Holy DPS

[Deleted]

I'm working on a guide for going Shockadin with some insights via Fatboss's Youtube vids on how to handle each Highmaul and BRF boss fight.

I'm really looking forward to reading that guide! I really would like to have a HolyDPS spec. I really can't handle RET or Prot for questing and this seems to be a fun qay to go about it! Also, since most Hc's these days are so easy and quick, I would like to see if I can pull some nice DPS in my 671 healing gear!

[Krekal]

I'm too lazy to read, are you saying that holy paladin can DPS?

[Jackielope]

I'm too lazy to read, are you saying that holy paladin can DPS?

Yes, though it's simming below Gladiator DPS right now. In full 695 gear with the 710 pre-legend ring it's doing 40k DPS.

[Dooganitis]

I was testing this last night in LFR. Mind you, my stats are all wrong. Using my ret gear with healing trinkets and rings and my str neck. Ilvl of 668 and a mast/haste build I was spiking at 28k and ended the first 2 boss fights at 17k. Ended blast furnace at an average of 14k, but I also tried a different talent combo that just did not work.

[Jackielope]

I was testing this last night in LFR. Mind you, my stats are all wrong. Using my ret gear with healing trinkets and rings and my str neck. Ilvl of 668 and a mast/haste build I was spiking at 28k and ended the first 2 boss fights at 17k. Ended blast furnace at an average of 14k, but I also tried a different talent combo that just did not work.

Hm, 17k seems a bit low even for the bad gear you had. What talents were you using? I'll have to run sims on Prism and Hammer to see what numbers they spit out.

14k on Furnace I can believe because that fight sucks for shockadin. There's not so much chance to go turret and shoot stuff.

Definitely work on getting crit, haste, and multistrike gear. They all flop around when it comes to DPS.

[Deleted]

Holy can be amazing for short fights, I managed 36k on LFR butcher. I used Harsh Words, Glyph of Holy Shock and Execution Sentence.

Naturally I got flamed for using ret spec.

- - - Updated - - -

I might have exaggerated, I gave LFR another spin and logged the results. Then again 35k+ is definitely possible on fast kills.

[Dooganitis]

I continue to test last night. Ran normal HM. Changed my gear up a little. DMF dps trinket, a 556 blue trinket that I bought from the AH and crafted a neck. Total ilvl of 656. The rest of my gear was still my ret gear. On average burst to 40k with a sustained 20k. I cannot wait to get more crit/multistrike gear. I have yet to have a mana problem. I am running spirit on my rings. I found that the best glyphs are Harsh Word, Holy Shock, and Denounce.

How do you figure 17k is low? I was thinking it was really good considering my highest secondary stat (mastery) is being completely wasted at this point. As far as real world testing. Hammer has out performed Prism every time. Maybe as I get better gear it might become a better option. With Execution Sentence by far has been out performing both of them. I've also found that SW performs better then DP (with more crit this might change) and HA is completely useless.

[Deleted]

I remember back in the WOTLK days of 25k hp 80 arena, shock dealing 3k dmg fully geared, soooo op when you had shaman lock on your team

[Jackielope]

Total ilvl of 556? Don't you mean 656?

Mana might be an issue on long fights over 5 or 6 minutes.

I highly doubt Denounce glyph is a DPS increase since the rotation is only HS, Denounce*3, HS, Denounce *3, HS, Harsh Word, Denounce*2, repeat. There is no way to get an extra Denounce in there with the glyph unless you're delaying HS, and that always comes out to a DPS loss.

And yes, SW will always outperform DP. HA will too in simulations. Last I recall Harsh Words didn't even work with DP, but if you tried it and did in fact get a proc then I suppose that's notable. The main reason DP sucks so much is simply because of poor HoPo generation leading to fewer spenders being used and thus fewer times for DP to be used.

