Hammer of the Righteous, now shockwave like?

[Gallahadd]

gotta say I don't mind the change, a small burst of melee damage to our main 'nuke' target, plus a burst of holy damage to all the surround us, couple of question though....
How well does the 'burst' scale? one thing that does worry me is the tooltip makes no mention of what % AP/SP it scales with, and I wouldn't put it past blizz to do something stupid like make it not scale at all, or scale with like 1% of our AP and not at all with SP.
HoTR now applies Vind, but does it apply it to everyone in range, or just the initial target hit by the 'hammer' I could get by with it not applying your seal to everyone hit, having 5stacks of Seal of Truth on all targets would be a touch OP, but it would be annoying if it didn't spread the Vindi love.
Is HoTR still considered a melee attack? or are we now stuck with just CS to hold agro with whilst silenced?
And now the most important, world breaking, game changing, face melting question......
does HoTR still use the stupid spellcast animation, or does our one melee attack finally use our 1h attack animation

[Ozmademos]

Really? You wouldn't spend a talent point on our hardest hitting move because of a design change? Good luck holding threat. :<

It wont be the hardest hitting move with this change... and it'll only be for grab-it-all-and-lol-aoe-it-down which Blizz claims to be cutting back on big time. My biggest concern is that it wont be much more use for snap AoE threat than Holy Wrath unless it also applies the Veng DoT like the current Hammer of the Righteous. It looks as though we're just getting this Holy Thunderclap without the Veng DoT, since it also does the same Thunderclap-ish reduction in damage buff to the mobs.

[Gallahadd]

any word from the beta on how HoTR is working out? good change, bad change, reroll now change? any answers to the questions I posted up there ^^

[Ozmademos]

Can I say (unconstructively) that I thoroughly dislike it?
Not just the horrible Holy Nova graphics (YUCH!), but the whole idea behind it? In no way (except for the AoE debuff) I'm enticed on hitting this button. It's damage is truly horrible, the whole "additional target" (what made it so nice) idea is gone. It is exactly what you say - a thunderclap in disguise, where we had a true paladin ability. Shame really.

Hammer of the Righteous
See above. It has McWeaksauce/copy-paste all over it, it hardly scales (45% weap dmg on one target and the rest is static) and basicly it's just there for the debuff. Shame really, you could get Holy Wrath to spread vindication again and leave HoR as it was with the shared CS/HoR cd?

So. from these posts, I'm gleaning that Veng still spreads on Hammer of the Righteous. I have no real complaints then.

[Gallahadd]

Yeash, so the 1/1.5k damage is STATIC? if so that is epiccly horribly failed, although not totally unexpected. so basically we only need this to keep the Debuff up, and once that's up even for AoE we'll just be Cs'ing

unless something gets changed...RIP HoTR, you were great, while you lived.

[Gallahadd]

I dunno man, having it proc seals could be pretty crazy, being able to keep up 5 stacks of Seal of Truth on an infinate amount of mobs for an infinate amount of time smacks a little too much of the 'high passive threat' that they're trying to get rid of in Cata, not to mention the insane Health/Mana returns we coujld get with Seal of Insight , don't get me wrong I'd love it to work like that, but I really don't see it happening.

Since in the last build they changed Vind to say it's applied by HoTR, and with HoTR being changed into a Thunderclap clone, it would be retarded for it not to apply.

JotJ though I don't think will fly, it's tied to judgement, so unless they rework the whole talent (admittedly this is the best time for that) then I don't see this happening.

Scaling must be put in, it would be retarded for our talented super cool AoE threat tanking tool to hit for the same when you're naked at the level you train it, and when you're at level 85 in full heroic tier 15 (or whatever the last tier will be), even if it scales quite badly, it still NEEDS to scale.

with a few tweaks I could see this becoming a very good ability, and a real core to our AoE toolkit, and I've gotta say I'm quite excited about this, as long as they don't screw it up

p.s. can anyone whose actually IN beta, find a pic/video of the animation for the move, yes I'm obsessed with attack animations

[Deathgoose]

Did they at least increase the range slightly on it? It always feels like the range for my hammer GONG to go off is less than it is for me to melee. Definitely feels like the range is less than CS.

Also, shares CD with CS, and both are at a 4.5s. Consecrate is on a lengthy CD now, HS is now linked with ShoR, and takes HP to make worth using.

