DPS Validation and Accountability

Well, here’s the final role specific addition to this series. It is also the one role that rew people realize as being as important as it is. The role of DPS is also the most popular role to follow, simply because of this misconception.

More often then not, though, most DPS feel that Tanks and Healers have some sort of entitlement when it comes to grouping. Simply put, they feel that because they are “must-have” roles, that they are more imporant than the lowly DPS. In some cases this is true, as if you did not have a tank, the DPS would get swarmed by mobs, and if you didn’t have a healer, those mobs would slice down the DPS with no resistance. However, without the DPS role, Tanks and Healers would never finish an instance within a single night, nor would they ever meet enrage timers. It was once joked that 2 paladins could almost do an entire instance (at level), it would just take 3 weeks to do it.

Because of this perception, a lot of DPS feel that they have to push themselves into the forefront so that they can get noticed. Hence the rise of Damage Meters, and the DPS ePeen. However, there are those who still stand in the back (figuratively or literally) and work hard as hell to keep the pain flowing, but also help out the rest of the group/raid. It is here that you can separate the real DPS from the twatmelons.

Don't be a twatmelon.

Making Ret Interesting

LOLFACROLLRETPALLIES!

I’ve been thinking lately about the Retribution rotation. There are several variations on how it can done, and how effective it may be, but the standard First Come First Cast Priority rotation is:

1) Judgement of Light/Wisdom
2) Crusader Strike
3) Divine Storm
4a) Hammer of Wrath, so long as the mob is below 20%
4b) Exorcism, so long as Art of War has proc’d
5) Consecration, so long as it will not pull threat or burn you out of mana

I would also dare to include Holy Wrath, in the cases of multiple Undead/Demon mobs.

What a weekend

Happy Monday folks… if Monday’s can be happy.

I was able to get online a bit this weekend, even having a late night raid till about 2:00 Friday night. Lots of stuff happened, just look at my latest Character Tracker. Well, lots of stuff for a very casual player who isn’t able to get on very often.

I started out, just messin’ around on the laptop, since it’s got a much lower framerate, I usually only quest and explore on there, so I decided to finally complete my World Explorer achievement. I was only a few zones away from getting Explore Kalimdor which would be the last touch. So I set up a roadmap to start with Talonbranch Glade in Felwood which was so far out of the way that I just got it done first. I then meandored my way into the Stonetalon Mountains and cleared the four last undiscovered locations there, moving my way southwest so that I could move right into Desolace. Once I got there, I took the long western shore, and finished up on the southeast corner, and moved into Feralas. From there I fortunately had only a few that were somewhat right off the road, and completed that zone. I happened to have some Elixer of Fortitudes that I had bought a while back to finish up my Sprite Darter quest, so I took the road into Shimmering Flats, but didn’t realize that I had a time limit on getting the egg back to Hinterlands, so I currently have a dead baby Sprite Darter egg sitting in my bag *sad*. After grabbing that, I took the elevator up to the Southern Barrens and picked up the one spot that I didn’t have in that area, and made my way into Mulgore.  There were a few here, mostly in a big circle from the east side around the bottom of the map up to the northwest corner of Thunder Bluff.

It was a relief to finally see that last flash of swirly light, and the World Explorer achivement get completed. I would consider it part of my Bucket list of things to do before Cataclysm, so it’s now marked off.

Boom!

May not have a post today, we were evacuated from our building at work due to a chemical explosion down the street. If I get a chance, I may be posting a bit more comprehensive Ret Paladin rotation.

See you all then.

Too Casual or too Lazy?

I hope you all had a good weekend, and have taken care of your young wards during the beginning of Children’s Week. I have, well, except for the Northrend little fellas, since it’s still bugged last I figured. Anyway, that actually brings us to today’s topic. Holidays and casual players.

Shhh, don't tell matron.

Now, first thing to come to mind is that Casuals love them some Holidays, and are usually the ones to take advantage of the quick quests, and gimmick items.

I for one, have a soft spot for pets and mounts myself. Usually I will take advantage of some of them, if i feel like it, though I have done the Hallow’s End, Brewfest and new Love is in the Air bosses a good many times. At one time, I actually thought about doing all the achievements for “What a Long Strange Trip” meta-achievement, but have really slacked on it, sometimes because I just don’t have time, others because, well, I’m lazy.