Hammer will always outperform Prism on damage. The reason being is Prism is 3 GCDs while LH is 1, so even though 3x Prism is 900% SP 1x LH is 602% SP + 330% SP from 2 Denounce used which totals 932%. LH can also be lined up better with AW, thus its average damage will be increased compared to Prism.

The only way HA could be completely useless is if it didn't boost HS's damage nor did it provide the 3 HoPo each time. Is that the case?

[Simulacrum]

Mana might be an issue on long fights over 5 or 6 minutes.

I'm confused by this. With denounce now free, how could you possibly run out of mana doing a holy dps rotation, even with no regen? The only way I'm even able to drop below 100% for any length of time is with unglyphed HW, and then it just goes right back up to 100% again while it's on cooldown.

[Jackielope]

I'm confused by this. With denounce now free, how could you possibly run out of mana doing a holy dps rotation, even with no regen? The only way I'm even able to drop below 100% for any length of time is with unglyphed HW, and then it just goes right back up to 100% again while it's on cooldown.

I'm only basing the mana talk off of sims. When I've done them in SimC after 5 to 6 minutes it always runs out of mana just from casting Holy Shock and Execution Sentence on CD.

Hang on a sec. HW? Holy doesn't have access to Holy Wrath at all. That's the only mana cost ability I can think of that's shortened to HW so now I'm just confused.

[Varabently]

I continue to test last night. Ran normal HM. Changed my gear up a little. DMF dps trinket, a 556 blue trinket that I bought from the AH and crafted a neck. Total ilvl of 556. The rest of my gear was still my ret gear. On average burst to 40k with a sustained 20k. I cannot wait to get more crit/multistrike gear. I have yet to have a mana problem. I am running spirit on my rings. I found that the best glyphs are Harsh Word, Holy Shock, and Denounce.

How do you figure 17k is low? I was thinking it was really good considering my highest secondary stat (mastery) is being completely wasted at this point. As far as real world testing. Hammer has out performed Prism every time. Maybe as I get better gear it might become a better option. With Execution Sentence by far has been out performing both of them. I've also found that SW performs better then DP (with more crit this might change) and HA is completely useless.

I think the only way this would really work is if there were some kind of aoe/cleave. I don't think LH is going to be enough. Single target, it appears to be competitive, but how many single target fights are there?

I always felt like Paladin should get a 4th spec for holy similar to how guardians/feral got split. Would definitely be nice to be able to go ranged dps on melee unfriendly fights.

And regarding 17k being low. Consider rets are doing 40k 50k 60k on Blast furnace from all the cleave damage. Blast furnace is one of those fights that having strong dps/cleave makes it so much easier. It's not necessarily a DPS race, but it is healing intensive if adds stay up too long.

All I'm saying is if you want to be taken seriously, you can't do 17k or 14k dps on blast furnace. Those numbers will get you kicked out of a group. You can hedge and say you have all this mastery and stuff, which is fine. But what you can't ignore is that you're a wasted raid spot at that dps point. All that means is you need perfect gear to make the spec work, which may well be true. I still think there's not enough cleave/aoe to make this work. There aren't enough patchwerk fights unfortunately.

[Dooganitis]

I think the only way this would really work is if there were some kind of aoe/cleave. I don't think LH is going to be enough. Single target, it appears to be competitive, but how many single target fights are there?

I always felt like Paladin should get a 4th spec for holy similar to how guardians/feral got split. Would definitely be nice to be able to go ranged dps on melee unfriendly fights.

And regarding 17k being low. Consider rets are doing 40k 50k 60k on Blast furnace from all the cleave damage. Blast furnace is one of those fights that having strong dps/cleave makes it so much easier. It's not necessarily a DPS race, but it is healing intensive if adds stay up too long.

All I'm saying is if you want to be taken seriously, you can't do 17k or 14k dps on blast furnace. Those numbers will get you kicked out of a group. You can hedge and say you have all this mastery and stuff, which is fine. But what you can't ignore is that you're a wasted raid spot at that dps point. All that means is you need perfect gear to make the spec work, which may well be true. I still think there's not enough cleave/aoe to make this work. There aren't enough patchwerk fights unfortunately.

