◊ madsushi

I'd like to have a discussion on the upcoming changes, and how we'll be able to manage real-world example without being crushed by the weight of the Illumination nerf.

Here's a simple list of 3.2 changes:

Mana and Regeneration:

• -20% Replenishment nerf (1% mana every 5 seconds instead of 0.25% mana every second)
• +25% MP5 buff (+25% more MP5 on gear)
• -5% total Intellect (Divine Intellect talent now only goes to 10%)
• Illumination now only returns 30% of the base mana cost instead of 60%.

Throughput:

• 10-50% bonus due to casting Holy Light on raid targets instead of the tank.
• Beacon's range extended to 60 yards.
• Flash of Light HoT on Sacred Shielded targets (even Ret/Prot SS's) improves FoL healing by 100% if the HoT doesn't overheal.

Misc:

• Improved LoH now reduces the target's incoming physical damage by 20%, providing Yet Another Damage Reduction CD.

ADDED:

• Paladin T9 Holy 2P Bonus (Judgement) - Increases the duration of your Judgements by 10.01 sec.
• Paladin T9 Holy 4P Bonus (Holy Light) - Increases the critical strike chance of your Holy Light spell by 5%.
• Paladin T9 Holy Relic (Judgement) - Each time you use a Judgement, you have a chance to gain 234 spell power for 20 sec.

New T9 Sets:
There's 3 tiers:

• 10m regular - http://static.mmo-champion.com/mmoc/..._spell_232.jpg
• 10m Hard / 25m regular - http://static.mmo-champion.com/mmoc/...pell_245_2.jpg
• 25m Hard - http://static.mmo-champion.com/mmoc/..._spell_258.jpg

My first thought on the Illumination nerf vs Beacon buff is that we're trading 319 mana per Holy Light crit (with 50% Holy Crit), which equates to increasing the cost of Holy Light by 160 mana per cast, or about 10%. However, the amount of healing done by Holy Light is being increased by 10-50% if used with the Holy Light glyph because we'll be casting it on targets with people in range of the glyph.

What we're seeing is a huge increase in the potential healing from HL (50% or even higher if they allow healing multipliers like Quick Recovery) for a slight increase in the mana cost of HL. Unfortunately, much of this healing will be lost to overheal as it has been in the past. It does allow us to cast Holy Lights onto the raid, where if fully effective, we'll be getting 250% one Holy Light's healing, and if none of the original HL's targets were low, we still get 100% effectiveness. Previously, we would see 200% healing from HL on two tank targets with a Beacon, or a paltry 0% if the original HL target was at full life. This is the key change, healing with a target Beaconed are now guaranteed to heal the Beacon at least 100% of the original heal, while still providing 150% of the HL as raid healing via the HL and its glyph.

By allowing us to never target the tank for heals, we're boosting our total HPS by a significant amount. Imagine Beaconing the tank and only casting heals on yourself. The tank always stays up, but you can now provide the HL Glyph to a ranged group. On Loatheb, your HL glyph can now keep the ranged group up while also healing the MT. By choosing the right target to heal INSTEAD of the Beacon, our HL Glyph is now quite a bit more effective as we can choose who benefits from it.

I would suggest picking up both the Holy Light and Beacon of Light glyphs for 3.2, as Blizzard sees these two are being key to our healing balance. I'd also suggest Seal of Wisdom, as our healing done is going to skyrocket and we will need SoW to assist with any mana issues we encounter with the reduce amount of Illumination. I see my individual healing rotation and spell choice remaining much the same, except I will simply be casting fewer Holy Lights (and spells in general). I won't be using FoL outside of specific situations and to keep up a HoT on my shielded target, and I will still use HL primarily. If we're getting 250% healing out of each HL, I think our total HLs required is going to drop significantly.

On the topic of damage reduction CDs, Paladins will now have acccess to a 20% Physical damage reduction CD with Improved Lay On Hands. This, coupled with Hand of Sacrifice and Divine Sacrifice, will allow Paladins to really control the flow of damage into our tanks and make it easier for tanks to control their own cooldown usage.

Any thoughts or math on the Illumination or Beacon changes that you would like to share? I will be posting some of my personal WWS/WOL reports, and breaking down exactly how much mana I'll be losing to the Illumination nerf and what we can do to counteract it.

