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  1. #1

    Cataclysm Class Preview: Paladin

    Update: Added a couple of clarifications at the end of the post

    Cataclysm Class Preview: Paladin (Paladin Forum)
    Originally Posted by Nethaera (Blue Tracker)
    In World of Warcraft: Cataclysm we’ll be making several changes to class talents and abilities across the board. While this list only outlines some of our plans for the paladin class, we want to give you a look at the new high-level abilities and an overview of how the new Mastery system will work with each talent spec.

    New Paladin Spells

    Blinding Shield (level 81): Causes damage and blinds all nearby targets. This effect might end up only damaging those facing the paladin’s shield, in a manner similar to Eadric the Pure's ability Radiance in Trial of the Champion. The Holy tree will have a talent to increase the damage and critical strike chance, while the Protection tree will have a talent to make this spell instant cast. 2-second base cast time. Requires a shield.

    Healing Hands (level 83): Healing Hands is a new healing spell. The paladin radiates heals from him or herself, almost like a Healing Stream Totem. It has a short range, but a long enough duration that the paladin can cast other heals while Healing Hands remains active. 15-second cooldown. 6-second duration.

    Guardian of Ancient Kings (level 85): Summons a temporary guardian that looks like a winged creature of light armed with a sword. The visual is similar to that of the Resurrection spell used by the paladin in Warcraft III. The guardian has a different effect depending on the talent spec of the paladin. For Holy paladins, the guardian heals the most wounded ally in the area. For Protection paladins, the guardian absorbs some incoming damage. For Retribution paladins, it damages an enemy, similar to the death knight Gargoyle or the Nibelung staff. 3-minute cooldown. 30-second duration (this might vary depending on which guardian appears).

    Next you will find a list of some of the paladin spell and ability changes, followed by our intentions for improving each talent tree for the release of Cataclysm. There will be further changes, but those revealed below should offer some insight into our goals.


    Changes to Abilities and Mechanics

    • Crusader Strike will be a core ability for all paladins, gained at level 1. We think the paladin leveling experience is hurt by not having an instant attack. Retribution will be getting a new talent in its place that either modifies Crusader Strike or replaces it completely.
    • Cleanse is being rebalanced to work with the new dispel system. It will dispel defensive magic (debuffs on friendly targets), diseases, and poisons.
    • Blessing of Might will provide the benefit of Wisdom as well. If you have two paladins in your group, one will do Kings on everyone and the other will do Might on everyone. There should be much less need, and ideally no need, to provide specific buffs to specific classes.
    • Holy Shock will be a core healing spell available to all paladins.


    New Talents and Talent Changes

    • We want to ease off the defensive capabilities of Retribution and Holy paladins slightly. We think the powerful paladin defenses have been one of the things holding Retribution paladins back, especially in Arenas. One change we’re considering is lowering Divine Shield’s duration by a couple of seconds. Having said that, Retribution does pretty well in Battlegrounds, and Battlegrounds will be a much bigger focus in Cataclysm since they can provide the best PvP rewards. Furthermore, the healing environment of Cataclysm is going to be different such that a paladin may not be able to fully heal themselves during the duration of Divine Shield to begin with, so this may not be a problem.
    • We feel Retribution paladins need one more mechanic which involves some risk of the player pushing the wrong button, making the rotation a bit less forgiving. In addition, we want to add to this spec more PvP utility. Right now the successes of the Retribution paladin in PvP seem to be reduced to either doing decent burst damage, or just being good at staying alive.
    • We want to increase the duration of Sacred Shield to 30 minutes and keep the limit to one target. The intention is that the paladin can use it on their main healing target. That said, we would like to improve the Holy paladin toolbox and niche so that they don’t feel quite like the obvious choice for tank healing while perceived as a weak group healer.
    • We want to add to the Holy tree a nice big heal to correspond with Greater Heal. Flash of Light remains the expensive, fast heal and Holy Light is the go-to heal that has average efficiency and throughput. Beacon of Light will be changed to work with Flash of Light. We like the ability, but want paladins to use it intelligently and not be constantly healing for twice as much.
    • Holy paladins will use spirit as their mana regeneration stat.
    • Protection paladins need a different rotation between single-target and multi-target tanking. Likewise, we're looking to add the necessity to use an additional cooldown in each rotation.
    • Holy Shield will no longer have charges. It will be designed to improve block chance while active, and will continue to provide a small amount of damage and threat.


    Mastery Passive Talent Tree Bonuses

    Holy
    • Healing
    • Meditation
    • Critical Healing Effect

    Meditation: This is the spirit-to-mana conversion that the priest, druid, and shaman healers also share.

    Critical Healing Effect: When the paladin gets a crit on a heal, it will heal for more.

