Wednesday, September 10, 2014

Spec in Focus: Retribution 6.0

Retribution is one of the specs I think is getting the benefit of the ability squish. In most regards, Ret is much the way it is in Mists. You still have access to your many Hand utility spells (though I think Salvation is out) and you still have all the heals you have on live, plus Divine Shield and Protection. The HoPo generators are all still there as well - Crusader Strike/Hammer of the Righteous, Judgment, and Exorcism. Exorcism still has its cool down reset on occasion, but this is now part of the Exorcism tooltip and not the passive Art of War. Functionally it's more or less identical.

The only big changes for Ret are Finishers and Cooldowns. First off: Guardian of Ancient Kings is gone. It's a bit of a shame, because it was kind of cool to effectively have a Holy version of the Shadowmourne effect as a cool down, but CDs were one of the major targets for the ability squish, and rather than stacking up those two, you'll now just use Avenging Wrath. AW still works the same way.

On finishers: Inquisition is flat-out gone. That might suggest that the rotation would get very boring, as you'd spend all your Holy Power on Templar's Verdict. However, some things alter that. First, and most importantly, is that the Ret t16 4-piece bonus is now one of the Perks you'll get while leveling in Draenor. So Divine Storm is now enshrined as part of the single-target rotation as a proc that makes it free and deal extra damage. What this means also is that Ret can now be a very proc-focused spec, with Enhanced Divine Storm, Exorcism, and Divine Purpose if you take it. Personally, I love the change, as responding to the DS proc is, to me, much more compelling gameplay than simply maintaining Inquisition (I also never liked the name Inquisition, as that's a word I associate more with religious hypocrisy than actual righteousness - don't get me wrong, I think there's a place for playing Lawful Evil or Lawful Neutral Paladins, but it's not WoW, where, with the exception of the Scarlet Crusade or on rare occasion Twilight's Hammer, Paladins are defined more by the Good axis in the old alignment chart.)

Most of the talents are the same. The new level 100 ones are markedly different. Empowered Seals allows you to opt in to Seal Twisting, the way that we used to do it back in the Old Days. Essentially, when you cast Judgment, the seal you currently have active will grant you a 20-second buff. At the very least, in a PvE setting, Ret is going to want to keep up the effects of Truth and Righteousness, though Insight and Justice have their uses as well. Seraphim then is a kind of short-term CD that costs a whopping 5 Holy Power (the only ability to do so,) but increases effectively all the secondary stats for several seconds - namely Haste, Crit, Mastery, Multistrike, and possibly Bonus Armor or Spirit for Prot/Holy. Finally, for those of you who don't want to deal with a CD or a crazy new (old) play style, there's Final Verdict, which replaces Templar's Verdict. This does pure Holy Damage and has you smash the target with a giant Light Hammer. It then increases the damage and radius of your next Divine Storm by 100%. I'm not sure what the intention is with this - earlier it was tuned such that you'd want to alternate FV and DS even without the DS proc, but in the latest build you'll still probably want to hold off on DS unless you get the proc. On the other hand, Final Verdict is probably worth mixing into your AoE rotation, given as the doubled DS damage pays off any debts it incurs, and of course on top of that it makes those DS's more likely to hit everything you want them to.

Ret's stat attunement is in Mastery. I expect that Haste will still be very attractive, if not more than Mastery, but just as it is today, you'll hardly be unhappy to see Mastery on your gear.

I imagine Ret will be pretty fun to play come Warlords. Much of its fussiness is gone and it has become more interactive and dynamic. For those who miss the fussiness, you'll have Empowered Seals to play with (which has a cool visual.)

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