Author of the Rogue column on WoW.com: Encrypted Text

 

Jackinthegreen

If you're going to add a list of the regen changes, you should have added what exactly happened to Illumination too.. Just for completeness' sake.

 

◊ madsushi

Thanks, and fixed.

On the topic of the set bonuses, it appears that the 2pc bonus is incredibly uninteresting. Also, the 4pc bonus is weaker than both of our previous 4pc bonuses, especially in light of the Illumination nerf. I don't see myself moving to either of these set bonuses unless the itemization is perfect.

The relic looks to provide 200+ spellpower with (hopefully) reasonable uptime, but I believe the value of the HL libram is still to high to warrant switching to the T9 libram. Our HPS has always been excellent and is being buffed considerably, whereas our mana situation looks to be the only touchy area. I see this new Libram getting sharded quite a bit.

Author of the Rogue column on WoW.com: Encrypted Text

 

tiberion02

Odd combinations on the T9 bonuses. Adding 2(.01?) seconds on your judgements seems like a very minor bonus compared to say.... 4pc T8. And a very generic +5% crit for HL in the same patch where they are obviously trying to tune down our HL casting, seems somewhat perplexing.

Borderlands: tiberion02, add me.

 

◊ madsushi

I believe it's 10 seconds to the duration of Judgement, though keeping a Judgement up has never been an issue for me. Even then, it doesn't provide any actual buff to the Judgement itself. Looking at the Prot Paladin bonus of -2 seconds off of Righteous Defense's CD, I guess we should be happy with something. I haven't been GCD locked like that for quite some time. The 5% crit bonus is even weaker than the -5% cost bonus from T7, and so it seems that our 4pc bonuses have been declining in quality. I am interested to see if our gear will be completely itemized with MP5/Haste as we've been seeing on much of our Ulduar plate.

Author of the Rogue column on WoW.com: Encrypted Text

 

• frmorrison

# Item - Paladin T9 Holy 2P Bonus (Judgement) - Increases the duration of your Judgements by 10.01 sec.

That is there so whatever judgement is cast, its bonus lasts 50% longer (increasing Judgement duration used to be a deep Holy talent). While it doesn't help direct healing, it adds utility.

While 5% crit is a strange bonus with crit nerfed, Pallies will still cast Holy Light and use the ilevel 200 badge HL cost libram (unless they are trying sheathadin spec, then use the PvP libram).

DK - Ashbane Failure is the condiment that gives success its flavor.

 

◊ madsushi

With Judgement of Light now scaling off of player health instead of SP/AP, it may fall on us Holy Paladins to keep up JoL, though I typically judge more often than I should (almost every CD).

Author of the Rogue column on WoW.com: Encrypted Text

 

tiberion02

Yea both bonuses are usable, but it just seems they are just weak in general. However, I guess we would need to see the general usefulness of other classes' sets to see if they are just being downranked in overall strength.

Borderlands: tiberion02, add me.

 

Jackinthegreen

Source: MMO-Champion - World of Warcraft Guides and Raid Strategies

Paladin
* Paladin T9 Holy 2P Bonus (Judgement) (Class: Paladin) -- Increases the duration of your Judgements by 101 sec.
* Paladin T9 Holy 4P Bonus (Holy Light) (Class: Paladin) -- Increases the critical strike chance of your Holy Light spell by 5%.

* Paladin T9 Holy Relic (Judgement) (Class: Paladin) -- Each time you use a Judgement, you have a chance to gain 234 spell power for 20 sec.


I'm assuming they have a typo on the judgements and it is meant to be 10 seconds. Of course, even if it was actually upped by 101 seconds it wouldn't really be useful except in PvP where doing JoJ can really screw with people.

2pc, not really useful to us unless we really need to have that extra 10 seconds for people to get more mana or health.

4pc... What the heck? Is this "compensation" or something for the Illumination nerf? It is comparable to our talent that adds 6% crit chance to HL and HS, but it's really underwhelming given our previous 4pc bonuses.

Relic: Kinda counter-intuitive with our bonus.. If the judgement lasts longer, we have less reason to use it. But if the relic proc is from the judgement, we have more reason to use it. In short, screw that, I'm sticking with my [Libram of Renewal] because I'd prefer to keep as much mana as I can while still healing whoever I need to.


Edit: Looking at the overall bonuses.. I'd say half are good, and half are crappy. DK DPS for instance will LOVE the strength and chance to crit on two of the diseases.. Warlocks on the other hand probably aren't going to notice the pet crits much, and the periodic bonus damage looks like it needs to be reworded or something.

