Retribution Paladin Battleground Blitz Guide — Midnight Season 1
This guide will walk you through everything you need to know about playing Retribution Paladin in Battleground Blitz, including specific playstyle tips, talent builds, and much more.
The Role of Retribution Paladin in Battlegrounds
In Battleground Blitz, Retribution Paladin is known for its high amount of cleave damage and teammate utility. The specialization excels at assisting healers in surviving large amounts of burst, quickly bursting down flag carriers, and spreading pressure in team fights.
Crowd Control
In Battleground Blitz, you will be fighting along with various damage-style classes.
One of the largest mistakes you can make as a Retribution Paladin in a team fight
is using
Blinding Light and removing several damage over time effects
from enemies. Be kind to your Affliction Warlock and Assassination Rogue
friends, and be aware of the classes near you!
Hammer of Justice can be more freely
used in BGs as healers will not always be around to dispel.
Capture the Flag (Warsong Gulch, Twin Peaks)
If you get either of these maps, you are suited to two roles. When flag
stacks are low, you are an ideal flag carrier support with
Blessing of Sacrifice
and
Blessing of Protection for your healers. Retribution has a tough time
chasing down mobile flag carriers such as Guardian Druids until stacks are higher
and they slow down. Ret is also very good at bursting flag carriers down at 5+ stacks,
so be prepared to make the switch to offense around then.
Resource Race (Arathi Basin, Battle for Gilneas, Deepwind Gorge)
Retribution shines in AoE team fights on these maps; however, the larger maps,
such as Arathi Basin and Deepwind Gorge, can be tough to escape from a team fight
as Ret. Pick a node or two to float between after the team fight as you can defend
maps better than other melee with
Divine Shield and
Lay on Hands
allowing you to survive until help arrives.
Hybrid (Eye of the Storm)
If there are tanks in Eye of the Storm, they will both likely go mid and spin the flags. If a tank and a healer go mid for the flag, try to avoid getting pulled into the trap of trying to kill them. Look for the open nodes with the least enemies and head there.
Note: Capping the flag will make the inactive bases active, and both teams will have to recap the nodes. Use this tactic if your team is falling behind on points or lost the team fight.
King of the Hill (Temple of Kotmogu)
Retribution Paladins excel at killing orb carriers, especially when playing
from behind on this map. If enemy orb carriers are stacked in the middle and you have
Divine Shield and
Crusade are available get in there and try
and focus the orb carriers to solo carry the games.
- Players take more damage the longer they hold the orb. This means that, eventually, the Orb carriers will die. Ideally, your team will only hold two to three orbs at a time so that you do not easily wipe when you have high stacks.
- Make sure you die on the correct side of the map! You and your team will resurrect depending on where you have died. If you die on purple side, you will resurrect on blue side and vice versa. Ensuring you and your team resurrect together is crucial, this will allow you to regroup faster and quickly wipe the enemy team that will be weak.
- There are Berserker buffs on the left and right sides of the map! Be sure to try and pick these up if they are available
Battleground Blitz Talent Choices
Here are the two builds best suited to Blitz:
Currently either build works well in Blitz with Templar feeling
slightly better for base sitting
with the new passive
Divine Hammer effect and tankiness of
Sacrosanct Crusade.
Recommended Battleground Blitz PvP Talents
Blessing of Sanctuary
Searing Glare
Hallowed Ground or
Blessing of Spellwarding
There are three PvP talent slots and four talents you need to choose between.
If you are on a map such as Silvershard Mines, Deephaul Ravine, or Eye of the
Storm
Hallowed Ground will be useful for helping mobility between important
locations.
Blessing of Spellwarding is recommended if the majority of the
enemy damage dealers are spell damage.
Retribution Defensives
In a Battleground setting, as a melee, you have to be aware of when it is safe
for you to push in and deal damage in a team fight. If you have
Divine Shield
off cooldown, it is generally safe for you to push in. If
Divine Shield is
on cooldown, you have to be much more aware of your healer's mana positioning, and
if you can make an escape using
Blessing of Freedom,
Divine Steed
in combination with
Divine Protection and
Shield of Vengeance.
Divine Protection is nerfed to 10% in PvP Combat, so pressing it in a
heavy damage team fight will do very little to protect you.
Retribution Flag Carrying
It is not recommended to be the flag carrier as a Retribution Paladin. You
cannot use
Divine Shield,
Blessing of Protection, and
Blessing of Spellwarding
on yourself when you are holding a flag or orb.
Retribution Paladin Stat Priority and Gear
- Strength
- Versatility
- Mastery
- Haste
- Critical Strike
Changelog
- 16 Mar. 2026: Reviewed for Midnight Season 1.
- 26 Feb. 2026: Updated for Midnight 12.0.1
- 19 Jan. 2026: Updated for Midnight Prepatch 12.0
- 30 Nov. 2025: Reviewed for Patch 11.2.7.
- 05 Oct. 2025: Reviewed for Patch 11.2.5.
- 04 Aug. 2025: Updated for Patch 11.2
- 15 Jun. 2025: Reviewed for Patch 11.1.7.
- 21 Apr. 2025: Reviewed for Patch 11.1.5.
- 24 Feb. 2025: Reviewed for 11.1
- 15 Dec. 2024: Reviewed for 11.0.7
- 24 Oct. 2024: Updated Talent Trees for Bug Fixes 11.0.5
- 21 Oct. 2024: Reviewed for Patch 11.0.5.
- 09 Sep. 2024: Page added.
Other PvP Guides
This guide has been written by Lvladen, a Ret Paladin Multi-Gladiator PvP Player, Streamer, and Content Creator. You can find him on his stream on Twitch, or his YouTube Channel
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