 seconds, 7 seconds for example. A 2.0 and faster will always get four swings. A 2.0 and slower will get an average of 8 seconds of double damage.
Gah you're right, I have it screwed up, I wasn't counting the "zero" mark as a swing. Why didn't you point that out on the last page :P
Originally Posted by CheshireCat
Eh, my nostalgia goggles aren't as good as they used to be.
I don't want to start developing formulas, but it seems to me that Seal of Blood would be more DPS than Seal of Command if your weapon is 3.4 or faster? Anyone know how it compares to SoC or SoR using faster weapons like 2 to 3 speed?
It all depends on how much spell damage you have on your gear. For example, SoB is always better than SoC, no matter what the weapon speed is, if you don't have any. In melee gear, SoR/SoC starts pulling ahead at about 350. In caster gear, there's no reason to ever use SoB.
Originally Posted by Kasonic
Also, someone mentioned Defense 'deactivating' while casting, which I don't get. Can you parry or block while casting? If not, that would certainly change my heroic/arena spec:
You can't dodge, parry, nor block while casting.
Originally Posted by Kasonic
http://www.wowhead.com/?talent=aVxhMgd0eshqMtc0hz
You think Spell Warding is worth dropping two points in Toughness?
or maybe this, but I don't like sacrificing the quick Holy Lights:
Whichever you go with, I'd drop 3 points from Shield Spec and put it into Imp RF. 6% reduction from all damage is too good to pass up if you're that deep into Prot.
I've heard base only, same with the +12% healing talent.
That was changed in 2.0, along with all the other healing talents. Unfortunately, Imp. SoR is still base, making it almost entirely worthless, unless you are leveling a pally as Holy 1-50(before spell dmg plate starts appearing).
As for raid tanking, you you have to put so many points in early prot to get full mitigation I really think it's best just to go 41+ in prot, and grab deflection in ret and go no further. ATM I'm 9/50/0 or something like that, not really what I planned to spec, just how it happened. Ardent Defender is underrated; I can't claim experience in BC raids yet, but it's definitely saved my life a few times on hard hitting 5 man bosses. Right now at 68 I've got around 10k-11k hp buffed up in tank gear, which means I could potentially("best case") absorb a 3998 hit at 1999 hp(don't forget the likelihood that you will also be shielded if something should drop you to <20%). The talent, though certainly a little weak for raid bosses, does scale well with your stamina and also performs the important task of making paladins SEEM to be very good mitigators on trash. One of the priests in my guild swears I am easier to keep up than our guild's MT; I'm sure math would prove him wrong but social impressions are still important for paladins at this point in time. As for avenger's shield, it rules for trash, and even on bosses, giving yourself a huge aggro spike on the pull is something many warriors wish they could do(and now can, if a hunter uses misdirection- but we'll still have more).
I picked up ardent defender since I guess vengeacne won't do much for threat with tanking gear crit. I can't see how avenger's shield could possibly be better then imp. sanctity aura though-> you're getting both more threat and extra healing.
Hell, I never even noticed they changed the Imp RF talent. That's amazing now.
It all depends on how much spell damage you have on your gear. For example, SoB is always better than SoC, no matter what the weapon speed is, if you don't have any. In melee gear, SoR/SoC starts pulling ahead at about 350. In caster gear, there's no reason to ever use SoB.
Not sure I understand why. Does SoB not receive any +dmg coefficients, or what?
When you consider a paladin tank that just started raiding, you will probably won't be equivlent to a T3 warrior in terms of gear. And if you wanna be self sufficient as well (Not rely on a retribution paladin to provide you with Sanctity) your best bet will be this build:
The real question of course is if Vindication is actually a usefull debuff or not in a raid enviroment. I really doubt it so might as well get some crits up for a bit more aggro.
Now after aquiring some decent gear and get enough defense to become crit immune without the need for talents, it will be quite usefull to drop points from Anticaption and get Stoicism and Precision. But when starting out I feel that 20 more defense rating will be crucial.
Another interesting talent is 1h Speciliazation, which actually ups your SoR damage, but I have decided not to take it mainly because I just don't use SoR while tanking. I find SoV to be a superior tanking seal, a Horde tanking paladin will most likely want to throw some points into it because SoR will be his seal of choice. But for Alliance, this is probably the best build for tanking paladins in raid.
Mind you a build like this will probably eliminate any chance of you solo healing any 5 men instance, Spiritual Focus is such an amazing talent that it made it possible for me to solo heal some instances (Mind you not the level 70 ones) with a prot build.
Also, someone mentioned Defense 'deactivating' while casting, which I don't get. Can you parry or block while casting? If not, that would certainly change my heroic/arena spec:
You can't dodge, parry, nor block while casting.
You can't block (as you put your shield on your back), can't parry (as you quickly sheathe your weapon) but I'm pretty sure you can still dodge while casting. Dodge however is probably the least of your defenses as an arena healing paladin (or a shaman, since they're right there in the same boat with you).
Hell, I never even noticed they changed the Imp RF talent. That's amazing now.
It all depends on how much spell damage you have on your gear. For example, SoB is always better than SoC, no matter what the weapon speed is, if you don't have any. In melee gear, SoR/SoC starts pulling ahead at about 350. In caster gear, there's no reason to ever use SoB.
Not sure I understand why. Does SoB not receive any +dmg coefficients, or what?
The seal doesn't, but the judgement does.
Personally I'm not too impressed SoB either considering that every type of Paladin wants to pick up at least a reasonable amount of spell damage.
