Crusader Strike rework

[Zokatar]

So I've been following the discord and reading the proposed changes, and have a few things to share in that front:

1. Someone suggested in the discord about making Crusader Strike give the Paladin a buff instead of giving the target a debuff. This has the obvious issue of making Shockadins and Prot Paladins even stronger than they already are, even more so with the changes being made to both said playstyles.

2. Make Judgement of the Crusader do something else and make Seal of the Crusader cleave. I think I saw this here on the forums somewhere if the one who made this reads this post. This has the problem of items meant for Crusader Seal not functioning for this purpose, as well as Judgement of the Crusader not really having a role defined to it this way.

So here comes my idea for what could be done with Crusader Strike.
3. Make Crusader Strike have a 6 (or whatever you feel like) second CD, mana costless attack doing an instant attack of 100% weapon damage (again, values can be adjusted) and restores mana (how much you can tune if you want to have it be percentage or flat amount) when it hits. Make this also the 7th row Retribution talent instead of Repentance, and move Repentance to where Ardent Defender is for Protection.

Here are my reasons for this. First of all the other two specs got some way of returning mana with the update except Retribution (outside Seal of Wisdom which all three can use). Giving Crusader Strike this job makes them more sustainable in long fights during Raid content, without infringing on the debuff limit of Vanilla. This also has the added benefit of boosting Retribution damage significantly without introducing something like "make Exorcism usable on every target" which is Wrath domain for a reason. If people are DEAD SET on having this Exorcism idea, make a sixth row talent that has 3 points to it that gives autos a 1-5% chance to trigger "Art of War" (that's what they really want here) that makes Exorcism usable for any target. I don't feel like it's necessary, but hey, just an idea to throw out there about that.

Having Ardent Defender for Prot Paladins in Vanilla also makes less sense, as the Percentage Damage Reduction component was supposed to be the Protection Warriors identity, and I want all tanks to have SOME identity in them for their jobs. The Protection Paladin identity as I see it is insane AoE threat and damage through Righteous Fury combining with Consecration, Blessing of Sanctuary and Holy Shield. They also got the best baseline FLAT damage reduction through their passive 30% block value and Blessing of Sanctuary, making them decent dungeon farmers at later levels. Prot is also getting a massive buff already with how the talents have been shoved up 10 levels than normal, while also losing the "Consecration Tax", so Ardent Defender isn't needed, especially since said flat damage reduction would be pushed closer to the golden "0 damage taken" line.

So make Repentance the Protection Paladin capstone ability. It fits and it's meant to take one enemy out of the equation for six seconds. Add some threat to the ability and you got a ranged ability that after the effect makes them run towards you (most likely) while also giving Protection one way of stopping at least ONE caster from casting on their party.

Added bonus: The other ideas thrown out there affect all three specs, my idea DOESN'T and only buffs Retribution damage output and helps Retribution out a lot with their mana problems seen in lategame. Having 20 points in any other spec literally isn't enough for their identity to show (well, maybe Holy since Illumination IS their identity but ah well).

Thoughts?

[Zokatar]

Oh yeah, the reason behind even changing Crusader Strike... It doesn't stack with Judgement of the Crusader as a debuff and the way it is at the moment would make it unusable in raids while also costing way too much mana to be worth it. It also looks really similar to Sunder Armor from Warrior, and thus doesn't fit the playstyle of Paladin at all. Just for clarification on the reasons behind all this discussion in the first place.

[Meepingmeeps]

Agreed! I think having the ability restore mana as a buff will help ret paladins out. I also wish that they keep holy strike the same, or at least lower its cost to make up for the increased cooldown.

[Geojak]

Hey, I suggested the cleave for seal of crusader, but it would not interfere with current items or libams because the idea was just to change the talents as follows.

Replace the 3 talents in the retri tree for seal of crusader to do instead:
Seal of crusaders hits a second target for 15/25/35% weapon dmasge as holy dmasge every swing.

I like your idea of moving the current 31 retri stun skill to protection very much. It would be a useful skill for prots for pack pulls as well.

Holy and prots with the so far changes seem rly well off, and crusader strike doesn't feel necessary, like you said, so I fully agree with making it a 31 talent for rets that restores mana.

But exocism on all targets would still be a really awesome thing, be it baseline or trough talents or maybe a legendary libram.

Libram of the high inquisitor: allows exocism to be cast without creature type restrictions.

