Retnoob, Prottrot, HolyhellFollow

ok, so from what i've read... i hear that Ret just plain sucks... protection is good when you get to 50, and holy is an endgame raid spec... now what about on the road there? any suggestions as to a PvE leveling spec? so far i've gone Ret, only because i know it gets the most damage early on, is this the better of the choices, or should i just go prot now and bring on the AoE grinding at lvl 25?
any help without needless ZOMG NUBletz! flaming would be appreciated.
(as for my talents, yes... i did pursuit of justice PURELY for the runspeed enhancement... call me a noob but i freaking hate running!)
heres a url to my armory:
http://www.wowarmory.com/character-sheet.xml?r=Skywall&n=Playbyplay


Edited, Jan 29th 2008 1:45am by Playbyplay

hey I bypassed pursuit of justice at first and then put points into a little later....I wish I never waited.

Ret is great for leveling. Prot seems just as good with the changes blizz made to the leveling path....just do quests and fly through those levels. I have a buddy who is leveling a prot build and we are keeping pace with each other (even when we aren't questing together).


Edited, Jan 29th 2008 7:53am by zebug

We're not going to lie to you; Ret is not a great end-game spec. In fact it's pretty terrible.

But for leveling, it has many things going for it. Good soloing potential, PoJ literally means you get quests done faster, and there's that very nice 2handed mace that Alliance paladins get at level 24. Now, prot paladins can't really AOE grind until they pick up Reckoning at level 35, and later Holy Shield. Their big advantage is their ability to chew through multiple mobs at once with multiple reactive damage sources. It's very appealing to a certain type of player.

A soloist Ret build with supplementary points in Holy is very good up until perhaps level 50, where many people believe the damage peters off. It's also popular for BG twinks operating in the early level brackets, mainly because Prot sucks for PvP and Holy is restricted to, well, healing. Speaking of; it is possible to level as Holy with 2.3, it just seems to involve instance grinding, which gives good gear, loot and money, but is much harder, highly situational (you need a group) and still takes longer.

Take comfort that your spec doesn't change your game until level 40+; up until them, tankadins can still heal, a retadin has enough armour/Hp to tank if he picks up a shield, and so on.

ima go out on a limb here and say,

with the changes to exp for both lvl req, and quests. Blowing through quests with a ret spec is your 'fastest' way to 70.

if you want to do quests alittle slower but tank some instances along the way, or AOE grind mobs for exp, then go prot no earlier then 35, but "I" would wait untill holy shield at 40.

Holy only if you really like to instance your way to 70, or you make a shockadin build to kinda help your way through quests also. but i really dont have any experience with holy specs at all. i just know my friends are always complaining when they have to go out into the world with them.

I leveled my paladin up as holy all the way - I don't recommend it to anyone.

I respecced into prot at the low level of 20, and stayed there since (lvl 65 now). Didn't kill stuff as fast as retribution, but I could do most orange and some red colored quests easily.

I have one 70 prot pally that can tank most bosses in kara right now. I leveled him prot all the way from 1-70 it took some time but I really understand the finer points of pally tanking.
http://www.wowarmory.com/character-sheet.xml?r=Greymane&n=Rannagne

My second pally I have been leveling ret from 1-64 atm it has taken almost half the time to level ret as prot. I was going to spec holy once I got to 70 but my last few instance runs I have out DPSed and 67 frost mage, 67 fury warrior, 66 destruction lock, and a 65 combat rogue. With the DPS that my ret pally is putting out I think that I will now stay ret.