The current WotLK Paladin Protection tree is broken



Kinda, at least in my opin­ion. So stick with me and try to follow.

The prob­lem with Pro­tec­tion Paladins

I was play­ing around with the tal­ent cal­cu­la­tor when I stum­bled on a prob­lem that I faced many times: reach­ing our 51-points tal­ent doesn’t feel right when only tak­ing PvE tal­ents. I know, it sounds weird but try and fol­low me some more.

Take a look at the pic­ture below.

It’s a stan­dard build with only 24 points invested. Where to go from now? Tak­ing Soicism, Guardian’s Favor, Divine Guardian or Improved Ham­mer of Jus­tice is wrong, just wrong if you want to PvE.

So basi­cally, in order to move on, we have two choices: take Improved Devo­tion Aura or Reckoning.

Improved Devo­tion Aura

Will give 602.5 Armor and 6% more heal­ing on the tar­gets affected at level 80. Does NOT stack with Tree of Life from Druids. Mean­ing, if you spec into this and raid with a Tree, you just wasted 3 tal­ent points.

Reck­on­ing

Great for lev­el­ing, bad for endgame rad­ing. Gear­ing your­self means you’ll get hit less. Get­ting hit less makes Reck­on­ing not to proc. Reck­on­ing not proc­ing = you just wasted 5 tal­ent points.

Other solu­tions

In order to move for­ward down into the tree, with the build I showed in the image above, we only need 1 tal­ent point. Only 1 more tal­ent point. But where to put it? Invest­ing only 1 point in a tal­ent just doesn’t feel good, right? But if we don’t like eighter Reck­on­ing nor Improved Devo­tion Aura, we need to make that sacrifice.

So what should we do? At the moment I have no idea. I doubt Bliz­zard will fix this until Wrath of the Lich King so I’m guess­ing we’re stuck at gimp­ing our builds.

Gimp? What do you mean?

Let’s say I’m level 80, I’m so good gear that Reck­on­ing doesn’t proc to my sat­is­fac­tion and I raid not with 1, but sev­eral Resto Druids. Let’s think, what are my choices? Get my point?

Con­clu­sion

We can’t ben­e­fit from our 51 points tal­ent with­out invest­ing at least 52 points, while tak­ing only PvE viable talents.

A viable PvE build for a Pro­tec­tion Pal­adin requires at least 54 points in the Pro­tec­tion tree, one being wasted exactly because of the prob­lem described above.

But I guess the per­sons capa­ble of fix­ing this are too busy nerf­ing Retri…

See More Pop­u­lar Posts:

• A Guide to Pro­tec­tion Pal­adin Glyphs
• Patch 3.1 Pro­tec­tion Pal­adin Specs and Glyphs
• Best WotLK Weapon Enchant for Pro­tec­tion Paladins
• Pro­tec­tion Pal­adin build for Wrath of the Lich King
• A ques­tion for all tanks

Sim­i­lar Posts of Interest:

• Pro­tec­tion Pal­adin build for Wrath of the Lich King
• Tankadin DPS is not a lie anymore
• Com­mon mis­takes in build­ing your Pro­tec­tion Paladin
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• I refuse to blog about Wrath of the Lich King

 

22 Responses to “The current WotLK Paladin Protection tree is broken”

1. Elebrimor says:

   09/11/2008 at 15:27

   Well maybe you are right! All those GCs and other crabs are busy / were busy nerf­ing ret pal­adins, which may have done PvE pal­adins weaker. I mean that they have nerfed retri palas and didnt think about Holy or Prot then. When the 3.0.2 came out it was the first time I could eas­ily kill mon­sters for daily quests, just like resto shamans do, or priests too. Not it changed. Whatever.

   Reck­on­ing. Hmm is it so bad? I’ve heard that it’s a good way to get more TPS. Well I used to be a healer, but now in WotLK I’m gonna be a tank. I’d like you to sug­gest me a few pal­adin tank builds, please. Thx in advance.

   Reply
2. Tepisor says:

   09/11/2008 at 17:12

   @Elebrimor — Reck­on­ing is not bad. I love Reck­on­ing. But when you’re overgeared it will stop work­ing or get a very low proc rate, so low it’s not worth invest­ing 5 points in it.

   As for the builds, here are two. I’ll prob­a­bly need to revise them or make another updated post.

   Reply
3. Tensas says:

   09/11/2008 at 21:52

   Reck­on­ing does proc off of blocks also. So, it will still proc when your gear gets good.

   Reply
4. Tepisor says:

   09/11/2008 at 22:05

   Yes, but you want Dodge in end-game raid­ing, not Block.

   Reply
   • Coward says:

     19/03/2009 at 02:29

     “Yes, but you want Dodge in end-game raid­ing, not Block.”

     Really?

     So have I been wast­ing my time this whole since release by mak­ing myself into a soak/block tank and not an avoid­ance tank?

     Reply
     • Tepisor says:

       19/03/2009 at 12:29

       The post and com­ment are rather old (before the release of WotLK) and they are kinda outdated.

       Now with the DR on avoid­ance, the proper way to do it is a mix between the two.

       You can read more about it here.

