Introduction
First off, I'd like to credit Ronark for letting me use his FAQ for my Protection Paladin FAQ. There are some parts of this FAQ that are directly taken from his FAQ, so it will seem a bit similar. Since I thought Offhand is taking too long to create his and I was in the mood, I am taking the liberty to create this FAQ for the Paladin section of the MMO-C forums.
Please feel free to provide comments, until I revise this into a solid guide.
Contents: (Copy the bracketed letters and hit Ctrl+F to skip to a specific part of the FAQ).
[1VRH]- Version History
[2ACS]- Acronyms
[3BSS]- Base Stats
[4SCS]- Stat Conversations
[5CTS]- Combat Statistics
[6EMS]- Enchantments
[7GMS]- Gemming
[8CSB]- Consumables
[1SLS]- Seals
[2CBA]- Combat Abilities
[3UTL]- Utilities
[4DRS]- Tank Rotations
[5TBS]- Talent Builds
[6EGE]- Endgame Expectations
[7UFM]- Useful Macros
[8CCN]- Conclusion
[9PSS]- Bonus Material
[1VRH]- Version History:
v1.0- Initial Posting, minor format editing.
v1.1- Various Edits.
[2ACS]- I’ll start by listing common Acronyms that are used commonly throughout this guide or elsewhere throughout these and other forums.
AE or AoE- Area of Effect. Generally spells, buffs, or effects that only affect targets in a given range.
Bubble- A Paladin’s Divine Shield and Hand of Protection spells are referred to as being encased within a bubble through which nothing can enter.
DI- Divine Intervention
DoT- Damage over Time. Any spell or ability that deals its damage gradually as time passes, rather than upfront.
TPS- Threat per Second. The higher your TPS, the better you can hold mobs against the dps.
DS- Divine Shield.
DS/G- Divine Sacrifice/Guardian.
EXP- Expertise
FoL- Flash of Light.
HoW- Hammer of Wrath.
HoF- Hand of Freedom.
HoJ- Hammer of Justice.
HoP- Hand of Protection.
HoR- Hand of Reckoning.
HoS- Hand of Sacrifice.
HP- Health Points.
HW- Holy Wrath.
INT- Shorthand for a character’s Intellect.
MA- Main Assist. You target whatever this person targets to ensure it dies quickly.
MT- Main Tank. The main person that holds the Aggro of a mob.
n00b- An inexperience or new player. Can also be an insult to a player’s level of thinking.
NPC- Non-playable Character. A PC is referred to a Playable Character which you directly control.
OT- Off Tank. Generally either a back-up tank or an extra tank for an encounter.
Proc- A spell from a talent or gear that requires a chance to be used from attacks or skills. For example, Greatness has procced from Darkmoon Card: Greatness.
PuG- Pick up Group. A random group of players that band together to conquer greater challenges.
PvE- Player vs. Environment. Situations in which players fight against computer-controlled opponents.
PvP- Player vs. Player. Any situation in which players fight against each other in battle.
QFT- Quoted for Truth.
SP- Spell Power.
STR- Shorthand for a character’s Strength.
STM or STAM- Shorthand for Stamina.
1337- Having the skillz to pay the billz.
Listed below are the typical Base Stat values that a Level 80 Paladin should have when they are not wearing any armor, are not affected by any buffs, and do not have any passive talents which increase stats- Note that this may slightly differ, depending on your chosen Race.
[3BSS]- Base Values at 80
Health = 6934
Mana = 4394
Strength = 175 = 350 Attack Power
Intellect = 97 = 1455 Mana
Agility = 86 = 1.65% Crit
Stamina = 196 = 1960 Health
All Mana-bound abilities are a percentage of Base mana, or mana with no additional Intellect: That is, as your Mana-pool increases, the cost of your spells does not.
[4SCS]- Stat Conversations, for Base stats
Each Base Stat can be broken down to reflect their impact on combat.
Each point of Strength is worth 2 Attack Power. With proper talents, like Divine Strength, this is increased to 2.3 AP. With Blessing of Kings, the amount gained is again increased, for a total of 2.53 effective AP per 1 Strength. With the Touched by the Light talent, 1 Strength is also equal to = 0.6 Spell Power, which in turn translates to increased threat.
