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Two great things about the contemporary ret paladin
Every week, WoW Insider brings you The Light and How to Swing It for holy, protection and retribution paladins. Seasoned ret paladin Dan Desmond is here to answer your questions and provide you with your biweekly dose of retribution medicine. Contact him at dand@wowinsider.com with any questions, concerns, or suggestions! Patch 5.3 has turned out to be a great time to be a ret paladin. Well, in my opinion it's always a great time to be a ret paladin, but this new patch and the changes it brought with it really drive the point home. Granted, the only change we saw was a buff to our weapon-based damage via Sword of Light, which, while being a welcome boost to our DPS, isn't necessarily the most earth-shattering, game-changing thing in all of Azeroth. Still though, it opens some doors and allows us to be more competitive in the DPS game. I have to admit, my inspiration for this column came from reading Matt Rossi's warrior column, The Care and Feeding of Warriors: Survival and the modern warrior. As I was reading through the piece, I found myself unconsciously caressing my keybind for Divine Shield, no doubt a realization of how blessed we paladins are when it comes to self-preservation mechanics and abilities. Some of the troubles that Matt detailed I have either sidestepped or easily handled with our generous toolbox, and his angst has given me a newfound appreciation for the veritable arsenal of useful spells at our disposal. This week I'll be touching on a couple of our newer abilities that have proven time and time again to be so valuable and effective that I can't imagine playing a paladin without them.
The Light and How to Swing It: Why retribution DPS is a-okay
Every week, WoW Insider brings you The Light and How to Swing It for holy, protection and retribution paladins. Seasoned ret paladin Dan Desmond is here to answer your questions and provide you with your biweekly dose of retribution medicine. Contact him at dand@wowinsider.com with any questions, concerns, or suggestions! Towards the tail end of Ulduar and into the beginning of Trial of the Crusader, I was in a guild that had a rogue that would consistently top the DPS charts. I would run so many heroics and PuG raids to get gear, all the while practicing what could laughably be called our "rotation" in retrospect, and I would still fall short. Over time, however, I began to notice that even though I wasn't beating him, I was beating many others. Soon the time came when I was neck-and-neck with him, always biting his heels and waiting for him to allow me an opportunity to beat him, once and for all. When I eventually did overtake him and saw my character's name on the top of Recount, the feeling was greater than any boss kill. You can't ever see a boss collapse and have the feeling that you did that all by yourself, that you were the sole reason for this victory, because it took a combination of other players, all supporting each other, to see that end result. The DPS race is totally different -- aside from healers keeping you alive (which, if you're properly aware of your surroundings and your threat, shouldn't be an issue) you shoulder the responsibility to push out as much damage as you can. Seeing yourself at the top is a much more personal victory because you can honestly say that you did that, that you pulled yourself up there and truly earned that spot. And from what I understand, this is not a unique experience. I have talked to quite a few players who have expressed concern over some fairly recent SimulationCraft results that show retribution ranking near the bottom out of all available DPS specs. Even ignoring SimCraft, many more players have expressed concern over their damage output as they compare it to their fellow raiders, guildmates, and random DPSers in LFR. Despite this mounting evidence, I have asserted that retribution is in a nice place -- not great, not OP, but comfortable. Indeed, Ghostcrawler tends to feel the same way. So what's the story here? Why does it seem like everyone and their uncle think ret is doing poorly?
