To all paladins players if you like our posts on the alpha forums gives us some likes. Show that you are supporting what we are saying. Maybe you don’t like my paladin vision and it’s fine! But you might find another alpha tester and agree with him.
I’m always looking on our forum for ideas. Lot of you been asking for divine protection to be back and I took it from here.
I appreciate you taking the time to test Paladins and give them feedback. My frustration comes from lack of insight into the development of Paladins.
It seems like Hunters and maybe to an extent, Warriors, have gotten some “deep dives” into why things are the way they are, yet Blizzard always seems to ignore the issues of Paladins.
Personal Mobility and Personal Defensives being on the GCD for example.
So, I’ll shamelessly plug in my questions with a bit of insight into why I think they are problems.
When it comes to paladin’s class identity, we’ve had some really class defining talents and abilities along the way that really sold the idea of “bringing justice to the unjust and to vanquish evil.”
Paladins had abilities like:
Pursuit of Justice
Seal of Justice
Judgment of Justice
Long Arm of the Law
Exorcism
Holy Wrath
Turn Evil
Sense Undead
However, most of these class defining abilities had been stripped away and we now have cumbersome, dated or watered-down versions of these spells.
Long Arm of the Law, Pursuit of Justice, Seals, Judgements, Holy Wrath— all removed.
Exorcism is returning, but feels pretty underwhelming, which doesn’t help emphasize this identity.
- And is not being introduced for Holy and Prot.
Turn Evil feels cumbersome with both a cooldown and cast time.
Sense Undead feels dated in 2022, especially considering spells like Spectral Sight
How cool would it be as a flavor spell to give Paladins a golden spectral sight ability? (Maybe it’s not for you, but it’s an RP thing in a RPG video game)
How do you plan to bring back the sense of being a Paragon of Justice to not only Ret paladins, but all Paladins?
Is this no longer the internal view of Paladins?
We wanted to give Holy Paladin abilities a clear and identifiable theme to further differentiate them from Holy Priest. A Paladin carries the light within them and radiates righteousness, so I tried to realize that theme visually wherever possible. Their abilities carry more warmth and physicality than a Priest, who casts a more pure and prisming light.
One of the things that has really begun to feel outdated on Paladins are the visuals. Our visuals have undoubtedly changed over the years, but some notable spells have continued to be stuck in 2004.
Auras not having any visuals at all feels like a missed opportunity,
Consecration is very lackluster and I know that it was going to get a visual update, but that got scrapped, but now with it becoming a more prominent spell for all specs, it would be pretty cool to see this updated.
Holy Prism and Light’s Hammer …
BoJ seems super weird having a Paladin unsheathe a Blade from the ground, it feels more of a Death Knight thing as paladins more often than not call to the heavens.
Wake of Ashes is a little missed on me, doesn’t feel like it packs the same punch as Sundering or Warbreaker.
Blessed Hammer is a bit of an acquired taste, but seems a bit too much on the cartoonish side, for my personal liking.
Hammer of Wrath and Judgment share the same visual, super weird.
Blessings feel a bit outdated compared to Blessings of Seasons, however that was never a “meta pick” in SL so sadly saw very limited use.
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__________From Legion introducing Demon Hunters, to Evokers and Dragon Riding in Dragonflight along with new talent revamps, it is clear to see that there will be this new amplification on mobility.
Simply put, mobility is fun.
Every class will have substantially better mobility… except Paladins. A lot of classes on live had competing talents when it came to mobility, however most of these are now incorporated into the new DF talent trees as coexisting options.
Warriors will have access to Charge, Double Time, Heroic Leap and Stormbolt.
Rogues will have access to Sprint, Grapple and Shadow Step.
Shamans will have access to Ghost Wolf, Thunder storm, and Gust of Wind.
Just to give a few examples.
Paladins will be stuck with the same Divine Steed, with a 4 point investment to just make that ONE mobility button “work.”
Why is it Divine Steed or nothing? Does that not go against the design philosophy of the new talent trees of giving players more options and customizations to how they wish to build their class(spec)?
Why the obsession with Divine Steed?
Do you think the over thematic graphic fits what the spell actually does?
Do you think this graphic isn’t obnoxious while in close quarter combat or interior spaces?
