My hopes for Ret in Shadowlands

Classes Paladin
1

Hi everyone, I’ve been maining Ret on and off for the past few years now and part of me wants to absolutely love this class, but specific things keep holding me back. So I though I’d see if anyone else shares these same feelings?

I both love and hate wings/crusade, it’s no secret that Ret is a incredibly front loaded DPS spec, with basically 80-90% of your damage coming from your cooldown / spenders. This is something I’d love to see changed come shadowlands, of course I want to feel like a god while wings is up, but while I’m waiting for the cooldown to tick around again I can’t help but feel like a wet noodle as I watch all the other DPS slowly start to over take me, now I’d be happy to sacrifice some of the potency of wings to make our outside of CDs rotation feel more punchy, the fact that melee damage is higher than crusader strike is horrible at no point do I want to feel punished for pushing one of my main rotation abilities…

The way they could fix this is to reintroduce a older mechanic pallies had, but in a revamped way something like sanctity of battle, but the effect could be based of crusader strike procing a free hammer of wrath that deals some bonus damage or maybe generates a extra holy power?

I’d also like to see some further talent changes to what I consider to be very bland and almost unusable talents, specifically fires of justice and blade of wrath, and more niche talents like zeal, not once have I ever wanted to pick fires of justice, and with Empyrean Power coming to that talent row I doubt I’d ever want to pick it during shadowlands either. Not every talent needs to be a flashy spectacular Uber button but all I ask is for something more interesting that ‘judgement increases your next few melee attack speeds’ or ‘blade of justice now procs more and does a bit more damage’

Finally the elephant in the room, paladin mobility, I don’t dislike divine steed, but I think thats my biggest issue with it, I don’t like it. Where as a lot of other classes mobility feels satisfying like mages blink, warriors charge and DH fel rush, pallys just feels kinda meh, it’s a very long CD for not a whole lot of movement, two charges baseline would make it feel better, or once divine steed ends give a 50% speed increase for 6 seconds that decays every 1.5 seconds. Just do something with it that doesn’t make it feel like a chore to find movement speed.

Overall I want to love my pally, but it feels like I’m stuck in the days of hybrid tax, because we bring decent utility our damage output is hindered because of it.

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2

It’s not a hybrid tax, it’s a bubble tax. You have an invulnerable bubble, so you can’t have nice things. Even when other classes get things that can remove your bubble.

You have a lot of good ideas, but here is what Blizzard’s gonna do:

  1. They’re going to carefully read each Paladin forum post, so they can compile a complete list of issues the class has. That way they can avoid accidentally fixing any of them.

  2. They are going to invent a couple of new abilities that don’t really do much for the class and nobody asked for.

  3. They are going to choose a couple of core abilities that have defined the Paladin class for years and remove them to make room for step 2 above.

I’ve played this class for 15 years. The last several expansions have followed this formula. Sorry =/

18 Likes
3

You forgot the obligatory nerf just in case paladin’s make it to middle of the pack in any kind of ranking.

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I’ve made the commitment to Pally for shadowlands already. I love it regardless of where it is

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That’s what i’ve been saying for years to nerf divine shield so we can have stronger things, more synergy and stuff. As a ‘‘nerf/buff’’ divine shield, I mean like 3min cooldown, 90% damage reduction and immune to interrupts and kicks. So we can still use bubble to cast flash of light, but still be stunned/cc during it. We could also have Divine Protection come back with shield of vengeance together.

But i keep getting ‘‘NO I LIKE MY BUBBLE’’, guess people like to hit themselves the head with a hammer aswell.

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To be honest this feels so true, because we have a true immunity that doesn’t interrupt us actually doing stuff we have to be gimped elsewhere, if it means I can be even just slightly above middle of the pack for DPS id happily let them add the pacified effect back to bubble, just make it so while bubble is active we can’t cast offensive spells.

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7

Not very long ago, a rogue was crying about bubble. I told him I’d trade it in an instant for things like Cloak and Evasion. He called me an idiot and asked me if I was serious, lmao. I was 100% serious.

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8

Same tbqh.

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The ability to go back into stealth(Vanish, Cloak of Shadows 2min CD) is far superior to bubble 5min CD(3.5 if talented). Bubble only lasts 8 seconds, stealth is practically a permanent immunity. Not to mention they can heal up in stealth too(but only Sub can do that if talented).

Evasion only has a 2min CD and doesn’t lock the rogue out of other abilities for 30 seconds. Compare to Blessing of Protection’s 5min CD and locking out.

So bubble holding ret back is no excuse, not anymore.

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How stupid do you have to be to think cloak, vanish, evasion, feint, crimson vial are worse than bubble, bop, shield of vengeance. Damn.

There’s a reason no one every attack the rogue ever except a hard swap during a stun.

Well all the players playing dh, mage, rogue, dk, ww thinks bubble is way stronger than their 5 defensive and passive tankiness from their high mobility somehow.

Hell i’d even take the a stronger % damage done reduction during bubble like 90 or not being able to attack at all during it if it meant bubble being a 3min cooldown baseline. And maybe getting divine protection back or shield of vengeance being able to be used during stuns.

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A lot of people think like this, sadly. In my opinion, bubble hasn’t evolved with everything else in the game. I like your idea for it though, SoV being usable during stuns would be super sick as well. I dunno, just feels like it’s time for a change for our main defensive.

I also really miss Divine Protection too. I hope some stuff changes before SL launches, but I’ve got my doubts.

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12

Rets gonna be screwed in SL with wars getting shattering throw back. Game has changed so much since when that was a thing and out of all my characters my Ret is the squishiest aside from my enhance. The spec will continue getting ran over by casters and now half the melee cleaves as well.

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Yeah and they’ve updated it to fit 2020. Before it only broke immune bubbles, but ret didn’t have shield of vengeance back in the day. So now, it breaks immunes and does a )@#(%*ton of damage to anyone with an absorb on (aka shield of vengeance).

Also, slap holy power over the existing mechanics of holy paladins and just hope it works meanwhile rework the entirety of Arms warrior even though it already worked.

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Has anybody with alpha confirmed that warriors get Shattering Throw? Can’t find it in the wowhead alpha talent calculator.

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Can confirm they receive it at or before level 57 (level 57 premades have it already).

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16

Thank you. Another question regarding Shattering Throw: does it break BoP and SoV, too?

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If I remember correctly shattering throw can’t be interrupted either. Can anyone confirm if it can be interrupted in Shadowlands?

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It doesn’t break shield of vengeance just instantly. It breaks bubble yes. It does 100% attack power * versatility damage and if the target has a shield like shield of vengeance that damage is increased by 500% (so about 600% attack power) making it hit like a truck. Templar’s verdict isn’t even a full 200% attack power to give you some perspective. If it hits harder than 30% of your health it will break shield of vengeance because that’s all it will absorb before breaking.

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Another week closer to SL and still no good news for Ret Pallys…
Welp 95% sure at this point that i´ll be playing a Mage or Fury Warrior.

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Here’s some additional stats for a human.
24360 health at 170 ilvl lvl 60
1,340 attack power

So shield of vengeance = 7,308 absorb
Shattering throw = 8,040 on target with absorb, it’s physical damage but it ignores armor (because WHY NOT). It’s a 30 yard range, so they can leap away and safely burst your bubble =\

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