[WoD] Retribution Paladin Megathread

[Ryuji]

Regarding the hilarious bug that lasted a few hours(note the dps meter and the draenei paladin, who died like 2 times lol)



Still not liking the lack of stuff on MMO's front page updates about paladins though.

[Lyese]

I mean, there really is space for good implementation with Emp. 15% haste/10% ap or mastery for Holy/10% healing, etc. Or you could work in secondary stats (crit/multi/readiness) OR EVEN, GASP, SPECIFIC PROCS. Your attacks radiate 25% damage splashed around your target in a 10y range, your attacks deal increased damage to the Judgement target, etc.

[ruiizu]

You know, you're right. Command wasn't garbage in Wrath, whereas Right is. COINCIDENCE?!?!

I do agree with making the buffs mutually exclusive. In fact, it could promote situational awareness. Blizz, however, doesn't care enough to really implement that.

I think most of us would welcome seals being a meaningful change in gameplay. Right now they're very passive and very uninteresting. In fact I recall several fights in MoP where I didn't use Righteousness because it was superior to just keep Censure rolling on 2-3 targets instead. Empowered Seals (not judgments, it should be noted) has a very strong possibility of making seals an integral part of play again. Seal of Insight could be a truly "defensive" Seal given a permanent passive tied specifically to the Seals, and Justice would unquestionably be the PvP Seal of choice with extra movement speed. There would be trade-offs for it, of course, because you could only use 1 effect at a time. But it would be an undeniably interesting talent at that point, making us really have to chose the right seal for the right situation.

Conversely I feel like the other two talents are lacking if that were possible. Final Verdict is powerful, but given that it only is single target, it definitely seems kind of one dimensional, although fairly potent if there's only ever 1 target. That other crap though is just...ultra stupid. Seraphim is probably the worst talent I think I've seen them push for Paladins, and I hope it doesn't make it to live as is. It's just like "here you're a bit stronger for 10 seconds" but at the cost of 5 freaking holy power (-1.66 templar's verdicts, or conversely, 1.66 Final Verdicts).

I love complexity when it's meaningful complexity that is well built and doesn't feel clumsy. For me, constantly changing seals is second only to warriors having to equip a shield to Spell Reflect in terms of unnecessary complexity and overall bad design.

[Deleted]

Yeah I have played this game since late Vanilla and it's always been painfully obvious that their heart is just not in it, their idea of ret development is shiny animations and half-assed and unpolished mechanics.

Good that you didnt play it since beta then... you would be even more disappointed! It was pretty much a holy warriors there, with holy strike and stuff, then between beta and release they made a total rework of the spec into stupid autoattack with seals design... it wasnt that good in beta, but its even worse post release... i keep leveling paladins, and keep abandoning them mid xpac for something even remotely fun... even tho i love paladin "style" in general, outside of wow... since in wow they are horrible trash in every way

You can imagine my surprise when after playing beta for 6 months i rolled paladin after release... just to end up asking myself "wtf am i playing?? wtf is this??"

Im not sure who was the very famous in everquest with his campaign against paladins... tigole or furor, think its tigole(just google tigole and first thing that google suggests is "tigole hates paladins" lol... his thoughts about paladins are easy to find)... but he hated paladins before coming to wow team and it shows even today... they had to make them somewhat playable but they keep trying to make them dull, weak and shitty in terms of style and feeling (melee dps priestlike caster instead of holy warrior)

Yeah like how Ghostcrawler played a Mage @_@. Look things aren't perfect but come on now. Blaming Kalgan?

i think its pretty safe to say we can blame Tigole... he is one of the main guys there with his buddy Furor from EQ, the dynamic paladin hating duo crashing EQ servers because paladin could tank better than warrior... thats why in vanilla only warriors could tank... with time they had to throw others a bone, but hate towards paladins never went away (obviously)

Yeah and Kalgan didn't have anything to do with it. If you think Kalgan purposely tries to balance Paladins badly I think you need to go to a conspiricy theory website.

