Lack of Support/Buff playStyles for paladins

Classes Paladin
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Coming back to WoW after a good long break. The gameplay on my main as a monk is fun, but Paladin has really let me down. Paladin used to be my favorite class, even when playing Classic for their ability to buff/support other people. Now, It feels like Augmentation Evoker has sucked all of the oxygen out of the room for that particular playstyle. Granted, the “play style” of constantly rebuffing wisdom/might/kings, and reapplying seal of light and seal of wisdom is obviously quite antiquated in WoW’s more modern, fast paced combat, but I Feel like they could have had it evolve, rather than scrapped, and abandoned completely. Now we don’t even have allusions to that original class fantasy, aside from lack luster auras, and the occasional utility blessing like freedom or protection.

To me, it feels like the class has lost a part of itself, something that was so core to it’s identity. It’d be like if rogues couldn’t stealth, or if mages lost the ability to teleport and cast spells. Now, paladins are just Holy themed healer, tank and DPS classes. I do get that class balance gets real sketchy once you start to introduce things that let you boost the damage of other party memebers, but I feel like it could work, especially since Augmentation evoker is already in the game. Maybe I’m totally out of hand here, and no one really gets what I’m saying, that’s fine.

Also, Am I the only one who liked seals? seals were fun, IMO. Maybe Bring them back as like, a short cooldown type buff, like blade flurry? or other adjacent buffs? Seal of Command, please

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For me, not in seals old form. They can re-imagine into something a bit more modern. I will agree blessings dun feel like blessings esp with things like 5 mins CDs etc.

We have also lost things like wisdom/might/kings and that wisdom has been re-imagined and given to ironically, our new lizard friends.

Now i am not saying Paladins should have a 100% iron grip on buffer playstyle and nobody else should be given a share of that pie. While the rework back in DF has made the core of the class work, the spec specifics can be changed further.

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Id be interested in seeing more defensive type buffs, in contrast to augs offensive style

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I mentioned in another thread why doesn’t ret bring more proactive defensive utility.

Like say, casting a HP spender such as WoG or TV causes a shield or something radiate to surrounding players.

Something that will not move health bars but still provide a small bit of protection.

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Kinda like mages mass barrier. I just don’t feel like it makes sense for ret to lose so much DPS for the heals they bring. Sac is helpful but often used in unhelpful moments (such as when I am using a healing CD at the same time the sacrifice is used)

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Which is why i wanted to give them utility that was more shield based that procced of
Spenders.

So in theory they can keep fighting, and every DS and TV they cast, a small shield is provided. They would on theory be balanced around that; shields not strong enough to keep a group alive by themselves but enough padding to make the run just a bit safer.

Blizzard doesnt want Ret to move health bars, so they should give them better group defensives.

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Honestly, I feel like that fills a really good niche and could potentially shift some power away from augs if balanced well

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Which appears to be their goal since they are stripping aug of their abilities to buff tanks and healers.

Now obviously a potential supportty Ret shouldn’t be making groups immortal, but like I said they should be there for some extra padding to make a run overall safer. You won’t be killing bosses faster because there’s should be no damage buffs, but if you’re willing to say clear a key a few minutes slower but with potentially less wipes, there ya go.

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So here’s the problem they contend with.
Every spec/class/role is balanced to achieve loosely the same output.
They need that so that everyone has the possibility to achieve the hardest form of content.

They also gave almost everyone a unique non-negligible class buff so that a fully optimize group would have 1 of every classes represented.

The blessing of paladins are niche because giving them anything else beyond Devo that would be generally useful would warrant always bringing 2.

We already saw this when they reworked Ret aura in DF.

You compare it to vanilla in role and philosophy if not gameplay.

In vanilla the end game raids had 40 people, now it’s 20…
In vanilla there were 9 classes, with 1 specific to each faction so 8 at a time, now it’s 13 for both…
In vanilla, Paladins were purposely nerfed in their damage and their ability to effectively tank because they were balancing with utility in mind, which they aren’t anymore.
They didn’t bother thinking about group composition because there were less classes and way more spots to fill.

