Competition for Cata Raid Spots for Rets

[Raffirin]

No, the evidence is that they nerfed and nerfed and nerfed.....again and again the 3.0 ret paladin always saying they will grant us the proper tools if burst dmg is under control. By the end of wotlk our dmg is laughable compared to ele, wl, mage, warrior and still we havent received the promised melee tools. This means, its very well a possibility that we will suck come lvl 85 and they will only tack on a few bandaids to keeps our dps above tanks like ele shamans in bad guilds and call it a day like they always do. In 6 month from now people will start saying: nextaddon will fix it, they said it for the last 15 months and now look how our long awaited revamp turned out....complete failure. pvp wise WE ARE screwed for this whole coming expansion....except for one gimmick comp in the dying arena maybe. rbg wise - i would never take a ret paladin.

So we're shifting the conversation from pve to pvp? In terms of the nerfs to ret, it seems to be fairly reasonable to me. Yes there are some fights like Proff and Sind that don't cater to ret, but many guilds explicitly stack ret for lk. As far as pvp goes, ret still has some impressive burst with seal of righteousness. Lining up your three nukes with an art of war proc does some serious damage within the time frame of one medium duration cc. We never got the tools we were promised in wrath, but we are getting a gap closer, short duration interrupt, and holy power gives the potential for stacking some serious delayed burst. The delayed part isn't a huge issue on a target switch. Of course, burst isn't supposed to be as big a deal in Cata, so we'll see.

[Pickwickman]

So we're shifting the conversation from pve to pvp? In terms of the nerfs to ret, it seems to be fairly reasonable to me. Yes there are some fights like Proff and Sind that don't cater to ret, but many guilds explicitly stack ret for lk. As far as pvp goes, ret still has some impressive burst with seal of righteousness. Lining up your three nukes with an art of war proc does some serious damage within the time frame of one medium duration cc. We never got the tools we were promised in wrath, but we are getting a gap closer, short duration interrupt, and holy power gives the potential for stacking some serious delayed burst. The delayed part isn't a huge issue on a target switch. Of course, burst isn't supposed to be as big a deal in Cata, so we'll see.

You are right that Ret has awesome burst if the stars align, but at the moment we get unpredictable burst through our procs. This can work in your favor, or against you. I do agree that we get PvP-tools though.

Let's shift back to PvE please.

[Raffirin]

You are right that Ret has awesome burst if the stars align, but at the moment we get unpredictable burst through our procs. This can work in your favor, or against you. I do agree that we get PvP-tools though.

Let's shift back to PvE please.

Lack of pvp tools was seemingly being used to support a stance that Blizzard is leaving ret in a bad place. I remain sceptical that we won't get our fix. Obviously there were specs that remained undertuned throughout wrath, but wrath was also the first expansion that balance was a primary concern. With experience comes wisdom.

[Badpaladin]

So we're shifting the conversation from pve to pvp? In terms of the nerfs to ret, it seems to be fairly reasonable to me. Yes there are some fights like Proff and Sind that don't cater to ret, but many guilds explicitly stack ret for lk. As far as pvp goes, ret still has some impressive burst with seal of righteousness. Lining up your three nukes with an art of war proc does some serious damage within the time frame of one medium duration cc. We never got the tools we were promised in wrath, but we are getting a gap closer, short duration interrupt, and holy power gives the potential for stacking some serious delayed burst. The delayed part isn't a huge issue on a target switch. Of course, burst isn't supposed to be as big a deal in Cata, so we'll see.

Whatever shit you're smoking, I want some because it must be damn good. For starters:

- Sindragosa is actually a good fight for ret if you're not bad. Ret should be in the top five every time unless you stack hunters.

- People don't expelicityly stack ret for LK. LK isn't hard, never was. HLK is hard, and people stack cleave; not ret. Ret arguably brought the best Valkyr cleave with Seal of Command, but the difference is negligible between warriors now that we're in full BiS and they have their ridiculous gear scaling.

- Ret does not have impressive burst with Seal of Righteousness. In fact, it's better to use Seal of Truth in PvP currently. If you're talking about live, then I guess I understand if all you do is stomp battleground baddies with no resil.

- Burst is "gone", but damage is still just as ridiculous. Dealing so much damage that you simply can't be healed through is not any different from globaling somebody.

- Keeping a 3-stack of Holy Power isn't giving you much burst, if any. You do realize that TV doesn't hit nearly as hard as most other classes' main nukes? The majority of our damage is strike-based yet those strikes do shit damage? Don't give me the 'numbers pass' crap either, because 4.0.1 is live.

[Deleted]

Whatever shit you're smoking, I want some because it must be damn good. For starters:

- Sindragosa is actually a good fight for ret if you're not bad. Ret should be in the top five every time unless you stack hunters.

- People don't expelicityly stack ret for LK. LK isn't hard, never was. HLK is hard, and people stack cleave; not ret. Ret arguably brought the best Valkyr cleave with Seal of Command, but the difference is negligible between warriors now that we're in full BiS and they have their ridiculous gear scaling.

