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End-Game Dungeons: A Guide to the Level 60+ Paladin by Mayo of Aggramar

Version 2.3 (08/09/2007)

*** Please note, you can repost this guide, so long as you include a line of credit to me, Mayo of Aggramar (US). Thanks! ***

Updates:

• 08/09/2007: Added disclaimer re: validity of concepts in The Burning Crusade.
• 06/28/2006: Added information about Finkle's Lava Dredger and Malistar's Defender.
• 05/26/2006: Added dedication, section navigation, and clarified the DPS Support task (specifically about judgements).

Introduction

The Paladin class seems awfully attractive to anyone just starting out on WoW. It's like having a warrior, but he can heal himself. A lot of folks pick a paladin as their first toon, and many stick with them throughout the game up to level 60. It's a fun class to play, but it's also a tough class to master.

Most of us climbed the Retribution talent tree while we were pre-60, and that's great. It worked because it gave us the extra melee power we needed to survive leveling. But now, end-game content is a completely different can of beans. Now we're being told that we're - ZOMG! - Healers! Healers? What do you mean healers? We wear plate! We can use Polearms and 2h axes!! I didn't even know I could heal others!

Just kidding. Sorta. ;)

All joking asside, this document has been written to help Paladins adjust to the change of going from soloing and running Strat/Scholo/BRD/BRS to becoming an ace MC/Ony/AQ/BWL runner.

I'm Level 60 & attuned. Now what?

Congrats on reaching level 60! You've sacrificed your friends, family, and any chance at meeting a hot girl or guy so that you could get your Paladin to level 60! Awesome! Welcome to the club! You've got your tier 0 or tier 0.5 armor set, and a nice blue weapon. Maybe you have an epic or two. Awesomeness. You've been attuned to Onyxia, MC, and BWL. More awesomeness! But... now what?

You're on your first MC run. It's a whole different bag of potatoes now. You're being told that you need to buff, heal, and cleanse. Wash, rinse, repeat. You're like, "ZOMG! When do I get to hit stuff?!?!?!?" Well...

Quite simply, as a Paladin in end-game runs, you have two primary tasks, one secondary task, and one special task. We'll go over all of those tasks as we go through this document, as well as a small guide to respecing, and of course, a short overview of the gear that you want to have before you start your first MC/Ony runs.

Required Add-on's

Before we dig into the tasks, talents, and gear of an end-game Paladin, it's important that we take a look at add-ons that are important for a Paladin to have.

• CT_Core, CT_RaidAssist, and CT_RABossMods: These three mods are CORE REQUIREMENTS. I don't know any guild ANYWHERE that doesn't require these three mods. CT_RaidAssist (aka CTRA) is an amazing add-on that helps raids track each other, manage healing, rezzing, and all other important things that are necessary for keeping large groups organized. You can download it at http://www.ctmod.net/ - make sure to get the latest versions after every WoW patch. IF YOU DO NOT HAVE THESE THREE MODS, CHANCES ARE GOOD THAT YOU'LL BE KICKED OUT OF THE RAID GROUP! THESE ARE **REQUIRED**!!
  
  
• Decursive: This, like CTRA, is a REQUIRED mod. If you come to MC/Ony/BWL/AQ without it, there's a darn good chance we'll kick you out of the raid. That said, this mod takes over the functionality of your Cleanse spell. Instead of having to manually target everyone who needs to be cleansed, and then hitting the spell, all you do is install this add-on, create a macro ( /m ), and all you put in that macro is "/decursive" (minus the quotes). It will automatically go through the raid list and cleanse one person each time the macro is used. This is an essential mod for Paladins, Priests, Druids, and Mages - all of whom have Cleansing/Decursing spells. You can download it from http://www.curse-gaming.com/en/wow/addons-643-1-decursive.html.
  
  
• BuffAhoy: While this mod is not required, I can honestly tell you that it has made raid buffing so very easy, it's become an essential add-on for me to have. Just like the name says, it's a Paladin buffing mod, that you can setup to buff each specific party or class with Paladin buffs. It's awesome. Get it. you'll love it. You can download it at http://www.curse-gaming.com/en/wow/addons-372-1-buffahoy.html.
  
