(I haven’t been posting much recently, it hurts me beyond belief, but I’ve been a busy dwarf…Between RL, Guild affairs, and organizing Low-end instances between guildies, there’s hardly any time to do anything else, I promise I’ll ease up a bit, when I reach the BIG milestone , but until then…bare with me)
When I started Niam, I’d never thought that it would be so fun to level a paladin, let alone, how fast it could turn out to be. I dinged 10 about a month ago (4 /played days ago) and it was that special time, when the Talent trees open up, that you choose (wisely) how do you wanna keep progressing.
I have come across several paladins on my trips arround Azeroth, I’ve pugged with a few, I’ve helped and been helped by others doing group quests and it still surprises me how few Holy paladins I’ve seen! Most interestingly I’ve been happily surprised on how well a carefully talented Holy paladin can effectively heal on low level instances (sunken Temple, Blackrock Depths, …) without to much of a hassle, and how fun it is to Level one. Still I keep finding myself thinking, why there aren’t so many of us out there (at least on the run to 70).
Of course, the first “reason” that comes to mind is: “your dps sucks! lolzor…roflmao!!11one!one.” if this was the first thing that poped into your mind, you fail miserably at…well anything community related, but that’s another story. The truth is you’re right, Kinda! “Holydins” dps is..how to put it…non existent, but that does not determine you’re utility or even you’re ability to successfully push yourself trough 70 levels of questing, grinding and instance pugging, not at all really. I’ve been more then happy grinding holy, my damage is more then sufficient to kill mobs higher level then me, I get arround preaty easelly without help, and sometimes get “ganked” by mobs without feeling shivers down my spine thinking how long is the way back from the nearest Graveyard, because they will not (can not) kill me dwarfic butt!
Besides if I wanted to Dps, I would choose hunter, mage, rogue and not paladin (whatever spec)! that said, I what to heal! I what to BAD!!! and so i did.
- Wait, if you wanted to heal why not a healer class, a priest or a resto druid (they rule btw!!! yay Bell) –
well, I like a challenge, I like the paladin versatility, not many healers can take the beating a pala healer can take.
- Paladin intermission – Let me explain something to all not paladin acquainted. we are not mana proficient! nada! When Elune said “and thou shall know of Mp5 and spirit and so you’ll replenish you’re mana pool”, I was chugging down thunder ale. Something definitely got lost in the process. I get most of my mana (during healing assignments) by critical healing my target’s and so gaining mana from them, that’s good right? It is, problem is that tanked mob(s), will find you extremely scrumptious and you will get add’s (allot of them in Sunken Temple) and now you’re in trouble! well you would be if you we’re not wearing Plate, if your Hp was anything close to 50% your mana bar, or you’re ubber skills at running TOWARDS the tank shouting, “Aggro on healer” we’re not at their top! that’s right, those litle dragonkin on Sunken temple are like rats, tank pulls them, he does is thing, with charge+Thunderclap and so one, I get my Flashes primed to hit, and has soon as the first one hits, (especially if hit happens to crit) I have anywhere from 1 to 4 of those “rats” byting at my ankles, the time it takes for me to get to the tank (or him to me) barelly pushes me to panic mode and I start chain-healing myself, so I keep on flashing the tank, happily doing my buisness while the party does their thing and take care of the pests, and move to the next group. versatility at it’s best! - End of intermission -
Finally, the holy tree provides me with endless fun, it lands me groups frequently (oddly there’s more need of healers then of Dps, strange hum?) it keeps me pushing trough mobs, like a bulldozer out of hell and the occasional pat on the back at the end of a run is a MAJOR morale boaster! No one says, hey rogue, good job spamming sinister strike, or even (Big Red’s gonna have my head) good job at dpsing, no, they get thank you’s and Good jobs on other things, things they do well, like controlling aggro, trapping mobs, crowd-controlling that last runner and stuff like that. but there’s something special to have you’re tank whisper, “awesome healing dude, thank you!” It makes my day (night).
~ . ~
I ran Mauradon recently (all of it, from tip to toe) a pug group that gathered for Sunken temple to do some quests was kind enough to help out a member “get some mobs” from mauradon. It was nothing much, nothing else to do, night’s going nicely, let me get some more consumables and such, and we’re good to go! (read: batroom brake for all! ^^) I hop to Nigel’s point to help out on summoning the group (Protection warrior, Enhancement shaman, holy paladin, Fury Warrior and Retribution paladin). In about 5 minutes we we’re good to go, all buffed up, weapons at the ready! We dove in relentlessly hacking away at anything with legs, and some that didn’t! I kept my fair distance from the melee (read: everyone) and kept a steady stream of light on all of my party member mates!
I knew both the Fw and the Rp could probably take more abuse then my Shammie, I also knew that if the tank dropped (it was not going to happen) i had 2 (maybe 3) other classes that would suck me dry on mana, but that could hold the group from wiping, so no harm there either. after about an hour (we took almost 4 hours on clearing it) the retribution paladin, a brave soul, asked if I could stop moving while I casted, because I could not heal if I moved (no, really?). I whispered a reply, since no one on party said anything, I said that It was called cancel-casting, that I usually cast flashes, but If I see a rescue in need (like him) I would start a holy light cast, then during the 2.5 sec cast, decide if it was really needed to lose that much mana, or if (for example) 1 or 2 flashes would do the trick too, thus conserving my mana for more important assignments, like the tank. he replied back with a “lols” I immediately thought to myself “Niam, he’s a paladin too, if he gets in trouble, he can bubble, heal himself too, no need to help him out!”
Even tough i kept on healing him, from time to time, we kept pushing, sometime during a boss-fight some adds came from nowhere and started knocking on you know who’s head, I tapped my aggro macro once, got in the tanks range, he tauted, I paused healing (casted divine favor), let the tank get some more threat, and casted holy light on him (back to around 90% from, maybe 20%) tank and spank, win! boss down. No one else (even though they could) helped on healing the tank, no one died, and it was a clear win moment for me and the tank, in a strange tank-healer synergy that rivaled the heavens. still, the paladin had to say something “man, you’re a horrible healer, you almost died, and let the tank die too! you suck” this time, both the tank (you rock Grymie) and the shaman had something to add too, they told the paladin to shut it, that he could leave if he wanted, (shaman went as far as to report healing done marking the paladin with less healing then the Fury warrior (from first aid, on breaks) and the tank saying that he failed at is class!
I said, that it was nothing I wasn’t used too, but If he though my healing sucked, I would simply refrain myself from healing him, and we would all be happy. no replies, no more arguing, we kept moving, 3 more bosses before princess (on all the pala bubbled and 2 he died anyway) all fine and dandy for rest of party!
We got to princess, tank pulled her with is back against the rock, so he could still be able to hold aggro after the “get out of my face move” she does, we grind away at her, steady stream of healing…princess down, nicely done, all around cheers! Fury warrior lays down the law, and says: good tanking, will add you to my friends list, may I? he replies: of course, awesome healing dude, will buzz you If i’m in need of a solid healer, ok? Before i could even write a reply, the party chat filled with everyone saying what a good job my healing was, how well the tank did and how cool we worked together (all of us). It was 3am, week day, work in the morning (early at that) and still I felt like a kid at christmas, and not even grinch has able to steal that from me!
Hope you made it this far ^^, thank you for reading! –
Considerably (again, by my thoughts) crucial towards a effective healing spec. I’ve had the chance to (in some way) ride a successful 