Do you think each Race has a justifiable connection to their “Charger?” (Tauren and Zandalari)
Will there ever be an option to replace it with Speed of Light?
How do you feel about ALL paladins getting better mobility?
What are your thoughts on Pursuit of Justice?
What are your thoughts on the Z-axis movement?
When will we see Falling Sword added to WoW?
Obviously a major issue with Paladins right now is the handling of Auras, the lack of return of Greater Blessings, the lack of raid utility for Ret and Prot and a few other issues I’m sure we’re all aware of.
Right off the bat, it feels like the right hand is not talking to the left hand.
But that aside, the problem with these Auras is that they feel selfish. That a paladin is choosing to deny their party or raid 3% damage reduction so they can gain the solo benefits of Retribution or Crusader Aura + Seal of the Templar.
It does not feel fun when you and a friend are two Ret paladins in a group and you have to flip a coin to see who gets to run Crusader/Retribution and who gets to run Devo.
Auras of Resolute feel better as Auras, not only because they benefit the whole party, but because they aid in 2 defensive playstyles.
This was the strength and benefit of Vanilla/Classic Auras. The majority of Auras were defensive in nature, but allowed you to swap depending on the situation.
Devo was an Armor increase, for when you fought melee mobs.
Frost Resist was used when you fought Frost Casters.
Shadow Resist for Shadow Casters.
Etc.
How does Blizzard feel Blessings and Auras are working out in World of Warcraft in 2022?
Will Paladins see Greater Blessings, such as Wisdom, Might, Kings, Salvation, or Light make a comeback?
What are the impacts of ST Blessings vs group utility tools? Is Sacrifice weighed the same as RoP, Mass Root, or Vortext, for example?
How do you classify “Auras” in World of Warcraft now?
Does Retribution Aura, Crusader Aura(Seal of the Templar), Vengeance Aura and Aura of Reckoning classify as “Auras” as these do not benefit both themselves and their party?
Could the above Auras be adjusted to benefit the group? (See Leader of the Pack(PvP Talent))
Will Aura Mastery become class wide?
Recompense – why?
Will BoP see a shorter cooldown?
Will Unbound Freedom be added to the Class Tree?
Will Spreading the Word and/or Blessed Hands be added to the Class Tree?
Will Scared Duty be added to the class tree?
Will Uther’s Devotion be added to the class tree?
Will we see offensive Blessings?
What lessons were learned from Blessings of Seasons?
As soon as they talk to us they appear overly patronizing. If they could just let that be I wouldn’t mind hearing from them.
Another thing I wanted to point out, which to be fair, I assume the Paladin Class tree will get completely revamped now that Holy is out, but I wanted to visually show the Horizontal movements between talents of the Paladin tree compared to DK and Shamans.
This is just an existing screenshot, that I highlighted the horizontal path ways to help demonstrate the differences.
The class tree for Shamans and DK just feels more full, more connected, with more choices and character customization that gets you excited to test things out because you have more options.
And on the flip side, the Specialization tree for Ret feels extremely scattered.
- “Does this mean it’s possible to make very ‘bad’ builds?”
- In short, yes. There are limits and guardrails here, such as those abilities that are automatically given. And furthermore, our goal in designing the trees is not to trap players in complicated choices in order to make a functional build; in fact, it’s the opposite—it’s to set up the trees with intuitive paths that lead you to reasonable builds. But a key philosophy of this rework is to keep the player in the driver’s seat of their character’s growth within their class.
This is from the talent system design philosophy, which states they want to encourage talent synergy and "to set up the trees with intuitive paths that lead you to reasonable builds. "
It’s gotten better this last Alpha build, but the paths aren’t exactly opened up fully. There still appears to be a bit of randomness and things like Improved Crusader Strike and Divine Storm are opposite from Fires of Justice and Divine Tempest.
Righteous Verdict is on the Left side, while Templar’s Vindication is on the right, and probably feels a bit redundant.
But the main thing is that there doesn’t feel like there are playstyles being honed in on. That you are traveling down this “intuitive path” while leveling, to get to those stratifying cap stone talents, that finish off the “build.”
So for example, on live, you get Execution Sentence right away, then Wake of Ashes, then Seraphim, then Final Reckoning, then Divine Toll. And it builds upon itself. These talents and capstones don’t seem to have that.