whats your favourite paladin era?

[Dreamscar]

I've always been horde, so even though I absolutely hated them in Vanilla (reckbomb was just a joke), I fell in love with my Holy Pally in TBC.

Maybe because I'm bitter to so much change but BC > Cata > Wrath for Holy. I think I'm one of the few people who misses downranking heals. Wrath was a joke as far as paladins go, way too easy. Just way too easy. Beacon + DStorm + Early SBV made the class so faceroll it's not even funny.

I still love the class but being such a long-time PvPer, playing as Holy in Arenas is not so much fun anymore.

[Revak]

I started leveling my pally in vanilla so I'm not sure about that era as my priest was my focus.

I preferred prot during TBC. It was a niche thing but I loved grabbing my pally for the waves of enemies in CoT Hyjal and pretty much all AoE trash tanking situations. I also enjoyed ret for doing Isle dailies.

I preferred ret during Wrath. DS was awesome. Prot was fine too and I pretty much played both of those specs.

I quit playing my pally early in Cata. I just didn't enjoy the holy power system. For 5 years my paladin was my #1 alt and now he just sits. Also, I've barely tried holy so I can't comment on that.

[Liminal]

Prot: Late WotLK
Ret: Late WotLK
Holy: Nax WotLK


Only started playing my pally at the tail end of BC.

Shadow Bolt Locks in BC... so much fun

[Grax]

lol how long was cd on bubble and lay on hands in pre tbc?

Bubbles were (I think) 5 minutes each, LoH was 30 iirc. No debuff/shared CD at that time, though. Every 30 minutes, a Ret-bomber was brutal.

[Zortha]

Pre 4.1 when WoG was actually useful and when Prot did more DPS than Ret =) Those days were great Avengers Shield whacking players for 60% of their HP in PvP.

[Liminal]

I dont understand why people are saying Cata for Prot.

Prots on the weaker end of the Tank spectrum right now only ahead of really Bears (who fill a different tank role). Additionally, Blizzards done nothing but create more buttons to press. Great! Two rotations (single target and aoe) to clutter up my already Hoading: Buried Alive keyboard from being a Paladin. Because pushing Hammer instead of CS is so tough of a concept, that its entirely necessary to require another keybind. Stupid. That and the WoG nerf, while necessary, was very bad news.

Plus the whole Holy Power system is a giant anchor on the whole class now because its so clunky...

[Zwergerl]

for prot : cata - it feels right now
holy: preCata - i loved the style of using swift, light heals with nearly unlimited mana

[kaloth]

Wrth just because they were op in pvp i would destroy people with Zinrok 60ver oustide org without even trying and Pve was Op to 4 spells for 20k dps lol ya those were the days

[Darkagial]

Reckoning Bomb... google Kazzak Reckbombed...

[zcks]

I kind of liked all of them in one way or another, yet each of them had serious problems that could have been avoided if the design team & management would just take their heads out of their asses to

1: Allocate proper time for testing & fine tuning.
2: Implement the tools everyone including blizzard management has admitted are needed for every melee & every hybrid (proper gap closer & a stance/presence/form system).
3: Listen to the community for reasons other then to take their ideas on how to fix us then turn around & give them to other classes (seriously paladin players came up with allot of ideas for paladins like chains of ice, death grip, anti magic shield, death strike, heroic leap, shadow step etc...., but blizzard ignored paladin problems & implemented them for others).

Vanilla: Basically sucked unless you were holy & even then you were sub par in allot of ways.

TBC: Finally saw holy becoming a good tank healer thought it couldn't group heal for shit, prot finally became a decent tank though it was really only good for add tanking, ret was basically a sub par dps buff bot.

Wrath: Holy was more or less the same except it could group heal slightly better thanks to beacon, prot finally came into its own as a tank, ret became OP for a half week & spent the rest of the expansion slowly being nerfed but ended up in its most balanced state ever by mid ICC.