       Reply
       • Coward says:

         19/03/2009 at 17:31

         Well I feel fool­ish for not pay­ing atten­tion to dates.

         Thanks any­way for the great site, Tep. Found and book­marked yesterday.

         Reply
5. mandm413 says:

   10/11/2008 at 00:20

   I agree that that is a spot where points are not spent on tank­ing, I took Imp devo­tion aura for lev­el­ing but I hope we have a bet­ter choice at 80. Maybe that elu­sive 11 point tal­ent that has been hinted at.

   I also wanted your opin­ion on bliz­zard adding dam­age reduc­tion to shield of the tem­plar. I had skipped that before because I didn’t feel like I had to have the extra dam­age at level 70 and was going to pick it up as I lev­eled. With the dam­age reduc­tion I think it made it a must have tank­ing tal­ent and made our pro­tec­tion tree too bloated. I have dropped 3 points out of ardent defender since I overgear most con­tent I will be doing until the expan­sion and will pick it back up as I level. What do you think of it now?

   Thanks, great blog, keep it up.

   Immanuel of Khadgar

   Reply
6. mandm413 says:

   10/11/2008 at 18:36

   Ten­sas– Where does it say that reck­on­ing procs off of blocks, I reread the tool tip last night and it does not say that that I can find. It would be a great addi­tion if it did proc off of blocks just curi­ous what the source is.

   Thanks

   Reply
7. Tepisor says:

   10/11/2008 at 23:30

   @mandm412 — read rank 5 of Reck­on­ing. It now also procs on blocks, unlike the old one. But only if you invest 5 points in it.

   Shield of the Tem­plar is a beau­ti­ful tal­ent. 3% less dam­age taken from all sources plus 30% more dam­age on two of our main threat build­ing tal­ents (Holy Shield and Shield of Right­eous­ness) are just yummy.

   Com­bine that with Guarded by the Light and we get 9% less dam­age taken from all sources. Remem­ber how we really lacked pro­tec­tion from spells before? Not anymore.

   Reply
8. mandm413 says:

   11/11/2008 at 00:26

   Tepisor– Thanks, as much as we block reck­on­ing would be up all the time again, but it leads me back to my ini­tial query.

   The pro­tec­tion tree is stuffed with must have tal­ents so are main tanks going to end up 63 to 65 tal­ent points in our tree? I def­i­nitely think kings needs to go back to one tal­ent point or become base­line so we don’t have two tal­ented must have raid­ing buffs in our tree.

   Reply
9. Tensas says:

   11/11/2008 at 14:58

   mandm413– In my builds, I don’t take kings. The holy pal­adins in my guild are respon­si­ble for that. So, that frees up some extra points. I don’t know that reck­on­ing will be in my level 80 build, but it will be in my lev­el­ing build from 70–80.

   Reply
10. Catylist says:

    23/11/2008 at 13:23

    Well, you say that you are not get­ting Imp Devo aura because you could poten­tially waste 3 Tal­ent points…But what if you’re raid­ing with other Pal­adins? Then you waste 5 tal­ent points with BoK. Besides, the game of tank­ing has changed since there are dimin­ish­ing returns with Dodge/Parry and pure avoid­ance. Also, your block value is going to be huge…HUGE! In TBC, it was, “Lets see how much dam­age you can take!” so peo­ple stacked sta­mina heavy on every­thing. This isn’t to say that you won’t be doing that now, but I notice a lot of tanks stack­ing Defense now (Not sure how per­ma­nent that is going to be since the cap is 540). I think in WotLK it is going to be more, “How much dam­age can you absorb?” I choose not to take Kings, and I choose to get the 3 points into Imp Devo Aura for that extra armor…even if it is just a lit­tle bit. It does give almost 3% extra dam­age reduc­tion any­way while active. Then you just get stuck with what to do with your 3 points to get to the next tiers of the pro­tec­tion tree…which then you would “bite the bul­let” and put them into Reck­on­ing since every­thing else is vir­tu­ally use­less. I am sure you will get hit a lot at 80 while raid­ing no mat­ter what the gear. It is just that you will be get­ting hit for less and less now…So I think over­all, reck­on­ing will be pretty use­ful even at 6%.

    Reply
11. Tepisor says:

    25/11/2008 at 14:21

    @Catylist — you are absolutely right on this one. The “prob­lem” with BoK needs to be dis­puted between the Pal­adins within a guild. Decide who will spec into BoK in order to opti­mize raid performance.

    I chose to spec into BoK because I’m cur­rently the only Pal­adin in my guild who’s 80. And besides me, there’s going to be only another Pal­adin raid­ing and he’s Holy.

    I agree that I had a dis­torted view on things at 80, but now that I am there, I can safely say that the num­ber one pri­or­ity will be stack­ing Defense and Block Value. I’m start­ing to love Block Value. See­ing those 3k+ crits with Shield of the Right­eous­ness just makes my heart melt.

    We’ll see how things evolve.