 

• frmorrison

Rets still should have Divinity (at least I plan to), so that extra 5% can add up, so they would judge it (unless another Paladin had Divinity as well), and 100% uptime is nice. JoW doesn't need 100% uptime, 50% is fine.

I would likely still spec 51/0/20 in 3.3, since the crit and 10% cheaper instants is nicer to me than 5% healing, raid-wall, and better SS.

DK - Ashbane Failure is the condiment that gives success its flavor.

 

Justizia

This is exactly what I thought when I read this- since the developers have been quoted as saying that they want to get us away from spamming HL and more into using SS+FoL, this seems like a very counter-intuitive set bonus. I was expecting to see something more focused around the SS or FoL mechanics.

 

◊ madsushi

There's been a lot of talk about these being "placeholder" bonuses, let's hope there's more in store as the PTR unfolds. The bonuses for several other classes are "buggy", as well.

Author of the Rogue column on WoW.com: Encrypted Text

 

Mox

Unless they fix bubble+DS you're basically giving up 100-150k "free" effective healing for every fight that is worth discussing (aka hardmodes). Combined with illumination nerf, can't see any reason to spec into ret myself.

 

SalleyNW

Quite weird new 2p bonus and very unwelcome RNG relic, not very interested in either.

2p - Generally i judge more then i should mostly everytime when i move, problem is however we have 2 very active ret paladins and we raid with 2/3 holy aswell. This bonus will completly goto waste in my raids sadly. (and i'm quite sure in many others too)

4p - Solid bonus i guess, in the same patch we are pushed away from HL spam, we get something that compliments it. Weird but not complaining.

Libram - I always found RNG to be extremly counter productive as healer and if anything frustrating, stuff likes to proc on phase changes, 10 seconds before pulls or just when you are running away from a fire. Personally i will never use this other then ilevel boost. Also as Jack said, it contradicts the 2p bonus.

All in all we should be in pretty good shape, not like now but it's looking up to be quite fun, cant wait to see the exact mechanics behind the FoL HoT and beacon. Hoping the bonusses are either wrong or changed though.

 

Justizia

I am curious if the FoL HoT is stackable- either with multiple casts made by the same paladin, or if 2 paladins cast it on the same tank if they will stack with each other. We run with 2 or even sometimes 3 holy paladins in a 25 man raid, so if they do stack at least with each other's, that would be good to know.

Although I am still not that excited about the fact that the HoT is over 12 seconds, it just seems like the HoT ticks would be pretty negligible on a tank, in much the same way that a mp5 gem is negligible to our mana pool.

 

SalleyNW

Afaik it would be a single FoL hot per paladin per target. Stacking the hot would be awesome, or even rolling but GC recently posted it won't do either.

"It stacks with other paladins. You can’t built a stack with it. You will reset the HoT if you keep spamming it. The goal is to get paladins to use both HL and FoL. FoL currently isn’t getting enough use, so we added this extra bonus for it to work with SS." - Link to post

Guess the idea behind it is kinda to keep the FoL hot running while healing the raid and not completely neglect healing the tank, the effectiveness remains to be seen and will deped mostly on the encounter. Or simply alternate between spamming HL in some situations.

 

• frmorrison

GC already said the HoT caused by Flash with the SS buff would not stack with the HoT or with other Flash HoTs. However that could change in a future PTR, Sheath's HoT stacks for each time to procs and every Paladin gets their own Sheath HoT.

At least Beacon will stack.

e: fb

DK - Ashbane Failure is the condiment that gives success its flavor.

 

superfula

DS is still quite bugged. Some of the time it will only go up to 150% of my health, and other times it will tick for the full 10 seconds. I have come across many others who are seeing the same thing.

 

healbotftw

Sweet in 3.2 I can keep doing what I already do except I'm taking a huge regen hit

edit: almost forgot about the hot that will tick for like 1k on bosses with 25k whites

 

◊ madsushi

Added the new T9 sets, looks like it's SP and Crit on all gear, with 3 pieces of MP5 gear and 2 pieces of Haste gear. Also interesting to note the new Red Sockets and the SP bonus on all sockets.

Author of the Rogue column on WoW.com: Encrypted Text

 

Vethon

Not sure if any one has noticed, but the 258 items actually say they are Heroic items, where as the 232 and 245 items don't.

