New Ret Mastery- 9/9/2010

[Kaneex]

How long does this proc last?

Can I say, get the proc, then CS 3 times to get 3 HP, then unleash 2 TV or 1inquisiton+1 TV right after eachother?

The proc lasts for about 8 seconds BUT once you use any ability that uses HP then the buff is used up (ie one time use).

That being said, you can have 0 HP when it procs and still be able to use TV (with it hitting as if you had 3 HP).

Hope that all makes sense.

[Astray]

It was actually a joke at bringing back Seal of Casino for even more RNG!

Stop joking. Our cataclysm rng is serious business.

[zcks]

I don't know about any of you guys, but Ret is the reason I'm not ditching my paladin tank now. I love all the RNG and the higher skillcap! Here's to hoping Blizzard don't dumb things down too much before release

True some RNG adds skill, but when you have 5 randomly generated procs then it is not about skill its about dumb luck. It would be better if they made a few of them always happen when certain conditions are met like a critical or Templar's verdict or another ability are used.

Also as far as this new mastery is concerned it may be alright if we could have 100% up time on a target but we cannot. Perhaps if they changed it so all attacks could trigger it it would be better especially on a pvp basis.

[Nillo]

Prot feels like it's back to bc times (cs, judge, wait, cs , wait , cs , YAY 3 HP SoR, judge, cs wait wait wait more wait even more /fall asleep)
And Ret is just utter nonsense with all those procs you have to monitor (Exorcism + new Mastery), HP you have to look at (being miles away from your action bars with the standard UI is godawful) and CDs you have to use (Inquisition + Zealotry + AW). And probably all that while still casting heals (Yay selfless healer) and dodging shadow traps.....


BTT: I do think the new Mastery is OK and doesn't cause too many troubles with wasting HP it's also something, that you usually don't have to use immediately to get it's full benefit. The thing that really needs to change is DP, which should be changed to something, that is more controllable (maybe 100% on Judgement and Exorcism)

[thoronius73]

This change is amazing, people were complaining our self healing was horrible in pvp, now we can proc WoG more and more, which brings us in line with rogues/warriors self healing. Also emphasizes Haste/Mastery which some were complaining immensley that Haste was gonna be wasted on us. Yeah its watching procs quite a bit, but the new model we would have quite a few seconds of down time anyways. For once the spec laughed at for 5 years won't have scrubs giving good players a bad name. Yeah we can proc a hell of alot of dmg in pvp setting, that is IF we are lucky, who knows what are mastery rating is even gonna look like in pvp gear at 85. I don't imagine it being mroe then 20% if that.

[ragingsoul]

for this to happen, you have 40%*15% chance (assuming you can get enough mastery for 7% using PVP gear)*40%*40%*15%*40%.
that has about 0.05% chance of happening. once every 1700 attacks. and that's being optimistic about the chance that HoL procs, because we don't know if there will be enough mastery on PvP gear to even get to 15%. if there is no mastery on PvP gear, then it stays the default 8%, so:
40%*8%*40%*40%*8%*40%. that's once every 6100 attacks.

you might want to rethink that, since it's at the moment very easy to get some procs at the same time.

I just did
CS--1 HP, 2 proc of hand of light and exorcism in 3 melee swing, HP proc from TV AND exorcism. TV again, proc, CS, jumdment TV

which did CS-TV-exo-TV-CS-exo-TV-jud-CS-TV

it's better with this patch, the problem is the absolute no control over it, and if you happened to have Zeal at this time.. well, you lost at least 50% effectiveness on your 31 talent point.
this mastery isn't that bad, the problem is that in the end, over only 2min, you might be lucky, you might be not. no control whatsoever isn't really fun after 1 or 2h of trying things out.

[thoronius73]

aye with Zealotry almost makes this Mastery Moot, unless you get luck and get to just spam TV/TV which does sound kind of fun even if it only happens once every 10 mins >.<

[zcks]

Its a strong probability that they will change zealotry again since we have this new mastery. Personally I'm hoping they change it so it requires no holy power to use & causes all your abilities which consume holy power to act as if you had 3 charges of holy power for the next X seconds.

