I am attempting to make sure everything in this post is confirmed, and that speculation is left to the discussion that will follow. Current as of 4.0.6, but as always I may have missed something, so please use diligence.
[top]Spec
I would currently recommend 31/3/3 as a base spec, with 4 points left to put where you feel it most useful.
Possible options:
- Enlightened Judgments - Transfers to beacon, helps offset judging for mana
- Eternal Glory - Usefulness depends on WoG usage, devalued currently by LoD
- Blessed Life - Can generate free HP under certain situations
- Last Word - Also devalued by LoD
- Improved Judgment - Extra range can be nice for flexibility
- Pursuit of Justice - Larger run speed bonus, minor Holy Power gains
[top]Healing Spells
Single Target Heals
Flash of Light, Holy Light, and our new spell Divine Light are all casted single target heals. They vary in mana cost, speed and power as per the chart below. Holy Shock generates 1 Holy Power at all times, while the Divine Light and Flash of Light require utilizing Tower of Radiance for Holy Power. Holy Light is the most efficient heal before the more complicated factors like Beacon, Holy power and Mastery.
This assumes the cast time reduction of Clarity of Purpose with untalented in parentheses.
| Spell | Mana | Cast Time | Base Heal | Base Coef. |
| Flash of Light | 7026.6 | 1.5 | 6907 - 7749 | ~0.8632 |
| Holy Light | 2342.2 | 2.5 (3.0) | 4163 - 4637 | ~0.432 |
| Divine Light | 7729.3 | 2.5 (3.0) | 11100 - 12366 | ~1.15306 |
| Holy Shock | 1873.8 | 1.5 eff. | 2629 - 2847 | ~0.2689 |
Holy Power Heals
We now have 2 healing spells based on our new mechanic, Holy Power. Casting a spell that requires Holy Power will consume all of your current HoPo. The number consumed will determine the power of the spell. These spells have no hard cool down, and are instead limited by the rate you generate holy power. These spells do not cost mana.
Word of Glory
Word of Glory is an instant cast single target heal of medium power. Useful under certain conditions where LoD would be unfavorable, such as during GoAK, or when only a single non-beacon target needs quick healing. It is worth noting that WoG does indeed scale with both SP and AP at the same time. As of the current patch, the WoG tool-tip was updated to reflect all modifiers affecting it, but this has caused the tool-tip to always display the average value.
| Word of Glory | Base Heal | Base Coef.(SP) | Base Coef.(AP) |
| 1 Holy Power | 2018 - 2248 | ~0.209 | 0.198 |
| 2 Holy Power | 4036 - 4496 | ~0.418 | 0.396 |
| 3 Holy Power | 6054 - 6744 | ~0.627 | 0.594 |
Light of Dawn
Light of Dawn is a cone based heal that uses the 'smart' targeting mechanic and has the following attributes. Light of dawn will require getting familiar with the cone targeting mechanic to use it to full potential. LoD has a 30 yard range, 10 yards shorter then the majority of our heals, but also the same range as BoSac. It will heal pets, and is currently transferring all heals to the Beacon target, resulting in many smaller heals that total a very large amount. LoD can and will heal yourself unless 6(5) other people need it more.
| Light of Dawn | Base Heal | Base Coef. | LoD 6 Targets | Base Heal | Base Coef. | ||
| 1 Holy Power | ~ 605 - 673 | ~0.132 | 1 Holy Power | 3632 - 4042 | ~0.792 | ||
| 2 Holy Power | ~ 1210 - 1347 | ~0.264 | 2 Holy Power | 7264 - 8085 | ~1.584 | ||
| 3 Hole Power | ~ 1816 - 2021 | ~0.396 | 3 Holy Power | 10897 - 12128 | ~2.376 |
Other Healing Spells
Holy Radiance
Holy Radiance is an AoE HoT, centered on the paladin that moves with him. HR has a base tick rate of 1s before haste, and base duration of 10s. Being a HoT this spell will scale very well with haste, and currently gets an additional 10% efficiency at 5% Haste, and every 10% beyond that. Holy Radiance has the potential for high efficiency and output. Use it any time you will be clustered for its duration, such as on the melee, as efficiency will drop significantly on players who are spread out. It is also beneficial to stack haste effects with this spell. 30s talented cool down means it can see fairly frequent use if the need arises. As HR scales with haste, both the total duration and number of ticks will change.