Retribution paladin DPS broken after realm restarts [Updated]
According to several reports, including the official forums, World of Logs, and several of our own staff, retribution paladins are experiencing a bug after tonight's rolling realm restarts. The bug has retribution paladins dealing several times their normal damage, with new records on World of Logs easily exceeding 100,000 DPS on any given Dragon Soul encounter. The bug appears to be related to Seal of Truth, as it's dealing over 60% of the affected ret paladins' damage, vastly dwarfing all other sources. The bug seems to be affecting PvP and PvE, as there are many reports of retribution paladins being nigh unstoppable in Battlegrounds tonight. One group of retribution paladins toppled Lord Rhyolith in under 15 seconds. There has been no official word from Blizzard just yet on these developments, although we can be sure that there will be a change deployed to fix this bug as early as possible. Reminder from the editors: Do keep in mind that abusing things like this is considered exploitation. Blizzard does have the right to ban you for abusing this if you're using it to bypass content à la our old friend Karatechop. Don't make Blizzard's job harder, and don't risk your account. Update 10:00 a.m. EST Blizzard is aware of the problem and is looking for a way to solve it. They also issue the same warning we did -- don't exploit this. Zarhym -- Ret Paladin DPS Bug We're aware of this issue and looking into it right now. It's likely we won't have further updates for you until we're back in the office in the morning PST. Just as a reminder from the Terms of Use: C. Rules Related to Game Play. (i) Using or exploiting errors in design, features which have not been documented, and/or "program bugs" to gain access that is otherwise not available, or to obtain a competitive advantage over other players. source
Retribution paladin buff and other hotfixes incoming tonight
A number of hotfixes have been (or will be) applied to live realms today. One is a particularly noteworthy PVE retribution paladin fix intended to bring ret DPS up to match the competition in the Firelands, as paladin DPS has fallen a bit behind in this raid tier. Paladins will be receiving a +40% damage boost to Censure, the stacking DOT associated with Seal of Truth. The other hotfixes are aimed at quest-related bugs that may have been interfering with players' solo progression. The explanation for the retribution buff and the details of these quest hotfixes can both be found after the break below.
The Light and How to Swing It: Basic retribution cooldowns -- when to pop your wings
Every week, WoW Insider brings you The Light and How to Swing It for holy, protection and retribution paladins. With the Light as his strength, Durin Mundahl takes on the foes of Azeroth with all the wrath of a retribution paladin. Feel free to send your retribution questions or comments to durin@wowinsider.com. Hello, my Light-wielding brethren. Let me start off by saying that all of this information applies to patch 4.2 and the current state of retribution paladins. In future patches, this information may become outdated. Use your own Judgement when reading. Some side effects may include increases of a few thousand DPS on target dummies and an overall feeling of ecstasy. Working as intended. After my last article, I got a few emails asking basic questions about retribution paladins and how to play them. I get questions like What's my rotation?, How is your damage so high?, and Why do you keep pulling aggro? pretty frequently. When I'm not trying to convince my guild it's the tank's fault I'm pulling aggro (even though it isn't), I try to explain to people that the key to doing good damage nowadays comes mainly from cooldown management, much like a lot of other classes -- but I'm not writing about mages or warriors here.
The Light And How To Swing It: Retribution changes and new gear in 4.2
Every week, WoW Insider brings you The Light and How to Swing It for holy, protection and retribution paladins. With the Light as his strength, Durin Mundahl takes on the foes of Azeroth with all the wrath of a retribution paladin. Feel free to send your retribution questions or comments to durin@wowinsider.com. Where do retribution paladins stand now that 4.2 is here? Let's look at the current state of the ret pally. In future patches, this information may become outdated, so use your own Judgement when reading. Side effects may include increased raid AOE damage and an overall feeling of satisfaction. Working as intended. Let's get down to business, shall we? Seal of Righteousness now can be activated by any melee ability, not just single target melee abilities. This adds Hammer of the Righteous (the physical component) and Divine Storm to the list of abilities that can activate this seal. In addition, Seal of Righteousness procs can now be critical effects. Inquiry of Faith now increases Inquisition duration by 66/133/200%, up from 50/100/150%. The Seals of Command talent now makes Seal of Righteousness hit an unlimited number of melee targets, instead of only 2 additional targets. Selfless Healer can no longer be dispelled and cannot be stolen via Spellsteal; and, in addition to its current effects, it lowers the cooldown of Word of Glory by 5/10 seconds. Glyph of Seal of Truth expertise bonus now also works when Seal of Righteousness is active. source
The Light and How to Swing It: Retribution of patch 4.1
Every week, WoW Insider brings you The Light and How to Swing It for holy, protection and retribution paladins. This week, Justicar Alex Ziebart tackles patch 4.1's impact on retribution paladins. Questions? Comments? Feel free to email the author. Before we get started here, I'd like to include a disclaimer: Yes, we're about to talk about patch 4.1. However, it is still extremely early in the patch's life cycle, so anything and everything could change before the patch hits live realms. We are going to talk about the patch because I feel the few changes to retribution currently on the PTR are significant, and talking about them is a good way to gain an understanding of them. If you like (or dislike) a change but don't understand the how and the why, what good is it? With that out of the way, it's time to render judgement upon the patch 4.1 patch notes.
