When you're a hammer, everything looks like a nail.

Friday, January 25, 2008

Leaked 2.4 Changes and Paladins

World of Raids has a post up containing some allegedly leaked patch notes. I enjoy looking at the notes, and even if they're fake, I am easily amused. Let's see what's probably not in store for my favorite class.
Paladins
- Holy Shock: The cooldown has been reduced to 12 sec, from 15 sec and the amount of damage and healing done has been slightly increased.
- Avenger's Shield: The cast time has been reduced to 0.5 sec, down from 1 sec.
- Crusade: This talent now increases your spell damage and healing by 25/50% of your Strength.
- Sanctity Aura now increases all damage done by party members by 4%, but the Holy spell damage bonus has been removed.
- Improved Sanctity Aura has been removed.
- Sanctified Reach (New Retribution Talent): Increases the range of your Judgement and Hammer of Justice spells by 25/50% and the range of your Hammer of Wrath and Repentance spells by 10/20%.

When a +damage coefficient was added to healing gear, the Gladiator's aegis sets became largely obsolete (not that you can PVP as Prot anyway... or can you... another post for another day). Is this a slight nod in the direction of the shockadin crowd? And can we put Holy Shock in the Protection Tree? I'll give you stoicism and Improved Concentration Aura in exchange.

Halving the cast time on Avenger's shield is a nice touch. First, it helps with beating quick-draw mages to their polymorphs, thus invariably protecting their squishy arses. It's now slightly more viable while tanking, making it easier to weave into a threat rotation whenever the cooldown is up. Now if they would just lower the cooldown... :D

Crusade: This is the most interesting talent change. According to Gankbang, the top US Ret pally has about 800 or so strength and is rocking the T6 with Hyjal gems. So at the highest level, we're really only talking about 400 or so spell damage, which is fairly low, and will really only apply to Consecrate and Seal of Command. On the other hand, it's effectively free damage that makes sense, given the new direction of Retribution. Definitely intriguing. It would also be helpful for low-level tankadins to take, given the overall lack of spell damage on low-level plate gear and the tendency to wear warrior gear anyway. It would also make future itemization easier for Blizzard, as they could just start focusing on Strength for Paladins. Upper level tankadins could also go this route and wear as much warrior gear as they could, counting on this talent to provide the spell damage buff necessary to support Righteous Fury.

Changes to Sanctity Aura would also make sense, given the rebalancing of the Ret tree. As for the "reach" talent, it would help somewhat with the frustrating kiteability of Paladins in PvP.

As to the authenticity of the notes... they are fairly comprehensive, and the paladin changes make sense from a game designer standpoint, even if they do require us to rethink certain assumptions. In the end, real or not, it's fun to take a step back and play the "what if" game. Sure, I too, will believe it when I see it in blue, but that doesn't mean it's not fun to daydream a bit.

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