Haste Rating scaling of HR, assuming a base of Speed of Light, JotP, and 5% haste buff.
| #Ticks | Haste | Needed | Rating | DF | Heroism | DF + Hero | Duration |
| 10 | 0.0% | 0.0% | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 10.00 |
| 11 | 5.0% | 0.0% | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 10.48 |
| 12 | 15.0% | 0.0% | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 10.43 |
| 13 | 25.0% | 6.0% | 773.1 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 10.40 |
| 14 | 35.0% | 14.5% | 1859.4 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 10.37 |
| 15 | 45.0% | 23.0% | 2945.7 | 320.4 | 0 | 0 | 10.34 |
| 16 | 55.0% | 31.5% | 4032.0 | 1225.7 | 146.4 | 0 | 10.32 |
| 17 | 65.0% | 40.0% | 5118.3 | 2130.9 | 982.0 | 0 | 10.30 |
| 18 | 75.0% | 48.5% | 6204.6 | 3036.2 | 1817.6 | 0 | 10.29 |
| 19 | 85.0% | 56.9% | 7290.9 | 3941.4 | 2653.2 | 76.7 | 10.27 |
| 20 | 95.0% | 65.4% | 8377.2 | 4846.7 | 3488.8 | 773.1 | 10.26 |
| 21 | 105.0% | 73.9% | 9463.5 | 5751.9 | 4324.4 | 1469.4 | 10.24 |
| 22 | 115.0% | 82.4% | 10549.8 | 6657.2 | 5160.1 | 2165.8 | 10.23 |
| 23 | 125.0% | 90.9% | 11636.1 | 7562.4 | 5995.7 | 2862.1 | 10.22 |
| 24 | 135.0% | 99.3% | 12722.4 | 8467.7 | 6831.3 | 3558.5 | 10.21 |
Beacon of Light
Beacon of Light is now only a 50% transfer of the healing value, before target based modifiers. Beacon heals will not produce the Illuminated Healing shield from the Mastery stat. Currently Protector of the Innocent, Enlightened Judgments, and Light of Dawn all transfer to the beacon, adding extra value to those talents, in addition to the normal casted heals. Seal of Insight heals are currently transferring to the beacon.
Lasts 5 minutes.
[top]Cool downs
Cooldowns
We have several potent cooldowns available to help when the going gets tough.
Avenging Wrath
Avenging Wrath provides a powerful 20% additional healing, and damage, for a fairly cheap mana cost. The 3 minute cooldown can be talented to 2 minutes allowing more liberal use of this cooldown, which lasts 20 seconds.
Divine Favor
Divine Favor is changed from its mana saving form into a very powerful burst healing cooldown. 20% spell haste and crit makes this more powerful then AW in most situations. 3 minute cooldown with a 20 second duration, which can be glyphed for an extra 10 seconds.
Aura Mastery
Aura Mastery is still around, this time as a deep holy talent. 2 minute cooldown for 6 seconds of enhanced auras. You can choose from 4076 extra armor, double damage retribution aura, silence and interrupt immunity, 195 extra fire/frost/shadow resistance, or extra mount speed. Extra resistance and silence immunity will be the best options in most cases, as almost 25% extra damage reduction is very potent.
Lay on Hands
Lay on Hands has become a very powerful heal with the health scaling of cataclysm. At 10 minutes, this is a long cooldown and should be used when it will matter. Can be glyphed to 7 minutes, as well as being able to restore 10% maximum mana to the paladin, even when used on other players. Now causes the Forbearance effect on the target.
Guardian of Ancient Kings
Guardian of Ancient Kings is a new cooldown at 85. This spell summons an uncontrollable pet that will replicate your casted heals. At this time the following are the only spells valid for GoAK: FoL, HL, DL, HS, WoG. It is invulnerable, and lasts 30s or until 5 valid heals are used. The effect is a duplicate heal cast on the same target, as well as healing all targets within 10 yards of the target healed for 10% of the heal value, which can hit the original target as well. {todo: test for double dipping mods and target cap/DR}
Divine Plea
Our mana regeneration cooldown, 12% of maximum mana (18% glyphed) over 9 seconds, with a cooldown of 2 minutes. Reduces all healing output by 50% during this time, which is a major drawback that has to be considered. Possible options are using it with HoSac or in low damage phases of encounters.
