Blue post from Ghostcrawler

http://forums.worldofwarcraft.com/thread.html?topicId=11296670044&sid=2000

As I stated yesterday, we are happy with Ret's PvE damage and sustatined damage in PvP, but were concerned that the burst damage in PvP could be too high. We discussed this for literally hours yesterday, which was certainly not the first time we have discussed the issue. Thus I hope these changes are not perceived as a knee-jerk reaction, but I am sure that will depend a great deal on which class you play. :)

Divine Storm -- the damage was changed from Holy to Physical. As you know, Holy damage is almost never mitigated and this talent could pack a lot into a very short time. This is a nerf to the ability's damage. This change is now active on Live.

Repentance -- this ability now lasts for only 6 seconds in PvP (down from 10). Obviously this is also a nerf. This change is also active on Live.

Art of War -- now affects all damage done by Judgements, Crusader Strike and Divine Storm (instead of critical strike damage). Net dps should be about the same but less bursty. This change will be made before Nov 13.

Righteous Vengeance -- now applies a dot affect similar to Deep Wounds (instead of critical strike damage). This ends up being a significant buff to the ability to make up for the damage lost to Divine Storm, but is also less bursty. This change will be made before Nov 13. EDIT: The dot will NOT break Repentance.

Glyph of Crusader Strike -- now reduces mana cost (instead of increased damage on stunned targets.) We thought paladins could stack too much damage vs. stunned targets. This change will be made before Nov 13.

We also fixed a bug with Seal and Judgement of Light that could sometimes result in too much healing.

In our tests, Retribution dps remains the same over longer periods of time, but they can't do quite so much damage in the initial few seconds of a PvP encounter.

I know Ret pallies feel a little picked on since we've made this mistake before of having them come out the gate too strong and then had to correct them. For that I do apologize. It's a difficult spec to balance since part of its design is to have large crits and stuns, which have obvious PvP implications. We are pretty confident this will not nerf pallies into the ground as I facetiously promised yesterday, but if we overdid it, we'll be happy to back off some of the changes.

On the other hand, maybe we'll see fewer BGs with 20 paladins on the opposing side and can get some reasonable feedback on all the other classes in the game.

EDIT: To clairfy the new dot will not break Repentance.

Edit for update by GC

[edit] Just making link clickable :-)

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Q u o t e:
Righteous Vengeance -- now applies a dot affect similar to Deep Wounds (instead of critical strike damage). This ends up being a significant buff to the ability to make up for the damage lost to Divine Storm, but is also less bursty. This change will be made before Nov 13.

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I hope they haven't done an 'oopsie' once again. What's that one spell called that breaks on damage? It begins with an R.

She has edited her post. (GC that is)

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Q u o t e:
She has edited her post. (GC that is)

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Good. But still, sadly repentance is back to it's former self in PvP.

And it's merely coincidence that the nerfs come now and the ''buffs'' lateron?
Alrighty then...

where did I leave my [carrot on a stick]?

Really dont like the Dull Storm Changes. While i dont like dots in general as they cant crit i dont like that righteous Vengeance Change. But the crit damage was imo to many of them. Even with thoes changes as long as SoC remains, Burst will barely be affected.

I´ll wait and see what the Righteous Vengeance talent is like before I pass judgement. However, if they´re reducing crit damage, then maybe they´ll revert the DS change.

Here we go again..

Great changes
Thumbs up

Thanks.

About glyph change.... it sucks change it to something else than mana cost reduction.

The changes are fine by me EXCEPT THE REPETANCE THINGY !

How is removing control from us (things we barely have) gonna reduce the burst ? In 6 seconds you can prepare a burst as big as in 10 seconds since CS and Judgement have low cd anyway, this is just stupid and it removes our only way of CC (wich has a 1min CD ftl)

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Q u o t e:
I´ll wait and see what the Righteous Vengeance talent is like before I pass judgement. However, if they´re reducing crit damage, then maybe they´ll revert the DS change.

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I'd really love for it to be reverted. More damage is nice ofc, but I want it rather because as Physical damage it's kinda...lame :/

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Q u o t e:
And it's merely coincidence that the nerfs come now and the ''buffs'' lateron?

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But we promise. Fo' realz this time, honestly! Wait and see.

Less killing plate ppl in 2 seconds (it's now a whole 5 seconds, omiegosh).
Similar dps.

Good changes, i actually didn't expect them to compensate with the extra upcoming dot, cause i'm finding the pve dps a too tad high as well.

These changes were pretty obvious to be coming.

i really prefer the art of war change. less burst more sustained. right on! but i am afraid that the change in divine storm with the change in righteous vengeance and art of war, will make it obsolete at best.

make it holy dmg again AND apply the other changes and it will be both balanced enough and usefull.