The Light and How to Swing It: Divine Sacrifice
by Gregg Reece 
Oct 29th 2009 at 2:00PM
While some of you might be looking at the skill in the title and not know what I'm talking about, we paladins have a nice little talented ability known as Divine Sacrifice. A lot of holy and protection paladins should already know about this cursed little gem. Depending on your spec setup, you might even be aware of it as a retribution paladin. If you're not familiar with the skill, it's sitting on the left in the third tier of the protection tree. Go look, I'll wait.
For those of you that didn't go over to look, it is essentially a raid-wide version of Hand of Sacrifice and often nicknamed the "raid-wall" for its shield-wall-esque capabilities. It allows the casting paladin to take 30% of the damage from every person in the party or the raid for 10 seconds. Luckily, it can be used in combination with Divine Shield so you don't instantly die from all of that incoming damage. Currently, it's a fairly dangerous little skill. With it you can either be savior or martyr of your raid group depending on how you use it.
When it was first implemented back in 3.1.0 PTR, it took 30% of all damage happening to everyone in your raid for the duration of the skill. This caused the skill to be unusable unless you were using using Divine Shield as the incoming damage would often kill the person trying to protect the raid. Due to this issue when it went live, they added a little addendum that you could only redirect a total of 150% of your own health. It became a bit more manageable in this form and didn't always instantly kill the casting paladin. It still required some careful planning when not used with Divine Shield, because if you have 30,000 health and Mimiron nuked someone in your raid for 100,000 damage in one shot, you'd be dead faster than you knew what happened.
Because of all of these issues with the skill, it isn't widely used overall. Those that don't use it are often afraid of mis-timing the skill and dying. Those that do use it put it to very good use and almost always in combination with Divine Shield to prevent actually taking the damage. It is actually so useful in some cases that Blizzard feels they're having to balance around the skill in raids. Currently on the PTR, Blizzard is trying to adjust it for both types of people. They want it a bit less deadly as well as a bit less powerful than its current incarnation.
Divine Sacrifice (as of build 10712 of the 3.3 PTR) - The effect of Divine Sacrifice is now party-only and the maximum damage which can be transferred is now limited to 40% of the paladin's health multiplied by the number of party members. In addition, the bug which allowed Divine Sacrifice to sometimes persist despite reaching its maximum damage has been fixed. Divine Sacrifice will now cancel as soon as its maximum damage value is exceeded in all cases. Finally, damage which reduces the paladin's health below 20% now cancels the effect early.
This is from the PTR patch notes, so it's a little more wordy than it should be. Yes, Divine Sacrifice will still redirect 30% of the damage from everyone in your party, but only in your party. It also has that 40% multiplier on the total damage relating to your party. So, if you're sitting in a party all by your lonesome, despite being in a 25-man raid, this skill would do nothing by itself. If you're sitting in a party with one other person, then it starts doing something. Since there are two of you in that party, you'll be able to redirect up to 80% of your total health, but only affecting that one other person.Also, you'll notice that if you're caught without a bubble up, the effect will end as soon as your health dips below 20%. Now, don't get too thrilled. It doesn't say it stops at 20%, but as soon as you've taken damage to reduce it below 20%. This means that if you're at 6,001 of 30,000 health and you get 7,000 in redirected damage then you'll still be dead. However, for smaller bits of incoming damage like the blizzards on Sapphiron you should be fine.
A lot of you will be looking at this and shouting "NERF!" and rightly so. That's because I haven't given you all of the information yet. They've also changed the talent for Divine Guardian.
Divine Guardian (as of build 10712 of the 3.3 PTR) - This talent no longer increases the amount of damage transferred to the paladin from Divine Sacrifice. Instead it causes all raid and party members to take 10/20% reduced damage while Divine Sacrifice is active. In addition, the duration has been changed to 6 seconds, however the effect does not terminate when Divine Sacrifice is removed before its full duration.
Again, this is a patch note, so it only mentions the stuff they changed. What it does change is Divine Sacrifice's duration from 10 seconds down to 6 seconds. In exchange, you add a flat damage reduction of 10/20% (depending on talents) to everyone in the raid. It also lasts for the full 6 seconds regardless of Divine Sacrifice. This means that if you meet either of the conditions it takes to cause Divine Sacrifice to break early, the flat damage reduction will still be active for everyone in the raid for its normal duration.This gives you a bit more of a choice. You can now be tossed into a low damage group where you can pop Divine Sacrifice without worrying about taking much damage, but still cause the 10/20% damage reduction for everyone. Alternatively, you can be tossed into the tank's group and be a greater damage reduction when using Divine Sacrifice with Divine Shield. Also, if you end up taking a bit more damage than you want, there is the possibility of it canceling before you die.
