The use of Sacred Shield as a Tank?

[Jasari]

Yes, when you have SS on yourself any incoming FoL has an increased 50% chance to proc. I don't see any downside in getting this ability considering that it has a minute long duration and to be frank, if you arent out threating your dps in a minute then you are doing something wrong in your Rotation. So, I don't see wasting a global cooldown if you aren't having major threat issues. It also allows a Holy Pally to use their SS on another raid member since Blizzard made it so SS can only be applied to one person at a time.

If you put SS on yourself, the holy paladin healing you will not benefit from the increased crit chance. THEIR SS has to be proc'd on someone in order for them to get the bonus.

[Rasmfrackn]

Yes, when you have SS on yourself any incoming FoL has an increased 50% chance to proc. I don't see any downside in getting this ability considering that it has a minute long duration and to be frank, if you arent out threating your dps in a minute then you are doing something wrong in your Rotation. So, I don't see wasting a global cooldown if you aren't having major threat issues. It also allows a Holy Pally to use their SS on another raid member since Blizzard made it so SS can only be applied to one person at a time.

Did they change how SS works or am I really not paying attention? (Or I don't think that's how SS works.)

Last I saw, whenever SS procs on the person a paladin casts it on, it also gives a buff back to that paladin to make ALL their FoLs +50% crit. I.e. holy paladin SSs a warrior, warrior gets hit, holy paladin auto-crits FoLs on bear tank for 6 seconds until the procs repeat themselves.

No?

[Lolpaladins]

I picked up divine guardian because A) I mostly do 5s and 10s, so it's less likely that I have a paladin healer and B) I keep sacred shield up as much as possible, because 1) it's not like threat is a concern (4k+ easily in any 5 man, 5k raid buffed) but any threat loss from not picking up crusade (6% in the best case )I figure is lessened by less global cooldowns spent on sacred shield (has anyone done the actual math) and b) outside of lay on hands, divine protection, holy shield, and trinkets, there aren't any other abilities to use that will actually increase your survivability.

[Muffswindler]

**Sorry miss read there**. I still don't expect to see many holy pallys speccing into imp SS and it does free up their SS for a OT or MT, what ever the case. Maybe a Prot Pally could apply it to another tank that isnt getting SS, but More mitigation ftw. Sorry again, but I don't see the down side to self application of this buff. Any good holy pally shouldn't need to rely on a SS proc that in a raid, especially in Ulduar, will last more than a few seconds, if that considering how much harder mobs hit compared to Naxx/EoE/OS.

[Kelaan]

Last night in Ulduar10, I noticed a Sacred Shield buff from me and from my holy paladin. Does the absorbtion effect stack? Would it be meaningful, in a paladin-rich environment, to have all of them cast theirs on the MT? I'm tempted to mention this tonight (as we have like 5 paladins), and see if the damage absorbtion stacks.

[Folstar]

I have a hard time thinking of a good reason NOT to SS myself. If there is a holy pally around they can either save some mana by not casting it (5 man) or cast it on the other tank/s (10/25) and everyone wins!

[majiben]

Last night in Ulduar10, I noticed a Sacred Shield buff from me and from my holy paladin. Does the absorbtion effect stack? Would it be meaningful, in a paladin-rich environment, to have all of them cast theirs on the MT? I'm tempted to mention this tonight (as we have like 5 paladins), and see if the damage absorbtion stacks.

It shouldn't but EJ testing is suggesting that it might. Further testing is required though.

[Eanin]

I love it, and I use it whenever I'm not assigned a holy paladin as my healer (which is more common now that we have no full-time holly paladins).

[Frickit]

My holy pallys are pretty 'special' people and I have yet to see a SS casted on me in 3.1. I use powerauras and I keep it on myself most of the time and its not a problem to cast it in combat. If you didnt take imp SS what would you take? 3 points in Divinity seems less useful from what I've read. Powerauras is cool btw.

[Selinaria]

Pretty sure that SS does in fact stack (now? never tried before because it didn't seem to stack), but running some simple tests with my ret paladin partner Spellbreak, we determined that I definitely take more damage with only 1 SS vs. both of ours. (packs of mobs and the like, pulling about 10 world mobs, using 2 shields with my back turned vs. 1 shield with back turned, etc.) Could potentially just be synergy with both of us having improved SS and thus shielded buff lasting longer than 6 second CD on it.