[top]Hand Spells
Only one hand per paladin can be on a target at the same time. You can have multiple hand spells up at any time, and you can also have multiple hand's on the same target, provided you have more then one paladin.
Hand of Freedom
Hand of Freedom removes and prevents debuffs that slow movement or root, even if they have other effects like damage. This can be very useful under these circumstances, always look to use this when it will help, and usually it will be on the tank or something with current agro.
Hand of Protection
Prevents all physical damage, removes all physical debuffs. This causes the target to be unable to use melee or ranged physical attacks. Mobs without a magical source of damage will ignore the target for the duration of the spell; it has no effect on threat levels. Causes the Forbearance effect.
Hand of Sacrifice
Transfers 30% of damage to you, up to your Max HP in value. While not technically a damage reduction cooldown, it is used as such due to our automatic and powerful self healing. The cooldown promotes using this under phases of increased damage, rather then constant usage. Can be used to 'bypass' mortal strike debuffs that would otherwise weaken the effect of other healing based cooldowns.
Hand of Salvation
Reduces the targets total threat by 2% per second, for a total of 20%. Potential use for niche tactics, usually to get slightly more raid DPS or to assist in transitions, threat drops, or adds.
[top]Other Abilities
Seal of Insight & Judgment
Seal of Insight will be our main seal, mostly due to the glyph which adds 5% to our healing. This seal will also restore 15% of our base mana when judged, giving us a net 10% base mana gain after the cost of judgment. This yields 2342 mana back. Judging gives us 9% haste from talents, and should be used at least once a minute. Judging on cooldown will return 1,463 MP5.
Auto attacks made with this seal up can heal the paladin and return 4% of base mana, or 937 mana. {details}
Cleanse
Cleanse now only dispels one Poison and one Disease effect, and has to be talented to remove a Magical effect. This now has a non-trivial mana cost and as such may be desirable to glyph in certain situations. You can use cleanse even without a valid debuff now, which you will have to watch out for.
Blessings
Blessings now affect the whole raid with one cast, and they have been consolidated into Kings and Might.
Kings gives 5% Int, Stamina, Strength, and Agility, as well as +97 to all resistances. Blessing of Kings does not stack with Mark of the Wild. The resistance bonus does not currently stack with Resistance Aura and is assumed to be a bug.
Might gives 10% attack power, and 326 Mp5.
Forbearance
This is the resulting debuff applied to anyone affected by LoH, HoP or Divine Shield Currently lasts 1 min, and prevents application of the aforementioned abilities. This has the potential for issues in multiple paladin groups, and should be a consideration in strategies.
[top]Stats
Short break down of the useful stats for Holy Paladins. Continuing with the tradition of comparing batches of 100 stats for ease of visualization.
Intellect
Intellect will provide Spell Power, Mana, and Spell Critical chance. Intellect has a 1.1025x modifier when buffed with Kings/Mark and wearing full Plate for the specialization bonus. Int will also increase your spirit based regen as well as regen based on maximum Mana. This is by far the best stat, and thus will be the primary focus of gems, trinkets, and enchants. Any Int gained after the fight starts is less potent then Int from the start of the fight You are unable to reforge for Intellect.
With 5% Plate Spec, 5% Kings, and 10% Spellpower buff, 100 Int will provide (assuming all regen abilities used on cooldown):
- 1653.75 Maximum Mana.
- 121.275 Spell Power.
- ~0.17% Spell Crit.
- ~8.27 Mp5 from Replenishment.
- ~8.27 Mp5 from Divine Plea.
- ~4.13 Mp5 from [Glyph of Divine Plea].
- ~1.38 Mp5 from [Glyph of Divinity] (plus ~0.59 Mp5 [Glyph of Lay on Hands]).
- ~4.13 Mp5 from Arcane Torrent racial.
- Additional Mp5 from Spirit based Regen. (see Spirit)
Spell power
Spell power comes primarily on weapons and from Intellect. It is currently the strongest stat for output and efficiency. Spell power also receives a 6% or 10% bonus from raid buffs, which further increases its desirability. Spell power cannot be reforged.
Haste
Haste is, in most cases at 85, the best stat for increasing output. Haste is desirable to reduce the GCD and cast times, which allows faster multi-target healing, as well as quicker emergency healing. Under full buffs, the GCD cap is 3489 haste rating, or ~27.24% haste from gear.