The Light and How to Swing It tries to help Paladins cope with the dark times coming in Cataclysm. See the upcoming Paladin changes the expansion will bring. With Wrath beginning to come to a close and soon the final showdown with the Lich King will be here. Will you be ready for the assault on Icecrown Citadel?Filed under: Paladin, (Paladin) The Light and How to Swing It
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 2)
Thetealone Oct 29th 2009 2:19PM
Dear OP, Hugs. Bye, GC (R)
Better to have loved and lost then to have never divine sacrificed with ultimate OP prowess before. This will make Anub'arak a tad bit harder then before and I'll have to demand to be in the same party as the tank BUT at least it says that the RAID still takes 20% less damage if you go 2/2 in Divine guardian.. which pretty much cuts the effectiveness of the old version in half on the bright side.. as a holy pally over a prot pally i wont be afraid to use this every 2 mins vs. every 5.
Rhabella Oct 29th 2009 2:22PM
GC (to conference room): What are we doing with paladins again?
*crickets*
GC: That’s what I figured. Anyone think they can come up with model for them before the Wrath cycle ends? I’m getting pretty tired joke this team has become because we can’t seem to fit an iconic Warcraft RTS class into our game without buffing-nerfing-buffing
*crickets*
GC: Fine, screw all of you, I’m going to my yacht to twitter and post on the forums. Someone call me if they come up with something.
*crickets*
(GC exits stage left)
Brownb Oct 29th 2009 3:56PM
I seen him..... Actually probably pretty close to
how descisions are made for pallys
BuzzDX Oct 29th 2009 2:25PM
I've already respec'd my Paladin to get Divine Guardian. He's already had Sacrifice, but I mistakenly spent the remaining 2 points in Imp. HoJ, which has helped from time to time, but would have been better served elsewhere.
I might be jumping the gun with this proposed change, but even as they are on live servers, its still a handy ability to have it around when needed. I usually OT in raids anyway, so I can pop this and Divine Shield to reduce the strain on healers or reduce overall damage to the raid and taunt back up to max threat when it ends.
Dominic Oct 29th 2009 2:39PM
Do you think it would good for holy pally's to spec into this. Is seems as tho. it's just made for Prot and Ret. Considering the holy tree really doesn't allow you to spec into this. I mean it is due able, but you will be loosing some stats in the holy tree! Anyone have any good suggestions. I am holy now and have never speced for it for PVE raids. Should I go back and spec for it before 3.3 or just wait wait until 3.3 comes out so i can adjust my tree with the new modifications.
Eternauta Oct 29th 2009 3:02PM
There are two schools of holy pala speccing:
- Holy/Ret: Get's many +crit talents from Ret (healing output and mana regen), as well as the very handy Pursuit of Justice to run faster from the fire or to heal somebody that is far from you.
- Holy/Prot: It's for people that is very well geared and dedicates mostly to hardmodes. It wastes a lot of talent points in the Prot tree to get Divine Sacrifice and Divine Guardian. This is a very useful cooldown for preventing raid damage, and since you're holy, you can pop bubble and use this without having to concern about losing threat (the problem tankadins have with this). Plus: it extends the duration of Sacred Shield and it's damage absorbed. So you have to worry less about keeping SS up.
I choose the first one when healing because my holy gear is not too good, and I can't play a pally without PoJ (dunno why).
Nith Oct 30th 2009 12:01PM
The Holy/Prot build has been superior to Holy/Ret since 3.2. With the nerf to illumination crits are not as much of a huge deal. The reason why a [url="http://www.wowarmory.com/talent-calc.xml?cid=2&tal=503501520100130531005152215032010420300000000000000000000000000000000000000000"]51/20/0[/url] build is the best is not only for DG but also improved Devo Aura. Besides having a holy pally with imp devo in case you dont have prot if you keep reading it also gives you extra 3% healing with any of your auras. Thats 8% straight up healing bonus with talents alone. I with this build so long as you have enough sp, haste and you keep the JoP buff up you should be able to land 10k crits from Flash of Light just about every second. With SS increasing your crit and putting a HoT up you should almost always crit which means huge HoT up on the tank. And this was when I had 2350 Wow-Heroes GS. And also dont forget that while you waste points in the prot tree those are just as useful as PoJ (both Toughness and Stoicism will help you move and get those heals to the tank quicker) in addition if speed really is that much of deal to you there are Tuskar's Vitality is still a good way to go (your other alternative is +spirit, bleh).
However if you're still sporting mostly naxx gear then maybe you wont have enough stats to pull this off.
Kuro Oct 29th 2009 2:52PM
I like using aura mastery as ret -- 100 x aura effect and the fear buff from concentration aura works to mitigate damage in all of the ToC fights. Add in the nice speed boost from Crus Aura. And it's more "fun" utility for me to use.
But... they're nerfing that too..
catharsis80 Oct 29th 2009 2:59PM
Honestly, the fact remains we can still protect some of our raid group about once per boss, so I still plan on doing this just as I currently am. I've been DS/G specced for most of my holy paladin time, and don't plan on switching yet.
Prot Oct 29th 2009 3:08PM
I have to say my guild really abused Divine Sacrifice throughout Ulduar. We often raid 10 man with minimum 2 Paladins and often with 3 or 4, and always 2 paladin tanks.
Divine Sacrifice trivialized XT's tympanic tantrum. And when we rolled 3 paladins it was basically off of cooldown for one of the paly's to use it on every tantrum. 30% less damage to everyone for free (using our uber-bubble) just makes the healers so happy.