Each point of Agility is equal to 0.88 Critical Strike Rating or 2 Armor Value or 52.08 Agi is equal to 1% Crit, and for every 59.89 points of Agility, the Paladin gains 1% additional chance to dodge.
Each point of Stamina is equal to 10 Health. This is further increased by two talents (Sacred Duty + Combat Expertise) totalling 14% increased Stamina.
Intellect increases your total Mana by 15 points per point of Intellect: Although it is not considered a Tank stat, we are still a Mana-bound class, so buffs like Arcane Intellect will help to increase your sustained threat.
[5CTS]- Combat Statistics
Defense = Defense rating increases your chance to dodge, block and parry as well as decreasing the chance to be hit and critically hit. For Heroics which is mostly lvl 82 mobs, you will only require 535 Defense. Raids like 10man and 25man will require 540 Defense, which are lvl 83 mobs. This is to enable your Paladin to be uncrittable, meaning that mobs do zero crit against you. It is also better to be overcapped as more Defense will boost your avoidance stats.
Dodge = Dodge rating increases the chance to dodge. This should be your main avoidance stat, due to the abundance of the stat on our gears. Due to Icecrown Citadel's Chill of the Throne debuff, it reduces your dodge chance by a FIXED 20%. However, this gives people a common misconception that it reduces the effectiveness of Dodge rating where in fact it DOES NOT. Getting more dodge is to bring your dodge stat back up to par, ie countering the Chill of the Throne reduction.
Parry = Parry rating increases the chance to parry with your weapon. This is your secondary avoidance stat.
Block = Block rating increases your chance to block with your shield. This is your third stat as a shield user. However, this is the least needed stat, except that it helps proc Holy Shield which is good for AoE threat. The only case where you would stack this rating is for Heroic Anub'arak in 25man Trial of the Grand Crusader.
Expertise Cap = Expertise increases your chance to successfully land attacks by ignoring an opponent’s chance to Dodge and Parry. Depending on your opponent, you may require additional Expertise rating to completely ignore an opponent’s Dodge and Parry chance. With every 8.2 Expertise rating equal to 1 Expertise, and each point of Expertise lowering your opponent’s chance to Dodge and Parry by 0.25%, you would need a total of 214 Expertise rating (or 26 Expertise) to hit the Soft Cap of 6.5% for a Raid Boss. Both Humans and Dwarves have Racial abilities which lower the amount of Expertise needed to hit a Raid Boss. Humans receive 3 Expertise when using either Swords or Maces, and Dwarves receive 5 Expertise when using Maces alone. Due to Bosses having Parry from being attacked in front of them, the hard cap is actually 56. However, it is enough to be Soft Capped at 26. Note that Glyph of Seal of Vengeance gives you 10 Expertise while you are using SoVeng/Corr.
Hit Cap = Hit rating increases your chance to successfully land attacks. Increasing your Hit rating is sometimes a good way to increase your TPS until you reach the soft hit cap. The Hit Cap for all melee-bound abilities is 5%, plus an additional 1% for each level that your target is above you. For a raid boss, this is a total of 8% hit. For every 32.79 Hit Rating, you’ll gain 1% Hit. But as Protection Paladins, you will NEVER need to worry about your skills missing. Extra hit is only needed if you are actually doing decent threat but your dps is doing too much threat assuming they are specced into decrease threat talents.
Critical Strike = Increases your chance to Critically Hit with attacks for 200% damage. While most of the Paladin’s abilities are Melee-oriented, some abilities (like Exorcism) are Spell-oriented; Thus, they only hit for 50% additional damage instead of 100%. For every 45.91 points of Critical Strike rating, you will gain an additional 1% chance to Crit.