So, 4.5 * 3 is 13.5s to get a full HP up, which means you are waiting on using ShoR until then. CS and HoR share CD, so it's either or there. Consc has a long CD, enough for 2 full HP building/dump cycles. Holy Wrath can only be used so much, as can Avenger's Shield.

For some reason, it just sounds like we are going to have a lot of dead periods with everything on CD and letting GCD's go to waste. Is that the case, Beta Pallies?

[Marilina]

Worst change ever. Do not like. HotR was really good as it was.

no, no, no


and nother no




having only 1 static rotation at which EVERYTHING is cleave is not good, it gives us WAY overpowered cleave and no singletarget options and can be fatal (saurfang adds)

[Ronark]

- Scaling. If it truly doesn't scale (POSSIBLY NYI), then it needs changing. I'd say 15% of AP + 50% of SP. With Vengeance stacked up, it'd hit for increasing amounts, and would actually scale indirectly based on your HP.

It's essentially shockwave, except without the stun or directional requirement. Remember, we've still got Blinding Shield to see properly (at least i've not heard much about it so far) which WILL be our Shockwave equivalent (although it'll be disorient over stun).

Blinding Shield was removed in favor of Inq. instead.

It also does scale with Attack Power and, therefore, Vengeance, at the rate of (30% damage + 2.4) * (AP/14) on your main target- I'd assume the AoE effect will scale in the same rate as Consecration ticks.

[Foibles]

Worst change ever. Do not like. HotR was really good as it was.

It was too good.

[Ronark]

It was too good.

It was ok or horrible for single target.
It was too good on 3 targets (4 when glyphed).
It was decent on 4+ targets when not glyphed.

[Ozmademos]

I dunno man, having it proc seals could be pretty crazy, being able to keep up 5 stacks of Seal of Truth on an infinate amount of mobs for an infinate amount of time smacks a little too much of the 'high passive threat' that they're trying to get rid of in Cata

The animation looks like the priest's Holy Nova. With the talent changes in the latest build, I'm debating spending the talents in Hammer of the Righteous. I can get far enough down the tree and have enough cool stuff without it for single target threat, which may be something Blizzard has wanted all along; to have some paladins spec for multi-target and some for single target (or using up one spec for single and the duel spec for multi).

Again, if it would have spread Veng DoTs on it's targets, I would have been more enticed to get it for a general tanking spec.

As is, I see it part of a multi-target spec.

[klaps_05]

something that worries me even more than this change - if they make it "chain lightning style" then they will prolly also change the AMAZING sound HOTR has when you punch it :S hope im wrong

[Fichek]

no, no, no


and nother no




having only 1 static rotation at which EVERYTHING is cleave is not good, it gives us WAY overpowered cleave and no singletarget options and can be fatal (saurfang adds)

You should read up on the changes to prot come Cata before commenting on stuff. You will be using CS for single target dmg no matter the implementation of HotR.
If this implementation goes live (or something similar) i will be a very sad panda. I mean it's actually complete opposite of their new tanking philosophy - work for threat, work for survival. Target switching to far left mob -> HotR, then to far right -> HotR, then mid so every mob would feel the power of hammer! Keeping Holy Shield up and what not. Now it turns into target 1 mob, HotR. SotR will keep HS up so no need to worry about that either. I mean it's dumbing down everything.
And i will be really missing that sound when it bounces around. I actually hated it when 3.0 hit, but after a while it really grew on me and now it's one of the best skill sounds in the game. Anyways, hitting HotR today feels like hitting an awesome button with pretty yellow numbers and pretty animation and great sound. "Tomorrow" it's a week version of Thunderclap. To each his own, but i don't like the change.

[Ozmademos]

LOL, here's something...

Maximum Single Target -
http://talent.mmo-champion.com/?pala...KCkw9X5,,12759

Maximum Multi-Target -
http://talent.mmo-champion.com/?pala...yhmzZS5,,12759

[Ronark]

LOL, here's something...

Maximum Single Target -
http://talent.mmo-champion.com/?pala...KCkw9X5,,12759

Maximum Multi-Target -
http://talent.mmo-champion.com/?pala...yhmzZS5,,12759

Grand Crusader has the potential to generate more TPS than 15% crit on CS.

