I really like hammers for paladins. The big problem I have with 2-handed maces in WoW: why is my character unable to wield them like a real hammer? At the end of the hilt? Looks really wonky.
5 Likes
There is nothing a ret pally brings to a raid or a dungeon group that’s not redundant or situational luxury.
No battle res, no group dmg reduction, no dmg buffs, no group speed increase, no aoe control (unless undead but WoA is part of our dmg rotation.) We have a talented cc that makes HoJ less effective of a skill and have bad mobility.
We effectively don’t have auras anymore and don’t have blessings buffs.
Unless a ret pally is top dmg for all specs why would you ever bring one when you can pick literally any other class?
8 Likes
Me and Churchmouse had this exact conversation on the PTR Forums. >.>
https://us.forums.blizzard.com/en/wow/en/wow/t/ret-pvp-talents-in-925/1213644/4
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Not really.
Depending of the spec, Ret should feel like a Lawful Avenger. Paladin in general was supposed to be a Lawful class, but its only there in the names, but you don’t really feel the aesthetic of being a lawful avenger while playing. Spells like Kyrian warrior Spear feels more like something out of the law, than anything Paladin does.
During wod, we were more of a inescapable justice avenger, and it felt great along the bane and smiter of evil and undead.
But right now, it’s like the justice feel and the smiter of evil and undead is very much gone in the class. Spells do stuff, but nothing screams ‘‘the law’’ even in the animations. Specially new Judgement animation is the worst thing ever.
Zeal is completely boring, so is Righteous Verdict, it’s a mini game that’s just bad and the window for it is too short to keep it up properly.
And as you can see, Night Fae is the least popular Covenant for Paladin for a big whole reason, and that reason is Blessing of Seasons, it’s terrible. Trying to do things of 3 different roles, and it’s skewed massively.
We don’t need seals, auras, or blessings. They can add completely different new spells. And seeing with what they’ve done with Shadowlands Execution Sentence and Final Reckoning, I want to give them the benefit of the doubt, because those were great additions to the spec gameplay wise.
The problem of Hand of Hindrance is that it’s freaking 30sec cd, the only snare in the game with this long of a CD, and on top of that it’s magical so easily dispelled. It should never be higher than 10sec cd. Change the duration to 6sec to make up for the lower cooldown.
And then Law and Order offer something so niche that it should be baseline, or it wouldn’t be needed as a 10sec cd. So it could be removed for something better.
It was such an amazing spell, you didn’t really need to juggle through all the buffs, but it really helped our survibility against wizards in pvp via that hot and it also buffed attack power by 20%. So in return it made our heals even better. The 20% haste for faster global and even shorter cd on crusader strike/hammer of wrath/judge/exo.
You really only used it against wizards because they were cloth/leather and templar’s back in the day was Physical, and Final Verdict was holy damage, so better into melee cleave and mail/plate specially since it made your DS pretty big and it’s one of the reason I found the design amazing, one talent was really good against something that countered you and helped you do better against them, and the other talent was better into something else.
3 Likes
Seal of Justice can be ranged. Judgement applies seals. Combine this with long arm of the law, and your judgement is now a snare AND a speed boost.
To me, that’s the more interesting conversation.
That sets a base, an ideal to work towards and helps narrow down what goes into making an “inescapable justice avenger.”
Then you can say, well what abilities help create that Fantasy Character?
- Blessing of Freedom
- Blessing of Sanctuary
- Unbound Freedom
- Hand of Hinderance
- Law and Order
- Jurisdiction
- Uther’s Devotion (Legendary)
- Pure Concentration (Reduced Fear Duration)
- Pursuit of Justice
- Seal of Justice
- Judgement of Justice
Can Pursuit of Justice come back, somehow? As Ret’s Mastery? Etc…
Like I said, I think Paladins need an overhaul from the ground up, the spells are there, it’s just a complete mess.
(And it feels awful to not have a line of communication without the Paladin Devs because these conversations can feel all for nothing. >.> )
1 Like
That’ll do, but I’d like for Blade of Justice to apply a snare too, less GCDs that way.
