Post by GenXCub
We understand this is a small adjustment to Protection paladins, which is why we improved Hand of Reckoning. The 3.2 patch will be pretty good for paladin tanks overall so hopefully they will forgive us.
Q. Consecration seems to utilize a sizable portion of mana per application of this spell; do we have plans on making this a bit more mana-efficient?
A. We think the mana cost is appropriate. Retribution and Protection paladins have enough ways to earn mana back that it doesn’t seem to be slowing them down much.
Community Team: Specifically with the various spells and abilities that paladins have in a PvP encounter, there have been questions concerning regarding survivability and utility, let’s get into some of these.
Q. Do we feel Divine Shield is fine in its current rendition versus other abilities such as Shattering Throw and Mass dispel?
A. Divine Shield is just a very powerful spell, so game-changing that we thought it needed a counter. The problem is that only one class has access to Mass Dispel, which we feel makes priests too much of a “hard counter” to paladins. We understand that classes will to some extent always have other classes they are better or worse against, but we want to avoid extremes. Shattering Throw is an attempt to let someone other than a priest have the chance to break the bubble. We implemented the ability as a ranged attack to help discourage warrior “tunnel vision” in just always unleashing all their attacks on the same target rather than having to switch targets on occasion.
Q. Will it be possible to prevent Avenging Wrath from being dispelled as well? This ability is the means to allow for on-demand maximum dps output for a brief period of time and only affects the paladin.
A. It’s possible but not probable. Really this is symptomatic of a larger problem, which is that the dispel game has become too important in PvP. If the other team has a dispeller, then abilities like Avenging Wrath get totally shut down. If the other team lacks a dispeller, then they may be in trouble. This leads to junk buffs and inconsistencies on which abilities can be dispelled or not. We are going to redo the entire system, though not for 3.2. One direction to take dispelling is to give magic dispel to all the healers (since 90% of player spells are magical), but to prevent offensive dispelling of any kind, or at least prevent dispels for “your-class-is-supposed-to-have-this buff” like Arcane Int or Fort.
Q. Do we have plans to introduce a stand-alone interrupt ability for paladins?
A: We would like to add this kind of utility to paladins. First we have to get the burst damage under control so that Ret paladins are not winning PvP encounters by blowing players up. When we accomplish that, we’ll look at finally giving them more tools.
Q. With the slew of options to either "jump into" or "jump out of" PvP encounters for either offensive or defensive purposes many classes receive, do we have any plans to incorporate special abilities for paladins to either help them escape tough situations or quickly get into pvp battle (i.e. Deathgrip, Typhoon, Summoning Circle, Disengage, etc.)? It seems paladins are the only class without a short cool-down ability on the same scale.
A. Players are pretty good at detecting problems, but for solutions they tend to just look around at what other classes have that is working for them. Homogenization is something we fight as much as we can, which is the reason not every class has Death Grip and not every class has Charge. Judgment of Justice is intended to be the gap-closer for paladins. If it becomes a huge liability, we’ll evaluate, but at the moment paladins are doing extremely well in PvP without it.
Q. Ranged attacks are extremely limited for paladins and are not considered a primary form of dps. However, players feel they would like an ability that will aid them in bridging the gap between melee vs. ranged. Do we have any plans to implement something to this extent?
A. We’ve already changed the “no ranged attacks” philosophy on paladins already and don’t feel the need to continue making them better at range.
Community Team: We’re on our last set of questions here, so let’s switch it up a tad and talk a bit about Librams and aesthetics.
Q. Do we have plans to incorporate a larger variety of Librams?
A. We try and make sure the three main paladin roles have their Librams covered. As these are special items that no other class can use, we have to make sure we don’t drop them too often in PvE encounters, but we have no problem putting more on badge vendors. Usually it’s just a matter of time because a new tier of content, like the Call of the Crusade patch, already involves making literally over a thousand new items.
Q. Do we have plans to incorporate Librams as a more prominent aspect of the paladin class? Also, can we expect to see Librams as a physical aesthetic item on the paladin? Much like the quiver is for the hunter (except only the hunter can see their own quiver mounted on their back).
A. This is something players suggest a lot, and honestly something we’d like to do. It’s a pretty iconic image from Warcraft, especially Warcraft III, to have the paladin toting around their libram. Someone at BlizzCon last year asked if they could beat on people with it. This is a big task to put on the art team though so we would want to make sure we do it right. The same answer would apply to shaman totems and hunter quivers. On the other hand, it took a long time to finally update the druid cat and bear art so don’t look for this in 3.2.
http://forums.worldofwarcraft.com/thread.html?topicId=18331429262&sid=1