  
• ClickHeal: I'm pretty sure I'm one of only a few Paladins using this mod, but I've gotta say, it's awesome. ClickHeal is a mod written for any class - ANY class - that gives special functionality for casting spells or using skills quickly. For Paladins, Druids, and Priests, it offers the ability to heal superiorly. When you have this add-on activated, and you're in a raid group, when you click on a raid member's name in the CTRA groups, it heals them. You can set it up so that different clicks (left-click, right-click, shift-left, shift-right, etc) will cast different heals/spells. I've got mine setup so that left-click is flash heal, right-click is Holy Light, shift-left-click is Holy Shock, shift-right-click is Blessing of Protection. This is a great mod, and I highly recommend downloading it. It's available from http://www.curse-gaming.com/en/wow/addons-2728-1-clickheal.html.

Buffing

Before we get to the primary tasks, I want to go over buffing for a moment. During runs, there's going to be ONE Paladin who sets up the buffs & judgements. Before the raid starts, paladins will be assigned specific buffs to give the whole raid/partial raid, and a few paladins will also be assigned the task of judging Wisdom & Light on MT/OT targets, as well as bosses. When you are given a buffing & juding assignment, you are expected and required to carryout buffing, rebuffing, and judging those specific blessings and/or judgements until the end of the raid, or until you have to leave or are assigned a new buff/seal.

It is VERY important that you pay attention to the lead Paladin in the raid, so that you'll know when it's time to buff and rebuff. Keeping everyone buffed is very important, and makes things much easier for us to get through mobs and (most) bosses quickly.

Potions & Reagents to bring to raids

This is the last thing I'm going to go over before I get into the Paladin tasks in end-game dungeons. Consider this your check list to go over before you enter Molten Core/Onyxia's Lair/Blackwing Lair/Ahn'Qiraji:

• At least 5 Major Mana Potions. 10 to 15 would be better. I always bring at least 20.
  
  
• At least 5 Major Healing Potions. I rarely use these, since, you know, I can heal myself.
  
  
• At least 20 Heavy Runecloth Bandages. These are great when you are running low on mana, or you need to heal someone who's standing still and want to conserve your mana pool.
  
  
• NO LESS THAN 300 Symbols of Kings. These are required for the Greater Blessings, and I've been known to go through all 300 or more in a single night in MC (taking out the first eight bosses) Keep in mind that if you're buffing all eight classes, then you're using 8 symbols per rebuff. So, if you rebuff everyone once every 13 minutes, for example, you have enough for 23 full rebuffs (or about 3 hours).
  
  
• At least 5 Symbols of Divinity. These are required for casting a Divine Intervention. When things get out of control and we're going to wipe, the best thing a Paladin can do is find another Paladin or a Priest who doesn't have a soulstone and cast Divine Intervention on them. That way, they can rez folks. Since this spell has a one hour cooldown (without the talent improvement), you shouldn't need more than one or two in a single night, if at all, but it's good to have extras.
  
  
• At least 5 Greater Fire Protection Potions. Self-explanatory for MC & Ony. I always carry at least 10 with me.
  
  
• At least 5 Greater Arcane Protection Potions. Great for Shazzrah & Majordomo Executus. I always carry at least 10.
  
  
• At least 5 Greater Shadow Protection Potions. Self-explanatory.
  
  
• At least 5 Greater Nature Protection Potions. Necessity for AQ.
  
  
• A good, positive attitude, and the willingness to be patient while setup for bosses is being done. Always a requirement. ;)

Primary Tasks

Finally, we're on to your primary tasks as a Paladin. Here's the meat and potatoes of your job in MC:

1. CLEANSEBOT - It is *imperative* that Paladins cleanse during fights. We have the power to cure poisons, magic effects, and diseases all with one single spell. In a number of boss fights, like Lucifron, it's our PRIMARY role. If we have eight Paladins in MC and one isn't cleansing, that means that the other seven have to spend more mana cleansing, and it also takes more time to get everyone cleansed. When someone says, "Pallies Cleanse!" over Ventrilo, that's your cue to POUND the cleanse button until everyone is cleansed. Again, the Add-on DECURSIVE is a REQUIRED add-on for end-game runs.
   
