I feel like Blizzard dislikes Holy Paladin being a "melee healer"

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Midnight Alpha Test Development Notes - In Development / Midnight Alpha Test - World of Warcraft Forums

First they remove Crusader strike, now they nerf Avenging Crusader in the Alpha… What comes next? Removing Auto Attack for Holy Paladin as well?

At this point, they wear melee weapons merely for show, not for use. If this stays I say Holy Paladins should be able to wear staffs as well and transmog them because that’s basically what we will be if these changes don’t get reverted… A glorified Priest in plate armor… :roll_eyes:

Feedback on the attempt from Blizzard

How about separating both playstyles into their own specs? Holy Paladin remains 1hand/shield as a caster. The other spec is called something like, idk, “Inquisitor” and is focused on melee healing with 2-hand intellect melee weapons OR optionally 2x 1-hand melee intellect weapons.

  • Holy Paladin is centered around
    • casting healing spells like Holy Light, Flash of Light and Holy shock
    • Beacons of Light and Blessings being handed out.
    • Holy Paladin is Mana-Based.
  • Inquisitor Paladin as a new thematical spec is centered around healing:
    • partially through attacks like Crusader Strikes/Hammer of Wrath/Judgement and Avenging Crusader.
    • using Word of Glory for single target and an improved “Light of (Sacred) Dawn” spell that works like the old cone ability, but with much stronger, compressed healing values (could be a charge-up like some Drachtyr attacks)
    • utilizing Damage-Absorbing Blessings (like Blessing of Sacrifice) to prevent damage on allies and having their own set of Beacon spells that not heal but convert a portion of damage suffered into healing, while the other portion is transferred to you as the healer as damage taken.
    • Inquisitor Paladin is Holy Power based.

That way Holy Paladin can become the “Glorified Priest in Armor” casting spells, while the Inquisitor can be thematically the “Fanatical Paladin that suffers the pain for the allies instead” using instant CD spells.

You (Blizzard) could even make it an unlockable spec from a Questline with Arathor in Midnight… Like the Support-spec for Evoker was in Dragonflight Season 2.

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I mean if they keep AVenging Wrath at 90 sec cd why would I use Avenging Crusader, ever? They are improving Holy Paladin’s AoE heal/mulitple target heals in general, something the spec lacked for a long time.
I personally never liked the melee heal aspect, but to each their own ofc.

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Then make it 2 separate specializations. Make one focused on casting and ranged healing spells. The other about instant spells and melee build-up healing.

One is Holy. The other could be called, idk, “Inquisitor” or something.

But ruining one liked playstyle in favor of another will make fans of the ruined playstyle more likely quit the spec than actually try and adapt to it.

And honestly, so far it does look like I will stop healing as Paladin as my main spec, something that wasn’t the case for the past 3 YEARS!

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Ain’t gonna happen. Blizz always had this “we have a vision how a class should work” and then they just went that way.
On the other hand Alpha still has a long way to go, it’s possible they will change a couple of things.

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Well, guess they should be fine then with people like me quitting healing. A role people like me are better at than any other role in the game.

Kinda sad that I see myself encouraged to play a mediocre DD over a good Healer as my role.

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for 6 expacs holy pala was ranged and rarely if at all mele. i for 1 and many others would love a return to pre cata days of holy pala.

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The only iteration of holy paladin I’ve liked since wotlk times was BFA, with vision of perfection.

Every other iteration has felt really clunky to play to me. It was so good to be rid of holy power but then they reimplemented it in SL.

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Personally I like Holy Power more as a system than pure CDs. But that’s preference.

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Um… I hate melee healing, really hate it. Especially in pvp. OP, you’re talking about pve, right? Suppose so. But imagine melee healing in pvp.
:skull_and_crossbones:
They can’t make 2 healing specs.
I am not very hyped about the incoming changes because I prefer to stay realistic. Even if the idea is good, the implementation might be a complete failure.
But I am for “A glorified Priest in plate armor”. This is what the paladin’s idea is, after all, isn’t it. Melee healer is rather a Retribution (fighter) with heals. I play for a long time and only holy in all game areas (pvp, pve), and when they made the holy paladin melee healer, it was like they killed the spec for me.

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You aren’t forced to melee heal as Holy Pala in PvP even. Crusader strike can be easily neglected instead for Holy Light and Flash of Light when using the passive “Tower of Radiance”. Just make sure you aren’t constantly interrupted.