100 Haste provides:
- ~0.78% Spell Haste
Spell Crit
Crit suffers from poor rating conversion, as well as the 50% bonus heal being low. Some level of crit rating will be useful to keep Conviction up. With Light of Dawn and Protector of the Innocent producing Conviction, this further reduces the amount of crit we desire.
100 Crit provides:
- ~0.56% Spell Crit
Mastery
Mastery has a unique effect per spec, Illuminated Healing produces a shield for a base of 10% on most paladin heals with an additional 1.25% per Mastery, which is not to be confused with Mastery Rating. This shield lasts 8 seconds and is refreshed by smaller shields from mastery, and overwritten by larger ones. If we assume these shields are 100% effective, Mastery will be between Haste and Crit in regards to output. These illuminated healing shield are produced by FoL, HL, DL, HS, WoG, LoD, and LoH. As much as 50% or more of our healing is unaffected by mastery, reducing the effectiveness close to the level of Crit.
100 Mastery provides:
- ~0.697% additional shielding
Spirit
Spirit is used for mana regen and hit rating through enlightened judgments. Any increases to Intellect will also increase the mana returned by your spirit. There exists a fight length for all values of Spirit and Int where the regen from Spirit will surpass that of int. Spirit based regen is reduced to 0% in combat, with holy spec changing this to 50%. The current formula for Spirit regen can be found here and can be used to find the value of regen for your current level of stats. I have modified the formula for level 85 regen in-combat for Holy Spec.
- Mp5 In Combat from Spirit = 0.0025 + [Spirit * Sqrt(Intellect) * 0.0083625]
[top]Enchants, Glyphs & Consumables
Glyphs
Prime Glyphs
[Glyph of Divine Favor]
[Glyph of Holy Shock]
[Glyph of Seal of Insight]
[Glyph of Word of Glory]
Major Glyphs
[Glyph of Light of Dawn]
[Glyph of Divinity]
[Glyph of Lay on Hands]
[Glyph of Beacon of Light]
[Glyph of Cleansing]
[Glyph of Divine Plea]
[Glyph of the Long Word]
[Glyph of Divine Protection]
Minor Glyphs
[Glyph of Blessing of Kings]
[Glyph of Blessing of Might]
[Glyph of Insight]
Enchants
Armor Enchants
Top 2 Enchants listed
Weapon Enchants
| [Enchant Weapon - Heartsong] | 20s ICD, 25% proc chance* |
| [Enchant Weapon - Power Torrent] | 45s ICD, 30-35% proc chance* |
Gems
Socket bonuses appears to be fairly weak, with the best being Int. +10 per socket, +20 per meta, and hitting the socket bonus is trading 10 int for 20 of a stat. This rules out a crit gem already, and Mastery as well. Haste will be worth it for pure HPS, but spirit will only be more mana on a certain fight length. We will end up needing 2 Yellow gems for the Ember meta, which naturally leads to Int/Haste.
Meta Sockets
Meta gems have varying levels of power depending on many factors like fight length, buffs, divine plea usage, and even character race. As fight length increases, the Insightful gem proc becomes more mana compared to 2% of max, but it will always be short 33 Int. [todo: add math}
[Ember Shadowspirit Diamond]
[Insightful Earthsiege Diamond]
[Revitalizing Shadowspirit Diamond]
Red Sockets
[Brilliant Inferno Ruby]
Blue Sockets
[Purified Demonseye]
[Sparkling Ocean Sapphire]
Yellow Sockets
[Reckless Ember Topaz]
[Artful Ember Topaz]
[Potent Ember Topaz]
Food
[Seafood Magnifique Feast]
[Severed Sagefish Head]
[Delicious Sagefish Tail]
[Basilisk Liverdog]
Potions and Flasks
Flasks
[Flask of Battle]
[Flask of the Draconic Mind]
[Flask of Flowing Water]
Elixirs
Elixirs are a poor choice now due to a lack of a solid guardian version. They do however cover some stats the flasks do not.
[Elixir of the Master]
[Elixir of the Cobra]
[Prismatic Elixir]
Potions
There are some interesting potions that will likey need further discussion. Note that you can pop an Int/SP potion before the pull and still use a mana potion later.
[Mythical Mana Potion]
[Volcanic Potion]
[Potion of Pure Genius]
[Potion of Concentration]
[Mysterious Potion]
[top]Professions
Listed roughly in order of usefulness.
