Hello my dear Highlords,
I've been playing Paladin since Burning Crusade; maining Ret since Wrath of the Lich King.
Since we all know our God and savior Solsacra won't be maintaining a Ret guide for Legion and so many people are shouting for some guide/discussion Thread - Let's start here.
12th January: Guide/OP is ready and updated for 7.1.5!
Retribution Paladin Notes for 7.1.5:
Retribution
- The damage done by most Retribution abilities has been increased by 12%.
- Consecration damage has been increased by 100%.
- Divine Hammer damage has been increased by 100%.
- Execution Sentence damage has been increased by 55%.
- Greater Blessing of Might removed.
- Greater Blessing of Wisdom/Kings can be cast in combat.
- Greater Blessing of Wisdom mana-reg has been increased by 33% (now gives 1% mana every 10 instead of 15 seconds).
- Greater Blessing of Kings absorb has been increased by 33% (2.7*Spellpower instead of 1.8*Spellpower).
- Fist of Justice now reduces the remaining cooldown of Hammer of Justice by 2.5 seconds per Holy Power spent.
- Divine Intervention now reduces the cooldown of Divine Shield by 20% (was 50%).
- Seal of Light replaced with Judgment of Light.
- Word of Glory healing has been increased by 33%.
12th January: 7.1.5 Thordros' Trinket List:
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets...#gid=234468278
*note that Faulty Countermeasure loses it's value as soon as you loot your Convergence of Fates as it doesnt line up anymore.
Content
#1 • Ability Pruning and what's gone
#2 • New Abilities and passives
#3 • New Mastery
#4 • New Talents
#5 • Rotation / Priority list
#6 • Stat Priority and Consumables
#7 • Ashbringer
#8 • Legendaries
#9 • Addons
#10 • Final words
#1 Ability Pruning
Let's talk about the things the lost in the fire. Hammer of Wrath, Hammer of the Righteous, Exorcism, Hand of Sacrifice, Righteous Fury, Emancipate, Divine Protection and all Seals have been removed from the game.
Word of Glory is no longer baseline; instead we can choose it as a T5(LvL 75) Talent.
Our Blessings got changed and now only buff up to 2 Player instead of being Raidwide.
*REMOVED*Greater Blessing of Might: Places a Blessing on the friendly target, increasing mastery by 5. -> Places a blessing on an ally that gives their attacks a 10% chance to deal 30% additional damage as Holy.
*Buffed*Greater Blessing of Kings: Places a Blessing on the friendly target, increasing Strength, Agility, and Intellect by 5%. -> Places a blessing on an ally that grants them an absorption shield. It absorbs up to (2.7 * Spell power) damage, and will be refreshed to full strength every 6 sec, even if fully consumed. Limit 1 target.
*Buffed*Greater Blessing of Wisdom: Places a blessing on an ally that causes them to regenerate 1% of maximum health and mana per 10 sec. Limit 1 target.
#2 New Abilities and Retribution passive
Blade of Justice:
New Holy Power generator with 400% weapon damage scaling. Generates 2 Holy Power. 12 yd range. 10.5 sec cooldown.
Hand of Hindrance:
Places a Hand on an enemy target, reducing movement speed by 70% for 10 sec. 30 yd range. 30 sec cooldown.
Shield of Vengeance:
Pretty much our Divine Protection replacement. Does have 2 min cooldown though. Absorbs (Attack power * 10) damage for 15 sec. When fully consumed deals damage within 8 yds for the amount of damage absorbed.
The interesting new passive; Retribution:
When any party or raid member withing 40 yards dies, you gain 20% increased damage done and 30% reduced damage taken for 20 sec. Where are the Surrender to Madness Shadow Priests now?
Worth mentioning our Divine Shield no longer reduces our damage dealt and Blessing of Protection no longer prevents from attacking.
#3 New Mastery
Let's jump to our new Mastery: Divine Judgment
Increases Judgment damage by 24%, and causes Judgment to increase damage taken from your Holy Power spenders by 12%.
0 Haste Judgment now has 12 sec cooldown.
Due to the new Mastery, our playstyle kind of shifts into Arms Warrior(Colossus Smash). We basically only want to spend our Holy Power when the current target suffers our Judgment debuff.