[6EMS]- Enchantments
Enchantments are the best way to improve upon your gear once you obtain them. The following are considered as some Tanking enchants:
Cloak: Either Major Agility or Titanweave or Mighty Armor
Chest: Super Health or Greater Defense or Powerful Stats
Bracers: Major Stamina
Gloves:Heavy Borean Armor Kit or Major Agility
Boots: Greater Fortitude or Superior Agility or Tuskarr's Vitality (Get this only if you do not have Pursuit of Justice)
Weapon: Mongoose or Blood Draining or Accuracy (I do not recommend Blade Ward, mainly due to the lack of uptime)
Shield: Defense or Major Stamina
Q: Why are there Agility enchants here?
A: Agility gives Dodge % at almost the same rate as Dodge rating as well as giving us armor and crit, hence they are considered as tanking enchants.
Q: So many enchants to choose from! What do I take?
A: If you happen to be starting out as a fresh Protection Paladin, it would be best to take the Defense enchants first as you require the needed 535 Defense for Heroic Dungeons. Once you obtain better gear, you can either go for the health options to boost your survivability or stick with the Avoidance enchants (eg, Def/Agi).
Q: What's wrong with Armsman?
A: The usefulness of this enchant is very small actually. 10 Parry rating is not a lot compared to the Agility enchant, and 2% extra threat isn't one of the best ways to improve your threat.
In addition to Scrolls, you can also enhance other pieces of gear with crafted Armorkits or purchased Inscriptions (Not to be confused with the Inscription profession):
Helm: Arcanum of the Stalwart Protector - Obtained through Revered status with the Argent Crusade (Not to be confused with the Argent Tournament's faction).
Shoulders: Greater Inscription of the Gladiator or Greater Inscription of the Pinnacle - Obtained through Exalted status with the Sons of Hodir.
Belt: Eternal Belt Buckle- Obtained from a Blacksmith.
Leggings: Frosthide Leg Armor- Obtained from a Leatherworker.
These professions buff your tanking effectiveness:
Jewelcrafting - 63 stam, using the 3 JC-only gems.
Blacksmithing - 60 stam through the 2 extra sockets, assuming you put 30 stam in both.
Enchanting - 60 stam as ring enchants.
Leatherworking - 60 stam from the bracer enchant.
Mining - 60 Stam Passive Skill
Inscription - Extra dodge rating from the shoulder enchant, if you are using this over the 30 stamina Wintergrasp enchant.
Herbalism - A HoT based on your total HP - Lifeblood
Engineering - Extra 885 armor to gloves, in addition to a number of explosives for a touch of extra threat. (Cheers to Iselian)
[7GMS]- Gemming
Meta - Austere Earthsiege Diamond
All slots - Solid Majestic Zircon
Except, that if the gear bonus gives 9 or more stamina, you should be matching the colour sockets with:
Yellow: Enduring Eye of Zul or Vivid Eye of Zul
Red: Shifting Dreadstone or Regal Dreadstone
Blue: Solid Majestic Zircon
Q: I'm a fresh 80, my defense is still low. Should I use these gems?
A: The first requirement you should meet is the 535 Defense for Heroic Dungeon (lvl 82). You should gem for this using the Thick King's Amber types of Gem. As you obtain better gear, you will notice your Defense is more than enough without gemming Defense.
Q: What about having Effulgent Skyflare Diamond?
A: It's is not really needed, as Blizzard stopped designing encounters based on the Sartharion +3 Flame Breath as well as that some bosses are mainly physical damage. I am not very sure about Sindragosa's Frost Breath though.
Q: Why is there an Agility gem here?
A: Agility gives Dodge % at almost the same rate as Dodge rating as well as giving us armor and crit, hence it is considered a tanking gem. There is some debate on the topic of Agi vs Dodge, but it is said that Dodge is better. Ultimately, it comes down to your own preference, with some consideration for which fights you will be tanking.
[8CSB]- Consumables
Flask - Flask of Stoneblood
Food - Any kind of food that gives 40 stamina. Dragonfin Filet or Fish Feast or Snapper Extreme or Blackened Dragonfin
Potion - Indestructible or Health Pot. I'd recommend Indestructible for Raids as it is a 2 minute buff. Otherwise, Health pots on the fly.