This support fantasy fit great in a DND type game like BG3 or other similar game but for what WoW has become it simply doesn’t fit.

And if the Augvoker experiment is any indication, we won’t see another support class added ever, much less a new support spec for paladin.

So I get what you’re saying but asking for something like this is like asking to get tires without having a car.

You’d first need to ask for the game to return to a slower more DND-type oriented game.

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I don’t agree. Other games like Gw2 have Support oriented buff classes that’re capable of dealing decent damage, while supplying groups with damage, and utility buffs. I also feel as though the hyper fixation WoW players have on DPS meters, and such as a metric for how good a player is. Even if the content could be reimagined to allow for more supportive type playstyles, I don’t think that’s intrinsically a bad thing.

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GW2 is a terrible comparaison because they purposefully don’t adhere to the same role paradigm that WoW does.
They built a different game which obviously lets them design classes differently.

There’s no tank in GW2 and healers aren’t just healers, they are supports.

They are like if Aug was merged with preservation.

Regardless whether that’s true or not, the point stays that for all specs to have the possibility to accomplish the hardest form of content, they need to perform similarly in their respective roles.

It would be pretty bad design wise if some spec were mathematically excluded from content because they literally couldn’t meet the threshold set to clear the content.

Neither do I but that would be a complete 180 from the direction they’ve been going with the game since it’s release, they only went further from this type of approach.

And as you say, it would need the content to be re-imagined first to support these support playstyle.

In other words…

It doesn’t necessarily need to be a slower more DND like game, but at the very least you’d need to change the essence of what WoW is ATM which is a tall ask…

And I don’t see that as being a realistic expectation.

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I agree with the OP. The extreme focus on spec and role at the expense of class is due to raids. The devs made the decision time and again to normalize everyone into three little roles rather than have 9+ unique classes. After a long stretch of time this evolved into dogma that dictates what can and cannot be done with class design.

Specifically,

  • blessings (the original ones) were more interactive than auras.
  • Empowered Seals was really cool. Finally the seal & Judgment system was sort of done right, and then it was removed next xpac.
  • I never understood why, way back when holy power was first introduced, Judgment wasn’t made our holy power spender. Lots of potential with the seal system, Templar’s Verdict is just a fancy name for Judgment, and Divine Storm has never been as satisfying as when it was its own thing separate from holy power.
  • I hoped Ret would get a support hero tree. I’d gladly sacrifice damage for certain utility. I want the option to be more of a hybrid.
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Our Blessings are very strong when they are actually used. They shouldn’t be “occasionally”.

We have Freedom, Sacrifice, and Protection/Spellwarding. All of which should be used liberally.

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I was going to make a big page of why I love that Paladin has access to Sac, Freedom, and BoP/BoS, but they don’t quite scratch the itch like Aug does…

but it really boiled down into an “I feel” statement. At the end of the day I want Paladin to be the defacto class of: “For maximum output, you need to play as a Paladin (dps, tank, and heal) rather than play as a dps, tank. or heal”

…but again, this is an “I want” statement rather than a argument I can put facts behind.

Sac
feels good when it does something. But the requirements for it to “do something” are

  • Healer or tank need to not have an external.
  • Someone needs to make a mistake that you know is going to happen (Sac has to be proactive) but the Sac target doesn’t know its going to happen
  • OR Sac will “cheese” a mechanic with the poison immune talent (First Boss Necrotic Wake)

For a Spell than we can talent into having every 60sec, the chances that it hits one of the above criteria every 60sec is super unlikely, and so it just becomes something you push because its on your Bars, and you might as well.

Freedom
is off cooldown every 25 sec. You can double it up on yourself and another target. It gives move speed even if you are not removing a snare or slow.

Awesome, no notes - I love that this ability gets to be used frequently for either a small (but tangible) benefit or to help with more deadly slows and roots.

…Just, where’s the glory? Where’s the fireworks? where’s the FREEDOM?

The move speed is nice in the same way if I told my group that by having a food buff, we might do 3% additional damage over the course of a dungeon.

