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01-14-11, 01:24 AM   #1
Dawn
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[Paladin] Cataclysm Retribution - an open discussion

I'm playing Paladin since Vanilla and have gone through all the shizzle the class has been gone through. I played all specs on 2 Paladins, one Horde, one Alliance. Current ma

Retribution has been a completely broken spec up to Burning Crusade and basically even until WoTLK went live.

WotLK was a lot of fun as Ret, you had Seal of Command + Divine Storm cleave for AoE and could do decent damage on single target fights. It was a little awkward though, because our hardest hitting attack was also combining some sort of utility (healing) and being an AoE attack: Divine Storm.

Cataclysm brought a lot of changes for all classes and game play in general. I do realize that AoE is not what the game is supposed to be about, therefore all class AoEs got nerfed, more or less. Paladins also got a complete talent tree overhaul (again). While still trying to keep some of the things that worked in WotLK.

The situation is this:
1) Divine Storm is utterly useless, there's almost no reason to even have it on your bar.
- it shares it's cooldown with Crusader Strike
- it doesn't generate Holy Power ... i realize it isn't supposed to counting in that you are not supposed to need it in an AoE situation where you only "AoE" aka "spam" Divine Storm, but ...
- last but not least: it hits for **** ...

A Paladin is not supposed to use it unless there are at least 4+ or even 5+ mobs, unless there are that many, single target DPS would be higher. And with World of CC-craft that is Cataclysm, there are basically no situations where this happens.

2) On top of our awesome FCFS rotation comes watching of RNG procs, that can be really, really RNG - think of chain procs or nothing.
We don't have a real filler, we are dependent on our RNG procs if Judgement and Crusader Strike are on CD.
What we use is HOLY WRATH - an AoE spell that doesn't scale, auto targets (would break CC...) everything in it's range, splits up damage between all targets, has a mediocre cooldown length and hits for ****. Have I mentioned that it doesn't scale with your gear?

3) Consecration has become a mana killer, that can be used very, occasionally, only. Even though I'm basically fine with that, except for PvP reasons, maybe.

4.) Seals used to have some use. Only seal you are using for damage now is Truth. Removing Seal of Command and trying to make Righteousness our "AoE" cleave was really bad game design, not to say: FAIL.


What I think would make Retribution interesting and fun to play again.

1) Bring Divine Storm back as it used to be. Don't make it the hardest hitting attack for single target DPS, let it be what it is, an AOE attack, that doesn't share a cooldown with CS, but is part of the rotation. Make it hit for something reasonable, though (mainly concerning AoE) - it doesn't do that as of now.
Divine Storm looks nice and a Ret Paladin is a melee, after all hitting melee attacks just feels about right. Just make it part of the rotation again, please. Casting Holy Wrath as a "filler" and hoping for RNG is crap.

2) Crusader strike is fine.

3) Seals feel quite awkward now, compared to before. Remove Seal of Righteousness and either bring back Command or make Seal of Righteousness like Command used to be. It was fun and it worked. Just make the damage match for Cataclysm AoE ... or remove the whole seal cleave thing and let Divine Storm be the only AoE. ATM, "Seal Cleave" is a freaking joke - without being funny at all.


Anyway, I'm really looking forward to patch 3.0.6, that might address some of these issues. Even though it still only tries to fix broken things without changing them into something that works.
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WoWInterface » General Discussion » Class Discussions » [Paladin] Cataclysm Retribution - an open discussion

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