Ok, so diverting from hot topic posting, I thought I’d ask a question about arenas for ret paladins. I know that ret paladin has uses but is hard pressed to easily find a 2s comp that works well against the other meta comps and is just decent in general. Based on what Ive read, the only real viable options is Ret/Disc and Ret/Rsham. What are your thoughts and which would you go for? At the moment, I would hope for ret/rsham but i might settled for Ret/Disc
Ret/rshamans for the seal twisting wf proc 1 shot.
2 Likes
If you’re really good, Ret Rogue, Ret Mage, and Ret Enhance and Ret resto-sham all work really well but there are counters to every great comp in 2’s.
So RNGezus kinda determines where your rating goes for the day you play, with some play times being really good im sure, and others not so good because you’re facing a ton of counter comps that may or may not be better than yours. Its horrible when they’re worse because you drop points knowing their crap.
That’s just the nature of 2’s in TBC, Wrath, Cata, WoD, Legion, BFA and SL. Legit the only time 2’s was any good was S3 MoP pre-WW buffs, before that WW was really balanced, but blizz went and took that way too far in S4 MoP kinda breaking the game.
1 Like
I’ve hears some say that Ret/Arms is decent. The paladin would have to play a bit more of a support role.
I’ve taken my paladin into a few different 2s combos. I was mostly good at dying.
1 Like
ye Rsham or rogue. my ret buddy said rogue was a pretty good partner in 2s, i think they hit low 2ks with that comp
We just tried ret/sham for the first time last week. it’s fun, the utility is very high. you play around HOJ kill windows and need to seal twist a lot. the shammy has to help secure kills as well.
It’s just ret/rsham
You auto lose to rdruid/warrior. disc/rogue and lock/X which is most of the ladder. Pray for RNG and find a good rsham
Which on grob, i’ve only seen maybe 4-5 geared rshams on ally willing to play this god awful spec
As Ret, your best comps in 2s are prob Ret/Rogue, RetMage, RetSham.
I personally play RetSham (sham PoV), and we are just shy of 2200 at the moment. Ret Sham and RetWar definitely feel like my best 2 comps… and I prefer the one-shot aspect of ret myself.
As previously mentioned by Stenze, RetSham is pretty RNG heavy. We often use cheezy all in strats (Bubble, hero, Bop, NS chain lightning etc) on a kill. It is quite satisfying when it lines up too.
We typically do very well vs almost all double dps teams, most disc/dps teams we do well against - but rogue/priest can beat us - but our win rate vs that comp is actually decent. RogueDruid or WarDruid feels like an auto loss most of the time - you basically just run at the druid all game and pray for a oneshot… but outlook is typically grim. Lock/Healer is also rough - with priest you can sometimes zerg the priest down, druid… is tougher.
The problem with our comp is consistency… sometimes the stars just don’t align… and the kill is missed. We can’t outlast most of the S-tier comps - so we fizzle. It’s a frustrating yet rewarding comp - a few have gotten glad with Rsham/Ret, its possible but an uphill battle for sure.
Best of luck on your Ret adventures.
4 Likes
When playing ret/rsham go reckoning spec. A majority of teams sit on you (esp war/Druid and disc/rogue). You can literally global someone with a reck twist wf. Good news is even if they don’t sit on you your dmg is still nice with twist and wf. Shaman needs to do dmg with you and spam purge or nothing will happen. Bad news is you will most likely get farmed by lock/Druid.
There is a ret paladin discord with a pin for “toolkit, matchups, 2v2” which pretty much has all you need to know. Strats for certain comps, gear, etc. Very detailed info on what to do against certain match-ups which for TBC is really nice cause 2v2 is basically following a script
The ret I play with(Zenal), is on same server as you and could also help you out. I keep my 2s open to help friends so I’d also be down to que a bit
Hard yea. Curse of tongues is just game breaking without a curse dispel
Warrior/rdruid one of the most popular comps on the 2v2 ladder is also an extreme hard counter unless you magically RNG the druid
Ignore 2s and have way more fun in 3s. Find a sword spec arms war and a rsham.
3s is way less RNG comp matchups, as 2s is really all about the queue session and who you face. At least in 3s, there are a lot less hard counter comps, and even there is one, you still have a chance.
Great reply and thanks for all the info. Currently running with a rsham. Still learning the ropes, but in a couple sessions we hit 1500. The rsham is really good and the one coaching/calling the shots. We were on a win streak, like maybe 9 games or something, then hit a streak of counter comps like you mentioned. Now we are just trying to find the best ways to put ourselves in a position to win those and hope for rng luck.
I have been considering it. Up to 1500, I didnt get targeted much. But at 1500, im starting to get targeted. It seems more viable now especially having the opportunity to cheese a rdruid/warr
Why does no one ever mention 5s? They are kinda fun. 3s are 10x funner IMO. Never got that high a rating in 5s tbh.
Because it’s hard to lock down 5 people to play consistently at certain times. Not saying 5s isn’t fun or an option, just much easier to find a solid group for 3s over 5s.
1 Like
Even if we did not have teams to work within, its just hard to find people interested in 5’s because its hard to organize play times consistently for 5 players in order to push any kinda ratings in 5’s…
I think 5’s could be a way way way better bracket if they make it solo Q only; not joking I think this would actually work and people could have a lot of fun with it if they did not take it too seriously. But that’s the roadblock, people take it way too serious and get frustrated even over a single loss in the middle of a winning streak of like 10+… the butthurt is real for some people and I really don’t get it.
1 Like
Yea, I’m in that one. Good resource.
I am 62 games in on this comp and am sitting at 1605. I personally, still learning this comp, probably scuffed 5-10 of those games so it could be higher. I switched to reckoning spec for today’s session. Climbed 100+ rating despite me not being able to pull off too many reck/wf bombs. So, seems ok for now. Played alot of double dps so that had alot to do with it. We are winning against the teams we are supposed to most of the time. But having trouble with Rogue Druid and Warr Druid, obv
yea dw, rogue druid is like your toughest matchup. lock druid is up there as well
disagree with above dude who said disc rogue is a counter. we beat them usually. good disc wont let you sac the pala out of sap but you still usually win unless they resist multiple HoJs (TBC diceroll city)
This topic was automatically closed 60 days after the last reply. New replies are no longer allowed.