#4 New Talents
Next up are our new Talents.
T1 - Level 15
• Final Verdict -> Increases the damage of Templar's Verdict by 20% and the damage of Divine Storm by 10%. Pretty simple.
• *Buffed 7.1.5*Execution Sentence -> Now costs 3 Holy Power and has a 20 sec cooldown. Deals (1700% of Attack power) Holy Damage after 7 sec. Cooldown and debuff are affected by our Haste rating.
• *Buffed 7.1.5*Consecration -> The same as always. Deals [(30% of Attack power) * 12] over 12 sec with a 12 sec cooldown. Just like Execution Sentence; Cooldown and duration are affected by Haste (always the same amount of ticks regardless of haste level).
Due to Patch 7.1.5 this row finally got some potential. Default talentchoice still seems to be FV although ES sims higher for most people. ES should definitely be considered for ST fights. FV tends to beat ES single target when you are using the Cloak(Whisper of the Nathrezim) but it's very close and you should always use SimCraft here. Consecration also works! At 2 or 3 targets it's already fine with an uptime of ~60% or more. And it's really strong in bigpulls like Maw of Souls(all mobpacks + 1st Boss).
T2 - Level 30
• The Fires of Justice -> Reduces our Crusader Strike cooldown by 1 sec and gives us a 15% chance to reduce the next finisher to cost 1 less Holy Power.
• Zeal -> A Crusader Strike replacing Ability with 320% weapon damage scaling. Also grants us the buff Zeal which basically causes Zeal to Cleave for each stack.
Maximum of 3 stacks and each jump deals 40% less damage. 2 charges.
• Greater Judgment -> Judgment now allows us to hit up to 4 targets instead of 2 and always deals a critical strike against targets above 50% hp.
The Fires of Justice has been the default talent when using Whisper of the Nathrezim. Zeal still works for cleave or even very short times where you can cleave 2 targets; sometimes even worth for just ST(even with Legendary Cape). Basically, again, use Simcraft here. Greater Judgment still for consistent 4+ targets.
T3 - Level 45
• Fist of Justice -> Got changed a little bit. Instead of flat reducing the cooldown on Hammer of Justice we now get cooldown reduce per Holy Power spent on damaging abilities. -8 sec everytime we spend our Holy Power.
• Repentance -> In the end the same as usual with the execption that it deals up to 25% of the targets health in over 1 min.
• Blinding Light -> Now has 1.5 min cooldown instead of 2min and deals (300% of Spell power) damage for some reason.
I would recommend using Blinding Light here. Especially if you are struggling with getting Haste items this cute little light can donate you a global instead of waiting for something to come up off cooldown.
Fist of Justice might be viable if there are lots of targets which are stunable and you are able to use Justicar's Vengeance but i can't really think of a Bossfight like that.(Odyn!)
T4 - Level 60
• Virtue's Blade -> Blade of Justice critical strikes deal 3 times normal damage.
• *NEW with 7.1* Blade of Wrath -> Blade of Justice now has a chance to reset it's cooldown on autoattacks.
• *Buffed 7.1.5*Divine Hammer -> Replaces Blade of Justice and has 12 sec cooldown without any haste. Hammer spin around you for 90% Holy damage instantly and every 2 sec for 12 sec.(Duration reduces and tick rate increased by Haste)
The new Blade of Wrath still outperforms Virtue's Blade on Level 110. Divine Hammer is definitely the go-to when you are hitting 2+ targets. It's even viable on ST since it only requires high/~99% uptime on Boss and you dont have to pay much attention to BoW proccs.
T5 - Level 75
• Justicar's Vengeance -> Deals a bit more Holy damage than a Templar's Verdict(without artifact progression and a low itemlevel weapon) and heals you for the amount of damage done but it costs 5 Holy Power. 100% additional damage and healing against stunned targets.
• Eye for an Eye -> Reduces Physical damage taken by 35% and instantly couterattacks any enemy that melee attacks you for 170% Physical damage. Lasts 10 sec.