Could drop in the scarlet crusade raid that I I think was planned

[Feomatar]

yes, but not give repentance to prot, instead make conviction line lead to -> 2\2 (2 tallents instead of 3) 2h specialization -> Repentance > Vengeance > crusader strike. It will have much more sense

[Zokatar]

Guess that could work as well, but do it like with Silence for Shadow Priests... A second talent more suitable for PvP use since that's where it's being used the most anyway.

Having the Exorcism effect on a Libram could be interesting, but it would most likely be mandatory for Protection and Retribution due to how much added damage it would be. It could also fracture the Paladin playerbase between those who has the Libram, and those who are unable to get it due to lacking Guild/Focus/Time/Any reasons.

I will probably have a post somewhere around here about a potential rework to the entire Seal system for Paladin, just as an idea that builds on what made Seals great, and what they fell short on. Judgement would naturally be affected, but said changes wouldn't fit with Holy Strike or Crusader Strike existing, so probably would never happen in this server. A lot of the changes I was thinking of happens to be included for a new server I was made aware of that I will try soon when it launches. Gonna be excited for that one that's for sure.

Turtle WoW is Turtle WoW though, and I think I will enjoy this server more than the other one as that other server has a shit ton more changes to it than Turtle WoW has currently or will have with the update. Thanks for your thoughts and hopefully we end up with a good alternative use for Crusader Strike in the future of TWoW!

PS, Drag on Discord leaked one new Talent for Retribution called "Sanctified Command", which could be similar to the 80% mana refund on Judgement back in TBC only for Judgement of Command exclusively... It could also just be added Crit chance for Judgement of Command, which will be super sad if it was... XD

[Geojak]

Seal of command is not that great currently since SoR is often better.

Restri also has mana problems.

So a new eet talent that fixes these 2 together sounds amazing.

I jut hope a compelte rework of anything never happens on turtlecwow.

I like vanilla.

[Minno]

PS, Drag on Discord leaked one new Talent for Retribution called "Sanctified Command", which could be similar to the 80% mana refund on Judgement back in TBC only for Judgement of Command exclusively... It could also just be added Crit chance for Judgement of Command, which will be super sad if it was... XD

We speculate that the talents could be anything. I tried searching for anything related to vanilla regarding a sanctified seal or a sanctified command or anything that boosts ret seals. But I couldn't find anything on the related to those words not in TBC.

Before I begin my suggestion for what sanctified command can be, here are some sources I found interesting on the original intent for the paladin (info from the wow site back in the day, the old talent tree calculator, the warcraft 3 paladin unit abilities and the dungeons and dragons spell list for the 3.5 edition which came out in 2003):
- http://web.archive.org/web/200403312309 ... adin.shtml
- http://www.classicwowtalents.appspot.co ... =1124125_2
- https://dnd-wiki.org/wiki/3.5e_Paladin_Spells
- https://dtdnd.neocities.org/books/playe ... aladin.pdf
- http://classic.battle.net/war3/human/un ... adin.shtml

Here is what I found:
- the original talents had a boost to seal of light healing, seal of justice stun chance, and seal of righteousness DMG. Ret still had imp seal of the crusader, but the version of that spell was different according to a few forum posts but i didn't find web information on that (I think wallcraft server will have that information once Wall releases the server this year).
- old talent tree had a few talents connected in a row (like how current tree links vengeance with conviction). But the old tree had SoC as a prerequisite for Retribution Aura and deflection was a prerequisite for precision. So you can argue SoC is somehow linked to retribution aura and parry is somehow linked with +hit.
- they had kings as a 31 talent. while mechanically not fun, it did solve that issue of needing a deep ret for kings. But players back then forced healing anyway, which you can kinda do with with repentance but for pvp. That is just the nature of the hybrid dmg/healing classes in general; you really should try to offheal/cleanse even if your gear sucks for it.
- sanctified seals in tbc said "Increases your chance to critically hit with all spells and melee attacks by 1% and reduces the chance your Seals will be dispelled by 33%.". If you reduce that into a simpler sentience, you can basically say "increase melee /spell crit and increase effectiveness of seals by x".
- you do not want to lose deep repentance in ret. Trust me, you will be mechanically useless in pvp and giving prot/holy access to repent will make them more strong in pvp; repent is still miles ahead of holy shock, even the buffed version they want to add on this server.
- the old seal system were basically the blessings we currently have. This actually comes from dungeons and dragons, where paladins could buff their weapons with specific effect and buff teammates weapons.
- If you try to google paladin D&D spells, you get the lists mentioned above. A few spells to note were holy light both healed/dealt dmg (similar to warcraft 3 unit) and a spell called sacred weapon. Sacred weapon basically buffed the weapon to deal extra dmg and chance to hit. BUT it also let you do something where you could "burn" it's duration to cause another effect. In this case, it was a dmg shield similar to priests power word:shield, an AOE daytime effect that burned undead whiled buffing your holy dmg enchantments on the weapon, or a giant AOE burst that had different effects based on your weapon. If you had pierce weapon it shot a spear, sword had a massive cleave, and mace had an AOE burst. 31 ret could be something that adds uniqueness to weapon type so you can have multiple rets in a raid one for each effect assuming you find a support or dps boosting way for each.
- warcraft 3 unit healed with holy light, dealt dmg to undead with holy light, devotion aura, divine shield without attack penalty, mass resurrect. I like that the dmg added to holy light and attack penalty removed from divine shield. But since we have holy strike and want to have a much more focused 31 ret talent, I don't agree they are good to add.