I think it should be baseline. Or perhaps the snare on Blade of Justice be baseline and Law and Order could make the snare and Hammer of Justice physical. Then it wouldn’t feel so mandatory(maybe)
Yes it could do that, but that would still require two GCDs rather just one. Or be forced to stay with that Seal on.
Its not a good idea to put movement abilities on to rotational dps abilities. Because you need to be using rotational dps abilities for dps and so won’t have them when need for movement. Also it would mean the movement will be on the GCD, so you can’t use it to react either.
I’ll take look.
I don’t think it need it to that exent, it just needs what works.
2 Likes
I really like this post. Really great posts everyone!
I am genuinely impressed. Sorry for not responding, I have been out sick for a few days. Maybe someone could help me with summarizing all of these posts?
Just saw this!
The blue and red knights look soooo good!
Yeah, it’s very easy to take someone else’s work and color over it, lol. I got a lot of respect for the WoW artist as the aesthetics in this game are amazing.
I just hope we get some better animations in Dragonflight for the existing classes… and they take the opportunity to redo Tier 2 in a BWL 2.0 Style. 
(https://www.artstation.com/pixelatedkiwi) ← Very talented person.
4 Likes
This set plus weapon would be so awesome!
And regarding animations: it’s about damn time that we get them on a more up-to-date level. Especially with Evoker who will look very shiny. I always envied DH for their superior animations. And without borrowed power systems that need to be tested the devs should have enough time to overhaul all classes’ animations.
Yeah I am massive on Judgement set. They really just need to give it the Legion T6 treatment and bring it back better and enhanced.
2 Likes
This is always a pain point when talking about the Paladin class. It’s had a ton of overhauls to where every person commenting has a unique outlook and personal favorite of whatever iteration. It makes these topics absolute headaches. I’m all for taking our current 2022 and improving on it. Not another overhaul but something like Vanilla → WoTLK that built up our class.
Like, what’s your favorite iteration of seals?
6 30 second seals with 1 judgement
3 judgements and 3 30 minute seals
1 judgement and 2 seals
or
Talents that act call back to seals with their effect I.E Ret’s Zeal talent being essentially Seal of Righteousness or Holy’s Judgement of Light talent
Before DF annoncement I would have said:
if you start from 2022 version and only want a quick fix I’d suggest the following change.
Remove lvl 45 row completly and make it a defensive themed row (move unbreakable spirit from 35 to 45)
Make the 35 row a mobility option row.
After dragonflight annoncement every spec is getting soft rework so… It’s up in the air.
1 Like
Yeah, and I think Paladins are very nuance when it comes to this because so much has been given, taken away, changed, etc… over the years.
There has never been this consistent underlining “feel” of being a paladin. (IMO)
Auras got removed, Blessings got removed, Blessing turned into Hand Spells, Seals got removed, came back, etc… It has consistently been all over the place so I think it would be awesome to get that underlining fantasy brought back into the class during this “soft reset.”
For me it’s this:
- What is that “Fantasy Character” you are trying to build?
- Lawful Avenger
- Holy Knight
- Cleric
- Etc…
-
What are the BASELINE ABILITIES ALL Paladins have.
- Auras
- Devo
- Con.
- Crusader
- Retribution
- Crusader Strike
- Judgement
- Blessings
- BoF
- BoP
- BoSac
- Auras
- Etc…
-
What are the baseline Paladin Talents all Paladins have?
- Bestow Faith?
- Judgement of Light?
- Blessing of Spellwarding?
- Divine Purpose?
- Divine Protection?
- Uther’s Devoation?
- Divine Toll?
- Etc…
- What are the talent options for Ret/Prot/Holy?
- Final Verdict?
- Beacon of Light?
- Guardian of Ancient Kings?
- Final Reckoning?
- Etc…
I feel like it’s a step process. What is the Baseline Paladin and from there, what makes sense to expand on?
- Every paladin has Auras, Blessings, CS, Judgement and Exorcism. - Baseline that’s what it means to be a Paladin
- What talents expand on those baseline abilities?
