Paladin in Retail seeking reassurance for Classic

[Kermore-frostmourne]

Don’t listen to the people that say you won’t be able to raid as Ret. Raids need 40 people, you think those normal guys are going to be able to find 30 warriors, mage and rogues?

[Eltherenius-whisperwind]

I raided as Ret in a casual guild, but mostly just did 5-mans every weekend, and 10-man UBRS.

To me it’s more the issue of woeful lack of fun. You just Judge and Seal refresh, and most of the time you can’t use Consecrate because it consumes so much mana.

You have one honest direct damage attack (Judgement) and that feels weak. IN fact it did pathetic damage until they buffed it later on.

[Derka-wyrmrest-accord (Derka)]

Buck up, sonny Jim. Get in there and play it and see how it feels. Try things out. Make it work.

[Zárex-anvilmar]

Having mained a healadin in Classic…they are saints. Especially when you get some good gear.

The only thing I will really miss from retail is the transmog ability. >.>

[Theloras-llane (Theloras)]

Can you switch out MCP to a different weapon while keeping the buff? that would be intense…
And yeah i was thinking of going paladin to abuse on hit affects and spell power but i didn’t know it would actually be decent in pve, that’s very interesting.

no, you lost the haste buff if you swap to another weapon - which is why you use all 3 charges in the same boss fight - after 90 seconds you either swap to another MCP (taking a 30 sec buff penalty) if the fight will go on for several minutes yet or regular weapon (such as Ironfoe if 10% proc rate goes live)if the fight is going to end with the next 30 secs or a minute.

I would advise that you ignore everything being said here, both positive and negative. Google legacy players, that will take you to a website with all of the raid logs from every major pserver. Now just start clicking on alliance raids.

no one has really pushed the envelope with Spelladin yet - other than Holyfrog once in AQ40 on his first attempt there:

He wanted to go toe to toe with another Ret Paladin in absolutely BiS gear for AP SoC Ret but neither of them had Flask of Supreme Power. It was also Holyfrog’s first attempt at going all out as Spelladin with him being 8/8 Tier 2 but still needing upgrades for several slots.

In the end, AQ40 isn’t the best outlier for testing DPS specs as most/all fights require lots of movement - not really many pure target dummy type boss fights to really test things out as there are in Naxx with Patchwerk, Thaddius or Loatheb.

That being said, it was a good first attempt by him and it shows how the playstyle functions over slow fat AP SoC Ret.

[Theloras-llane (Theloras)]

Seal of Righteousness is confirmed to proc on weapon hit effects and shadow oil is confirmed to scale off of spellpower.

Ret is a viable build that can abuse non-normalized procs better than ANY other build in the game. The datamining and testing from the beta shows some INCREDIBLE stuff, and even on private servers I genuinely never thought I’d see ret in such a strong state. Classic Ret will blow the hell out of original ret, and private server ret. We will see a rise of on hit builds that will rival or surpass the pre-normalization winfury.

[Skjaldbjorn-lightbringer (Skjaldbjorn)]

Is anyone actually using the spellingbee spec on pservers? I have serious doubts about it’s viability but would like to see raid logs.

[Theloras-llane (Theloras)]

@Alys-warsong

As you can see from my current avatar, I was an original classic raider. Your destiny as a paladin in classic raiding will on be as a raid/tank healer/buff/cleanse bot & judgment of wisdom bot.

Retribution is a auto swinging seal of command judgement spamming joke

And protection is even worst; although, it’s ok for SOME dungeons.

Give me BC/WotLK/Cata/MoP/WoD/Legion/BFA version of the paladin any day of the week beside 1.12 paladin.

With that said. My advice is go warrior because at least you can tank or DPS & not be pigeonholed into healing.

I would be excited about Classic if they just gave paladins Crusader Strike from the BC pre patch it would be a game changer but that will never happen.

TLDR - we don’t need Crusader Strike in Vanilla - read/watch this about Spelladin my friend:

The Spelladin - new Retribution meta for Classic

Courtesy of DexterBravo: Gear competetion - That T2 gear that every pally wants for PVP or RP, isn’t good for holy. But it is BIS (likely forever) for Spelladins. That’s 8 pieces of items that is Spelladin prio, which won’t be replaced in ZG, AQ, NAXX. That’s a lot of gear for happy warriors, casters, etc., that otherwise was wanted by the AP ret. Actually viable DPS most likely (none of us know how Classic will be tuned in the end). Much better than AP ret – more dps, more mana uptime…

[Alys-warsong]

HAHA, don’t make me laugh item dependent gimmicky spec!

By the time the hardcore player farms all that gear needed for the spec, we will be playing the end of classic BC

[Theloras-llane (Theloras)]

phase 1 bis is dungeon blues bro - and a level 29 2handed mace from gnomer - did u even watch the video?

anyway, I’m not the one asking for Crusader Strike in Vanilla…

“I would be excited about Classic if they just gave paladins Crusader Strike from the BC pre patch it would be a game changer but that will never happen.”

[Alys-warsong]

You just want to justify a build that is a gimmick and not understood by many players. Crusader strike was in vanilla orginally but was dropped & changed & added back at the end of vanilla after 1.12.

I played a paladin as my main through all of vanilla & played many dIfferent specs including the broken reckoning bomb but as a raider, the only viable spec is Holy.