[1SLS]- Seals
Currently, there are 3 choices for a Seal when choosing to Tank in a raid environment:
Seal of Vengeance-
What the Seal Hit does:
---> Applies a DoT effect on auto-swing only that deals [(1.3% SPH + 2.5% AP) * 5] * [X] Holy
damage over 15 seconds, stacking up to 5 times, with X being the number of stacks on the target.
---> Strikes for 7% Weapon damage, based on the number of stacks on your target (max of 33%
weapon damage when fully stacked); Unlike normal spells, when this crits it strikes for 200%
damage instead of 150%.
What the Judgement does: Deals [1 + (22% SPH) + (14% AP)] * [1 + (X/10)] Holy damage, with X being the number of stacks on the target.
Seal of Vengeance, or the Horde equivalent Seal of Corruption, is your main seal as a Protection Paladin.
The initial damage done by the DoT, Seal Hit, and Judgement effect of the spell can all be increased by speccing into Seals of the Pure for 5 talent points in the first tier of the Holy tree.
Seal of Command-
What the Seal Hit does: Deals 36% Weapon Damage, but as Holy damage instead of Physical damage: Can chain to up to 2 additional targets when applied with a single target Melee ability, excluding Judgement.
What the Judgement does: Deals [19% Weapon Damage + 8% AP + 13% SP] Holy damage.
Seal of Command is learned by spending 10 points in the Retribution tree, and an additional 1 point in the spell itself- Thus, the earliest that this spell can be obtained is at level 20. The seal does a percentage of your weapon damage on every hit, but as Holy damage rather than Physical. In addition, the spell will also hit up to two additional targets (often refereed to as "cleaving") when proc'd off any single-target melee ability outside of Judgement- either White hits, Crusader Strike, or Hammer of the Righteous. You could spec into this talent for some needed AoE threat.
Seal of Righteousness-
What the Seal does: Deals [Base Weapon Speed * (2.2% AP + 4.4% SP)] additional Holy damage.
What the Judgement does: Deals [1 + 20% AP + 32% SP] Holy damage.
Seal of Righteousness is the basic Seal for all Paladin specs at the earlier levels of their career. It scales the most with Spell Power, and deals a portion of Holy spell damage on each hit. Because of the scaling, it is often not used by a Paladin once Seal of Command is obtainable. However, testing has shown that with points in Seals of the Pure, it can be viable to use in single target fights in which you cannot stack Seal of Vengeance, due to the increased Judgement damage.
*Important Note*---> Unlike other DPS Seals, Seal of Righteousness cannot crit.
[2CBA]- Combat Abilities
Outside of Seals, most of a Paladin’s Combat Abilities are either enhanced or obtained by spending points in the Protection talent tree.
Hammer of the Righteous: This is our 51 point talent skill. What it does is hit your target and 2 additional targets (3 additional if glyphed) for 4 times your main hand's damage per second as Holy damage. This is off the DPS value of your Main Hand Weapon (ie 111dps), not the damage range (100-200 melee). Hence, the speed of weapons do not matter for this spell. It is also one of your AOE skills.
Avenger's Shield: This is our 41 point talent skill, which is mainly used for pulls or extra threat. It throws a shield at your target and then, bouncing off your current target and to 2 more targets. Due to Shield of the Templar, this can be used to pull casters to you as it silences them for 3 seconds, except silence immune mobs.
Judgement: A Judgement focuses the energy of the current Seal being used, and releases its lawful punishment upon your enemy. Judgement spells are broken down into three separate abilities, which all have a shared cooldown: Judgement of Wisdom, Judgement of Light, and Judgement of Justice. Depending on which Judgement is used, attackers can gain a benefit when striking your Judged target. They can be used while Disarmed, but not while Silenced or Spell-locked out of the Holy school. Additionally, casting Judgement on your current target also reduces the mob's attack speed by 20% if you are specced into Judgements of the Just.
Holy Shield: The 31 point Talent in the Protection Tree, which is needed to obtain the Avenger's Shield talent. Some of you may feel that the spell is useless, but this spell is good for your AOE threat. This is because multi-mob does proc through the Holy Shield charges, 1k each on a well geared paladin.
