First disclaimer: I have never played a Holy Paladin. So I don't have any idea what issues Healadins are dealing with these days. I do now have a healer (a Monk, who is one level away from Pandaria) but I can't really say much about the overall healing issues.
But, I've got my tankadin, and I've done a fair amount of DPS on him, so let's talk issues.
Multi-Spec Gearing:
Actually, Holy Paladins are finally going to have their biggest remaining issue solved - Intellect Plate will now be interchangeable with Strength Plate. Sure, Healadins might not be so happy about this (having to share their gear - though given how common the new loot style is and will be, it doesn't make a huge difference.)
Actually, just as Death Knights kind of got a head start on "Active Mitigation tanking," Protection Paladins kind of stepped into the new gearing paradigm an expansion early. These days, Tankadins favor Haste, then Mastery, and then avoidance stats (meaning it's very rare for you to every seek out Dodge or Parry.) It actually works out quite well, because Retribution also favors Haste then Mastery. We do have three new secondary stats coming in 6.0, but if these stats retain the value they have now, it really means that a Prot/Ret Paladin can really use the same armor for either spec and not have to worry at all about having off-pieces to optimize.
As a class that can use Strength or Intellect, Paladins stand to benefit greatly from the stat-switching nature of the new gear. I don't actually know if weapons and shields will also do the switch, but if they do, this could make a Prot/Holy Paladin very, very happy. We'll still need to gather accessories like rings, trinkets, necklaces and cloaks, but that's a hell of a lot less off-spec gear to hoard.
Consecration:
This is less of a necessity and more of a desire. They are trying to cut down on button bloat, but it seems to me that Retribution at least ought to get to use Consecration again. It's such an iconic Paladin ability. As a tank, you'd have to pry it away from my cold, dead hands, but it has great flavor to it and it's just such a great-looking ability, even though the graphic for it hasn't been updated since vanilla.
Downtime and Fillers:
Sanctity of Battle is basically a core part of the class now. Essentially, ability cool downs are now our main resource. We are thus rewarded for stacking haste by getting to do things more frequently.
For Retribution, pretty much any ability you have that doesn't cost Holy Power generates it. This has done a lot to make the build up to Templar's Verdict far quicker. Overall, I think Retribution is in an ok place with these abilities. The one issue, though, is that this cool down-based system for abilities automatically requires a bit of button bloat. Take a Rogue for example. They get to use more abilities thanks to haste, and thus generate more combo points, but they can basically hit the same ability. Assassination, for example, uses Mutilate and Dispatch when they are able to (either in Execute range or thanks to a Proc.) Ret has twice as many abilities, with Crusader Strike, Judgment, Exorcism, and Hammer of Wrath. Admittedly, my Ret action bar isn't exactly crowded, but given how similar many of these abilities feel, it might be good to consolidate them, or perhaps just try to give them better identities.
Protection, on the other hand, has true filler spells. Consecration doesn't generate Holy Power, but as I said before, don't you dare take it away from us. Hammer of Wrath is there, but doesn't generate any HoPo, and as I said in the Death Knight article, Tanks probably don't need execute abilities. Finally, there's Holy Wrath. Now, I like Holy Wrath, mainly because you can usually ignore it until you need it. Yes, you should technically be using it whenever everything else is on cool down, but I often like to save it to get some snap-threat on a group of adds. Consecration is obviously useful for maintaining threat on a large group, but Holy Wrath will get their attention.
Still, I wonder if you could get rid of Holy Wrath simply by removing the need for a target on Hammer of the Righteous. If you could hit that regardless of whether there's someone in melee range (and only generate Holy Power if it does hit someone) it would basically serve the same purpose (minus the conditional stun.)
It's really just that when you've got Monks who can do Spinning Crane Kick at basically any time, or Death Knights who can usually spam Blood Boil a bit, a Paladin gets jealous of his former glorious status as the king of AoE tanking.
Mana:
The role of Mana for Paladins is pretty well tied to the notion of Downtime. With the exception of Holy Paladins (who are more conventional healer-casters,) Mana is basically utterly irrelevant to Paladins. Yes, if you're casting heals, you might run out, but a Strength-based Paladin can basically ignore mana.
The question is: what role does mana play as a limiting factor? With all of our abilities on cool downs and our super-high mana regeneration, we might as well not have the resource.
But perhaps that's best. After all, back in the days when Ret could run out of mana (Prot didn't because of Spiritual Attunement, at least if they were taking enough damage,) gearing was a nightmare. Cataclysm tried to introduce a bit of mana management, such as the super-expensive Consecration, but we clearly all hated that.
Overall, the least controversial solution is to just do nothing. Mana keeps tanks and melee from spamming heals, and that's basically its role.
Alternatively, and something far more likely to infuriate people, is to do something similar to Monks. Tanking and DPS Monks use Energy, but healing Monks use Mana, thanks to the Stance of the Wise Serpent. Monks are, in many ways, similar to Paladins (Paladins are already a quasi-monastic order in the first place - just more Western-style.) Perhaps if modern design philosophy had existed when WoW first started, Paladins might have used something like Energy.
Would this be good for them? Eh... I'm hesitant to say so. While I think a Paladin's rotation could become far more dynamic (and abilities would have to really distinguish themselves to be justified,) I also think the backlash could be catastrophic. And while I was on board with the switch to Focus from Mana for Hunters, if I'm honest, I don't really enjoy playing them as much as I used to (though the rampant button-bloat for Hunters is also an issue.)
Holy Paladins, Batman!
All this aside, I think that Paladins have largely made it through Mists decently. It was very strange switching to Haste gear, but that's clearly the way that the wind is blowing. We have a lot to look forward to in WoD, especially now that we can carry far less off-spec gear. Also, and I think this is maybe the most exciting thing: we'll actually be able to get gear that looks like the Paladin tier for non-healing roles!
No comments:
Post a Comment