Currently, we think paladin tanks are almost there and that they just need slightly better cooldowns to handle some of the tougher boss fights. Rather than add a new ability that felt like a clone of another class’s ability, we decided to buff an existing talent that was no longer cutting it. Ardent Defender has two important changes. The first is that the damage can no longer “skip over” the 35% health level – it will always be reduced. Secondly, it has a new effect that if a blow would kill you, it instead sets you to 30% health. This portion of the ability cannot occur more than once every 2 minutes. Think of it as a Last Stand that you don’t have to push.I am reminded of Psalms 75:10 “will cut off all the horns of the wicked, but the horns of the righteous shall be lifted up,” and I hope these change will bring paladin tanks more in line with the others with regard to “oh shit” situations. The best thing about ardent defender is you could save your divine protection until after the proc and use them at the same time. I will be interested to see how exactly it alters paladin tanking, but it looks exceptionally sexy. The auto proc is pretty interesting as well, and I am sure there will be plenty of comments about how paladin tanking is ZOMFG EZ MODE tanking already, but any command that doesn’t have to be sent has both advantages and disadvantages and I will not complain because a perk is a perk.
A second change to Protection is we want to make sure Blessing of Sanctuary is always the tanking blessing of choice. A likely change here is to have it boost stamina as well.This is a welcome change as well. I know that the general rule has been to run with kings when you are on correct level content and to use sanctuary when outgear the content, but since the beta of WotLK, it was pretty apparent that Blizzard intended for sanctuary to be the tanking blessing, and that it just wasn’t sexy enough with all the perks that kings carried with it.
And now to pat myself on the back a little bit…
If you will note, I previously posted on the forums about potential ret changes and said. “As far as the ret tree goes, isn’t part of the problem compliments provided by a rotation? You specifically pointed to using ice lance after a freeze, or an earth shock (maybe instacast lightning) with Stormstrike. Where are the teases to get ret paladins to work with in what become perk parameters like the previous examples? Maelstrom weapon is a beautiful ability. For numerous reasons, but one of the ones that sticks out is because it allows a hybrid to choose what they will do with their stack. Art of War doesn’t do that. It gives you a free ability that you have to heal with. Shaman get to choose what they are going to do with that stack, and that makes it exponentially more fun. “
LO AND BEHOLD, the incoming change to exorcism…
First, Exorcism has a cast time of 1.5 seconds but can be used on players again. This will let paladins use it in PvP, but not while moving towards a target. Second, we are changing The Art of War to make not only Flash of Light instant, but also Exorcism. Choose healing or damage. Paladins will have to watch for this proc and use Exorcism when it happens. The spell itself is still ranged, but the proc will only occur when the paladin is already in melee.Looks like some of the fellas at Blizzard understand that combos are fun and that Maelstrom weapon is extremely fun for a hybrid because it allows them to choose which part of being a hybrid is most important in any given situation.
3.2 is looking to be one hell of a patch, and I can’t with until it hits the PTR.
-Rhab
Nerf Judgements! (I keed I Keed)
ReplyDeleteHaving never been able to gat a Pally bast level 29 I cant really speak to this, but for all Blizzards "Bring the player not the class" is kinda morphing into "Bring the player (with the spec we say) not the class.
I would have preferred a cooler tanking cooldown, but I say preferred with no actual idea as to what they could have given us. The Ardent Defender is a cool change, but for a tanks whose job is to stay alive, it seems like it could be quirky because you may blow all your cooldowns b4 the ardent defender kicks in and then you have to hope it's enough for the healers to keep you up.
ReplyDeleteOf course being kicked back up to 30% HP and not anything over 35 means the damage reduction from the talent should be enough to buy your healers some extra valuable time.
I don't really view the changes described as "combos". There are several game (LOTRO for example) that do a much better job of it than changing a cool down.
ReplyDeleteAs for whether this will make prot pallys better in progression raiding, the prot pally who MT's for my guild didn't seem to have a problem.