The Queue: We love fasty, too
Welcome back to The Queue, WoW.com's daily Q&A column where the WoW.com team answers your questions about the World of Warcraft. Alex Ziebart will be your host today. The above video is brought to you by our very own Mat McCurley. You might know him better as "that guy that writes about addons I guess" if you don't pay much attention to author names. There's a backstory to the video, but I think leaving it out makes it far more hilarious. Enjoy! clundgren asked... "Why is there a continued perception of ret paladins as overpowered? Raid data shows them to be a lower tier DPS class on ICC bosses, and they are not particularly feared in arena. What gives? Did patch 3.0.2 leave that much of a lasting impression?"
Forum post of the day: Collateral damage
Retiribution Paladins had about three weeks to really shine. Think of it as retribution for many years of being laughed out of PUGs. Blizzard implemented promised nerfs to the Class in patch 3.0.3. Dumptruk of Frostmourne is upset about the effect that these changes have had on tanking in the Protection specialization. He opined that reduced damage in Judgments equates to reduced threat per second. He finished is post with a plea to reevaluate protection Paladins.In a response to the thread Rauss of Sentinels disagreed. He believes that a Paladin tank should not rely on Judgments to build threat. Rauss relies on Consecration, Hammer of Righteousness, and select Seals/Judgments to build aggro- depending on the situation. He thinks the original poster should expand to additional aspects of the class to realize its true potential.
The truth about Ret fixes
Rumors and unsubstantiated news have been floating through the ether like confetti since last night, when Ghostcrawler predicted Ret was going to be nerfed. Today he's finally out and said what they've hotfixed in and what's coming in the future: Nerfs: Divine Storm now does physical damage instead of holy (live). Repentance down to 6 seconds in PvP (from 10, live). Buff: Righteous Vengeance now applies a DoT "similar to Deep Wounds" instead of upping crit damage. GC calls it "a significant buff to the ability to make up for the damage lost to Divine Storm, but is also less bursty." The DoT will not break Repentance. (coming before Wrath) Update: "It should end up at something like 10% of the crit damage each tick for 4 ticks of 2 seconds each (+40% and 8 sec total)." Neutral: Art of War improves damage done by Judgments, Crusader Strike, and Divine storm, instead of upping crit rate. GC says "net dps should be about the same but less bursty" (coming before Wrath). Glyph of Crusader Strike now reduces mana cost, since the devs felt pallies were able to do too much damage on stunned targets (coming before Wrath). Fixed a bug with Seal and Judgment of Light that would result in too much healing. Technically a nerf, but since it's a bug fix I can't really put it in that category. (live) Overall, GC assures us that sustained Ret DPS remains the same as before this storm of changes; it's just less bursty at the front end of a PvP fight. He also says "if we overdid it, we'll be happy to back off some of the changes," so we'll just have to see how it works out, I suppose. One more thing. This isn't directly a Paladin change, but it will primarly affect Paladins, I think: the damage reduction Warlocks get from having their Felguard out with Master Demonologist is being extended to include Holy.
