I would say remove Flash of Light instead. Holy Light is much more useful. Also, make it castable while moving but at a slower speed with a passive talent choice.
I just wished you would have brought back the possibility to live out the 2h fantasy again from Legion. This was peak holy Paladin to me.
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Protection Paladin feels extremely vulnerable in Beta mythic plus testing. Surviving a low key such as a 10 is a challenge equivalent in feel to a 17 on current retail servers. Basic mitigation provided by mastery and shield of the righteous does not grant enough defensive value, and major defensive cool downs offer only temporary relief and are rapidly exhausted.
The spec requires substantial increases to the value of its defensives before expansion launch.
I feel immensly frustrated as a protection paladin. Not to mention the squishiness, that has been mentioned already. I have several spells, that are not/barely feasible to press on myself, or that could possibly save the life of a party member. Pressing them felt rewarding, it mattered and it could definitely save my healer some nerves. But I can no longer see if someone is struggling. Pressing Sacrifice on for example a mage with ice cold, is a waste of GCD.
I can only imagine how fun healing must be now, the role in itself is extremly unrewarding, because you have to compensate for everybodys mistakes and now you cannot even see defensives⌠Do you want even fewer healer in this game?
HolyPala (CE-raiding perspective)
Pro:
- I love the change to shield of the righteousness. Finally having a âfillerâ-ability which
allows to save mana (while dmging) without having to literal afk is chefs kiss. - having consecration worked into judgement is a perfect change, reducing bloat
- Apex-talent: very cool, fits in the class/spec fantasy and will be a interesting aspect in gameplay I feel (has a risk of being annoying to track and play with tho!)
Cons:
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Rotation is clunky: the removal of Crusader Strike was too much imo, at least right now on beta the rotation does not feel smooth, but has interruptions where Crusader Strike used to be
- EDIT: Thought about this again, actually it wouldâve been such a chance to make crusader strike be a more interesting skil instead of removing it. Like it giving +1 HolyPower AND making your next Holyshock heal for x more, or sth. idk.
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There has been some work on the class talent tree, but thereâs still some really weird talents which seems to be PvP-oriented (which I dont find in such an emphasis on almost all other classes). E.g.: âFaiths Armorâ Word of Glory giving the paladin armor, âStoicismâ Stun duration reduced, âEye for an Eyeâ attackers receive (neglectable) dmg on attacking the paladin, âFear no Evilâ Reduction of fear effects
- changing those or make them choice-nodes would enable a much more interesting choice, cause now for any pve-player those are just dead talents leading to a very strict layout (cookie cutter build)
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quite many talents are just pushings Avenging Wrath to be stronger and stronger which always was a pitfall as hpal then usually become the 20-sec-star with insane healing and then falling off a cliff for the remainder of Avenging-Wrath-CD.
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Sad to see Rising Sunlight being removed, this was such a cool and unique buff which felt very nice to use
TLDR: Some good and interesting changes (bloat reductions), but Im scared of the gameplay becoming too simple, which might be nice at the start when content is new, but might get bland real quick. Also the spec identity/fantasy is fading imo (losing cs makes us again less of a melee-type healer)
Itâs been a while since Alpha/Beta launched but i want to give an overall feedback now on the changes made to the class as a CE/HoF raider and have been in 0.1% for m+ in couple of seasons in past. Therefore my thoughts are limited to pve aspect of the game so if it is something that is already a thing with pvp mechanics and talents, i wouldnât know as i have only done heroic raid and mythic+ testing aswell as dummy bashing.
First of all the general movement of the game towards a more âcasualâ gameplay style has been noticed with all classes getting an overhaul and losing abilities. Ret was one of the first victims of this experiment as the class design that was favoured and enjoyed by most during Shadowlands and before has been gutted down in 10.0.7 patch to remove massive amounts of abilities. This trend continued on other specs untill one of the most notorious ones lately, Frost Death Knight spec. At this time many of the specs canât even fill seen by many as the standart 2* full combat action bars. While this could be a good thing it does take away from the feelings of the specs. It reduces gap between skill ceiling and floor in spec gameplays.
