Ret Paladin Pve DPS guide 3.XX WoTLK

Read this so you don’t have downtime, your dps is at 100%, and your group utility is absurd. If anyone says they don’t prefer a ret in their group, tell them that you read this post and they’ll change their mind. There's a TLDR below should you be inclined to skim.

There's no theory crafting here, and no begging blizzard to buff us (they've stated plenty of times that forum posts to not affect who they buff/nerf. Vigorous testing does). We're perfect the way they are, and this will show you how to see it for yourself.

This guide is for all rets. I haven’t played a 3.x ret in low levels, so apply what you can and toss what you can’t as your level and talent points permit. Things may be different for you, but this is my experience at 71+, mostly with pugs.

I don't usually post in forums, but playing ret in Northrend has got me noticing the amazing potential of retadins that lies outside of the impressive CS JoL DS rotation. It's good and all, but it's obvious. There is so much more to do with your endless mana bar and not enough good paladins are spreading the word.

If you do run out oom ever while instancing, then this guide is especially for you. If you do often partake in groups that never break for mana/health, then I hope I shed light on something you haven’t previously considered. We’ll start with the most significant and obvious. I’ll try to maintain some order of importance.

I’m sorry for those who are on a crusade against caps, but understand I use them sparingly, and they have very special emphasis. This can get a little wordy, but bare with me and understand that I care about this spec, and the people who make it look bad. I’m only trying to make the scrubs understand all aspects of the conversation, so there’s some obvious nub details left in here. Without further interruption:



1. You NEED 3/3 Judgements of the Wise AND 5/5 Fanaticism.


I really wish this went without saying, but I’ve grouped with a few rets that didn’t have it 3/3. This is now our staple. With it, you require no downtime solo/grouped, without BoW, and Replenishment is just one of the most coveted efficiency tools for all groups, because regardless of the number of casters, your healer has a mana bar, and this serves him/her well.

5/5 Fanaticism is for the supreme judgment dps, and so you’re not a douchebag acting like a tank. You’re not. Prot/feral mitigation in LK is so much greater than you that your plate means nothing. If you’re getting hit, you’re doing the group a terrible disservice by sucking up a healer’s or your own mana (or your tank isn’t specced, and hasn’t read his own pro tip guides). You may be the reason that your group needs a mana break.



2. USE THIS MACRO: FoL


/cast [target=focus] Flash of Light

And when the group starts, find out who is tanking, and type this in chat:

/focus TankName

If successful, a portrait of the tank will appear below the party display, and you’re ready to go. BE AWARE: As of this post, instant cast FoLs reset your swing timer. There is a lot to handle and concentrate on, but if you can help it, use this macro immediately after a white hit lands to not stunt your dps.

This macro alone can get an under-geared group through an encounter. If it’s not obvious what it’s for: You’re ret, you get instant cast FoLs often. You’re not the healer, but your role extends far beyond amazing dps. With this macro, you can instant heal the tank without having to find who to click, or switching targets, allowing you to keep up your dmg and minimize confusion. This macro is amazing on bosses and long fights. Save your healer mana, keep your tank alive, all with one click so you can keep dishing out the righteous pain. Remember not to waste your mana by using this at every opportunity. At least glance to see that the tanks health bar isn’t full. Don’t over do it, and let your healer heal.

If you want to pay more attention and fill an off-heal roll, this macro is for you:

/cast [target=mouseover] Flash of Light;

Hotkey the macro, mouse over someone in party UI, and hit it. You won't have to switch targets.

***NEW: Beyond these, if your serious about using the insta FoLs or your healer blows and you just wanna finish the instance or something, then use the HealBot mod. I hear Grid is good to, but I have yet to use it.


