Holy Paladin P8 - Tier Set Bonus Feedback

In Development Season of Discovery Patch 1.15.7 PTR
1

I personally am of the opinion that the currently proposed P8 Holy Paladin set bonuses are thoroughly lacklustre, and furthermore represent a fundamental lack of understanding of the spec and how it functions - both on paper and in practice.

2-Set - Lay on Hands also grants you 20% spell haste for 1 min.
To start with the good.

This is a fine bonus and in theory (despite demanding that we remain firmly tethered to our current T3 2p to mitigate Lay on Hands’ otherwise prohibitive cooldown) the idea of a 20% uptime personal mini-Heroism meshes well with our playstyle.

That said, from a practicality standpoint I do have some concerns regarding the GCD cap. With T3 gearing, Holy Light is already nearing the baseline GCD whilst under the effects of Light’s Grace. With a 1.28 second cast time on Flash of Light, as of writing this it is impossible to buffer sequential casts of the latter cleanly.

4-Set - (Originally) Casting Holy Light, Flash of Light, or Divine Light on your Beacon of Light target causes you to gain 100% of the spell’s base mana cost.
This was concerning. Holy Paladins have functionally, in a raid environment, been privy to infinite Mana since P4 - P3 even assuming the presence of a Shadow Priest. The notion that we would forfeit the vital role that Beacon of Light plays in our kit for the sake of a Mana refund effect is quite frankly asinine to me.

This was not proposed by someone that understands the spec. Much in the same way that the initially proposed T2.5-set bonus suggested that we heal our Beacon of Light to splash 30% to a nearby (random) ally instead of merely… healing that ally directly and allowing Beacon to transfer 75% to its target?

Ironically enough, it even came as direct anti-synergy to our currently proposed 6-set bonus, which I shall touch on shortly.

4-Set - (Current) Your Beacon of Light now also triggers when you heal your Beacon of Light target, but at 50% reduced effectiveness.
This is… better? It no longer directly opposes our 6-set; in fact, it synergises well with it.

The issue is that more single target healing has never been something that SoD Holy Paladins have ever needed, nor asked for.

We have already replaced Flash of Light with Holy Light, and we have long been healing our fellow co-Healers and DPS from 1-100% in a single cast - oftentimes with thousands of overhealing to spare.

Of course, should the Scarlet Enclave come with unprecedented levels of Tank damage - the likes of which would demand our full throughput on a single target at all times, then perhaps this current iteration of our 4-set could shine. I do however find this unlikely.

6-Set - An additional 25% of your healing is transferred to your Beacon of Light target.
This is just… sad.

First and foremost yes, this is strong. Regardless of whether it is additive or multiplicative, it synergises well with our currently proposed 4-set and is, in the most boring terms imaginable, worthwhile.

Going into P5 (BWL) Beacon of Light was nerfed from 100% down to 75%. It stung, of course, but evidently the consensus was that we needed it.

My core issue with it is… why now? And why… like this? If you feel that we need it, why are we not getting it in the form of a walk-back of the original nerf? Why is it being stapled to a 6-set?

It has no effect on our gameplay, it’s unimaginative, it’s debatably unnecessary, but most of all it just feels bad. Our carrot, the final culmination of our set’s power, the thing that many people strive for in a tier… is - in a best case scenario - simply undoing a nerf.

Disenfranchised would be an understatement.

2

There is time for change. Just look at the shadow priest changes.

Your post is good and I agree but finish the post. As a holy paladin, what do you want to see? What do you think would be a fair but suitable tier set bonus for the “final” phase.

Issue is holy paladin is so insanely strong at single target healing that you can’t expect to have too much AoE healing because you would become the only healer required.

Here is my suggestion for a cool holy paladin final tier set. Drop yours down, I am hoping they read the ptr discussion section more than the whinefest general chat.

2pc - Healing your beacon of light, inspires all nearby party/raid members increasing their healing received (by all healers not just the paladin) by 3-5% stacking up to 3 times for 10 seconds (numbers can be tweaked)

4pc - Critical heals on your beacon of light. Reduce the cool down of Avenging Wrath by 1 second.

6pc - During Avenging Wrath, all single target heals cast (on any player) will also heal their party members for 10%

3

I deliberately avoided adding my own suggestions so as to not give the impression that I simply dislike the currently proposed set bonuses because they aren’t “what I want”.

I can understand and respect this, yes. I personally have always lobbied against giving Holy Paladins meaningful AoE healing for SoD simply because thematically that isn’t what I picked the spec to do, however I do not think that limitation excuses the way they have been handled as a spec.

