The most overpowered class in the game
You probably didnt guess it, but i’m talking about holy paladins
A lot of people complain about warriors and maybe hunters being overpowered; and they are, but take a moment to think about it and you’ll realise that every single zerg/cleave setup in the game (beastcleave, wizard cleave, tsg to name a few) is currently running with a holy paladin due to the obscene amounts of utility, healing power and mana efficiency which they provide.
Lets take a moment to look at all the utility that holy paladins bring to the team:
- Single target sacrifice – Dispellable* with good rng – 2 minute cooldown
- Sacred Shield – Dispellable* with good rng
- Aoe Sacrifice – Undispellable – 2 minute cooldown
- Aura Mastery – Undispellable - 2 minute cooldown
- Trinket – 2 minute cooldown
- Divine Shield – Dispellable* by priests Lasts 5 minute cooldown
- Hand of freedom – Dispellable* 25sec cooldown
- Hand of protection – usually not needed defensively and can be used to remove stuns or blind (dispellable*) 5 minute cooldown
*dispelling is unreliable at best due to 30% dispel resistance, i’ll touch on this in a later blog though.
The issue with warriors and hunters is not their damage alone, (although ridiculously high in it’s current state) it is bearable with enough cc which warriors in particular are very susceptable to. The issue is the fact that a good paladin can keep his entire team crowd control free for the duration of 2 sacrifices, aura mastery, trinket and finally bubble should they need it. Lets add up the collective durations of all the utility paladins have to remain free of crowd control assuming nothing is dispelled (aside from fear, though any warlock is probably going to have a hard time fearing with two melee breathing down his neck and the paladin can just stay at 40 yards anyway, no harm done).
As the damage of other classes increases, the defensive healers – druids and paladins become more and more overpowered and the offensive healers – priests and shamans become worse. This is because when damage goes up, the offensive healers can no longer play offensive due to the need to heal up the obscene amount of damage going around. Paladins are becoming so overpowered now because they allow the high damage classes to stay on their targets for longer, something that no other class can do anywhere near as effectively. The difference between paladins and druids is that the paladin has slightly less crowd control than the druid but more utility and with the way that the game is now, druids do not get much chance to use their cc as they are forced to heal constantly. For example if you compare almost any setup with a druid to the same setup with a paladin, the setup with a paladin will almost always be the stronger of the two.
- Single target sacrifice – 12 seconds
- Aoe sacrifice – 10 seconds
- Trinket – ~1.5 seconds (aside from the fact that it DR’s the following crowd control)
- Divine Shield – 12 seconds
That’s roughly 35 seconds that a paladin can allow his team to zerg a target such as a priest without interruption. The priest is in turn unable to remove single target sacrifice or bubble due to the insane amount of pressure which he is under due to two melee training him non stop as he needs every global cooldown to stay alive.
Sacred Shield
Counterspell you say? The sad truth is that a good paladin will never need to take a full counterspell due to two spells, holy shock and sacred shield (on top of this they have aura mastery if they really need it). A good paladin can simply holy shock, then fake until his next holy shock is up, or cleanse in the mean time if need be. The main reason for this is due to sacred shield, the spell that myself and kalimist believe to be the most over powered spell in the game by a very large margin. Let me explain why.
Currently sacred shield will proc every 6 seconds for holy paladins on live and with ~3200sp each proc will absorb ~3400 damage, not only that but every single time it procs the paladin gains 50% flash of light crit for 6 seconds. All of this in return for one global spent when the opposing team does not have pressure. This causes paladins to do very little to sustain defensive power compared to other healers and allows them to use their defensive cooldowns offensively. This is the main reason comps like tsg and beastcleave seem so overpowered.
Lets also compare sacred shield to the priest equivalent:
Sacred Shield: Absorbs ~3.5k every 6 seconds, does not need to be recast, two components to dispel. Also grants the paladin 50% crit on flash of light when it procs. Mana cost: 474 mana
Power word: Shield: Absorbs ~6.5k every 13 seconds (assuming 4set pvp bonus), needs to be recast, one component to dispel. Mana cost: 888mana (untalented)
There are a few options that could be taken in order to balance sacred shield:
- Reduce the absorb coefficient to 50-60% rather than 75% of spellpower.
- Make the internal cooldown 8 seconds rather than 6 seconds so that it procs less often.
- Make it undispellable but have the main buff last a shorter duration (say 15 seconds) and increase the mana cost to rougly 1k.
In my opinion the last option is probably the best since it balances the spell for all teams since right now sacred shield is even more devastating for teams without offensive dispel.
