World of Warcraft: Forever Protection Paladin Guide

Protection Paladin has received some great quality of life buffs, but there are also reasons to be concerned. Consecration has been nerfed quite a bit in its ability to pick up a ton of mobs at once, significantly reducing the historic strength of Prot Paladin. While mana is also often a concern, Shield Specialization helps to remove the concern but with a caveat. You must be actively tanking in order to regen mana. Off-tanking and not having aggro means that you will not be blocking and will not be able to maintain your heavy mana costs.

There is still some reason for hope however, many quality of life buffs have hit Protection Paladin, making the spec much less frustrating to play. Seals are no longer consumed when casting Judgement and all Blessings are now an hour long. This means the frustration of managing short duration buffs has been removed. Additionally, Protection now has a taunt through Seal of Fury and Judgement, allowing the spec to function as a real tank.

Protection Paladin finds itself in a decent but not great spot in Forever. There are many reasons for optimism as you can finally be a real tank and have a lot of tools to manage the mana costs, but the kit is in a weaker spot than the powerhouse that is Protection Warrior. Paladins will still be needed for all of the raid buffs they provide, but they are currently not in a position to dominate the meta.

Protection Paladin has two main needs. Firstly, mana management needs to be tied to something other than blocks, allowing the class to maintain the heavy costs of abilities without needing to have constant aggro. Secondly, Judgement serving as a taunt has created problems where you are wanting to press Judgement on cooldown for damage, but that would also mean taunting an enemy at a poor moment. In raids, you will have to rotate between Seals to continue casting Judgement or instead just not cast it entirely and lose a significant amount of damage and threat. These issues being addressed would massively help the viability of the spec.

Playing Paladin gives you access to the unique Auras mechanic. Players are given an extra "Aura" bar where they can select a number of buffs to provide to themselves and their allies. In Forever, Auras are raid wide rather than just covering your party. It is important that if you have multiple Paladins in your raid you will want to be running diferent auras.

• Devotion Aura provides players with additional Armor.
• Retribution Aura deals damage to any enemy that damages a party member.
• Concentration Aura gives players a chance to ignore spell interruption when damaged.
• Shadow Resistance Aura provides players with additional Shadow Resistance.
• Frost Resistance Aura provides players with additional Shadow Resistance.
• Fire Resistance Aura provides players with additional Shadow Resistance.

Choosing the best Aura is largely situational. Typically Retribution Aura will be the best choice while questing or doing dungeons, to help speed up the process of killing enemies. That being said, Devotion Aura can be good at reducing some of the damage intake your party is facing. Concentration Aura is similarly helpful when you are in situations where your spells are constantly being slowed down.

During difficult encounters, you can opt for one of the Resistance Auras, especially in groups with multiple Paladins who already have the other Auras covered.

Seals are a Paladin specific system, granting you a powerful buff of your choosing. Additionally, each Seal gets a bonus triggered from casting Judgement or "Unleashing" the seal. It is important to note that only one Judgement can be applied at any time.

• Seal of Righteousness causes melee attacks to deal extra damage. When unleashed, you will deal an extra burst of damage.
• Seal of the Crusader grants additional attack power and causes your auto attacks to be much faster. That being said, each attack will deal less damage. Unleashing this seal will place a debuff on an enemy, increasing their Holy damage taken for a duration.
• Seal of Fury causes auto attacks to deal a very small extra amount of damage. When wearing a shield, you will gain an absorb for some of the damage that your attacks do. Unleashing this seal causes you to taunt the target for 4 seconds.
• Seal of Justice gives your auto attacks a chance to stun the target. When you unleash this seal, you prevent enemies from fleeing for a duration and each melee attack you do will extend the duration.
• Seal of Light causes your auto attacks to heal you. When unleashed, this ability will place a debuff on the target causing any attacks you or your allies deal to heal them.
• Seal of Wisdom restores mana on melee hits. Unleashing this ability will cause attacks and spells used against the target to have a chance to restore mana.

While Seals are typically coordinated with your groups, you will be using Seal of Fury for taunting purposes. Other Paladins in your group can play around this by choosing their own seals. If you are not actively tanking, you can choose to temporarily swap to another seal to benefit your party based on what is missing.

Blessings are buffs you can apply to party members, granting them strong bonuses. Only one Blessing can be applied to a player at a time and you should always keep your party members buffed. Below are the available Blessings:

• Blessing of Might increases Melee Attack Power for any player with the buff. This is strong on any Melee DPS and Tanks.
• Blessing of Wisdom restores Mana for any player with the buff. This is good on Healers and anyone else who is in desperate need of Mana.
• Blessing of Kings increases a players total stats. This is typically the strongest buff you can provide, and if you are ever unsure what to cast on a player, you can default to this.
• Blessing of Light increases the healing done by Flash of Light and Holy Light to the target. This is the Blessing with the lowest priority and will only be cast when other buffs are already applied.

Additionally, Mass Salvation has replaced Blessing of Salvation and can now be applied in addition to any of the above Blessings. Ensure you maintain this at all times on everyone but Tanks.