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Paladin Confused with other guides

BountyCze

BountyCze

Authorized
Joined
Oct 6, 2013
Hi,
Its my first time playing on vanilla server as an paladin therefore i looked up some guide but im really confused.
Some talents seems to be illogical and random. I would like to level as a retribution paladin and don't understand this choices people in guides made.

1) Protection Talent - Redoubt - I really dont get this one, unless you are carrying shield with you all the time its useless and yet i see a lot of guides use it. Or maybe its just a tool to get to 3% hit talent...

2) Retribution Talent - Improved Seal of the Crusader - This one i find cool and yet i read that i should use only Seal of Command, so another useless talent or? But atleast there is that 15% Judgement damage.

I just reached level 25 and im not sure if i should go for consecration, since im killing one mob at a time i feel that i wont need it. My rotation : Seal of Crusader (To make sure im using the talent) - judgement - Seal of Command - judgement -> repeat. I would like to know you opinions if im doing it right or you have better rotation.

My talents:
http://db.vanillagaming.org/?talent#sxxzZVuZef0tbcqo

Thanks :innocent:
 
What about 20/0/31? I think its a pretty common spec for soloing and doing some PvP also. As Retribution paladin I would not put any points in Protection as there are better alternatives. I would definitely get Illumination as it turns every critical heal into a free one. That is very valuable. The holy damage increase of Improved Seal of the Crusader might be okay, but I always went for Deflection. With it you have 10 % parry and parrying an attack completely avoids its damage. Also I left out Improved Blessing of Might because at level 60 it gives you + 40 attack power which is not worth the 5 points spent on it in my optinion. I think Benediction is more important as you cast and judge seals very often and if you run out of mana you cannot do anything anymore. That leads me to prefering Divine Intellect to Divine Strength. Managing you mana pool is an important part of playing the class and Divine Intellect helps. I always found Eye for an Eye a very useful talent in PvP against casters. In some fights it really adds up to the damage you do against your opponent and the alternatives in the Retriubtion tree aren't as good as this talent is.

Consecration is very important if you want to tank instances. You don't need any points in Protection to tank low level instances if your group always gives you a few seconds to build up some aggro. But without Consecration it is very hard to hold aggro of multiple mobs. So if you are planning on tanking early on, you have to get that talent as soon as possible.

I think the reason for Redoubt is that you just need to spend some points to get Guardians Favor or Blessing of Kings if you aim for them. And Redoubt is a better alternative than Improved Devotion Aura if you plan to tank from time to time.
 
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I've noticed alot of people use and recommend Seal of Command on here as well, I'd like to see the hard numbers comparing it with Crusader because +40% attack speed seems better than a chance to proc 3/4 of a regular attack. But the numbers may show something different, idk.
 
Crusader should also make your hits weaker, but thanks to this https://vanilla-twinhead.twinstar.cz/?issue=4904 your hits are not weaker, therefore Crusader might actually be worth it. Unless the bug was actually fixed.

In theory, Seal of Command becomes stronger the more damage you have and the more AP you have. Making it simple - attack power is integrated into your base damage. With Crusader, it goes off every attack, you could say 100% of your attack power goes into your attack.
With Command, every Command proc takes 70% of your base damage and gives you another hit at 70% power. So with every Command proc, you could say 170% Attack power goes into your attack.
Damage modifiers will work the same way, for example Vengeance, which adds Physical boost as well as Holy boost. With Crusader, you would be using only half of Vengeance and the bonus to Holy damage would be wasted. With Command, you boost your base damage as well as your Holy damage.

Therefore as long as your Command proc gives you more damage than that AP boost from Crusader, Command should be better.
That means a level 40 paladin using The Pacifier and having Int/Stam gear would be better off to use Crusader. But a level 60 paladin using Darkstone Claymore would be better off to use Command.

* WARNING * Math incoming *

An example http://armory.twinstar.cz/character-sheet.xml?r=Kronos&cn=Spasi my pally is currently wearing int gear, so he has only 500 AP, damage 319-436, average 377 per hit. Speed is 3.8.