Children’s Week seems different though. It wasn’t until last year that I actually buckled down and did some of the quests (partly because I always wanted to get Willy, if not for the perverted comment aspect). Well, so far I’ve got 5 of the pets, 2 from Azeroth/Outland, and the little Oracle from Northrend. I have done a good many of the achievements but have yet to do the dreaded “School of Hard Knocks”. Currently, I do still have one chance to do it, I believe (as long as you can use the Northrend Orphans for the achivement), and have debated on whether to do it or not. It’s not that I don’t like to do PvP, in fact, just recently I spent an entire evening, hitting the Random Battleground button, and seeing what I got. The thing that I’m not sure of, is really messing up other folks’ experience in the Battleground.

Basically, it’s not often that a Paladin (Holy or Ret), will grab the flag and run with it. I have done it a few times before (even got 5 flag caps in EotS), but more often then not will stay back and defend a node, especially if everyone leaves a lonely Healer there to defend it. I would rather reach our objectives then grab a flag so that my orphan can see it. Secondly, it’ll take a good bit of time, because, for example, Warsong Gulch can only have so many flag captures, and if you want to actually get the achievement, then you need to provide one of those three captures.

I’m not sure how to categorize it. Am I being too casual, or maybe actually too hardcore, by wanting to complete objectives, rather than let fools run around in PvE gear trying to complete an achievement, only to disappear once they get it. Or am I just being lazy?

A Violet Protodrake, is a great reward to work towards, but it’s a lot of work, and a lot of time that I don’t have.

What do you think? Have you completed the achievement? Was it as aweful as has been commented already?

P.S. More informational post later, this was just a bit of a rant that I wanted to get off my chest.

Diamonds are Forever: Paladin Gemming Part II

Welcome to Part II of my guide to Paladin Gemming. Here we’ll cover Prismatic, Dragon’s Eye (Jewelcrafter only), and Meta Gems. Again, I have marked each with what spec it works best with. In this case, I also marked some for their PvP uses, mostly including those with Resilience or Stun/Silence/Fear reduction effects.

First up, we’ll talk about the Prismatic gems. These provide increases to all stats in a single gem, most often used as filler gems, as they match every color, and can be used to fill the requirements of one red, one yellow, AND one blue gem for Meta gems.

Prismatic
	Enchanted Pearl	+4 Stats
	Enchanted Tear	+6 Stats
	Nightmare Tear	+10 Stats

It’s obvious what is provided by each, and the only difference is the amount of stat increase, and cost. Obviously Nightmare Tears are far more expensive then the lesser Enchanted gems.

Diamonds are Forever: Paladin Gemming

Good afternoon folks…

Big 'ol Gem

Got a new topic on my mind, this time dealing with Gems. Not just any gems, but gems good for Holy and Retribution paladins. I would go into Protection paladins, but I think that has been covered fairly thoroughly.

A good while back, I had created a sheet with all the different gem types, and their uses. Some of that has changed due to the +healing +spell damage combination, but not that much. So, here’s my little guide to gems and what I’ve chosen for my own gemming needs on both my Holy and Retribution sets.

The Basics

Below I have put together a set of tables including the different colors of gems, as well as the attributes in which they modify. Each gem will match the same color slot, in the cases of gem bonuses; HOWEVER, you can put whatever color gem, in whatever color slot you want, there is no limitations, only the loss of the extra gemming bonus.

Badges and Buffs

Guess I’m a little late to the game, but for those who do follow my blog, I’ll still keep you all updated with the latest. Looks like over the evening some more information came out about raiding progress. These details pertain to the death of emblems, and rise of badges/points.

I have personally enjoyed the latest emblem changes, of course coming from a casual perspective. Emblems of Triumph, which I never thought I would EVER get, were suddenly the peanuts handed out during our flights through Heroic dungeons. Heroic Dungeons were my bread and butter.  I would do them 1.) because they were easy to group for, 2.) they were quick with a good group, 3.) I could still get a few upgrades by way of trinkets etc. When Triumph began flowing like tasty Shadow Priest tears, I was able to quickly gear up to raid level gear. Sure, I was still behind the big guys and their Frosty badge goodies, but closed the gap fairly quickly.

