Rotational Queries...

In our recent Ulduar 25 run, I had the pleasure of being one of three retribution paladins.

Of the three, I was second in terms of damage. Now, the paladin who topped me is normally a tank (how galling), and does a lot of pugging (how brave), and has really nice gear.

So I just assumed it was an issue more of gear than of rotation or ability or anything like that.

Then I looked at the WWS for the run. With the exception of Exorcism and Ret Aura, my abilities do more damage than his abilities (if you look at the white line. On the green line, his abilities do more than my abilities. I wish I knew how to read this stupid chart better. It seems that the white is damage, the green are how many? Or something... in which case, I'm just not doing ENOUGH). My Seal, Judgement, Swing, Crusader Strike, Divine Storm...

Yet he's out damaging me. (Shut up. I know on the charts it looks like only by 9 DPS. But that's apparently the difference between #1 and #2. So 9 DPS is GIGANTIC. And I have no idea why Micro, who is pulling over 4100 DPS is so low on the charts. Probably because Paladins are awesome and mages are just glorified water boys.)

So I've been trying to figure out what I'm doing wrong.

I'm going to assume it has something to do with my rotation. Which admittedly is my hardest to watch/do thing, given that I'm also often using art of war, and moving, and decursing and all that fun stuff that makes being a paladin so awesome. Which means that my perfect rotation, where nothing is off CD at the same time so I don't 'waste' time waiting for GCD, never happens.

I tend to move in and judge light, to get Heart of the Crusader on the boss. Then I'll try to crusader strike, then divine storm, then judgement will be off cooldown (or close to). I use exorcism whenever I have all three of the others on cooldown (or the boss moves away and I'm not in melee range). I'm not sure if I should use exorcism whenever it's up? It does some nice damage.

I think the problem is that I have one 6s CD and two 10s CDs. And I get confused which one I should be hitting first to try to keep the CD's from overlapping.

I guess it's time with the training dummy for me. Or maybe RetLoL has new information.

Ironsoul

The other day I was looking at Kvasira's gear and wondering when I'd ever get out of the Spiked Titansteel Helm and the Titansteel Destroyer.

I don't need the hit rating, for heaven's sake!

And I was commenting to Vialora how I hope that Flame Levi, one of those times I'm in Ulduar-10, drops this neat two-handed weapon that he has.

And usually I'm the only plate DPS in Ulduar-10.

And the other night, Vialora is invited along.

And Flame Levi drops Ironsoul.

And Vialora has more DKP.

But Vialora lives in my house.

And I know how to castrate things.

And make brownies.

Together, those two arguments convinced him that passing so I can get the upgrade was a good idea.

I'm sure my guild thinks I beat him into submission.

But I think 'beat' is too strong a word. Strongly demonic glares and the promise of brownies isn't beating. It's negotiation. It's a compromise.

(In all honesty, Vialora passed out of the goodness of his heart, and the fact that I raid far more often than he does, and would use the weapon more. Also, his equipped weapon was better than my equipped weapon at the time (he is using The Jawbone). So I really do owe him brownies and my very sincere gratitude.)

Fun in Regular Halls of Lightning

One of my friends has leveled a DK tank and he wanted to take it on a test drive. So we rousted together some people and hit the heroic daily, which was Utgarde Keep. I took Kikidas, because Ingvar drops a ring. It's better than the rings I have. So I went.

When I joined the group, I got a swell of heart-ache and longing remembrance, as Agurtzane said, "Nooo! I wanted JUST ONE CHANCE to hold aggro!"

Of course, it would have helped if he had been in frost presence instead of unholy! (Remind me to tell you guys about the hunter in our Ulduar-10 that had on Pack during the Deconstructor.)

So after a few wipes (well, I kept dying, so as far as I'm concerned... wipe) where I kept going, "I don't know WHY I'm pulling aggro! I'm waiting!" I finally notice that the tank is not in frost. I gleefully point it out, gloating that it wasn't my warlocky badness that was causing me to pull aggro. I, dare I say, was innocent.

We go on through the instance, la-de-da, kill the boss, la-de-da, no ring, poop, and we try to get him the tanking trinket out of regular HoL. Kikidas doesn't need anything out of regular HoL (not that any of my 80's do), so I decide to take Kvasira just to make it a nice quick run.

Heehee. I need to run regular instances more often! I was almost hitting 4k DPS on everything. *glee* I know it means nothing... but it still made me squeal in delight and fuzzy warmth.

So fuzzy. So warm. Like curling up with a kitten of epic DPS proportions.

And once Frost presence was on, Agurtzane kept threat really well... except for when I opened with Divine Storm...

C'mon people, I need the BIG NUMBERS! Aggro be damned. (It isn't like every tank doesn't have to get massive amounts of AoE threat right away with ANY ret paladin that they run with. I was just training the new tank appropriately.)

On a side note... I'm still having issues figuring out a good single or duo-target trash rotation. For quick deaths, rain of fire seems to do better than SoC? But other than that, is it SB, SB, DL?

PvP Martyr vs. Command?

Yes, my paladin is PvPing again. Namely because Boon wishes to arena. And what the Boon wishes, the K provides. So I need PvP gear.... so it was off to the battlegrounds for me!

It's a new game out there. There are times when, yes... it's an 'even match' and we win. By even match I mean not a horde premade and equal amounts of people on both sides. Of course, we still lose a fair number of those even matches.

And then there are those matches where we go into EotS (I see this most often there) and it's 15 to 7, Alliance to Horde.

Those are so sweet and clean. Feel a little bad for the poor Hordlings.... until the next match where I sit there and curse them all back to the bowels of Hell.

Anyway... I had been noticing that some paladins in PvP are still using the damage to self Martyr. Presumably because of the higher overall damage, despite the 'always crit on stunned targets' of Command.

I slapped it on to try it... and surprisingly, I didn't do as poorly with it as I expected -- didn't die from it, at any rate.

So for PvP, I've rediscovered the rawr. Yes. The rawr. The feel of running the flag and nyah'ing at the Horde's attempt to stop me. The feel of rushing FRR and whomping people. The feel of running up and planting a seaforium charge at a gate and defending it and seeing the gate blow open with no tanks nearby. The serene joy I get sitting at the top of IBT and watching it burn. And of course... Arathi Basin and the... yeah, still hate the terrain advantage in AB.

Back to Martyr and Command in PvP. From what I had read, people still preferred Command over Martyr in PvP. But it isn't matching up with what I'm seeing in actual battlegrounds. I'll have to evaluate if I notice it on arena opponents, as well.

You'd think that without the constant whackitywhack on something with judgement of light inflicted upon it, that the damage you take from Martyr would swiftly outstrip your Divine Storm/Art of War healing, and if you didn't have a healer nearby, it would be a big negative. But again, it isn't something I noticed as a big downside. I think because most fights are over before the health loss becomes an issue. You're either going to die or not.

Granted, there are a few times where it comes down to the ittybitty little last bit of life for you and the other dude, where Martyr could seriously make you have a baaad day, but that doesn't happen too often.

If any other paladins read this blog, chime in with your impressions of Command vs. Martyr in PvP and Arena.

Retribution Paladin Glyphs

This post is going to focus mainly on the glyphs (mainly major) that are beneficial for retribution paladins, and you will see why Blizzard really doesn't love us. :(

Major Glyphs

Glyph of Avenging Wrath

• This glyph has the potential to really boost your DPS, if used at the right time and in the right cirumcstances.
• It reduces the cooldown of your Hammer of Wrath by 50% when Avenging Wrath is active. What this means it that if you save your Avenging Wrath to when a boss has 20% or less health, then pop it, you can cast Hammer of Wrath every 3 seconds.
• The thing to consider is the fact that this is a glyph that only applies at a very specific set of circumstances. You need your avenging wrath to be on cooldown and the boss has to be at 20% or less health, and for the best use of this, once the boss hits 20% or less health, and you pop your avenging wrath and start hammering away, it needs to live for 20 seconds to get the MOST use and DPS out of this combination of things.
• That set of circumstances often applies to most raid bosses. Go go HoW!