With all that said, this is what I think the ret's 31talent or sanctified command talent could be any of the following from a thematic standpoint:
- "While SoC is active, gain one of the following enchantments for each weapon type slotted: 2h hammer = x% chance to ignore armor, 2h sword x% chance to hit for X seconds, 2h axe x% chance to AOE knockdown, 2h polearm x% chance to create a dmg shield."
- "increase base spell crit and melee crit for all party members while command is active" (like turn spell crit from 150% to 200% or whatever value you want for balancing).
- "command aura. gives all party members chance to deal extra holy dmg." Balance it in a way that makes the ret have dmg similar to if they had 100% command proc dmg instead of 70% and gives all party members a mini SoC on their melee attacks. Also require it to have 5/5 deflection and 2/2 imp retribution aura prerequisites. Can move kings from where is exists at SoC's old spot and replace it with imp retri aura.
- " Commanding Dedication. Increase effectiveness of seal of command by x%, reduce the dmg reduction penalty of seal of the crusader by x% and your holy lights can now deal dmg to undead targets".

[Geojak]

Seal of command actually doing something for the party would be Hella fun and maxes more sense since commanding a group

.like each command proc restores mana to all party members euqal to 15% of the Holy dmasge dealt.

[Thefishyone]

Removing AD and replacing it with Repentance would be a certifiably Bad idea for a few reasons:

1. It will demote Tankadins to mere trash tanks. Trash tanks aren’t real tanks. A Rogue with evasion up can tank trash. Tank identity should be based around bosses, not trash. There is already a unique style for tanks: Prot warrs are best at taking slow hits, Bears are the best OTs, and Tankadins are best at taking fast hits.

2. The flat DR component for BoSanc is hot garbage for everything but tanking large amounts of AoE trash: It scales inversely with DR from armor, so a plate tank in AQ40 gear will get less than half the value, and a Bear at armor cap will get one quarter. The fact that you even made this argument is telling of your lack of understanding of Tankadin mechanics, and damage mitigation as a whole. Raid bosses as early as MC hit tanks for several hundred damage a whack. Do you really think a flat mitigation of 10-20 damage per hit will really matter?

3. Repentance is a PvP tool and always will be. It only affects Humanoids and has a measly 20.yard range. EZ-Thro Dynamite would make for a better pulling tool. Seriously, there’s a reason Blizz moved Repentance out of the Prot tree during the Pally class revamp of 1.9.
is
I’m sure others can think of more examples, but I’m sure you get the jist. You are basically trying to promote one spec at the expense of another.


TL;DR - OP doesn’t know what he’s talking about, and should sit down and shut up.

[Zokatar]

I'm thinking this "fishy one" is all hot garbage themselves, as I've seen Sanctuary remove damage by a flat amount AFTER all percentage mitigations happen, I am currently using it myself. It's way more effective with 50%+ physical DR than when I was running around with 30-34%.

Ardent Defender is worse than garbage with the version it is atm for boss tanking, as they require at most 3-4 hits to kill you, sometimes even bypassing the health value required for Ardent Defender to trigger... If anything Ardent Defender is promoting trash tanking which you want Paladin to move away from.

Repentance is a PvP tool, I give you that, but it can also be made into an effective CC against casters in dungeons, or as a great pull against a pack together with Polymorph and the likes. Just because you are unimaginative in the uses of Repentance doesn't mean they don't exist.