Cataclysm: Holy lost a little single target healing potential but became a decent group healer (still better then average single heals & less then average group heals compared to others), prot stayed more or less the same till 4.1 (the wOG nerf) then it started to fall behind 2 other tanks & be more or less even with bears. Ret took a major hit to its utility & survivability & in the end only got an interrupt (one it cant use half the time in pvp because its still lotl easy to kite) & lost its mind deadening easy rotation for one with so much RNG that it makes you want to smash your computer.

As far as pvp goes only holy has ever been good consistently, ret had its time but even then it was still cannon fodder for ranged classes & ret was only really ever good for half a week in 3.0 because of designer screw up (after that it only ever got anywhere when played as a heal bot which goes against what the spec is about).

[Deleted]

Vanilla: Basically sucked unless you were holy & even then you were sub par in allot of ways.

TBC: Finally saw holy becoming a good tank healer thought it couldn't group heal for shit, prot finally became a decent tank though it was really only good for add tanking, ret was basically a sub par dps buff bot.

Wrath: Holy was more or less the same except it could group heal slightly better thanks to beacon, prot finally came into its own as a tank, ret became OP for a half week & spent the rest of the expansion slowly being nerfed but ended up in its most balanced state ever by mid ICC.

Cataclysm: Holy lost a little single target healing potential but became a decent group healer (still better then average single heals & less then average group heals compared to others), prot stayed more or less the same till 4.1 (the wOG nerf) then it started to fall behind 2 other tanks & be more or less even with bears. Ret took a major hit to its utility & survivability & in the end only got an interrupt (one it cant use half the time in pvp because its still lotl easy to kite) & lost its mind deadening easy rotation for one with so much RNG that it makes you want to smash your computer.

All true except the part about Prot being behind DK/War after the WoG nerf. Prot is doing very well, I'd still take a prot pally over a DK/War on quite a few fights. I'd rank us as even overall. I think if we had Cata Prot and Holy along with WotLK Ret pallies would be in the best state possible.

[Khwaj]

ret @ 3.0 b4 the nerf 2 weeks later, got time to payback all those ppl calling us lolret
was short time, but very sweet

[Arrsoul]

Wrath, Pre-BC pallys were boring, BC pallys were way OP, Wrath pallys were ok, Cata pallys suck ass.

[TheRabidDeer]

Vanilla
Full bubble
Physical bubble
Ridiculous heals that were hard to stop with endless mana (FoL)
Epic LoH
Awesome seals
Reckoning bombs
HoJ

Sure, your damage was pitiful, but if you were holy you were a god in T2/T3.

Oh, also... being plate really meant something in those days. Like, REALLY meant something. Cloth healers were getting killed in stunlocks easily, but a paladin would survive no problems at all.

[ipoststuff]

cata > wotlk > tbc > classic

anyone who says tbc was obviously a blood elf.
and reckoning wasnt as OP as ppl make it out to be.

[Deleted]

For ret, id say Vanilla > WotLK > Cata/TBC
Why vanilla? Well...

[Holyweed]

Probably vanilla just due to the fact it was alliance only and special.

[Krohnis]

TBC for me. I miss 30 sec. seals the most for some reason. I also miss when Belfs were actual blood knights or whatever, and had different seals.

[Deleted]

Although I like Templar's Verdict, I feel that ret pally has lost much of its "paladin powers", especially with what comes to survivability - which seems to be better for every single melee class. Losing different Judgement effects is pretty crap too. Late Wrath ret pally, with interrupt, would probably be the perfect setup.

I also miss when Belfs were actual blood knights or whatever,

Belf Knights of the Brown Hole probably.

[zcks]

Although I like Templar's Verdict, I feel that ret pally has lost much of its "paladin powers", especially with what comes to survivability - which seems to be better for every single melee class. Losing different Judgement effects is pretty crap too. Late Wrath ret pally, with interrupt, would probably be the perfect setup.


Belf Knights of the Brown Hole probably.

This ^ is almost true, wrath certainly was designed allot better & the combat mechanics were definitely smother (without all the RNG). Sadly as long as blizzard keeps putting a half assed effort into ret design & refuses to implement the basic tools/mechanics that even they have admitted are needed to balance every melee & every hybrid the spec will never be balanced.