I can assure you that is the case... they did make paladins horrible on purpose, and they didnt fix them completely over the years on purpose too... other classes got huge reworks, bigger than what would be needed for paladins, but paladins never... they just tweak stuff so we are somewhat playable and useable, but always keep it bad enough and boring enough not to be in the upper ranks

If you really think that those people hating paladins has nothing to do with the state of paladins over the last 9? years... and that its all "conspiracy theories"... then i dont know what to tell you anymore...

I don't deny Paladins and class balance overall during Vanilla wasn't great. I agree and TBH MMO's should at least TRY to fix that shit before releasing(Those that are starting). But that's a digressing thought so don't mind me.

they did "fix" it before release... huge rework of the paladins for the worse, to make it worst and most boring class and retri the worst spec ever... paladins were pretty much like warriors in beta, warrs with heroic strike, paladins with holy strike... did holy dmg with exactly the same mechanics on next swing... then they destroyed it completely between beta and release... and they are sticking to it to this day...

[Vintersol]

I mean, there really is space for good implementation with Emp. 15% haste/10% ap or mastery for Holy/10% healing, etc. Or you could work in secondary stats (crit/multi/readiness) OR EVEN, GASP, SPECIFIC PROCS. Your attacks radiate 25% damage splashed around your target in a 10y range, your attacks deal increased damage to the Judgement target, etc.

They should simply turn empowered seals into a simple mechanic like:

Seal of Truth: 5 - 20% more single target damage (CS, TV)
Seal of Righteousness: 5 - 20% more aoe damage (DS, HotR)
Seal of Insight: 5 - 20% more ranged damage (Exo, HoW)

Swap seals if needed, instead of stupid "lawl, need nonsense seal to swap into to retrieve buff!!1"

That's what i imagine about "empowered" seals.

[Deleted]

Infact I feel seals are the CORE of retribution. EMpowered seal should have EXCLUSIVE buffs active ONLY with the seal like a stance. Fuck judging and "twisting"

Yes! I want to use a Seal because it's strong and not to keep a stupid buff up! I don't want to switch seals on single target, but I want a reason to switch to Seal of Righteousness for AoE.
Seal of Truth: something that buffs single target dps
Seal of Righteousness: more damage (better on 2 targets, but less damage per hit on more targets - a little like Dragon Roar) - good on 2-3 targets and not LOL 5 MILLION DPS on 8 targets.
Seal of Justice: speed buff, snare on judgement, more damage (less than Truth)
Seal of Insight: 10-15% less damage taken (basically like a def stance) and heal every 2 sec (like the buff in emp seals now)

FV will be probably better for pure single target, but if AoE (or defensive gameplay) is involved, Emp Seals can shine.

[Deleted]

The design is fixable in many ways. Personal preference would be a revamp of the Hand of * design or make spec-spesific hands/alter what the spell does from spec-per-spec, similar to how the L100 talents work.

make up your mind is it class design that doest work or raid design?,

You don't need any of our utility because of how encounters are designed.
Again, encounter design issue.

Cos im firmly in the class, as i previously stated, raid design cant really be realistically fixed.

For Malkorok, Freedom only removes the root and makes you able to walk out. Windwalk totem/stampeding roar completely removes the buff without causing it to explode or deal damage to the person with the debuff. That and there's nothing else to use windwalk/stampeding on in that fight apart from spreading after blood rage.

My point about malk is more that even in a scenario where it worked as HoF, its AoE nature would still be superior.
he would have to debuff 3p/30s for HoF to ever be useful, and then we are back to Palas being mandatory, since we are the only one with this tool, I.E, Its not a fixable design.

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sniped

Then you can flesh out a proper defensive, AoE, and Single Target seal solving every single fucking ret problem in the game.

yeah, first when they yanked Command i was pissed, and now with SoR, im glad they did, if SoC would have been SoR now that would have been depressing.

[Huntingbear_grimbatol]

The problem is that our "hands" abilities have always been a "bonus" to the raid, same as having a druid or shaman with knockback mechanics is a "bonus" to the raid or a DK AoE grips. All classes have these minor "bonuses" that's theirs and theirs only, problem (from a dev perspective) is that the paladin "hand" abilities is more or less always useful where as AoE grips and things other classes have isn't always useful, in fact it's rarely useful compared to paladins.

