paladins in general seems pretty lackluster for dragonflight?

[Thundering]

Anyone who got the beta that does know it kinda seems like all speccs are getting a bad rating right now..

[Gestopft]

If you mean lackluster in performance, that's still up in the air. We dunno yet, really. There have been nerfs recently on beta, so they were definitely tuned high, but I don't know how that shakes out since then since balance is still in flux.

If you mean lackluster in design, then I'll say that if you are fine with Paladins in SL, you'll probably be fine with them in DF as there are builds that let you play very similarly to now. I think the Paladin trees are in general the most uninspired of any class, but I wouldn't say the sky is falling or that they broke Paladins or anything hyperbolic like that. If you were hoping for big changes to Paladins, then you'll probably be disappointed.

[Felfaadaern Darkterror]

Not all content makers are saying the same thing. Dorki is my favorite tank streamer and he enjoyed playing prot pally. Losing HP from Avenger Shield has lots of players grumbling, but honestly AS is so strong now we might be lucky it's not a HP spender! I mean, before Shadowlands, who knew we'd have Divine Toll? Who thought they would buff it even more? Who thought it would explode on every impact, producing 25 overlapping hp explosions and providing buffed damage absorb? As for HP, we can now run Blessed Hammer (with Holy Shield at same time) with 3ch and get 2ch for Judgment. So always a button available to generate HP. We can even spam BH to start every pull with 5HP. AND we now have b-rez. The future is bright and I'm wearing shades

[Gasparde]

Not all content makers are saying the same thing. Dorki is my favorite tank streamer and he enjoyed playing prot pally. Losing HP from Avenger Shield has lots of players grumbling, but honestly AS is so strong now we might be lucky it's not a HP spender! I mean, before Shadowlands, who knew we'd have Divine Toll? Who thought they would buff it even more? Who thought it would explode on every impact, producing 25 overlapping hp explosions and providing buffed damage absorb? As for HP, we can now run Blessed Hammer (with Holy Shield at same time) with 3ch and get 2ch for Judgment. So always a button available to generate HP. We can even spam BH to start every pull with 5HP. AND we now have b-rez. The future is bright and I'm wearing shades

That same Dorki has also acknowledged that, once again, Paladin tanks are on the squishier side if they opt for all their damage options - which is the exact same boat they've been in before: Good damage but not nearly as tanky as the better alternatives. And the sad thing, as always, is that they don't even bring the best damage (at least they didn't bring it in s3 / S4) compared to Monks and DHs, yet they're being noticeably less tanky than other tanks. It doesn't matter if you deal good damage if you can't survive. And it especially doesn't matter if there's other tanks that deal good damage and survive - and unless we get a major tuning pass relatively soon, that seems to be exactly where we're headed.

The same applies to Ret btw. Doesn't matter that they're dealing relatively good dps right now if there's other DPS that deal just as much (or more) while being significantly more tanky - and considering that Ret has been hit with the nerf bat for like 10 beta patches in a row now... I wouldn't get my hopes up for them to be more than average / bottom of the barrel again.

And then there's Holy, which both dps and hps wise simply can't keep up with other healers right now. So you might still have your raid spot solely due to bringing Devo Aura / Aura Mastery... but in m+, at least right now, you'll still be outhealed by some, outdamaged by others, and worst of all, outhealed and outdamaged at the same time by fotm.

Unless there's a lot more tuning to come, Paladins are once more looking to be a one per raid and average to slightly above average at best for m+. Yay.

[Thundering]

That same Dorki has also acknowledged that, once again, Paladin tanks are on the squishier side if they opt for all their damage options - which is the exact same boat they've been in before: Good damage but not nearly as tanky as the better alternatives. And the sad thing, as always, is that they don't even bring the best damage (at least they didn't bring it in s3 / S4) compared to Monks and DHs, yet they're being noticeably less tanky than other tanks. It doesn't matter if you deal good damage if you can't survive. And it especially doesn't matter if there's other tanks that deal good damage and survive - and unless we get a major tuning pass relatively soon, that seems to be exactly where we're headed.

The same applies to Ret btw. Doesn't matter that they're dealing relatively good dps right now if there's other DPS that deal just as much (or more) while being significantly more tanky - and considering that Ret has been hit with the nerf bat for like 10 beta patches in a row now... I wouldn't get my hopes up for them to be more than average / bottom of the barrel again.

And then there's Holy, which both dps and hps wise simply can't keep up with other healers right now. So you might still have your raid spot solely due to bringing Devo Aura / Aura Mastery... but in m+, at least right now, you'll still be outhealed by some, outdamaged by others, and worst of all, outhealed and outdamaged at the same time by fotm.

Unless there's a lot more tuning to come, Paladins are once more looking to be a one per raid and average to slightly above average at best for m+. Yay.

