The Reckoning: 4.0.1 Hands-on: Retribution
WoW Blogs - The Reckoning Paladin Blog
Sorry about being a little late on this article, I’ve been out digging ditches for the past week, and between that and normal life stuff, I haven’t dedicated much time to writing. Your beloved Drekai became drunk at a rodeo and got into a fight with a drunken redneck because I looked “Gay”(Paraphrasing out the literal, more vulgar word). He found out the hard way, via a bench to the side of his head that you don’t have to be gay to look fabulous. Aslo that you don’t try to physically attack someone bigger than you on the assumption that they’re a wuss.
Retribution hands-on in 4.0.1
Two things I’ve noticed right after jumping into the game is the new UI, which if you’re like me, the UI is in eye-strain-o-vision and you can’t really see anything. Two, that there have been major changes to the stat get up.
One stat that struck me the hardest was that they REMOVED RESILIENCE. I mean, it’s still there, but now only provides a flat damage reduction, and that numbers rather minute in the big picture.
The good news is that there isn’t really resilience anymore, the bad news is that there really isn’t resilience anymore.
Top that off with everyone’s damage being tripled or MORE, it’s not too common to see people in full relentless or wrathful for that matter f#*%ing EXPLODE like little bits of bad all over the place. I don’t know how I still manage to get more killing blows than deaths in BGs, but I digress.
Several classes are obscene ATM, but Paladins aren’t one of them. I’m honestly surprised, seeing how every 4.0-like patch since the beginning of WoW, we’ve been walking murder machines that feed off of cute animals and get mana back from the broken dreams of the innocent.
Hunters do 20-25k kill commands
Rogues do 30k envenoms
Demo warlocks have a few I-win nukes that hit you so hard your grandchildren will just spawn in the graveyard.
Basically any class with a pet, the pet is going to solo you.
Boomkins, Shaman, and Mages can burst you down long before you get in range.
Warriors, DKs, and surprisingly healers are the three classes you’re going to win hands down 1v1.
Our healkilling is off the charts, I mean, we’re the only class with balanced burst, and our burst can take down healers, forcing them to cast instead of instantly healing themselves and keeping them at 100%
Then when they cast, rebuke like they owe you child support.
Moving on to PvE, our rotation is solid if a bit clunky. There’s some serious lag going on with Divine Purpose and holy power procs. There’s a full 2 seconds between casting an ability and getting the HP return.
Our Mastery has changed from the holy damage flat % to a fun original mastery similar, but not equal to, the old Rime. You have a base 8 percent chance to get a proc, when it procs, you can use any Holy Power ability that you want with only 1 holy power and it will hit like you have 3 and cost no Holy Power.
Damage wise, you’re looking about even to what you have now, but with a little more complex rotation. Replace where you had divine storm with Holy Wrath and it’ll feel just like 3.3.5, only you put Templar’s verdict in to hit for 5-12k(Depending on item procs) whenever you get 3 Holy Power. Crusader strike hits like a truck now, doing around 5-7k, Exorcism and judgement crit for around 4k, which is a nerf, but it’s made up with TV’s damage and Holy Wrath’s damage, which also hits like a truck if you’ve got one target. I can understand Judgement and Exorcism’s nerfs, considering the utility they’re giving judgement, and that Exorcism has no cooldown what-so-ever. That’s right, they gave us a ranged nuke, similar to frostbolt or fireball, etc. Art of war makes it hit harder, cost no mana and be instant, which also helps with our damage.
As much haste as I have in PvE gear, I’ve never got Sanctity of Battle to go under a 4 second cooldown. But seeing as I have a very limited supply of PvE gear(Enough to make me get at least 1-4 on the meters, but not ridiculous.
Mana-wise, we’ve been balanced. We’ve actually got infinite mana with our rotation, but will run out quickly outside of it. We’ve got a lot of nuke heals. Flash of Light and Divine Light are the ones I put on my rotation. Forbearance is gone, so you can go from bubble to AW to Divine protection and cast them in immediate succession. There is a bit of a shared cooldown between Divine Shield and Lay on hands, though. 3 minutes, but with Flash and Divine light, LoH is only useful as a last ditch resort, seeing as around 3 FoLs and 2 Divine lights heal you nearly to full. Word of Glory is fun, but a bit –too- situational.
Leveling to 10 my impression is that they want to stave us away from being known as a purely healing class. At 1 you get Crusader strike. That’s it. Just crusader strike. You get HoJ, Judgement, and Seal of Righteousness to 10, and Word of Glory at 9, and that remains our only heal until 14 when we get Holy Light. I like this, it distinguishes us as a hybrid that seems oriented for melee roles, while hinting that it can be a healer if you want it to.
It’s much-MUCH harder to do quests, though, as we only have 2 abilities and they’re both damage. But it’s more balanced than soloing zones, like what I can do on live.
I’ll put my thoughts in more when I get to 85 and have 85 gear to test it.
Last Updated on Wednesday, 15 September 2010 22:11 Written by Drekai Tuesday, 14 September 2010 19:59