Glyph of Consecration

• Now, back in the OLD days, a lot of people I spoke to said that they never used Consecration, simply because of cooldowns and the lack of damage/mana spent. But these are the new days. We young whippersnappers are slapping down consecration on a regular basis, and what's more... we're dancing in it.
• The glyph itself is pretty simple and straightforward, this increases the duration and cooldown of your consecration by 2 seconds.
• What this means is that there will hopefully be one less time when your consecration goes off at the same time you need to hit another ability or spell. It puts it on the same timer as your divine storm, judgement* and 4 seconds longer than your crusader strike.
  *If you have four pieces of your T7 set, judgement cooldown is 9 seconds, not 10.
• Paladins don't think of ourselves as having a casting rotation as strict as say, a mage or warlock, but in actuality, we do. It is possible to screw things up so that instead of being able to use crusader strike every 6 seconds, we're actually using it every 8-10 because we hit a cooldown right before crusader strike is up. If we start our rotation wrong, and we say to ourselves 'zomg, need to keep judgement of wisdom up!' and we hit judgement before we hit crusader strike EVERY TIME... it eats into your DPS. But that's a whole other story in and of itself.

Glyph of Crusader Strike

• Crusader Strike is the bread and butter for single target DPS for us RetLoL's. We loves our Crusader Strike, yes we do!
• Now, if this glyph increased DAMAGE, I would be in hog heaven. However, a decrease in mana is still not a bad price to day, considering our ever shrinking mana pools. Having to replace your Seal of Command or Martyr with Seal of Wisdom because you're running out of mana, even chain-casting Divine Plea... makes us sad pandapaladins.

Glyph of Exorcism

• One word. Nifty.
• If this glyph doesn't change when Exorcism affects all creatures, not just undead, it will be a handy ability to have. Finally, we can pull a caster without having to find a hill to hind behind or a corner to duck around! However, it's PROBABLY more for solo-play than group-play.

Glyph of Hammer of Justice

• HoJ has its uses in PvE, but I don't know if an extra 5 yards is worth it. I can EASILY see this being useful in PvP.

Glyph of Hammer of Wrath

• Free HoW? Pair that up with Glyph of Avenging Wrath and you're one hammer swinging bad-ass.
• However, again I find this glyph very situational. Yes, you do cast your hammer of wrath frequently, but usually just once on your average fight... boss fights is a different story. And again, if you're pairing it up with Glyph of Avenging Wrath, this is definately a nice one to take. Lets you whackitywhack for free!
  

Glyph of Judgement

• This is a must have for us, imnsho. Not only do our judgements cause Heart of the Crusader, but also have the potential to put up Righteous Vengeance, two very important things.
• We should be judging whenever the cooldown is up, not just when our judgement is going to fall off the boss. The duration of Heart of the Crusader is shorter than the duration of our judgement, so please, pretty please, especially if you are the only ret paladin in your group, JUDGE. Cast your righteous vengeance on them! Be the Judge, Jury and Executioner!
• In short... increasing the damage of our judgements? Gravy.
  

Glyph of Seal of Command

• I currently HAVE this, but that will change since I've started to use Seal of the Martyr and I no longer really use Seal of Command. But it's very useful for times when you aren't using seal of the martyr (pvp?).
• No seriously, if you're thinking that Seal of Command, thus buffed with this glyph is better than Seal of the Martyr, I'm proof that it isn't. I switched mid-raid from Command to Martyr and saw my average DPS jump up from low 2k to high 2k-low3k.
• In more concrete terms, Command is a flat boost to damage, whereas Martyr seems multiplicative. What it multiplies with, dunno!
• Here's some info on Seal of the Martyr from WoWWiki. Martyr can crit (and be missed, dodged and parried) and scales on a 27% of weapon damage (or so I gather).
• Don't let the healers gainsay you from using this. (where "this" is seal of the Martyr) Yes, you do have to be careful. Yes, you need to use it responsibly. Yes, we will laugh and point if you kill yourself. But Judgement of Light will help heal a portion of your damage and that's also why we have Art of War. (Well, that and Loatheb. Be kind to your healers on Loatheb. Heal thyself.)

Minor Glyphs
We're a little screwed on the minor glyph side, with the only direct benefit coming from one glyph, all the others being pluses for pre-raid buffing or self-buffing the regular blessings as opposed to greater blessings. Boo.

Glyph of Sense Undead

• This is the only directly beneficial one to us pallies. 1% increased damage to undead when we're sensing them? Okay. I'll take that. I just need to remember to switch to Sense Undead when I walk into Naxx.
  

Glyph of Blessing of Kings

• Typically a pre-raid issue, it's useful to keep us from burning out on mana when we're buffing a full raid with Kings, or if we have to buff on the fly in a fight or some such. Why don't see get glyphs that make our spells reagentless? *pout*
  

Glyph of Lay on Hands

• Again, not a direct boost to us, but useful if we're having to save someone with a mana bar... or, in worst case scenarios, use it on yourself if you're almost out of mana, to give yourself a mana injection... though, I still prefer to save it to, I dunno, save someone?

Glyph of the Wise

• Useful if you're low on mana in combat and have to wait for yourself to passively generate enough mana to slap on Seal of Wisdom. Hopefully you've enough awareness of the fight you're in, your own mana bar, and you're using Divine Plea on a regular basis, you should have plenty of time to either eat/drink, Divine Plea, or slap on your seal of wisdom.
  

Glyph of Blessing of Might/Glyph of Blessing of Wisdom

• These are both glyphs that make your regular blessing of might or wisdom last as long as a greater, without using a reagent. Personally, I prefer kings on myself anyway.
• This does not apply to anyone else you cast said blessings on, they get the ghetto-10 minute.
• Did I already say I prefer Kings on myself?

So, pick your glyphs with care and thought. We don't have a huge selection with our minors, but then again, who does? However, our major glyphs can really boost our DPS! And that's what we're all about, the deeps.

Go out there and represent!

Brand New Year, Same Old Tricks

If you've been wondering where I have been (and I know you've missed me... it's been over 10 days since I've been around! How did you ever survive?), I was in Florida!

Florida, by the way, is just south of Un'Goro. The raptors are just a bit smaller, but still everywhere. And don't get me started on the size of the pterrodax's!

Anyway... so it's a brand new year. Have you guys made your Resolutions?

I made mine in November, shortly after my birthday. How am I doing with that? Meh. The wagon has fallen off the beaten path, but it's still stubbornly chugging along. Had to fix an axle here, a wheel there, but it's still plugging along.

But enough about the boring real world... how about in WoW?

Just because it's a virtual world doesn't mean you can't make resolutions for it, too.

Want that Traveler's Tundra Mammoth? Is your resolution to farm an hour (or more!) a day for funding?

Drooling over some piece of gear but feel you'll never be able to get into the instance it drops in? Have you decided to work towards bettering your character and your gear in ways you can?

Are you a DPS class that's getting outDPS'd continuously by the tank? Have you looked into what's going wrong? Do you have recount? Do you have appropriate gear for your class? Etc.

Since I'm perfect, I have no Resolutions in WoW.

(I'm kidding.)

We've started to hit Heroics with our Paladins (by 'we', I mean Boon and Kvasira) and ran our first two last night - Heroic Violet Hold and Heroic Culling of Stratholme.

We're going to be venturing into 10-man Naxx this weekend, just for a looksee and to see how many times in one night we can die. Any wagers?