Where it crashes for me is that they're trying to make our single target "bonus" utility equal in strength / value to full on raid cds. But then what other "bonus" will paladins bring to raids? The answer that blizzard suggests is offhealing through talents, I'm not going to say that it won't work but it's going to demand so much more from paladin players to raid compared to say a warlock or a mage.

I hope blizzard proves me wrong but forcing players to basically raid watch to use their "raid tools" (hand abilities) in WoD is going to push a lot of people away from playing ret paladins or guilds from using ret paladins because it is a significant challenge to do your potential dps and still being able to give your tank a LoH at 3% hp or the retard standing in X for too long etc. Give the average player a choice between one button that brings you a safe raid spot that raid leader(s) will call for or 2-3 abilities you have to manage yourself through watching raid frames while you dps...

[Rathimis]

Some of these ideas for Emp Seals are great, but at the same time I can't help thinking: Seals should do this baseline, we shouldn't have to talent into them to make them more than button bloat

[Deleted]

Some of these ideas for Emp Seals are great, but at the same time I can't help thinking: Seals should do this baseline, we shouldn't have to talent into them to make them more than button bloat

Yes, that's true. -.-

[Morally Grey Storm]

They won't release us without functioning aoe.

.

I'm sure there's a reason you're so sure.

[Vash The Stampede]

It's still a raid design issue because our utility has no uses in raids. This can chance with WoD since nobody here knows encounters.

Paladin utility is mainly made for Holy Paladins. Ret and Prot can't constantly scan the raid for when to use their utility like Holy Paladins can. Melee have to constantly be aware of their surroundings. To give out hand spells and heals means you have to momentarily look at your raid frames.

It's pretty clear that developers want Prot and Ret Paladins to remember that Holy is the core of the Paladin class. Most of our utility is really meant to be used by Holy Paladins, who sit in the back of the raid spamming heals safely away. It takes an exceptional Ret Paladin to be able to dps in melee and use their utility.

[Tangra]

One huge and easy workaround for making Emp seals work is to have the the duration stack per judgement. such as. Each judge gives u a 20 second buff and each one is rolled into the remaining time of the buff. Caps at maybe 2-3 mins?

THEN it's a workable non shit clunky talent.

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We didn't have early in Wrath. It was Command a PROPER AoE seal that rightiousness fails horribly at replacing. and Blood. Until blood was replaced somewhere after Ulduar.

Infact how insulting is that? We had a proper AoE seal and we swapped ALL the time in Wrath. Now Rightiousness is a shell of what command used to be. Isn't this disgusting?

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Infact I feel seals are the CORE of retribution. EMpowered seal should have EXCLUSIVE buffs active ONLY with the seal like a stance. Fuck judging and "twisting"

Rework seals entirely similar to wrath where the seal hits were a substantial part of our DPS. It's AMAZING for sustained to actually have it this way.

Then you can flesh out a proper defensive, AoE, and Single Target seal solving every single fucking ret problem in the game. I know it just so hard to ask for some non half assed class design but doesn't this sound alot better then well... ANYTHING they have tried to design in the last 2 expansions?

Yeah, Seal twisting is sounds neat and nostalgic, but I don't think anyone really wants to do it all the time. The buff really should be stronger, have nothing to do with judging, and go away when seals are switched.

Seal twisting never had anything to do with maintaining some buff anyway, if anything real seal twisting would be something that makes Censure last for much longer, and then have it interact with other seals in interesting ways. Like maybe Seal of Righteousness spreading Censure to other mobs, or Seal of Justice causing Censure stacks detonate for a big burst.

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Paladin utility is mainly made for Holy Paladins. Ret and Prot can't constantly scan the raid for when to use their utility like Holy Paladins can. Melee have to constantly be aware of their surroundings. To give out hand spells and heals means you have to momentarily look at your raid frames.

It's pretty clear that developers want Prot and Ret Paladins to remember that Holy is the core of the Paladin class. Most of our utility is really meant to be used by Holy Paladins, who sit in the back of the raid spamming heals safely away. It takes an exceptional Ret Paladin to be able to dps in melee and use their utility.

Yes, dps utility should be mainly automatic and mainly smart heals/buffs that find the most needy for you, targeting heals and hand spells is a pretty huge burden.