When it comes to just numbers can tune it, i am more worried about the tree makeup and if we got all the skill we need.

Like the Holy talent tree to me they can remove the first two rows and make them baseline they are simple not talents.

Like the left side of the tree should be melee and the right side is casting it makes alot more sence to me and i think its good to support both playstyles.
The problem you have to mix them right now..
The problem is the talents are all over the tree an you cant connect them....

Also losing Shock barrier is massive....

[Felfaadaern Darkterror]

That same Dorki has also acknowledged that, once again, Paladin tanks are on the squishier side if they opt for all their damage options - which is the exact same boat they've been in before: Good damage but not nearly as tanky as the better alternatives. And the sad thing, as always, is that they don't even bring the best damage (at least they didn't bring it in s3 / S4) compared to Monks and DHs, yet they're being noticeably less tanky than other tanks. It doesn't matter if you deal good damage if you can't survive. And it especially doesn't matter if there's other tanks that deal good damage and survive - and unless we get a major tuning pass relatively soon, that seems to be exactly where we're headed.

The same applies to Ret btw. Doesn't matter that they're dealing relatively good dps right now if there's other DPS that deal just as much (or more) while being significantly more tanky - and considering that Ret has been hit with the nerf bat for like 10 beta patches in a row now... I wouldn't get my hopes up for them to be more than average / bottom of the barrel again.

And then there's Holy, which both dps and hps wise simply can't keep up with other healers right now. So you might still have your raid spot solely due to bringing Devo Aura / Aura Mastery... but in m+, at least right now, you'll still be outhealed by some, outdamaged by others, and worst of all, outhealed and outdamaged at the same time by fotm.

Unless there's a lot more tuning to come, Paladins are once more looking to be a one per raid and average to slightly above average at best for m+. Yay.

When it comes to just numbers can tune it, i am more worried about the tree makeup and if we got all the skill we need.

Like the Holy talent tree to me they can remove the first two rows and make them baseline they are simple not talents.

Like the left side of the tree should be melee and the right side is casting it makes alot more sence to me and i think its good to support both playstyles.
The problem you have to mix them right now..
The problem is the talents are all over the tree an you cant connect them....

Also losing Shock barrier is massive....

When I bounce between tank forums on Discord, everyone (except maybe Warriors) seems nervous for their spec. That's just normal part of pre-patch. I agree we can't draw many conclusions until tuning happens. Numbers can be tweaked quickly. Overall playstyle changes less frequently.

- - - Updated - - -

Sha likes the Prot Pally!
This is a streamer who's played every tank to 3000+ in M+.

[Thundering]

Another update, and paladins are 100% neglected.

[Simulacrum]

Sha likes the Prot Pally!
This is a streamer who's played every tank to 3000+ in M+.

This guy seems like a rambling idiot, which really comes across well in his videos, which are like 20% him going "I could waste time talking about X/Y/Z, but I won't because that would waste too much time". OK, congratulations. You just dedicated all that time of your video to doing something *worse* than the thing you admonish yourself to not do. Absolute grade-A fucking moron.

So many of these tank players are just morons who found 3-4 guys to make regular parties with and who then play 12 hours a day doing m+ and just grind their way to the top. You can tell they're idiots every time they do pug groups in low keys where they madly overgear the instance to the point where they should be able to solo a lot of the trash packs, yet they barely time keys that you could comfortably 2-chest in pugs in 70 ilvls lower gear than they're doing them in on stream (also that would've been done pre-nerfs).

I don't watch a lot of these streamers because, like I said a lot of them seem like idiots who just play a lot, but Dorki is one of the few who seems like he isn't a retard and his opinion on pally is just: It's the same as shadowlands but weaker. His summary is also inconsistent, in that he'll talk about ppally damage being impressive, then summarize it as worse than every other tank except prot and BDK and with those two specs being so close to ppally that it's negligible.

Imo., ppally is the most fun tank to play, but nobody thinks it's remotely the strongest for anything right now, and in addition to that we're currently seeing INSANE buffs to e.g., bears, which are consistently ranked as one of the strongest (if albeit the most boring and with the shittiest talent tree). What's going on over at blizz, where they'll look at bear, see it being the highest damage tank after brew (which may as well not count since brew is so un-tanky right now), and then deciding to buff its overall damage by 50-60%?

[micwini]

This guy seems like a rambling idiot, which really comes across well in his videos, which are like 20% him going "I could waste time talking about X/Y/Z, but I won't because that would waste too much time". OK, congratulations. You just dedicated all that time of your video to doing something *worse* than the thing you admonish yourself to not do. Absolute grade-A fucking moron.

So many of these tank players are just morons who found 3-4 guys to make regular parties with and who then play 12 hours a day doing m+ and just grind their way to the top. You can tell they're idiots every time they do pug groups in low keys where they madly overgear the instance to the point where they should be able to solo a lot of the trash packs, yet they barely time keys that you could comfortably 2-chest in pugs in 70 ilvls lower gear than they're doing them in on stream (also that would've been done pre-nerfs).