I'm guessing we wipe at least 5 times. On our way to the first boss.

My shaman dinged 78 yesterday and so naturally I made Seraphelia (Boon's Blood/Frost DK) tank CoS at 78 too.

We made it through with only one true wipe. We had people die here and there, and I had to pull out all my tricks to keep my mana up. And at one point, I was tanking when Seraphelia died on a pull. Why did Seraphelia die? Because I thought it would be funny! (No, I'm kidding.)

It was very fun, in my opinion and I think Seraphelia did just swimmingly. The only true wipe was on Mal'Ganis, because no one realized he had a frontal arc AoE and I just couldn't keep everyone alive. (Bad shammy, BAD!)

Seraphelia however, kept giving me the hairy eyeball because we had three 78's in the instance. ("What part of 80 instance do you not understand, K?!")

*giggle*

Oh, it's good to be back.

Revisit the Naked Paladin

Wearing only my Stormpike Tabard, I have a whopping 11.03% crit.

I will have to assume that is due to talents that I have when completely nekkid.

However... when I put my gear back on, my crit dropped to 17.51%. Down from 19 and change. I don't know why. Boon thinks I may have had a buff on that I wasn't aware of.

Who knows! But there you have it, by gear we need to make up about 14% critical strike to keep Vengeance up most of the time. Maybe we can reduce that by increasing our speed, so we're hitting faster so we have more crits / time rather than more crits / swing? Or whatever.

Well, I'm home now, time to play play play!

Edit: I figured it out. For some reason, my mouse-down box keeps going from melee stats to spell stats.

Paladin: Hit, Crit, Agi, Expertise and Armor Pen.

With the advent of Wrath of the Lich King, we've had a lot of itemization changes.

Spell Damage and Spell Healing have been merged into Spell Power.

Melee Hit and Spell Hit have become Hit.

And most of the plate has merged to become: Tank, Melee, Healer.

Lucky holy paladins. :P

What does this mean for us Ret Pallies? We're sharing armor with DPS warriors and now DK's. Neither of the two of them use intellect (which I mean in so VERY many ways!) and so a lot of the gear that's floating out there for us to use also has no intellect.

Which means a magical shrinking mana pool!

But that's besides the point. That's why we have Replenishment and Divine Plea and Seal of Wisdom and Judgement of Wisdom. You start getting low in mana and you do something and poof, back it comes. The bad part of having a small mana pool is also the good part of it - you don't need a lot to fill it back up!

The other thing of note is the scarcity of gear that makes us sit up and jump. All of a sudden we have all these new things being thrown at us. Expertise and Armor Penetration, Hit Rating? What?

With the loss of Precision, suddenly we paladins need to start thinking of our hit ratings.

And how do we handle this expertise and armor penetration? How important is it over our tried and true crit rating?

I CAN'T HANDLE CHANGE!

Ahem.

So here are some K-Derived numbers (take as truth at your own risk!, all my numbers were generated through wowwiki or worldofwarcraft forum research).

Hit Rating
If we can't hit, we can't crit. (or do damage, really...) so hit rating, especially at the level of 80 heroics and raids, is very important.

The hit rating assumes that you have maxed weapon skill.

Lvl 80 requires 5% hit. Lvl 81 requires 5.5% hit. Lvl 82 requires 6% hit. (Lvl 82 is, iirc, the level of most heroic bosses.)

Lvl 83, the level of all raid bosses in Northrend, requires a whopping 9%!

So, I hear you say, those numbers are the same as they were in BC! We always needed a 9% hit.

Ah, but as we all know, the amount of stat required goes UP UP UP the higher level you are. Which is why people wearing their Uber-Classic gear at level 70 were always looked at sideways. Yeah, real cool that you have it, and sure, it LOOKS like it's got stats that are equivalent to what gear that drops for you now appears to have... but the gear level is too low and so those numbers don't mean what the numbers seem to mean!

Blizzard likes to screw with our heads this way.

So, not only do they take away our pretty pretty Precision (which gave us ret pallies at 3% hit), but they then increase the amount of hit rating points we need!

A 32.79 hit rating is equal to 1% hit.

So at level 80, with 400 weapon skill, you need 295 hit rating to hit a level 83 boss.
At level 80, with 400 weapon skill, you need 197 hit rating to hit a level 82 boss.

And by hit, I mean 'not miss'. This doesn't stop parries or dodges however. So don't attack from in front of the mob. Not only do you piss off the tank (because who knew! Mobs hit faster after they parry! So if you're causing them to parry, they're hitting the tank more often. Which incidentally will probably irritate the healer, even if they don't know that you're the cause. Be a good little DPSer. Go stab the mob in the ass.) but you get parried.

If you're a draenei or always run with a draenei and have access to Heroic Presence (1% hit rating), you need 262.21 hit rating to be hit capped.

Agility or Crit? Or both?
Wrath has been very stingy with the drops of pure crit gear. I have seen my % crit plummet from in the 28% range to less than 20%. This makes me a very sad sad person.

However! We have a bunch of talents that increases our critical strike chance!

Heart of the Crusader at max rank will increase our critical strike chance by 3%.
Conviction at max rank will increase our critical strike chance by 5%.
Sanctified Seals at max rank will increase our critical strike chance by 3%.

So just by talents alone we have 11% critical strike chance.

To keep Vengeance up at all times, it is recommended to have about 25% critical strike chance.

At level 80, it takes 52 agility to get 1% crit. At level 80, it takes 46 crit rating to get 1% crit.

We need to 'make up' 14% crit from our gear.

Now, just looking at Kvasira, she has ~6.7% from crit rating and agility. But according to her tooltip, she really has ~19%. Is this the other 11% from talents? Or some other source? I DON'T KNOW! *aieeeah*

I plan on getting nekkid when I get home today and seeing what crit% I'm at wearing no gear whatsoever.

Regardless, it is easier in terms of stat to % to stack critical strike rating. However, a lot of gear out there seems to have a lack of critical strike rating at all... and then when you do find one with lots of crit rating, it's worse in all other areas than what you're currently using.

Such as Brann's Lost Mining Helmet that dropped for us last night. However, I am wearing the Faceguard of Punishment... which is great in terms of crit! That's 2% increase in crit! ... but oh, yeah. A huge drop in stamina and strength. Poop. (For those interested, Strength increases our attack power by 1 str = 2 AP.)

If someone out there knows, does the tooltip on the character sheet take into account talents or not? I had thought it did NOT (hence why Heroic Presence doesn't show up in hit rating on the tooltip). If so, where is that extra 13% crit coming?

I WILL revisit this idea when I have a chance.

Regardless to say, you need to look at the gear overall to determine if taking that tasty tasty crit rating is really an overall upgrade in terms of the other things we need to have.

Expertise
One of the new kids on the block, Expertise decreases your chance of being parried and dodged. There's not a ton of information on this out there, other than 'it's good.'.

Gee thanks!

As near as I can figure it's another 'rating to actual expertise' stat. So 8.2 expertise rating really gives you 1 expertise?

Meh.

214 is listed as the 'soft cap' for a decrease of 6.5% dodging. Melee DPS don't have to worry about avoiding parries (because why class? That's right! Melee DPS stab in the ass.)

People used different terms, one person saying you need 26 expertise to avoid dodges and 60 if you want to avoid parries. I'm ASSUMING they're taking of actual expertise, rather than expertise rating.

So, expertise is also an important stat in terms of not getting dodged. Dodge is not the same as a miss. You can be hit capped and still get dodged.

In terms of what is more important however, it is still advisable, imnsho, to stack strength, crit and hit before you worry about expertise.

