Ret finally helps for once, buffs, &c.
I know Retribution sometimes gets a raw deal around here, mostly because they’ve been an unending source of nerfs for us. Not to mention Holy Power is their fault, they stole our gap closer, and they smell bad. But–wait, where was I going with this?
Oh yes, well apparently hell froze over because for once they’ve done right by us, receiving a nice buff that has (as collateral “damage”) led to many of our abilities receiving a buff as well. Reports are that Crusader Strike, Holy Wrath, Hammer of Wrath, Judgement, and Censure were all buffed.
I can confirm that Hammer of Wrath in particular has done a complete 180 in terms of worth. Last night I was getting 14k crits from the spell, consistently. I think it’s safe to say we want to possibly start replacing Holy Wrath in 939 with Hammer of Wrath under 20%. Perhaps even Avenger’s Shield, numbers permitting.
In other news, the damage boost from the Crusade talent wasn’t affecting the splash portion of the attack, significantly hurting our AOE capabilities. Ghostcrawler has confirmed, though, that this was hotfixed last night. I’ll take it.
Lastly, I updated the 101 guide for 4.0.1. As always, please let me know if I forgot anything!
@thorianar
15 October 2010 at 11:47 am #
In the guide, the links for the specs are missing.
Julio Biason/Thorianar’s last blog ..401- Healing is Broken
@Rhidach
15 October 2010 at 11:55 am #
Ok, that’s kind of funny!
Fixed now, thanks for the heads up man.
@hazmacewillraid
15 October 2010 at 11:53 am #
“Not to mention Holy Power is their fault…”
Point conceded.
“…they stole our gap closer…”
That we did. Another point to you, sir.
“…and they smell bad.”
IS THIS HOW YOU REALLY FEEL? Well, I have bad news for you then, bud;
Your hair… looks… stupid.
@Rhidach
15 October 2010 at 12:03 pm #
Your hair… looks… stupid.
TOO FAR, Antigen. TOO FAR.
I’d be such a crap tank without you, kind sir. As always — THANK YOU.
Been hearing some conflicting reports, so I thought I’d just ask a fine group such as yourselves focused on the most handsome (or beautiful!) looking tank class :
Is it worthwhile to use Hammer of the Righteous over Crusader Strike for single targets? I’ve been trying to do some digging around for some facts regarding this, and after reading the news today and seeing Crusader Strike buffed again, I’m assuming it’s better for singles now, but thought to ask just to make sure.
@Rhidach
15 October 2010 at 2:31 pm #
I haven’t run tests yet, but I suspect (disclaimers apply) that the hotfix means CS is better for single-target now. If this was Wednesday morning I would have said HotR for single target.
Oh, if anyone can tell me, has there been any testing for Bladeward for a viable enchant? I swapped over to it and it seems to be decent so far.
@Rhidach
15 October 2010 at 5:50 pm #
It’s still not good. The uptime is low and the effect scales negatively against your avoidance. If you’re looking for an avoidance enchant, I’d recommend getting Exceptional Agility!
Cool, thanks! I’m gonna also try Accuracy as well on a secondary weapon for threat. I’m about 0.3% below hit cap for bosses.
I’m still a bit dissapointed by Mongoose. No more bonus armor. :[
I love the new holy wrath. So much that I’d ask it to marry me if my glyph didn’t have it messing around with elementals and dragonkin. Yuck!
I noticed that the buff food section of your 101 post mentions block value (and redoubt!). Might wanna fix that. Speaking of block value, I noticed that the eternal earthsiege meta now provides dodge rating and 1% increased block value. That still doesn’t seem worth it, but does the 1% actually work? Seems kinda odd that they would leave that in the game after all the changes they made to block mechanics.
HotR still does more damage than CS on single targets (target dummies). Unless I am missing something it still seems to be not working properly?
I believe (And I could be very wrong here) testing on the target dummies usually leads to inaccurate results, because of the Vengeance buff. The best thing to do is get a sizable amount of Vengeance on yourself and then try the results. If I remember right, the weapon damage scales with Vengeance while the holy damage portion of HotR does not.
Again, not 100% sure on this, but food for thought.
“In other news, the damage boost from the Crusade talent wasn’t affecting the splash portion of the attack, significantly hurting our AOE capabilities. Ghostcrawler has confirmed, though, that this was hotfixed last night. I’ll take it.”
Holy tits. I was ripping off our other tanks on AoE pulls as it was. They’ll never hold off me now. >.<
Ret’s have been having fun at Prot’s expense for so long that it’s about time we gave something back to you.