   
2. HEALADIN - I hate to break it to you, my Paladin friends, but we have the ability to heal. Heal ourselves, and heal others. Look up the definition of a Paladin and it's a PRIEST who wears plate to defend the faith. You know, a Knight. That explains it all. We're a hybrid class. A mix of a Priest and a Warrior. We can't heal or tank as well as a Priest or Warrior, but we can supplement, and in MC, it's ABSOLUTELY NECESSARY. In your assigned group, even if you have a Priest or Druid, your PRIMARY TASK when you aren't cleansing is to keep your group healed. In boss fights, you should also be watching to toss out spam heals to our tanks, who need all the healing they can get.

Secondary Task

This task is secondary, and should never supercede healing and cleansing.

1. DPS SUPPORT - IF - and I really do mean *IF* - we're fighting trash mobs and you can manage to keep your eyes on your groups health, go ahead and do some DPS. It's especially important for paladins who are assigned to judge light and wisdom to dps a bit, since it keeps folks healed, restores mana. Also, remember that you have to keep hitting a target that has been judged to keep that judgement on them for more than 10 seconds. That said, however, fighting against mobs should ALWAYS be secondary to CLEANSING and HEALING.

Special Task

1. TANKADIN - There are times where a Paladin can act as a tank, but the circumstances are special. For instance, on the Garr (Garrrrrrrr!) fight, if we don't have enough Warriors, a Paladin can tank, as I've successfully demonstrated a few times. But seriously, unless you are DIRECTLY TOLD that you are tanking, DON'T. Even the best Paladin can't sustain the kind of damage that a Warrior tanks, nor can we deal the amount of damage a Warrior smacks down, and even with Righteous Fury + Retribution Aura + Judgement of Crusader + Seal of Righteousness, we just CAN'T hold aggro like a Warrior.

Talent Builds

While it's fine and dandy that a Paladin continue to have points mostly in his Retribution tree for end-game content, you'll be a lot more successful and a much better healer if you consider tossing some extra points into the Holy and even the Protection trees.

There's a few talents from the Retribution and Holy trees that should be a requirement for every end-game Paladin. Here they are:

• Benediction (5/5 - Retribution): Reduces the mana cost of your seals and judgements by 15%. Great for mana conservation.
  
  
• Divine Intellect (5/5 - Holy): Increases your total intellect by 10%. This increases your mana pool and your chance to crit when casting.
  
  
• Spiritual Focus (5/5 - Holy): Gives your Flash of Light and Holy Light spells a 70% chance to NOT lose casting time while taking damage. Think about this: Your concentration aura gives you a 35% chance to not lose casting time when taking damage. If you get this spell, combined with your Concentration Aura, you will NEVER lose casting time on your healing spells - even when getting zerged. This is awesome for boss fights AND for PvP.
  
  
• Healing Light (3/3 - Holy): Increases the amount healed by your Flash of Light and Holy Light spells by 12%. Extra healing is always a plus.
  
  
• Consecration (1/1): Consecrates the land beneath the Paladin, doing 64 damage over eight seconds to enemies who enter the area. The only Paladin AoE effect. A must-have.

My build is 33/0/18. It was previously 31/0/20, but I was lucky enough to receive the [Libram: Blessing of Wisdom Rank 6] on an AQ run in May 2006, and respec'ed slightly so that I'd have improved Blessing of Wisdom. With the Rank 6 blessing and the 2 extra talent points, my Blessing of Wisdom restores 39 to 40 mana per tick. That's a nice improvement over the rank 5 max (with talent points) of 35-36 mana per tick.