Armor Penetration
So, one day long ago I had discussed Spell Penetration. And that is still true. Spell Penetration is NOT armor penetration. Armor Penetration is not necessarily the melee version of Spell Penetration and is useless for PvE.

Because otherwise Blizz is telling us all to get off the carebear server and go PvP with as much armor pen they're throwing at us.

Is it good for PvP? Yes. Does that mean it's useless for PvE? No.

Armor Penetration reduces the amount of armor your attacks have to actually deal with. It's an ability that doesn't 'stack' additively, but exponentially (according to Retlol).

Yet another 'stat to rating' stat. 7 Armor Penetration is equal to 1 Armor Penetration Rate.

1000 ArP = 142.8 ArP Rate = 9.2% ignoring of armor.

In the past, this varied with the amount of armor you're dealing with. Against things with low armor, the % bypassed was higher. It's now a flat rate.

15.39 ArP = 1% armor ignored.

This is another 'new kid' for us in terms of how useful it is. WoWWiki indicates that it's useful for bosses as well. Retlol says that it gets better the more you have. Bully for us! I'm old school. I want my crit. :(

This is another stat that doesn't have a lot of immediately useful applications that you can read about. However, the more armor you ignore, the harder you hit. This is a good thing.

And last but not least, Haste.

I know the title doesn't say it. But meh. Haste is another new-old friend that we're seeing more of. To my knowledge, Haste does not reduce our cooldown of Crusader Strike or Divine Storm or Judgement or anything else.

But it does make us swing that big ol' two hander faster. And if you have Seal of Command (or your seal of choice) on, then that means it has more of a chance to activate.

Haste is both additive and multiplicative.

Meaning multiple pieces of haste gear add up, 10 haste here and 14 haste there = 24 haste.

But it is multiplicative with other sources of haste.

Yeah, I don't know what those things are. The example they give on wowwiki is hunters... they get haste from Serpent's Swiftness (ability) and their quiver. The SS gets multiplied by the quiver haste which gets multipled by the additive values of your haste rating gear.

...

So it makes us swing our big two-hander faster. Yay!

That isn't really sarcasm, because a good portion of our damage comes from when we whack things with our weapon and our seal of command (or whatever you're using!) goes off. Which is not to say that Crusader Strike still isn't our baby, but hey, we take DPS where we can get it. :)

Haste additionally improves our casting speed and GCD on spells cast. With Art of War, even Flash of Light takes forever when it isn't instant, so imagine casting Holy Light? Oy. Can a spell take any longer to cast? Geeze!

Now, to make life easier for everyone, there's a nice addon called Rating Buster. It compares what you're looking at with what you're wearing in terms of percentages, etc.

However, nothing beats the human brain.

Let me repeat.

Nothing beats the human brain.

Do not just look at what the tooltip tells you and say, "I take shiney." because it looks better in terms of that particular item. What do YOU need? If you're hit capped, will trading out that piece cause you to unhitcap? Or will it drive you over hitcap and free up points you can use for something else delicious?

Take care with what you're wearing and what you're looking for. Know what you're shy in, what will help you better, what you need to work towards and all that fun stuff.

Now, to go home and get nekkid.

80 and 74

Kvasira hit 80 last night. I flew her out to Sholazar Basin, since I 1: had never been and 2: I figured a new quest hub would have more condensed quests than an older hub that has you going every which way.

I was right! And I hit 80 in a brief period of time. During that time I had a troll rogue named Rogueray ninja a saronite node from me. (Hi Rogueray!)

I was there. I was tapping. He rides up. He dismounts. He taps. Unfortunately, I have auto-loot on, so I wasn't able to 'hold' the node. :(

Now, could it be an issue where one of us is lagging slightly and thinks they really were there first? Sure! But I doubt it. Rogues are sneaky bastids. They steal things. It's in the class definition!

(So, for your roleplayers out there, how do you handle someone doing something 'in character' for them, even if it's a rude thing to do, like node-ninjaing?)

I power leveled my JCing (yes, my paladin is a miner/jewelcrafter. Hush.) so I can start to do the JC dailies. And since I have 4 BOP world blue JC drops from Northrend, I figured it was worth it.

Then last night I went into Old Kingdom with my shaman. She was a pitiful level 73. Rawr. The only time we wiped was because someone *coughwarlockcough* who shall not be named *coughAbsitivelycough* aggro'd 9 people.

And then I used the soulstone that was on me and started to rez. And a patrol tagged me.

And then I used my reincarnate (ignore previous post) and continued to rez.

And then I saved the day (rawr) when some minion or another *coughFelguardcough* was set on aggressive and went and aggro'd another group of six after a boss fight. We lost no one, even though mobs were everywhere at first! I am teh awesome. And I was using my staff instead of a shield. And I didn't die. So NYAH.

Of course, I suppose the druid tank and the deathknight deathgripping things to be whacketted on and off of the squishy/crunchies helped a teeeeensy bit. But it was so all me. *flex*

(I will completely gloss over the fact that I forgot to put on Earthliving Weapon. Nope. Didn't happen.)

And now my shaman is 74. *woot*

Yay for progression! I have so much fun healing as a shaman. I was contemplating glyphs the other day for her. Something I will post more in-depth on later.

My healing experience, let me just say, has been a priest as holy from the getgo, a shaman that went resto at 58, a druid that started balance/resto, went resto briefly at 58-60, then went rawr-tank and a paladin that says, "Holy Light? Oh, you mean the really SLOW healing spell as opposed to the instant Art of War Flash of Light?"

OutDPS'd a Warlock...

Granted, I don't know what spec said warlock was, or what gear he was wearing (though Boon says high Tier, maybe a Helm of Bloodshed?) ...

But I out DPS'd him. (Granted, by 2%, but getting over 1100 DPS for my overall Utgarde Keep DPS... nummy)

It's a sad day for warlocks and a day of triumph for Retribution Paladins.

Rogue vs. Retadin

I don't have anything interesting to post today, not really, because yesterday I was tabletopping.

So I will instead relate something that happened a few days ago. I took my rogue into AV, to try to nab a few achievements, hoping to loot a bunch of storm crystals and stuff, wind up dying as I surely would, and get sent back to defense where I could turn it in for reputation.

Instead, I somehow found myself solo-defending IBT.

Naturally, I'm nervous. Kava has no PvP gear other than the Brutal Gladiator's Gloves, and I've never been particularly skilled at PvPing, despite my Retadin's success at it.

Now, I am going to assume that the person who came running up the tower was a retadin. It was a BElf Paladin. He had a big two hander on his back.

He came running around the doorway and *sap*.

*cheap shot*
-- 110 energy --
*shiv* *mutilate* *mutilate*
*kidney shot*
*mutilate* *mutilate*
*cold blood* *eviscerate*
Honor Kill

I was stunned.. as he was, undoubtedly!

Now, I didn't notice, was he level 70 or not? No idea. I'm guessing not, because I really can't imagine that I took down a level 70 retadin THAT fast.

But I chortled to myself as IBT burned.

And I've always HATED rogues that stunlocked me. You know... cheap shot, kidney shot - vanish - cheap shot, kidney shot and dead.

Was it cool? Yes. Was it efficient? Sure! Was it all that fun? Not if I did it all the time. Wouldn't that get to the point where it feels like shooting fish in a barrel? Where's the thrill? Where's the excitement? Where's the MUAHAHAHAHA! moment?

Either way... I am the party star!

Spread the Word: Retribution Paladin Reworked

This little thing is courtesy of someone named Peregrine.

Whether or not it will ever be seen? Whether or not it will ever be tested?

Who knows! But take a looksee and give yourself some nice daydreams about if it were true.

70 Retribution Paladin: J.O.A.T.

A JOAT is an acronym for Jack of All Trades.

The end to that is: Master of None.