When you consider a paladin tank that just started raiding, you will probably won't be equivlent to a T3 warrior in terms of gear. And if you wanna be self sufficient as well (Not rely on a retribution paladin to provide you with Sanctity) your best bet will be this build:
The real question of course is if Vindication is actually a usefull debuff or not in a raid enviroment. I really doubt it so might as well get some crits up for a bit more aggro.
Now after aquiring some decent gear and get enough defense to become crit immune without the need for talents, it will be quite usefull to drop points from Anticaption and get Stoicism and Precision. But when starting out I feel that 20 more defense rating will be crucial.
Another interesting talent is 1h Speciliazation, which actually ups your SoR damage, but I have decided not to take it mainly because I just don't use SoR while tanking. I find SoV to be a superior tanking seal, a Horde tanking paladin will most likely want to throw some points into it because SoR will be his seal of choice. But for Alliance, this is probably the best build for tanking paladins in raid.
Mind you a build like this will probably eliminate any chance of you solo healing any 5 men instance, Spiritual Focus is such an amazing talent that it made it possible for me to solo heal some instances (Mind you not the level 70 ones) with a prot build.
I don't think there is ever a time 20 defense is not worth your 5 talent points. To become crit immune to a level 73 mob you need 490 defense(+140). That extra 20 defense means at the cap you can put stam gems on instead of stam/def; further, 20 defense is always 2.4% avoidance (dodge+parry+miss) and .8% block.
As for SoV, are you really using it for tanking? It's way to slow for trash, and I find it falls off bosses all too frequently(stun/fear/blink/etc = gg). I pretty much only use it when soloing.
SoV works decently well for bosses in static situations where you have a good guarantee that you can keep hitting it repeatedly, and it's nice for some de-aggroing bosses so that the DoT ticks get you aggro back after it's wiped.. It also works better with a slower on-hander. SoR is better just about everywhere else, and it's miles and miles better on multi-mob pulls. It also scales better with gear, so it seems likely that SoV will be relegated increasingly to niche applications as gear improves.
Also, Guybrush, do you really find Sanctity Aura indispensible? Granted I haven't been past the 5-mans but I've really never had any trouble holding aggro with a 41-Prot build, even when I don't get to open with a shield toss.
My comrades are my weapons, and I am their shield.
I had some interesting experiences with the new Righteous Fury (all holy spells), and wondered if anyone had shared them. I respecced out of my levellng build into mostly holy, with prot up to Imp. Righteous Fury. I kept it up the whole evening during Karazhan, and become a lightning rod for trash. If there was a stray mob, it was on me, quite strongly, as I continued to heal. During Moroes, we had an OT tanking 2 of the mobs, and I actually pulled the 2nd mob off him after awhile while healing. Moreover, Moroes would beeline for me whenever he gouged the tank, it got to the point where the MT would just come and stand next to me with Moroes. I also heal-tanked Ushers prior to Opera, they'd come to me after the tank got frozen with a single exorcism, and I'd heal myself (and get healed, ow ow) while people DPS'd. This lightning rod for aggro effect naturally resulted in my premature death a couple times, but it seemed borderline overpowered that I could function as a stray sponge with little/no effort.
This lightning rod for aggro effect naturally resulted in my premature death a couple times, but it seemed borderline overpowered that I could function as a stray sponge with little/no effort.
I wouldn't really say that this is overpowered for two reasons:
1) Since you continue to heal, you will not be able to avoid the mobs' hits barring misses (and crits if you carry some Def).
2) In your role as healer you are geared for healing which increases the amount of healing you can do and your HP/s.
If you go with Prot gear in either case you will not be as good at healing as before due to the low healing stamina and if you stop healing you lose your healing capability and you just become a "normal tank".
Either way you are making trade offs in damage taken or utility so I wouldn't call it overpowered. :)
I thought I posted this but I guess the forums ate it: how does Crusader Aura actually work? Is it multiplicative or additive, and does it affect flying mounts?
Originally Posted by CheshireCat
Eh, my nostalgia goggles aren't as good as they used to be.
I thought I posted this but I guess the forums ate it: how does Crusader Aura actually work? Is it multiplicative or additive, and does it affect flying mounts?
It doesn't stack with carrrot on a stick and all that other mount speed increasing items.
It should affect flying mounts, since it is still a mount.
Millions of words are written annually purporting to tell how to beat the races, whereas the best possible advice on the subject is found in the three monosyllables: 'Do not try.'
I thought I posted this but I guess the forums ate it: how does Crusader Aura actually work? Is it multiplicative or additive, and does it affect flying mounts?
It doesn't stack with carrrot on a stick and all that other mount speed increasing items.
It should affect flying mounts, since it is still a mount.
Does this mean that the new trinket, Riding Crop (10% increased mount speed), does not stack with Crusader aura for flying/normal mounts?
If that is the case, I'm no longer going to go for the trinket...
Comparing the speed of a flying mount over a fixed distance (from one wall to the other near the Mana Tombs) the elapsed distance traveled with the flying mount gained some speed over a standard mount. The effect was viewable and apparent by the midpoint crater, implying a speed increase greater then 5% given this simple test of a linear rate of velocity. Both mounts were tested with both the 60% and Artisan mount speeds, without any other extra buff to + riding other then the aura.
On another note, the ground speed of a flying mount appears to be the same speed as their land counterparts. 60% for the ghetto one on both land and air.
I hope this is the correct topic for this kind of question, didnt want to make a new one:
I'm a leveling blood elf paladin, my old main used to be a shaman. I think I have the healing aspect pretty much covered, but I fail miserably at my gear choice for soloing. Pre 60 I didnt have much choice and just went with the str/sta/agi warrior loot, but now I'm being overloaded with stuff that that str, int, sta, agi, +dmg, mp5..
01/24/07, 9:56 AM
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