I feel the same way now like I did in 1.12 when I was playing wow the most. Crusader Strike was a game changer for the paladin & made the class more interactive then some soulless auto attack build.

[Theloras-llane (Theloras)]

You just want to justify a build that is a gimmick and not understood by many players. Crusader strike was in vanilla orginally but was dropped & changed & added back at the end of vanilla after 1.12.

dude, Crusader strike in BETA =/= Crusader Strike in 2.0.1 TBC pre patch

don’t make ludicrous statements like that

the beta Crusader Strike was not instant - it functioned like a Holy Heroic Strike as it was “on next attack” and replaced your white for a yellow

it had a 10 second cooldown and cost a ton of mana = OOMADIN

similarly, I actually interviewed Kevin Jordan - the original vanilla wow class/spec designer

the strike system was NEVER going to go live - it was merely a placeholder while they got everything ready for the game launch

how do I know this? cause I specifically asked him about it…

• Calling Countdown #2 – Kevin Jordan On Paladins (With Theloras) – 1:13:45
  https://countdowntoclassic.com/2019/04/17/episode-100-the-journey-from-nostalrius-to-classic-kevin-jordan-on-paladins-josh-chooses-a-region-hardcore-guild-onslaught/#more-1358

[Raynorr-dark-iron]

I remember Shockadin being a thing back in Vanilla as well. I tried it out as I had full T2 and the gear to make it work. It was fun to play around with but nobody really took it seriously, I still had to go back to holy for raiding. More power to you if you can work it, but I just played my arms warrior if I wanted to go smash stuff back then as pally was holy or bust.

[Alys-warsong]

That’s wonderful, but I played classic paladin through that void of vanilla’s launch until they add CS in the game in end of 2006. I had so much fun when they added CS in both pvp & pve. That one little swing ability was enough for me To relevel a BE pally in BC. The class become so much better but like I said it wouldn’t happen & I can care less.

If I do play Classic, I will play a warrior & priest because they are not much different from how they are today unlike the auto and pray style the paladin was back then.

As you can see from my avatar was a dedicated raider in classic & find this Classic hype the most toxic thing ever.

[Kolben-icecrown (Kolben)]

I don’t get why people think not having a Taunt is the drawback to a Paladin tanking raid bosses.

Having a Mana Bar and not having any tanking set gear is a much bigger issue.

[Theloras-llane (Theloras)]

That’s wonderful, but I played classic paladin through that void of vanilla’s launch until they add CS in the game in end of 2006. I had so much fun when they added CS in both pvp & pve. That one little swing ability was enough for me To relevel a BE pally in BC. The class become so much better but like I should it wouldn’t happen & I can care less.

yea but you are literally mistaking the beta crusader strike for the tbc pre patch crusader strike and that’s being intellectually dishonest

they are two completely different abilities in every possible way

likewise making statements that it would take forever to get all the gear to make Spelladin work when BiS phase 1 is literally dungeon blues with +spell dmg on it while swinging either Manual Crowd Pummeler (level 29 weapon from Gnomeregan) or Ironfoe should it go live with 10% proc rate and that comes from lol Blackrock Depths.

Once BWL comes out in phase 3, guess what gear then becomes BiS?

8/8 Tier 2 Judgement set - which if you recall are the actual armour drops in Vanilla not armour tokens that are shared between multiple classes so if the boss drops Judgement gear no other class can use it - but again this setup goes with either Manual Crowd Pummeler or Ironfoe

and 8/8 Tier 2 Judgement remains BiS for the rest of the game all the way into Naxx if the 8/8 set bonus ends up triggering procs (still to be determined).

[Theloras-llane (Theloras)]

I don’t get why people think not having a Taunt is the drawback to a Paladin tanking raid bosses.

Having a Mana Bar and not having any tanking set gear is a much bigger issue.

cuz people are not intelligent and think that all raid bosses can be taunted in Vanilla/classic lol

quite literally like 90% of the raid bosses in the entire game CANNOT be taunted

but yes, you are spot on with your assessment my friend regarding mana bar and lack of class/spec itemization

[Buldranen-uldaman]

Anyone that says you “can’t” do something is a gatekeeping a**hole.

Yes, some classes are not as sought after as others, but EVERY class is going to be raiding. EVERY one. For some you may have to work a little harder, or you may need the trust of your guild to be able to play, but they will ALL be there. As for specific specs, yes some are underpowered and some are really designed for pvp over pve, but AGAIN: if you work hard enough and have the trust of your guild, you are going to be able to see all the raid content. LITERALLY anyone that disagrees is gatekeeping and more interested in dictating how other people enjoy themselves than in playing the game.

Make some friends (or bring them along), find a decent guild, play through all the content you could hope to see no matter your class. Your ret paladin is going to be just fine. /thread

[Dertae-area-52 (Dertae)]

Its true, ret and prot are pretty trash in Vanilla. I will be playing mage most likely

[Quarck-earthen-ring]

You will be a buff and cleanse bot. You will not be able to tank at max level and you will perform very poorly trying to dps. Get ready to bless every 5 minutes because that’s how long they last. Lay on hands has. 1 hour cool down. You will be able to bubble hearth because there is no way to dispel bubble. However if you use bubble you will have much decreased attack speed and if you use blessing of protection on yourself you will not be able to attack at all. I played a paladin all through vanilla and the only viable end game role for a paladin is to heal plus do blessings every 5 minutes.