Hail RetPaladin.com Visitors!
Tharvolde here and I’ve got a few Paladin changes for you revealed as part of the recently announced start of the closed beta testing period for Cataclysm. Stay tuned and I will update this post with said changes as they are discovered:
Update @ 9:41AM EST on 7/1/10
So I literally stayed up until 3:30AM last night despite the fact I had to be in the office at 9. I did this because the beta patch rolled out yesterday in the early evening and I was antsy for what Paladin changes were to be revealed given this fact partnered with an NDA lift. So in short, here are your Retribution changes for the initial beta patch:
- none
That’s correct. There is nothing we didn’t already know about with respect to the Retribution tree that came out of the beta patch. As a result, I’ll just list out ALL of the Paladin changes for the patch that could in some way affect a Retribution Paladin who goes at least 51 points into the tree so you can at least have something to chew on in the mean time:
1) (Protection T5) Blessing of Sanctuary has been removed and now has been replaced with just “Sanctuary” which is a passive version of the blessing minus the stamina and strength component. It reduces all damage taken by 3% and causes your blocks, dodges and parries to regenerate some mana
2) (Holy T2) Divine Intellect now increases both intellect and spirit by 1/2/3/4/5%
3) (Holy T4) Sanctified Light has been changed to now increase the critical strike chance of your Judgements and Holy Shock by 5/10/15%.
The above changes (particularly those in the Holy tree) do offer some interesting build opportunities for Cataclysm should Blizzard continue down that path. As we well know, many Retadin go at least 5 points into Holy anyway for 5/5 Seals of the Pure. Many also grab 2/2 Unyielding Faith. With Holy Shock now being baseline and (from what I can tell) being a decent, instant cast, ranged nuke at the Retadin’s disposal it may be attractive to run a build such as 18/7/51 which would get you 3/3 Sanctified Light (15% Judgement and Holy Shock crit), 2/2 Unyielding Faith and some extra intellect and spirit (which will be more substantial of an enhancement than it is today given the inflation of statistics at level 85 compared to level 80) while still allowing you at least 5/5 Divine Strength and 2/2 Guardian’s Favor from Protection.
At first glance, the above changes (although only a few and certainly belonging to trees early in development), it seems that Blizzard may be aiming to have Ret builds with Holy as your secondary tree as more “offensive” while Ret builds with Protection as your secondary tree as more “defensive”. Granted this is generally how it is today but it certainly seems they are pushing this even further with Cataclysm. I for one am looking forward to having 33% increased Judgement critical strike chance from talents alone.
No doubt time will tell on this but for now we at least have something to chew on.
June 30th, 2010 - 11:34 pm
It’s about time we had a new post. And while i’m at it since cs now does 100% weapon damage is it still 4 sec cool down?
June 30th, 2010 - 11:38 pm
So… It looks like holy pallies new 31 point talent to replace holy shock is… AURA MASTERY!!!
July 1st, 2010 - 7:51 am
@Wasselin
Aura Mastery has moved from T3 to T7 in the Holy tree but “Improved Holy Shock” also exists in T7 as follows:
- Reduces the mana cost of your Holy Shock by 35/70%
July 1st, 2010 - 8:05 am
Holy shield is now passive and has the 6% crit immunity component. So basicly between HS and Redoubt, prot palas get a passive 60% block chance unless something changes!
July 1st, 2010 - 9:22 am
Great job squeezing out information and insight despite any real changes; hopefully the next beta patch will deliver actual paladin news.
I’m hoping Improved Blinding Shield (Prot Tree, instant cast) won’t be too deep in the tree so that I can go 51 Ret with Prot talents. I’m going to miss 30 second hammers if Holy seems to be the better secondary spec.
July 1st, 2010 - 9:24 am
Also currently, Improved Sacred Shield increases the duration of SS from 30 sec to 60 seconds and improves absorption by 20%.
Since the duration of SS will be 30 min in Cataclysm, I’m hoping a new effect such as, 50/100% chance for SS to not be dispelled, will be added.
A paladin can dream, no? :]
July 1st, 2010 - 10:05 am
Perhaps Retribution with sword and board may make an appearance come Cataclysm?
July 1st, 2010 - 10:06 am
And perhaps Retribution with sword and board may play much like a “Shockadin” used to given that crits will still result in instant Exorcism and Holy Shock is having its damage increased and becoming baseline.
July 1st, 2010 - 10:18 am
@Azium
Paladins aren’t allowed to dream. Divine Shield lasts too long. :V
July 1st, 2010 - 10:28 am
Hi,
There is some talent preview paladin?
already exists as Rogue, Priest, Druid and Shaman
tks!
July 1st, 2010 - 1:22 pm
I hear that in Beta Crusader Strike is doing 157% weapon damage for Ret from a pretty reliable source.
July 1st, 2010 - 7:54 pm
The CS tooltip is probably calculating in all the damage increase buffs it gets just like on live:
10% from Imp CS
10% from Art of War
15% from Sanctity of Battle
6% from 2H weapon spec
3% from Sanctified Retribution
10% from PvP gloves
July 1st, 2010 - 11:15 pm
On Ferarro’s Blog:
Q: You hinted recently that Paladin’s may be getting a gap-closer (that you approved of) is it still on the cards for cata?