Leather-working - Draconic Embossment - Intellect
Net Gain: +130 Int, -1 Wrist Enchant
Jewel-crafting - Brilliant Chimera's Eye x3
Net Gain: +81 Int with current gems
Alchemy - Mixology
Net Gain: +80 Int
Blacksmithing - Socket Gloves/Bracers
Net Gain: +80 Int with current gems
Enchanting - Enchant Ring - Intellect
Net Gain: +80 Int
Inscription - Felfire Inscription
Net Gain: +80 Int
Engineering - Synapse Springs
Net Gain: +480 Int for 12s / min
Strength depends on longer fights and cooldown stacking due to not generating extra initial mana
Tailoring - Lightweave Embroidery
Net Gain: +580 Int for 15s, -50 Int Enchant
Assuming a reasonable 1 PPM, this rival's engineering, but is even more situational due to the loss of a passive increase.
Herbalism - Lifeblood
Net Gain: +480 Haste for 20s / 2min
Skinning - Master of Anatomy
Net Gain: +80 Crit
[top]Rotations and Mechanics
The tower of radiance change leaves little in the way of flexibility, with most situations devolving into using Divine light like Holy Light in wrath, trading a weakened beacon for Holy Power and Holy Radiance. There are two considerations to make in this area. The uncommon 'Single Target' situation, where only a 1 person is being healing, and the AoE/Multi target situation, which is far more common in raiding conditions. At current gear levels, Tower of Radiance is only an efficiency talent, and only under 'Single Target' conditions. It is worth noting that ToR is more desirable under FoL conditions.
The AoE healing situation is fairly simple. LoD and Holy Radiance are still the only spells that actually hit multiple targets, and they are fairly straightforward. LoD is more or less point and shoot, and competes with WoG for priority, since you don't want to waste holy power generation. Holy Radiance is pretty much a spell you can use on cooldown with even just 6 people in the area of maximum effect. Treating Holy Radiance as a burst AoE heal will probably leave you disappointed, GoAK fills that role much better. {is there a cap on the number this hits?}
The basic order of business between the two styles is roughly the same. Beacon will be a sizable portion of healing, and is usually best served on a tank, which one will depend on your total setup and strategies. Healing will come from Holy Light and Holy Shock, with divine light replacing HL under higher healing requirements. Effective use of Holy Power will ensure Holy shock is useful, but diminishes as you approach the GCD cap from haste due to the loss in output outweighing the efficiency gain.
Mechanics
Dispels
I tried to find what I thought was a blue post about PvE dispel mechanics vs boss level debuffs, but I cannot find it. Is 88 level spell hit required? 85? It would be nice to have a definitive on this.
Modifier Stacking
The following is how our healing modifiers stack, obviously the WoG Glyph only applies to WoG, as Crusade only applies to Holy Shock.
Healing Modifier Stacking = Heal * (Spec + SoI + Crusade + WoG Glyph) * Divinity * AW * DP * Conviction
Haste Modifier Stacking = HasteRating% * JotP * SoL * HasteBuff
[top]Appendix
Terms
| AW | Avenging Wrath |
| BoK | Blessing of Kings |
| BoL | Beacon of Light |
| BoM | Blessing of Might |
| DF | Divine Favor |
| DL | Divine Light |
| DP | Divine Plea |
| EG | Eternal Glory |
| FoL | Flash of Light |
| GCD | Global Cool Down |
| GoAK | Guardian of Ancient Kings |
| HL | Holy Light |
| HoPo | Holy Power |
| HPS | Healing per Second |
| HPM | Healing per Mana |
| HR | Holy Radiance |
| HS | Holy Shock |
| ICD | Internal Cooldown |
| IoL | Infusion of Light |
| JotP | Judgements of the Pure |
| LoD | Light of Dawn |
| LoH | Lay on Hands |
| SoI | Seal of Insight |
| SoL | Speed of Light |
| ToR | Tower of Radiance |
| WoG | Word of Glory |
| HoF | Hand of Freedom* |
| HoP | Hand of Protection* |
| (Ho)Sac | (Hand of) Sacrifice* |
| (Ho)Salv | (Hand of) Salvation* |
It says haste>crit however in my raid group I'm casting HS, WoG, and the AoE heals more often then cast time heals, in this case should I gear crit>haste?
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