Oh ho ho ho. You’ve just opened up a twelve gallon stein of dwarven whoop-ass on your skinny little behind!
“I know Retribution sometimes gets a raw deal around here, mostly because they’ve been an unending source of nerfs for us.”
Lex Luthor spoke wisely when he roared, “WRONG!”
If anything, Holy’s been the source of all of the entire paladin class’ problems since the game started. Since Blizzard made the mistake of hiring hybrid hating, server crashing, warrior loving trogs as the raid and encounter designers, all classes that had a heal spell had no choice but to heal.
Laying the blame on Ret’s feet is not only presumptuous, but ignorant of the entire history of the class.
“Not to mention Holy Power is their fault,”
Oh yeah, like it’s ret’s fault that they want to be viable and adding an additional resource is a better alternative than scraping the class and doing it all over again, though, that would be nice.
“they stole our gap closer,”
Stole nothing. We had it first! Tanks don’t need that!
” and they smell bad.”
With as much shampoo you got in that hair, pal, you’re in no room to talk!
“But–wait, where was I going with this?”
Flame baiting, that’s what. And I hate myself for falling for it.
“If anything, Holy’s been the source of all of the entire paladin class’ problems since the game started. Since Blizzard made the mistake of hiring hybrid hating, server crashing, warrior loving trogs as the raid and encounter designers, all classes that had a heal spell had no choice but to heal.”
That was a valid argument in Vanilla. Now, not so much. Ret PvP has been a large part of the justifications for keeping things like an interupt out of Prot hands.
– “Not to mention Holy Power is their fault,”
Oh yeah, like it’s ret’s fault that they want to be viable and adding an additional resource is a better alternative than scraping the class and doing it all over again, though, that would be nice. –
Give it just to Ret, then. There’s no reason Prot should have to deal with the clunky implementation it got so Ret can have a new resource. If it was as smooth for Prot as it is for ret, it wouldn’t be an issue.
– “they stole our gap closer,”
Stole nothing. We had it first! Tanks don’t need that! –
In terms of PvE, tanks need it more than DPS ever will. PvP, we’re kited just as easily as Ret.
Looks like someone here is flame baiting, but I think you’re staring at the wrong person.
“That was a valid argument in Vanilla. Now, not so much. Ret PvP has been a large part of the justifications for keeping things like an interupt out of Prot hands.”
You act as though Prot’s needs somehow override Ret’s, when Prot has been working far longer than Ret has.
“Give it just to Ret, then. There’s no reason Prot should have to deal with the clunky implementation it got so Ret can have a new resource. If it was as smooth for Prot as it is for ret, it wouldn’t be an issue.”
From what I’ve been seeing, it’s getting fixed and made to work effectively without it being the 969 snorefest it was in Wrath. Sure, it worked, but it was hardly a triumph of design.
And I hate the homogenization argument as much as the next guy, but at least Holy Power does something to make us unique, though some would argue it’s made us into a Rogue clone.
“In terms of PvE, tanks need it more than DPS ever will. PvP, we’re kited just as easily as Ret. ”
Oh really? Explain to me why Tanks needing to cover distances is so important to tank stationary mobs and even then, you have taunts to bring them to you.
And don’t you talk to me about being kited. At least Prot/Ret had a snare/silence burst attack, something Ret never had until recently.
“Looks like someone here is flame baiting, but I think you’re staring at the wrong person.”
Perhaps if he didn’t start out with the same condescending tone, unintended or not, that seems to dismiss Ret as an afterthought, when Ret is what the paladin class was introduced and primarily was in the Warcraft universe, then perhaps things would have been different.
@Rhidach
16 October 2010 at 11:58 pm #
I feel obligated to explain that I was engaging in a little tongue in cheek barbing of the Retribution spec, and I totally don’t think you guys smell bad.
As long time readers of this blog (and Antigen can confirm) I like to indulge in some intra-class rivalries–you know, some good, clean fun. Still, I get the impression you caught the joke with your shampoo remark.
Anyway, just wanted to clear that up!
Ugh. You know the worst part about your statement? It’s right! And I apologize for flying off the handle.
I guess the whole intra-class rivalries have gotten to me more than I think. It’s like my own personal, and small-scaled, Nam Flashback from the original WoW forums during Vanilla.
Not sure if you were around during Vanilla, but it wasn’t pretty at all. The official WoW forums made a lot of paladins hating each other, (Well, mostly it was Prot and Ret against Holy) and it almost seems that recent events have Ret and Prot at each others’ throats.