• Word of Glory -> Already mentioned it is no longer baseline and costs 3 Holy Power. Heals yourself and up to 5 friendly targets within 15 yards for (900% of Spell power). 2 charges; 1 min recharge.
Justicar's Vengeance is o.k when you are able to cheese some stunable adds. The healing aspect could be worth it for some encounter aswell. Eye for an Eye is also pretty good to reduce some AoE physical type damage or small tanking sessions. Eye for an Eye damage got buffed in 7.1.5 too! Word of Glory healing is really strong with Crusade up and even stronger when using "Chain of Thrayn".
T6 - Level 90
• *Nerfed 7.1.5*Divine Intervention -> Divine Shield cooldown is reduced by 20%. Additionally to the cooldown reduce, any attack that would kill you instead procs Divine Shield and sets your HP to 20%.
Can't trigger when Divine Shield is on cooldown or Forbearance is active on you.
• *NEW 7.1*Cavalier -> Grants a 2nd charge on Divine Steed; Mounting our Paladin Class Mount and basically charging into battle! Grants 100% movement speed for 3 sec and has 45 sec cooldown. You can still attack while mounted. Steed is baseline now.
• *Replaced by Judgment of Light 7.1.5*Seal of Light -> Judgment of Light ->Judgment now applies Judgment of Light to the target, causing the next 40 successful attacks against the target to heal the attacker for (20% of Spell power). This effect can only occur once per 1 sec on each target.
This is pretty much personal preference. Divine Steed is our one and only movement speed thingy right now(unless Aggramars Stride) but if you are certain you dont need any movement speed Divine Intervention can be fine too even though it got nerfed. Judgment of Light is not really strong but since our GBoK and GBoW are fine or even good now and you absolutely want to be the supportive guy - take it!
T7 - Level 100
• Divine Purpose -> Your Holy Power spending abilities have a 20% chance to make your next Holy Power spending ability free.
• Crusade -> Replaces Avenging Wrath and increases your damage and haste by 3.5% for 20 sec. Each Holy Power spent during Crusade gives you an additional 3.5% of both with a maximum of 15 stacks.(52.5% damage and haste at 15 stacks)
• Holy Wrath -> Deals Holy damage to up to 4 enemies within 10 yards equal to 200% of missing health (50% missing health against player). If ever used try to combine with Divine Intervention proccs.
Nothing really happened here in 7.1.5. Crusade provides best DPS gain. It also has a nice synergy with Convergence of Fates (the cooldown reduce trinket dropped in Nighthold). DP is basically garbage. Holy Wrath could very rarely be useful.
#5 Rotation / Priority list*not yet uptdated*
You always want to cast your finisher when Judgment is up on your target.
The default Priority list should look like this:
Priority Ability name Condition 1 Judgment Keep Judgment on cooldown @4+ Holy Power and/or DP procs.*** 2 Templar's Verdict Cast Templar's Verdict with Judgment up and @5 Holy Power. 3 Crusader Strike/Zeal Cast Crusader Strike or Zeal if @2 charges. Generates 1 Holy Power. 4 Blade of Justice Cast Blade of Justice/T4 talent @3 or less Holy Power. Generates 2 Holy Power. 5 The Fires of Justice Cast the Fires of Justice Crusader Strike if @2 charges. Generates 1 Holy Power. 6 Templar's Verdict Cast with Judgment up and @4 Holy Power or to spend a Fires of Justice proc regardless of your current Holy Power. 7 Consecration Cast Consecration if talented. 8 Crusader Strike/Zeal Cast Crusader Strike or Zeal if @1 charge. Generates 1 Holy Power. 9 Blinding Light Cast Blinding Light if talented and there is nothing else to cast. 10 Templar's Verdict Cast with Judgment up and @3 Holy Power when there is nothing else to cast.
