Shadowlands paladin changes

[Beefhammer]

I am excited to see auras return. But I do hope they keep away from the blessings (as buffs). They are so insignificant as is I honestly forget to use them and as actually real buffs there was really just Kings. Maybe if they return as a 5 min cd, 5 min buff for an ally?

Exorcism will be great for this expac thematically!

I also wonder if they will add holy power to each spec or remove it from ret?

I wouldn't mine seeing seals reworked into situational, short duration, self buffs.

[Wrecktangle]

I wouldn't mine seeing seals reworked into situational, short duration, self buffs.

That's what Vanilla seals were...

[StrawberryZebra]

On the other hand they want to double down on classes rather than specs, so they have to a) give all paladin specs hopo or b) remove it from all if they want to be consistent.

From the sounds of it, they simply intend to throw Auras, Totems, Poisons etc back in and call it a job well done. It's really too early in development to say, but there's very little that screams "Paladin" about all specs having access to Holy Light, or Holy Shield or whatever dumb ability Blizzard have decided to give players back rather than look into if said ability is worth having in the first place.

I mean... I doubt many Arcane Mages are going to go around casting Fireball in the same way Rets aren't going to be bothered with something like Light of the Martyr. It's a button for the sake of having a button.

Speaking as a top 20 ret during WotLK with several top 10 world parses on 25H encounters during ICC there was a lot of nuance to the Ret priority. It was beautiful in that you could just mash and do well, but if you actually followed the priority and managed uptime you consistently outperformed other Rets.

I'm well aware that there was ample room for optimising your rotation in WotLK. The community perception, rightly or wrongly, was that "faceroll". That was right to some extent, there were times when you were pressing whatever was lit up at any given moment. The trick really was to eliminate future cooldown clashes while still using things as close to on cooldown as possible. Doing that well left you pretty much hitting things on cooldown too - The difference was subtle, and it took a skilled player to spot the difference.

For anyone else watching on a Stream or YT it simply looked like button bashing. And button bashing alone would get you something like 80% of the results - Which was fine for most players who weren't doing Heroic raiding.

I actually disagree that the concept isn't fun or interesting for a melee class. I think it could be if it was mechanically sound and balanced well. It's really no different than any other resource, including Holy Power. You generate it and spend it.

The implication with Mana however is that it's a finite resource. Making it an infinite resource on a class that has access to healing abilities can potentially lead to some very wonky balancing issues, in particular it could make Ret too good in PvP if they're putting out none stop healing. On the other side, it would make Mana Draining abilities unfairly punishing for the Paladin, and comes with a plethora of other potential design space issues - Like abilities that cause damage when you spend Mana and similar which are designed more to hinder spell casters.

It's not an impossible situation, but it does shrink the potential PvE design space while opening up routes for abusing it that no other class would have. While those are fun for the player, they're a nightmare for the dev team.

I've done this exercise a few times. There was my Zealotry concept where using a weak filler attack transformed your next attack into an empowered version (different animation/effect, i.e. Exorcism baseline becomes Hammer of Wrath under Zealotry).

I've also tried retrofitting this concept into Wings into a WoD era Seraphim variant. In that you had alternating short duration windows (i.e. 30s) where you were empowered. In the empowered form (i.e. in Wings) your abilities change animation/effect like the Zealotry example above. The goal then becomes trying to stay in that form for as long as possible (a la Voidform from SPriest).

Another version used a stacking DoT mastery (thematically, the idea was that a Paladin's weapon is sheathed in light which rends the foe, and we reclaim the light which deals burst damage based on stacks) that dealt damage and granted an effect on "unleashing" an Seal, very similar in execution to D3 Crusader Laws. The Seal had a passive effect and an active one. Activating a Seal triggered your Mastery. The concept was pretty binary in that you had your standard DPS Seal (passive effect was every crit finisher or something reduced the CD of wings by like 3s) and the active effect boosted haste by x%. However, abilities had mana costs so you couldn't indefinitely sustain your DPS Seal, you'd have to switch occasionally to your regenerative Seal.

All of which are good ideas - And perhaps worthy of discussion in another thread.

Personally, I don't think Holy Power is beyond salvaging. The problem really is the abilities involved more than the mechanics. Having all the damage loaded onto TV means the rest of your rotation is quite weak in comparison. Redistributing some of the damage would help things play a lot better imo. Then there really needs to be another ability in there somewhere that generates Holy Power - Perhaps with Consecration being a base line Paladin skill it'll fill in the gap.

I do think the Paladin needs room for free GCD's though. It allows us to use our utility skills when required without tanking our damage. Cleanse, BoP and even BoF are all solid skills to bring to a group, especially if you're in the habit of cheesing mechanics with them.

[Vintersol]

That's what Vanilla seals were...

I'm still in for seals as an amplifier for judgment.

