Classic Retribution Paladin DPS Guide

Champions of the light, Paladins bring powerful blessings, potent heals, and an array of auras that make them excellent at supporting a raid group. Paladins are also clad in plate armor, making them quite durable and hard to kill in PvP. Perhaps most importantly though, Paladins have a wide array of powerful cooldowns, some of which are considered to be among the most powerful in the game.

While Retribution Paladins are not going to top meters with their damage, they do offer incredibly support tools and cooldowns that can make them worth a raid spot in some groups. Your seals and Judgement combine to unleash Holy damage upon enemies, which can be reasonably effective when played well. While Retribution Paladins are not considered to be a meta class, they are viable when you put in the effort with extra consumables and prep.

In PvP, Retribution Paladins are walking juggernauts that beat their foes down with auto attacks and Holy damage. While you have limited mobility, your array of powerful cooldowns enables you to take on any player out in the world, and more importantly to support your group when needed. Hammer of Justice is one of the best stuns in the game, and can be devastating when setting up kill windows on potential targets.

Although the Season of Mastery brings with it a number of changes to how you may experience the content of WoW Classic, these tweaks do not include any adjustments to how you play Retribution Paladin. As such, this guide will cover all you need to know regardless of which version of Classic you wish to play.

However, due to certain pieces of content from later Phases now being available at an earlier date, gearing recommendations for Retribution Paladin will be different. Because of this, we have created additional pages detailing your best in slot items for both pre-raid gear and the current raids available.

• Powerful raid buffs;
• Many important cooldowns;
• Durable in PvP;
• Strong off healing;

• Low sustained damage;
• Low mobility;
• Damage toolkit is limited;

Paladins are an Alliance only class, meaning you must be Alliance to play a Paladin. Within the Alliance, Paladins can choose to be either Human or Dwarf.

Humans are going to be the best race for Retribution Paladins primarily due to the extra weapon skill you get from Sword Specialization and Mace Specialization. In WoW Classic, weapon skill is incredibly important and will increase your chance to hit, reduce glancing blows, and reduce dodged attacks. This is worth going Human for, as it is a significant DPS increase that Dwarfs just cannot match. Humans also have some other nice racial abilities such as Diplomacy which is a nice quality of life bonus when farming important reputations. Perception can also be quite good in PvP, but is situational and hard to use since you need to activate it to detect stealthed targets around you.

• Diplomacy increases your reputation gains be 10%.
• The Human Spirit increases your Spirit by 5%.
• Mace Specialization increases your weapon skill with maces by 5.
• Sword Specialization increases your weapon skill with swords by 5.
• Perception is a 3-minute cooldown that increases your stealth detection for 20 seconds, making it easier to spot stealthed units near you.

Dwarf is a viable race for PvP due to Stoneform, but is not a damage increase making them strictly worse in PvE. Stone Form gives you an 8-second immunity to any bleed, poison, or disease, which can be incredibly important in some raids. In AQ40, poisons are incredibly common, making Stone Form invaluable on many bosses. While it will not be meaningful in every raid and dungeon, when it is usable, it is powerful. In PvP, Stone Form is a game changing ability against Rogues and Warriors, and can counter their bleeds and poisons that could potentially kill you. Specifically against Rogues, Blind is considered a poison effect, giving you a free counter against one of their best control spells.

• Find Treasure allows you to sense nearby treasure, showing it on your minimap.
• Frost Resistance increases your frost resistance by 10.
• Gun Specialization increases your weapon skill with guns by 5. This is useless for Paladins since you cannot use guns.
• Stoneform is a 3-minute cooldown that makes you immune to bleed, poison, and disease effects for 8 seconds, while also increasing your armor by 10% while active.

• PvE: Human
• PvP: Human

The best profession to have as a Ret is Engineering. It provides powerful items that you can use in both PvE and PvP content to either deal damage or help you get out of a tough spot. There are several unique items accessible only through Engineering that are considered to be some of the strongest utility items in the game.

While Engineering is a great profession, probably the more important thing to think about is how you plan to make gold. Gold is incredibly important in WoW Classic for a number of reasons and will be quite hard to come by especially at the start. Check out the Paladin Goldmaking section for more information on other potential professions for making gold.