And this Loatheb pull (http://wowwebstats.com/ijconssn5owtu?s=242835-281032) I wore a mere 1700 BV and I believe most of the damage avoidance can be attributed to me asking both Spellbreak and Phoenixdown to keep SS on me fulltime ( as well as my own as well). Think tonight in Naxx I am gonna just drop holy shield and wear my normal tank gear, see how much more damage I take and how much mitigation can be attributed to shields (damn disc priests, do not shield me kk thx!)

Vast majority of nature and physical damage reduction is attributed to other sources.

Still hard to say for sure, but I keep MTs in my raids with every SS they can have from now on until I see definite proof otherwise.

[onimarishu]

I think you can have multiple SS on you, but you can only cast 1 on someone else. So you can only target one person with it, but that person can have as many as you want on that person (as many pallies as you have obviously )

[KysenMurrin]

The stacking is supposedly not in way of higher absorption, but larger number of shields (shields from different paladins will only be consumed one at a time, but two will work back to back - ie, they do not stack their absorption, but now have seperate ICDs). So if you have two up, you can be shielded for twice as many hits*, but for different values depending on the two casters.

[PsiVen]

If you put SS on yourself, the holy paladin healing you will not benefit from the increased crit chance. THEIR SS has to be proc'd on someone in order for them to get the bonus.

This is what I've assumed, which is why I never self-cast it in raids. Has this been tested at all?

[theothersteve7]

This is what I've assumed, which is why I never self-cast it in raids. Has this been tested at all?

It's probably irrelevant anyway. SS scales better with Holy, so you should be letting him apply it anyway. Unless you're really, really hurting for heals, in which case I guess it should be tested.

[Garath.Gorefiend]

Have been doing some experimenting with Sacred Shield

Basically, it does indeed stack. If you toss SS on yourself and a holy pally tosses SS on you, then the following happens:

Incoming damage procs initital Sacred Shield. Which one procs first is fairly random though,...

Code: Select all

Sample Log Excerpt:
  0:00'08.234   Ignis the Furnace Master melee swing hits Garath for 16326 Physical. (1692 Blocked)
  0:00'08.766   Garath gains Sacred Shield.
  0:00'13.250   Ignis the Furnace Master melee swing hits Garath for 12269 Physical. (2167 Blocked) (2591 Absorbed)
  0:00'13.641   Stealboots Sacred Shield was removed from Garath.
  0:00'13.641   Garath's Sacred Shield is refreshed.
  0:00'15.156   Ignis the Furnace Master melee swing hits Garath for 11188 Physical. (1692 Blocked) (1712 Absorbed)
  0:00'15.219   Garath Sacred Shield was removed from Garath.
  0:00'16.484   Ignis the Furnace Master Scorch hits Garath for 2453 Fire. (761 Resisted)
  0:00'16.828   Garath gains Sacred Shield.
  0:00'17.000   Ignis the Furnace Master Scorch hits Garath for 923 Fire. (817 Resisted) (1712 Absorbed)
  0:00'17.000   Garath Sacred Shield was removed from Garath.
  0:00'17.219   Garath gains Sacred Shield.
  0:00'17.297   Stealboots Sacred Shield was removed from Garath.
  0:00'17.312   Ignis the Furnace Master Scorch hits Garath for 93 Fire. (832 Resisted) (2591 Absorbed)


Now in the above sample, Stealboots is a holy paladin (but does not have talented DG. Because SS only scales with SP, his absorbs more than mine.

During this test, I was specced DG. As a result, I was absorbing an extra 20% thanks to the talent.

In a nut shell, SS really works a lot like having a critical block every 6 seconds (give or take) per SS you have on you.

In some raids, I have had 3 SS up on me and basically pretty much always had an absorb effect up, and the amount is very comparable to our block value.

The only caveats I have noticed is that you can only 'gain' one SS absorption shield at any one time...but it does stack fine with power word shield and does not affect Earth Shield procs.