Something atleast needs to be done because with the resilience changes, paladins will be gods next season since they’ll top all other healers in terms of utility, healing throughput and mana efficiency (with the exception of maybe druids, hi innervate).
| Print article | This entry was posted by Hydra on January 25, 2010 at 19:53, and is filed under News. Follow any responses to this post through RSS 2.0. You can leave a response or trackback from your own site. |
about 7 months ago
Ok enough with the paladin drama , if u like that way i can remind u that ur fear got 20 seconds CD and paladin’s stun who affect 1 target/can be dispaled or get to ground totem takes 60 seconds untalanted. If u realy believe that paladins are so OP why i watching only Priest/shaman/druids on top, can someone explain it? sry for the broken english.
about 7 months ago
I’m gonna have to say that’s wrong.
1. Single Target Sac, dispellable, doesn’t take RNG. Most teams that are going to get it off have already dispelled most buffs and will get this instantly. Most of the time you have to time it so you can break ONE CC (unless you’re using it to reduce damage).
2. Sacred Shield, dispellable, doesn’t take RNG but can be easily refreshed (maybe why you think it takes RNG).
3. AoE Sac – Smeh.
4. Aura Mastery – A lot of teams try to save stuns, blinds, fears, cyclones for this.
5. Trinket – Listing something that everyone has is silly.
6. Divine Shield – Dispellable by Priests and Warriors (and once you use it you become a very juicy looking target.) I will note, as having played Priests myself, that sometimes RNG will fuck you with this.
7. Hand of Freedom – RNG Dispel? Kidding me? Any team I face above 2.2k with a dispel that freedom lasts about three seconds and then you’re waiting twenty-two to get it back up.
8. Hand of Protection – Most teams that you would use this against can now remove it. You can use it to break a blind, but it works both ways, you used it for offense instead of defense and then if you do end up needing it then :\.
The Sacred Cleansing still leaves you with about a 70% chance to hit with dispels, so where it’s effective it doesn’t fit under RNG. RNG is more something with low chances happening, RNG is when it actually stops you. You have no idea how many times I’ll proc Sacred Cleansing and watch it do nothing. But you, not playing a Paladin, probably only pay attention to when you get gayed by it instead of the other way around.
Your saying that Holy Paladins are reducing the number of Priests/Shamans is untrue, seeing as Shaman healers have been unpopular for some time now and Priests hold more popularity than Paladins for healers.
Sacred Shield is pretty OP. Can’t argue that, but to say that you can just Holy Shock and win a match is kind of stupid. On my Paladin I use PvE rings and helm to boost my crit so that I can get the Holy Shock procs but I still cap around like 33% chance to crit.
I think the reason you might think Holy Paladins are so overpowered is because they’re usually associated with high burst teams, because as I’ve said, after he uses CDs he either becomes a good target or just runs out of things that keep him able to heal.
I think while Paladins might be quite good right now, they can not compete with the level that Hunters are out of control, Warriors are out of control.
You can usually tell what is actually most OP by looking at the percentage of Spec/Class people are playing that season in arena. This season the most popular healer is Disc Priest followed closely by Holy Paladins.
about 7 months ago
Sacred cleansing needs to go for sure, but most of the whine is slightly unjustified. You’ll find just as many paladins who complain that priests in rmp can basically tunnel them 3dps style if they get the perfect opener in alot of their viable setups
about 7 months ago
@creighton
’3. AoE Sac – Smeh.’
this is probably the most powerful defensive cooldown paladins have, i think you’ve entirely missed the point of this blog. I’m not highlighting oh shit they have pvp trinket, i’m saying that if they chain all of their cooldowns they can remain cooldown free for over half a minute, easily enough time to keep their team zerging one target.
The reason warriors and hunters are so out of control are because paladins allow them to be.
http://sadpanda.us/images/90181-XJFGEB5.jpg
This was on single slowfall + ice barrier, just an example of what happens every day while dispelling. 30% in wow is not 30%.
The reason disc priests are doing well is because they were dogshit at the start of wotlk so all the disc priests learned to play. Then they got buffed on par with other healers but the average skill of priests was higher so they were higher represented. The exact opposite is happening with DKs right now, at the start of season 5 they were retardedly overpowered, nobodoy bothered to learn to play them correctly so when they were brought in line with other classes almost nobody was able to play them at high rating.
about 7 months ago
@Hydra
By smeh, I meant I really couldn’t argue against it. I also got the point, as I said, I think you’re thinking that mainly because Paladin teams are known for ridiculous burst and the inability to actually control the Paladin because you need to attempt to control the damage.
Trinket -> Lasts until you’re CC’d again.
