Protection Paladin 8.2

A Protection Paladins use Holy power they’re given to protect themselves and any ally who needs protection.

Introduction

Let’s take a closer look at the weakest and the strongest aspects of this specialization:

Advanteges:

• High DPS.
• Mediocre selfhealing.
• Capability of protecting allies from various rypes of damage.

Disadvantages:

• Paladin is a tank with the lowest health pool.

Basic information on the spec:

The only resource available for a Protection Paladin is Mana only used for auxiliary abilities. This is why the whole gameplay is based on ability restoring time which is influenced by Haste.

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Glossary

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Main abilities

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Talents

General information. On achieving several new levels you’ll get access to new talent ‘Tiers’. Talents may have different effect on abilities: add new features, replace old ones, modify passively different effects and spells. Talents can be changed in Sanctuaries or any recreational zones. However, if you don’t have any of those places nearby you can use the Codex of the Tranquil Mind which allows you to switch channels within a minute. You can’t change talents in combat. You can’t change a talent if the talent you’ve picked in the last Tier is on Cooldown. You’ll have to wait until it’s restored first.

Tier 1. Lvl 15

• Holy Shield. Increases the probability of blocking by 15% and allows you to block spells. Also, a successful block deals minor Holy damage to the assaulter. The best choice for m+ and a situational choice for raids.
• Redoubt. Avenger’s Shield bounces to 1 additional target and increases your block by 75% for 8 sec. A weak talent because paladin has enough blocks and he rarely needs additional block abilities.

• Blessed Hammer. Replaces Hammer of the Righteous. You throw a hammer that flies in a spiral trajectory from the spot where you cast it, and deals Holy damage. The enemies hit with it deal you 12% less damage with their next auto-attack. The best choice for raiding   because hammers hit the target with a big hitbox a few times and reduce damage from the next 2-3 auto attacks.

Tier 2. Lvl 30

• First Avenger. Avenger’s Shield now deals 50% more damage to the first target, and the probability of triggering Grand Crusader grows by 10%. A good talent for aoe dmg but bad choice for survivability.

• Crusader’s Judgement. Judgment now has 2 charges. Triggering the effect of Grand Crusader also restores 1 charge of Judgment. The best choice for defense and survivability, it is used in m+ and raids.
• Bastion of Light. Instantly restores 3 charges of the ability Shield of the Righteous. CD 2 min. Not used anywhere

Tier 3. Lvl 45

• Fist of Justice. Judgment reduces the restoring time of Hammer of Justice by 10 secs.

• Repentance. Allows you to paralyze the enemy from a 30-m distance. This effect can be applied to a special share of enemies: only Demons, Dragons, Giants, Humanoids and the Undead. CD 15 secs.

• Blinding Light. Disorients your enemies within the 10-m radius of you for 6 secs. Any damage – apart from Holy damage – cancels this effect. CD 1.5 min.

* This Tier’s pick is up to you. Choose based on what type of control – if any – your encounter demands. For Mythic+, Blinding Light could be useful as is has no shared diminishing with stuns. This can be used to interrupt casts in mob packs.

Tier 4. Lvl 60

• Retribution Aura. An aura with an active range of 60 m. Deals a tiny bit of Holy damage to the enemies attacking you and your allies in Melee. This is not a very strong talent but could be used as an option if you don’t need other talents in this tier.
• Cavalier. Divine Steed now has 2 charges. If you lack mobility
• Blessing of Spellwarding. Replaces your Blessing of Protection. CD 3 min. Makes your ally immune to magic attacks for 10 secs. It also causes Forbearance and can be applied to a player with this effect. You should take it for encounters where you definitely will not need its original version Blessing of protection but will require a defense from magical spells

Tier 5. Lvl 75

• Unbreakable spirit. Reduces the cooldown of your Divine shield, Ardent defender and Lay on hands by 30%. It is a situational talent that is not really used anywhere.
• Final Stand. Utilizing Divine Shield, you provoke all your enemies within the 15-m range to attack you for the next 8 secs. An amazing choice for m+ where you need to tank a big pack of mobs with 100% immunity for 8 sec to survive or save dps players in the raid.
• Hand of the Protector. Replaces Light of the Protector. Light of the protector – you heal yourself of an ally in amount of 200% of the missing health. Has 15 sec cd. It is used in raids or if you need to heal an ally in m+.

Tier 6. Lvl 90

• Justice of Light. Now Judgment hits the target with 40 charges of Justice of Light. Each successful attack by your allies on one of these targets restores them a tiny share of Health. It doesn’t give you a lot of self heal but allows you to heal up raid a bit no matter where you are standing unlike Consecrated Ground.

• Consecrated Ground. Your consecration is 15% larger, and enemies within it have 50% reduces movement speed. Default choice for m+

• Aegis of Light. This is a channel spell to be maintained by you for 6 secs. You create a giant light shield in front of you thus protecting yourself and all your allies behind you within the 10-m range and decreasing the damage received by them by 20%. It is a good talent in overall but it is hard to manage it because it requires to be kept up so it is not a popular choice.