Phat Loot Phriday: Torch of the Damned
We've been a little husky the past few weeks here at Phat Loot Phriday, so this week we're aiming to fix that, and get back to what this column is all about: gigantic spiky, glowy things that you can kill with.Name: Torch of the Damned (Wowhead, Thottbot, Retribution)Type: Epic Two-hand MaceDamage/Speed: 396-595 / 3.80 (130.4 DPS)Abilities: +51 Strength, +45 Stamina Improves crit strike rating by 38, improves haste rating by 50. Great for Paladins, and any other class that uses weapon damage for certain abilities. Warning: this gets into some deep math, and you guys know I'm bad at that, so expect to see some more number crunching in the comments. Basically, Seal of Command, a Ret Pally talent, gives a chance to add 70% of the weapon's damage to any normal attacks, and since most weapons trade off speed for damage (as in, the slower the weapon, the higher the damage), slow weapons are better -- you'll get more damage output when SoC procs. And since this weapon is very slow and very powerful, you'll get more damage overall out of Seal of Command. The Haste rating is also good for Paladins, not because it will help with Seal of Command (SoC is a procs-per-minute talent, so no matter how many times you hit, you can't get it to proc more often), but because it'll let you hit more often, which means more white damage. Any class that benefits from big swing damage (Windfury is awesome when it procs with a huge weapon like this) will love this mace. Oh, and anytime we mention a two-handed weapon, Matthew Rossi's eyebrow twitches until we mention Titan's Grip. Imagine seeing a Warrior wielding this baby... and something else at the same time. Yeah. How to Get It: Drops from the Essence of Anger, which is part of the Reliquary of Souls in the Black Temple (which, trivia for you, was influenced heavily by Sinistar, an old arcade game). Essence of Anger is the third phase, so get your 25 man raid up to that point, be one of those silly Ret Paladins (silly Paladins -- DPSing is for Hunters, Locks, Mages, and Rogues!), and spend your DKP or win the roll, whatever you need to do. Then you too can haul around this big purple spiky Mace, swinging it at will and bringing your enemies to their knees with just one proc.Getting Rid of It: You probably won't, for a while. But it does disenchant into a Void Crystal, and vendors will buy it back for 18g 43s 86c
Git along, li'l dogies
Time for a little WoW blog roundup, cowpokes! Whoopie-ti-yi-yo!Making gold with second account | Full Time WoW AddictWith Blizzard's new refer-a-friend incentive, you might be thinking about opening a second account to get those XP benefits. Even better, Examino at Full Time WoW Addict shows you how to earn your raiding gold with some light multiboxing. No Wrath spoilers!Spellpower and You: Gearing in WotLK | Banana ShouldersSiha at Banana Shoulders (best blog name ever!) compares theories to practice in Wrath's current Paladin spellpower changes.Achievements and why they suck | Yet Another Warlock NerfSome people think the achievements system coming in Wrath is awesome sauce. Horns at Yet Another Warlock Nerf vigorously disagrees.Three more blog dogies after the break...
Noblegarden in Pictures
After having the chance to actually get out there and start my Egg Hunting, I can confirm that no, there really isn't anything new for the Noblegarden event this year. That's alright though, it entertained me for awhile, and I know for a fact that the Midsummer Fire Festival has a lot more in store.On the bright side, I did get my Elegant Dress this year! An entire day dedicated to finding this dress last year got me nothing but cruddy candy. Within twenty minutes this year, I got my dress! Of course, it doesn't look very good so I'll probably never put it on my character again, but I have it. That's good enough for me.If you're not able to participate in the event, or you're reading this after it has ended, do not fear! You didn't miss out on any leet items, and I did my best to capture the fun of the event in the gallery below. Go on, take a look! You know you want to. %Gallery-19015%
Breakfast Topic: Should all classes get to tank, heal, and dps?
Ret Paladins are currently in an uproar. They want their dps increased so they can be viable at raiding, yet they are given no way to shed aggro. The idea behind the paladin class is tanking and healing. Most classes have two roles they can play very well given the proper spec and equipment. But Druids can play more, why shouldn't other classes?This isn't a qq moar ret pally question or a n3rf druids question. The question I'm putting forth is: should all classes get to do all things? And should they be able to do them very, very well to get raid slots?