SoComm 7 / 60 * 3.8 = 44.3% to proc. In a minute fight, I would swing 60 / 3.8 = 15 times, causing 6 procs on avg. Proc would deal 377 * 0.7 = 263 dmg on avg. 263 dmg times 6 procs would be 1578 extra damage and 377 white damage * 15 hits would deal 5655 (assuming no crits and avoidance), resulting in total 7233 damage over the minute.
Current bugged SoCr would give me 40% speed boost, resulting in 3.8 / 1.4 = 2,71 attack speed. I would swing 60 / 2,71 = 22 times. The added 306 AP would increase my damage by 306 / 14 * 2.71 = 59 damage, so I would deal 377 + 59 = 436 average damage per swing. 22 swings times 436 damage = 9592 total damage over the minute.

With SoCr working blizzlike, your DPS would stay the same, in other words since your speed is faster, your attacks would also deal proportionally less damage. It works as follows - average damage 377 / 3.8 weapon speed = average 99 DPS. SoCr would reduce your swing speed to 2.71, so 99 DPS * 2.71 speed would be only 268 average damage per hit. Adding the AP bonus from SoCr would give you 268 + 59 = 327 average damage per swing. 22 swings times 327 damage = 7194 total damage over the minute.

So you see, current SoCr is really worth it when your damage is low. When it's fixed, it won't be worth it anymore tho :tongue:

However, if you had extra 1500 AP (blessing of might + kings + battle shout + trueshot aura + dps oriented gear)...
1500 AP / 14 = 107 DPS
SoComm: 107 DPS * 3.8 = 407 extra avg. damage. Base hit = 377 + 407 = 784. Seal hit 784 * 0.7 = 548 holy, so over a minute it would make 15 * 784 + 6 * 548 = 15048 total damage.
Bugged SoCr: 107 DPS * 2.71 = 289 extra avg. damage. Base hit 377 + 59 SoCr AP + 289 damage from extra AP = 725 damage per swing * 22 swings = 15950 total damage over a minute.
See how the gap is closing even with bugged SoCr?
Fixed SoCr: 107 DPS * 2.71 = 289 extra avg. damage. Base hit 268 + 59 + 289 = 616 damage per swing * 22 swings = 13552 total damage.

Once again, I'm disregarding critical hits, Holy damage bonus from Sanctity Aura, from Vengeance, etc. I went by the memory, but it's been over a month I'm not playing, so there might be errors. Feel free to check.
 
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frederik said:
What about 20/0/31? I think its a pretty common spec for soloing and doing some PvP also. As Retribution paladin I would not put any points in Protection as there are better alternatives. I would definitely get Illumination as it turns every critical heal into a free one. That is very valuable. The holy damage increase of Improved Seal of the Crusader might be okay, but I always went for Deflection. With it you have 10 % parry and parrying an attack completely avoids its damage. Also I left out Improved Blessing of Might because at level 60 it gives you + 40 attack power which is not worth the 5 points spent on it in my optinion. I think Benediction is more important as you cast and judge seals very often and if you run out of mana you cannot do anything anymore. That leads me to prefering Divine Intellect to Divine Strength. Managing you mana pool is an important part of playing the class and Divine Intellect helps. I always found Eye for an Eye a very useful talent in PvP against casters. In some fights it really adds up to the damage you do against your opponent and the alternatives in the Retriubtion tree aren't as good as this talent is.

Consecration is very important if you want to tank instances. You don't need any points in Protection to tank low level instances if your group always gives you a few seconds to build up some aggro. But without Consecration it is very hard to hold aggro of multiple mobs. So if you are planning on tanking early on, you have to get that talent as soon as possible.

I think the reason for Redoubt is that you just need to spend some points to get Guardians Favor or Blessing of Kings if you aim for them. And Redoubt is a better alternative than Improved Devotion Aura if you plan to tank from time to time.
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Im sorry but that build is pretty weak. Im not an elitist and believe you should play the class and role you enjoy and find most fun, no wrong in that. But lets discuss the talent choices and why you would even consider using them.
First off: Consecration is awesome no matter what build/role you have. Cons adds another damage ability in between judgements (8/10 sec cd) and autoattacks and its essential even when soloing one mob simply because it adds another damage ability to press while doing nothing waiting for that next judgement, its not like you have anything else to waste you GCD on anyway. You should also have different ranks of Consecration on your actionsbars and use it accordingly with mana management.

Improved Seal of the Crusader is another must-have. You seal up SotCr, judge the boss with Crusader to get debuff, switch to command or stick with SotCrusader, thats a valid discussion I guess, but picking Imp Seal of the Crusader talents is not up for discussion, its a must-have core ability if you wanna ret.