Sac -> Lasts 12 Seconds
AoE Sac -> Lasts 10 Seconds
Only really effective against things that break on damage. I thought it’d good against fear when they brought the whole ‘damage will break fear’ but I’ve sat many a full fear while being damaged from this and sat many a full fear while being trained so I don’t even know about that.
Total time immune to things such as seduction, polymorph, blind if nothing it dispeled: 22 seconds.
Divine Shield -> Lasts 12 Seconds
Total time immune to CC: 12 Seconds, if bubble isn’t dispeled.
But like I’ve said, when’s the last time you let a Paladin sit with a full Sac up or sit through a full bubble?
Honestly the way it plays out for me if I’m playing against a good, let’s say, RMP team (and by good team, I don’t even mean on the level of expert teams like yours and many other teams, I mean like your average Gladiator) is I’ll wait to see if a Poly is coming, see if the Rogue is running at me for a blind and I’ll throw up single target sac. They might see it before they blow CC on me, but usually they won’t and I’ll break one CC and then they’ll dispel it and attempt putting me into another CC. Next I’ll use the AoE Sac and avoid CC all together. Next I’ll use bubble to avoid CC, now depending on how fast I had to blow these things and how many CDs they still have left, they might switch on to me with full assisted burst from the Priest, which can end in me dying pretty easily and it usually always make me burn trinket. If that doesn’t work they’ll go to CC me in a chain of sheeps into a fear or vice versa (maybe followed up by an MC if the Priest has the time and is good up on his healing) and bring down something I’m playing with.
But then again maybe I’m wrong. I don’t play many mainstream comps, I usually just play to goof around. The last time I played Holy with people who were good I played Boomkin/EnhanceS/Holy.
I play a Priest as well, like I said I understand about the dispelling being gay. I actually play a Priest to about +300 rating to what I’ve played a Paladin.
I play from around 2.2k-2.5k TR and MMR ranges a lot, think the highest any of my teams ever got to was 2.8k.
about 7 months ago
I never really thought about it but holy paladins really are over powered. As a mage in arena, when ever I run into one it’s really a stressful fight and it takes a lot of coordination to counter what pallys well throw at us.
One thing that I think you forgot to mention was the fact there plate, which is very powerful compared to priests.
Nice post, keep them coming =P
about 7 months ago
i usually just figure, if one good player rolls a hunter/holy paladin, they will be so devastating with it that they it will instantly get nerfed.
about 7 months ago
This really is nothing new… It’s pretty widely agreed that the easiest thing to hit glad with is a paladin.. there is your reasons why…
about 7 months ago
Personally I think Priest is easier than Paladin. I can’t say much for Shamans/Druids, I’ve never had anyone let me use theirs. It just seems that with how much control most Priest teams have it leaves you with a larger margin for error than most other healers.
First day I played a Priest I started with 487 resil and 18k health (buffed) and broke 2.4k.
about 7 months ago
I like you, very great article, once again. You got sportmanship. But as i know from myself, this seem kinda emo, if you know what i mean. Anyways.
But why are you making an article about overpowerness? You know you only will get gimps that disagree with you, because they play holy paladins.
I agree with you, with your fair way of looking on both sides of an subject. You are the right man to take the seat of making game mechanics at blizzard. Congratulations.
(is there a way to thumb this up, it needs to be heard, insight, enlightenment)
about 7 months ago
all i ask is that people support the site
about 7 months ago
Creighton I have to totally disagree with that statement… and your continual statements to your arena ratings are really a bore.. No offense but your claim to 2,400 first day as a priest is kinda laughable and even on the remote chance that it is true… Then, I’d say you get carried by pretty capable players which would make your earlier rant about you in a 3v3 matchup against some random Glad RMP… (which hitting glad as RMP these days isn’t THAT easy mind you).. Kinda double edge swords it because I highly doubt your partners would allow such a event to even occur in the firstplace where it sounded like it was really you in a 1v3 against the RMP…
“Priest being easier to play then a pally” is really laughable statement which makes me giggle with delight though… So much control?? fear… ahh ye.. gg.. and if your partner lets a Mind control run Full duration L2 focus kick.. Maybe it depends on what is verusing who here.. But hydra does have something when he said that having a priest instead of a pally for pally dominated comps like TSG animal planet, and the Prot alot cheese makes it a much weaker version of the comp…
However I really enjoy this site as it… for me has surpassed the gayity that is world of ming and the boredom of reckful’s site. Maybe I was too short with my earlier comment and not explaining in detail but.. watching Bladerunner for the first time is kinda causing me to rush anything I have to say…
It was an interesting blog that merely states abilities of a pally, not to mention
That being said at least he didn’t blog about what happened today when he was at the license bureau or something retarded that no1 would even care to comment about…
about 7 months ago
blah so many spelling errors and mis thought sentences… I did mention bladerunner right? this shit is crazy!!
about 7 months ago
The problem is, which other combs can a holy paladin play. It´s a cd class and without the cds he´s the worste healer ingame. So holy paladins are looking for a short game, like you have it with tsg, beatscleave or wizradcleave.
