WoW Patch 2.3: Rejoice of the Raiding Paladin?

Anyone who's trolled around the World of Warcraft class forums knows what it's like to talk about something off-limits; that is, something inherently ridiculous and far-fetched. If someone were to talk seriously about, for instance, the specialization of a Warlock for melee damage, he'd face unending ridicule.

Now, one topic that, for many, is akin to the prospect of playing a melee Warlock is the prospect of playing a melee Paladin within a raid setting. Paladins, it is usually argued, are not designed to do sustained damage. In fact, their sustained damage is pathetic compared to basically any other class that is specialized for damage (e.g. a feral druid, a rogue, an MS/fury warrior, even a Shaman).

Well, the naysayers may have to bite their tongue. With patch 2.3 coming out soon, the paladin retribution tree--the tree that offers the most in damage-producing potential but little in terms of raiding utility---is apparently the star of the show. According to the WoW forum moderator Drysc, the paladin changes to be offered in the next patch include:

Mana cost for Exorcism, Holy Wrath, and Hammer of Wrath lowered

Vengeance duration increased to 30 seconds

Improved Seal of Crusader benefits put into base spell, talent benefits replaced with those of Sancitified Crusader

Sanctified Crusader renamed to Sanctified Seals, which increases chance to critically hit with all spells and melee attacks by 1/2/3% and reduces the chance your Seals will be dispelled by 33/66/100%

Crusader Strike cooldown reduced to 6 seconds

Vindication frequency and duration increased and reduces all attributes by 5/10/15%

Pursuit of Justice is now 3 ranks and increases movement speed by 5/10/15% and reduces the chance to be hit by spells by 1/2/3%.

With the exception of the first talent, all of the proposed changes have to do with the retribution tree. In most, if not all cases, any change to a damage-type talent is a change for the better. The change to vengeance--a talent which gives the paladin a potential 15% increase to holy and physical damage--has been basically doubled in terms of sustained damage potential.

Another change that seems consistent with making retribution paladins more raid viable includes the increased potency and frequency of application for vindication--a debuff that will now reduce all attributes by 15% max. Currently vindication apparently has about a 20-30% chance to apply per hit--around the same as "procc'ing" most rogue poisons--but it's not sufficient since a retribution paladin will have a very slow (>3.5s swing-time) for melee attacks. Compare that to a rogue who will be hitting with both main hand and off-hand attacks for between 1.8-2.6s each and you can imagine the difference in application. This change seems to be equally a buff to PvP and PvE (i..e. raiding).

But some players have noted the lack of an "aggro [i.e. the amount of hate a mob has for a target player] management" skill. When you think of an "aggro management skill" what you should think of is something with an instant cast that can be used frequently (i.e. not too long of a cooldown period) that lowers the aggro or hate of the player that uses it. Rogues have a skill called feint, which can be cast every several seconds and lowers the amount of aggro they've generated in the past minute or so. Rogues cycle this as they use their damage abilities so that should something happen to the tank, for instance, the monster they are attacking will not immediately turn and destroy the rogue(s).

So, why the lack of an aggro management skill? One explanation is that retribution paladins still won't do enough damage to warrant the implementing of such a skill. Trolling through the forums, this seems to be the most prevalent idea. Another explanation can be that paladins are akin to warriors in that like warriors, if they are going to specialize for melee damage, they'll have to do it absent an aggro management skill. Why? Simply because of the multi-functional nature of the class, probably. Paladins can heal and tank effectively. Warriors can tank and do damage effectively. Rogues, mages, and hunters get an aggro management skill because all they offer is damage output, plus a few other raid utilities. The former is their primary function, though, so they'd better be good at managing it!

Retribution paladins can probably be useful in other ways than just damage capabilities. Certainly crusader strike, with its function as a "judgment refresher", offers something; it's just simply not enough. A review of the proposed changes sees that most of the changes increase damage output but don't offer anything like another buff or crowd controlling features. Given this and other items touched upon in this article, I think it's doubtful retribution paladins will be suddenly "high-demand" for raiding.