Why Paladin tanks don't like shields, and why they shouldn't complain.

Postado por Squishalot

Bloodrage isn't up every pull. Shield spec isn't really something a raiding warrior will take. It's usually only 2/5 as most will go for decreased CD on Shield Wall. So that point really depends on the tanking warrior.

Taunts is a different matter. You need to remember (if i have learnt anything form the guys over on the warrior forums) Challenge Shout is no a true taunt. It will not put me top of the aggro table for all mobs, it just focuses them on me. While that timer is ticking away, i need to get my threat above 110% of anyone else. A Paladin can do that very quickly, i can't.

I know that Shield spec isn't often spec'd for (though I don't see why - I'm only at 52 on my Warrior, and I'm loving the rage generation from it). But you can use the same argument that a Paladin with mana issues should spec 2/2 Spiritual Attunement instead of 1/2. And I'd agree with that, if the alternative is using Seal of Wisdom instead of Seal of Vengeance.

I didn't realise that Challenging Shout is only a focus tool, not a true taunt. Either way though, you have Thunder Clap and Shockwave, and will be able to fit two or three Cleaves in, in the 6 seconds that they'll focus on you for. Compare that to a Paladin - you might get one or two ticks of Consecration down and a single Hammer of the Righteous, before the mob packs (less the three guys hit by HotR) run rampant over your mages.

The conventional wisdom is that Paladin tanks rule for AoE, but it misses the point that they can't generate quick threat on AoE packs of more than 3 mobs at a time. So as an OT, the only way that they'll get their threat up past 110% quickly is if they've plastered their Consecration down all through the fight, which is a horrible mana drain. Thunder Clap uses 13 rage when spec'd for, Consecration uses 22% base mana, which is around 18% of our actual mana pool.

Anyway, we're digressing, as Paolo has pointed out.

Which is why I'm wondering how much of this thorough exposition of the technicalities of playing a paladin is relevant -- or even marginally interesting -- for priests who do not also play paladins.

It's relevant in the sense that we're discussing OT healing and mana/rage recovery. My general view is that an OT will prefer not to get shields, which led us to get a bit sidetracked (the natural progression of Warrior vs Paladin, apologies).

Isn't all the information that priests need basically summed up as: "tell your tankadin to use Divine Plea properly"? And let them worry about the ins and outs of that?

Not really. For example, you're only thinking from an end-game perspective. Paladins only get Divine Plea at L71. Prior to that, a hefty amount of mana regen is split from block/parry/dodge, and taking damage. At lower levels, your avoidance isn't as high, so more mana regen comes from taking damage and being healed.

You're also only thinking from a MT healing perspective. Again, an OT will only get mana recovery from Divine Plea and from taking damage and being healed. This thread is to highlight these facts to you, so that you can either ease off with the shields on your paladin tank, or tell him to STFU and send him packing.

Edit: And I totally agree, overrated. As are most of them out there right now.

Postado por karlusdavius

However, your missing that Snap threat, isn't all that great. You have a much higher block chance than us with librams and what not!

Nobody spec's for thunderclap.
Cleave ability only hits 1 other mob other than your target unless glyphed. A paladins has a base 2 extra (i have no idea why).
Warriors don't usually OT. So Shield Spec isn't great. Even if we did OT, we would take it as it's marginal rage gains.

Taking into account a 6 second focus time. GCD is 1.5 seconds. You would be able to fit in 4 spells. One of those lasts longer than 6 seconds and gives consistent threat. We would fit the same in, however our abilities are all snap aggro. Once used, we have to wait for them to come off CD (one is 20 seconds long).

You are much more primed for AoE threat than we are.

Postado por Squishalot

Taking into account a 6 second focus time. GCD is 1.5 seconds. You would be able to fit in 4 spells. One of those lasts longer than 6 seconds and gives consistent threat. We would fit the same in, however our abilities are all snap aggro.

No, you'd fit more in. We don't have off-GCD abilities like Warriors do, even if your cleave only hits 2 targets. And in the first place, we don't have the 6 second focus time like Warriors do either.

In any event, can we be agreed that we are likely to be rage/mana starved as OT? Unless we're using Consecration / Thunder Clap regularly, I don't see any way that we'd be able to keep up with a steady FS/Blizzard stream of AoE damage and even be within touching range of taking aggro.

Postado por karlusdavius

Taking into account a 6 second focus time. GCD is 1.5 seconds. You would be able to fit in 4 spells. One of those lasts longer than 6 seconds and gives consistent threat. We would fit the same in, however our abilities are all snap aggro.

