I’m somewhat new to Holy Paladin and was trying to make an Avenging Crusader build work and this is what I’ve settled on so far.
It relies on Beacon healing along with Bestow Faith(which comes with HP generation) to offset any martyr damage and Avenging Crusader for coasting. I don’t really use Flash of Light or Holy Light as a result of nearly all the instant cast healing it’s capable of doing.
My question is this: is this a flawed build? And how can I squeeze more damage out of it?
Is it a build for raids or mythic dungeons?
My personal opinion is if you’re going hard into melee and glimmer you should put at least one point into Crusader’s Might so Crusader Strike reduces Holy Shock cooldown, two points makes it super smooth but you have to sacrifice to get that. I hate Bestow Faith personally, but it’s not a bad ability. I don’t think martyr damage is really much of a factor if you use Maraad’s, because it turns it into damage over time, usually giving you tons of time to heal back from it.
If you use double beacon and maraad’s in dungeons, and give yourself the second beacon, you will never once even have to think about the ticking dot damage. You can spam martyr all day and your self beacon will keep you healed with zero problems.
Veneration in the holy tree could increase your damage sliiiightly by making judgement crits give you a free hammer of wrath, but if you’re not casting FoL or Holy Light it’s probably not worth a talent point. Hallowed Ground in the class tree increases consecration damage by 10%, and (sadly) consecration is currently a holy paladin’s biggest damage dealer, so there is that. I don’t think holy paladin damage is very good right now, even if you try to build for it. I have both an hpal and resto shaman and it’s night and day. The best way to do damage as hpal is make sure consecration is always ticking in the biggest packs, and use Divine Toll offensively to stack glimmers on enemy packs (again, more holy shocks to trigger glimmer effects make this much more effective, so two points in Crusader’s Might help a lot)
Sadly, As much as I love Avenging Crusader, regular wings is probably better for dps with the holy shock cooldown reduction and stacking glimmers on enemies. I still use AC a lot though.
Right now, it’s m+. For Raid, I’d take out blessing of summer for the 40 yard Light of Dawn.
What point could I spare for that?
I’m running it because the alternate is Word of Glory boosting and I don’t often cast it.
Sanctified Wrath isn’t rolled into Avenging Crusader?
It is, but in normal wings, if you have holy shock cooldown reduction with crusader strike, you’re basically alternating CS/HS every button press. Using Avenging Crusader you always want to use judgement as soon as it’s up, which has no holy shock synergy, and crusader strike will cool down so fast you’ll probably end up skipping some holy shocks just to do more crusader strikes for the massive heals. I guess you could alternate CS/HS to do damage in Avenging Crusader if you didn’t need as much healing.
Only way is dropping one of the non-glimmer capstones, and you might not want to. It’s just a preference of mine, feels very nice to be able to force holy shock off cooldown faster
Well in 10.07 if nothing else changes for Holy you will gain 1 point due to Divine Toll talents moving over to class tree
Anything that isn’t the melee build is flawed for m+.
You can pretty well run anything you want in lower keys, but if you have any interest in doing harder keys then builds like this won’t cut it.
SW is taking DTs spot on the spec tree
Why I said 1 point extra he will have since DT line was 2 points and SW is 1
This is very similar to the build I started with for M+. BoFaith might seem like a good idea for healing back that Martyr damage, but honestly using Virtue on near-CD will do the same and Virtue is necessary for group damage on keys higher than 16.
I really think the build I’m running might be up your alley. It’s AC, using Martyr (no casting spells, so no haste stacking) and Bestow Faith. Like Greybrook said, Holy Shock gets in the way of when AC is up, so you don’t want SW. Instead, Zealot helps keep AC up as long as possible for more damage and aoe healing. Further I don’t use meta embellishments and have completed +21s. So you can get far even with this unconventional build.
SW adds 3 more sec duration to AC. Why SW and Zealot’s Paragon is really good with AC as it allows 3 Judges and 6 CS with about 3900 haste in a AC duration that is not extended.
what’s the ideal secondary stat allocation for this build? Is it crit/haste or something different?
My stat priority is Vers>Crit>Mastery>Haste.
Vers to stay alive even as you pump out Martyrs (and they can get really strong). This also increases the value of the two trinkets I use, making it a more valuable stat. EDIT: To compliment the versatility stacking, go for Leech everywhere you can over avoidance. My leech is 5% and it just barely is under covering the damage I take from Martyr.
Crit because you want as big of judgments and CS as possible for AC+Virtue heals. Stacking crit next, you wouldn’t want Divine Glimpse and can better allocate those 2 points. (Infusion of Light procs are almost never used; I only cast Flash of Lights with it and that’s about 5 times in a dungeon for any reason.)
Mastery third for obvious healing increase on WoG, LoD, Bestow, Martyr, and Holy Shock/Toll.
Haste last because everything is instant cast and you don’t need Holy Shock or CS to come up more, although an argument could be made to get enough haste for another CS during AC. Still, I’d say take the haste that unfortunately is with the 4-piece and avoid it elsewhere if you can.
You can always look at my build on the armory. There’s about 3-5 talents I move around on the class tree and about 3 in the spec tree depending on dungeon factors.
I don’t know about 5 mans but for raids zealot’s paragon is an extremely strong talent choice with avenging crusader.
I would argue seal of order and sanctified wrath are stronger for raid. Sanctified wrath gets you a full extra judgement in AC, zealots paragon doesn’t. You also don’t need ZP with sw in order to get an extra judge, Sw does that by itself. Seal of order/dnd keeps your healing rolling outside of AC.