Other combs available could be hpala/warri/ele oder maybe hpala/warri/shadow, becaus of the support. But that arnt that strong combs. The truth is is, moste other combs work better with a drood or priest, like dk/wl/healer.
So if the holy paladins abilities get nerfed he need just something make him still playeable in arenas, so it doesn´t end like it was in tbc.
Sry for my bad english.
about 7 months ago
about 7 months ago
What is up with all the jealous 4channers? If you guys wrote something useful….. in other words, maybe you want to start a discussion here, but it SEEMS like you only want to gimp around Hydra.
But seriously, if you wrote an article that seemed more smooth and less “offensive” (i know, you have to be very sensible with people) you might get some fair discussion and chat going on here.
Sorry for bad english!
But then again, this is a blog, please dissable, you asked for gimped comments, as it seems like a discussion.
Anyways, what can i say, i am a lowrated idiot who probably is a noob. I don’t know, but by the way people judge each other i am.
So, i can’t add anything to your article.
So in the end; all i can say is; Interesting article, it gives me something to think about, it adds more to my thought of balance in this game.
Great to hear your point of view, as you seem as a gamer who wants to make this game better.
(dont we all ?) yes, but you do atleast do it in a fair way, everyone else, also myself, do it in a cocky way. So you have to be pro to take a GAME serious?. Even thought it is one of my hobbies, i strive for more.
So thanks again, for your adding.
I will support your precious blog! And look very closely at the adv., all you want is money right?
about 7 months ago
I ment disable comments on this article, it is your point of view mate!
about 7 months ago
rofl http://www.arenajunkies.com/showthread.php?t=148318
about 7 months ago
So to condense my comment down:
i do not have an idea.
about 7 months ago
-Paladins aren’t OP imo but they are the best Healers for specific comps (that are OP) because of their cooldowns. They can keep their Team alive for something like the first minute easily but from this point on every other healer in the game would be better. So they play setups which are built around rushing down the enemy team as fast as possible -> TSG, PHD, Beastcleave, etc… so it is not the class that is OP but the comps they play in imo.
-Paladin is the easiest Healing-Class. So you see a lot of retards running around with high ratings just because they play Paladin which is a reason why a lot of people dislike paladins… but in the end the difference between a good and a decent paladin is very big.
-I don’t think the resilience Change is good for paladins as they depend on cooldowns and rushdown-comps. With more survivability you have longer games and the longer the games are the harder it is for the paladin to keep his team alive.
-Let’s cry about Elemental-Shamans… i really hate them… even if you tunnel them the whole game they will do the most dmg by far just by casting lavaburst and lightning bolt… they are just standing at the same spot all day long and do casts on anything that is in los to them including 9K Lavabursts and 6k Lightningbolts. I’ve played against soooo many different Elemental Shamans which will all get gladiator this season and they all do the same (standing around, casting 2 spells and tanking dmg). Imo on live servers Elemental Shamans are the most OP class in terms of difficulty to play them related to success.
about 7 months ago
Good read! But if you play against these OPaladins you will need to play at your best. So this will greatly favor you after you’ve became super saiyan priest level of skill and they lvl the balance out a bit.
Then these paladerps will be replaced by the next OP class and you’ll have to do a weird dance to merge with kalimist and say stuff with a double voice and… Well yeah…
I agree with you
about 7 months ago
I thoguht he already merged with kalmist.. and the double voice thing… I thought he was doing that but only because of his long case of puberty…
JK JK <3 hydra
about 7 months ago
I think the main problem is how fucking easy they are to play, and how mistakes seem to hit them less than other classes, you commentated on beastcleave being the best on LAN because of how it is the least affected by mistakes, seems to be the same thing with holypaladins on live, you don’t have to play a flawless paladin in order to keep your teammates up and survive yourself while other classes struggle more.
about 7 months ago
Im almost agree with hydra, in particular with sacred shield because its more powerful then priest shield and thats retarded. Also paladin has too much more mana efficiency then other healers so he can just spam literally heals without really take care about his mana. I mean priest flash heal heals for like 5k (3k sp) and costs 700 mana and paladin flash of light heals for the same amount (but can crit for ridicously 9/10k) and costs like 300 mana. Not to mention the enormous paladin skillcap. Ah right: and 20% haste for free is fair, not that they don’t need it.
