Retribution
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WoW Moviewatch: Retribution
In the mood for a samurai movie? Addicted to WoW? One of our readers, Alcevious Baluki (sorry, Bal, gotta give the right credit), mentioned this video in our last edition of WoW Moviewatch, and I just had to check it out. Somehow the voice acting and the mouth movements remind me of old kung-fu movies. From the blurb on YouTube: Retribution tells the story of Musashi, "a wandering Samurai searching for vengeance and redemption in a western infused universe."It was named an Honorable Mention in the drama/action category in the Xfire Summer Movie Machinima contest. It's a great little movie, and something fun to pass the time on President's Day (or Family Day, if you live in Saskatchewan) either at home or at work (we'd never recommend you spending 10 minutes watching WoW videos at work. Never.)
Leveling build for a Retribution Paladin
NOTE: Current Paladin leveling guide can be found on our Leveling Guide Page. As with the Enhancement Shaman build I previously wrote, this guide is meant to be a resource to new paladins who'd like some advice on a single build to go from 1 to 70, focusing on leveling quickly. To level quickly, I'm a big fan of doing the most damage possible in the least amount of time. Retribution Paladins (aka Retnoobs) are not the most mana efficient of paladins, nor are they excellent healers or tanks. They do great damage, actually staying a bit ahead of the curve until level 40. Paladins are HIGHLY gear dependent. Keep this in mind. Eventually, you'll want to focus on Int and Stamina, as paladins make perfect tin-can healbots. For leveling, I focus on Str/Sta/Agi/Int, in that order. Strength gives extra attack power, stamina is your hit points, agility is for crits, and int is for your mana pool and spell crits. Your typical combat is a bit dull, and will go like this: Seal of the Crusader, Judge, Seal of Command, Hammer of Justice, Judge, Seal of Command, Judge, Seal of Command, Hammer of Justice, Judge.. *yawn* Toss in some self-heals and you'll be fine. Paladins are incredibly resilient in combat. If you're low on health, judge Seal of Light; if you're low on mana, judge Seal of Wisdom. When running zones, I almost always have Blessing of Might on myself, for extra attack power. Full list of talents is after the break!
Tier sets: Who chooses, guilds or players?
What classes should have priority on what gear in raiding instances has been a topic of debate for a long time. Tier 4 and 5 -- with their options of tank, DPS and healing sets for hybrid classes -- looked like they might help solve this problem. Feral druids can get their DPS sets, resto shamans can get their healer sets, and protection paladins can get their tank sets, and everyone will finally be happy and stop arguing with the master looter. This looked pretty good until someone on the Raids and Dungeons forum posed a nasty dilemma. Let's say that you're a paladin officer in a raiding guild at 70 that's hoping to progress through content quickly. You have a couple paladins that are protection specced for tanking, maybe one paladin who's retribution specced because he has the gear for it, and a bunch of pallies who are specced to heal. Paul the paladin heals in raids and seems to enjoy his role. One day, Paul wins his first Tier 5 token, and goes and gets ... the Crystalforge Battlegear. "What the heck, Paul!" you say when you inspect him. "You're holy specced! I thought you liked healing! This retribution gear won't help you in raids! How are we going to kill Illidan if people don't upgrade their healing gear?" "I do like healing in raids," says Paul, "and I'll keep doing it, but I need to solo too so I chose the DPS set. I know I won't wear it in raids, but in the end, it's my gear, isn't it? I earned it." This situation is tough. On one hand, the guild helped Paul get that Tier 5 under the expectation that he'd use it to fulfill his primary raiding role, and thus help the guild progress. If everyone picks DPS sets for farming, the guild probably won't be able to handle some fights. On the other hand, it is Paul's gear, and Paul's got to farm sometime. As long as his healing is adequate, shouldn't Paul get to choose which set he wants when it's just him, the token and the gear vendor? I'm glad that as a rogue, I won't have to face this choice. (Should I take the damage set or ... the damage set?) In theory, it would be nice if everyone took the set that they would use in raids, but that's not necessarily going to happen all the time. For those of you who are officers or hybrid classes, I ask: What should our fictional guild do about Paul the paladin? Should guilds have any influence on which sets their hybrid classes pick?