Shield of Righteousness: A trainable spell obtained at level 75, which slams the target with your shield, causing Holy damage based on your block value plus an additional 520. This is your main spell which does the most threat on a single mob.
Consecration: Consecration is a ABAoE spell that damages enemies that enter and leave the area. The damage dealt by Consecration is dealt equally between all ticks, meaning that the initial tick, a middle tick, and the final tick of the spell should all deal the same portion of damage, as long as outside factors remain consistent. Despite Consecration’s large Mana cost, it is still invaluable to use for Threat, even against single targets. Finally, Consecration scales off your Spell Hit table, meaning any ticks of the spell can miss or be resisted with less than 17% Spell Hit.
Exorcism: One of three of the Paladin’s Ranged attacks, Exorcism deals Holy damage after a short cast. Due to the purifying potential of the spell, it will instantly strike for Critical damage when used on Demon- or Undead- type mobs. However, this is never used in your rotation as it makes a 1.5 second cast as of Patch 3.2. A Prot Paladin should never be doing a timed cast (ie, this and Healing Spells) while tanking as it renders you 100% hittable because your Paladin is trying to cast a spell and not avoiding hits. If you need a ranged pull, there's Hand of Reckoning and Avenger's Shield to be used.
Hammer of Wrath: The Hammer of Wrath is the Paladin’s finishing skill; It is only useable on targets with less than 20% health remaining. However, the spell does deal instant Holy damage. The hammer can also be fired from a longer range, and thus does not require the Paladin to be in melee range for execution.
Holy Wrath: Undead and Demon targets will sob beneath you once you unleash your Holy Wrath. Every 30 seconds, a Paladin can stun all Undead and Demon targets in range for a brief moment while dealing some moderate Holy damage. The spell can be used offensively to cut through weak groups with ease, or defensively, giving you ample time to heal yourself if wounded. The stun effect on Holy Wrath, like all stuns, is subject to diminishing returns. This can be used in your AOE tanking IF most of your targets are undead/demon.
Hand of Reckoning: This is your main taunt skill, and also used to pull mobs. When a mob is not targetting you, it taunts the mob to you as well as dealing a percentage of your AP in Holy damage for added threat.
Righteous Defense: This is another taunt that taunts up to 3 targets. This also can be casted on your Party member to taunt the mobs that are aggro-ed to him. But be careful, you could taunt off mobs that your other tank might be tanking! Also used as a spare taunt if the Hand of Reckoning misses.
Righteous Fury: This spell is your threat buff which should be on you all the time. It is removed when you die, change spec, or cancel it. So remember to rebuff it!
[3UTL]- Utilities
Being a Hybrid, the paladin brings many utilities to a group, both Offensively and Defensively.
Blessings and Greater Blessings:
Blessing of Might: Blessing of Might replaces Battle shout on the buff bar, and offers up to 687.5 Attack Power when fully talented into. This is most optimal for physical classes, such as Warriors, Hunters, Deathknights, and Rogues, as well as Feral Druids.
Blessing of Kings: Often used as a back-up Blessing with multiple Paladins or a smaller group sizes, Blessing of Kings increases all of the target's base stats (Strength, Intellect, Agility, Spirit, and Stamina) by 10%. It is useful to use on Tanks for larger health pools, on Spell caster DPS for larger Mana pools and regen, and Physical DPS for more AP. Generally, all classes should have Kings on them.
*Important Note*---> Blessing of Kings is applied multiplicity with other effects that increase stats by a percentage. For example, a Paladin with Divine Strength (x15% STR) and Blessing of Kings (x10% STR) would gain a total of 26% increased Strength.
Blessing of Wisdom: Most of the time, you will have either a Shaman or a Holy Paladin use Blessing of Wisdom- However, in smaller 5man instances, you may not have both or either of these. Some classes may prefer Wisdom over Kings for mana regen as well. Note that in larger raids, a Restoration Shaman may drop their Mana Tide totem- this will more than likely override a Ret Paladin's Wisdom, due to the higher amount of Mana restored every 5 seconds.
