Very shortly players will gain access to the new Tier 13 raid gear. In the case of Paladins this will be the Battleplate of Radiant Glory. In addition to ramping up the stats on the gear simply because it will be a higher item level than the tier 12 set, it has some great set bonuses, and looks amazing.

Patch 4.3 and Paladin Tier 13 Raid Gear Set Bonuses

What I really want to look at however are those set bonuses and how they will affect the Paladin class. Before looking at the specific set bonuses and how good or bad they are though let's look at what the bonuses are currently set to be, remembering that they are still in flux as this is from the announcement and still not fully tested on the PTR never mind released to the production servers.


Tier 13 Paladin Set Bonuses - Battleplate of Radiant Glory


Paladin



Holy, 2P -- After using Divine Favor, the mana cost of your healing spells is reduced by 25% for 15 sec.

Holy, 4P -- Increases the healing done by your Holy Radiance spell by 20%.



Protection, 2P -- Your Judgement ability now also grants a physical absorb shield equal to 25% of the damage it dealt.

Protection, 4P -- Reduces the cooldown of Divine Guardian by 60 sec and increases the radius of its effect by 70 yards.



Retribution, 2P -- Your Judgement ability now also generates 1 Holy Power.

Retribution, 4P -- While Zealotry is active your abilities deal 12% more damage.

A Paladin as three very different specs and therefore three very different armor sets and different bonuses. Therefore let’s look at each of the sets separately.


Paladin Tier 13 Set Bonuses – Holy / Healing

Let’s start with the Holy Bonuses that are granted by the Tier 13 set. As you can see from above they look pretty solid at first glance.

The 2 piece bonus especially seems really strong at a first look as it allows cheaper heals right after using your [ps spell=31842]Divine Favor[/ps] ability. This allows you to cast faster spells th at crit more and cost less all at the same time, what more could you want.

How much this will really affect your overall mana usage is a little complicated. Without factoring in the haste since this will grant 25% less mana use for 15 seconds out of every 3 minutes, or 8.33% of the time if you use Divine Favor every time it is available. Since during that time you will be using 25% less mana, that means overall you will be saving 2.08% mana. Of course since you also gain haste during that time, you will be casting more during that time and therefore burning more mana. Therefore I would estimate it as being just a bit better than a 1.5% mana savings, but it could be closer to a 2% savings.

Next up the 4 piece bonus is a straight increase to an important healing spell. Since our AOE heals are limited and this gives a 20% bonus to one of them, I will take it. To me the bonus is a bit weak for a 4 piece set and I really hope it gets boosted to a 30% or 40% boost to the spell.


Paladin Tier 13 Set Bonuses – Retribution / DPS

Looking at the Retribution Tier 13 set bonuses they look decent at first glance. The 2 piece bonus especially looks good.

The 2 piece bonus is simple but extremely useful as any additional Holy Power means more holy power abilities can be used, which means more DPS. It would mean that you are guaranteed to have the holy power available to cast Inquisition and keep it active, and to use Templar’s Verdict more often.

The 4 piece bonus is also pretty cool, but probably not as good as the 2 piece bonus is. It grants more damage while zealotry is active. While good I am not sure how much of an overall boost this is going to turn out to be. My guess is less than 1% which is pretty weak for a 4 piece bonus.


Paladin Tier 13 Set Bonuses – Protection / Tanking

Ok onto the really important part of the article, how does this effect Paladin Tanks, after all this is where my heart really lays.

Here the bonuses are a bit different than other classes and specs. What Blizzard has done for all tanking classes with the Tier 13 set bonuses is completely homogenized them and granted almost identical abilities across the board. While the stats and exact benefits vary from class to class the type of ability doesn’t.

While I don’t really care for the fact that the bonuses are so similar between classes, I love the fact that they actually involve tanking. Too many times the set bonuses for tanking have been about increased damage and not mitigation at all, these are a nice change, even if they are the same between classes.