    Protection
    • Damage Reduction
    • Vengeance
    • Block Amount

    Vengeance: This is the damage-received-to-attack-power conversion that all tanks share.

    Block Amount: We want to keep the kit of the paladin as a tank who blocks a lot. So by contrast, the warrior tank will sometimes get critical blocks, but the paladin will absorb more damage with normal blocks.

    Retribution
    • Melee Damage
    • Melee Critical Damage
    • Holy Damage

    Holy Damage: Any attack that does Holy damage will have its damage increased.

    This concludes this Cataclysm preview for the paladin class. The development of these changes will continue to evolve in the coming months. Please be sure to provide any feedback and thoughts you might have on what was covered here.

    [...]

    Here's a bit more clarification on some of these changes. Also, please keep in mind that this is merely a preview and we'll still have more to go in testing up to and including any other changes that aren't listed here in the preview.

    We've updated the Flash of Light reference to make it a bit more clear in the original post as follows.

    • Flash of Light remains a fast heal, but will be more expensive to justify the cast speed. Holy Light will be the go-to heal that has average efficiency and throughput. Beacon of Light needs to be changed so that its benefit is letting the paladin heal two targets at once, not letting the paladin get two heals for the mana cost of one. It’s intended to save GCDs and targeting time, not mana.

    In addition we’re changing the paladin heal design to match that of the other healers. Holy Light is the middle heal. It’s very efficient, but not particularly fast and doesn’t have a lot of throughput. Flash of Light will be the faster heal that costs more mana. (Currently paladins sort of flip the model around by having a fast, efficient heal.) Holy paladins can talent into an additional heal that is like a giant Holy Light. It might take three of these big heals (or two crits) to get a tank from death’s door back to 100% health.

    Currently on live, Beacon of Light is a tool that allows paladins to target more than just the main tank. In Cataclysm if it just doubles their healing, it is going to be overpowered. We have two ways we might handle this and we’ll experiment to see which feels better. The first is that Beacon only works on some heals, such as Flash of Light or Holy Light (but not the big one). An alternative idea is that Beacon increases the mana cost of a heal cast on a beaconed target, since you’re essentially getting a double heal. Under this model, Beacon itself would cost no mana.

    Also on the live realms currently, paladins have huge mana pools and massive throughput. The trade-off is that they are excellent single target healers and much weaker in other roles. We want paladins to be slightly more interchangeable with other healers. In Cataclysm, you should be able to have a Holy priest on the tank and a Holy paladin on the raid. We’re not sure we’ll back off of the current healing roles completely, but we definitely want to add more breadth to those whose roles are currently too narrow.

    As for the Guardian of Ancient Kings. First, it's important to understand that this is not a pet nor does it have a pet bar associated with it. Second, it's also not meant to last for very long. So, it's not a pet in the traditional sense. It's a friend in need when you need it, but not a permanent companion.

  2. #2
    Pandaren Monk Forgottenone's Avatar
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    Re: Cataclysm Class Preview: Paladin

    Very nice changes, worth the wait

  3. #3

    Re: Cataclysm Class Preview: Paladin

    So the taiwanase "fake" wasn't fake after all.

  4. #4

    Re: Cataclysm Class Preview: Paladin

    So the post from TW community forums isn't a fake, right?

  5. #5

    Re: Cataclysm Class Preview: Paladin

    Holy changes are horrible make ss fire and forget add a passive long cd and a short range self targeted self heal. Cuz when chain heal had a tiny radius it worked so well on almost all fights.

  6. #6
    Deleted

    Re: Cataclysm Class Preview: Paladin

    Originally Posted by Nethaera (Blue Tracker)


    Guardian of Ancient Kings (level 85): Summons a temporary guardian that looks like a winged creature of light armed with a sword. The visual is similar to that of the Resurrection spell used by the paladin in Warcraft III. The guardian has a different effect depending on the talent spec of the paladin. For Holy paladins, the guardian heals the most wounded ally in the area. For Protection paladins, the guardian absorbs some incoming damage. For Retribution paladins, it damages an enemy, similar to the death knight Gargoyle or the Nibelung staff. 3-minute cooldown. 30-second duration (this might vary depending on which guardian appears)
    Can someone tell me what this looked like?

  7. #7
    The Patient Lifestyl's Avatar
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    Re: Cataclysm Class Preview: Paladin

    yay crusader strike
    So why, I ask, it just doesn't make much sense
    That a man of my stature should have to wear a dress
    I mean what, may I inquire, were you thinking on that day
    When you conjured up for a man like me a robe that looks so gay

  8. #8
    Stood in the Fire
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    Re: Cataclysm Class Preview: Paladin

    Hmm quite a pleasent change. I really want to see how The new healing ability towards Greater heal will work out. Starting to sound abit like a priest but yeah steps in the right direction.


