Reckoning - Prot/AOE grinding

[Triskelion]

Hi all,

I'm new to the board. I started my Paladin back when the game launched, day 1. I had gotten a Paladin to lvl 10+ in the open beta as well. I've been playing MMOs since EQ back in 1999. Well, I leveled my Paladin to lvl 60 using mainly Ret, back then we had no way of pulling and I remember body-pulling all of SM Cathedral, lol. Yeah, it was tough. Well, my Paladin sat for quite a while, I leveled up a Warlock and my first char to 80 was a Hunter.

I remember finding the AOE Prot build, which I loved since it allowed me to solo at my own pace and not rely on others. I'm now lvl 70 and I still want to be able to tank and AOE grind. I see that Reckoning, which was/is a huge part of AOE grinding, is now frowned upon by the basic Protection builds.

My question is - where did the AOE grind build go, and can I spec both tank and AOE without gimping one?

Thank you.

[Jasari]

AOE grinding is actually better than it ever was (assuming you can find a good location). Our AOE damage has skyrocketed and we have a lot less downtime due to mana returns being added to BoSanc. There's really no difference in how you would want to spec. I'd go 0/53/18 and probably pick up 3/5 in Reckoning instead of Divine Sac+Divine Guard.

[Triskelion]

Thank you very much, that is what I am using so far.

EDIT - also, currently I am 11,427 in hps and my mana pool is 5718. Typically is there a standard rule of thumb regarding our mana pool for Prot? I'm currently level 70 btw, so in other words should my mana pool be 50%, 60% of my hp pool, etc?

[Dread]

The only real rule about your mana pool as prot is to not do or add anything that will increase it. You receive a large enough return of mana from BoSanc and Divine Plea that you won't need anymore mana than the base amount. Anything else is a wasted stat/talent/ect.

[Triskelion]

Thank you!

[Noradin]

The only real rule about your mana pool as prot is to not do or add anything that will increase it. You receive a large enough return of mana from BoSanc and Divine Plea that you won't need anymore mana than the base amount. Anything else is a wasted stat/talent/ect.

You should try to get an int buff.

[badgermonkey]

My mana pool unbuffed is around 6k. Mana is irrelevant

[sublimated]

Let's not forget most all (if not all?) our tanking spells are based off a % of our mana.

So as your mana goes up, so does the spell cost, mana really is irrelevant. As your mana goes up, so too does the replenishment from BoSanc and divine plea, making it a complete stalemate either way.

I was always a fan of reckoning from early days, and I had like 2 points in my tank spec all through TBC even though it was never a great stats just cause I always liked to go aoe grinding during my offtime. As it stands now, while it helps a lot, reckoning isn't even a necessity to aoe grind. You will notice that hammer of the righteous will proc your seal on every target it hits, so if you're glyphed for HotR it will be hitting 4 targets, that's 4 light procs (if that's your seal of choice for aoe grinding) every 6 seconds for a substantial amount of healing. The damage is also pretty spread out and you will notice that you are going to go through trash a lot quicker than you used to as well.

I pretty much instanced my whole way from 72 to 80 just chain tanking heroics with pugs, but whenever I wasn't bashing heads in instances I was out aoe grinding.

I really hate questing.

[majiben]

Let's not forget most all (if not all?) our tanking spells are based off a % of our mana.

So as your mana goes up, so does the spell cost, mana really is irrelevant.

This is not true. Spells are based off of base mana not total mana.

[Braundo]

All spells in the game are pretty much now based off of base mana.

All that this means in practice, though, is that the mana cost of everything increases as you go up in level. That's really all.

[Candiru]

Yeah, while before while leveling your spell would cost the same, and leveling up and getting more base mana was GOOD, with new ranks of spells doing more damage but costing more mana, now when you level your spells constantly get WORSE (from a damage per mana point of view) but suddenly spike when you learn a new rank.

I think I preferred the old model while levelling, but I see why they wanted to stamp out downranking. Why not keep base mana pools a fixed amount though, and have int just give mana pool rating?