A retribution paladin is, in my opinion, a joat. We don't do the best damage. We don't do the best healing. We don't do the best tanking.

But by God, do we help out in all three fields when needed!

To quote RetLoL (my inspiration and source of all knowledge... well, not really, but it's a good plug?) about Ret Pallies in 5-mans.

"Here your job will be firstly, to provide blessings, because likely as not you will be the only paladin in the group. So make a note of what Blessings your party wants and keep them up all the time. But be prepared to pro-actively change them mid fight – healer low on mana and using Blessing of Kings? Switch him to Blessing of Wisdom. DPSer asked for Blessing of Might but is constantly aggroing mobs? Switch her to Blessing of Salvation. DPSer got a bit carried away on the boss and pull aggro? Drop them a Blessing of Protection. This fluidity is what will give you a name as a good Retribution paladin, the ability to adapt to the situations, and do it quickly.

Another thing you will provide is wipe recovery, if a team mate dies be ready to Resurrect them – don’t expect the healer to do it “because it’s the healers job”. And of course if the shit hits the proverbial fan you also have to be fast to get that Divine Intervention up on a healer to save your repair cost… I mean… save the group from a corpse run. Yes, that’s what I said. Helping prevent wipes in the first place, with skilled use of Blessing of Protection, Righteous Defense (in none heroics only) and off healing can also get you a reputation for being a good Retribution paladin.

.~~. (removed nonessential paragraph)

Where auras are considered you are likely to have Sanctity Aura up all the time for the extra DPS, however during some boss fights you may need to swap to a Resistance aura for example, or even Concentration Aura for your healer and casters benefit. Again adaptability is the key."

In my oh so humble opinion... every player that enters an instance should have a certain awareness and adaptability of what is going on around them and to the other people in their group.

Now, sometimes having that awareness won't help anyone at all. But those times, in my opinion, are exceptionally few and far between. This is vitally true for classes who can help by changing their role slightly.

The warlock who steps in and fear yo-yo's something that is too much for the hunter to handle or when the sap breaks early or at a poor time.

The hunter who not only traps one mob, but then kites another that was eating the healer.

The tank who keeps an eye on the life of the group and turns to investigate why someone else's health is dropping so prodigiously.

The boomkin or feral kitty who pops out of form to help heal or who keeps an eye on decursing and removing poison.

The rogue who saps, then blinds the sap, then gouges the sap, then kidney shots the sap, then gouges, then kites, until the tank can pick the sap up.

And the retribution paladin that uses blessing of protection, righteous defense, healing spells, judgements, hammers of justice and wrath, repentence, divine protection and makes sure to keep everyone buffed appropriatly...

Let's face it, have YOU run with such a creature? You have if you've run with me. (shameless plug!)

Sure! 98% of my time playing is spent doing a combination of seal->judge, crusader strike, +/- exorcism if it's a demon/undead, +/- hammer of wrath if it's almost dead.

But the 2% of the time where I'm doing everything and it's brother is the time where you're thankful you have a retribution paladin versus a rogue in your group!

It's a change for me, to go from trying to be the tippytop of the DPS meter, to being content where I wind up being. Because I'm useful. I do decent DPS (400-600 instance depending) when I am able to DPS. Sometimes I'm being the catch-all for whatever is going on.

(Ooh, ooh! In Slabs, against those big pulls of skeletons? Consecration + Holy Wrath = 1500 DPS. *squee*)

It's a subtle role and a lot of people probably miss it. However, I make sure that the people I party with don't miss it because I'm a verbal attention whore. "Did you see what I did there! You are SO lucky that I'm in the group with you!"

(Just kidding! Though I have been informed that when I do blessing of protection on someone who is not the healer, I need to let them know so they can remove it to continue to cast. So I do have a little bit of 'I just bubbled you (name).' advertisement.)

Retribution paladins have a hard role to play. Our contributions to the group are subtle, especially in the heat of the moment. Can a group survive without a retribution paladin? Yes, naturally (duh!). What we bring to the table may not be needed if instead you have another CC class or a straight kick-ass DPS class.

And I hear all the talk about how retribution paladins are getting buffed in WotLK. And I'm happy for that. Yet, I think ret pallies ARE already viable. Hard to play? Yes. Easily put into one group role? No. But viable in 5-mans. Probably also a handy thing to have in 10 and 25 mans, too.

I really need to work on a healing set... not to mention just find something to swap out weapon wise when I wind up being primary healer when the real healer bites the dust! Because 0 bonus healing... not so good.

Things to think about when you're being a retribution paladin.
- You are not going to top the healing or DPS charts and you are not going to do more than tank something for two seconds before probably dying. So don't try. Just do your best to be your best. You are not a tank. You are not a healer. Let these people do their jobs and help only when needed. The tank is not going to thank you for pulling aggro from him. The healer is not going to thank you for sucking up their time and mana from damage you really shouldn't be taking.

- You are going to go through a lot of symbols of kings. Because everytime you have to cast blessing of protection on the DPS, or blessing of protection on the healer... you're going to have to rebuff their usual buff.

- Understand that you are NOT the tank. Sure, righteous defense is a GREAT tool, but keep in mind that the tank is probably (hopefully) already aware of the situation. Only use righteous defense when it's really needed. The tank has a ton of stuff on their plate, the healer is getting eaten, pop righteous defense. Ideally, you'll be standing next to the tank anyway. So the tank can hopefully pull it right off of you without having to run all over the place trying to get aggro. Let the tank know when you are doing this.

- Divine protection is also a great tool. If the healer is swamped and people are taking tons of damage everywhere, pop your shield. Heal yourself. Heal someone else. Then either continue to heal if needed or remove your shield and start DPSing again. That little bit of time where you can't take damage will allow you to heal yourself, let the healer focus on someone who is taking damage, and let you get a little bit of breathing room to help out.

- A lot of tanks will switch targets just before the target dies, to start generating threat on the next target. Some high DPS will also do this. Why is the warlock going to waste their time casting a shadowbolt that hits for 3k, when the mob may die before the bolt actually hits, and the mob only has 1k health left? Waste of time! So everyone leaves except the melee. Sometimes, this mob decides to run away. Hammer of Wrath is your friend in this instance.

- Repentence only works if no one is hitting the mob. The best time to use it is at the start of a pull when the mob isn't near the tank, or if it's an add that's wandering in from somewhere else and is running madly for the healer. This move also only works if you let the tank and DPS understand that you're doing this. It gives them only 6 seconds of wiggle room, but ask any husband... 6 seconds is more than enough!

- Hammer of Justice is saved for interrupts of heals, or stopping it from hitting the priest, or running away or anything else you want it to be for, including a temporary CC. I've done it where I repentence and then hammer - 12 seconds of time out.

- Sometimes you'll want Kings. Sometimes you'll want Wisdom. And sometimes the tank will be a crybaby and you'll need to have on Salvation. Sometimes you'll need to swap buffs for other people as well. Sometimes the hunter will be happy with Might. Sometimes they'll need Salvation because FD is on a 2 minute cooldown and they need the extra threat reduction because they're a hunter that isn't human!

- Pally Power is a must. Must. MUST. Do I need to repeat myself? It's simple. It's easy to use. It lets you figure out who what where and how frequent. It tells you when buffs are wearing off. It's a one click solution so you can free up some of your hotbar places because it's got what you need!

- Other useful things are Grid (I like to have it up on any character that can heal, it's easier for me to see the boxes than for me to see a line of health) and Decursive. Sure, Paladins have one button to hit, but instead of hitting cleanse and finding the person, or finding the person then hitting cleanse, I like the simplicity of left clicking on the highlighted little box at the bottom of my screen and cleansing whomever of whatever. Be careful though, if you have multiple alts that have decursing/debuffing/dewhatevering options, you'll wind up Abolishing Poison when you should be DeCursing on your druid, or Abolishing Disease when you shoud be Dispelling Magic on your priest. Paladins are simple. Cleanse.