If you'd like to see my particular build, as well as my gear and other information about my toon, head on over to http://ctprofiles.net/825023. I keep it pretty up-to-date with my stats and gear.

Gear

Since there's so much good gear for Paladins to use, I'm not going to be too specific about all the particular pieces of gear you should look to get for running end-game runs. The set pieces that drop in MC are great for MC and BWL. The set pieces that drop in AQ are overall pretty good. The set pieces that drop in ZG are pretty awesome as well.

Armor

Before you start going to MC or Ony, you should start building two armor sets. One that gives you +healing and +intellect, and one that gives you as much fire resistance as possible.

Fire Resistance Gear

The fire resistance gear is pretty easy to get. Most 300 blacksmiths can make some, if not all, of the Thorium set, which yields a total of +41 fire resistance. Add your Fire Resistance Aura to that, and you've got a total of +101 fire resistance. A good start, but not great. The full Runic Plate set yields +62 fire resistance, which equals +122 FR with your aura. The best set, strictly for +FR, is the Dark Iron set. Armorsmiths who are Exaulted with the Thorium Brotherhood can make this set. It yields +168 FR, plus the 60 from your aura, which equals +228 FR. That's pretty darn good.

There's a lot of trinkets & necklaces that offer +FR as well. Check out Thottbot.com for more information on +FR gear.

Healing Gear

As for +healing and +intellect gear, let me say this: Don't be affraid to wear cloth, leather, and mail to boost your stats. Until I started getting my tier 1 set pieces, I wore a cloth chestpiece made for Priests, [Tanglemoss Leggings] which are leather druid pants, and all kinds of wacky non-plate gear. Yeah, I didn't have a much armor, but since I was mainly healing (and I used a 1h mace + shield) I did quite alright.

Weapons

Weapons. Mmm. Weapons are awesome. For Paladins in MC, there's two weapons that drop that are absolutely spectacular to get. First - the one I have - is the [Aurastone Hammer]. It's got +int and +healing, and it just looks cool, too. Pair this with a shield like [Rhombeard Protector], and you've got great armor and healing. +22 intellect on the hammer, of course.

The other great weapon for Pally's that drops in MC is [Finkle's Lava Dredger]. This is an awesome two-handed mace that has awesome stats (+25 stam, +24 int, +15 FR), and has pretty high DPS (67.1 at 2.90 seconds). It's commonly suggested among Paladins and Druids that the Dredger go to Druids, however, since Paladins can get the Aurastone Hammer and [Malistar's Defender], which is much stronger as a combo than simply having the Dredger.

Given the choice, I'd go with the Aurastone & Malistar's over just having Finkle's Lava Dredger. More mana, more mana regen, extra +healing power, and of course the extra armor (damage reduction) you get from having the shield.

Pre-MC, there's a two-handed mace that you should grind your butt off to get: [Hammer of the Grand Crusader]. It offers +26 intellect, +9 spirit, +10 Stamina, and +22 healing. Add a +22 intellect enchantment to it, and you've got a great weapon with superior healing power.

As I said above, there's a lot of great gear that Paladins can use in MC. Just remember that strength is not a stat that you need to build for MC. +Int, +Stam, and +Spir are the three stats you should focus on. You want to have as big a mana pool and as high a mana regen rate as you can possibly get.

Conclusion

So, Paladins, in conclusion, playing your part in MC is not hard. Get some +intellect/+spirit/+healing gear, or at least your lightforge set, and start healing and cleansing. And don't say you can't, because I remember a great MC run some time ago when a Paladin named "Angreal" out-healed EVERYONE in MC - even the Priests - and with less than 10% overhealing. So, don't complain that Pally's can't heal, because damnit, we can, and we can pwn the Druids & Priests in healing with some skill and effort.

I hope this guide has helped you, and I'm always open to suggestions. I will try and keep it up-to-date. The most current version of this guide will always reside at: http://www.mexijew.com/paladin/default.asp.

If you ever have any questions, you can contact me at mayo@mexijew.com, or in-game as "Mayo" on the Aggramar server. Enjoy!