That would let us spam high cost heals or damage for a brief time when a situation called for it.

As for other changes they could do.

1. They could make our mastery have a chance to trigger off of all attacks since in situations that have target switching or in pvp vs ranged classes we are rarly in auto attack range long.

2. They could let us build up more holy power charges then we can use with a single spell, this would be nice since many of the RNG procs we have cause us to generate extra holy power that is wasted.

3. They could double the duration of inquisition per point of holy power spent, as is it costs allot considering its duration & it can be very awkward/clunky to keep it up since our holy power generation is for the most part random & luck reliant.

4. They could reduce the sheer amount of RNG holy power generation we have in favor of having another short CD ability also generate holy power (this would make retribution take more skill instead of being reliant on dumb luck since we have 4+ RNG procs that determine our dps & healing potential). One idea I have heard would be to reduce the Cd on crusader strike to 3 seconds base then change sanctity of battle to where it would cause haste to lower the Cd on judgment & give judgment a 100% chance to generate a holy power charge.

5. They could give us a snare or make hand of freedom immune to dispels when used on self, as is even with long arm of the law we have very little face time vs ranged classes especially since we lost the ability to cleanse and a good deal of our healing potential while they just made gains in terms of Health & kiting ability.
(one good idea I have heard for this problem would be having hand of freedom reflect any snares on you back at their casters for their remaining time when used on yourself & having hand of freedom daze the person who dispels it if it was cast on the paladin)

[Ryme]

I don't know about any of you guys, but Ret is the reason I'm not ditching my paladin tank now. I love all the RNG and the higher skillcap! Here's to hoping Blizzard don't dumb things down too much before release

How is RNG something to love? This level of RNG actually takes away from the skill part of the game... Please, do a bit of thinking.

[Pheonixdown7]

Its a strong probability that they will change zealotry again since we have this new mastery. Personally I'm hoping they change it so it requires no holy power to use & causes all your abilities which consume holy power to act as if you had 3 charges of holy power for the next X seconds.

That would let us spam high cost heals or damage for a brief time when a situation called for it.

As for other changes they could do.

1. They could make our mastery have a chance to trigger off of all attacks...

2. They could let us build up more holy power charges then we can use with a single spell...

3. They could double the duration of inquisition per point of holy power spent...

4. They could reduce the sheer amount of RNG holy power generation we have in favor of having another short CD ability also generate holy power...

5. They could give us a snare or make hand of freedom immune to dispels...

While they could change zealotry, there is no reason to do so, and on top of that, the change you suggest is outlandish and would never be allowed.

1. If it triggered off of all attacks it would have to have a significantly reduced chance to occur due to PvE, which in turn would be worse for PvP having a reduced time on target.

2. The whole point of only have 3 is that it takes more skill, adding more would push ret back towards faceroll.

3. Unnecessary change to appease the lazy, and again, keeping it up correctly increases the skill cap.

4. Stop trying to get TV every 5s and realize that it's a finishing move... A long (5 min) CD to generate HP would be good to start fights with Inq, a short CD would just be feeding holy power mid-fight. CS on a 3s CD, while being excellent for rotational purposes, is terrible for the "not GCD locked" model. Judgement does not need to give holy power, the rate at which it is currently obtained is fine.

5. Yes, let's just get rid off all ways to counter a paladin in PvP, cleansing slows is the job of the healer now, paladin's can help with freedom when they have it. We do not need a gap closer (Long arm) and a snare, justice is snare enough, if you can't stick on someone who has no speed increase while you have 30%, that's pathetic.

Sounds to me like you are player who wants everything to be easy, go find another FotM please, stop ruining the reputation of our spec. See your sig, GTFO.

How is RNG something to love? This level of RNG actually takes away from the skill part of the game... Please, do a bit of thinking.

