New blue post

Here is how Prot paladins are working in our current beta build. You might not see these changes in the next beta build, but in the one after that. Things are still in a high degree of flux however.

Shield of the Righteous -- Now consumes Holy Power to cause damage.

Holy Shield -- Now a passive ability that causes your Shield of the Righteous to provide 5% block per stack of Holy Power consumed. In other words, you never click Holy Shield. You just click Shield of the Righteous and buff yourself.

Hammer of the Righteous -- Now generates Holy Power but shares a cooldown with Crusader Strike. Almost all talents that affect one or the other will affect both. The intention is you use Crusader Strike -> Shield of the Righteous for single target and Hammer of the Righteous -> Shield of the Righteous for multitarget.

Avenger's Shield -- No real change, but it still hits pretty hard. Both CS and HotR can proc Grand Crusader to lower the Avenger's Shield cooldown.

Vindication -- can be caused only by Crusader Strike or Hammer of the Righteous.

Holy Wrath -- With the above changes, we think Prot paladins have enough rotational buttons to hit, so we are downplaying Holy Wrath. Holy Wrath is really intended as a Ret filler spell (for when other attacks are on cooldown). Prot could technically use Holy Wrath, but we aren't providing any talent hooks.

Consecration -- Now on a 10 sec duration with a 30 sec cooldown. The Hallowed Ground talent makes it cheaper and hit harder -- it does not affect duration. Use Consecration when you need it, but you can't spam it. This is consistent with the AE changes we are making to all tanks.

With these changes in mind, Prot will be thinking about buttons such as these:

Single Target: Judgement, Crusader Strike, Shield of the Righteous, Avenger's Shield.
Multi-target: Judgement, Consecration, Hammer of the Righteous, Shield of the Righteous, Avenger's Shield, possibly Exorcism.

None of this includes things like Seals, Inquisition, defensive cooldowns, Word of Glory, etc.


This was a blue post I took from the front page of MMO champion. Id have to see how this actually works mechanicwise before I can really start QQing but im not sure how I feel about these changes. Nothings set in stone just yet though. I can see pros and cons about this playstyle.. though I do like the fact that they are trying to keep ShoR. I dont see the reason to add avengers shield to a constant rotation.. it just seems abit... well.. the way I view AS, is the paladins trademark pickup spell, dont piss a paladin off unless you wanna get captain america'd but it seems like it will lose abit of its epicness if we are using it so often even on close range targets.
I can live with the consecration changes IF they really do manage to get rid of aoe... paladins in my mind have always been the tank that drops their consecration, picks up everything, and blocks alot, cata seems to be just turning them into a generic warrior clone. Oh well I could be wrong, only time will tell. I will still love my pala either way.