Paladin PvPFollow

Ret or Holy in PvP? in BGs it dont matter. a properly geared Ret in a BG is pretty damn scary. but Heals wins BGs so what ever spec is debatable.

in arena, i wouldnt know. this is prolly where you hear about Holy as the only Pally spec.

i noticed you have imp seal of crusader, i hope your not actually using it in PvP. one SoC proc will do more damage then the time you waste putting that up first in pvp. if your running into a fight ready to judge SotC then your first swing will not have SoC.

You don't judge SotC in PvP? But why not? With Improved Seal of the Crusader, every melee friend of yours will gain an extra 3% crit, plus your SoC procs will do more damage.

If you can't judge SotC and cast SoC before getting in the first swing, you need to work on your hotkey setup. I haven't had any issues thus far.

Its for holy paladins that spec extra buffs. I used it for the longest time, but ditched it to make my life easier on tidewalker and certain BT pulls.

/agree twice on Gaudion

PVE is where SotC judging shines.

So what your saying is, ditch imp SotC, and seal SoC and judge SoC, rinse and repeat?

Yes, when your Ret is properly geared, you can almost one shot a clothy.

white damage
SoC proc
Crusader Strike

will happen all in the first swing. and one of those should crit.

i never open combat in pvp with a judgment, sure it has range, but the way lag and latency works, if you open with judgment at max range, you will still auto swing before you get your seal back up. (unless you stop your charge into battle, which serves little perpose)

i open every fight the same way.

Jump behind my target (prevent dodge or block or parries) then press my CS hot key, it will start auto attack at the same time and you get a ton of burst damage in the first second of the fight. and judge imediatly after, as your auto swing just when off and you have 3 seconds to get your seal back up.

ive had all 3 crit and nothing survives that. (auto, CS, SoC proc)

SotC, with a properly geared Ret, is a waste of time. (in PvP)

i only use it in AV against High HP NPCs

Edited, Feb 8th 2008 9:06am by RuenBahamut

If I were going to start playing my Paladin again and spec Retribution purely for PvP purposes, this is how I would spec.

Honestly, it doesn't matter. The first tier of Protection is superfluous, you won't be using either of those talents at any time.


A choice that may seem odd to a lot of people, I realize. But I construct my talent builds the same way for every spec in every class. First I decide what I want to do (PvP, PvE, or hybrid), then I run a cost/reward analysis with the experience I've managed to accrue taken into consideration.

For starters, the 18 points in Protection is a must. HoJ on a 35-second cooldown is huge in the arena, I wouldn't really ever consider putting together a serious PvP build at 70 without it.

So I've got 43 points to spend in Retribution, and a lot of talents to cover. In the end, it's really just a matter of what I think will do me the most good.

Vengeance only procs on crits. Compare that to the constant, guaranteed damage increases of Imp. Sanc Aura or Crusade, and I'd much rather take them over Vengeance. Imp. Sanc Aura is also going to increase my teammates' damage.

Vindication is a brutal debuff since it got buffed a while back. I'd rather have that than Vengeance.

PoJ will get me moving 7% faster than any opponent after their enchant (barring abilities like AotC), and with JoJ judged I'll be moving 15% faster than them period. Vital to Ret Pallies in PvP since we lack an Intercept-esque ability. I'd rather have that than Vengeance.

... And so on and so forth. In the end, Vengeance just ended up being the talent I decided I could live without in PvP, and not forcing myself to put points into it allowed me to max out everything else I decided I couldn't live without.

Edited, Feb 9th 2008 12:28am by Gaudion

Well, yeah... when I design a PvP build I always do it with the arena in mind. You can take a 0/0/0 build into Battlegrounds for all it really matters.

Imp. BoM is complete crap. We've been over that a billion times on this board.

I would have loved to take Crusade, but I just didn't have the points for it. I don't see any other damage components I missed aside from that other than Vengeance. Imp. BoM is, I reiterate, complete crap, and Imp. SotC is equally asinine for PvP.


