Seal twisting possible as Prot with no GCD issues

[Lemondish]

I recently took it upon myself to map out a set rotation for skill usage as a tank in Wrath of the Lich King. This assumes that, as a rule, the four most important abilities would be as follows...

Hammer of the Righteous or HotR
Shield of Righteousness or ShoR
Judgment
..and of course, Holy Shield or HS.

For the purposes of this explanation, these four abilities which I've defined as 'most important' must therefore follow one set piece of criteria...we must use them WHENEVER the cooldown is up. Since Judgment does not activate the GCD, you can cast it throughout this rotation without fear of repercussions. I do not therefore insist that they are the ONLY spells you should use, nor that they're the only spells you CAN use. I'll show you what I mean.

Here is the timeline written out in a list format with the times the spells would occur in this scenario...

HS at 1 second into the fight, GCD locks you out until 2.5...
HotR at 2.5 seconds, GCD until 4...
ShoR at 4 seconds, GCD until 5.5...
3 second gap
HotR at 8.5 seconds, GCD until 10
HS at 10 seconds, GCD until 11.5
ShoR at 11.5 seconds (1.5 seconds late from its cooldown), GCD until 13
HotR at 14.5 seconds, GCD until 16
1.5 second gap
ShoR at 17.5 seconds, GCD until 19
HS at 19 seconds, GCD until 20.5
HotR at 20.5 seconds, GCD until 22
1.5 second gap
ShoR at 23.5 seconds, GCD until 25
1.5 second gap
HotR at 26.5 seconds, GCD until 28
HS at 28 seconds, GCD until 29.5
ShoR at 29.5 seconds, GCD until 31
1.5 second gap
HotR at 32.5 seconds, GCD until 34
1.5 second gap
ShoR at 35.5 seconds, GCD until 37

And so on and so forth...

Implications

What I discovered when mapping out a time line up to a maximum of 1 minute is that it is possible to maintain Holy Shield, Hammer of the Righteous, and Shield of Righteousness without overlapping their Global Cooldowns. There is one exception however...

For instance, when you begin the fight, should you cast Holy Shield, Hammer of the Righteous, and then Shield of Righteousness you'll then be left with a roughly 3 second gap with additional time to use another ability (or, if you're fast enough, two). Feel free to speculate as to what you'd use (change seal, cast sacred shield for 5 mans, consecration etc.). After this you'll be capable of hitting one more Hammer and refreshing Holy Shield at the end of its 10 second duration and once you do that, you're putting Shield of Righteousness (or Hammer of the Righteous) on hold for that 1.5 second global cooldown from Holy Shield. This is the only time in the entire length of the rotation that this will happen, and this initial mess of GCD limiting occurs only up to the 10 second mark of the fight, so after the second Holy Shield, you're free and clear.

Also, every time you refresh Holy Shield it'll be on the 9 second mark, a full second before the duration ends. You'll be capable of hitting HotR and ShoR on every single cooldown that they are up.

That isn't all either. In the middle of this rotation, starting at the 16 second mark, you'll have 1.5 second gaps. At this point, another gap opens up in 6 seconds and after that, they occur in sets of 2 that are 3 seconds apart. The next set of two gaps after that occur 9 seconds apart. These will be the same duration apart in the rotation at all times after the initial opening cast sequence beginning at the 16 second mark.

Things you can do with these gaps...

The first gap is at the 16 second mark into the fight, and given that its closer to the next set of gaps than at any other point, you could theoretically pop Seal of Vengeance and have 15 seconds of Seal of Vengeance/Corruption before switching back to Seal of Righteousness. This 15 second opening does not happen anywhere else in the timeline, its perfect for stacking up 5 stacks of SoV/C, assuming your weapon speed is faster than 3 seconds, which is virtually guaranteed.

If you reserve the second of the gaps in each set of two for Consecration, you can have Consecration up throughout the fight at the start of the 16 second mark. What will occur though is that your Consecration will be off the cooldown for a full second, however, theoretically, with the extra threat you'll be providing through HotR, losing a second on each Consie wouldn't hurt as much as it would on live.

Observations

Two cycles of these gaps equals out to 18 seconds, which is also the duration of Seal of Vengeance/Corruption. Keeping a stack up is completely possible while also twisting with Seal of Righteousness.

Other than for the extra charges and the initial opening sequence, 2 points in Improved Holy Shield is not entirely required as you'll be refreshing it at 9 seconds anyway.

Disclaimer

These are just observations made from a timeline which expects everything to be perfect in the fight. Theoretically, if you should need to alter the rotation for any reason, it would, in a matter of seconds, revert itself back to the above.

Given the requirements to be quick on the rotation so as not to waste any time (therefore spells, which would mean lost threat) it would be smart for every paladin to either spam Judgment on top of the next ability they'll use, or macro all their abilities onto Judgment so that you'll always cast it as you're frantically hitting the next spell in the rotation.

Should my math be off for any reason, or you have any questions/suggestions/comments/complaints/coupons for free ice cream, please feel free to share with me.

[Lemondish]

Saved for happiness

[Joanadark]

i approve this message

[snowwight]

Very nice theorycrafting, though word from the beta forums is that judgement is now on the gcd =(, as of path 8681.

[Lemondish]

Very nice theorycrafting, though word from the beta forums is that judgement is now on the gcd =(, as of path 8681.

Then perhaps I should add that into the rotation...as it stands an 8 second judgment would not be possible if its on the GCD.

[Noradin]

Skill 9s CD for judgements and use (SoR should be active at the beginning):

0.0 HS
1.5 ShoR
3.0 J
4.5 HotR
6.0 SoV *
7.5 ShoR
9.0 HS
1.5 HotR
12.0 J
13.5 ShoR
15.0 SoR *
16.5 HotR
0.0 HS
(...)

*You can use Consecrate and other abilities instead of twisting seals.


If you don't take the 9s judgements you'll have to judge every 12s. 8s judgements won't help you.

[Lemondish]

Skill 9s CD for judgements and use (SoR should be active at the beginning):

0.0 HS
1.5 ShoR
3.0 J
4.5 HotR
6.0 SoV *
7.5 ShoR
9.0 HS
1.5 HotR
12.0 J
13.5 ShoR
15.0 SoR *
16.5 HotR
0.0 HS
(...)

*You can use Consecrate and other abilities instead of twisting seals.


If you don't take the 9s judgements you'll have to judge every 12s. 8s judgements won't help you.

Yeh I saw that as well as I jotted it down on breakfast. Seems its just like live where 9s judgments is the best.

[Cakes]

Even with Judgement now eating a gcd, seal twisting is going to be more mana intensive then ever with 2 minute seals.

[Lemondish]

Even with Judgement now eating a gcd, seal twisting is going to be more mana intensive then ever with 2 minute seals.

Oh, I didn't notice that Seal mana costs were going up. Where is that?

Either way in a raid scenario I doubt we'll be at a point where SA won't be keeping us topped off for high end fights. Perhaps it wouldn't even be needed to Seal twist in order to maintain a proper threat lead, but the other purpose of the thread was to show that there are spaces available for other spells in between our normal rotation. This includes Avenger's Shield, Sacred Shield, Holy Wrath and Exorcism.

The basic impression I got in other threads was that people were convinced that there would never be any room to do anything but our set rotation of 4 abilities, I attempted to prove that isn't the case.