No, you'd fit more in. We don't have off-GCD abilities like Warriors do, even if your cleave only hits 2 targets. And in the first place, we don't have the 6 second focus time like Warriors do either.

In any event, can we be agreed that we are likely to be rage/mana starved as OT? Unless we're using Consecration / Thunder Clap regularly, I don't see any way that we'd be able to keep up with a steady FS/Blizzard stream of AoE damage and even be within touching range of taking aggro.

we have stupid *on next melee swing* god i hate those. But yes, we can agree that OTing as anything is hard on the resources situation. That said, A discipline PW:S will help you out in AoE situations. It pop's you just got mana back from absorbing AoE damage.

Postado por ande9249

quick clairification from my warrior alt, 3.3 patch made cleave hit 3 targets, glyph is now 4

secondly, I am sad that I have to jump in on this on page 3.

Let me focus on the situation before Lvl 71, or low lvl dungeons. Do you think that priests have excessively large amounts of SP at low lvls? those shields then do NOT get too large at lower lvls i would imagine.

Also consider that most priests while lvling up have a fairly different mentality towards PWS than end game priests do. Even if "disc" PWS doesnt return mana to ANYBODY until lvl 40, and then most priests dont have the extra Intellect on their gear to make that mana return anything more than gravy until they are up to lvl 75 or so.

Therefore if you are in a low lvl dungeon, and a shield fades off because there was not enough damage my first impression is:

overgeared tank : because while the debate and testing on whether or not you can block under a shield or not can go on, the fact that your armor reduces the amount EITHER will absorb remains

overgeared healer: maybe the shields are too large

Over protective healer : some poor lost soul who read that PWS was "da bomb" on wowhead and trys to heal with just it while lvling...and finds that he goes OOM more often than is normal.

Otherwise I would like to throw in my take on the thread

Raid MT: yeah, most times I WISH PWS would last longer than 3 sec

Raid OT: honestly i will look to change my ways concerning this, but the other post about a page back has it about right, generally I PWS where ever the aggro is, but I will try to lay off OT pallys from here on out.

Lvl80 dungeon: I am overgeared enough now that i can switch from PWS->FH into PoM->renew and be just fine. I can easily understand however fresh 80 preists wanting to fall back on what their spec tells them to do. Good news is that fresh 80's have maybe 1600 SP, making for about 4-5k shields, much less than your estimates(which i thought 8k was large anyways, but then again, i dont trust any "geussed absorbs" because i dont think the programers are faithfull enough to subtract the +healing that the glyph gets from the spec, and even if the glyph crits, the shield will not, blizz has mentioned that before cata they will figure out how to actually measure the end absorb, but until then)

lvl 80 dungeon cont: I would suggest that fresh 80 priests be careful around a pally tank, instead of pushing PWS premtively so that you can cast it again mid combat, cast it after they have taken about 20% damage, and then let a renew tick inside of it. If the pull finishes with the shield still there, then maybe only shield on bosses. A warning though to any palys: This kind of play WILL make your disc priest go OOM faster, So wait for them to top off before boss pulls.

honestly, I am happier with this "tank consideration" rather than the whole "never shield a warrior" thing that was around before.....now if only the DK tanks will actually use the 32 runic they get every time a shield pops on them....

Postado por ZoraLink

quick clairification from my warrior alt, 3.3 patch made cleave hit 3 targets, glyph is now 4

Wait, what?

Postado por ande9249

doh! dang it, it was something they played with in the PTR for a while, sorry, cleave still only hits 2 unglyphed.

also side question, heard a rumor that if damage is "absorbed" it reduces the "damage to armor" thus reducing the repair bills, any thoughts?

Postado por dhampir1989

I had a pally tank praise my shields and Rapture today. Who knew.

*shrugs*.

Im also levelling a pally tank, with a friend who has specced disc (a reversal of our last alts ironically) and we've worked out a pretty good system of rotation PW:S to maximise our mutual mana pools. It worked well enough to clear mara at 42, 6 levels below Pigcess, its not exactly raiding, but its pretty intensive.

Postado por Squishalot

Ok, just to confirm, the earlier tests on the Pally forum were crap (not enough damage being done, I believe was the key problem).

I've just tested the block/absorb relationship with Holy Shield and Sacred Shield, and found that damage done above and beyond the blocked amount can and will be absorbed (though in the combat log, it comes across as 'absorbed' only, no mention of blocked, which may explain the confusion), and will proc Holy Shield, and presumably other block-based effects.

So threat isn't an excuse. This thread still has relevance for low level tanks with mana issues, OTs with mana issues, and MTs who need to be schooled.

Sorry for all the confusion.

Postado por MegaVolt

No paladin should go OOM MT or OT'ing ever. ever. ever! Regardless of shields.