I don't watch a lot of these streamers because, like I said a lot of them seem like idiots who just play a lot, but Dorki is one of the few who seems like he isn't a retard and his opinion on pally is just: It's the same as shadowlands but weaker. His summary is also inconsistent, in that he'll talk about ppally damage being impressive, then summarize it as worse than every other tank except prot and BDK and with those two specs being so close to ppally that it's negligible.

Imo., ppally is the most fun tank to play, but nobody thinks it's remotely the strongest for anything right now, and in addition to that we're currently seeing INSANE buffs to e.g., bears, which are consistently ranked as one of the strongest (if albeit the most boring and with the shittiest talent tree). What's going on over at blizz, where they'll look at bear, see it being the highest damage tank after brew (which may as well not count since brew is so un-tanky right now), and then deciding to buff its overall damage by 50-60%?

He's those guys that starts his sentences slow-and-then-overtime-they-becomeso-fuckingfastitshardtofollowwhathe'ssaying.
If you don't know your stuff well enough or don't put enough time in preparation, you'll end up with a lot more text/time than is actually needed.
You said it correct: PPal in DF is the same as shadowlands, but slightly worse to play. I'm not sure how they fall tuning wise tho, as they're still making changes.

[Felfaadaern Darkterror]

This guy seems like a rambling idiot, which really comes across well in his videos, which are like 20% him going "I could waste time talking about X/Y/Z, but I won't because that would waste too much time". OK, congratulations. You just dedicated all that time of your video to doing something *worse* than the thing you admonish yourself to not do. Absolute grade-A fucking moron.

So many of these tank players are just morons who found 3-4 guys to make regular parties with and who then play 12 hours a day doing m+ and just grind their way to the top. You can tell they're idiots every time they do pug groups in low keys where they madly overgear the instance to the point where they should be able to solo a lot of the trash packs, yet they barely time keys that you could comfortably 2-chest in pugs in 70 ilvls lower gear than they're doing them in on stream (also that would've been done pre-nerfs).

I don't watch a lot of these streamers because, like I said a lot of them seem like idiots who just play a lot, but Dorki is one of the few who seems like he isn't a retard and his opinion on pally is just: It's the same as shadowlands but weaker. His summary is also inconsistent, in that he'll talk about ppally damage being impressive, then summarize it as worse than every other tank except prot and BDK and with those two specs being so close to ppally that it's negligible.

Imo., ppally is the most fun tank to play, but nobody thinks it's remotely the strongest for anything right now, and in addition to that we're currently seeing INSANE buffs to e.g., bears, which are consistently ranked as one of the strongest (if albeit the most boring and with the shittiest talent tree). What's going on over at blizz, where they'll look at bear, see it being the highest damage tank after brew (which may as well not count since brew is so un-tanky right now), and then deciding to buff its overall damage by 50-60%?

I do my own thinking, but do like to listen to good players. Sha, as I understand it, has tanked every spec to 3000+ (all six tanks). I also follow Dorki, Lincoln (of course - he writes the Wowhead guides), Andy...

[Donkeywing]

So many of these tank players are just morons who found 3-4 guys to make regular parties with and who then play 12 hours a day doing m+ and just grind their way to the top.

Amen to that holy fuck. Litteraly saw tanks playing 11h/day unironically, and just because they do that they get away with a lot of shit and suboptimal builds, or playing insanely aggressively for no reason (timing keys with 3min+ left). When they die it doesnt really matter because they play 11h/day and just go again. You ask these ppl a question and they will never elaborate on anything of note. Taking these kinds of people seriously is hilarious, especially since there is zero discussion on the theoretical foundations anywhere and they sure as hell wont participate in a discussion. You just get opinions and if lucky 1 argument to go along with it. Not everyone of course, but enough.

[loras]

Anyone who got the beta that does know it kinda seems like all speccs are getting a bad rating right now..

Definitely agree on retri, it doesn't really seem to know what it wants to be.

Prot is pretty fun though, imo.

[Donkeywing]

Also I'll say the following; when it comes to the ''power ranking'' of tank specs, its mostly bullshit and they cant tell you for certain. Anyone remember that protection paladin had almost no representation in castle nathria, despite the fact it was the strongest off-tank spec? By a large margin actually. I could of course choose not to elaborate on that any further to keep in tradition, providing arguments is after all old-fashion. All the hardcore guilds missed it/underestimated the power of a prot paladin untill 9.1. Considering the extend of class changes, why would one trust these same ppl to be accurate this time, especially when their arguments cannot be countered in a discussion?

[Ralphias]

In pvp after the nerfs coming for season 1 prot paladins are gonna suck the 30% nerf to self healing is gonna be felt