(Boon will tell me that Grid and Decursive are crutches. I USED to be able to heal and decurse and dispell all without the use of add-ons. He and I are OLD SCHOOL. But just because old school worked just peachy and fine and was wonderful doesn't mean we shouldn't avail ourselves to the benefits of modern technology. And for new healers and people who have a lot of stuff on their screen and a lot of things to do... anything to help organize and highlight issues that you need to take care of is a bonus. It doesn't play FOR you (big no no!) but it issues the information you need to see in a format that's easy TO see.)

(By the way, Boon is magical. Seriously. He's the fastest cleanser in the West! And don't get me started on healing. Oy. Blizzard needs to nerf Boon.)

So... yet more rambling about non-warlock related things from me. I'll probably post something warlock related in the next few days. I'm eyeing the uses of imps in raids versus the increase in self-damage from demonology-specced-non-imps. I may have posted this before. But I'm going to post again. Because this is my blog and I can.

Kvasira Update - aka Retribution Paladin kicks ass!

The other night I was playing Kvasira in an instance. Yes. A retribution paladin DPSing in an instance. Try not to fall over in shock. It happens.

My damage done was equivalent to a BM hunter one level lower than I was and my DPS was roughly 300. And according to the hunter, I was outdamaging him on boss fights.

I'm jiggling a bit with my rotation on fights. For the MOST part, I ignore consecration, it being a little too mana heavy for my taste. Maybe it will up my DPS that little bit more, but if it's a longer or tougher fight, my mana is required elsewhere... like judging, crusader striking, dispelling and the occasional healing.

I've learned to WAIT to judge Crusader, due to improved judgement, the mana return will net me immediate aggro from the tank. I make sure my seal is on and I go in and whack the mob with my sword. I open up with a crusader strike and THEN judge Crusader and apply Seal of Command.

I have a macro that I use that judges and reapplies seal of command at the same time. This works well enough for me soloing because I'm a tad forgetful sometimes of reapplying seal of command, but the global cooldown sometimes means that I CAN judge command but not be able to reapply seal of command. A swing timer is rather important as well, since you want to make sure that Seal of Command is up as much as possible when you're about to swing your bigass two hander at the mob.

The most important thing.. is Crusader Strike whenever possible.

In a 'normal' fight (instance) where I don't have to cleanse or heal, my mana pool, albeit low, is enough for me. I immediately pop a drink so I stay as far up in mana as I can be, in case we got a 'not-normal' fight.

If I start to get low on mana, or a fight where I have to start cleansing or offhealing, I judge crusader (or wisdom, depending on where the boss is in terms of health when I would switch judgements) and will often just leave seal of command on, judging only when the seal is about to expire. Crusader strike when it's up. And usually that'll do for it. If the mob or boss is pretty high on life and I'm pretty low on mana, thats when I'll sometimes judge wisdom. Honestly though, considering that I'm using a big slow twohander, I don't HIT it enough to get that much mana back. Based on that, I usually just leave crusader on it.

My personal blessing is Blessing of Wisdom, not Might. (I don't have Kings yet.) Unless I need salvation, which sometimes... I will. Paladin DPS is spike damage. When every 6 seconds you have the potential to hit the mob for 1k damage... yikes. Keep your bubble handy. :P

However... Kvasira is so much fun to play. Love. Love. Love.

Arcane Mage, Retribution Paladin and Restoration Shaman

What can I say? I like going for the outlying spec.

After a bit of thought, I decided I was going to go Arcane Mage. Specifically, Arcane-Fire. Now, my mage is only 36 (or was when I respecced), so I'm not as nifty as a level 70 arcane-fire mage. And I do plan on going arcane down to slow, and fire down to improved scorch. From my research, that spec is suitable for solo play, PvE 5 and 10 man raiding. Which is what I do. (It's also good for PvP, but we all know where I stand on that!)

(preferably far away)

I thought to myself as I respecced that maybe I should have leveled frost and respecced when I hit higher levels, simply for survivability. Yet I discovered that I'm just as survivable as this as I was as frost.

Frost mages are well known for the mobs to not reach them, due to slowing effect and freeze effects, that by the time the mob reached them, it was so dead a fire blast or a cone or something would kill it. With my frost mage, this usually included a blink a time or two, frost nova, multiple frost-bolts and lots of running around to stay away from the slow moving mob.

My arcane mage has roughly the same effect. In the fact that by the time it reaches me, a fire blast is usually enough to kill it, only without the moving about bit.

I was about to type a very boring account of how I kill things. But you don't care about that! Suffice to say, I'm content. The only time I've died thus far is when I'm playing at work and I get distracted by something at work. Which since work > game, is appropriate.

As for my retribution paladin, I've quasi-figured out what keeps pulling mobs to me. Apparently when I judge something, since I have improved judgement, I get back mana. Just like anything else, this gets me aggro. Otherwise, I'm still kicking ass and taking names! Boon's admitted he's been kind of heavy on me with the ret paladin, since he didn't think it was a viable spec, but I'm changing his mind with my awesome abilities! And he admits that as a pure DPS spec, he still doesn't think it's a good idea, but he does say (and to this I agree, read previous post!) that the way I play, more as a party support role while doing decent DPS, makes me viable. The worst is when you have a retribution paladin that doesn't toss any heals, or protect the healer, or do anything and the group dies with the ret pally having an almost full mana bar! That ain't me.

My restoration shaman is boring as hell to solo, but I don't seem to be able to be killed. :P I'm going to wait for Diathim (Boon's enhancement shaman) to hit outlands to quest. Because ... it's boring as hell. I've begun doing crazy things trying to see if I could be killed... like solo Bogslayer and the Drillmaster at 61, fight four or five mobs at once (the ravager mobs can kill me, fast attack + stun = dead shaman), fight multiple healing casters at once, etc. Does anyone have a suggestion of a situation to stick her in to see if I can survive it? (nothing silly, like solo-instancing (though I may see if I can kill an instance elite by myself) or going and attacking a level 66 or something.)

And... 38, 62, 61 respectively.

On an aside, I had this wierd dream the other night. My druid Kathe was imprisoned in a new Alliance jail in Tanaris for the unlikely crime of murder (she killed a Scarlet Crusade fanatic that was killing the tame moonsaber's in Darnassus, and it was self-defense, since he started to call her a demon and tried to kill her when she stopped him!). The method of them keeping a druid in prison is to keep her too mana drained to shapeshift. Boon the paladin was a common visitor and he would regularly bring her gifts from her sisters. Kiya, the alchemist/cook, made her some pastries which had the side effect of mana regeneration. This gave her enough mana to innervate herself, so she shapeshifted and escaped! And to keep Boon from being implicated, she did this by first shapeshifting into a bear and bashing him to stun him, then shifting to a bird, flying away (which you can't do that in Azeroth, but meh.) and escaping into the water's around Tanaris. A hunter brought in at the scene (Teppou), made joyful fun of the jail by asking them how they expected him to track a druid through the air or the water!

The Alliance Police then go to her family members to question them about her escape and what role they may have played in it!

Kiya the hunter, with Bumper the cat, live in Darnassus and denied any knowledge about the escape. The police had a nasty moment when in defense of her sister, Kiya defended the act of Kathe stopping the cat-killer, and the police said 'it was a cat versus a person', and Bumper got very upset.

Kava the rogue and Kiljara the priest live in Stormwind, and they both denied any knowledge, though Kava out and out admitted that she's glad her sister escaped and even if she knew where she was, she'd hardly tell the police! Kiljara simply admitted she knew nothing about it and was very calm and soothing to Kava's somewhat hyper rhetoric.