Protection Paladin Tier 13 - 2 piece set bonus

The two piece bonus for Tier 13 gear for all tanks is a type of damage shield to provide mitigation. For Paladins this is based on our use of Judgement and as a core ability that means it will be used very often. How much does that 30% really add up to though and should we care?

Currently in a raid Judgements hit for around 15k to 17k and that means an average absorption shield of 5000 damage in current gear. Since Judgment is on a cooldown of 8 seconds and is used as a key ability we can assume it will be used 7 times a minute (7.5 if you are completely on the ball and hit it exactly when it is available). These numbers are based on current tier 12 gear, no crits, no haste, just base usage.

The total damage absorbed with this new set bonus will therefore start off at about 35,000 damage per minute or about 175,000 damage over a 5 minute fight. Once you count in some crits, haste, and more it could realistically be about 250,000 absorbed over a 5 minute fight. Better yet as we see damage and stat progression throughout the tier by the time raid players are geared fully it could be well over 350,000 per fight.

This is a serious amount of absorption to get simply for getting 2 pieces of gear. Sure it isn’t a lot when compared to how much healers can heal you over the course of a fight. In fact it is only a few less heals thrown over the course of any given fight. However, any fewer heals that a healer needs to throw at you the better, therefore this is a massive set bonus.

What will be really interesting is how this compares to other classes. By my paper napkin based math it looks like Paladins gain more than the other tanks, but will not state that as fact just yet, as everything is subject to change. I would love to hear from other tanks on this though.

Protection Paladin Tier 13 - 4 piece set bonus

The four piece bonus for Tier 13 gear for all tanks is an extension of a tanking ability to all players in the raid. For other tank classes this is a new ability and means that a warriors shield wall, a druids frenzied regeneration, and a death knights vampiric blood can be shared with other players in the raid.

All of these are very cool abilities meant to keep the tank alive at critical moments in the fight. However now it can be used to help keep the whole raid alive. The important question becomes do you save it to keep the raid up, or use it when you need to? Judging the optimal time to use these abilities is much more complicated than before.

For Paladins however the bonus is a little less subtle as it only shortens the cooldown and extends the range of an ability we already have. This to me at first meant that the tier 13 4 piece set bonus was not as strong as the others, however after some thought, I think we actually end up better off than the other classes.

Divine Guardian with the 4 piece set bonus will be down to a 2 minute cooldown that will protect everyone within 70 yards for 20% of the damage caused against them. Sure it is less damage prevention than some of the others, such as a warriors shared shield wall providing 20% damage reduction for 12 seconds every 2 minutes, but it was only used to protect the warrior before. Now the other classes really have to judge the timing of which to use these abilities for maximum personal and raid benefit.

A Paladin meanwhile gains the ability to use Divine Guardian more often and affect more players, all without affecting their personal tanking cooldowns. After all Divine Guardian doesn’t effect the Paladin at all and is therefore not of any concern for them as a tanking cooldown.


Paladin Tier 13 Set Bonus Overview

So overall I am pretty impressed and happy with the Tier 13 Paladin set and their bonuses.

The one set that I am not overly impressed with is the Retribution set bonuses. However since I don’t generally play Ret and don’t particularly think the game needs more DPS melee players, I am not going to worry about it that much.

The other two sets (Holy and Protection) are both very good, especially the protection set. Being able to mitigate more damage while using a basic ability is a great ability and one that I will be happy to get. The 4 piece is not that exciting, but given that all tanks are getting a similar ability it implies that it will be needed to help against AOE fights. On the Holy front it is great as well since it improves mana regeneration significantly and grants some improved AOE healing.

I can’t wait for players to start getting access to the tier 13 set bonuses and see exactly how they work out in the game.


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Last Updated: Mar 29, 2016

About The Author

Byron has been playing and writing about World of Warcraft for the past ten years. He also plays pretty much ever other Blizzard game, currently focusing on Heroes of the Storm and Hearthstone, while still finding time to jump into Diablo III with his son.

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