Now, before anybody starts crying about welfare epics, and the fact that anybody wearing T9 now-a-days is just a scrub and has no skill, I wasn’t that kind of person.  I personally attempt to better the class in which I play, and learn the strategies and abilities of a fight and my class before an encounter.  I was a scrub… who could read and watch YouTube.

Well, anyway, I quickly geared my Holy set to full T9, and not long after did the same for my tank set (am currently working on my ret set). I was able to pull my own weight when having to PuG a raid, which is what I do best. Eventually getting Frosties and picking up some T10, and gearing my Holy set up slowly but surely.

Well, that’s all about to change, well… Soon™

Bullseye – Hit and Expertise

Well, my Retribution experiment has continued over the weekend. I think that the progress has come along well… so far.

First off, I’m a poor pally, I hardly ever have any gold on hand, so I usually never spend it on rediculously priced items on the AH. In addition, this is my off spec, so money would go to Holy gear anyway.

So, these changes are using onhand items only, plus a little bit of gemming/enchants off of the AH. The changes nearly brought me where I should be, and from what little testing I’ve been able to do, I believe that the gear is getting to where it should be.

Here are some of the changes:

• Gloves: I’ve swapped out the old Valorous Redemption Gauntlets with the current T9 Tank gloves I already had.  They already had more strength, also as I had already enchanted and gemmed them to increase my Expertise & Hit, they worked well with my current set (though the +parry/+defense wasn’t much help, never can hurt).  I’m currently about 5 emblems away from grabbing the actual Ret gloves, so these are only temporary.
• Chest: Updated the enchant to +10 to All stats over the +6 that I had.
• Legs: Changed the ToC5 legs out for the ‘ol standby of Staggering Legplates from Utgarde Keep (Heroic). I’ve had them for a while, and thought that they’d be of use, so I held onto them.  Lucky I did, because they brought my +Hit above where I needed it to be, allowing me to do a bit of reorganization elsewhere.
• Weapon: Swapped out the Tyrannical Beheader for the Mourning Malice 2H sword. Increased my expertise rating by 73, bringing it up to about 17 expertise. Didn’t have the cash on hand to get a better enchant, so I just threw some Greater Savagery on it, still +85 Attack Power, so not a bad enchant for the time being.
• Relic: Pulled out the old Libram of Discord out of the bank, trying to save up Frost Emblems for my T10 helmet for my Holy set, but once I’ve got that, I’ll probably grab the Frost Emblem Libram.
• Trinkets: Hit my bank, and found a Meterorite Whetstone that I had, as well as the good ‘ol Mirror of Truth. Not sure what to upgrade to, though the Banner of Victory looks like a good Mirror of Truth replacement, we’ll see how that goes.
• Glyphs: Picked up Glyph of Consecration and Glyph of Seal of Vengeance to replace Glyph of Exorcism and Glyph of Crusader Strike. I didn’t seem to have any trouble with mana, so the Crusader Strike glyph was an easy change. Glyph of Exorcism, I felt, would be of good use, but after reading some of my comments from my last Ret post, Glyph of Consecration did make sense.

These changes increased my dps by nearly 1k, a wicked change. Current Melee stats are:

Damage: 1580-1906
Speed: 3.33
Power: 3413
Hit Rating: 336
Crit Chance: 27.67%
Expertise: 17

Now, with the change in Glyphs, when I’m pounding on bosses I can be sure to switch to Seal of Vengeance, and up my Expertise by 10… bringing it to 27 (I believe that’s what it did, was to busy to actually check, haha). This brings me 1 Expertise over where I need to be, maxing my Expertise to where it needs to be.

Some of that testing that I was able to do was both a little bit of beating on a test dummy, but I didn’t feel that it was really proper data. So, I planned on hitting a few heroics to see how the new spec and gear worked out. The first group I hit was Heroic Old Kingdom. Of course these were a little bit inflated due to the fact that nearly everything was Undead, so I was able to throw some Holy Wrath out and get some extra points of DPS out, but id did feel more powerful. Nice quick run (skipped two bosses, but oh well).