The reason you pick Redoubt is because devotion aura is useless (you wont use it ever) and Redoubt gives you the ability to quickly switch to sword & board to offtank if needed in raids/instances. Its all about getting 3/3 Precision though, which is a must-have most of vanilla unless you get hit capped by gear alone, which you wont at this stage.

Divine Intellect is worthless. Yes, mana is an issue and needed to be managed in other ways but you wont use much intellect gear for that tiny 10% to be worthy, you WILL on the other hand use loads of strength gear so that 10% in Divine Strength is a must-have for all (except healers).

Why you use Unyielding Faith, Illumination and Eye for an Eye is beyond me (you pvp much? respec entirely for pvp build in that case, its cheap on Kronos)

Repentence is also kinda worthless, sure its just one point and you could take it as a spare filler I guess but it doesnt help retribution damage whatsoever and points could be better placed elsewhere.

BountyCze has a pretty flawless setup going on his OP, minus Guardian Favor/Repentence for me personally but thats just 2 spare points not essential.

Edit: Noticed the original posts in the thread were kinda old so I guess I necroed abit but still worth to throw in some opinions. Rets are already struggling alot to get into groups and are not considered viable by the elitists mixmaxer's so having some really misplaced talents that straight out lowers our dps even further (not picking Imp Seal of the Crusader for example) will hurt us and our struggle for acceptance even more
 
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Magnifican said:
Im sorry but ...
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When I recommended that build I had PvP in mind, it is not a PvE build. Thats why I chose Eye for an Eye, Repentance, Pursuit of Justice and Unyielding Faith. The build suits more my playstyle (I play solo most of the time, do world PvP and heal in groups) but I have seen very similar builds often.

Consecration is awesome but when levelling I never spam it because I don't want to drink that often. I use it mostly for tanking or spamming rank 1 when I know a rogue is around.

The damage bonus from Improved Seal of the Crusader is just 45 AP or 21 additional Holy Damage when judged. I tried it out and the increased damage was not that much. I took parrying instead. It may make a difference when doing instances as damage dealer because the fights last longer, but in groups I prefer healing. When I am alone fights usually don't last that long to make it a big difference.

Divine Intellect was a preference for me because I like to heal in groups. It not only raises my mana pool but also my chance to get critical heals and therefore get my mana back. If you are healing in groups then this is in my opinion superior to Divine Strength.

In PvE Repentance is pretty useless, but in PvP it gives you the ability to prevent an enemy to get some distance, lets you heal yourself up and allows you use Judgement of Command for improved damage. Pretty useful there I think. Altough Divine Favor for a free critical heal is pretty awesome too.
 
In PvE soloing, Repentance is also not useless :wink:

Reading your explanation about how you prefer healing, I would really expect you to take Divine Favor instead of Repe tho.
 
Psojed said:
In PvE soloing, Repentance is also not useless :wink:

Reading your explanation about how you prefer healing, I would really expect you to take Divine Favor instead of Repe tho.
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I switched between those but got Repentance instead of Divine Favor because I tend to get nervous in PvP (although I enjoy it) and it kind of gives one panic button more :)
 
frederik said:
When I recommended that build I had PvP in mind, it is not a PvE build. Thats why I chose Eye for an Eye, Repentance, Pursuit of Justice and Unyielding Faith. The build suits more my playstyle (I play solo most of the time, do world PvP and heal in groups) but I have seen very similar builds often.

Consecration is awesome but when levelling I never spam it because I don't want to drink that often. I use it mostly for tanking or spamming rank 1 when I know a rogue is around.

The damage bonus from Improved Seal of the Crusader is just 45 AP or 21 additional Holy Damage when judged. I tried it out and the increased damage was not that much. I took parrying instead. It may make a difference when doing instances as damage dealer because the fights last longer, but in groups I prefer healing. When I am alone fights usually don't last that long to make it a big difference.
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Ah, that explains it. I thought you were talking about an PVE retri build, soloing dont count imo ^^ Without dualspec having a seperate build just for soloing normally seems very expansive, but then I forgot about the cheap respec we got on Kronos. Should be fine to respec in between raids/dungeons I think.

Sorry if I sounded like bashing your build or something, im normally extremely lenient and all about playing what one finds the most fun etc, I was just kinda chocked there was no Imp Seal of the Crusader but now I understand your reasoning. Though I personally think its worth to have it even for soloing, as well as Consecration, partly because we dont have much else to press in between in between judgement cooldowns, and partly because its a dps increase.