Divine Purpose priority:
Priority Ability name Condition 1 Judgment Keep Judgment on cooldown @4+ Holy Power and/or DP procs.*** 2 Justicar's Vengeance Cast Justicar's Vengeance @5 Holy Power with Divine Purpose proc and Judgment up. Or if DP is about to fade. 3 Templar's Verdict Cast Templar's Verdict with Judgment up and @5 Holy Power. 4 Crusader Strike/Zeal Cast Crusader Strike or Zeal if @2 charges. Generates 1 Holy Power. 5 Blade of Justice Cast Blade of Justice/T4 talent @3 or less Holy Power. Generates 2 Holy Power. 6 The Fires of Justice Cast the Fires of Justice Crusader Strike if @2 charges. Generates 1 Holy Power. 7 Justicar's Vengeance Cast Justicar's Vengeance with Divine Purpose proc and Judgment up. Higher priority than spending last charge of CS/Zeal. 8 Templar's Verdict Cast with Judgment up and @4 Holy Power or to spend a Fires of Justice proc regardless of your current Holy Power. 9 Consecration Cast Consecration if talented. 10 Crusader Strike/Zeal Cast Crusader Strike or Zeal if @1 charge. Generates 1 Holy Power. 11 Blinding Light Cast Blinding Light if talented and there is nothing else to cast. 12 Templar's Verdict Cast with Judgment up and @3 Holy Power when there is nothing else to cast.
For multiple target scenarios simply replace Templar's Verdict with Divine Storm @2 or more(WITH artifact progression: 3/3 DS damage, Echo and Divine Tempest); Divine Hammer outvalues BoJ/BoW @ 2+ targets and Greater Judgment starts working with 4 or more targets to hit. However this does not occur when hitting multiple targets for a few seconds - You have to be consistenly hitting the amount of targets mentioned for the different talents/scenarios.
Shield of Vengeance:
Whenever possible you can try to cheese some DPS with our new Shield of Vengeance. Best example would be -> Use Shield of Vengeance -> run into Helya Water and profit!
Avenging Wrath/Crusade:
Make sure to use Avenging Wrath/Crusade on cooldown. Simply pop Wings when you are about to spend Holy Power on Judgment debuffed targets. Keep in mind that "Liadrins Fury Unleashed" gives you 1 extra Holy Power per 4 sec.
Try to fit the maximum count of Avenging Wraths/Crusades into a fight and stack with on use trinkets / Bloodlust and Old War Potion.
#6 Stat priority and consumables
The aim is to, obviously, stack the best stat (haste) but to also find a balance in the acquisition of others. Too much of one at the expense of others tends to be a DPS loss. You need to find the balance between haste, crit and versa. But generally, the best bet is to pursue crit and Versa after the first plateau ( about 20% haste). It appears there are some breakpoints for haste at 19%,24%,27% and about 31%.
If you are using the Legendary Cloak(Whisper of the Nathrezim) you should pursue haste till about 31%.
Please note that SimCraft can give you different results and won't always be 100% accurate for every single character.
Consider using SimCraft on your own character if you want to make sure you are heading for the right stats.
Enchants and Gems should be used for Haste. Our neck enchant should be Mark of the Hidden Satyr
For consumables I would recommend the following:
- Flask of the Countless Armies; 1300 Str for 1 hour.
- Potion of the Old War > Potion of Prolongued Power(2500 mainstats)
- Azshari Salad: 375 Haste for 1 hour. Or the cheaper version: Suramar Surf and Turf; 300 Haste for 1 hour.
- Defiled Augment Rune; 325 Str for 1 hour.
#7 Ashbringer
Here's the optimal Ashbringer path taken from HoWDiscord:
As for DPS-gain Relics:
Wrath of the Ashbringer(AW/Crusade Duration +2.5) >>> Might of the Templar(2% TV Damage) > Highlords Judgment(8% Judgment) > Delive the Justice(8% BoW/BoJ/DH Damage) > Sharpened Edge(6% Crit on CS)
Note that Righteous Blade(5% DS Damage) is fine for Dungeons/Mythic+ Dungeons etc.
Always use simcraft to know how much Itemlevel you can 'skip' with Wrath of the Ashbringer(or the other possible traits). Right now for my Character, a 835 Holy Relic with WotA does have more gain than a 865 Holy relic with cooldown reduce on Blessing of Protection.(That's 9 Weapon-itemlevel)
#8 Legendaries
7.1.5 Legendary adjustments for Paladin:
- Chain of Thrayn: Avenging Wrath increases healing done by an additional 25% for Holy and 50% for Protection/Retribution and increases damage done by an additional 20%.
