Blinding Shield (level 81): Causes damage and blinds all nearby targets. This effect might end up only damaging those facing the paladin's shield, in a manner similar to Eadric the Pure's ability Radiance in Trial of the Champion. The Holy tree will have a talent to increase the damage and critical strike chance, while the Protection tree will have a talent to make this spell instant cast. 2-second base cast time. Requires a shield.
Interesting . . . A nice AoE snap aggro tool. Very similar to warrior’s Shockwave, but still retaining the paladin flavor
Healing Hands (level 83): Healing Hands is a new healing spell. The paladin radiates heals from him or herself, almost like a Healing Stream Totem. It has a short range, but a long enough duration that the paladin can cast other heals while Healing Hands remains active. 15-second cooldown. 6-second duration.
Effectively does the same thing as having Consecration heal friendlies. The paladin still has to physically go to where the healing is needed. In 5-mans, this is awesome. In raids, it will need to be used a little more judiciously. All that said . . . I like it. A paladin, being a holy warrior, SHOULD be wading into battle even if it is just to heal his compatriots.
Guardian of Ancient Kings (level 85): Summons a temporary guardian that looks like a winged creature of light armed with a sword. The visual is similar to that of the Resurrection spell used by the paladin in Warcraft III. The guardian has a different effect depending on the talent spec of the paladin. For Holy paladins, the guardian heals the most wounded ally in the area. For Protection paladins, the guardian absorbs some incoming damage. For Retribution paladins, it damages an enemy, similar to the death knight Gargoyle or the Nibelung staff. 3-minute cooldown. 30-second duration (this might vary depending on which guardian appears).
This spell seems pretty cool. I love how it is a single spell, but has a different effect for each of the three specs. Hopefully, the artwork on this temp pet will be new (not a rehash of the Val’kyr art).
Changes to Abilities and Mechanics
Crusader Strike will be a core ability for all paladins, gained at level 1. We think the paladin leveling experience is hurt by not having an instant attack. Retribution will be getting a new talent in its place that either modifies Crusader Strike or replaces it completely.
I like the Crusader Strike change, but it is not a surprise at all. Regardless of the post I made yesterday, I pretty much thought that Crusader Strike would become the low level “strike” for paladins. The big question is . . . what is the talented improvement/replacement strike in the Ret tree going to be?
Cleanse is being rebalanced to work with the new dispel system. It will dispel defensive magic (debuffs on friendly targets), diseases, and poisons.The Cleanse change is pretty much old news.
Blessing of Might will provide the benefit of Wisdom as well. If you have two paladins in your group, one will do Kings on everyone and the other will do Might on everyone. There should be much less need, and ideally no need, to provide specific buffs to specific classes.
Further simplification of the Blessings system is more a quality of life change than anything else. Also, it helps make bringing 3-4 paladins to a raid seem less mandatory.
Holy Shock will be a core healing spell available to all paladins.
Holy Shock becomes a core ability (I called it yesterday!!!!!). Although it seems it is going to be all healing – all the time.
New Talents and Talent Changes
We want to ease off the defensive capabilities of Retribution and Holy paladins slightly. We think the powerful paladin defenses have been one of the things holding Retribution paladins back, especially in Arenas. One change we're considering is lowering Divine Shield's duration by a couple of seconds. Having said that, Retribution does pretty well in Battlegrounds, and Battlegrounds will be a much bigger focus in Cataclysm since they can provide the best PvP rewards. Furthermore, the healing environment of Cataclysm is going to be different such that a paladin may not be able to fully heal themselves during the duration of Divine Shield to begin with, so this may not be a problem.
I knew this was coming, so I go nothing to say at this time.
We feel Retribution paladins need one more mechanic which involves some risk of the player pushing the wrong button, making the rotation a bit less forgiving. In addition, we want to add to this spec more PvP utility. Right now the successes of the Retribution paladin in PvP seem to be reduced to either doing decent burst damage, or just being good at staying alive.
/agree . . . Make it so.
We want to increase the duration of Sacred Shield to 30 minutes and keep the limit to one target. The intention is that the paladin can use it on their main healing target. That said, we would like to improve the Holy paladin toolbox and niche so that they don't feel quite like the obvious choice for tank healing while perceived as a weak group healer.
Another quality of life change. But one that I am fond of.
We want to add to the Holy tree a nice big heal to correspond with Greater Heal. Flash of Light remains the expensive, fast heal and Holy Light is the go-to heal that has average efficiency and throughput. Beacon of Light will be changed to work with Flash of Light. We like the ability, but want paladins to use it intelligently and not be constantly healing for twice as much.
The thought of a “heal bomb” that is bigger than Holy Light is a little disturbing at first. But this is not an unexpected change.
Holy paladins will use spirit as their mana regeneration stat.
No news here
Protection paladins need a different rotation between single-target and multi-target tanking. Likewise, we're looking to add the necessity to use an additional cooldown in each rotation.
Again . . . Called it yesterday.
Holy Shield will no longer have charges. It will be designed to improve block chance while active, and will continue to provide a small amount of damage and threat.
So we are going to be further cemented into the “block tank” niche.
Mastery Passive Talent Tree Bonuses
These are all pretty much as expected, and as such, I have nothing new or interesting to add.
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