[Vash The Stampede]

Yes, dps utility should be mainly automatic and mainly smart heals/buffs that find the most needy for you, targeting heals and hand spells is a pretty huge burden.

That's why losing devotion aura sucks. You just pressed a button and that was it. No need to scan the raid and determine if giving out a heal or hand spell is worth your effort. Warriors put down banners, and Mages use time warp. Press one button and bam, everyone is now awesome thanks to me. Give out a heal or a hand spell and bam, that person probably didn't even notice it.

This is also the reason why Ret is terrible for RBGs and PvP in general. Those heals and hand spells are extremely unreliable coming from a Ret Paladin. Not like smoke bomb, time warp, or Gorefiend's Grasp where it's fire and forget it took any skill.

[Tangra]

How is this for a funner version of Empowered Seals.

Censure duration is increased by 100%, while Seal of Righteousness is active Divine Storm costs only 2 Holy Power, while Seal of Justice is active Templar's Verdict costs only 2 Holy Power, while seal of Insight is Active casting Flash of Light generates 1 Holy Power.

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That's why losing devotion aura sucks. You just pressed a button and that was it. No need to scan the raid and determine if giving out a heal or hand spell is worth your effort. Warriors put down banners, and Mages use time warp. Press one button and bam, everyone is now awesome thanks to me. Give out a heal or a hand spell and bam, that person probably didn't even notice it.

This is also the reason why Ret is terrible for RBGs and PvP in general. Those heals and hand spells are extremely unreliable coming from a Ret Paladin. Not like smoke bomb, time warp, or Gorefiend's Grasp where it's fire and forget it took any skill.

Yeah, rewarding skill in nice and all, but if we have to go through so much trouble it should be more noticeable.

[Reghame]

theres one issue people seem to be forgetting about paladin hand spells.

When our hand spells are used on a fight that require them, they are deemed too strong.

Remember yar'sajh or w/e his name is with purity? or horridon with BoP?

any time our hand spells are required and can change a fight, it usually breaks the fight.
The reason of this is because each niche that each hand spell is assigned to is SO STRONG when it can be applied directly to an encounter.

The fact that holy and prot both have these spells is less of an issue than one would think. the main issue with them is that when they work, they work SO DAMN WELL that it NEEDs to be nerfed.

There will not be a single encounter come WoD where an encounter will be countered by a single hand spell for long. If it gets countered at all, paladins become a necessity, which is bad for design, and blizzard notices this quickly and nerfs it.

in all honesty, hand spells, lay on hands, and bubble are holding the class back. despite being major core functions of the class, they CANNOT balance us with them at their power. because when they work, they break the game. Sad truth in it really and i hate it :/

[Aeluron Lightsong]

I can attest our hand spells are asked by my raid leader to use them on certain fights like Protectors. He's taught me to use it on those that are garooted(The cloth users mostly cause yeah). I do so almost instinctively now(Take note it takes me a bit to notice things in front of me, I process things slower then the average person).

[Deleted]

In mythic they can balance some bosses around having at least one paladin, because of the raid size. But that can easily be a holy.

[Deleted]

It's still a raid design issue because our utility has no uses in raids. This can chance with WoD since nobody here knows encounters.

Suggestions are suggestions. Revamping the hand spells is a personal preference to all the suggestions made. I really don't see how I need to make my mind up.

Your malkorok suggestion would be worked around with the entire raid moving as the debuffs came out, not by stacking paladins.

yes our utility has no use in raids.
it requires change.
or encounter design requires change.
and as you pointed out with malk, that's not actually doable.
Bringing us to A, we are probably not going to get an overhaul, B its not really possible to change encounter design so as to make the hands work, giving C, we aren't going to have any utility going forward.

[Lyese]

Stacking Paladins in Wrath was the thing to do for world first Anub/LK kills. Of course, our utility was pretty much unmatched back then.

Balancing encounters around Hands is a lot of extra work. Either they're mandatory, or they're useless. They should either rethink the Hand system (unlikely) or work around them (probably), but they'll more than likely just ignore them and make mechanics that go through HoP/HoSac, keeping HoPur as a niche because it's a talent.