Could it actually be
232 = 10m Regular
245 = 25m Regular
258 = 10/25m Heroic

Could well be place holder so could change.

 

Zaroua

The new Libram doesn't have 100% proc chance, but it's still very high (seems to be over 50% at the very least, no scientific dataz to prove this though). The buff can refresh itself, though I haven't tested with 8 seconds Judgements to see if it refreshes there too.

I do think that the Libram is fairly worthless compared to -114 mana cost on Holy Light: the only two builds that would want the spell power over the huge decrease in mana cost of HL are Sheath and TbtL specs but neither of those builds have 40 yards Judgements.


Beacon of Light double dips with healing modifiers: healing Warlocks with Demon Armor and Cats with Nurturing Instinct proved this.

The new Flash of Light hot is reported in the combat log as "Zaroua's Sacred Shield heals target for X amount". The HoT buff is refreshed on a new FoL cast and it will not tick if FoL is cast before 3 seconds have ticked down: FoL spam means no HoT ticks. For the math impaired, my 7500 FoL crits were netting me 1800 ticks.


The way the new sets are itemized leaves a lot to be desired. With crit being greatly devalued, it's a real wonder why 4 of the 5 pieces have crit on them. However, as bad as the itemization is, the set is still ridiculously high ilvl and will most likely end up being an upgrade unless people decide to keep 4pcT8 (something I'm personally considering). Keep in mind that our T8.5 is ilvl 226 and that the 25 man set is ilvl245 - a whooping 19 levels difference.

As an example: going from T8.5 gloves to the ilvl245 gloves gives 14Stam/13Int/19SP/10Haste/5-6MP5 and a Yellow socket with 5SP bonus vs Red socket with 4 haste bonus.



As far as actual specs go, I did go for a TbtL build and I must say that the build has some serious potential to be overpowered on progression. You gain: the new broken-beyond-belief Ardent Defender which, in worst case scenario acts as a free Guardian Spirit a few times per encounter, 14% Stamina bonus, Spiritual Attunement (read: infinite mana, meaning SP/Crit/Haste gear would be best for this spec), 4 minute cooldown Divine Protection/Divine Shield which translates in more safe use of Divine Sacrifice and being able to put up Blessing of Sanctuary assuming a raid with 3 Paladins. Compared to Holy which gets 15% haste, 40 yards Judgements, Holy Shock, a far more potent Holy Light and Beacon of Light.

Now I don't expect Ardent Defender to go live as is, but if Blizzard is actually dumb enough to go through with it, then TbtL may very well be competitive. A constant stream of 9k+ Flash of Light crits, infinite mana and obnoxious survivability are very, very attractive for hard modes.

Dogma also claims that God has a sense of humor and at times presents Him as a joker of sorts, thus again lowering Him to human level. While I am certain God has a "sense of humor" since He gave it to us, I find it most difficult to believe He finds humor in sin since He will cast the unforgiven sinner into the lake of fire for eternity. Not very funny at all.

 

Varuk

So the new set is out, aaand it's our worst itemized set yet. I would wear the gloves. That's about it.

Some decent other loot though.

Head: http://static.mmo-champion.com/mmoc/...e/at_32_35.jpg
Bracers: http://static.mmo-champion.com/mmoc/...2_10026_16.jpg
Chest: http://static.mmo-champion.com/mmoc/...32_10026_5.jpg

Throw in the [Pauldrons of the Combatant] from Ulduar and the only tier slot missing is pants.

 

Cangiz

Blizzard clearly stated that they don't want us pallies spamming holy light.

So what I don't understand is:
1. The FoL Hot from Sacred Shield will not tick with FoL being spammed.
2. Our T9 4 Piece bonus.

As fast as I am concerned, not much has changed. We will have to time our divine pleas better, melee the boss whenever we can.

 

GwolfGarona

Yes but that 1k tick is a free (as in zero mana) heal that if you do SS+FoL+HL+HL+HL will tick 0.5 sec after your HL lands for each of those 3 HL. A free 3k heal there plus the 4th 1k tick will pop during the reapplication of SS.

In situations where HL lands just mliseconds after the tank dies you will wish that 1k tick was there (unless there is more then 999hp in overkill)

Also with the JoL buff (napkin math has this procing for ~200% vs current) you will get even more free healing. Need to test more to find any changes in proc rate.