Patch 5.2 interview with Dave Kosak
Inside an old alt's vault
The latest patch 5.2 news
All of the latest Mists of Pandaria newsPaladins nerfed on the beta
by Adam Holisky 
Oct 25th 2008 at 1:00PM
Most of the changes are centering around the Retribution tree. Some are pretty crazy, like Seal of Corruption dealing holy damage, and Divine Storm dealing physical damage. There is no indication if these changes will make it into patch 3.0.3 or arrive in a later update.
There's a couple of other changes that stick out for me.
- Seal of Command lost about 20% of it's overall damage
- Most other seals were reduced by around 13% to 21%
- Judgement of the Wise grants 15% of base mana instead of 33%
- Most other judgement effects are reduced by about 15%
- Art of War was retooled to increase damage of Judgement, Crusader Strike, and Divine Storm instead of increasing critical strike damage
And finally, Blessing of Might now increases AP by 306. It used to be 305. So it's not a total nerf...
Filed under: Paladin, Analysis / Opinion, News items
Reader Comments (Page 5 of 7)
supersaint Oct 25th 2008 3:00PM
Can't cry for my pally alt right now, I'm still waiting for a rework of the half-baked Demo tree.
Mo Oct 25th 2008 3:03PM
FInally we were given fair treatment. Finally we were able to compete on an even playing-field with the rest. Finally it was balanced. It was completely legitimate, and should stay the way it is. I deserve to two-shot anyone I see. I deserve to keep my mana going non-stop, no matter how much key-mashing I do, and still have the ballz to call myself a "skilled player". I deserve to keep my super-shield, along with my array of super-heals...I deserve to out-heal the most healing-specific classes, out-dps the most damage-specific classes, and remain invulnerable while doing it. This is fair, and I expect nothing less.
Blizz is only changing things because of the QQ'ing going on. My astronomical DPS and survivability have nothing to do with it. Blizz doesn't look at numbers; not to see how classes are performing, and not to crunch them to see how they might be changed. They ONLY look at forums and resond to the winds of change according to the rest of you.
Just because every other class whines about any given deficiency in their class as being outrageous, doesn't mean I'm wrong complaining about any of my super-powers being changed. Bring me down to earth will you? I'm a Paladin, dammit. I deserve it all.
=)
Ok...was feeling a little obnoxious there. Pallies, I have to give you credit for keeping straight faces when saying things to the effect of "it's totally fair and balanced the way it is currently". The rest of WoW is getting a good chuckle at your protests; Guess what?
We're still gonna be gunning for you in every BG, world, and Arena pvp situation you find yourselves in. Good luck.
It took about a week for the world to hate you guys, in general. Expect it to take far, far longer for that to go away. I'd hope the DKs provide enough distraction when the time comes.
Eternauta Oct 25th 2008 3:23PM
You're stupid and gay.
dean.speedway Oct 26th 2008 7:50AM
"It took about a week for the world to hate you guys, in general. Expect it to take far, far longer for that to go away."
Mo I think this sentence sums it up.
Nice one =)
Mo Oct 26th 2008 9:16PM
E..?
I'm gonna go ahead and assume you're one of "them", so I'd probably have to try twice as hard to take what you say seriously...even if you had written something useful...BUT...two points for using "you're" properly, at least.
Props, my man
Warcloud Oct 25th 2008 3:10PM
Guy in the pic looks kind of like Fedor Emelianenko.
Aldheim Oct 25th 2008 3:23PM
I'm a paladin, but I have spec'd Ret exactly once in my entire time playing my character, so while I feel bad for my Ret brothers and sisters I can't say they effect me much personally. (I also don't PvP, and I could honestly care less about PvP viability.) But damn it all, why are you messing with my Seals? I need those for Holy and Prot too! Seal of Vengeance is one of my primary threat sources as Prot, and you've changed the top end of the Holy tree to emphasize Judgments more and more. And now Seals and Judgments aren't very good.
Sigh. Seriously, what Ret pally even USED Seal of Righteousness? Why did that need to be nerfed?
Burgdorn Oct 25th 2008 3:25PM
I don't feel that JotW was something to be unexpected. To be honest the invincibility of being a Retadin post 3.0.2 had me way OP. I would walk into an area and just kill and keep on moving with no mana concerns simply because I had this infinite mana pool. Every single judgment brought me up to full mana. As for the crit conversion to DoTs, I don't see this as a big bad deal, Rogues can't run and hide as easily and we have a continued concern after we deal our damage.
Here is what people have to consider when fighting us post 3.0.3
-a dot (likely around 900 damage over 8 seconds per SoCom procs, and Crusader Strike hits) The only problem will be if they overwrite each other, I often get 3 crits in a rowso I'm expecting 2.5k damage to be ticking away, again rogues don't hide no mo'!