When I say you "should" use SotCr its not for the AP bonus - using the seal all the time is normally a bad idea (except its bugged on Kronos so you dont get lower damage, only 40% faster swings which is big buff) - but normally you use Crusader for the Judgement debuff as an opener, then throw out Consecration which does alot more damage with Crusader debuff on the mob combined with Sanctity aura which gives another 10% holy dmg (here is also why Devotion aura is useless for us, we either use sanctity or retribution aura in PVE, both solo and in groups, retribution in cases to help tanks with threat)

Mana is never an issue for me, from time to time I switch to Seal of Wisdom http://vanilla-twinhead.twinstar.cz/?spell=20166 in between instead of Seal of Command as the usual go to, to get the mana back, you can even use higher ranks of Consecration and you wont go out of mana if you seal-juggle as needed, mana management is fun and makes hybrids more challanging :) ...or you could throw a Blessing of Wisdom for a minute or two to regain some mana (although that takes away to much damage later on from BoMight so not really worth, be sure to switch back ASAP.)
 
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I always pick Consecration as I think it is useful in many situations. I also use Judgement of the Crusader to increase holy damage on mobs that don't die too fast. I just prefer 10 % chance to parry to the increased holy damage. I don't use Consecration when soloing that much because against a single target it is basically the damage of a swing over 8 seconds for tons of mana. And when I screwed up and pulled a ton of mobs I conserve my mana for healing. But I am only level 46 now. The times when I had a level 60 Paladin are long gone. So my opinion on that might change. I can't remember exactly what I did on retail.
 
Personally I also tend to favor the Parry instead of holy damage. I always remind myself that I only get a percentage from that 21 additional holy damage.

And since we opened up the levelling discussion, I will mention the Imp. Retribution Aura, which is godlike for levelling full ret from the start. Monsters autoatack you non-stop, so dealing guaranteed damage back is always welcome, and you will probably deal more damage than using Consecration, at the expense of some armor.
 
Is Improved Retribution Aura better than Sanctity Aura when leveling or do you just reset your talent points when you have enough points available to get it?
 
It's definitely better. You can keep the improved ret aura for dungeons too, it adds more aggro to your tank. I usually reset the talent points when I need to, so as long as you can stay ret it's mighty fine. Let's say you hit 56 and learn the final rank which has 20 dmg return, with talent that's 30 dmg return.

Quick math - you have Kang the Decapitator, adding about 600 AP you'll get about avg. 330 damage per swing, so avg. 227 Command hits. Sanctity aura adds 10% holy, therefore +27 damage per proc, multiplied by 7 PPM gives ~189 extra damage.
Taking a normal monster hitting at 2.00 speed, it hits you 30 times in a minute, 30 * 30 holy damage return = 900 extra damage. No contest :yes:
 
Thanks for crunching the numbers Psojed! I think I'm gonna do some DPS tests over a long period of time to see if Command beats out Crusader with my current gear/build. If you guys are interested in the results I'll post them up here for sure. :) I'll be sure to fight the same level and same type of mob, and to run tests for atleast 15-30 mins so we can get a good idea of the averages of the two, though I'm pretty sure Pso's already got it covered.
 
I use full AP/strength/crit gear (0 spell power) in raids and still Seal of Command outperforms Seal of The Crusader. That should be evidence enough.
 
Psojed has a very good point when it comes to soloing. Sure Retri aura gives more damage output than sanctity aura then, when mobs are actually hitting you. My posts were mainly for group PvE and when it comes to that, you will use Sanctity aura as a way to maximize our already struggling dps. Tank threat is nice but if they struggle there is usually couple of holy pallies in raids and one could always use Ret aura, thats not your job as retri.
If I want to avoid respec every time between group content and soloing I rather just switch auras and use normal retribution aura instead of wasting 2 precious points into improved ret aura, which only gives 10 extra damage solo but does nothing for you in groups. Just my two cents anyway. Psojed is a very experienced pally from what i've gathered so his advise should be taken anyday :wub:

bl4ckc0d3r said:
I use full AP/strength/crit gear (0 spell power) in raids and still Seal of Command outperforms Seal of The Crusader. That should be evidence enough.
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That's great! We only use judgement of the crusader then and back to seal of command, just like it should be! sweet (also gives us a little more seal juggling, always more fun)
 
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