Tier 7. Lvl 100

• Righteous Protector. Shield of the Righteous reduces the restoring time of Light of the Protector and Avenging Wrath by 3 secs. The best choice for raids and m+ because it grants haste.

• Last Defender. For each enemy within the 8-m radius, the outgoing damage is increased by 3% and the incoming one is reduced by 3%. The efficiency fades with the growth of the enemy count. A good choice if you need to refresh cooldowns on saving abilities you lack.
• Seraphim. Increases Haste, Crit, Versatility and Mastery by 1007. Spends up to 2 charges of Shield of the Righteous receiving 8 secs of duration per charge. CD 45 secs. The best choice if you want to deal damage, improves your bursting damage a lot but it is not really used anywhere because it requires to spend defensive resources for its activation.

For raid:

1. Blessed Hammer
2. Crusader’s Judgement.
3. –
4. –
5. Hand of the Protector
6. Judgment of Light
7. Righteous Protector

For Mythic+:

1. Holy Shield
2. Crusader’s Judgement.
3. Blinding light
4. Cavalier
5. Final Stand
6. Consecrated Ground
7. Seraphim / Righteous Protector

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Azerite traits

In BFA typical sets were removed and Azerite armor took their place. Now every chest/helmet/shoulders have a few rings for traits.

• Indomitable justice. Judgment deals additional damage when your health percentage exceeds the target’s. It is a good trait that grants you some damage. Since prot paladin doesn’t really have traits to improve defense abilities this trait would be a good choice.
• Inspiring vanguard. Grand Crusader’s chance is increased by 20%.and grants you strength for 8 sec. A great trait that should be taken 2-3 of it. Grants strength and shield procs so there won’t be much gaps between GCD.
• Inner light. When shield of the righteous expires, gain Block and deal damage to all attackers for 4 sec.
• Soaring shield. Avenger’s shield  now strikes 4 enemies and grants Mastery per enemy struck for 8 sec. A good trait that grants a lot of mastery on AOE, increasing your survivability. Having 2 of this trait is ideal.
• Avenger’s might.  While Avenging wrath is active, your Mastery is increased. It is simple, while your burst is active you gain additional mastery. It is enough to have 1 of  such a situational trait.

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Essences

Gameplay

The whole gameplay can be divided into two parts: damage dealing and utilizing defensive abilities.

Damage Dealing.

Prioritylist for single target:

• Survival:

1. Judgment.
2. Avenger’s Shield.
3. Consecration.
4. Hammer of the Righteous (Blessed Hammer, if you’ve got the talent)

• DPS:

1. Avenger’s Shield.
2. Judgment.
3. Consecration.
4. Hammer of the Righteous (Blessed Hammer, if you’ve got the talent)

• AoE:

1. Avenger’s Shield.
2. Consecration.
3. Judgment.
4. Hammer of the Righteous (Blessed Hammer, if you’ve got the talent)

Active Mitigation.

Avenger’s Shield is not influenced by GCD meaning you can use it any time. It is the main incoming damage reducing ability. You have 3 charges of this ability. The active time is 4.5 secs, and your charges’ CDs can be reduced by Judgment. Keep in mind, though, that reaching a 100% uptime of this ability is impossible. For that reason, only use the ability in case you are about to receive massive damage. But don’t let the stacks idle out, either. So just keep 1-2 stacks in restoring in order to have at least 1 in stock in case things go south. It is reasonable to collect all 3 stacks only in case you are going to take the Boss, and you are about to receive massive damage over and over for a long time.

Light of the protector affected by GCD, restores you health. The more health you lack the more health you restore. Preferably to use this spell at 40-50%.

If you need time to restore your Shield of the Righteous charges, sometimes you can receive several attacks without it, and instantly restore your Health with Light of the Protector, and activate Shield of the Righteous after that.

CD usage.

Guardian of Ancient Kings allows you to reduce the incoming damage by 50% for 8 secs once every 5 min. It is reasonable to use this one right before you receive massive damage. It can be combined with Shield of the Righteous, or vice versa in case your shields need a recharge.

Ardent Defender saves you from fatal damage during its action time. It also reduces the incoming damage by 20% for 8 secs. It should be used any time you have a fat chance of dying, for instance, if you’re willing to restore your Shield of the Righteous stacks and then utilize Light of the Protector, but you have absolutely no desire to die in the meantime. You can also use it on higher Health levels solely to benefit from its 20% damage reducing properties. In this case, though, you need to be sure you are not going to die within the next 1.5 min.

Lay on Hands is a very potent healing cooldown. You can apply it on your allies, but still try to use it wisely. Keep it as Plan B as your cooldown, because if you don’t, and things get tricky, you might end up health-less, and barely any heal would be able to kick up your HP.

