I just want to add that not only does it feel bad to lose Crusader Strike, creating gaps in our rotation, removing baseline Hammer of Wrath as its own separate ability and merging it with Judgment while Avenging Wrath is active also feels really bad.
We no longer have an Execute ability, creating awful moments when an enemy is low health and there is nothing we can do but stand there and auto-attack. With Veneration it allowed us to use it on targets regardless of health, yet another dps ability in our rotation gone.
I cannot stress enough how horrible these changes are, Classic WoW Holy levelling was more fun than Midnight.
Iâm all for losing crusader strike. Iâd personally like a mid-range healer, and not a melee. Give the option to weave into melee, but I despise the requirement to pull competitive numbers. Itâs also hard to compare Paladins in WoWâs lore to game mechanics. Yes, people like having melee healers. Yes, long-time players miss when Holy wasnât melee. In my opinion, mid range healers can connect the two.
Paladins were originally priests who decided to learn how to use the light as a weapon, while also supporting their allies. I believe this sounds more like protection than any other spec.
Maybe itâs just me. But this is the first time in a very long time that Iâm just bummed about how Holy currently is, and Iâm looking forward to Midnight and whatever changes that the expansion will bring to Holy.
Speaking from experience⌠itâs also the place your toon will die most often. If youâre with melee, you move with melee to avoid things. If youâre with range, you move with range to avoid things. If youâre standing in the middle⌠you moved too late.
Weâre just going to have to agree to disagree. I canât wrap my head around the idea of someone considering it âmore funâ to have Holy Shock on a 30 second cooldown, and having to recast buffs to their auto-attacks every 10 seconds after hitting Judgment.
The Human Paladins of Stormwind were.
The lore of the Warcraft universe has been added to significantly since, and there are Paladin-equivalents who predate the Human kingdoms entirely (Troll Prelates/Freethinkers, Draenei Vindicators)
And there are those who donât want to play melee healers, because Paladins have spent more years NOT as melee healers. Just because a change happened a few expacs ago doesnât make it a good one for everyon who had been playing the class prior to that.
Weâre just of two different opinions and talking about it is fine, but people donât need to get so bent out of shape about it (not referring to you or your comment). Weâre still in Alpha. Thereâs no telling what will actually make it to retail.
I kind of get the reasoning, but itâs simultaneously telling Holy Paladins, âwe donât want you to be able to deal enough damage to engage in anything aside from group content.â
I really hope they revert the crusader strike removal, i have played holy pally as an alt since the TBC and yes it has had both iterations of ranged and melee but the removal of one playstyle feels like it would be a folly. Not only would this leave dead globals in the spec but also would split the community on how its played. Why not just take a similar route to Mistweaver who have a stance option for fistweaving or cast weaving? (also it makes me sad that this removal of Crusader Strike would make the Avenging Crusader talent pointless and would need to just be removed at that point cause only judgement working for it makes its useless)
And Holy Paladin was a ranged healer for 16 years. There was nothing wrong with that design and a lot of Paladin players prefer the ranged style over sweating balls in melee range to deliver pathetic dps and mediocre healing.
OkâŚso far this isnât as awful as I initially thought, just make SoTR not require a shield and I think they may be cooking, itâs very similar to how meleeing was a mana management tool. I still want crusader strike but if they make SoTR worth weaving with mana sustain and a better cdr on shock then it may not be over for us.
Im giga bad at math, what does this make the cooldown of Holy Shock now?
I do think .5% of mana from SotR is a too small but would need to see it in practice.
I still donât like not having Crusader Strike, but if the cooldown of Holy Shock gets low enough it might even out and SotR returning mana means we still have a reason to be in melee range.