I think you have completely missed the point of this thread. By no means is Holy a viable DPS spec in a progression raid team. That being said, it is extremely fun to play. As far as the 17k goes, that was on single target and in LFR and I was out dpsing most of the raid ....No that is not an accomplishment.... changed up my gear a little bit and dropped ilvl and increased my sustained DPS. I am positive once I get a full set of gear I will hang with the top 5 dps in LFR. Once again, this is for fun...not progression.

[Jackielope]

Holy can do single target fine, but you have to work on it. Gruul and OG are fine for Holy. Furnace is not. Hans and Franz are kinda doable but even just going up to 2 targets means every other spec is going to do better. Flamebender relies on other people taking care of the cinder wolves and Holy's lack of DPS there might not justify doing that. Kromog is pretty doable for Holy. Darmac can be done if you're not on spear duty. Thogar is a hell no due to all the AoE needed. Maidens is probably a no too. Blackhand is doable.

Some sort of priest or paladin full caster DPS spec that does holy damage would be wonderful and interesting.

[Dooganitis]

Total ilvl of 556? Don't you mean 656?

Mana might be an issue on long fights over 5 or 6 minutes.

I highly doubt Denounce glyph is a DPS increase since the rotation is only HS, Denounce*3, HS, Denounce *3, HS, Harsh Word, Denounce*2, repeat. There is no way to get an extra Denounce in there with the glyph unless you're delaying HS, and that always comes out to a DPS loss.

And yes, SW will always outperform DP. HA will too in simulations. Last I recall Harsh Words didn't even work with DP, but if you tried it and did in fact get a proc then I suppose that's notable. The main reason DP sucks so much is simply because of poor HoPo generation leading to fewer spenders being used and thus fewer times for DP to be used.

Hammer will always outperform Prism on damage. The reason being is Prism is 3 GCDs while LH is 1, so even though 3x Prism is 900% SP 1x LH is 602% SP + 330% SP from 2 Denounce used which totals 932%. LH can also be lined up better with AW, thus its average damage will be increased compared to Prism.

The only way HA could be completely useless is if it didn't boost HS's damage nor did it provide the 3 HoPo each time. Is that the case?

Yes in the perfect world of sims that is the rotation. I found in raid it comes in handy. Many fights have movement phases, and in these movement phases you can get off 2 sometimes 3 shock. It also came in handy during burst phase with SW.

HA, holy power generation is just too slow to make it worth while.

Sim is lying about mana issues. With spirit just on my rings I ended every fight at 100% mana.

[Simulacrum]

I'm only basing the mana talk off of sims. When I've done them in SimC after 5 to 6 minutes it always runs out of mana just from casting Holy Shock and Execution Sentence on CD.

Hang on a sec. HW? Holy doesn't have access to Holy Wrath at all. That's the only mana cost ability I can think of that's shortened to HW so now I'm just confused.

Sorry, I meant Sanctified Wrath... so many different wrath abilities in the paladin arsenal, I mixed them up. What I meant to say was that, even with Avenging Wrath active, unglyphed, with Sanctified Wrath, spamming holy shock every second ability, I still could barely get my mana to drop below 100%, even with no regen on gear. Granted, I only have 21.25% haste (or 922 haste rating) unbuffed in my gear, but I think you'd need to reach truly astronomical levels of haste to be able to spend more mana than you regenerate dpsing as holy.

[Jackielope]

Yes in the perfect world of sims that is the rotation. I found in raid it comes in handy. Many fights have movement phases, and in these movement phases you can get off 2 sometimes 3 shock. It also came in handy during burst phase with SW.

HA, holy power generation is just too slow to make it worth while.

Sim is lying about mana issues. With spirit just on my rings I ended every fight at 100% mana.

