With 3.0.2 coming out tomorrow, you might be at a loss for what might be a good spec. Don’t worry, I got you covered! Here are some of my specs.
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I. Holy
i. Beacon of Light PvE
ii. Beacon of Light PvP
iii. BoSanc
II. Protection
i. Protection
III. Retribution
i. PvP Retribution
ii. PvE Retribution
IV. Hybrid
i. “I Have Unlimited Mana!”
ii. “I Have Unlimited Mana!” MATH and STRATEGY
I. Holy
Holy’s gearing and strategy has remained generally unchanged.
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…..i. Beacon of Light PvE (Talent Calculator - World of Warcraft)
Not much to say here. Blessing of Kings is good to have since no serious protection paladin is going to be wasting his points on kings.
…..ii. Beacon of Light PvP (Talent Calculator - World of Warcraft)
Only 4/5 in Spiritual Focus because you don’t need the extra 14% because of Imp Concentration Aura (You are using that 100% of the time in PvP, right?). I based this one around my play style, but you may wish to switch out some things for Blessed Hands. Sacred Cleansing may also be desirable because of rogue poisons.
…..iii. Blessing of Sanctuary Holy (Talent Calculator - World of Warcraft)
Pulled this one right out of my ass. Because of the changes to BoSanc, every tank and his dog will want it. Losing Divine Illumination and Beacon of Light honestly won’t hurt you too much.
II. Protection
With the changes to Strength (Much more block from it now) and Touched by the Light (30% of stam --> spell damage), protection paladins will only need to stack Stamina and Strength on top of avoidance stats. In addition, Hammer of the Righteous is based on Main Hand Damage, which means you’ll be using either a melee DPS weapon or a warrior tanking blade. Also, this means that AP from Strength will increase your TPS noticeably.
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…i. Protection (Talent Calculator - World of Warcraft)
You should base your spec off of this loosely. You may want to move some points around to get 5/5 reckoning if you really need the threat, and Guarded by the Light might still be worth it just because of the spell damage reduction, but largely with the new changes WotLK brings, mana should not be a problem. Also, if your threat is lacking, Seals of the Pure might be worth considering.
III. Retribution
Retribution is in the prime of its life. I’ve played a paladin since release, and we’ve never been anywhere close to this level of crazy since pre 1.9. Sheath of Light gives us amazing heals. Ret is now what it was supposed to be: a supporting DPS.
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…i. PvP Retribution (Talent Calculator - World of Warcraft)
You can shift around points within the ret tree to your taste. Eye for an Eye is pretty nice with the new changes, as is Divine Purpose. You can get points for those from Vindication and/or Crusade.
….ii. PvE Retribution (Talent Calculator - World of Warcraft)
Fanaticism isn’t all that necessary any more because of the threat changes; IE, tanks are generating threat out the ass. You could take more points out of Fanaticism for Pursuit of Justice if you’re in the type of content where you need to move a lot (T6 etc)
IV. Hybrid
…..i.”I Have Unlimited Mana!”(Talent Calculator - World of Warcraft)
This spec is quite an interesting one. Sacrificing Holy Shock, Divine Illumination, and Beacon of Light, this spec picks up Judgements of the Wise and Repentance, essentially giving you a gross amount of mana (See IV-iii for details). This spec can also be used in PvE, but not having 40 yard judgements is going to hurt you a lot, since you’ll constantly need to run into 10 yard range and judge to reap the full benefits of this. I’d say it would only be functional in a 5 or maybe 10 man.
…..ii “I Have Unlimited Mana!” MATH and STRATEGY
Judgement MP5
Base mana of 70 paladin = 2953
2953/3= 984.333….
(984.333*5)/8= 615.208 MP5
Replenishment MP5
Given 10K mana pool (Very easy to obtain and surpass)
10000 (mana) * .0025 = 25 MP/Second
25*5= 125 MP5
125+615.208= 740.208 MP5
Yes, you read it right, 740.208 MP5 in ideal conditions. Of course, this will be lower due to human error, GCD overlapping, and inability to judge, but the potential is astonishing.
This spec would be played much like the “Restokin” which is popular among druids right now. That is, the paladin would play offensively and healing himself and his allies when needed. Without holy shock, he is limited to judgement and auto attack, but many times this can make all the difference. In addition, the holy paladin can now use mana inefficient spells like Consecration and Holy Light with a bit more ease because of all the raw incoming mana. This looks to be the future of PvP healing, largely because Beacon of Light (Bacon of Lol) is so lackluster in every facet of the game.