-15% stam, str, agi, int. That's pretty severe, especially when key stats are hitting anywhere from 400-700 in full PvP gear. Losing 60 to a stat is worse than losing an entire piece of gear, and losing 105 would be like losing two or three. That's roughly 600-1050 HP they can't heal back. Also, if their HP hits 0 while that -15% is in effect they still die.

I would swap out 3/3 Vindication for 3/3 Crusade if I found Vindication to be lacking after some experience, but I still wouldn't take Vengeance.


How do you figure?


Out of morbid curiosity, let's see your build.

we are talking 44 AP. in many cases thats a piece of gear worth. i run regularly with 1 hunter+pet, 2 rogues. thats a fair chunk.

if im interested in personal max pew pew, ima take it. im rockin 6500mp, i never oom in pve and rarely in arena. plus seals and judgement are not where the oom comes from. so to me Benediction is kinda meh, but i still have it for BGs.


gotta consider the proc rate and the actual usage. it doesnt directly affect AP or spell dmg, as would be OP. by the time you proc, all it does is lower the max hp and the max mp...like shinking a glass after you take a sip. i see this talent gimping only a warrior or ret pally with high +str and +agi. a rogue is usually zipping around and lockin you up. i would get Divine Purpose for the guaranteed dmg reduction.


if max hp is 10k and enemy has 2k = 20% use HoW
if max hp is 8.5k(-15%) and enemy has 2k = 23% cant use HoW
at least this is my theorycraft assumption(and simplified)


i couldnt make a build that made sense. too much survival = too little dmg. from my experience, max dmg creates panic for the enemy and puts them defensive allowing for extra survival...no one likes to see 4k worth of red numbers on the screen at once.

Well, to each his own, I guess... I would much rather start out with BoK in the arena, and your blessing is going to disappear anyways when you have to cast BoF or BoP on yourself. To that end, again, you get a constant benefit from Benediction, and against a good healer + DPS combo, you probably will go OOM, not to mention Priests who will Mana Burn you into obscurity.

Keep in mind, this is not a hybrid Ret build. This build wouldn't see any PvE at all. This is a pure arena PvP build. And it's been my experience that "max pew pew" is almost never the answer in the arena PvP.

It's just too easy to heal through as a healer (I know, I heal on a 2v2 and 3v3 in my guild, you wouldn't believe the duress I can keep people alive under), and most healers are a royal !@#$ to take down. Damage alone just can't do it, you have to shut them down.


Vindication has a very good proc rate, or at least good enough, I see it pretty often when getting hammered on by Ret Pallies. I'm not a huge fan of proc-based talents in PvP, but this is not one I could pass up.


Uh... yeah... yeah, it does.

- Strength = - AP.
- Agility = - AP (depending on class), - ranged AP, - dodge, - crit, and even - a little armor.
- Intellect = - spell crit.
- Spirit = - mana regen.


Go look at that list above. This hurts every class in the game. Some more than others, but if Vindication procs, that class is watered down however much or little for the next 10 seconds, longer if it procs in succession (which it will be if you are constantly beating on them).



That's one way to think about it. Another way to think about it is that it's going to be much easier to get them under 20% with Vindication. If you've done 6800 damage and Vindication procs, you can use HoW. If you don't have Vindication you would have to cause 8000 damage before you could use HoW. So in actuality, you get to cast HoW when they get under 35% life, meaning you get to cast it more, not less. Vindication still > without Vindication.


Again... your experience is what it is, so by all means, go with what works for you... but my experience has taught me that max damage is almost never the answer. A Ret Pally has certainly never caused me to panic. If I can heal through with Rogues and Warriors pounding on me, how afraid do you think I am of Ret Pallies?

By the way, you're only adding fuel to my fire by not being able to come up with a build yourself. Much easier to ridicule mine when you're not willing to put one of your own out there, isn't it?