- Ret does not have impressive burst with Seal of Righteousness. In fact, it's better to use Seal of Truth in PvP currently. If you're talking about live, then I guess I understand if all you do is stomp battleground baddies with no resil.

- Burst is "gone", but damage is still just as ridiculous. Dealing so much damage that you simply can't be healed through is not any different from globaling somebody.

- Keeping a 3-stack of Holy Power isn't giving you much burst, if any. You do realize that TV doesn't hit nearly as hard as most other classes' main nukes? The majority of our damage is strike-based yet those strikes do shit damage? Don't give me the 'numbers pass' crap either, because 4.0.1 is live.

This.

As usual Badpaladin, you sir hit the nail on the head so to speak.

[Requital]

I usually agree with BP except to the Sindragosa part as that fight can be good or bad for Ret depending how your guild handles it.

[Badpaladin]

I usually agree with BP except to the Sindragosa part as that fight can be good or bad for Ret depending how your guild handles it.

pft stop being a baddie and make the healers heal you more! DPS's job to tunnel, healer's job to heal imo.

[Raffirin]

Whatever shit you're smoking, I want some because it must be damn good. For starters:

- Sindragosa is actually a good fight for ret if you're not bad. Ret should be in the top five every time unless you stack hunters.

- People don't expelicityly stack ret for LK. LK isn't hard, never was. HLK is hard, and people stack cleave; not ret. Ret arguably brought the best Valkyr cleave with Seal of Command, but the difference is negligible between warriors now that we're in full BiS and they have their ridiculous gear scaling.

- Ret does not have impressive burst with Seal of Righteousness. In fact, it's better to use Seal of Truth in PvP currently. If you're talking about live, then I guess I understand if all you do is stomp battleground baddies with no resil.

- Burst is "gone", but damage is still just as ridiculous. Dealing so much damage that you simply can't be healed through is not any different from globaling somebody.

- Keeping a 3-stack of Holy Power isn't giving you much burst, if any. You do realize that TV doesn't hit nearly as hard as most other classes' main nukes? The majority of our damage is strike-based yet those strikes do shit damage? Don't give me the 'numbers pass' crap either, because 4.0.1 is live.

Number adjustments have come in minor patches before. There will be multiple bug fix patches in the next couple weeks, and with all the new mechanics, I'm sure there will be balance shifts shortly.

/shrug If our damage is still unadjusted on the live build, then I was wrong. I still expect a fix shortly though.

[carnage1320]

WE HAVE A BIGGER PROB ON OUR HANDS, NO MORE BUBBLE HEARTH PEOPLE! video of the last one aka Death of bubble hearth http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eFoSjONlBrI

[Lyese]

Number adjustments have come in minor patches before. There will be multiple bug fix patches in the next couple weeks, and with all the new mechanics, I'm sure there will be balance shifts shortly.

/shrug If our damage is still unadjusted on the live build, then I was wrong. I still expect a fix shortly though.

I think they erred on the side of caution this xpac. 2 weeks into the patch, we'll see hotfixes left and right. 1 month into the xpac, we'll see number juggling. It happened in BC, it happened in LK, it'll happen in Cata.

---------- Post added 2010-10-12 at 11:02 PM ----------

Blizzard seems to have been unhappy with the concept of "unique snowflake buffs" and in Cataclysm raid composition I was under the impression they would be homogenized/removed/reduced (more or less). Lately, I have been thinking about what raid compositions will be like post-cata. So I looked at all the talent trees as they are right now and noticed alot of the classes still have their talented raidbuffs-
Frost DKs have Improved Icy Talons, Unholy Dks have Ebon Plaguebringer, Feral Druids have Leader of the Pack, Assassination Rogues have Master Poisioner, MM Hunters have Trueshot Aura ...to name a few.

Then, looking at the ret tree....

Heart of the Crusader - removed
Sanctified Retribution - replaced by Communion, so we still have this (edited as I had made a slight error...whoops)
Swift Retribution - removed (Moonkin form still in the balance tree, provides the same buff)
Replenishment - remains, also in Communion talent

Now, thinking on the non-talent buffs provided by rets:
Blessings - in essence we have kept Blessing of Wisdom and Might, only one Paladin is needed tho. Kings is done by druids lol.
Auras - kept those, changed slightly....
CDs: Hand of Protection, Hand of Sacrifice, Lay on Hands

Did I miss anything? Anyway, I hope I didn't come off too cynical. These changes probably won't be an issue for those of us who do great damage, have high survivability and learn fights and strategies quickly and are able to execute them. But if there is already replenishment in a raid, some rets are going to have a hard time competing with others vying for a spot who do equal damage and have just as good awareness as they do. There may only be room for one ret paladin per 25 man in a serious progression guild, if that.

What do you guys think? Agree? Disagree? Cause for concern or not a problem?

