I started wow in late TBC and raided casually as a holy paladin throughout wrath and cata. I then took a break during grad school and came back last year when the pandemic started. At first I didn’t like the melee play style… at all. I remember hating holy power the first time it came around so I was hesitant to play my paladin at all.
I decided to give it a chance and honestly I’m having a blast with it. I’m really getting into the fantasy of a battle healer and it is still so satisfying to drop huge heals on people (spamming huge holy lights was what I enjoyed in wrath). Adjusting to melee mechanics was a struggle at first but I am getting the hang of it.
The holy power generation is fast enough that I really don’t mind it. I never use holy light or flash of light which is a big change from the old holy pally play style, but I don’t really miss these spells.
The only thing I don’t like is in M+ (I only do pugs) when the entire party takes a hit, I panic. If I don’t have divine toll available then trying to get everyone up can be a struggle (especially without wings). The positional requirements for light of dawn can also sometimes be a struggle for me.
Castle Nathria in particular has been super fun to do on my holy pally. The Kael’thas encounter is especially unique and I absolutely love it. The only boss I feel hampered in is sludgefist as I spend so much time trying to stand in the right spot my healing suffers. But there’s so many mechanics that require single target spot healing that I really feel like I am bringing something useful to the raid.
Forums can be pretty negative sometimes but I just wanted to say that I’m having a lot of fun on my holy pally (for some reason I can’t change my forum character to any of my retail characters).
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Same, I was playing Disc Priest and got really disenchanted with it. I started playing this Paladin on a lark and ended up really digging the style of Holy Paladin.
Two things you might want to consider for M+ is Holy Avenger for when you need to get a lot of healing out in-between your wings period and Beacon of Virtue for big spread healing among your party.
BoV is definitely good if you’re not heavy optimized stat/gear wise as it has a short enough cooldown to use frequently and solves a lot of the small group healing issues of Paladin.
Also consider Saved by the Light as the absorb generated by your Beacon target will work on all targets affected by Beacon of Virtue.
Once you start to understand the damage profiles of packs of mobs/comps you have for M+, it becomes easier to know which of the builds is most effective for each situation.
I’ve been having a blast with Hpally so glad to hear others are enjoying it too!
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I haven’t played with BoV yet, I may give it a try! I’ve use holy avenger occasionally. Thanks! The saved by the light + BoV sounds like a fun setup
Alright finally let me change to my pally
I second the BoV suggestion. Its a life saver on prideful.
Do you feel that Pallys are proactive healing instead of reactive?
I’ve found Virtue to be only marginally useful on Bursting and even then I just switched back to Glimmer/Triage.
However, I agree, Holy has been my main since BC and I am extremely happy w the melee combat medic style.
I just hate that they took the style away from Mistweaver. I used to enjoy MW Monk healing as well when it involves heavy fist-weaving.
I find myself far more reactive in regards to healing. There are ways to be proactive, especially with Aura Mastery, however, I rarely hard cast during most fights so prepping a Holy light to hit after a damage event isn’t common for me.
The Shock Barrier legendary does allow me to throw out some Holy Shocks prior to big damage.
For example, on M Huntsman, ill typically Blessing of Sac the tank and hit him with a Holy Shock shield as Rip Soul is occurring in order to have the mobs health that spawns be as high as possible
Definitely more reactive. The other healer I play a lot is a resto druid which is 100% proactive. Very different styles. Holy pally is kind of like whack-a-mole with huge instant heals
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Holy would be a perfect spec if only casting Judgement and consuming Infusion of Light generated a Holy Power, and beacon of virtue was replaced with a talent that made Light of Dawn a 360 degree area with a 20 yard range. It’s the most fun healer by a country mile even without that though.
Problem is I really don’t like Ret or Prot. Custom classes when? I want to play Feral/Holy/Vengeance.
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I feel that. I actually like Prot, but I definitely wish I could have Shadow Priest as my DPS spec. Easily the worst part about shelving my Priest, I have such a hard time playing Ret. It’s a good thing questing as Prot basically feels like cheating.