3. You want to spam Divine Plea on almost every CD.


ONE MINUTE CDS ARE NOT FOR EMERGENCIES. USE IT. Here it is. Another gift from god; free mana. You’re not the healer, and 20% isn’t a big loss from your JoL procs, so if you’re not at 80%+ mana, and you're not going to spike up on mana because your Judge is on CD, THEN USE IT. Be aware of it (don’t stare at its CD though, as this action is for scrubs). Know when you’re going to click it again. This will stop you from going oom, thus keeping your potential dps at %100. You don’t need to stop your CS-JoL-DS rotation for it, as this rotation has a cd gap, allowing for the use of such things. So don’t wait, pop a 1 min CD.


4. End pulls with judges.


Do this for the greater good. I know; you want to use Hammer of Wrath. You want to see your name on the top of dmg meters. Fight the temptation to see big numbers and remember that you’re reading this because you want to be a better player. That damage is going to overkill anyway. Don’t waste the mana for bragging rights. That = scrub.

Replenishment lasts 15 seconds whether the mob is dead or alive. Use your last chance to judge to give your group another 15 seconds of precious mana regen! Even if you have an SPriest, they’re not going to DoT (vamp touch-mindblast replenishment) a mob that is so close to death. It falls on you. You don’t need Hammer of Wrath to top meters in pugs. I don’t want to gloat, but to provide credentials, I’m top damage and 2nd in heals in 90% (accurate, no exaggeration, literally 9 of 10) of groups. And I wish there was such a thing as mana meters, because I’d definitely lead that one too.

IF YOU RUN OOM SOLO, take this tip to the next level. If the mob is near death and your JoL is on CD, turn you back to him, hit esc, w/e you want, stop all dmg. Wait for CD to end, and end with a judge. Get your manas worth! You should never be oom!



5. Mana loss vs dps gain. Consecrate and HoW often hurt. A lot.


Stop spaming consecrate. Stop using HoW if you’re going to get overkill. Use these skills when mana permits (100%), or when they’re efficient. AKA: Use consecrate on huge or accidental add pulls, after the tank has aoe aggrod of course. Use HoW on bosses or pulls consisting of a large, high hp single mob. Time potential rare consecrates with use of Divine Plea. If you go oom, you’re doing it wrong. Read this again.

Spec into Benediction for a huge dps increase. With this talent, you can fit a lot more Consecrates/HoWs in without your mana bar being eaten alive. As a rule of thumb, don't do it until you're oom, even if you think a pull is over. !#@# happens. You want enough mana to use your judgement. If you need to, have combat text tell you when you're low on mana. You can set the threshhold to warn you at the point where you mana is at the cost of judge + consecrate (because it's our highest mana move). That way, when you've hit that range, you know that your next move MUST be a judgement to keep your bar alive. This range may alot for you to get a CS in, but try to play it safe. Maybe you'll need that spec of mana for an FoL

@@@LVL 80@@@ At 80, benediction, glyphs, and 1337ness pretty much allow you to spam consecrate, HoW, exo, w/e on trash pulls. On bosses use consec as your mana dump. Time your mana bar and DP with consecrate usage, so at the final 20% you have the mana to spam HoW. Down a mana pot for more consecs.

***NEW:
6.ROTATION


This section is new and thus open to suggestions:

To start, and anytime all 3 CDs are up at the same time: Judge, DS, then CS.

Why? If you CS right after judge they will come off cooldown at the same time. Any time this happens, you are losing dps.

1 mob: Favor CS>DS, so long as not all 3 CDs are up (Judge DS and CS). If they are, DS first to unsync, or reapply consec if you must and its a boss.

2 mobs: Judge, DS, then CS/consec, depending on the fight's duration

EDIT: 3/4/5 mobs: DS, Judge, consec, CS

EDIT: Buttloads of mobs (enough mobs to make 1.5s of consec outdmg a 1.5 sec delay on DS on 4 target's damage):
consec, DS, Judge, CS. Alright, so the CS after judge will cause a CD conflict. Guess what? The damage caused by this rotation more than makes up for it. Go go aoe!

