Spoiler: Ret is not THAT broken.

[LeBoucher]

Before I get started on this, I think I might want to give some information about myself:
I started playing WoW back in TBC, My main was a Holy Spec Draenei Paladin, and I played him for 3 years (I even had offspec gear for Ret at that time). After going through many "mah keys r haxd!" phases and fiddling around with WoW and AoC; I regrettably destroyed ALL my toons during the ToC patch. Well, I'm back now and I wanted to remake my Paladin, but I did not want to level him up again while the class leveling system was still broken. Let's face it: leveling a ret Paladin was EXTREMELY boring (until you hit level 61 *twirls finger* woo hoo).

I decided to make my Death Knight instead, and followed along on these forums about the 4.0.1 changes to Paladins. Everything about them seemed very good, fair, and balanced. Now that I finally remade my Paladin, this patch, I actually come to find that even at level 17 there are some issues. Issues like "Wow, casting TV is almost impossible!" or "I can one shot EVERYTHING with CS that is equal or higher level than me, if it crits!". The biggest problem though is the HP system; IMO it is a crapshoot that needs to be fixed badly. It relies too heavily on RNG. Some spells that get casted by using HP need to be fixed too. For example: TV is not worth casting for 1 or 2 HP. You're pretty much forced to wait until you get 3 HP. That's bad. it should be more like...
1 HP: 70% WD
2 HP: 110% WD
3 HP: 225% WD
30% WD for 1 HP is waaaay UP'd.

Other than that, I'm REALLY enjoying my Paladin. I don't hear many positive things about ret on this forum ATM, but hopefully with some hot fixes we will all sing praises. I mean, Blizzard busted their asses fixing ret...AGAIN. Now it's almost complete. Deathwing won't stand a chance once blizzard replaces "Selfless Healer" with "Ass Light of Thee Righteous"!

TL;DR: I enjoy playing my ret pally so far, ret is almost fine, now it's your turn to say something positive about ret. I'm a strong believer that Blizzard works harder when they get praised by their consumers. Not without us heckling them first, of course! lol!

[Deleted]

i love how the random gain on HP with DP and HoL proccs can give me 3 full strenght TV's in a row or having me wait for 12+ seconds before i can TV. :P
and btw TV only being good with 3 HP is intended its there to punish people for not wathing their HP and pressing it early

[Quehn]

I was in RFD earlier today, our lvl 37 retpaladin critted for 1.5-1.7k with templar's verdict, which is like 70-120% of a players hp at level ~40.

[Matt3s]

I enjoy playing my ret pally so far, ret is almost fine, now it's your turn to say something positive about ret.

In its current state, ret is completely fine.
Im doing as much damage as i expect myself to (no point in trying to be a spriest or moonkin right now, since they both need to be nerfed a bit) and thats fine.

Hell, im doing more dmg now, than pre-4.0, why shouldnt i be fine?

[Deleted]

Of course it isn't, not damage wise anyhow, from experience Blizzard won't leave a dps specc in the dust(post-TBC) unless the class has another readily available, which paladins don't, hence why ret would at least get a number fix.

PvP on the other hand, there the sky could be falling, already have fallen so we have clouds up our ears, or we have to wait and see. But with the mobility buffs to many already mobile classes and us ending up +/- zero more or less, it is hard to find many positives in the pvp department.

[Deleted]

Jesus holy Christ.

You actually know that the -Majority- of the QQ (which is for the most justified) comes from BETA PLAY, which is lvl 85, not lowlevels :S

Who the hell cares if it's overpowered/underpowered/normalpowered from 1-84 anyway

[Boloney]

ret is not broken at all... if anything they got buffed. people only qq about them being nerfed because most of them can't grasp the mechanics of holy power

EDIT: the qq from live.... that is

[Sezuka]

Ret really is good now. I am enjoying it a lot, and it feels a lot more fun and interesting than 3.3 ret, albeit still a bit faceroll (Mainly on singletarget, AoE is a bit different.).

[Nikoll]

ret is not broken at all... if anything they got buffed. people only qq about them being nerfed because most of them can't grasp the mechanics of holy power

EDIT: the qq from live.... that is

yes, before last night we were perfect. thats why blizzard hotfixed us almost as fast as they hotfixed us for 3.0

[Underskilled]

Just went 50-3 on my 19 ret paladin.

Ret? Broken? Psh.

[Urt]

Just went 50-3 on my 19 ret paladin.

Ret? Broken? Psh.

Are you even thinking before you post? 19 =/= 80 or even 85 for that matter.
I'm sure all other classes are balanced at 19. /end sarcasm.

[Nzo]

granted our dps is back inline with what it was before 4.0.1, but the random aspect of HP makes ret pallies less fun atm =(
However! Prot paladins are god damn epic fun now

[Cowpunch]

Ret is fine.

[Deleted]

It's fine now it was hotfixed people playing the "I dont know what you were QQ'ing about" card clearly didnt try it before the buff :P

[Talen]

I enjoy playing my ret pally so far, ret is almost fine, now it's your turn to say something positive about ret. I'm a strong believer that Blizzard works harder when they get praised by their consumers. Not without us heckling them first, of course! lol!

Works harder when they get praised? Not here for the Great Threat Revolt of 2007 then?

As for ret...it has a fair number of issues outstanding. There are a good many poorly designed or ill-conceived talents....Sanctity of Battle, Sanctified Wrath, Eye for an Eye and Zealotry among them. There aren't enough finishers to make HP anything other than a proc mechanic and HP has been implemented in such a way there is next to no reason to utilise anything but 3HP. And so on. And the other trees have their own flaws.