This becomes easier when you have the spells, talents, etc laid out in front of you, and you can have a more meaningful conversation, of course.
But for me, that baseline paladin is not there. It’s not satisfying.
Edit:
For content, maybe this helps explain it.
Divine Steed is a very unsatisfying button press, for the animation, graphic and what it does for Holy/Ret. The Paladin instantly spawns their Charger, and increases movement speed by X%… but nothing else.
For Holy/Ret there is no freedom, no knock back, no banner/rally, nothing else attached to it.
It’s a hallow feeling you get when you press the button for what’s supposed to be such a signature ability.
Final Verdict on the other hand is a very satisfying button to press, for what it does.
I think numbers, and tuning matter, but this is before all that is taken into effect.
What does it mean to be a WoW Paladin? What is satisfying to press, a moment to experience?
(https://youtu.be/-zBD_5pjLzY?t=681)
Trying to bring Paladins (and WoW) to the 2023 age of gaming. (idk)
(The legos are there, the pieces are there, we just need to rebuild it. :D)
2 Likes
Stemming off that, this is where I think the conversation and class fantasy can get creative and pretty cool.
You can say:
All paladins get Crusader Strike, Judgement and Templar’s Verdict baseline.
- Shield of the Righteous has been removed from the game.
New Ret Talent:
-
Final Verdict
- Replaces Templar’s Verdict with Final Verdict, a devastating strike that deals 5000 Holy damage.
New Prot Talent:
-
Righteous Verdict
- Replaces Templar’s Verdict with Righteous Verdict, a devastating strike that deals 2000 Holy damage to all enemies in front of you and increases your armor by 500 for 4.5 sec.
Now, depending on your “class fantasy” do you give Holy Final Verdict, a powerful single target strike that they use their 2h weapon for, or do you give them Righteous Verdict, a mutli target strike that increases armor.
(Righteous Verdict is just renaming Shield of the Righteous)
So not only have you given Paladins as a class, a more defining ability, but you expanded on it through talents in a unique and meaningful way for all 3 specs.
Depending on how you view the fantasy of a Holy Paladin, they could get either Final Verdict or Righteous Verdict.
It just makes the class, imo, all around more connected and satisfying.
4 Likes
I’d prefer Final Verdict or at least its 10 yard range to be baseline.
I don’t think that’s necessary, Prot could do with a single target spender. Just make it give the same defensive buff when used and off the GCD as well. Than you’d have this for single target and Shield of the Righteous for AoE.
Why not both, just weaker and without the buffs.
Personally, I would be hesitant to add abilities just for the sake of adding abilities, if they aren’t purposeful.
I think there’s something to be said for “less is more.”
Make TV a good button to press for all paladins level 10-38, and than make Final/Righteous Verdict an even better button for all paladins level 38-70.
¯\ _ (ツ)_/¯
(And, this is a bit more of a conversation than most care to have, it’s just interesting to me. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wf6RA9YHj8w)
Well they have a purpose, dps for things like questing, solely content ect.
But an idea just came to me, because you suggested they should be purposeful. So how about making it Justicar’s Vengeance but usable at say all holy power levels(or just 3) and heals allies around you.
Cool, that would be an exellecent animation for Falling Sword leap/telport ability.
What id like to see in the new expansion, is a return to actual healing for holy spec. over the past x amount of xps, we have been dealing with holy power as a form of healing.
we use to have spells and abilities that allowed us to heal raids and groups more effectively then holy power provides. while I do enjoy holy power and have in other expansions, holy power wasnt center stage in alot of situations in those xps. if we cant remove holy power, then we should be allowed to play a style of our spec as we choose, if players dont want to use holy power and want to heal the old way, then we should be allowed to and they should be allowed to as well without being punished between the two styles. more importantly, I think we need a more effective spell then light of dawn. we use to have radiance, which was actually an extremely good spell we had, compared to lod. while lod offers only cone hps, radiance was a heal for the entire raid and allowed us to heal everyone when we needed to. so I hope some sorta spells similar to this will be added to the new xp.