Below 20%: 1 mob: Judge, HoW, CS, DS, consec

More than one mob: Judge, DS, HoW, CS/consec, depending on the fight's duration and how many more mobs there are

Boss home stretch (boss is below 20% and your mana bar is sure to last you the rest of the fight):
HoW, Judge, CS, DS, consec (simply because HoW has a 20% higher crit chance than Judge)

WHEW, that can get complicated. Use your head. If the above doesn't play out as a direct rotation for you, think of it as an ability priority list along the First Come First Serve guidelines that people are blindly sticking to.

If you have any doubts about Judge being priority over everything, then just go get:
http://www.wowhead.com/?item=37574

@@@LVL 80:THIS ITEM IS BETTER THAN THE VENTURE CO LIBRAM. Do not vendor it! In raid, with trash everywhere, procing this, then using divine storm will apply the crit rating to the all 4 of the DS strikes. The venture co libram procs AFTER DS is made, and thus cannot benefit DS (this can be seen in combat logs)

7. If your group is pro and you know it, go faster with Avenging Wrath.


It’s a 2 min cd with our talents. Not for emergency, but for frequent pwnage. So up your dps and use it. You’re still going not going oom, unless you’re over doing it with the easy-mode-macro FoLs. Use it with your reseals if you cant remember a cd. If you need to reseal, you want to use AW again soon. Losing bubble is :(, but you don't need bubble in optimal situations, and waiting to pop any cds for some horrible catastrophe is a complete waste.


8. Macro to allow melee hits easily on new targets even if judge/CS is down.


Really simple macros here. Just replace your CS and JoL with these so you can hit the button and start auto attacking even if your judge/CS is down. Sometimes you don’t even have to hit tab with this, as it auto targets for you. Having to know when what and where to right click is for scrubs.

/startattack
/cast Crusader Strike

AND

/startattack
/cast Judgement of Light

Of course you can make macros for the other judgements as well, but:



9. JoL > JoW solo, JoW > JoL grouped[b]


Here's some reasons to use JoW in pugs:

1. JoL heals on yourself do not cause spirtual attunement mana return, which should occur often because you should ALWAYS use seal of blood in a pve environment
2. JoW supplements your mana pool and allows you to throw consecrations. Consecration is a huge amount of damage, and on our meters it's usually third of my top three damaging abilities.

Okay, so, other than that:

JoL JoL JoL. If you’re doing it right, you’ll never be oom and you don’t need JoW to keep you that way. Solo, JoL heals you like crazy. JoL should be in prime space on your hotbar and JoW should be off in the abyss. Switch the 2 buttons whenever you get into an instance. Use JoL if your group asks for it and you're nice, or there's 4 melees.


[b]10. You don’t need any +int gear at all.


If you’re judging every moment you can, using Divine Plea, and not spamming consecrate or something else retarded, you don’t need any int to stay completely self sufficient. Any gear that has +int has some of its “power” diverted from maximizing your dps. I spam the rotation. I don’t go oom. I don’t have +int. And you can too! I don’t believe rets who go oom, because I can’t see what they’re doing, and it’s not something I’d ever do. If you’re fighting a single mob and you’re lom, maybe you should let your DS sit for a bit. It costs a lot of mana, and never being oom wins at life. It’s what makes ret so drooly. If you’re fighting for constant DS forever, maybe Benediction will help you, but I don’t recommend it. I sliver of mp5 2 put you on the right track. You won't find it on random gear that's for melee dps, which is what you're after, so maybe an enchant'll do the trick.

Someone wanted to say "Int is great". To this, I can reply with math. I didn't want to do any theorycrafting, but since this is just solid game mechanics, I hope I can get away with it.

EXAMPLE: You're cool, you get +50 int from your gear. 50x15 = 750 mana. Nifty! Replenishment gives .25% mana per second. That's .0025 of your max mana per second, or .0125 mp5. Replenishment on 750 mana will give you 750x.0125 = 9.375 mp5..... And 10 mp5 is just plain easier to come by than 50 intellect. You can get a whole lot more than 10 mp5 from gear instead of getting 50 int from equivalent gear. You have more mana huh? Well a bigger mana pool doesn't help if your mana is infinite. With 750 mana, you can get another consecrate in! Woop-de-doo! Think about how much AP, crit, etc you lost to stack your 50 int. The +spell crit is negligible.