Blessing of Sanctuary: This should be your main Blessing next to Blessing of Kings if you have another Paladin with you. For Heroics, it helps to replenish your mana for 2% every time you dodge/parry/block an attack. For Raids, it gives a 3% damage taken reduction if you have 3-4 Paladins in raid and one is a Prot.
Hand spells:
Hand of Freedom: Hand of Freedom prevents movement effects such as roots and snares from affecting the target. This works wonders in PvP battles because we have a limited amount of ways to catch up to a fleeing target. When talented, this spell also removes all stuns from the target, but does not prevent any additional stuns from being applied. Stronger stuns, such as Maexxna's Web Warp, may be immune to its effects.
Hand of Protection: When an ally is in suddenly threatened, Hand of Protection can be used to prevent any physical damage. Because the bubble blocks all physical damage, the target of the spell can also not physically attack: however, they can still freely cast spells. This ability also causes Forbearance on the target, so they cannot be affected by Divine shield or another Hand of Protection.
Hand of Sacrifice: Hand of Sacrifice redirects damage taken from the target, and instead depletes it from your own Health pool. While in some cases this may be unwanted, when combined with Divine Shield all the damage done to the player is negated.
*Important Note*---> Damage received through Hand of Sacrifice can also break Crowd Control effects which break on damage (Freeze Trap, Repentance, Polymorph, etc).
Hand of Salvation: The best thing about this Hand is that it is usable on other people that pull aggro quickly, and a timed Salvation can help keep the mobs on the tank. When Glyphed, it also reduces the amount of damage done to yourself by 30%.
Other Utilities:
Divine Shield: Divine Shield is what makes a Paladin unique in the World of Warcraft. This creates an impenetrable shield around your Paladin rendering ALL attacks immune as long as the Divine Shield lasts. This also can be used to remove any debuffs currently on your Paladin. As Protection Paladin, this is rarely used though as Divine Shield makes you immune to mobs and thus force mobs to change target.
Divine Protection: Another unique Protection Paladin spell, the so-called Shield Wall. This creates a shield around you that reduces all damage taken by 50%. This is not the same as Divine Shield though, as it allows mobs to continue attacking you.
Vindication: Vindication is applied from other attacks and needs to be specced into after spending 10 points in the Retribution tree- The amount of Attack Power reduced scales with your level, and as such does not require any additional training for higher ranks. At level 80, the amount of AP reduced is equal to either 287 or 574, depending on how many points you invest in the talent.
Sacred Shield: Sacred Shield reduces incoming damage every 6 seconds by placing a shield on our target that reduces a total of 500 damage, plus 75% of our Spell power. With the Divine Guardian talent, the length and the amount absorbed by Sacred Shield is increased. Similar Sacred Shield effects do not stack. However, it is recommended that if you have a Holy Paladin specced into the Divine Guardian talent, it is better to let him cast Sacred Shield on you as his Sacred Shield absorb is better than yours since he has more SP than Prot Paladins.
*Important Note*---> The absorb effect from this ability will not "roll" with itself- meaning that if you had part of a damage shield remaining and are stuck again after 6 seconds, a new refreshed shield will be place on you or your target instead.
Divine Sacrifice: Divine Sacrifice is a talent in the Protection tree that is available after spending 10 points. Some Protection Paladins will pick it up to negate a large portion of Party-oriented and Raid-wide damage. Note that it is, however, the prerequisite for the Divine Guardian talent.
Cleanse: Cleanse removes one Poison, Magical, and Disease effect form the target. This is useful for assisting other teammates when a large amount of people are inflicted with ill status conditions.
Hammer of Justice: Mainly used in PvP, but also in PvE to help prevent spell casting, Hammer of Justice will stun it's target for 6 seconds. It's chance to hit targets is dependent upon your Spell Hit chance and not your Melee Hit chance.. However, all other spell statistics (Resist, Spell Reflect, etc.) still affect Hammer of Justice.
*Important Note*---> This ability will also interrupt spell casting of ONLY mobs when they are immune to the stun effect- Players immune to stun effects will NOT be interrupted.