A: It’s still in the cards as in, I can see what’s on the horizon and in-game and know about discussions (Paladins are the last class to be worked on so far). I just don’t like how easy the proposed mechanics can be avoided. You’ll see soon. The NDA was lifted and the Beta is live, so the info should be out soon.
July 1st, 2010 - 11:18 pm
Q: What is the tooltip of the % weapon damage of Crusader Strike?
A: 157%. 100% Base. Then it is increased by the normal stuff, Sanctity of Battle and Art of War. The current placeholder 41pt talent increases CS damage by 10%, but I’ve read that it actually doesn’t increase the damage, only the tooltip. Heh.
July 2nd, 2010 - 4:09 am
So in short, here are your Retribution changes for the initial beta patch:
- none
Nuff said.
July 3rd, 2010 - 10:49 am
Wait and see. Have patience… and your shotguns at the ready
I still remember someone (Ghostcrawler maybe?) saying that they wanted to move away from a glut talents that just enhanced one or two abilities with nothing more than just damage modifiers. I’ll find it when I have more time.
Somewhere, in the back of my head, I am still crossing my fingers.
July 3rd, 2010 - 11:06 am
@Oden
No, it was the opposite. They wanted to get away from talents that gave global bonuses in favor of conditional bonuses or enhancing specific abilities. For example, a 1% crit talent would be removed. A 3% crit talent to just Crusader Strike would stay for example.
July 4th, 2010 - 1:20 am
I tried to see if anyone mentioned it but I kinda wonder what the actual heal in combination with the new health at level 85 will be. The cost have been changed and we now have a number of healing abilities to our disposal.
Flash of Light old (at 80):
785 to 879
7% of base mana
Flash of Light new (at 85):
4830 to 5418
27% of base mana
That is a lot of mana.
Holy light old (at 80):
4888 to 5444
29% of base mana
Holy Light (at 85):
3881 to 4323
6% of base mana
Heals for a lot less but cost less mana and longer cast time. Perhaps good when in between fights but not nearly enough effective in combat.
Healing Hands (at 85):
Heals all friendly targets within 10 yards for 683.58 every sec. Lasts 10 sec.
40% of base mana, Instant cast
Heals on self for slightly more than a flash of light but hits friends too. And cost more. Can be good sometimes but the mana cost is steep.
Holy Shock
Blasts the target with Holy energy, causing 1399.45 to 1516.07 Holy damage to an enemy, or 3938.43 to 4266.63 healing to an ally.
18% of base mana, 20/40 yd range, Instant cast, 6 sec cooldown
Using flash of light as soon as we get a crit will not be possible due to the cost. but it does seem to heal more, but with the increased health I wonder how large percentage it will actually be.
July 4th, 2010 - 2:32 am
The healing abilities aren’t fully revamped yet. All healing classes will have a fast heal, a medium heal, and a big heal. For paladins, they’re Flash of Light, Holy Light, and Divine Light. All the fast heals will heal for as much as the medium heal in half the time but for twice as much mana. The big heal heals for double what the medium heal does for twice its cost but the same time.
Example:
Fast Heal
3000 HP
1.5 sec cast
10% base mana
Medium Heal
3000 HP
3.0 sec cast
5% base mana
Big Heal
6000 HP
3.0 sec cast
10% base mana
Ghostcrawler outlined this in a post on the Cataclysm Alpha/Beta forums. I’d link it, but comments with links need to be approved here first. You can check it out on the general forums here in the Cataclysm changes thread. Keep in mind those numbers aren’t close to what will actually happen. It’s just meant to illustrate the relative values.
July 4th, 2010 - 3:29 am
yeah. I know. I read it. But that means that the healing abilities are balanced around the holy spec, as they should be, but it will affect ret paladins. I typically don’t like to share stuff with holy paladins. It has never led to anything good for us since they always have been prioritised.
It risk going in two bad ways: our instant heal being too strong. Or that it end up costing too much of our mana to be useful.
Divine Light will be a holy talent so it is irrelevant for us.
July 4th, 2010 - 10:27 pm
ppl like lighthammer in alpha/beta testing are the reason ret will never get any utility/cool talents. He made a post saying that holyshock as a baseline is increasing the initial offload damage ret can do.
/facepalm
July 5th, 2010 - 12:09 am
@Uthere
Ret paladins posted about ret being stupidly overpowered with damage and not having utility in the WotLK beta as well. Blizzard nerfed the damage, but didn’t add in utility. The sooner the damage gets nerfed, the better the chance for real utility to be added.
July 5th, 2010 - 10:24 am
@Exedore
You are looking at my post from a wrong angel. The way Holy Shock is right now, it is worse than Exorcism and most likely we wont even use it. My concern is why jump to conclusions and give the nerf reigns to blizzard before the abilities even get tuned for our spec.
July 7th, 2010 - 9:40 pm
Yayy, new info with the talent changes.
Highlights:
Divine Storm will be given at lv 10 for all “Retribution” paladins.
New “51″ pt talent — ??? (not repentance)
All trees will be trimmed to 31 points.
CS/DS at lv 1/10 will be awesome for new rets. A new end-tree talent could be very good, and should give more damage.
straight from the blues mouths when asked about the design intent for ret:
“Retribution should feel like Arms Warriors who traded some of their mobility for healing and defenses, and do more holy damage instead of bleeds.” – GC