They can. Priest has 2 healing specs.

No, the idea of a Paladin is a a Priest wearing armor, not reluctant to enforcing violence for the sake of the greater good. They are basically Knights/Templars with actual Holy Powers.

THAT is the idea of a Paladin. In WoWs lore however, they are Priests that were trained to be Knights and vice versa Knights trained to use the powers of a Priest.

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I mean they can’t make 2 healing specs and keep the other two (retri and prot) :slight_smile:

This is Retribution Paladin, not Holy. Holy pala for me is first and foremost a healer, so it’s closer to a priest wearing plate armor than an offensive knight.

In history indeed paladins are knights who embraced faith. But in game lore…not sure is there a lore specifically for holy paladins?

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They absolutely can. Have you seen Druid and Priest? Both have 1 role as duplicate specs.

Especially Druid with its 2 DD specs is the entire leverage against your argument.

https://imgur.com/a/too0hoN

What is a Paladin for you and me is not relevant. What is relevant is the official definition of a Paladin in Fantasy.

In fantasy, a paladin is a holy knight or warrior who is a champion of a cause, justice, or a religion, often wielding heavy armor, a shield, and holy magic. They are typically depicted as righteous and virtuous, adhering to a strict moral code or code of honor, with abilities that blend martial combat with divine powers like healing.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Character_class

See text section “In fantasy games and role-playing games” in that article.

A Paladin is a Warrior/Knight that follows a creed or deity with martial combat skills and abilities such as healing and divine power infused attacks/spells.

That IS the definition of a Paladin class.

In WoW it only happens to be explained in the lore that both Knights with faith into the Holy Light and Priests with willingness to learn to fight were trained to become Paladins. The lore doesn’t specify if they are any of the specializations specifically. They are the “base class” in lore books and only their use of the Light defines on an individual basis which of the 3 classic RPG roles they fill.

Take 2 famous Paladins for example. Tirion Fordring was a Retribution Paladin, hence Ashbringer is also their artifact weapon. Meanwhile Lady Liadrin, a former Quel’dorei Priest, is a Protection Paladin in fighting style, appearance and personality.

The specialization doesn’t define what the core class fantasy is. Only which aspects the player focuses on.

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is that wow lore or random another game lore? because it is nothing to do with wow if its about another game.

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Holy pal has always been a complete mess of no clear spec identity and contradicting ranged, melee, defensive, offensive and support abilities that don’t work together. I’ve never understood what blizzards problem is. Either make it a ranged defensive healer or a melee offensive healer, just pick one and stick with it.
It’s trying to be everything all at once and end up sucking at everything and the only way they manage to make it any “good” is by completely overtuning it to the point you can ignore its crap design.

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I keep saying this. For every class, when it works, keep it that way!

And about holy paladin; they kept reworking and reworking and reworking. In s1 Dragonflight it actually was a really good spec. But then they changed the main paladin talent tree in s1 for ret/prot and we holy got shafted.
Then in s2 half way they reworked holy way more to the spell casting version, because blizz didnt liked it we were ignoring Infusion of Light procs. They half butchered the spec.

I do not care what version of holy blizz wants, but at least make a choice. Stick to it and improve it that way. Do not try to invent the wheel multiple times per expansion. Just stop it. That is how we got into the current crap (and i stopped playing holy because of it).

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Move aside and make way for new class the devourer in midnight .all other classes and specs will feel underpower compare to it :smirk:

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It’s a wikipedia/language definition of what a Paladin is.

As for the lore, I already said that the lore of WoW isn’t that relevant to dictate what the generic class fantasy of a Paladin is.

Devourer can’t heal others tho!

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So not what a WoW paladin is basically a priest in plate as shown via the order hall in Legion 2019,its there lore not generic.

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Here is my cup of tea on the subject:

What is the point of having heavy plate armour and a shield (or massive 2-hander) if you are going to sit next to the mage in Narnia?

Imo. A Holy Pal belongs in melee. He is a Priest that wanted to get close to melee (some crazy/overzealous priest), but realized he needed extra protection. So he slapped some plate and a shield.

DONE. :blush:

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You played many years so you know what holy pala was like for many expacs and was well loved and liked before it became a melee dps and using holy power which pushed away a lot of old school holy paladins to go ret or prot.

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