That's not really true. If a Paladin severely out-gears the content he is tanking (like fully ToGC and ICC geared and tanking 5mans for the daily) he will hardly ever get hit. There will be almost no healing required to keep him alive. A single shield will probably last him through a complete trash pull.
In such a situation the Paladin will go OOM pretty quickly if he uses his normal threat rotation.
He will most probably also OOM without the shield. Simply because building threat costs mana and if no damage is incoming he won't get any mana back.
Warriors and Druids have exactly the same problem: Without enough incoming hits in 5mans a vastly overgeared Druid / Warrior will get almost no rage and he will have problems building threat then (totally unrelated to shields but still an issue for those classes).

The very simple solution in this case is: Pull more. If you are so overgeared that you are not taking any damage just pull 2 or 3 groups at once. So much that you start taking damage and thus start getting rage / mana. Problem solved and it makes your 5man go a lot faster.

Postado por OscarDivine

No paladin should go OOM MT or OT'ing ever. ever. ever! Regardless of shields.

That's not really true.

Actually it is. If you're a pally and you're having trouble getting hit, you can do 1 of 2 things:

Sit Crit
Pull more mobs

Now oddly, you've already done your little soliloquy on tanks pulling more mobs, which already contradicts your initial interjection "That's not really true."

If we're discussing going into a lower level raid like Naxxramas while you're in mega-super-awesome ICC 25 Gear, then you're STILL going to get hit. The damage mitigation hasn't gotten to the point yet where you can completely mitigate the damage from any bosses, even with blocks. This means... The tank is taking damage.

So... Why isn't this true?

Postado por 91278

This post was from a user who has deleted their account.

Postado por Pachuca

If it's for the heroic daily and the tankadin is over-geared, then pulling more is a great solution. Would make the dungeon go way faster. Encourage your pally tank to pull more if your PW:S is lasting an entire pull.

If you're in Violet Hold, however, the size of his pulls are going to be limited. In that case, if they're still struggling for mana, suggest to the paladin to remove his/her shield (or pants!)

Postado por jwjsmith

What Paladins tank low level 5 man content in Protection spec anyway? It's all about Retribution specc'ed Paladin tanks that never run out of mana and top the DPS charts while pulling gobs of threat.

Postado por Squishalot

What Paladins tank low level 5 man content in Protection spec anyway? It's all about Retribution specc'ed Paladin tanks that never run out of mana and top the DPS charts while pulling gobs of threat.

Because Ret paladins can't pull more mobs.

The damage mitigation hasn't gotten to the point yet where you can completely mitigate the damage from any bosses, even with blocks. This means... The tank is taking damage.

So... Why isn't this true?

Aside from the fact that 'pulling more mobs' has nothing to do with OT'ing, the simple fact is that 5000 damage of shields is less resource renewing than 5000 damage and heals. Sit doesn't work either unless the boss is focusing on you - it won't make a difference to AoE damage that you're probably taking. And if you're suggesting that a person should take damage on purpose, when the problem can be mitigated by simply using Flash Heal instead of PW:S, your raid leader might take issue with that.

It can also kick in in unexpected circumstances - I recall being frustrated tanking with my guild lowbies in MC, because I wasn't taking enough damage to keep my mana pool going, so I stopped using my Sacred Shield.

Postado por OscarDivine

Postado por 174266

This post was from a user who has deleted their account.

Postado por Squishalot

I think I need to be enlightened here. Please give me an example of a situation where an OT can lose so much mana (as a result of PWS) while OTing that they cannot continue to generate threat.

Don't forget about Rapture either. This is pretty handy, you know and was designed with this kind of thing in mind.

Not 'as a result of PWS'. Just that PWS and Divine Aegis makes it worse, by sucking down a limited form of mana recovery. Rapture only imparts about 40% of the mana that healing the shielded amount would give for a typical raiding spec'd Paladin tank. I can't comment on rage mechanics for Warriors/Druids.

If your OT is having mana issues due to things outside your control, why do you seem to think it's ok to starve them more with things inside your control? Straw breaking backs and all. Just shift your healers around, or shift your tanks around, and solve the problem.

Postado por OscarDivine

I get what you're saying, but I still can't really think of a situation where this is all... relevant. I have a well geared tank who is tanking ICC 10's right now. I've also tanked (MT and OT) every instance from Naxx up. I can't think of a single situation where what we're discussing becomes relevant.

Postado por ande9249

For you oscar, this discussion is only relevent in "low difficult heroic 80's" where the paly's can overgear the place and take reduced amounts of damage.

Why Paladin tanks don't like shields, and why they shouldn't complain.

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