Besides, as it currently is, those 3 points in Rule of Law would be better spent in Divinity.

[Talen]

Yeash, so the 1/1.5k damage is STATIC? if so that is epiccly horribly failed, although not totally unexpected. so basically we only need this to keep the Debuff up, and once that's up even for AoE we'll just be Cs'ing

unless something gets changed...RIP HoTR, you were great, while you lived.

We'll have to see.

Personally, I'm still wondering if the fact that both Ret and Prot have an unlimited target AoE effect as the 11 point targets is saying something about Blizzards design intentions. I've always felt that if two specs use simialr tools for the same job, then theres a strong case for that system to be baseline.

That and I don't like the fcat both HoR and CS share a CD. That just shouts "I'm too lazy to think of anything better right now".

EJL

[Marilina]

You should read up on the changes to prot come Cata before commenting on stuff. You will be using CS for single target dmg no matter the implementation of HotR.
If this implementation goes live (or something similar) i will be a very sad panda. I mean it's actually complete opposite of their new tanking philosophy - work for threat, work for survival. Target switching to far left mob -> HotR, then to far right -> HotR, then mid so every mob would feel the power of hammer! Keeping Holy Shield up and what not. Now it turns into target 1 mob, HotR. SotR will keep HS up so no need to worry about that either. I mean it's dumbing down everything.
And i will be really missing that sound when it bounces around. I actually hated it when 3.0 hit, but after a while it really grew on me and now it's one of the best skill sounds in the game. Anyways, hitting HotR today feels like hitting an awesome button with pretty yellow numbers and pretty animation and great sound. "Tomorrow" it's a week version of Thunderclap. To each his own, but i don't like the change.

so youre saying a stupid static rotation is better?

[Wotar]

You should read up on the changes to prot come Cata before commenting on stuff. You will be using CS for single target dmg no matter the implementation of HotR.
If this implementation goes live (or something similar) i will be a very sad panda. I mean it's actually complete opposite of their new tanking philosophy - work for threat, work for survival. Target switching to far left mob -> HotR, then to far right -> HotR, then mid so every mob would feel the power of hammer! Keeping Holy Shield up and what not. Now it turns into target 1 mob, HotR. SotR will keep HS up so no need to worry about that either. I mean it's dumbing down everything.
And i will be really missing that sound when it bounces around. I actually hated it when 3.0 hit, but after a while it really grew on me and now it's one of the best skill sounds in the game. Anyways, hitting HotR today feels like hitting an awesome button with pretty yellow numbers and pretty animation and great sound. "Tomorrow" it's a week version of Thunderclap. To each his own, but i don't like the change.

The use of CS vs HotR would be quite situational. I wouldn't hastily conclude that targeting one mob and using HotR is dumbing down the game for prot. HotR doesn't always have to be used for a whole encounter on multi target situations.

Based on a fictional example, if you are tanking a small number of mobs (let's say 3) that would take about 30 seconds to kill compared to about 15 mobs that would take about 8 seconds to kill, you may be better off using HotR on the 15 mobs, and a balance between CS and HotR and switching between targets on the 3 mob pull. This would be because cataclysm is not intended to be the aoe-fest as it is in wrath, and the devs have stated that they intend to use CS on single target threat and HotR on multi target threat. There is still leeway for the use of HotR on small mob pulls, to gain initial threat before a healer's HoT out-threats you. But after that, it's highly situational and dependent on threat levels of the mobs on when it's best to use single target threat abilities and switch between a small number of targets (since dps may be focusing on a particular target), or using HotR to produce distributed threat when healer threat is creeping up.

Devs have also stated at one point that they wanted to have inquisition be used to improve aoe threat. Prot is also given the choice of spending HP on WoG as well for some survivability (as a prot talent sees a 60% increase on self-cast WoG).

There are still choices to be made. Will a paladin use HotR to add some threat to adds so healers don't get aggro, or use CS to add threat to the main target that the dps players are focusing on? Is there enough threat to warrant the use of WoG, since healer mana might be low, and will no longer be seemingly infinite, and let 15% block fall off for a bit?

With at least 3 HP consuming abilities, I still see room for on-the-spot choices to be made while tanking. Perhaps you could elaborate why everything is being dumbed down.