-When you factor in our replenish, with our instant mana gains we aren't doing bad, we just now get a use out of replenish. (I'm always full in S3, this ability will scale very well)
-The retuned glyph of Crusader now has a bloody purpose
-Hand of Freedom can still remove stun effects
We still hurt, just slightly more sustained, our crits lose a little bit of that extra edge they had but compared to what we have on live we will actually deal a great deal of damage because these DoTs have yet to be implemented to offset the Physical damage change.
Deathgodryuk Oct 25th 2008 3:29PM
Am I the only person who remembers GC saying that if the nerfs go too far they'll buff pallies back up a bit? Quit crying, they're trying to get the classes ballanced.
iliya Oct 25th 2008 4:34PM
Sure, like they did when most of the cycle of Burning Crusade was over... that was like, what, a year and a half? Yep, they'll get right to it.
Deathgodryuk Oct 27th 2008 4:18AM
And it would be better to just leave them overpowered and completely dominating in every aspect of the game? Please, I don't like the people whining about how OP paladins are either but there has to be some effort to balance the classes out and I'd be willing to bet that this nerf will separate the good ret pallies from those who were just riding on OP buffs. Undergeared and underskilled paladins will hate this but those who have put the time and effort to gear and learn the class will still be able to do well.
BigFire Oct 25th 2008 3:41PM
You weren't paying attention, they nerfed Prot and Holy along with Ret as well. It's a huge across the board nerf.
Levica Oct 25th 2008 3:48PM
Oh cry some more, This is beta guys.
The did this same maneuver with the Death Knight class a month ago. Its how they test it, check its efficiency blah blah blah.
Death Knights were stupidly OP at first, they brought them "To the Ground" and then steadily ratcheted up the damage.
You're not a beautiful and unique snowflake.
iliya Oct 25th 2008 4:34PM
The difference is, they actually took the time to properly balance Death Knights, while leaving paladins to wonder if Blizzard actually acknowledged their presence.
Wanna know how long it took them to finally fix ret paladins up to raiding standards after tbc came out? A year and a half. Yep, they'll get right on it.
Max Oct 25th 2008 3:49PM
To the ground, baby!!!
badbillybovine Oct 25th 2008 3:56PM
well here we are again, ret palis who cannot beat anything but our meat LOL. well it dosent matter i have many 70s so ill just put my poor little pali back up on the shelf and wait for the day that he isnt a joke again LOLOOOLLOLLOLOL
Burgdorn Oct 25th 2008 4:09PM
Thank you, we do appreciate it when paladins that think they know how to play finally leave and let the constructive work that helps improve the class go forward.
badbillybovine Oct 28th 2008 7:58PM
WOW Burgdorn you sure are full of yourself, or maybe...just maybe you are the chosen one LOL!
Spearhawk Oct 25th 2008 4:28PM
I seen the changes etc that Blizzard has in store for us and I am still hopefull that it actually will boil down to not who got the best skills/talents etc but who does know his/her class the best.
I am not giving up on my Retribution Paladin even though its been nerfed and still is going to be nerfed because I know a few truths.
1. If we get to low and to many quit etc, Blizzard will take action, either nerf other classes or buff Paladins.
2. They intend to balance the game out so it comes down to player skill and not a "I win button"
3. I don't PvP as much as when I do the team I run with suck so bad it won't matter if I am OP or not, we loose anyways because in AV as in any other BG its always a team effort and if the rest of the team is a 9 year old pimpled pre-adolescent nerd thats likes to PK in middle of AV...then we will always loose.
What I wish however for some to keep in mind is this. Paladins as any other class have 3 different speccs, that means that a healer can't dps as well as a retribution can, and a retribution can't tank as well as the protection can.
Sure there are a few things that still remain but please keep those 3 speccs separate in your comments.
I can't for example as retribution heal more than 2-3 times with greater heal because then I run out of mana and no replenish can regen mana as fast as healing would take it.
Bubble can be dispelled, it happend to me many times. and while it is a powerful tool it is also a way to balance out rogue being able to vanish/cloak of shadows etc.
All classes have their own nich that they are good at and in my mind there are no class that has so over powerful skills that its unbalacing the game.
Please keep that in mind when you try to slam a class for having skills, that indeed every class have them and every other class THINK that its over powered since they don't have that.
I for one am waiting for WotLK for new bosses and for new content to conquer.
Thank you
Archon129 Oct 26th 2008 10:20AM
The problem in my opinion is not the one nerf this time. It's the multitude to come. I've rolled ret since the beginning and I have seen so many nerfs with this class it's pathetic. Of course the other classes see problems with ret pally's, because the class has always been a joke before. Now there is some competition and there is nothing but crying. So once again, the ret pally nerfs begin. Can't wait to see wait Blizzard does next *sarcasm*