- Seal of Single Target (Next Judgment causing x additional single target damage)
- Seal of AoE (Next Judgment causing damage and x damage around the target)
- Seal of Slow (Next Judgment slows the target)
- Seal of Runspeed (like LaotL)

[Beefhammer]

That's what Vanilla seals were...

Omg. Hiw did I forget about seals.

[ExiHext]

I mean... I doubt many Arcane Mages are going to go around casting Fireball in the same way Rets aren't going to be bothered with something like Light of the Martyr. It's a button for the sake of having a button.

That's what meant with being excited how impactful the "class abilities" are going to be. I don't see many fire mages running around using frostbolt. On the other hand it has a built-in slow effect. And arcane explosion might be quite handy in pvp as stealth detect.
My guess is class abilities won't be that impactful (that's my worry with auras), because it would end up in a balancing nightmare for the devs. Yet I would like my aura bar back, same as stances for warriors or DK presences. I know they won't have much impact, it's more of a psychological effect.

Wouldn't mind seals returning in any form...at least in the name. You could easily rename Zeal to Seal of blablabla, it even has a seal animation.

[roboscorcher]

I'd like to see auras and seals return in a specific way.

Imagine if your auras also gave you a personal buff, such as:
- all holy damage leaves behind a dot for X% of the original amount.
- increase AA dmg by X%.
- CD's proc-reset X% more often.
- increase haste by X%.

Now imagine that your spenders converted these aura effects into Seal buffs that last 30-60sec. Now there's a seal-juggling game to play.

Now imagine that one aura increases all dmg by X%, minus Y% for each buff up. This seal would be for short-term fights.

Now imagine that Concecrate returns and shares a CD/role with Blade of Justice. Now we have AoE builder options, not just the spenders.

Seal/Aura juggling has a lot of potential for spicing up long fights. They key is keeping the seals on the Paladin instead of the target, so we can switch targets without losing everything.

[Tyris Flare]

Man I really hope they don't consult these threads for ideas (they almost certainly don't) because almost all of this sounds terrible.

I mean auras are whatever, but seals are terrible. Ret is pretty much fine right now, with a good mix of az traits and talents depending on dungeons or raids. Vision proc getting buffed in the next patch will also be very welcome.

[FlubberPuddy]

Hammer of Wrath seems to stay a talent but at least for prot either.

HoW is becoming baseline ability for all paladins.

https://www.wowhead.com/news=296013/...runing-is-here

"Hammer of Wrath is no longer a talent!"

[molsn]

I'd like to see auras and seals return in a specific way.

Imagine if your auras also gave you a personal buff, such as:
- all holy damage leaves behind a dot for X% of the original amount.
- increase AA dmg by X%.
- CD's proc-reset X% more often.
- increase haste by X%.

Now imagine that your spenders converted these aura effects into Seal buffs that last 30-60sec. Now there's a seal-juggling game to play.

Now imagine that one aura increases all dmg by X%, minus Y% for each buff up. This seal would be for short-term fights.

Now imagine that Concecrate returns and shares a CD/role with Blade of Justice. Now we have AoE builder options, not just the spenders.

Seal/Aura juggling has a lot of potential for spicing up long fights. They key is keeping the seals on the Paladin instead of the target, so we can switch targets without losing everything.

And now stop imagining and poof, you're an Outlaw Rogue using Roll the Bones, get outta here.

The only thing wrong with Ret now in PVE is that there is that small amount of downtime where you have no buttons to push, all I'd like to see is Exorcism back, with the talent to make it Mass Exorcism. Auras are trash and they can stay extinct, bring Consecration along for the ride too, never do I want that trash back on my bars, useless aoe that sucks.

[FlubberPuddy]

Man I really hope they don't consult these threads for ideas (they almost certainly don't) because almost all of this sounds terrible.

I mean auras are whatever, but seals are terrible. Ret is pretty much fine right now, with a good mix of az traits and talents depending on dungeons or raids. Vision proc getting buffed in the next patch will also be very welcome.

They will more than likely take most of the feedback that comes from their official forums/beta testing etc.

[StrawberryZebra]

That's what meant with being excited how impactful the "class abilities" are going to be. I don't see many fire mages running around using frostbolt. On the other hand it has a built-in slow effect. And arcane explosion might be quite handy in pvp as stealth detect.
My guess is class abilities won't be that impactful (that's my worry with auras), because it would end up in a balancing nightmare for the devs. Yet I would like my aura bar back, same as stances for warriors or DK presences. I know they won't have much impact, it's more of a psychological effect.

My biggest concern with them is that they seem to be simply throwing old abilities back onto existing classes in what seems like nothing more than an attempt to simply placate players. Some people are going to be happy with that, I see it as being a step backwards. A lot of what is already anounced for Shadowlands looks like they're simply reverting back to older designs.

I've mentioned this a lot this thread, but I don't want old abilities back just for the sake of having them. I want something new, something fresh. We've yet to see a shred of originality from what we know about Shadowlands so far.