But what does it matter to discuss it with you? You would just discount any evidence I give as "fake" and cling to your own version of the "truth" that is Paladin tanks. I stand by what I say, Protection Paladins don't need Ardent Defender, Repentance is way better and was actually their capstone ability back before 1.9 reworked Paladins as a whole, and I still think it's a mistake to give Repentance to Retribution, since they could have used a way better capstone for actual damage dealing, which is kinda their thing?

[Zokatar]

The thing with tanks is that with the exception of Bear tanks, magic damage is really effective against them, and it will always be as long as Armor doesn't affect it. Paladins at least get a fighting chance with Blessing of Sanctuary, as little as 24 flat DR could be against 400 damage hits. It's more than Warrior that's for sure unless they pop their 30m CD Shield Wall. This is just the truth of tanking in general and there are several reasons to why.

Melee damage can scale to ridiculous amounts through weaponry, magic is a collective effort of spell damage gained from equipment as a whole. Armor piercing is king in TBC because physical damage is complete bonkers unless armor exists. So do us a favor and research more about what you are talking about before harrassing some random person on the internet because you disagree with them

[Geojak]

Warrior have defensive stance, so they getc90% spell damage. Better than paladins

[Thefishyone]

Dude, I’m afraid you’re wrong about BoSanc. It’s been tested in a number of Tankadin discords. It does not work the way you claim it does. If that’s the case here, then it’s a bug and will likely be corrected.

You ARE aware that BoSanc can be cast on warrs, Bears, or anyone in the raid you feel like, right?

Again, Repentance will always be hot garbage for tanking sans a rework. You conveniently left out the key fact that it’s only usable against Humanoids, not to mention that it has only twice the range of JUDGMENT.

Topkek at your claim that I ignored your “evidence” when all you did was post a few unverifiable anecdotes.When you were in school, did you cite Wikipedia as a source?

[Zokatar]

I will double check the Blessing's efficiency right now with a dungeon run, and see what the total DR is from said Blessing, but why are you focusing on that detail when it was an idea I had for replacing Repentance as a capstone ability? earlier someone wanted it to stay Ret and I suggested it being treated like Silence is for Shadow Priests... It's an idea, and the main focus is making Crusader Strike relevant. Stop focusing on the wrong thing Thefishyone

[Thefishyone]

You’re right, I suppose I was being a bit of an Ogre. I apologize for derailing your thread.

[Minno]

I will double check the Blessing's efficiency right now with a dungeon run, and see what the total DR is from said Blessing, but why are you focusing on that detail when it was an idea I had for replacing Repentance as a capstone ability? earlier someone wanted it to stay Ret and I suggested it being treated like Silence is for Shadow Priests... It's an idea, and the main focus is making Crusader Strike relevant. Stop focusing on the wrong thing Thefishyone

Reason bosanc is bad is because before or after mitigation, its still 24 dmg against attacks like 600-1k each. Avoidance, and magic resists are pulling the bulk of the weight of your mitigation that having bosanc is just icing. When you dodge or parry you also make bosanc useless for that hit because you didnt get hit.

You also need repent to be at a spot after reckoning. You dont want ret reck or holy builds access to it. IT actually can't even be on the same line as vengeance because ret reck can actually reach that level. It would have to replace the spot where sanctity aura is currently, and that is not a bad thing either. There is also nothing stopping the prot paladin from getting repent either, the best tanking spec actually just picks up bosanc with imp RF and goes deep holy for holy shock for snap threat.

There is also nothing spectacular for pve rets, but good paladin pvp players have said this in the past "paladin isnt in their selection of talents, but in their selection of gear because our kit is actually very robust". We just need to bring that level of robustness to pve paladins. What does that mean?:
- more 30s cds blessings (similar to the functionality that blessing of sacrifice brings to pally pvp, just with other effects)
- CD reductions on core pve talents similar to how guardian's favor reduces freedom/bop cds.

[Zokatar]

During the run, I noticed you were correct in your statement, as I wasn't taking 14 less damage the second I applied the buff, but 6-7 instead, which is in line with the 55% physical DR I have from Armor. My apologies with that misinformation, but I stand with what I said on the rest, as Sanctuary is pretty nice to have as a Paladin. Less damage is less damage, even it it is 7 less on 45 damage hits

[Minno]

Yea you use it for the holy dmg on block, not for the survival.