Either way, I’m sorry for my overreaction.
@Rhidach
17 October 2010 at 11:08 am #
No problemo, happens to the best of us. :)
“You act as though Prot’s needs somehow override Ret’s, when Prot has been working far longer than Ret has.”
I’m not suggesting that. You’re acting, however, as if you wouldn’t be upset to have something that other DPS have held back from you due to tank balance concerns. It’s simply frustrating for whoever is affected.
“From what I’ve been seeing, it’s getting fixed and made to work effectively without it being the 969 snorefest it was in Wrath. Sure, it worked, but it was hardly a triumph of design.”
969 was more of a success than what we have now. At least 969 was flexible an we could tailor the spell order to the situation. The current protection implementation is rigid and boring, and it’s a direct result of our hardest hitting ability being reliant on a clunk-ily implemented Holy Power system. The ramp-up style threat of Vanilla WoW simply isn’t a good model to use any more.
“Oh really? Explain to me why Tanks needing to cover distances is so important to tank stationary mobs and even then, you have taunts to bring them to you.”
It’s pretty clear you’ve not tanked in high-end PvE; taunt is pretty ineffectual at picking up adds, and the times where picking things up matters they’re very rarely stationary.
“And don’t you talk to me about being kited. At least Prot/Ret had a snare/silence burst attack, something Ret never had until recently.”
I played mainspec ret for half the expansion. I know exactly what it was like. It really wasn’t much better as prot, I assure you.
“Perhaps if he didn’t start out with the same condescending tone, unintended or not, that seems to dismiss Ret as an afterthought, when Ret is what the paladin class was introduced and primarily was in the Warcraft universe, then perhaps things would have been different.”
A humourous jab at ret–one I’m sure was not meant to be taken seriously–is far different that the total entitlement complex you seem to be exhibiting here. It could be equally argued that since Paladins are former Priests, lorewise, healing is what they should be doing. It’s a weak argument from anyone, arguing lore for game mechanics changes.
Personally I like the idea of Prot, in both pvp and pve. Outlasting others has always appealed to me, although other classes have greater survivability now, DK especially.
I think balancing pve/pvp has most greatly affected paladins. Overpowered classes in pve might annoy people but it benefits raids overall. Put the same class in a pvp situation and steamrolling (or the perception of steamrolling) has people calling for a nerf, which is often an over-reaction
Dual-speccing is standard now. Why not separate pvp/pve talents and only allow pvp when in a pvp spec. Yes it’s more work for the developers but balancing would be made much easier.
Oh and I hate how POJ is out of reach for now. I feel like a snail.
Intra-class rivalries aside, the crusader strike vs HotR debate on singletarget has been held on EJ and in Theck’s thread I thought. What Shaeloth said is completely correct in that regard. As the damage of CS scales with AP, and thus all of its damage it starts to outperform HotR once vengeance goes up. This is because only the 30% weapon damage on HotR scales with AP, while the holy portion scales with strength.
Just figured I’d clear it up amidst the banter.
Meanwhile I’m also looking forward to 85 for PoJ ;_;
I’m getting this information second-hand but it seems blocked attacks might not be affected by armor mitigation.
Source: http://forums.worldofwarcraft.com/thread.html?topicId=27303224952
A fellow prot pally has checked into it and it makes more sense the more we look into it. Just thought I should mention this as reforging mastery would, for the moment, cause tanks to take higher physical damage. I’m sure this is a bug if it’s true, but for now personally I’m forging out of mastery.
@Rhidach
17 October 2010 at 5:18 pm #
I need to look into this. I hope this isn’t true.
We’ve been doing some small testing in duals and regular mobs and it seems as though block is working correctly but we’re going to test with some 5man heroics and maybe do a junk ulduar run to see if we see any differences in higher damaging hits. It could be the amount of armor mitigation when blocking has been changed but I’d like to think Blizz would of said something about it given that mastery affects blocking.
I’ll post if we find something more interesting.
yeh i would hope blizzard would notice something like that and tell us, but i mean they miss stuff all the time, luckily they caught that sanctuary bug. But there’s alot of problems now, that still aren’t fixed. like the projected textures problems: i can’t see my consecrate at all when its dropped nor any ground effects by mobs with settings up to ultra…and i know when i went into kara to solo for mount like usually do, i was getting hit pretty hard even with “unhittable” cap…so maybe they did miss it :S