Wouldn't mind seals returning in any form...at least in the name. You could easily rename Zeal to Seal of blablabla, it even has a seal animation.

So.. Anything thats got "Seal" in the name, even if mechanically it's something hugely different? What if it was called "Seal of Fireball" and cast Curse of Weakness on your target would that satisfy you, provided it had the Seal Animation where the symbol appears and the column of light rises around your character? What if it was a hollow self buff that did nothing but give you some flavour text, would that be acceptable too?

I realise those are absurd example, but that seems to be the length some people are willing to go to get anything that's a Seal in name only into the game. I mentioned this in another thread about Classic, but Seals never worked for Prot or Holy until WotLK when they became self buffs that you activated once and forgot about. In Holys case, they only worked in WotLK because they were required for a 15% haste buff and were supported by a Glyph. The whole thing, honestly, felt quite forced.

They, kind of, worked for Ret and ret alone. Even then only Seal of Command scaled with stats Ret would commonly have on their gear. Again, that was until WotLK when Seals were allowed to scale properly and their effects were divorced from the Judgement debuffs.

That leaves Blizzard in a difficult situation. Why add back a mechanic that only "worked" for a single spec after they'd separated it into it's component parts? Attempting to side step the issue and making them Ret only runs contrary to the more class focused design for the expansion. Making a Seal system that works for all three Paladin specs is something Blizzard have tried and failed at for years across multiple expansion. Even if, by some miracle, Blizzard nails it - The mechanics themselves are still uninteresting to play with.

Seals are best off out of the game in my opinion. There's no way to make them fun, interesting and useful without also making them something completely different to what players are asking for.

[kenn9530]

please god let them remove holy power.

holy power actually adds something to the spec instead of spamming without even paying attention like in WotlK you could top meters without even trying to, in general most specs are so easy to play these days the gameplay is just lacking, when snap shotting was still in place that when you could actually tell if someone had skill on not.

[Lorgar Aurelian]

holy power actually adds something to the spec instead of spamming without even paying attention like in WotlK you could top meters without even trying to, in general most specs are so easy to play these days the gameplay is just lacking, when snap shotting was still in place that when you could actually tell if someone had skill on not.

I comply disagree. holy power makes the spec a boring build 3-5 spend 3-5 which paladins should have never been. if you want a combo point class you should play a leather class.

[FlubberPuddy]

My biggest concern with them is that they seem to be simply throwing old abilities back onto existing classes in what seems like nothing more than an attempt to simply placate players. Some people are going to be happy with that, I see it as being a step backwards. A lot of what is already anounced for Shadowlands looks like they're simply reverting back to older designs.

I've mentioned this a lot this thread, but I don't want old abilities back just for the sake of having them. I want something new, something fresh. We've yet to see a shred of originality from what we know about Shadowlands so far.

To be fair though, this is a restructuring that is setting a new foundation going forward. So while we might not get any new permanent abilities for Shadowlands, with their redesign of leveling and 'every level should mean something' I'm pretty sure we will get more permanent abilities going forward.

Probably the most known complaint of BfA was "fix the classes" and here they are doing just that. Almost nobody was clamoring for new abilities over 'fixing' the core gameplay loop of the classes.

I think it's fine, Blizzard devs this time around kept consistently referring to WoW as an RPG and a lot of RPGs allow new levels to bring new abilities/perks. It's just it'll probably happen after Shadowlands.

[kenn9530]

I comply disagree. holy power makes the spec a boring build 3-5 spend 3-5 which paladins should have never been. if you want a combo point class you should play a leather class.

and you think spamming 1,2,3,4,5 without even looking is better, there needs to be a set rotation where if you dont do it you notice a large damage loss. WoW has really boring class combat these days.

[Easo]

After seeing how the Kyrian ability look from couple of Blizzcon streamers, all I can say is that it is going to get nerfed hard.

It'd be nice if auras actually had some sort of visual that stays with the Paladin, like it was back in the Warcraft III days.

I always disliked this, ever since the WoW launched. I understand why it was done, but still, I wanted (want) a permanently visible aura.

P.S.
Who want's to bet some gold that the next expansion is going to take something away. Say... HoW again? xD

[Lorgar Aurelian]

and you think spamming 1,2,3,4,5 without even looking is better, there needs to be a set rotation where if you dont do it you notice a large damage loss. WoW has really boring class combat these days.

there are other options then spamming 1-5 and combo points unless you think warriors dk's sv hunter's and dh don't exist.

[kenn9530]

there are other options then spamming 1-5 and combo points unless you think warriors dk's sv hunter's and dh don't exist.

before holy power all you needed to do as a paladin was hit anything on cd, without holy power it would go back to a time where rotation barely even matters, what wow needs is combos where you can set up abilities to be more powerful than normal, holy power does that in a small way. Your basically asking to dumb down paladin even further.

[Theoris]

Just give me back Sense Undead, and I'll be happy as a clam at high tide.