Next up, I hit Heroic Gundrak. Far fewer undead, so I felt that it would be a much better view of my real dps scores. Started it up, and some issues occurred, waiting on some of the DPS who didn’t enter the right door, etc. So once we got going, it was time to bring the pain. I don’t believe in damage meters, but did help me determine how well my rotations were doing. I stayed at the top of the charts, even with a Mage and Hunter in the party.  We were all gearing up, but it was still an accomplishment. I hit about 4k dps on Gal’darah, even with a few knockbacks happening.  The group tore into him pretty good, and it was a really quick fight, so I wasn’t able to truly get the feel of my rotation, but it was helpful in getting into some groove.

So, I have a feeling that I’m going to enjoy this spec as much as I did tanking.  it’s going to be interesting having to wait for dungeons, but we’ll see how it goes.  If I’m fortunate enough to hit a raid or two, I’ll give an update on the differences between the gear makeup of the other dps, and this poor fledgling Ret pally.

Later today, keep an eye out for the new Raid changes just released this morning.  Some interesting information.

The ayes have it

Though there were few votes (8 in total), I have decided to follow the advice, and have a little bit of fun.  Last night, while my wife was giving my son a bath, I hopped online and respec’d my Protection offspec to Retribution.  Sadly, as often happens when decisions are made, Trade chat is suddenly filled with “LFM Tank & Heals for ICC10″ and “LFM Tanks for VoA25″ *sigh* C’est la vie.  As I said during my last post, I plan to stick to this new spec for a while.

So, without further ado, here is Khraden decked out in his scary spiky helmet.

The Spiky Ret Khraden.

I’m not totally sure about the spec that I put together, but was in a bit of a hurry, and wanted to go ahead and put together a basic spec, and fix it up later. I did try out some rotations on the training dummy in IF, and was able to attain about 2.8k dps, and that was without really optimizing my gear, including forgetting to swap out my libram, forgetting my ret trinkets, and not reglyphing yet.  So I hope to get a bit higher when I get a chance to really work on it.

Protip: Hit Exodar to use the Training Dummy, it’s so much less crowded.

Anyway, here’s the rotation that I was using, and please, don’t laugh, I’m just a beginner

Divine Plea (to get the mana regen started)
Exorcism
Judgement of Light (likely to use it more than wiz, cause we often have a pally healer)
Crusader Strike
Divine Storm
Concecration (optional dependant on mana reserves)

Rince, repeat as cooldowns arise.

I decided to use Judgement of Light before Crusader Strike, simply because it places Heart of the Crusader on the target, allowing more chances for Crusader Strike, and the Divine Storm attacks to crit. It is most likely that I will swap Divine Storm and Crusader Strike for groups of mobs, so that I get more damage out at the opening of battle.

I had forgotten how cooldown dependant the Retribution Paladin was.  I would slap all my attacks out, and then wait, while all my damage dealin abilities would be on cooldown, scanning my bars for something else to use. It almost felt like I should have been throwing pebbles at the target while I waited. I’m sure that will clear up the more I try it out though.

As for glyphs, I ended up picking a few out, just from looking at the AH, but will likely be swapping Glyph of Crusader Strike out with Glyph of Seal of Vengeance, simply because I don’t appear to be having trouble with mana yet, with Divine Plea and Judgements of the Wise keeping the trickle of mana coming in. In additoin to that I have Glyph of Exorcism and Glyph of Judgement in the other two spots. It is suggested that Glyph of Concecration should be used, but I don’t totally see the benefit of 2 extra ticks of Concecration. I kept the minors that I already had, as there isn’t much to choose from, and they already included Glyph of Sense Undead.

I’m currently just below hit cap, but with the change of one piece of gear can increase my hit to surpass the hit cap, but drop my AP and Strength a bit.  Not sure if it’s worth it, but will likely try it out to see how it goes. I am also far below expertise cap, though I have another weapon that may increase that value, but again, in turn drop my strength/AP.

Unbuffed stats.

Needless to say, I’ve got a good bit to go to optimize this build and the gear with it.  With the availability of gear with the inception of Emblems of Triumph, I’m sure it won’t be too long before I get these straightened out. (Note that I still haven’t even equiped my ret trinkets yet.. *sigh*)

We’ll see how this little experiment goes.  If anybody has any suggestions, please throw them my way, I’d love to hear about them.