Look, int isn’t the worse stat on earth for ret (spirit is, lol). If you think you need it for some reason, get it. If there’s a nice piece of gear but it has an abundance of int, don’t say “EW! CHODER SAYS NO!” Do what you must, but as I operate without going oom and have 0 +int, I advise against it. Sure, you can do some more burst in a fight, but think of all the passive damage something like +50 str could get you . If you take it to the extreme, your rotation dps’ll suck, and you might just end up needing a drink, god forbid.




11. You don’t need any +spell power gear at all.


You’re talented to make atk power sooooo much better, and ALL OF YOUR ATTACKS gain a bonus from attack power that is LINEARLY EQUAL to the bonus granted from spell power (YES, even consecrate benefits from ap). This is something many rets don’t realize. Not only that, but ~3ap = +1sp, so there is absolutely no reason to favor spell power. Your heals even gain from ap. For 1337er heals? What do you need that for? Soloing? JoL is enough. And guess what? The amount healed by JoL scales with your attack power, at the same exact rate as your spell power. That’s right. Linearly equal. If you want spell power and you want 1337er heals, respec holy. AP > SP for rets, end all, be all, in the same way agi > str for sham/hunters post 3.x.



12. Get Decursive Mod


Don't be against mods. If you've never used a mod before, go get this now. Google 'wow mod decursive'. It's not just for healers. It allows you to one click cleanse anyone in your group without switching targets. Use your endless mana. You're not the healer, so maybe you don't think its your job, but not all classes can remove magic, disease, and poison. You can. So do it.

BE AWARE: Cleanse resets your swing timer. Being awesome hurts your dps, ever so slightly. It may be worth it.



13. Target of target BoP (HoP now) macro, saves lives in a moment of confusion


You’re going to have to be good for this to be any benefit to you. There are some people who just aren’t capable of doing this, and while this guide is mostly for them, this macro is for any good pally, ret and non ret alike. Some people are door knobs. Some people don’t have reactions. If you do, or you think you could get lucky one day, then use this macro.

I would post mine here, but everyone would want it to behave a little differently. For instance, no target = HoP yourself, maybe /cancelaura if you’re mistakingly HoP youself, etc. A google search will yield good results.

Use it if you think your reactions are quicker than the tanks, or the tank doesn’t realize that someone is about to die. If you’re a second too slow, the tank will taunt, you’ll hit the macro, you’ll BoP (HoP) the tank, and he’ll lose agro on all physical dmg mobs. If he’s not quick enough to click it off, everyone dies.


14. SoB/SoM Macro


/cast Seal of the Martyr
/sw 115
/script Stopwatch_Play()

Gives you a graphic display and sound for when you SoM/SoB is about to end. Don't get caught dead w/out seal up. Put up before fight, or use this timer 2 squeeze it into your rotation. You can do this for all of your seals if you feel like it.

Mods like TellMeWhen > This. And if you don't know what seal you should be using 24/7, 100% of the time in pve, I hope this helps you figure it out (a rare exception is a raid boss that pwns u and the healers just can't handle it: Decimate during gluth, during Saph, maybe even loantheb if ur healers suck).