On topic, we have HoSac, HoProt, and LoH. All of which are "unique" buffs/cds. I agree we lost a lot of our individuality in the buff department, but Shamans did, too. If I see a skilled ret that avoids wipes at clutch time by smart use of cds, I'll take him over a rogue that does more dps but simply watches the raid die.

[chuck123]

And it will have precisely the exact opposite effect. Blizzard cannot and will not make all damage/healing even across the board because of PvP. If you've already got ret's buffs covered, why bring a ret over a class/spec that does more damage? Name me one logical reason why.

i know a top 50 guild in the world that "firstkilled" lk25hm with 3 mages even tho it was told that mages are kinda "sunwelled" and not awesome for this.

[Phive]

for me ret is just fun

and its been that way since i started a female belf pally about four months ago because i took a break from guilds and raidn

i havent looked back and really dont intend to... no matter what the outcome! ( i think the pigtails and twirly jump was what helped me get to 80)

as it is, i just got in a small time guild and already the GM is thinking replacing me because my dps is too low

personally, i dont care about that. i dont have recount, i have grid for justincaseohshiii... moments and oh, we have raided once.

if the gm is gonna start in on me so soon then eff him, im staying ret because i enjoy melee even though it seems to be a ranged game these days.

my saving grace is that , even if my dps is a lil low, they will still need me since i also bring an offspec and that, fellow plateys, is far from useless, especially in tens (which will be where its at

i dont complain, i bring my flasks, i show up

...and if that dont work, i have a mage :P

[Pickwickman]

If you guys have only raided once as a group, the Raidleader has no inherent evidence of you being bad. Try to perfect your skill by reading guides and looking at video's and most importantly spreadsheet and practice your rotation at least one hour in a week to keep everything fresh.

I know it sounds like a lot of work, but trust me, especially in small-time guilds it is so much fun to obliterate everyone on dps while you either undergear them or are doing secondary tasks. You will get a lot of /cheer your way.

That said, yep your secondary spec will help you get a long way, but some people just like ret.

[Raffirin]

Just pointing out that it took from Tuesday to Wednesday for Blizz to acknowledge the class balance issues and the intention to promptly fix them. So I was wrong about the changes going live without a fix, but I was right about the intention to fix it promptly.

That being said, we aren't that far off. Did 14k on Festergut tonight and 13k on Rotface while still adjusting to the rotation (haven't been on the beta) and wishing I wasn't too lazy to find an addon that would display holy power not on the opposite side of the screen from my character. We aren't so bad off as people are inclined to believe.

[Agathon]

will be doing icc hc today. only did pdok 10 hc yesterday as a test. the warlock alt without much class knowledge was doing as much dps as the fury warrior and me combined even more than that most of the time. bossmobs died way to fast to even get a full use of zealotry - it was just awful but thats not a correct test environment.
There seems to be something wrong with tvs crit chance. i have around 30% unbuffed and consistently get like 12% crit on tv over 5mill dmg tests on the dummy?! but thats entirely different...

sure they registered that ret is too low but i dont think they will drastically change mastery, dp, zealotry all at once before we have to lvl with this really bad specc. its bandaidfix time.....and nothing good can come of this.

[Raffirin]

will be doing icc hc today. only did pdok 10 hc yesterday as a test. the warlock alt without much class knowledge was doing as much dps as the fury warrior and me combined even more than that most of the time. bossmobs died way to fast to even get a full use of zealotry - it was just awful but thats not a correct test environment.
There seems to be something wrong with tvs crit chance. i have around 30% unbuffed and consistently get like 12% crit on tv over 5mill dmg tests on the dummy?! but thats entirely different...

sure they registered that ret is too low but i dont think they will drastically change mastery, dp, zealotry all at once before we have to lvl with this really bad specc. its bandaidfix time.....and nothing good can come of this.

We got a little bit more than a bandaid on this one. I'm not sure there is a source of damage from ret that didn't get at least a 10% buff.

[Pickwickman]

We got a little bit more than a bandaid on this one. I'm not sure there is a source of damage from ret that didn't get at least a 10% buff.

Yup this buff is exactly what we, and warriors/ferals/rogues needed. We are more or less in line with each other now, we just have to wait and see how the new skills affect our dps.

[Requital]

We got a little bit more than a bandaid on this one. I'm not sure there is a source of damage from ret that didn't get at least a 10% buff.

This is definitely not more then a band-aid if anything this put our numbers fairly close to even to what they were before the 4.0.1 fiasco, If they were trying to buff all other classes and leave Warriors, Ret, Combat Rogues and DKs where they then yes we got a fix however it's the case then casters still need to lose between 3-5K DPS off what they have now after the nerfs.

Hell our Mages, Boomkins and Warlocks finished Heroic LK last night @ from 20-30K DPS that has never happened before. While I'm happy they basically reverted the changes from 4.0.1 they serious have balance issues as always.