Holy Paladins in Cataclysm

Ok, so onto my beloved Holy spec: Lets get a few facts down, the only real main I would play is my Holy Paladin: I love this spec, it is the only healing spec I have fell in love with and for the next few paragraphs I am going to detail why I love it, especially in Wrath. The second fact is I do not love it because it is "overpowered", but that will be explained in the next few paragraphs.

Firstly, Wrath healing is not really mana limited, I do run out of mana as a holy paladin: But that is usually me being over-zealous on using Holy Light or not using plea enough: this sort of thing. Basically though this means my healing is basically a combination of 5 spells: Keep Beacon and Sacred Shield and Judgements of the Pure up, Holy Shock when moving and Holy light 80% of the time. Whilst Using Plea with cooldowns to compensate that loss.

Now whilst that is pretty simplistic meaning you are only really using 1 spell the majority of the time, the fact that it is a direct heal means that it is totally different from say Rejuvenation and Shields and Renew. Whilst those 3 healers (Druid/Disc/Holy) are the majority of their time blanketting a raid, relatively they are just using 1 spell and keeping up hots/shields on around 10 people whilst using other spells to either heal directly (Prayer of Healing/Penance/Swiftmend) or more blanketing (Coh/Wild Growth) meaning their healing has relatively little choice, you are sort of pidgeonholed into healing specific people at specific times with only really 3 or so heals over 15 seconds.

In contrast Paladins have free reign on who they heal, because their "job" is usually to heal the beacon target only on 1 tank fights, this means that on fights with lots of aoe damage you are basically choosing who to heal, whilst the 3 aforemented heals blanket people the holy paladin and, to a lesser extent, the resto shaman pick them back up to full hp. Basically although you don't have much choice in your spellbook you have full choice on who to heal, perhaps you might be assigned to a specific group or pact of the darkfallen target or whatever but regardless you are choosing who to heal and aren't cycling montonously.

This is precisely what I love about Holy Paladins, you choose who to heal, it doesn't matter to me that I am only using 1 spell I get to have alot of choice and freedom in my healing, even if it is in a niche role.

Now I won't make any bones about it, I have my severe doubts over Cataclysm Healing Style, not the intention of it: I think that is good, but I feel it is going to take away what I love about Paladin healing, one of the main reasons why I am quitting hardcore raiding is because I don't think paladin healing will be attractive enough in Cataclysm, along with real life issues and all this jazz.

Now I am going to make alot of points about "healing style" and will attempt to not view paladin healing in cataclysm under a "lk eye" like many people do when reviewing the current status on the beta. What I mean by this is I will make a few key assumptions and ignore numbers on the beta.

1) You can Spam Holy light constantly for a good 5-6 minutes using standard mana regen techniques and have a good 20-30% mana left. I make this assumption based on blue posts that have been made about cataclysm healing.

2) Any necessary "healing buffs" are kept active/used on cd satisfying condition 1, ie if i keep up my healing buffs and spam holy light I have 20-30% mana left after 5-6 minutes.

3) Flash of Light and Divine Light cost the same mana, and are worse hpm than Holy light.Flash of Light Heals for the same as Holy Light. Holy Light and Divine Light take the same amount of time to cast.

4) Light of the Dawn is a choice and Healing Hands is Spammable.

5) Holy Shock is something you want to use on cooldown.

6) At 3 Holy Power you want to use Word of Glory without question.

7) 80% of your Holy Power Generation will be through Holy Shock and not through Tower of Radiance.

8) I assume that tank healing is purely tank healing

9) I assume Raid healing will be group based

Now these assumptions are based on the current talent design of the Trees and what I would envisage healing choices to pan out between the 3 direct heals.

Under these assumptions I assume that whatever the Paladin is healing they will be doing a few things: Keeping Beacon up, Keeping Sacred Shield up, Keeping Jotp up, Using Holy Shock on Cooldown, Using Healing Hands on Cooldown, using Word of Glory at 3 holy power and using Holy Light with Infusion of Light.