Lay on Hands: A powerful heal on a 20 minute cooldown, Lay on Hands can be used in many situations to prevent a wipe or to prevent yourself from being killed. Its cooldown can be reduced to 15 minutes with a glyph, and further to 11 minutes with talents in the Holy tree.
*Important Note*---> This ability will also cause Forbearance when used on yourself. Except when another Paladin casts it on you.
[4DRS]- Tank Rotations
Unlike other classes, a Protection Paladin has no true rotation - Instead, you must watch the cooldown of your abilities and use them once they are available, much like an Enhancement Shaman or Affliction Warlock. Depending on the situation, you may do more threat with one specific ability than you would with another.
Single-target-
Hand of Reckoning and/or Avenger's Shield > Holy Shield > Shield of Righteousness > then go into 96969 rotation.
What's the 96969 rotation? Press a 8+ second cd spell then a 6 second skill then a 8+ second skill.
8+ second = Holy Shield, Consecration, Judgement.
6 second = Shield of Righteousness, Hammer of the Righteous.
So it goes something like this: Judgement > Shield of Righteousness > Consecration > Hammer of Righteousness > Holy Shield > repeat.
With 2pcT9 and/or 2pcT10 Bonuses, your highest threat spell is Hammer of the Righteous.
This takes higher priority over Shield of Righteousness. Hence you start with:
Hand of Reckoning and/or Avenger's Shield > Holy Shield > Hammer of the Righteous > 96969.
Multi-target-
You should be spamming Hammer of the Righteous, Holy Shield, Consecration, Avenger's Shield. And using Shield of Righteousness, Judgement on tab targets. Holy Wrath if your targets are mostly Demon/Undead.
[5TBS]- Talent Builds
Depending on which aspect of play a player wants to participate in will determine where he or she places their Talent Points. I’ll list some come builds for all aspects of play.
PvE Build:
http://www.wowhead.com/?talent#sZV0t...dxfMobc:G0pzcm
This is my current build that I use for Raiding. You will be using the Seal of Vengeance/Corruption all the time, as it became the staple seal of Protection Paladins. The points in the Retribution tree are both defensive and offensive. Vindication is your mitigation debuff a la Demoralizing Shout. If you do not raid with a Retribution Paladin, then Heart of the Crusader will bring an added 3% crit to your raid. Further down the tree is the Crusade talent which adds 3% more damage and another 3% damage if your target is Humanoid, Undead, Demon, or Elemental. Crusade has been proven to be better than Seals of the Pure, if the mobs are Humanoid, Demon, Undead or Elemental.
If you want Seal of Command, simply take 1 point out of Conviction and put it into the Seal of Command talent.
http://www.wowhead.com/?talent#sVZE0...sIufdxo:G0pzcm
If you prefer to have Divinity, then this build is built around it. Because of the lack of points, the Crusade talent is unobtainable here. So, Seals of the Pure will help your threat in this build. There is 2 free points for your choice.
PvP Build: Unfortunately I do not PVP. So any comments would be appreciated.
[6EGE]- Endgame Expectations
PvE:
As a Protection Paladin, you are expected to be very well geared in order to survive boss hits for as long as possible. You have an array of Hand spells at your disposal as well as 3 cooldowns to use for survival of yourself and your party/raid members. You are the person who prevents death from befalling your DPS and Healing members, by utilizing taunt skills and Hand of Protection.
[7UFM]- Useful Macros
There is no need to macro Righteous Defense, as the macro is inbuilt into the spell.
I use a simple Divine Shield macro. Pressing it once casts it, it is canceled on the second press:
Works if you want to remove debuffs on yourself while tanking. Just becareful that once the Divine Shield goes up, the boss will momentarily turn to and hit the second person on threat list (In most cases, it is a DPS!) until you cancel the Divine Shield.Code:#showtooltip Divine Shield /cancelaura Divine Shield /cast Divine Shield /cast Hand of Reckoning
If you are here to look for 1 button spam macros, then this is the wrong place.
[8CCN]- Conclusion
Please provide any further discussions for the Protection Paladin below.
Do refrain from trolling or flaming, and try to be constructive in your comments.