More importantly, Ret has had several issues with PvP, wrt offensive utility and mobility. These issues have been addressed....with solutions tailored for PvE. Add to this is the random nature of Rets mechanics and you end up with inconsistent DPS and uncontrollable damage. I've had situations where I've been able to get off several TVs in a row....and others where I've had to very painfully build the 3 HP required using CS.

A situation where whether you win or loze is determined not by skill, but by pure luck is not a good thing. But thats largely where Paladins are now.

As it stands PvP was where paladins had the greatest problem in LK and those have been largely unaddressed in Cat to date. Indeed, the situations arguably made worse in some ways, by the regression to TBC random burst mechanics and while the addditrion of tools such as rebuke are good, their effectiveness in PvP is debatable.

Paladins needs the RNG taken out of their rotation - probably by having DP tweaked in someway. Perhaps giving it a lower chance to proc would make it much more of a bonus but you'd need to reduce the cost AND add a secondary effect or merge it with something.
HoL needs a boost of some sort - right now, its replacing an attack by shifting it one GCD ahead which limits its effectiveness.
The existing mobility appears fine for PvE but I'm still finding it questionable in PvP...and that in turn hinders the effectiveness of other tools.
More finishers are needed...and baseline so as to give the class real choice as to how HP is used.
HP probably needs to be tweaked...lower HP values could be more efficient but higher ones more concentrated...e.g. you do more damage with three 1HP TVs but a 3HP TV would pack more punch into 1 GCD.
Talents and abilities/talents need to be reworked or redesigned where necessary.
The UI needs improvement - the HoL proc is still hard to see and there needs to be some indication of when you get 3 HP.

And so on.

EJL

[Requital]

granted our dps is back inline with what it was before 4.0.1, but the random aspect of HP makes ret pallies less fun atm =(
However! Prot paladins are god damn epic fun now

Pretty much this I do about the same DPS now after the hot fix that I did before 4.0.1 not really a DPS upgrade but at least I'm back where I was.

[Hexme]

Jesus holy Christ.

You actually know that the -Majority- of the QQ (which is for the most justified) comes from BETA PLAY, which is lvl 85, not lowlevels :S

Who the hell cares if it's overpowered/underpowered/normalpowered from 1-84 anyway

Yes cause beta has decent gear to test dps out, you're in blues most of the time in beta and not in raid gear so expect crappy dps in blues.

Although the hotfix buff earlier, all i have to say is i got a big grin when hammer of wrath crit for 21k in a heroic 5 man.

[LeBoucher]

Works harder when they get praised? Not here for the Great Threat Revolt of 2007 then?

As for ret...it has a fair number of issues outstanding. There are a good many poorly designed or ill-conceived talents....Sanctity of Battle, Sanctified Wrath, Eye for an Eye and Zealotry among them. There aren't enough finishers to make HP anything other than a proc mechanic and HP has been implemented in such a way there is next to no reason to utilise anything but 3HP. And so on. And the other trees have their own flaws.

More importantly, Ret has had several issues with PvP, wrt offensive utility and mobility. These issues have been addressed....with solutions tailored for PvE. Add to this is the random nature of Rets mechanics and you end up with inconsistent DPS and uncontrollable damage. I've had situations where I've been able to get off several TVs in a row....and others where I've had to very painfully build the 3 HP required using CS.

A situation where whether you win or loze is determined not by skill, but by pure luck is not a good thing. But thats largely where Paladins are now.

As it stands PvP was where paladins had the greatest problem in LK and those have been largely unaddressed in Cat to date. Indeed, the situations arguably made worse in some ways, by the regression to TBC random burst mechanics and while the addditrion of tools such as rebuke are good, their effectiveness in PvP is debatable.

Paladins needs the RNG taken out of their rotation - probably by having DP tweaked in someway. Perhaps giving it a lower chance to proc would make it much more of a bonus but you'd need to reduce the cost AND add a secondary effect or merge it with something.
HoL needs a boost of some sort - right now, its replacing an attack by shifting it one GCD ahead which limits its effectiveness.
The existing mobility appears fine for PvE but I'm still finding it questionable in PvP...and that in turn hinders the effectiveness of other tools.
More finishers are needed...and baseline so as to give the class real choice as to how HP is used.
HP probably needs to be tweaked...lower HP values could be more efficient but higher ones more concentrated...e.g. you do more damage with three 1HP TVs but a 3HP TV would pack more punch into 1 GCD.
Talents and abilities/talents need to be reworked or redesigned where necessary.
The UI needs improvement - the HoL proc is still hard to see and there needs to be some indication of when you get 3 HP.

And so on.

EJL

Alert! Alert! Elitist Jerks 1000 club poster; 12 meters and closing in!
I would have read your post, but it as it seems you only read my TL;DR part, what makes you think I'm going to read your wall-o-text?!

I really hate it when people post theorycrafting, class balance, and game balance issues mostly to inflate their egos rather than to inform people.

On the other hand, I was a healer in TBC, so I would not be able to remember the great threat revolt. Let alone would I care since I never pulled aggro off my tanks.

[edit]: Inb4 "implying, or assuming". I KNOW I AM.

[Badpaladin]

Numbers have a way of working things out, but that still doesn't justify the shitty design if divine purpose.

[Rayvene]

I enjoy the new Ret. Yes some things need improvement, but they did nearly redesign the spec. I just like that bad rets are bad again.