  9. #9
    The Patient
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    Re: Cataclysm Class Preview: Paladin

    Holy Shock will be a core healing spell available to all paladins.

    Here come the Shockadin nerds.

  10. #10
    Stood in the Fire Jimmybob117's Avatar
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    Re: Cataclysm Class Preview: Paladin

    Wow, the Taiwanisse one wasnt fake
    Quote Originally Posted by Slummish View Post
    I don't get it. I've gone AFK a million times to blow my bf so he'd get off my back and let me raid. What's the problem here? People have sex...
    Check me out on youtube! Playthroughs of Diablo 3, Minecraft and many other games with daily content!

  11. #11
    Mechagnome Deaths's Avatar
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    Re: Cataclysm Class Preview: Paladin

    Quote Originally Posted by Synthaxx
    No mention of an interrupt and distance closer.....
    Looks like i truly am rerolling Warlock now.
    I'm going to start gearing my lock up again... Stopped with Togc and haven't really touched ICC... Looks like its time to start.



    "Stop," said a loud booming voice. And Rhonin turned around to see it was Bolvar Fordragon, but he was all burned up and shit. He took the helm from Tirion. "I can take no comfort anymore, in the world of the living, for Arthas has burned my genitals off. I shall bear the burden. I shall be the jailer of the damned." - Legendary Knaak Thread

  12. #12

    Re: Cataclysm Class Preview: Paladin

    sounds interesting

  13. #13
    Epic! Tribunal's Avatar
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    Re: Cataclysm Class Preview: Paladin

    Doesn't feel like enough for Holy.

    Original Beacon got nerfed super fast, I have a feeling this one comes pre-nerfed.

    Depending on how much the jiggle/improve Ret/Prot rotation, that might be my go to.

    OTHERWISE, WTB Account-wide titles/achievment points/pets/mounts so I can even really consider swapping mains.

  14. #14

    Re: Cataclysm Class Preview: Paladin

    im happy with these changes
    BoOoOoOmMmM!

  15. #15

    Re: Cataclysm Class Preview: Paladin

    Absolutely bloody awesome. Ret is looking good :>

  16. #16

    Re: Cataclysm Class Preview: Paladin

    No! Beacon of Light only working with FoL? I understand but HATE THIS CHANGE! No longer feeling like a god on battlegrounds.

    Might reroll a priest actually.

  17. #17

    Re: Cataclysm Class Preview: Paladin

    Blinding Shield (level 81): Causes damage and blinds all nearby targets. This effect might end up only damaging those facing the paladin’s shield, in a manner similar to Eadric the Pure's ability Radiance in Trial of the Champion. The Holy tree will have a talent to increase the damage and critical strike chance, while the Protection tree will have a talent to make this spell instant cast. 2-second base cast time. Requires a shield.

    Thank god my paladin is prot. Sorry for ya, rets.
    A true Patriot fights for their country, not for their government.

  18. #18

    Re: Cataclysm Class Preview: Paladin

    Quote Originally Posted by Nighthunter
    Originally Posted by Nethaera (Blue Tracker)


    Guardian of Ancient Kings (level 85): Summons a temporary guardian that looks like a winged creature of light armed with a sword. The visual is similar to that of the Resurrection spell used by the paladin in Warcraft III. The guardian has a different effect depending on the talent spec of the paladin. For Holy paladins, the guardian heals the most wounded ally in the area. For Protection paladins, the guardian absorbs some incoming damage. For Retribution paladins, it damages an enemy, similar to the death knight Gargoyle or the Nibelung staff. 3-minute cooldown. 30-second duration (this might vary depending on which guardian appears)
    Can someone tell me what this looked like?
    when paladin used that spell 6 dead units came back to life , animation was White winged angel with sword coming from sky and with swing of a sword bringing back people to life , its bad ass imo
    Quote Originally Posted by Daralii View Post
    An orc named after Jesus firing a kamehameha at a tentacle dragon and making it explode into fairy dust before a group of dragons don't lament the loss of their once-friend or the now inevitable extinction of their species due to their newfound sterility and mortality but instead congratulate him on knocking up his wife was pretty fucking insane even by this series' standards.

  19. #19
    Epic! Tribunal's Avatar
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    Re: Cataclysm Class Preview: Paladin

    Quote Originally Posted by Blix

    Here come the Shockadin nerds.
    Note the "core healing spell". I'm guessing they're just chunking the damage component, which is a little sad

  20. #20

    Re: Cataclysm Class Preview: Paladin

    wow so highly disappointing....rets get a 30 second summon and get to lvl using crusader strike blizz = fail

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