I think you can play any of the capstones with ac, but from where my logs are at I prefer SW/SoO
I didn’t know SW added any time to AC. When SW said 20sec, I thought it was just mirroring regular, ol’ Avenging Wrath. In my case, since I don’t stack haste, the extra 3 seconds doesn’t let me fit in another judgment anyway.
It is a good discussion, though, depending on what stats you prioritize. SW does only go into affect every 45s whereas ZP helps extend Awakening-procced ACs too. The uptime on AC might even out over the course of a dungeon because of this with the only difference being Holy Shock casts or judgment/HoW damage increase. I still like the current iteration of Seal of the Crusader as well for stronger holy damage spells.
Knowing this, I’m more accepting of SW in the spec tree. I guess I’ll take those 3 seconds.
To get 3 Judges and extra CS’s during AC
All tests were with Seal of Alacrity and on PTR 10.07
Min haste to get 3rd Judge → SW + 21%~ haste you can AC with 3 Judges and 5 CS
SW + ZP + 21%~ haste is 3 Judges and 6 CS
SW + ZP + 37%~ haste + Seal of Order Dawn buff is 3 Judges and 7 CS
For Awakening proc(Judge immediately)
Awakening AC + SW + 21%~ haste is 1 Judge and 3 CS
Awakening AC + SW + ZP + 21%~ haste is 2 Judges and 3 CS
Awakening AC + SW + 37%~ haste is 2 Judges 3 CS
Awakening AC + SW + ZP + 37%~ haste is 2 Judges 4 CS
Plus there is Blessing of Autumn to recover cd’s 30% faster making some of these have more CS’s and at least 1 more Judge.
In 10.07 you can get all class capstones.
Yeah it is actually a pretty interesting discussion. All 3 talents provide something different for AC, although the new dusk/dawn doesnt do much for it however it is still really good just like current for healing outside of AC and for fading light absorbs.
SW going to spec tree is a big change for it as now we can grab either ZP+dusk/dawn or dusk/dawn+divine toll talent or all 3
You cant get all the capstones in the class tree without giving up a lot of good stuff elsewhere. I dont think that is worth it really.
You lose haste/judge cdr node, golden path, seasoned warhorse, JoL and afterimage. This is a lot of passive hps to lose, im not sure its worth doing but im not sure. You also have to take a useless talent (incan/touch of light or faiths armor) in order to get down there. You could take alacrity and give up seal of might instead, but you are just losing 4% int which is bad.
The biggest ones there to lose would be seal of alacrity and golden path, and also seasoned warhorse if you need the mobility. alacrity lowers the cd of judgement entirely by 1 sec+passive haste. idk this is an interesting choice.
Another issue with ZP is it requires you to press HoW on cd now too, and HoW doesnt really do anything for ac. Its a global you spend in ac where you do no healing while ACs healing is already not the most reliable. The HoW globals could be spent on HS or LoD, and if you pick up seal of alacrity you get 1s off judgement permanently.
My assumption is it would be too much of an hps loss overall to drop seal of alacrity+jol+afterimage, or drop seal of might+jol+afterimage. It would also mean you cast less HS/LoD as that global during AC would now be HoW. I think with alacrity you will get a 2nd judgement in awakening window regardless of ZP and the lod/hs globals make up for losing that 1 extra cs cast
I forgot to post that one but it does require more haste
From the tree I use I would lose seal of might + afterimage but depending on fights you can take out of ZP/Seal of the Crusader.
I’m not saying you have to play this way.
Just pointing out some AC breakpoints for others to make there choice.
Yes you do less HS and maybe LoD as there are gaps in the rotation but you can make the rotation less chaotic if you take ZP out.
Now that brings me to Glimmer of Light. It does get affected by AC but I think Glimmer needs to change somehow or have a choice node to have something else proc it/ something different.
Maybe make Judge and CS heal 1 person(smart heal) passively.
Glimmer is really strong talent even though I don’t like it that much.
I think ZP needs more to it though now that D&D is not that great with AC. Why I’m trying to push added effects into ZP like HoW heals 1 target. Other things also need attention. Now imagine if we didn’t have 4-5 caster only talents in the bottom tree.
I do enjoy the discussions and how others play.
hello i am back after doing a lot of testing.
I no longer believe paragon is worth it at all even. You have to spend 2 really bad points to reach it, meaning you give up divine resonance/divine toll cdr+2 other talents to get seal of crusader and if you take all 3 capstones you have to spend 3 really bad points to reach zp and give up some pretty good healing talents as well.
From testing (all with sanctified wrath, seal of alacrity and 1 point in relentless inquisitor, no dusk cdr):
SW+37% haste+no paragon=3 judgements in avenging crusader
SW+37% haste+paragon=3 judgements in avenging crusader
Awakening:
SW+no paragon+39% haste=2 judgements in awakening
SW+paragon+39% haste=2 judgements in awakening
This is all with pressing HoW on cd as well. I don’t think paragon is worth it at all (in raid at least) as all you get are a couple extra crusader strikes.
You also have to give up healing gcds with holy shock/light of dawn in order to fit HoW inside of AC which makes the extra CS in awakening and extra 2 CS in regular ac not worth it. On top of having to give up pretty good throughput talents for it, it really does not seem worth the points at all. Also tier leans us towards wanting to press holy shock, so taking paragon and pressing HoW instead is an even worse prospect.