Hm, alrighty. I guess I'll note the glyph as useful for movement fights. Granted, if the sims are right then Merciful Wrath is higher DPS sometimes to the tune of 2 or 3k. But come to think of it perhaps the sim should be taken with a grain of salt since Holy isn't exactly well cared for.

SW is a gain over HA for overall DPS, but in burst HA does look like it'd win. Especially if Bloodlust is up.

Sorry, I meant Sanctified Wrath... so many different wrath abilities in the paladin arsenal, I mixed them up. What I meant to say was that, even with Avenging Wrath active, unglyphed, with Sanctified Wrath, spamming holy shock every second ability, I still could barely get my mana to drop below 100%, even with no regen on gear. Granted, I only have 21.25% haste (or 922 haste rating) unbuffed in my gear, but I think you'd need to reach truly astronomical levels of haste to be able to spend more mana than you regenerate dpsing as holy.

Ah, understandable. Agreed, there are too many Wrath abilities.


Alrighty, I'll take a look through SimC to see if there's something odd with the mana that's going on. I did think it was odd at first that it was showing it as a loss when constant casting HL should apparently be mana neutral. Then I forgot about my concerns.

If nothing else I might be able to find a way to ignore the mana costs until the system gets fixed, assuming the discrepancy can be found.

[Jackielope]

For what it's worth I've posted a Shockadin guide: http://www.mmo-champion.com/threads/...-the-Shockadin


I'll be working on the layout more as I figure which ways I want to present all the info.

[Deleted]

Well, since this is about Holy DPS and i´ve seen some ideas for a possible talent choice alá Gladiator Stance, this is what i came up with. Keep in mind, i have no idea about the current damage dealing capabilities of a Shockadin, so numbers are ofc subject to change.

Seal of Condemnation

A Seal to improve your damage dealing capabilities.

Increases mana regeneration by 300% and decreases healing done by 50%

Holy Shock, Holy Light, Word of Glory, Holy Prism and Light of Dawn no longer heal, but deal damage instead.

Judgment now applies 5 stacks of Censure.

Beacon of Light increases holy damage dealt by you against the target by 10%.

You cannot change into or out of this seal during combat.

The idea is to have kind of the same "standard" spells for a damage rotation. HL is your filler spell, HS is your HP generator, WoG is your finisher. LoD, HR and Daybreak are for AoE, while Beacon is kinda like a curse, increases the holy damage that is applied to the target. LoD would have to be ranged ofc, kinda like Holy Radiance or maybe like the old "flashlight" it used to be.

[Timinycricket]

What is the state of things lately for Shockadins?

Here's my two cents:

Outside of Censure, we've always seemed to be more about direct damage/healing (rather than dots/hots). That feels fine to me.

I think we could benefit from the AoE damage love (as everyone agrees), but has anyone considered it working at all like Shaman's Flame Shock spreading? (not talking dot, but yes talking a debuff opening them up to damage splashing).

Alternatively, I think the AoE mechanic should revolve around Beacon of Hope. Plant the Beacon on the boss. If you cast a damaging spell against another target within 30ft of the Beacon.. the Beacon takes 100% of the damage as well. If you attack the Beacon directly, it takes X% additional of the paladin's damage (low % .. like.. 10-15% extra) and all enemies within Y distance (8-12m) suffer Z% (like 25-45%) of the original damage.

It could be called Beacon of Despair when you cast it on an enemy. It should be on a shared CD with Beacon of Hope.
If you cast Despair, it puts Hope on a 3 min CD.
If you cast Hope, it puts Despair on a 3 min CD.

This would prevent people being able to flip back and forth well enough imho. Casting one or the other would also commit a Holy Pally to one purpose or the other pretty well for a given Boss fight or even an Arena.

I like the daybreak proc a lot... it should proc from a slower damaging spell as well. Holy Shocking an enemy, rather than a friend, would deliver splash damage rather than splash healing, of course.

Also, add Denounce to the list of spells which trigger Enhanced Holy Shock. (10% chance to cause your next Holy Shock to not trigger a cooldown)

...just some thoughts.