Damage Patterns
After the first round of raid testing, it is clear that Holy Paladin still has a lot of issues that need to be addressed. While the core rotation with Crusader’s Might is very fun, Holy Paladin lacks the tools to deal with the continued bursty damage patterns. Holy Paladin has lost practically everything you can call burst healing, especially since Beacon of Virtue is unplayable with its current mana cost.
Maybe it will be different on Mythic, but on Heroic, damage patterns on bosses have felt exactly as bursty as they do on Live. This is unfortunate because the whole point of the initial healer changes at the start of the Alpha were predicated on slowing down and making healing less bursty.
I think it is fine for Holy Paladin to have a rather flat healing curve, but if damage patterns continue to be burst focused, then, as is evident from testing, we will struggle to keep up.
Bugs
Holy Paladin is riddled with numerous extreme bugs that make it very hard to get a proper feel for the spec. Hopefully most of these are fixed before Mythic testing so we can actually play the spec as it is intended.
I keep a continually up to date list of the bugs here: https:// docs.google. com/spreadsheets/d/1MTbf-dYMsNF3wWUqE8HZokIm8drV1-hNogcQtV31Ues/edit?usp=sharing
Beacon tracking and UI Issues
Currently, the only thing that reminds you to apply your Beacons is that they glow on your action bar if they are not out. This is simply not good enough. It ignores the fact that lots of players prefer to hide the action bars to reduce clutter.
Even if you do have action bars shown, it is super annoying that they are glowing 24/7, even when you aren’t in a group or anything. The glow is also not a foolproof, it is very easy to miss and still forget to put them out. It is also very difficult to notice the glow mid combat if your Beacon target dies.
All in all, it is just a very frustrating and unfun side effect of the ridiculous addon restrictions. Sure, being able to have an addon remind you to apply Beacons in a better way than the base UI, is technically a “competitive advantage”, but jfc it is just so annoying and frustrating to not have that.
Beacon of the Saviour
Our Apex Talent, Beacon of the Saviour is fine for what it is, but trying to keep track of who it is on in raids is impossible. Right now, because it transfers healing done to the Beacon target to themself, it is objectively the correct play to play whack-a-mole with the Apex Beacon. This way you benefit both from the 20% increased healing to the target and the Beacon transfer.
Needless to say, this is very unfun gameplay and I hope it is not the intended gameplay.
Furthermore, in raid testing, there were several debuffs that went out on players that used the exact same Icon as the Apex Beacon. I strongly feel, that with the restrictions in buff and debuff tracking, every icon you use for anything needs to be unique, so they are easily distinguishable. Either change the Apex Beacon icon or change the mechanics that use the same icon.
Lightsmith vs Herald
Right now, it is pretty clear that Lightsmith is much stronger than Herald. Some of this is down to positive bugs for Lightsmith and negative bugs for Herald, but the discrepancy is definitely bigger than those bugs.
Obviously, this is a personal opinion, but Lightsmith is still one of the weakest hero talents when it comes to how it feels to play. I find it incredible that Holy Paladin feels worse to play with Lightsmith than it would without a hero talent selected at all.
The Holy Armaments have always been unfun and boring to use. They feel like empty filler gcds. The fact they now proc 2 Hammer and Anvils helps a bit, but it is still just strange to me that they don’t grant Holy Power to cast. Losing Divine Toll / Holy Prism to get Holy Armaments is a sad trade off.
Herald on the other hand feels much more fun. It actually focuses on enhancing your core spec and spells. It makes Holy Shock and spenders more fun to use. It makes your Divine Toll feel much better to press with the free Divine Purpose proc and the two Dawnlights.
Lightsmith is just way too random with Hammer and Anvil, the random Awakening procs, and the random Armament procs. On top of that, most of the power of Lightsmith is tied to extremely boring and mostly useless padding on the tanks with Holy Bulwark.
I hope Lightsmith is changed to be more fun, or that Herald is kept as the best option while Lightsmith stays competitive for the people that for some reason prefer it.