15. Specs



I thought I’d show the core spec that I think is necessary for all paladins who wish to call themselves ret. It is attainable at level 69, so there are many (11 at 80) points to throw around at your leisure. This renders my first protip moot:

TOO MANY PEOPLE THINK THIS IS A LVL 80 SPEC and are wondering why I'm missing so many great talents. It's a spec from lvl 69, and they are talents that all rets must have to follow this guide, no matter where you think the rest should go. The reason this spec can't be bad is because you still have 11 points to do w/e you want with. Link below for the "core" ret spec:

http://www.worldofwarcraft.com/info/classes/paladin/talents.html?tal=000000000000000000000000000050000000000000000000000052322512033310302135201351

If you're doing what I do (point of reading this guide), you can do EVERYTHING with SoM/SoB and still have 0 mana problems. So at some point you'll feel comfortable taking a point out of SoC. You can have safely have kings as early as 74 (if you don't spec swift retribution). I got it at 77 with this spec:

http://www.worldofwarcraft.com/info/classes/paladin/talents.html?tal=000000000000000000000000001450000000000000000000000052320502033310302135231351

Having Kings makes you a cool kid to have in groups. Kings on tank = omfg hp bar. Others enjoy kings as well (like the agi classes). Ask them. You still want to BoM yourself, cause you'll do more dmg this way, unless you have tons of agi, and I have no idea where the hell that would come from cause it's not on northrend plate.

@@@LVL 80: And here it is. Min/max raiding cookie cutter ret spec. This is my spec. If there's 2 rets in the raid, you don't both need kings, so maybe you can find something cool to do with your points like 2/2 Divine Purpose and remove stuns all day, and 2/2 vindication for w/e mobs it works on. Also, It has SoC again just in case a fight needs it. I can't think of any that do, but wth:

http://www.worldofwarcraft.com/info/classes/paladin/talents.html?tal=000000000000000000000000001450000000000000000000000052320512033310322135231351


16. Glyphs


1. Judgement Dmg
2. CS glyph.
3. Consec glyph.

Glyph of SA doesn't provide more mana than CS or consec glyph.

Glyph of SoB provides less mana than glyph of SA (I tested this myself, it's multiplicative, not additive, making SA 11%, as opposed to glyph of SA with makes SA 12%, so GoSoB is actually completely useless. Wtf Blizz).

Glyph of Avenging Wrath (GoHoW) is interesting, but too situational. Hard to line up a boss on 20% and pop wings. On top of that, with the length of raid fights, having the extra mana from GoCS or GoConsec
with give you more dps than this glyph.

Glyph of Divinity gives you the same amount of mana that LoH gives your target. This turns self LoH into an uber mana pot with a 20min cd, especially when combined with the minor LoH glyph which gives a 20% bonus to LoH mana. Is it cool? Well, you've lost your LoH and gained a free mana bar every 20min. It'd be interesting to see whether this or GoCS gives more mana in a boss fight, but I'm not gonna be the guy who runs those tests.

Minor Gylphs:

1. Glyph of Sense Undead (Actually useful, gogo naxx!)
2. GoBoM (Convenience)
3. GoLoH (Moar MANA!)



Before I go: You definitely want to go ahead and warn everyone that you’re the best retadin on earth (if you’ve read this whole guide) and you do crazy, unheard of things, like BoP people within an inch of their life to save a wipe. Tell them to be ready to click off a BoP to continue fighting. If you can pull it off, you impress me. You’re not half bad. I didn’t write this guide for you, but I hope you took something from it.

Tyvm.

Feedback wanted.








TLDR:

1. You NEED 3/3 Judgements of the Wise AND 5/5 Fanaticism.
2. USE THIS MACRO: FoL
3. You want to spam Divine Plea on almost every CD.
4. End pulls with judges.
5. Mana loss vs dps gain. Consecrate and HoW often hurt. A lot.
6. ROTATION
7. If your group is pro and you know it, go faster with Avenging Wrath.
8. Macro to allow melee hits easily on new targets even if judge/CS is down.
9. JoL > JoW in general usage.
10. You don’t need any +int gear at all.
11. You don’t need any +spell power gear at all.
12. Get Decursive Mod
13. Target of target BoP (HoP now) macro, saves lives in a moment of confusion
14. Macro SoB
15. Specs
16. Glyphs

If any of these points interest you, feel free to scroll up and find their section for further information/explanation

Taken from Choder from Gorgannash