Divine Shield makes you immune to any type of damage and debuffs for 8 secs. It also, upon casting, cancels these negative effects. It is extremely brainless to use Divine Shield without Hand of Reckoning while directly tanking a target because Boss removes you from the aggro-list and moves on to the next ally of yours on it which can end badly. That is why this ability is used to cancel debuffs or avoid fatal mechanics on encounters while Boss is taken care of by a different tank.

* Playing the Hand of Reckoning trick allows you to ignore one of Boss’s mechanics completely receiving no damage / debuff off it.

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Stats

First of all, one important thing should be noted. Your key objective is to STAY ALIVE! That is why your top priority is getting hold of the class. Stats are only there to help you get steadily less damage, more self-healing and deal more damage.

Your base priority ranking can be divided into two categories: survival and DPS.

Survival:

Armor (it means ilvl) >> Haste > Versatility >> Mastery > Crit

DPS:

Strength >> Haste > Crit >> Mastery = Versatility

• Mastery and Versatility are very close to each other in values and their weight is going to be quite volatile, meaning, for example, your Mastery would grow if you collect more Versatility.

What does each stat do?

• Strength increases your power of attack used in calculating the damage/heal provided by your abilities.

• Stamina increases your max Health. The higher your max HP count, the more damage you can receive without being killed.

• Haste increases both DPS and HPS as it affects your main abilities’ CD. This enables you to trigger those abilities more often. It also affects GCD which, in its turn, reduces the intervals between utilizing your abilities.

• Crit increases the chance of doubling the damage or the heal. Its significance is a lot higher for DPS than for survival (critical hits of Judgment restore you 4 secs of Shield of the Righteous CD; also, Crit has effect on your Parry).

• Mastery may seem a nice stat at first site, but it is not. Shield of the Righteous provides nice basic armor improve, and no needs increase to it. The chance of blocking which also grows with Mastery, isn’t stable, either. A block has a chance of working against an attack in case your Parry and evasion failed, which makes this stat inconsistent and unpredictable. The only way to make Mastery interesting for you is using Holy Shield against magic. In this case, it has the opportunity to reduce the damage coming in from magic attacks.

• Versatility is a great stat for survival and an average one for DPS as it only reduces incoming damage, increases the outgoing one, and healing, too.

Based on these priorities, you can see that the strongest stat is your main characteristics which can only be increased by upping the ilvl (exceptions: trinkets, necks and rings). Out of the secondary stats, Haste stands out in any scenario, that is why:

• If you get a new thing with an ilvl 10 points higher than your current one, use it regardless of its secondary stats.

Based on the aforementioned characteristics, you can draw conclusions on Gems, Chants and Raid Chemicals.

1. Gems:

• Quick Sand Spinel 50 haste

1. Chants:

• Rings: Accord of Haste
• Weapon: Force Multiplier

1. Food:

• Raid feast for stamina or strength, Baked Port Tato for Haste

1. Flasks and Potions

• Greater Flask of the Undertow 360 strength
• Potion of Unbridled Fury against 1 target
• Superior Battle Potion of Strength 2-3 targets
• Potion of Empowered Proximity 4+ targets

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Macros

Rebuke with a modifier, with the Shift key held, the ability is applied on a remembered target, without – on the current one.

/cast [mod:shift,@focus][]Rebuke

Your Blessings at the cursor’s position (you need to care not only about yourself but about your allies as well)

#showtooltip Blessing of Protection
/stopcasting
/cast [@mouseover] Blessing of Protection

#showtooltip Blessing of Freedom
/stopcasting
/cast [@mouseover] Blessing of Freedom

#showtooltip Blessing of Sacrifice
/stopcasting
/cast [@mouseover] Blessing of Sacrifice

Also, Lay on Hands at cursor’s position

#showtooltip Lay on Hands
/stopcasting
/cast [@mouseover] Lay on Hands

A useful macro to cancel any defensive cooldown on you that remove you from your enemies’ aggro-list:

/cancelaura Blessing of Protection
/cancelaura Divine Shield

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What’s next?

1. Leveling. If your character has been inactive since the previous expansions, the best  option to level up it is by Timewalking dungeons. You will gain a lot of experience, but there is one big disadvantage of leveling this way. Timewalks are available only for one week during a month, but Overgear is always here.
2. Equipment. At high level, the most important thing for you will become your gear. WoW is a multiplayer game, that’s why we recommend for you to play it with your friends, or to find a new friends for mythic+ runs. If you have any trouble with it – Overgear may help you to find not just friends for a run, but a complete well geared and experienced group that also will be glad to trade all the loot you need.
3. Raids. Raids are the top-tier PvE content in the game. That’s why the equipment’s base ilvl is higher than anywhere else. These dungeons require knowing all the tactics and have a good gear to kill the bosses. The possibilities of Overgear might let you skip those criteria.
4. Azerite. It is also not the best idea to forget about the Heart of Azeroth and not to feed it with more Azerite. Ignoring this won’t make your character stronger. The easiest way to do it – just complete all the world quests with Azerite rewards everyday. You can get extra azerite from Island Expeditions. Companions can be found at Overgear.