- Uther's Guard: Your Blessing of Freedom, Blessing of Sacrifice, and Blessing of Protection have 50% increased duration and heal the target for 15% of maximum health.
- (Retribution) Justice Gaze: Hammer of Justice deals 600% (was 350%) weapon damage and has 75% reduced cooldown when used against an enemy above 75% health.
- (Retribution) Liadrin's Fury Unleashed: While Avenging Wrath is active, you gain 1 Holy Power every 4 seconds (was 2.5 seconds).
- (Retribution) Whisper of the Nathrezim: Templar’s Verdict and Divine Storm increase the damage of your next Templar’s Verdict or Divine Storm within 4 seconds by 15% (was 25%).
Shared Legendaries:
- Aggramar’s Stride: Now grants movement speed based on Haste or Crit, whichever is higher. Additionally, the movement speed bonus now stacks with other movement speed bonuses.
- Prydaz, Xavaric’s Magnum Opus: Every 30 seconds, gain an absorb shield for 15% (25% for non-tanks) of your maximum health for 30 seconds. Now has Critical Strike, Haste, and Mastery as secondary stats.
- Sephuz’s Secret: Successfully applying a loss of control effect to an enemy, interrupting an enemy, or dispelling any target grants you 70% increased movement speed and 25% Haste (was 15%) for 10 seconds. This effect may occur once every 30 seconds.
The Specc-Legendaries we want now are:
Chain of Thrayn(Belt) > Whisper of the Nathrezim(Cape) > Liadrins Fury Unleashed(Ring) > Ashes to Dust(Shoulder)
*note that Liadrins Fury Unleashed beats Whisper of the Nathrezim when playing with t20 4pc & t19 2pc.
Fine/Situational Shared-Legendaries are:
Aggramars Stride(Boots)[Speed for stuff like Odyn]; Sephuz's Secret(Ring) actually really strong now if you are able to activate it every 30 seconds. And Magnum Opus your best friends lifesaving Survival-Legendary! Aegisjalmur(Bracers) is pretty fine for some minor dps gains and of course, survivability.
Something about Kil'Jaeden's Burning Wish:
Stats are pretty fine 2264 STR itemlevel 910 + 408 Crit; Haste; Mastery. The use on the other hand is o.k. It does little to no damage baseline single target but its getting better for AoE. The damage always crits. But you should try to get and use one of the Specc-Legendaries listed above.
#9 Addons
In my opinion the only Addon that you should consider using is WeakAuras 2. Everything else is optional.
WeakAuras can be used to track pretty much every single buff/debuff/event in the Game. Its highly configurable in terms of pictures/sounds/emotes.
In addition you can simply copy+paste WeakAuras/WeakAurastrings of other players and share yours with them.
There are some other Addons that serve to be usefull for example BigWigs/Deadly Boss Mods and Skada/Details! but in the end it all comes down to personal preference.
#10 Final words
I'll be updating when Legion hits and I'll try to link/insert some SimCraft results for our talents at the current state (Level100) and of course for Legion.
I hope this post helps understanding the new Retribution Paladin and the guide will be helpful in general.
I appreciate any kind of feedback and discussions!
Cheers.
Last but not least here's a link to the Paladin Discord channel!
https://discord.gg/0dvRDgpa5xZHFfnD
Changelog:
22/07/2015
-pre-Patch/Legion thread created
25/07/2016
- updated trinketlist
- updated weaponenchants
03/08/2016
- updated lvl 90 / T6 talent; Divine Steed -> Cavalier
08/08/2016
- added "what to do when Legion hits" Spreadsheet
27/08/2016
- added Sol's latest 110 Sims
04/09/2016
- added Legion Trinket list
13/09/2016
- Ashbringer Skill Path
26/09/2016
- updated some major parts of the guide + relics
03/11/2016
- New trinket list; relic sheet; general updates
7/12/2016
- some minor updates
12/01/2017
- Pretty much everything updated for 7.1.5; new trinketlist 7.1.5/nighthold; added #8 Legendaries section
17/01/2017
- updated graphs
29/03/2017
- updates for major parts
01/06/2017
- getting ready for 7.2.5