Against my better judgement I shall rattle off a few ideas based on different aspects of our kit.

Judgements:
2-Set - Your Judgements of Light and Wisdom can now always be applied to a target in addition to any already existing Judgement of Light or Wisdom effects.

4-Set - Party and raid members that trigger your Judgements become Sanctified, reducing the damage that they take by X for 12 seconds. Sanctified allies that trigger your Judgement grant you Y% of the Health or Mana received by its effect.

6-Set - Dealing damage with Holy Shock rallies your Sanctified allies, refreshing its duration and causing them to receive 500% increased effect from your Judgements for 12 seconds. This effect can not occur more than once every X seconds.

Beacon of Light:
2-Set - Your Beacon of Light effect persists for 4 seconds after it changes target.

4-Set - Casting Beacon of Light on a target grants them X% increased healing received from all sources for 10 seconds. This effect can not occur on the same target more than once every Y seconds.

6-Set - Your Beacon of Light now also applies to healing done by your Fanaticism Rune.

Consecration:
2-Set - Your Hallowed Ground Rune’s healing is reduced by X%, it now heals all party and raid members with its effect. Additionally, your Beacon of Light now also casts Consecration whenever you do.

4-Set - Holy Light and Flash of Light casts reduce the mana cost and increase the radius of your next Consecration by 25%, stacking up to 4 times.

6-Set - Your Consecration moves with you and your Beacon of Light, granting all party and raid members within its effect X% increased movement speed and Y% damage reduction.

4

Some very cool ideas there.

Consecration set is a funky idea, not sure about the moving with u, but the other 2 bits are nice.

Lingering Beacon is also cool , but would 4 seconds be long enough?

5

The numbers are very much just feelscraft, and I’d prefer to lowball them when making suggestions where possible.

The goal of me suggesting 4 seconds was to not feasibly permit more than one “bonus” heal via the lingering effect, working sort of like a Trail of Light passive that Priests have had in some expansions.

A 4 second window would grant you one baseline 2.5 second Holy Light factoring in Light’s Grace and the 1.5 GCD, but it could of course be more or less lenient at the team’s discretion.

My main gripe (and thus the point of my suggestions) is that our gameplay is horrifically stale. With our infinite mana pool we ironically have fewer moment-to-moment decisions to make in SoD than our Classic Era counterparts do, so having additional things to press or consider for even moderate gain would be (in my opinion) appreciated.

The “lol now u overheal ur beacon for 10k instead of 5k” of our currently proposed slew of set bonuses is not only uninteresting and unnecessary but runs counterintuitive to what Beacon of Light as a spell would suggest.

6

Yea, I am all about the fun playstyles, its always fun to talk over tier set possibilities. You never know, Blizz might see some :slight_smile:

1 Like
7

Another Tier Set pass and no mention of anything changing for us.

Currently, our only “interesting” set bonus (2pc) could very well be actively detrimental after Lay on Hands drops our Holy Light cast below 1.5 seconds.

Is this the best we can hope for?

8

For curiosity’s sake, I decided to hand ChatGPT the following prompt:

Please propose three separate “set bonuses” for Holy Paladins in World of Warcraft’s Season of Discovery. All three bonuses should be synergistic, coming together to form a cohesive tier set that focuses primarily on their strength as single-target spot healers while promoting interesting new takes on their core gameplay. Please avoid absorption effects as well as “AoE-healing” where possible.

Format your suggestion as follows:

2-set:
4-set:
6-set:

After three attempts at generation (on account of ChatGPT thinking that I was referring to Cataclysm), I was presented with yet another infinitely more interesting suggestion:

Certainly! Here’s a set of tier bonuses designed to elevate Holy Paladins’ role as powerful single-target spot healers, promoting interesting gameplay mechanics while staying away from absorption effects and AoE healing.

Holy Paladin Tier Set Bonuses (Season of Discovery)

2-set:
Casting Flash of Light, Holy Light or Divine Light on a target grants you Shock and Awe, increasing the healing of your next Holy Shock by 25% for 8 seconds. This effect can stack up to 2 times.

4-set:
Healing with Holy Shock consumes your Shock and Awe. Each stack consumed in this manner reduces the cast time of your next Holy Light or Divine Light, or increases the healing of your next Flash of Light by 50%.

6-set:
Your critical heals with Flash of Light, Holy Light and Divine Light grant 2 stacks of Shock and Awe. Consuming a stack of Shock and Awe reduces the cooldown of your Holy Shock by 3 seconds.