Having some is what makes the game challenging, having none makes it bland and boring. I'd assume that different people enjoy different amounts of challenge, however it is true that there comes a point when RNG dwarfs the effect skill may have, and that is frustrating to alot of players. I don't think we have to much RNG in terms of playability atm, but we may have too much in terms of performance variability. Hopefully tho, as our mastery increases, there will be a more even distribution of HoL procs per fight, and stabilize much of the variance.

[zcks]

2. The whole point of only have 3 is that it takes more skill, adding more would push ret back towards faceroll.

3. Unnecessary change to appease the lazy, and again, keeping it up correctly increases the skill cap.

4. Stop trying to get TV every 5s and realize that it's a finishing move... A long (5 min) CD to generate HP would be good to start fights with Inq, a short CD would just be feeding holy power mid-fight. CS on a 3s CD, while being excellent for rotational purposes, is terrible for the "not GCD locked" model. Judgement does not need to give holy power, the rate at which it is currently obtained is fine.

5. Yes, let's just get rid off all ways to counter a paladin in PvP, cleansing slows is the job of the healer now, paladin's can help with freedom when they have it. We do not need a gap closer (Long arm) and a snare, justice is snare enough, if you can't stick on someone who has no speed increase while you have 30%, that's pathetic.

From the way you talk about the way we operate I'm guessing you either have not been on the beta or are happy with having our dps completely reliant on RNG luck.

Good players are not however happy with having the majority of our holy power generation based on lucky RNG. They are completely happy with RNG allowing the use of abilities that you could not normally use but having it control how fast you can build up a resource needed for your primary role leads to lucky people doing better then skilled people because of sheer luck & as we all know luck can vary greatly from fight to fight. Now for the reasons I made those suggestions.

2. I made this suggestions because many of our holy power generation procs (as well as our mastery) are completely random & happen at times when we already have full holy power, this leads to them being wasted. As for my suggestion of having one of our core attacks being added to the list of things that guarantee creating a holy power charge I am not alone as many players on the beta forums have suggested changing divine purpose or sanctity of battle to let another of our short Cd spells generate charges 100% of the time instead of being yet another RNG proc in a spec that already has so many that luck decides how it does more then skill.

3. I suggested this because of the sheer randomness that we have in creating holy power charges that we use to keep inquisition up. If we could generate these charges more consistently this change would not need to be made.

5. As for why i suggested this change it is because frankly we do not stand a chance against anything on beta that can kite. A short term run speed buff and a dispellable snare remover just don't cover the lack of being able to slow opponents ourselves. I know we are sposed to work in a team but when we have weaknesses like these then there is more of a reason to bring someone else then there is us because ALL other melee classes on beta can provide better self survivability then we can as well as provide better offensive utility. If they were to give us a ranged daze or make hand of freedom immune to dispel when used on self this would not be as big of a problem but since they have not it is and will remain one. (as for why justice is not enough of a snare in our current state on beta here is a simple reason, we can only have hand of freedom up about half the time & when we are fighting a mage, felhunter, priest, shaman, prot warrior, or hunter it can be dispelled almost immediately because of the lack of trash buffs or dispel resistance. Combine that with us being slowed by 50+% whenever it is down & LOTL just does not make up for it).

As for our new mastery, it is a good design to work with, however having it only work off of auto attacks can be a vary bad thing as any fight which requires target switches or any pvp fight vs ranged classes will completely wreck it's proc rate because we will spend so little time face to face with the target. If we had more consistent holy power generation & our mastery's chance to trigger was reduced in exchange for being able to trigger off of any attack it would be much more balanced overall in a game full of fights against ranged classes & fights that require target switching.

Now as for why I am suggesting changes instead of just ripping on others like you are. I do it because I have played this class for more then 3 and a half years now & I do not want it to end up being a shitty spec yet again either because of its lack of depth or because of its complete reliance on dumb luck getting resource generating procs. Don't get me wrong many of the changes Blizzard has done for cataclysm are good but some (especially in retributions case) are just to reliant on luck & not skill. They could do this by making our RNG procs more about using abilities we cannot normally use when they come up, they would still require skill to use & this would be a much better idea because having your resource generation vary so much from fight to fight because of luck is an extremely bad design.