Secondly, removal of functions of certain addons results in some of the paladin utility being borderline useless without voice communication with players or pre-assignments and such. Right now i have no way to see if a player has defensives or immunities and such, requiring the use of my Blessing of Sacrifice, Freedom and Protection or Lay on Hands abilities. While many players on a less competitive level love throwing these abilities randomly. Unfortunately in higher end content these abilities are meant to be used in a clutch. It creates a voice clutter envoirement asking questions these stuff in comms.
When it comes to the hard spec, specific changes for Retribution, Right now in retail the class plays âfineâ this no skill floor/ceiling not existing envoirement for Ret in DF was a niche a lot of players abused to get into mythic raiding and such as they previously couldnât dps and do mechanics at the same time. But the changes to several other specs in TWW created an envoirement where Ret population has dispersed into other specs. I see Midnightâs changes to amplify this.
Abilities, talents and such wise. The mentality change for removal of passive holy power gain is a welcome one especially considering the ways to track these passive holy power gains have been gutted down with addon restrictions. But the readdition of Crusading Strikes confuses me. This ability just completely puts the gameplay of Ret on halt if you talent in to it. You have huge gaps where you do not press anything and it actively sabotages the Apex talent of the class. This being a choice node is basicly going to bait a certain player niche to just actively do less dps than they could be doing by the allure of passive ability.
Judgement generating 2 holy power talent also being removed is confusing to me as it had smoothened the -rotation- of the class. But i suppose with return of Crusader Strike in form of Templar Strikes kinda mitigates it. Still judgement is a problematic ability for Ret right now. As it stands it is the hardest hitting generator we have in optimal single target talents. So you would use it on cooldown regardless over starting a fresh templar strikes/slash combo. But problem beyond this is itâs interractions when it becomes Hammer of Wrath when used during Avenging Wrath. Hammer of Wrath, right now does no more damage than Judgement would do with Avenging Wrath activated. It basicly means that Hammer of Wrath is just a purely skin change for the ability. A lot of paladins i have talked assume this is a bug or unintended. If it is intended it is just a very poor design.
Another thing is the damage numbers from our DoTs and DoT adjacent abilities are very low right now. Empyrean Hammer (For Retribution at least due to interracting with DoT talents. Is a DoT for this purpose) does significantly less dps than it does compared to retail version of the game on our breakdown. Not only that but every other dot we have is very low on damage contribution. Especially considering that our tier set increasing our primary dotâs damage and such. It and other dots doing so little damage in our breakdown makes no sense. This is amplified for Herald even more considering itâs abilities are actual dots and still do no damage.
Execution Sentence change is a welcome one. Divine Wrath interracting with Radiant Glory finally is also a welcome change.
Wake of Ashes damage feels very low for a 30 second ability. I donât know what else to say about that. It is just feeling.
Apex talent being based on Art of War is very rng based aswell for Ret at this time on a spec that already relies pretty much only on procs or abilities critting to make any difference in numbers, adding another proc based Apex talent seems redundant. It just doesnât change anything for us in any way aside from high rolling more satisfying and low rolling even worse.
AoE talents being more accessible is big positive also.
A few suggestions:
Templar Strike/Slash combo having an additional reward aside from being âmore damâ, maybe an affect like ânext spender does this or thatâ or extra holy power?
Hammer of Wrath actually dealing more damage than a regular Judgement to begin with instead of being a skin.
Ability to end Execution Sentence damage collection early. Nothing is more annoying than casting ES and target(s) dying before damage going off.
Seperate Shield of Vengeance and Divine Protection again. Retribution already have a lot less defensives than other melee classes.
Retribution still has no group wide defensive utility like other plate classes do and no cc utility like many other dps spec do for m+ envoirements. Ret has one of the only melee range only kicks left in the game with 1-2 other specs also.
I mean, my suggestion would be that Crusader Aura grants Blessing of Freedom to Allies within its range only in combat when you cast it, but only for 2-3s raid-wide. Maybe with a target limit too. The 5 closest to the casting Paladin.
Not exactly a defensive but would give us more means to buff allies for a short moment. Or something similar. In any case, Crusader Aura imo is lacking a bit and could need a buff. Something that makes it useful in combat too.