Like, yea, them 1% incremental gains are technically a benefit. If I use freedom off cooldown on the tank, they will be able to be out of combat for 6% less than if I didn’t (Total time save <11 seconds over the course of a dungeon).
Woopdeedoo

But, again, on the flipside - Freedom can be very impactful. Using it on the last boss of Necrotic wake to immune Frozen Bonds will give melee more uptime - it does have a strong single use case.

…it just feels very forgettable everywhere else even when used optimally.

BoP
Now we are getting to the meat. This is a big juicy 4 minute cooldown (with talents). This is a big, powerful spell that should make someone excited they are playing Paladin.

…What is the current best use case for Blessing of Protection in the current Dungeon rotation?

This is a genuine question.

Best case I’ve found so far is the “Call of the Brood” spell on second miniboss for Ara Kara. Assuming, of course, the Healer isn’t using a group healing CD to fight the damage (they are) and the target you are BoP’ing isn’t already using a defensive for the cast (they are).

Other use cases include such bangers as:

  • putting BoP on the tank so they lose aggro and it wipes the group.
  • putting BoP on yourself after you accidentally rip aggro.

This big, powerful spell feels like garbage. If the cooldwon of BoP was 20 seconds I still dont see myself casting it more times per dungeon than I usually do.

Why is the utility spell with the bigest cooldown the least fun to use?

BoS
Just cooler BoP in every way. Actually being able to use this on a tank feels kinda nice.

(and it better, dang spell is a 5 min cooldown and causes forbearance)

This spell (unavailable to Ret in PvE :upside_down_face:) is the most impactful spell of utility available for 2/3 of paladin specs.

…best use case is still to “cheese” mechanics btw.

I want to hybrid support. I want to hybrid support

Blizz please ;-;

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I feel there’s a fair amount of unavoidable damage and spell going around that you can find a steady source of use for it.

Playing with my friends, I would also coordinate it’s use on either the tank or someone else who didn’t have a defensive up.

You can BoP the burrow target in ara-kara as well.

You can BoP people focused by on by the scientist before 3rd boss.

There’s a bunch of roots you can remove with it.
You can pop it on people who tear aggro as well.
There’s some physical dot you can immune in Mist and Stuff in siege as well.

Well it’s a niche immunity and it is so purposefully.
The game isn’t made around it, It’s made so people can survive stuff somewhat autonomously.
If it was clutch from the get go, there might be something to be said about the encounter or ability it is being used against being “fair” at all.

I get what you’re saying though.
Personally, I lean toward wondering why isn’t it clearer what it can be used against rather than it not being useful at all.

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I wouldn’t go so far as to say paladin should do all three roles at once. I tried this in UBRS back when I was a big noob in Vanilla. But you’re so right that class should come before role. The way I like to put it is I’m a paladin who plays Ret instead of a Ret Paladin. I don’t think the devs see it that way though.

I also agree that BoP should be a powerful cooldown that’s always useful, something like half the duration but doesn’t cause the tank to drop aggro, instead of a niche ability used to remove the occasional bleed or whatever. I’m talking long-term changes here btw, not something that should be done out of the blue in the middle of an xpac.

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Couldn’t agree more on BoP. It’s such a bad spell.

Use it for aggro being ripped, well did it swap to another DPS? Bummer
Can’t ever use on tank
4/5min CD for a bleed removal
4/5 minute CD for a small damage reduction (if you have the talent and use that way)
Literally all of those suck AND it incurs a wildly long CD. Might honestly be the worst spell in our kit.

Hpal sac is TWO got dang minutes long. Disgusting. It already damages us so it’s not all rainbows and sunshine to use it anyways.

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I play with a Boomkin and Havoc DH and between those two BoP is constantly and always on CD. Whether it’s melee units hopping at the Boomkin or the DH Hunting into the middle of a pack ahead of the tank, BoP’s are flying off the handle.

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Both sound like insurance for mistakes instead of a genuine “this is a useful event that you can anticipate and expect with 100% certainly, to use BOP for”

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Which, in all honesty, doesn’t even feel bad, per se. A Paladin could/should have spell/spells like that.

BoP can definitely not be a 5 min cd / super important thematic core spell, however. BoP is long overdue a redesign.

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