    Reply
12. Hermi says:

    07/12/2008 at 08:05

    As it stands, prot can­not take BoK because tanks DEMAND BoSanc. When I do Naxx, my OT War­rior whis­pers me non­stop if I don’t rebuff BoSanct imme­di­ately — it’s that impor­tant for rage gen­er­a­tion. And as a pally I wouldn’t be able to tank any­thing below raid bosses with­out BoSanct on me with­out run­ning out of mana.

    But there are still some good PvE choices in the low prot trees for pal­adins. Get 3/3 Imp. Devo­tion, as if any sane tank would turn down 600 free armor, its like a free armor elixir up all the time. Plus you aren’t guar­an­teed to have a druid in 5– and 10-mans unless you have a pocket one.

    The remain­ing 3 tal­ent points can be spent in imp HoJ instead of reck­on­ing. This is not strictly an PvP tal­ent any­more, it is invalu­able in 5mans, for the stun, and the inter­rupt com­po­nent could make the dif­fer­ence on inter­rupt­ible raid mobs.

    I do hope that our promised 11-point tal­ent will be good for mit­i­ga­tion though, as that would be a solid place to put a point early in the tree.

    Reply
13. Bloodhealth says:

    26/01/2009 at 03:37

    I see your prob­lem, but I also see wasted points.
    As an MT you’ve got to expect there to be a holy pala or retadin in the raid who’s going to have BoK. Sanc is a must have to any tank­ing class, if just for the mit­i­ga­tion its still needed. For my build I’ve included imp. devo sim­ply because your not always raid­ing and in most hero­ics your going to have an even spread of heal­ing classes. What I’m cur­rently find­ing incred­i­bly good is sto­icism, that –30% stun dura­tion really helps when your tank­ing mul­ti­ple mobs (and as a tankadin any­thing less than 3 to tank is bor­ing) if 1 or 2 of those mobs has a stun you can guar­entee they’ll use it at the worst pos­si­ble time, mak­ing Sto­icism a really use­ful addition.

    Imo, skip reck­on­ing unless you have the points to spare and masses of expertise.

    If you really get stuck with your build just stick a few points into Guardian’s Favour, its defi­nately not a tal­ent that you need per-say, but its always nice to have a slightly smaller CD for those mem­bers who go off and attempt to solo-kill a mob your not work­ing threat on.
    As it is we’ll just have to sit and wait for any tal­ent changes that might be com­ing with the next few patches.

    Reply
    • Nanji says:

      08/02/2009 at 07:04

      Good dis­cus­sion, but one thing I don’t under­stand with you guys. How are you expect­ing holy pal­adins to have kings? They give up at least 3% of pre­cious crit to get it:

      http://www.worldofwarcraft.com/info/classes/paladin/talents.html?tal=503501503001300531025212510000000000000000000000000052300500030000000000000000

      That said, I’d always expect a ret pally to have it unless they’re all out pvp spec or some kind of holy/ret hybrid.

      Note: As a tank, I kind of expect to be the respon­si­ble party in terms of bring­ing group util­ity, so it doesn’t entirely bug me that I have to have 2 tal­ented blessings.

      (As to OP, you’re spot on I have a heck of a time get­ting to the bot­tom half of the prot tree when­ever I build a new spec. Of course, I really like hav­ing Divine Guardian, even though I can’t use it while tank­ing, so usu­ally that’s where the extra point or points go.)

      Reply
14. Dirz says:

    23/02/2009 at 20:29

    I picked up kings for heroic runs– usu­ally I’m the only pally in 5 man groups. I also picked up imp devo aura as it helps when there isnt a tree in my raid/5 man– which means I directly can help my healer out. I don’t have threat gen issues, with 3k tps if not higher in all heroic/naxx gear– mostly heroic gear. I also took heart of the cru­sader in the ret tree as it increases the crit strike chance aginest the tar­get by 3% and thus helps kill the boss faster. I didnt take reck­on­ing because of bad expe­ri­ences with prince:) Might have to rethink that one since it seems the wrath bosses arent into parry deaths

    Reply
15. Doramue says:

    25/03/2009 at 14:40

    hey guys just thought I’d get some con­struc­tive crit­i­cism on my build lemme know what u think and what i could improve because I’m sure every­one is gonna tell me what I’m doing wrong lol http://www.wowarmory.com/character-talents.xml?r=Blood+Furnace&n=Doramue

    Reply
    • Tepisor says:

      27/03/2009 at 07:11

      Hey Dora­mue,

      First thing I would sug­gest is to drop Reck­on­ing and get Ardent Defender. It will help out a lot more.

      Another thing I would sug­gest is to get Pur­suit of Jus­tice (maybe drop the points in Conviction).

      Other than that, you should be OK.

      Good luck!

      Reply
      • Doramue says:

        02/04/2009 at 15:45

        can i ask why i should take pur­suit i dont under­stand since i’m geared for raids and never do pvp will pur­suit of jus­tice really help me since i can’t remem­ber ever being dis­armed by a raid boss or are there other hid­den ben­e­fits i’m missing?

        Reply
        • Tepisor says:

          02/04/2009 at 17:44

          It’s just that you move faster.

          When you’re done with the Prot tree you can usu­ally go T3 in Ret and PoJ is imo the best place to put your extra points into.

          Reply