Keyami the warrior lives in Ironforge and my dream hasn't progressed that much.

But Kikidas made an appearance (not that she's a night elf), by appearing talking to Kava and Kiljara about clothing (all three are tailors), then later on helping the two sisters summon Kathe to Stormwind (after the police left!). Ruptik was also there, being his usual charming self. And no, I have no idea why Kathe would want to go to Stormwind!

Dhark made an appearance last night (yes, same dream story two nights in a row) by stealthing into the office of the head of the Alliance Police who is trying to catch Kathe and nearly killing him. (He didn't kill him all the way because that would be bad. He merely beat him up severely as a lesson that you don't mess with Night Elves.)

In the office of the Police, the police head was talking to his aide who said that on the negative side, all the druids, some of the shaman and a high percentage of night elf citizens of the alliance didn't like the fact that Kathe was being made an example of by the newly founded Alliance Police, on the positive side, Fanghelm (the druid head in Darnassus, this was his dream name, not sure if it's his real name!) was also on Kathe's side and if anyone could turn a positive into a negative, it was him! Also brought up was how hard it would be to track a druid that didn't want to be found and that the likelyhood of them catching Kathe now that she was escaped was slim to none. That's when Dhark made his appearance.

Maybe I play too much WoW?

Retribution Paladin: Group Support

As you may all know, I've been leveling a retribution paladin. Mainly because I'm contrary, but also because it's fun to stretch.

Everyone, everywhere, says that until you can really get the gear, your retribution paladin is going to do less damage than Sleepy Willy. Because of this, you may have a hard time getting a group unless you 1: form it yourself or 2: run with friends.

So I'm going to pick option #2! My Paladin, Kvasira (I particularly like the part about Beet Juice) hit 60 the other day and I cajoled Owaru and Boon into doing the epic paladin quest with me. So 60, epic charger, and outlands! Time for fun!

I'm duo-ing/quartet-ing with Fyzzgig(Warrior:Boon)/Teppou(Hunter:Owaru) and Zeshura(Priest:Neshura). And then we decided to hit Hellfire Ramparts. Everyone (except Tep, who was 58/59) was 60 (I was 61). Our first run we picked up a rogue that was 62. And we only had one quasi-wipe where for a reason I still don't understand (though, I think it was a hunter pet!) we pulled two groups instead of one.

And through trial and error and just sheer intuition (and let's face it, it's me. I always know what to do!) I figured out what my job is. I'm catch-all lady!

I don't know why the hunter's trap kept pulling off of him and coming to me (and no, I was not using consecrate!) but it did when I wasn't doing anything to it (nor was I healing!). So I still need how to figure out how to not pull the hunter trap off of the hunter by merely breathing. :P And I only Hammer of Justice'd it when it was hitting me a lot. I'm not a tank, I can't take that type of damage! I blame the hunter. Thankfully, my blame translated into the game deciding to teach him a lesson and he died a few times. (Blizzard loves me.)

But Hammer of Justice and Repentence (Cast out your corrupt thoughts!) lets me keep a non-tanked/non-CC'd mob out of the way for roughly 12 seconds. Long enough for myself and a second DPS to burn down either the non-elite dogs or one of the elite casters. And even if it doesn't, at least that mob is coming to hit me instead of bee-lining for the healer! Plate > Cloth. Plate DPS > Plate Healer.

Now, Fyzzgig claims that I should let him tank more mobs. And to a certain extent, he's right. But on the other hand, if you have what amounts to as a tank and an offtank, why not use your offtank? There are plenty of times where I'm marking and I'll stick the DPS warrior on something that is easily killed and doesn't hit very hard on plate to burn it down, so the real tank can concentrate on the things that need to stay tanked.

My role also includes offhealing when the priest is otherwise busy (she's being killed by something: macro! /target healer /cast Blessing of Protection), keeping the healer alive (see previous comment regarding macro!), tossing out the occasional heal when the priest has to spam-heal the tank, healing the priest so she takes less healing aggro for healing herself, keeping party buffs up on people (and after reading RetLoL a bit more, I'm going to go for Blessing of Kings down the prot tree), stunning/temporary CC and swift death to non-tanked/non-elite mobs and as a raid wipe protector (Divine Intervention! I'm just itching to use this. I haven't had the chance to, yet.). (Though.. I just got a great idea! Heehee.)

So, maybe I'm third DPS on the DPS meter. But someone has to be! It may as well be someone who is also a group support member! This way, I can claim that my DPS isn't the highest because I'm so busy doing other things! :P It's a lie... but at least I can say it. With a swing timer in place, I can usually heal and other things while all my cooldowns are readying and while my weapon is in mid-swing. Or, I should say, I try to do it at those times. Sometimes though, you gotta do what you gotta do.

Now, at higher levels this may change a little bit, because I'll have beautiful gear and I'll be outDPSing Illidan.. but until then, I've resigned myself to trying to just do my best and not shame retribution paladins everywhere!

On a plus side: Seal of Crusader now gives Crusader Strike a 40% damage increase. Nummy.

And, polling people for a response here. Which is more important? Judgement of Justice on a mob that has the potential to run into another group, or keep up Judgement of the Crusader for use on Judgement of Command? I'm talking your average mob, average instance, average location and average time til death?

Fyzz says Justice. I say Crusader. His rational is: My DPS is less important than a potential party wipe. My rational is: If I'm going to get Justice off in time, considering how fast most mobs die, I don't think I'm going to be able to judge Crusader at all and my DPS is already so dependent on gear and spells, that it'll make me less useful in a group than a Dragonhawk around Crowd Control. That and also because by the time they're ready to run, they're so dead that a Hammer of Wrath will almost kill them (if not kill them outright), and if the DPS is doing their jobs (ie: following the kill order until said mob is dead, the only person who should be jumping the kill order is the tank!), it won't get more than two staggering steps, anyway!

Chime in and let me know what you think! People who have paladins or who have run with retribution paladins, love to hear from you especially!

Leveling Goddess! and Other Things

In a grand total of 4 hours, I went from level 56 to level 58 on my RETRIBUTION (add CRACK-POW sound effect) paladin.

Then, since I'm going to stick with Teppou, Fyzzgig and Zeshura, I stopped leveling experience wise and instead went to get my mining skill up from 239 to 300, ready for Outlands! Otherwise I'd be 70 by the time they got to 58! (I jest! ... slightly, but it is a jest! I'd only be 68... not 70.)

So, I needed to get from 239 to 250 for Thorium. Right. Mithril it is. Badlands I went. Not too shabby if you ride back and forth across the southern zone wall. I hit the 250 mark and I said, finally, now I can go get Thorium. I went to a mining map website and looked at where they recommend. They recommended the Burning Steppes and lo and behold, the Burning Steppes isn't all that far from the Badlands. So that's where I went.

Big Mistake.

I spent 4 hours (long enough I could probably have been almost 60, if not truly 60, if I was actually leveling) getting to 300 mining skill out in the Burning Steppes. There were simply no nodes to be found. I had no competition (except one donkey's butt hunter that stole a node out from under me. No, really, he did. I was fighting something RIGHT ON TOP OF THE NODE, and it was almost dead. He rides up and starts to mine and stays in 'loot box' mode on the Rich Thorium that I was wanting to mine. I said, 'Uh, do you mind?' but apparently he didn't. I only saw him the once, otherwise, I was the only person in the zone it seemed.)

Afterwards, Teppou says the better place for thorium is EPL and Winterspring. Of course, he said that after I was 300.

Now I'm looking at leveling up my jewelcrafting on my paladin to 300.