Now if they are Tank healing they will be healing in melee for healing hands splash on the tanks and basically using Holy light Primarily, using Flash of Light if say they need to top the tank fast before some high damage point and using Divine light after a high damage point with small threat of them dying.

If they are Raid Healing they will stand with their specific group, using holy light primarily and light of the dawn when all members of the group are taking damage, mostly using flash of light in emergencies rather than divine light.

Now what I have a problem with is the first paragraph of the 3.. the fact is that you have a good 7 things you have to do, you don't really have a choice not to, I might have some of these assumptions wrong like using holy shock in cooldown mostly is what I am a little unsure about, but that would still leave 6 things you are forced to do, obviously 2 things would be far less stringent without the holy shock assumption.

Now in the same way that druid/priest healing is very montonous with lack of choice I feel like because you are having to do 6-7 things without thought you are losing alot of elements of choice. I mean alot of this ties into cataclysm healing style where you will have a max of 5 people you are healing, because overhealing matters I presume that raid healing will go back to 1 healer per group and 2 healers on tanks.

I know Blizzard's position on making healing fun is to make you choose between spells and manage your own mana and really have an obvious idea of who you are healing. Now whilst I actually don't have a problem with that at all, I feel that is a very good mantra and actually makes healing far less stressful, which it currently is today. However I don't feel its been implemented in the best possible way for a paladin. Paladin healing has lost its simplicity and has become a very complex healer.

Firstly, lets take the positives: 1) Far more viable raid healing, personally I feel they should give an aoe heal talented for a holy power dump so you have a nice choice between word of glory and this aoe heal as a power dump, that way its far less monotonous.

2) I LOVE how the position of the paladin matters, it has given paladin alot more mobility they don't currently have, its a very unique way of aoe healing and even single target healing this part of the paladin healing is my favorite.

Personally I feel that Paladin healing is going to be in a good place, I actually like the style, I would definitly find a way to generate Holy power besides Holy Shock, like I said if you don't have to use holy shock on cooldown then you have 4 main things you have no choice over and 2 you have to do based on a proc (again giving an aoe heal as a power dump along with Word of Glory would be 1 less of that) then I think the healing style is actually going to be great.

Things I don't like about Paladin Healing and the talent tree at the moment.

1) The Bloat of the tree, I know there was a post saying they like "bloat" but when I need to take 32 points in my specialised tree with 0 choice for utility and all for performance, and then the only point I can "choose" is to get pursuit of Justice for more manoeuverability.

What I envisage for a "good tree" is that you take a good 25 points all for performance with not much room for manoeuvere in your specialised tree and then 5 points in another tree you have to take again for performance. You are then with at least 6 points to choose between utility points in your tree and then 5 points to choose in the other 2 trees or further in your own tree.

At the moment you need don't really have any utility choices in the Paladin tree. (Note: I do not consider Enlightened Judgements as utility, you can argue that it is, but considering that having the hit cap and being able to Judge anywhere is vital to keep up judgements of the pure which is essential to performance)

2) The bottom of the tree: It's hideous, Improved Concentration Aura needs to be cut, improving auras is just generally a bad decision, I don't want to have to say Yes I need a holy paladin for improved conc aura, and a prot for devotion aura. I presume this talent will be cut but yes, it needs to go, or be tier 1.

Blessed Life, I like this talent and again with say some of the NEEDED BLOAT cut it will be an interesting choice, it has no real place in the current tree of course.

Denounce should really be higher in the tree (tier 3) just so that a person levelling as holy can have access to it earlier, again it suffers from the rest of the tree, and would be a nice choice, would also be nice if it could proc seals but i doubt that would happen :D.

Those are my big 2 quarrels besides what I already stated above. I believe Paladin Healing can be great, and is poised to be in a great spot, it just needs a few iterations and it would be awesome :D.

Although to be clear I won't be healing "hardcore" in Cataclysm, I still want to see paladin healing get into a great place as it is something I hold dear to my heart :).