about 7 months ago
life of a paladin in 3v3 as TSG:
1. trinket first CC
2. bubble next CC
3. aura mastery after bubble
4. if nothing is dead stun something
5. something is definitely dead now (wheither it be you or the other team)
and its the same EVERYGAME.
its a fucking joke, i agree 150% with EVERYTHING hydra has said in this blog, paladins promote tunnel visioning and allow MASSIVE damage classes to be unstoppable.
about 7 months ago
First of all im playing Paladin on Bloodthirst EU TSG 2700 Rang 8 this Season. Also Gladiator in S5 (Hunter/DK/Pala) and in S6 (Warrior/RestoDrood/Holypala).
My english isnt that good so please be tollerant.
On one way your´re right. Paladin is the best Class for incomming Burst because of his whole cooldowns he can use, but on the other way your argumentation fails:
You say:
“As the damage of other classes increases, the defensive healers – druids and paladins become more and more overpowered and the offensive healers – priests and shamans become worse. This is because when damage goes up, the offensive healers can no longer play offensive due to the need to heal up the obscene amount of damage going around.”
And at the end:
Something atleast needs to be done because with the resilience changes, paladins will be gods next season since they’ll top all other healers in terms of utility, healing throughput and mana efficiency (with the exception of maybe druids, hi innervate).
So the Damage decreases because of the resilience changes but paladins will still be overpowered? You say that Priests and Shamans are now cappable of doing more offensive spells when the damage decreases.
Our TSG is wearing resilience between 600-800. Most RMP are around 1000-1200 Resilence.
Thanks for having your attention
about 7 months ago
Sorry for doublepost:
I Agree that Paladin is based on RNG Power and im not happy about it. Changing Sacred Shield to be undispellable is worst because then it cant protect Freedom, Sacrefice of Protection anymore. That will be a huge nerf.
A better solution is to change the dispell system:
-You cant resist any dispell effects
-Every dispell deletes 33% or 50% of the dispelled effect
(Example: Bubble (12sec) will be dispelled after 3 or 2 “Mass dispells” so that we cant whine about RNG
about 7 months ago
That’s funny. Every time I play my Priest any time I face TSG all we do is immediately open hard on the Paladin, and if can’t bring him down there we just made him trinket and bubble. I think I have just about a 90% win against TSG.
DK/Hunter/Paladin, different story. We still rush the Paladin though.
about 7 months ago
I agree that overall Paladins are pretty strong but honestly think they’re pretty balanced.
Aoe sac is dispellable (as im sure many have told you after your original post.)
PW:S as disc (which all healing priests are in arena) returns practically the entire mana cost when it absorbs damage, and can also be on multiple targets, and also absorbs damage immediately when cast on a target.
Sacred Shield is none of those things.
I think damage will be going down this season, which means all other healers get stronger and paladins get weaker. All paladins do is heal. They don’t assist damage (lolexorcism and judgement i guess), they don’t interrupt, they don’t help CC (okay, one stun every minute which is also dispellable btw) all they do is spam heal and keep their allies free from debuffs/slows, and yes, they’re good at that.
When damage goes down and other healers can do their offensive stuff, Paladins can um… hide behind a pillar more. If they aren’t healing, dispelling, or giving buffs, they’re pretty much standing there.
Also, there’s alot to be said about both Shaman and Paladin mobility and susceptability to interrupts (because they have to cast way more than any other healers, but atleast shaman have grounding.)
about 7 months ago
I will tell you Hydra 1 thing before i complain.
Yes i got Paladin but im not complaining since im Butthurt, Paladins are 1 of the weakest Healers and most of your facts was not correct.
I have rerolled to Priest im currently 64 there is 2 reasons i rerolled
1. Paladin sucks in PvP healing
2. When i saw you play it seemed so fun and i did get alot of respect for you.
But now you have lost all that respect with this post full with non correct fact.
about 7 months ago
The post above this post is so full of awesome win that my previous post has now been voided.
about 7 months ago
paladins at 2.2k vs hydra
whos right
about 7 months ago
I must fully agree with morfius, i had respect for you hydra aswell, and also rerolled priest (instant 1800 rating with 500 resi and 1,8k sp)
and found them very good.
holy paladins most overpowered class in wow pvp? my main is holy pala, and is probz one of the weaker healing classes of wow.
sry but i lost all respect for you.
ALL.
about 7 months ago
>holy paladins most overpowered class in wow pvp? my main is holy pala, and is probz one of the weaker healing classes of wow.
ololol