Iteration on SoJ - could slight modification fix Ret?

[Handsylton]

In my opinion, the idea opened up by Blizzard of a stacking Justice mechanic has gotten me thinking...

Could Justice become a secondary resource to similar to shadow orbs for priests that could work with Holy Power to finally create a more cohesive resource system, while providing better damage and survivability, AND solve QoL issues? Bare with me...

What if Justice was a pooled resource that stacks up to 8 times on the Paladin. Each stack of Justice would increase the power of your next HP consuming ability by 10%. So in total, we could boost the heal of WoG by 80%, TV and DS damage by 80%, and Inquisition duration by 80%. To ccontrol the consumption of Justice, we get a new filler attack off the GCD, called Righteous Strike. This attack would do 50% weapon damage from range and have a 6 second cooldown. Using the attack would grant Justice of the Templar to the Paladin for 6 seconds, and causing the next HP ability used to consume the Justice stacks.

Do you think this kind of iteration would make the system too clunky or complex, or is it not synergistic to you? I truly believe that Blizzard's first iteration of Justice could be far expanded and solve quite a few issues with Ret in its current state...

[Nairobi]

So, you want to add a Bastion of Glory mechanic to all specs?

In short; no.

This system would be essentially the third (fourth?) mini-system, between Holy Power (both generation and consumption), Inquisition, GCD management, and mana management. So this would now be an additional thing that stacks and is consumed. It's consumed via an ability (albeit off the GCD in your example) that hits from range which causes another buff to consume the previous stacking buff. Granted, off-GCD abilities would just get macro'd to their consumers to bypass this, but I think that's also something blizz has stated they want to get away from (see: Deadly Calm).

It's just far too much going on, and too complicated to be implemented in this era of the game. This is reminiscent of old feral or sub rotations, which have historically been nerfed for being too unforgiving and difficult for the masses (albeit quite fun for a few).

I agree that the idea of a "boost" to our TV abilities would be cool, but I think this idea on how to do it may be trying to fit 10 pounds of mechanics into a 5 pound bag.

Maybe a tweak of mastery or a passive that makes X stat (i.e. crit) give us a % increase on HoPo consuming abilities. Basically, your idea, just more passive.

[Reith]

Just for information of what I know so far, right now it procs off every melee attack, including Templar's Verdict and Judgment.

[Tangra]

Just for information of what I know so far, right now it procs off every melee attack, including Templar's Verdict and Judgment.

This would be great news if they had not committed themselves to making this seal do less overall damage than SoT. Given that Justice does drastically less damage than SoT on a moving target that is kiting you, it's overall damage will have to pale in comparison to SoT, in order for it to be "balanced" in PvE.

To add to all this, our Seals are just not a large enough part of our damage to make redesigning them make any serious difference. OMG 10-15% of my damage is now a bit more bursty... As an example, this SoJ change is like making Shadow Word Pain do damage only when the Priest is in melee range, but tick 3 times harder and 3 times less often.

[Handsylton]

@Nairobi - This would be a specific seal/system for Ret. I agree that it could probably be simplified to make it much more user friendly for less experienced players. Maybe baking Justice and Inquisition into one system, where using stacks of Justice activates Inquisition where for each stack of Justice consumed, Inquisiton's duration is increased by 5 seconds.

However I think that needing to activate the Justice stacks in this type of system is necessary because it puts all the control into the players hands. You would never reach 8 stacks otherwise. Sometimes you want that extra damage or healing right now and sometimes you want to wait. That's part of the skill cap of the resource, especially if Inquisition would turn into an easier buff to maintain/apply.