wow Dragonflight Beta Holy Paladin Talent Tree Changes: September 9th

[Staff 1,488]

Blizzard have explained upcoming major changes to Holy Paladin's talent tree, with pathing improvements, spell changes, enabling Lay on Hands in rated PvP, new talents and more! 

Holy Paladin (Source)

Greetings Holy Paladins!

In the next beta build we will have an updated tree ready for testing This update will include major pathing changes, new spells, and node cost reduction. We would like to give you our thoughts on our design direction for this tree moving forward.

Pathing Improvements

We’re excited at the prospect of offering tools for a casting focused Holy Paladin build existing in this tree. Our intention is for this to not overpower the melee playstyle, but we want to find room for both to exist simultaneously without impeding each other. At the same time however, we do not think separating the tree into two distinct “caster” and “melee” paths is compelling tree structure in this case. Our goal is to intermingle spells and abilities in such a way that players are encouraged to path throughout the tree, but not feel like they must pick up undesirable talents for their build along the way.

Spells Changes

We felt the overall nodes in this tree were in a solid spot and that most of the issues in this tree were pathing related. That said, we’ve added several new or returning spells in support of both the melee and caster styles. Hopefully this mixes gameplay up a bit more and offers further compelling choice, particularly in the bottom section of the tree. We’ve also removed a few nodes that we felt were not playing well including Liadrin’s Fury Unleashed and Tyr’s Munificence. Tyr’s Munificence’s effect will be added baseline to Tyr’s Deliverance.

Lay on Hands in rated PvP

We’ve decided to enable Lay on Hands in rated PvP with a 25% PvP multiplier healing reduction. This change was influenced by several factors. Modern PvP realities are that a powerful heal such as this does not have the same level of impact that it did in previous versions of the game. It is likely that if we were to go back in time with the current tools we have, our solution would have been to apply a PvP multiplier to such a strong ability without outright disabling. Given that Lay on Hands applies Forbearance, its cooldown is quite significant, and with Dampening and PvP multipliers to leverage, we feel comfortable enabling this iconic Paladin ability in rated PvP. This change will be applied soon and won’t apply to the upcoming beta build.

Here’s a preview of what you can expect to see next build:

New Talent Additions

Infusion of Light: Now learned baseline.

Divine Insight. New Talent, row 3. Holy Shock’s healing and damage is increased by 5%.

Tirion’s Devotion. New Talent, row 4. Lay on Hand’s cooldown is reduced by 1 second per Holy Power spent.

Resplendent Light. New Talent, row 4. Holy Light heals up to 5 targets within 8 yards for 8% of its healing.

Imbued Infusions. New Talent, row 5. Consuming Infusion of Light reduces the cooldown of Holy Shock by 1.0 seconds.

Unwavering Spirit. New Talent, row 5. The cooldown of Aura Mastery is reduced by 30 seconds.

Boundless Salvation. New Talent, row 10. Casting Flash of Light on targets affected by Tyr’s Deliverance extends the duration of your Tyr’s Deliverance by 0.5 seconds. Casting Holy Light on targets affected by Tyr’s Deliverance extends the duration of your Tyr’s Deliverance by 1 second.

Divine Favor. New Talent, row 5. The healing of your next Holy Light or Flash of Light is increased by 60% and its cast time is reduced by 30%. 45 second cooldown.

Veneration. New Talent, row 8. Flash of Light, Holy Light, and Judgment critical strikes reset the cooldown of Hammer of Wrath and make it usable on any target, regardless of their health.

Relentless Inquisitor. New Talent, row 9. Spending Holy Power grants you 1% haste per finisher for 12 sec, stacking up to 3/5 times.

Empyrean Endowment. New Talent, row 10. Judgment empowers your next Word of Glory to automatically activate Light of Dawn with 25% increased effectiveness. The effect can only occur every 30 seconds.

Inflorescence of the Sunwell. New Talent, row 10. Infusion of Light has 1 additional charge, reduces the cost of Flash of Light by an additional 30%, and has a 30% chance to generate an additional Holy Power from Holy Light.

Thank you all for your continued feedback!

[Teufel 331]

Still trying to keep Blessings of the Seasons eh?

Wondering why.

[SidonisAntares 290]

On 9/9/2022 at 8:32 PM, Teufel said:

Still trying to keep Blessings of the Seasons eh?

Wondering why.

Because otherwise they'd have to redesign an entire replacement, tbh. Not saying whether they should or shouldn't, but that is the likely reason.

[Zelebra 7]

As someone who is looking at Paladin (mainly holy) as a new main in DF...something i would love to see is more melee abilities buffing your healing abilities. The Judgement talent that does what Vanquisher's hammer used to do but on a 30 sec cooldown just seems too much of a nerf for holy paladins...Something more on the lines of "shield of the righteous now costs 5 holy power, and makes your next WoG cast LoD for free at 20% increased effectiveness". 

Couple of benefits for this change:

1). Would replace a huge spell we had in SL's that kept us quite competitive with other healers, especially in M+

2). Continue that "Melee" healer role and aesthetic that most people now come to know about holy paladins now

3). another spender for our holy power that brings us crucial buffs to situations where we want to pool our HP for moments where we need more healing output/throughput, Considering most Holy paladins rarely use SotR and just spam Light of Dawn or Word of Glory to use up their HP.

 

With some tuning and thought, this could become a very powerful ability. some may think 5 holy power is too much with this, but considering if there is no internal CD, using 5 holy power, then having to build back up to 3 holy power to use WoG to use the buff, it already keeps us toned down a bit, having us to rebuild our HP to use those abilities each time, but still giving us that much needed buff to our spells.

 

Just a thought about this, could be a great implement to the talents!

Edited September 22, 2022 by Zelebra

[Krystalline 0]

I love that the "Source" link is a literal table from IKEA lmao wtf

[Starym 3,800]

38 minutes ago, Krystalline said:

I love that the "Source" link is a literal table from IKEA lmao wtf

Rofl, that is too good. I didn't buy that table though, just in case you were curious :D:D