Sure, TAJ is uncontested, and we will get it if it drops. And we will get tier for free. So we can hope to be bottom DPS if we get every item except for SM. Awesome. And even if we do get SM, it will take months to farm that and we will be bottom DPS the entire time until we get it, and finally become lower middle.
Like DKs are projected to be?
Yeah pretty much, without SM would put us on par with Arms again, & Blood DK, but with no hysteria DPS. Once we finally got SM, we’d be tied with Blood DK +SM with no hysteria DPS, near the lower end of the middle. DKs fall off hard in full bis ICC, that’s just WOTLK. It’s not a great place to be.
The big thing is that Ret without these buffs in ICC would be in a far different place to where Ret was in Ulduar when the buffs were designed.
Not really. Ulduar pre-buff we were bottom DPS tied with Arms. It would be the same in ICC except for being tied with Blood DK (-hysteria) & Arms instead. If we got SM after a few months, we would be slightly better off than we were in pre-buff Ulduar, yes, but it would be pretty similar to where we were at post-buff in Ulduar, still not far from the bottom, lower end of the middle of the pack at best.
Taking DSac is a choice
Not always. Such as Algalon progress, sure AM has slightly less reduction on the AoE damage, but it does nothing to reduce tank damage which was a big factor in Algalon progress. On a fight like Saurfang, it will be very important to have on progress to reduce the Mark damage which is physical in nature and cannot be AM’d. If you’re going to say that we are good because of utilities like DSAC, then you need to consider the DPS loss that it requires. And we’ve already gone over utility many times, our real only claim to fame is the 3% damage buff that no other meta class brings now. If we were nerfed to bottom damage without SM, people may look to other sources.
It’s the same scenario, classes that were quite bad in Ulduar getting buffs for that tier, which see them top tier and above lots of other classes in ICC.
How is it the same scenario when Feral is a tier above classes like Ret/Fury/MM/Spriest on DPS, S+ tier tied only with Fire Mage? When Feral is outDPSing all these classes, including fully buffed Retribution by 500-1000 dps. Feral is in a position to be stacked in ICC. Retribution is not.
This includes having them scale mostly as you’d expect them to.
Note Blizzard looks to player expectations here. Retribution has always been expected to be a top 5 DPS in ICC. I don’t know what the problem is with that statement there. You’re also twisting it out of context to fit your argument. Such as this quote:
Not a Goal – Make Retribution competitive with the highest output specs and classes in PvE. The utility of all Paladins cannot be overstated here and is absolutely a factor to consider still. With access to critical raid buffs, auras, and raid cooldowns such as Aura Mastery and Divine Guardian, all flavors of Paladins have a vital place in any raid composition, and as we’ve previously stated, we are pleased with their overall representation in raids, as a class. We do not want to start seeing Retribution become stacked in raids. Most raid groups that run Retribution Paladins typically include a single Retribution Paladin, and we feel that 1 or 2 is still a good target number to have in each raid.
This was clearly speaking about Phase 2, and even if you insist it applies to ICC, we aren’t that close to Feral/Fire, which are 500-1000 DPS above us. So no, we aren’t really competitive with them. If you include DSAC then you can add ~350 DPS (515 DPS if you have to get 2/2 imp might) to that number. They are aiming for each raid to have 1 or 2 Ret Paladins and not be stacked, and that is exactly the case now. Nobody is stacking Retribution in ICC if things stay the same. If you reverted the buffs, the number of Retribution Paladins may well go to 0 for many raids, at least on progression, because we would once again be, the literal worst DPS, even if we managed to get set bonuses & TAJ after a few weeks we would still be at the bottom. But it would be far, far worse than just bottom DPS on progression before we gear up, it would be a mile below everyone and probably unviable period.
And personally I have always said that Blizzard overstates the importance of our utility here, even in Phase 2, in their own post they say that prot/holy representation is so good, and that’s one of the things that hurts our utility the most, as they bring basically all the same utility besides 3% damage.
They mention DSAC, which again costs us ~350 DPS to use (again, 515 if you need 2/2 imp might), and puts us a lot further from the top post-buff. Many of our other utilities, once again, are already provided by better classes pre-buff, including other paladin specs that would be much more meta (prot/holy).
Ret and Feral shouldn’t be this high on the meters in the tier they were originally supposedly balanced around.
Once again, most people did expect Retribution to be somewhere near the top 5 here in ICC BiS. This has always been a common talking point. “Wait until ICC when Retribution will finally be a top 5 DPS class” etc was a common sentiment. I’m not super familiar with 2010 but I’ve heard many people say that Retribution was quite strong in ICC originally, which it wouldn’t be in Classic without the taunt glyph.
What exactly do you think changed from Blizzard saying Ret’s overall strength was fine when they were at the bottom with Fury in Ulduar?
I already answered that, Retribution players began rerolling, raids began to take Arcane mage instead for 3% damage, and Retribution fell further and further behind literally every other class on logs. We literally were unviable if you didn’t need the DSAC for Algalon. They claimed representation was fine and then a month later changed their minds on that.
In order to justify a nerf you need to explain why it’s a problem for Retribution to be where it is in the DPS rankings. If we aren’t topping DPS, not even among the S+ tier classes Feral/Fire, and we aren’t affecting class representation of, for example, Fury, and we aren’t being stacked, then you accomplish literally nothing with a nerf, except for making Retribution mediocre DPS all expansion long, and less fun to play for everyone. On top of that, it subverts the expectations that everyone has regarding Ret being a strong DPS in ICC.
If we want to nerf them in phase 5 because they are beating the next closest classes by 10% or more, go for it.
I know you already know this, but Retribution isn’t going to ever be in that position if the sims are accurate. Fire/Feral will likely continue to be a tier above everyone else by a hundreds of dps. Retribution AM will likely stay tied with the other DPS classes on the 2nd tier, SP/MM/Fury/Affliction, with DSAC spec falling toward the upper middle of the pack.
Also, let’s say we nerf Ferals to remove them from that S+ tier. Now instead of having Feral stacking, you just have Fire Mage stacking instead. Sure, they didn’t get any changes besides the munch/vomit fix, but still. Maybe it’s more agreeable to some to have that instead, idk. I don’t think it is that important.
Or - and stick with me here - or we are playing a game that is 15 years old and people have expectations about how classes work. Nerfs would go down very poorly in this game.
You should re read this comment to yourself again Snipsy. Apply that to Retribution and it’s literally exactly the same. People expect Retribution to be strong DPS in ICC.