Here’s a quick roundup of the latest changes from the PTR. I don’t normally post ongoing changes, unless there’s something big for holy paladins, but this time around the news sources are overwhelmed with Ulduar data and the class changes are getting a lot less press. So here we go. (The source: MMO-Champion.)
The usual caveat: all of this is subject to change before 3.1 goes live. If you watched the progress of class changes in the WotLK beta, you’ll know just how much something can change during the testing process.
This is from Build 9658 of the 3.1 PTR.
General
- All paladins auras had their range extended from 30 yards to 40 yards.
Thank God. Along with Blessing of Kings being baseline, this is one change where we can all say “It’s about time”. On the other hand, now Holy needs an 11-point talent.
Holy
- Sacred Shield now cannot be on more than one target at any one time.
This change was implemented because Sacred Shield was doing “too much” damage prevention in Ulduar.
- Infusion of Light no longer has a chance to reduce the casting time of Holy Light, but increases the the critical chance of your next Holy Light by 10/20% instead.
No word on why this change was made, but I’m hoping it doesn’t stick, personally.
Protection
- Hand of Sacrifice now lasts 12 sec or until the caster has transfered 100% of their maximum health.
A PvP limitation; I don’t think HoS gets used as much as it should in PvE content anyway.
- Targets affected by Divine Shield, Hand of Protection or Divine Protection can no longer be affected by any of these spell for 2 minutes. (Down from 3 minutes)
A nice change. Not unbalancing, I think, just making life a bit easier.
- Divine Sacrifice *New Talent* (Tier 3) – 30% of all damage taken by party or raid members within 30 yards is redirected to the Paladin (up to a maximum of 150% of the Paladin’s health). Instant, 2 min cooldown.
Well, protection paladins finally got their 11-point talent. You can see some of their discussions in this Maintankadin thread.
Also, this isn’t a paladin change, but it’s something you need to know about anyway if you do any PvP:
Arms Warrior
- Shattering Throw *New Skill* – Throws your weapon at the enemy causing [ 50% of AP + 12 ] damage (based on attack power), reducing the armor on the target by 20% for 10 sec, and removing any invulnerabilities. 25 Rage, 30 yd range, 1.5 sec cast, 5 min cooldown
Just like a priest’s Mass Dispel, that’s bye-bye bubble. Be wary of warriors wielding only one weapon!
Source: MMO-Champion.
As with you i sincerely do hope that they change Infusion back. This new iteration is not something that I think is necessary, unless they drop the base cast time down. While many paladins think that the mana regen will be nice, in a pvp or pve situation, getting the heal off faster is more important than the crit, IMO. I did not notice that the shattering throw removes any invulnerabilities. For my hunter I am saddened to see that there disarm will now disarm ranged weapons, but i am happy to see it in the interest of class balance.
Did you also scroll down?
Aura Mastery: Now makes anyone affected by Concentration Aura to be immune to Interrupt and Silence mechanics and increases the effectiveness of all other auras by 100%. Lasts 10 sec. 2 min cooldown.
–> Wow, this is really cool. At first my eyes popped, but then I saw it was an activated ability…
Blessed Hands: No longer reduces cooldowns of Hand spells. Instead, it improves the effectiveness of Hand of Salvation by 50/100% and Hand of Sacrifice by an additional 5/10%.
–> Not terrible, especially if you use Hand of Sacrifice to help in times of necessary extreme mitigation…
Enlightened Judgements: No longer increases the range of Judgement of Justice. Moved to Tier 10.
–> What? Now we’ll be stuck having to judge Wisdom in PvE, or staying close to the boss… Also, moving to Tier 10 means we’ll need a replacement further up the tree, and it’s likely nobody will take this anymore anyway. I thought they wanted us to Judge?
Infusion of Light: Now increases the critical chance of your next Holy Light by 10/20% instead of reducing cast time. Moved to Tier 10.
–> Boo.
Judgements of the Pure moved to Tier 9.
–> Something to take, at least.
Sacred Cleansing moved to Tier 8.
–> Not really important, as far as I can see.
The new aura changes are good I’d say, the 40m range is a long awaited change and the 11pts replacement ability can be moderately useful especially in PvP, with the bubulle removal, they know we will be much more sensible to silence.
Blessed Hands & Enlightened Judgements were obviously changed for Arena reasons, hand of sacrifice was very useful in the arena against several stuns & sap and it’s strength wasn’t the point, it was it’s “awaking” part due to taking damage. On the same line, Judgement of Justice was the main paladin judgement in the arena, so bye bye judging anything useful ; ;
I’m a bit sad to see, as so many times for paladin lately, PvE gameplay having to change, sometimes a lot, because of class changes forced by arena “balance”. 3.1 is the come back of the druid as the best arena healer anyway, so I don’t see why they can’t see that and are still worried about healing paladin “dominance”.
*shrug* these changes aren’t that bad for us in pve anyway, most of them will only hurt us in arena play.
The change on Sacred Shield still shows that Ulduar will have a lot of aoe continuous damage (Hodir anyone ?), so well, a bit more of what it so bad for us to heal.
NO!! I love my SS, change it back! =( And my infusion QQ
@Xiphias – Those changes are new since I made the post. I’ll add an update within a few hours, but in short – I agree with you. The Enlightened Judgements change is particularly terrible.