I’m very new player. I love the Paladin genre. I also really want to heal. So I figure I would try it but all the feedback I have got is it is too hard for new players and requires me to melee to build holy power to heal.
Is it too complicated to start off with? I am a seasoned vet at gaming, just not WiW, and I don’t want my first experience to be too overwhelming that itnsours my taste.
Any feedback?
My advice, just play. Heal as much content as you can, make as many mistakes as you can, learn and improve as you go.
you’ll be fine. play what’s fun to you, and eventually set up a healer ui. you can take hpal as far as you want
there are also different ways to build a holy paladin. something like priest or shaman are good for beginners because dmg happens and you just press the spell. it’s a very straight forward way to feel out what it means to be a healer
as a melee holy paladin relying on holy shock and glimmer, you’ll have to get used to optimizing the holy shock cd, and being in melee, which is sometimes a mess. but 1: you’ll have time to learn the build long before healing any difficult content, and 2: there is a more caster focused build you can play. just play the spec and mess with the talents as you like
Pally is ez and so is the mage tower for it this time (holy).
all are good but disc. bc it’s a proactive healer I think still. you’ll need a lot of practice bc you need to dps to heal but you should play with wat seems most fun imo
So basically, here’s the thing Holy Paladin right now. Mostly centered around M+ because that’s what I play the most.
It’s in the bottom half the healers in M+ dungeons (5 man content). You have very strong healing inside of your cooldowns like Avenging Wrath, Divine Toll, and Beacon of Virtue, and fairly weak healing outside of those cooldowns.
You also need to be in melee range attacking enemies with Cruader Strike as part of your healing rotation, so that you can generate Holy Power to spend on healing people. That means being able to DPS enemy mobs while healing allies at the same time, so that will take some interface setup to master (I use mouseover macros and click-to-cast addons).
The difficulty is from being on the lower end of healing output, especially outside of your cooldowns, and still managing to deal with all the incoming damage. And also managing both attacking enemy mobs and healing allies (a challenge shared with Disc Priest and Mistweaver Monk).
I’d say that Holy Paladin is one of the hardest healers. Resto Druid and Preservation Evoker just have an easier time keeping people topped off. But Holy Paladin is definitely something you could learn to play. The difference between a hard healer and an easy healer is not that big.
if that’s what you have your heart set on, dude, then just sit down and learn it. there’s many guides and vids to watch.
yes, its not as easy as say resto druid, but nothing in wow is out of reach. personally i wish we had the option to go back to ranged healing/denounce spam; i hate being forced into melee. 
Thanks for all your feedback… A few have said some variation of “Play what you like/want”. That’s my point, no idea what I like or want.
This is my first character and I just started (I have friend IRL that are high end raiders so they gave me some tips and stuff and some gold to buy all 343 armor.) So yeah, think I will go with Paladin.
I have always disliked the Druid in all games, so wont play that. Especially that fat star shooting thunder chicken thing. What an awful visual.
respect the thunder chicken things >:(
won’t know what you like until you try it. what you learn on will become easy after a bit
Hah sorry. Just looks so awkward.
You.
I like you.
I think it’s one of the easier healing specs!! Watch a guide on YouTube and practice 
good damage and imo good healing rn. Definitely a different type of play style but not too bad and fun, been playing the glimmer build since BFA
Paladins are pretty terrible right now unfortunately. If you want to heal I’d pick any other healer unless you’re holding out for the ret rework
there are a bunch of hpals over 3.3k io, and atleast 1 on the roster is really good on mythic raid prog
its good enough for any pve and if u like it, play it
Let’s see what we have.
It’s easy to play
It’s very hard to play
It’s in a bad spot
It’s in a great spot
I have spent some time in the class forums and answers seem to be that same way for every spec. So as you guys said, play what appeals to me and I think I will.
Start a new paladin, and level it up in Holy spec. Learn it one spell at a time and see if it’s a good fit for you. That’s the best advice I can give.
Paladin is just an awesome class. You should give it a try and you wont regret.
Eventually you will even try prot and ret. All the specs will feel great. Prot is my favorite.
Like it was said you can be more range if you dont want melee, it’s just as melee you can build more holy powers…
Nope not palas, shammy is noob friendly
Now is not a good time to be an HPal.
For one, welcome!
For two; Holy Paladin is very good for PvE content. Holy Pally’s bring lots of utility for your group or raid, and have a few emergency heals or mitigation should things get hairy (mostly single-target though) You don’t HAVE to be in melee range to be effective. There are enough talents to be more than viable in a traditional ranged healer role.
PvP (Arenas specifically)… well, that’s another story.