And then we make it to Hodir. Oh, he cast a frozen blow QQ all the raid damage incoming. Oh, wait, we take only70% of that across the raid. Hmmm, looks like more healer happiness.
And now in ToC we have faction champs giving raid wide damage. A well timed Divine Sac saves a couple of healers and keeps the party going (not as needed now that the Faction Champs have had their damage reduced).
I'm anxious to see how this will change post 3.3. Talented right it reduces 20% which isn't quite as much but should be enough. It also will still be raid wide and having the redirect effect disappear before death should be fine. Although when our paladin tanks took it Ardent Defender usually saved the day.
All in all though this is a talent that ALL Paladins should have picked up. It makes so many encounters easier on the healers it is silly not to have it and in some cases just trivializes the encounters. We tried raiding with our alts which reduced our paly count and suddenly some of these encounters were challenging again. ;-)
thinkasumtinb3tr Oct 29th 2009 3:59PM
"This means that if you're at 6,001 of 30,0000 health and you get 7,000 in redirected damage then you'll still be dead."
I think you mean 30,000 health.
Gregg Reece Oct 29th 2009 4:09PM
I hate it when I misplace a decimal point...
Fixed.
tenchibr Oct 29th 2009 4:22PM
Also, Gregg is forgetting one thing being a paladin specialist...
Ardent Defender, duh! (For tanks only though, but still...)
I'm not even gonna explain what it does, simply the most OP talent in the game IMO.
Gregg Reece Oct 29th 2009 6:01PM
Tenchibr: Completely agreed that it is the most OP talent in the game. It is made of win covered in awesome sauce with whipped cream and a cherry on top.
However, I was talking mainly about Divine Sacrifice in this one and didn't want to go too tree specific as it's a fairly low hanging fruit for all 3 specs. I could have pointed out the lowered Divine Shield cooldown via Sacred Duty would also let you pop Divine Sacrifice more often, but didn't want to muddy the article too much.
Cas Oct 29th 2009 7:23PM
What most people don't realize when hearing about how "op" this may be is that this is a tool in the Holy Paladin's toolbox. A handy one, at that. When healing in a PvE situation on a Paladin, it is nice to get any additional tools you can get—especially in terms of AOE mitigation/healing we just don't have. Overpowered? Perhaps. Useful? Highly.
I specced into this talent, just like I take Aura Mastery, in order to have another asset to bring to the raid in lieu of three high-crit heals (from the Holy/Ret spec). The devs are dulling the ability's value, and that stings.
Angus Oct 29th 2009 7:27PM
I tank with DS and Bubble Wall on tantrums. Makes life trivial and the healers don't mind since it was trivial to the damage I was taking when not in a tantrum.
This makes it less useful, but it is still effectively a mini shield wall.
Lemons Oct 29th 2009 10:55PM
In my experience Divine Sacrifice is used mostly by retadins.
When my GM made a DS rotation I don't remember healers or tanks ever being included.
Also...why did Zach Yonzon get replaced by this dude?
Adam Oct 30th 2009 2:02AM
It's the "hot potato" column that nobody wants, apparently.
Least of all Zach, since we're supposedly a bunch of crying little girls.
ABr Oct 30th 2009 5:05AM
When you talk about the Divine Guardian changes, you mention that:
"What it does change is Divine Sacrifice's duration from 10 seconds down to 6 seconds."
However, from my understandment of the ability text and the patch notes text, I understand that only the Divine Guardian's duration is changed to 6 seconds, not Divine Sacrifice. This means that what you get is a 20% damage reduction for the first 6 seconds of the 10 second duration of Divine Sacrifice.
Is this right, or am I missing something?
Koukalaka Oct 30th 2009 5:20AM
Divine Sacrifice, as GC has eluded too, is so so powerful, every paladin should be specced it at the moment. Fights were being balanced around it and simply put its a very powerful cooldown. The changes on the ptr do not change it being very powerful for holy/prot but for ret it becomes worse because they can't pick up divine guardian.
Divine Sacrifice is so powerful at the moment, not because it only hits the raid, but because it is bugged. Essentially any damage caused at the same time to multiple people, ie ticks of a dot, xt tantrum etc. Only counts damage one person takes and adds it to its 150% limit, basically meaning its very hard to hit that 150% hp cap and you get the full 10 seconds of D.S. However the Ptr has fixed this bug and changed it to group wide. Essentially though, it has become more powerful. At the moment you can only realistically use it with divine shield because else you would die very quickly. Now we can use it with D.S and D.P. and even without it, since its only 30% from 4 other players, with an average of 25k hp of the paladin.To die from it before the 20% hp cancels the effect takes place would require a large amount of partywide damage. As long as the holy paladin isnt in group with the tank they should be easily able to use it whenever is required. This essentially doubles or triples the amount of times you would use it in an encounter.
Via Numbers the new divine guardian works out as *just* less than the current incarnation of D.S over a 5 minute fight, but in terms of it being a life saving cooldown, being able to use it 2-3 times in the same period compared to 1 can save many more people.
Wtb more paladin posts =(.