I will admit, I am HEAVILY biased AGAINST leveling guides for experience and going up levels. Not that they aren't useful for people who may not know where to go and what quests to do. But I don't like them. As I mentioned above, I don't have a problem with leveling fast. (This probably has a little to do with having leveled 6 characters to 70 without a guide. I kinda know where to go now. I POSSIBLY would have used a leveling guide if it was my first or second character.)

(But then again, possibly not. I'm stubborn and hate 'following the crowd', as my asinine brain insists on calling it.)

(This probably explains my non-conformist warlock spec.)

(Are you getting tired of parenthesis yet?)

(I'm not.)

However, I am an absolute idiot when it comes to leveling crafting skills. My jewelcrafting is (was) 206. And I sit there and look at what I need and say, "Ooh, let me go get that." and I run out and I grab what I need and I make 4 items to get to 210. Then I look what I need and say, "Oooh, let me go get that." and I spend HOURS getting the materials to make 3 things. (I didn't do that second part yet. I got to 210 and then I said, 'Crap. I'm in Ironforge. I don't think there's a JC trainer in IF.'

I is dumb.

So I caved... I'm going to use a crafting guide to get my jewelcrafting to 300. I can hear Owaru now "It's not worth it!" he shouts. But you know me (or if you don't...), and I have to have a jewelcrafter. I have one of everything else (granted, my engineering is craptacular, but I do have an engineer!), so it's only natural that I have a jewelcrafter, too. I've been hoarding outland gems for a while so hopefully I can turn a little profit from them when I can start cutting gems... that and no more running to the AH everytime I upgrade a PoC piece and need 2 or 3 gems.

On a warlock aside...

I took Fyzzgig through Sunken Temple and my only wish is that SoC could have an instant proc the way Shadowbolt can with Nightfall. Owaru's words to that were, "The last thing you need is an instant SoC *shudder*.".

But truly, when you're mass clearing a low level instance, even though they aren't doing a lot of damage to you, you still get knockback on your casting bar. Which makes it really frustrating because the best way to clear something is to have a bunch of SoC on things so that when the first goes off, it sets the others off too. And then you have a bunch of dead mobs with 4 casts.

I managed it once, to get 4 off before I started to get hit. It was beautiful... bunches of purple lights and explody sounds, then the agonized groans of multiple dragonkin dying and hitting the ground. And clearing Jammal the Prophet's room was fun too, I'd SoC two things, then run over to a third group. Then I did the 'back up and DoT' thing, to avoid the ghosties. 'Twas much fun.

The best quote of the evening... well, there were many, but the funniest-warlock-related one was...

Owaru: "You think I go Ogrila?" (talking about the most heart-rending death saying.)
Kvasira: "No, you're going to HELL! HAHAHAHAHAHAHA!"
Kvasira: "Oh wait, sorry. I was channeling Kikidas."

Crusader Strike! BAM!

In keeping with my previous post, I was being all paladiny yesterday. I took my shiny new spec and I went out to Winterspring to do some quests.

Now, in the past, I could handle something maybe orange level but I had to be full up on mana and health to do so. I could handle two yellow level things, but I had to be full up on mana and health to do so.

Yesterday, I was chaining orange and yellow mobs, starting out 1/4 down on mana. I could feel my jaw hanging open the first time I wasn't paying attention and wound up chaining four mobs on me at once. I said to myself, 'Crap, I'm going to die. But I'll take as many of them with me as possible!'...'I haven't died yet, okay... next mob.'...'Holy hell, how did I live?'

My husband, the renowned healadin Boon, said that he tried ret when it became 'viable', bought the reputation gear that's available, and couldn't kill a thing. Now, I'm not saying he's a bad paladin -- with his spec, he can main heal and main tank (5-mans), gear dependent -- but maybe he doesn't have the mindset to be a retribution paladin? Who knows!

All I know is that after I read RetLoL, respecced and did some of the things they recommended doing, I was killing things better and faster than ever before. It makes me want to rescind my statement yesterday that my previous spec worked! The change was dramatic, like the difference between a Cinnaspin girlscout cookie and a Cinnabon cinnamon roll.

(Mmmmm... cinnabon.)

Now, I'm at a crossroads. My paladin is 56. My shaman is 51. The triumverate is a quatrille, as Neshura the hunter is Zeshura the priest. Boon is a gnome warrior named Fyzzgig. Owaru is a hunter named Teppou. So the question becomes, do I stay enhancement shaman with that group or do I bring my retribution paladin to that group? Either way, I'm competing with someone for gear -- either the hunter with mail drops or the warrior with plate drops.

I have a feeling it would be easier to solo a shaman through instances than it would be to solo a ret.pally through instances. :P Silly preconcieved notions!

Ret Pally Reading

In the interest of being the best that I can be (I have to uphold Owaru's overwhelming and undeserving opinion of me!), I delved into the world of retribution paladin. Well, I delved into one particular article, I should say.

I had thought that my spec was decent. I thought I had it figured, a little bit. I was only somewhat correct.

My spec was decent for how I played and I certainly had no problems leveling. But according to RetLoL I should have deleted my character... and how embarassing is that for me to admit! The Great and Powerful K... wrong. Mark it on your calenders, because this day will probably never come around again. And see, I didn't post it on April 1st, so it also isn't an April Fool's joke, though it is a hilarious thought. Me, wrong? HAHAHAHA.

So this afternoon I respecced. My paladin is 55, so I was able to get all the way to Crusader Strike, which I had ignored earlier (silly K). Then I went to test it out. I like it thus far. I shall have to see how it goes as I continue to level. I have to get some of my timing down and obviously, since I'm in old world gear, my stats and gear aren't maximized for DPS -- apparently strength, melee hit rating and melee crit rating are my friends!

Now, obviously I won't have problems getting a group, not merely because it's me! but also because of the Triumverate[(c) Owaru] and various friends who I can browbeat into running with me no matter what I do. (I love you guys!) ... that and because have you seen some of the "armor" that plate wearing females get to wear? How the hell is that armor? And what guy won't run with a chick wearing a plate bikini?

Anyway, this cake is great. It's so delicious and moist.

Has anyone played The Orange Box, specifically the game Portal? If so, have you heard the song 'Still Alive'? That's the song playing in my head right now, mainly because I drove home in the ice and snow with it on repeat.

Some of the lyrics I can't make out. But the part about cake always makes me laugh.

But I digress.

I'm still alive, though I haven't posted in a while. I've been playing my druid and my paladin for a bit. My druid is feral tank>dps. My paladin is RETRIBUTION. No seriously. She is. Stop laughing. I'm not kidding. Quit it!

I'm having fun with it. I'm going to see if I can succeed where millions of others have failed and see if I can truly make her a successful DPSing paladin. I already have two tanks. I have a healer. True, I have melee DPS and ranged DPS and spell DPS, but oh well. I like the challenge. :) I've figured out, thus far, that seal of command works well if you can stun frequently, but overall you want seal of righteousness on with a fast two hander. Consecration is nice, but not mana effective right now, at least for single mobs. I'm a bit at a loss if I should focus on attack power for straight melee attacks or spell damage. Some of the ret abilities seems to be for melee attacks, others of it for spell damage. I suppose that's the crux of the matter for the class though. You just have to have the right mix, I suppose.

I need to rework some of my skills again. Keeping the same basic talent distribution (I'm talking Kikidas now), but my spell hit has gone up, so I don't need as many points in suppression now that I did before. They can be slapped into something else. What else, I don't know yet. I haven't played with how many points I need to keep in suppression. I worked the numbers out one time, but I forgot, silly me, to keep that piece of paper, so I have to do my number crunching over again. :)

Anyway. I'm still alive and when you're dying I will be still alive and when you're dead I will be still alive.

Heehee.