Retribution Paladin DPS Guide — Dragonflight 10.0.7
Welcome to our Retribution Paladin guide for World of Warcraft — Dragonflight 10.0.7. Here, you will learn how to play as a Retribution Paladin in both raids and Mythic+ dungeons: from the very beginning to maximizing your DPS.
If you were looking for WotLK Classic content, please refer to our WotLK Classic Retribution Paladin guide.
Retribution Paladin Overview
Retribution's greatest strength is its versatile talent kit which can adapt to all kinds of throughput requirements. The utility is also excellent, as it offers a damage reduction aura, a strong single-target damage reduction cooldown for others, massive off-heals, and the best immunity in the game. They also bring an offensive aura, increasing the entire raid's throughput. Their defensives are very good as well.
Strengths and Weaknesses
Strong and adaptable single-target and cleave talent builds.
Strong defensive cooldowns like
Divine Shield,
Divine Protection, and
Shield of Vengeance (talent).
Many utility spells, such as
Blessing of Protection,
Blessing of Sacrifice, and
Blessing of Freedom.
Strongest single-target off-heal with
Lay on Hands.
Source of a raid-wide up to 5% damage and healing increase aura with
Retribution Aura.
Source of a raid-wide 3% damage reduction aura with
Devotion Aura.
Low mobility.
Mediocre community perception.
Uptime-reliant.
Dragonflight Changes for Paladins
We are maintaining a list of changes for Paladins, so you can see what changes with every patch of Dragonflight.
Retribution Paladin Rework in 10.0.7
Retribution Paladins got a large rework with many changes, removals, additions, and improvements of their base Paladin class spells and talents, as well as of the spec-specific Retribution base spells and talents. The core gameplay of building and spending Holy Power is still the same.
All kinds of new information and recommendations can be found on the various pages of this guide in regards to the rework, however a few fundamental changes shall be mentioned right away in no particular order:
Divine Steed is no longer on the global cooldown.
Unbound Freedom is now a Paladin PvE talent, and just like its previous PvP version allows us to use
Blessing of Freedom on others while getting the buff ourselves. We also obtained the 30% movement speed increase part of it, granting us a 30% sprint on demand while being able to duplicate it on allies.
Retribution Aura has been redesigned and now grants a damage buff to the entire raid. It triggered once someone takes 30% of their maximum Health worth in damage in a single hit. This damage buff starts at 5% and slowly degrades over 30 seconds. It can proc anew starting at 5% once the old buff runs out.
Divine Protection is now baseline and has a separate cooldown from our
Shield of Vengeance talent. These two personal defensives can be defensively improved via
Aegis of Protection, and their cooldown can be shortened via
Unbreakable Spirit. This allows us to have 2 separate, strong personal defensives with short cooldowns, which is a huge step up from our previous lacking personal defensive capabilities.
Sanctified Plates is a new Paladin talent, which grants us passive damage reduction and a larger Health pool.
Guided Prayer is a new defensive talent that grants us a large
Word of Glory selfheal once we drop below 25% Health, it is on a 1-minute cooldown. Its effect can be improved via
Healing Hands.
Avenging Wrath is now a 1-minute cooldown.
Crusade remains as a 2-minute alternative.
Final Verdict extends the range on our single-target spender to 12 yards. We can improve it via
Jurisdiction, which extends its range to 20 yards while also buffing its damage. We now have this incredible quality of life improvement for all single-target talent builds and for some of the hybrid ones.
Wake of Ashes no longer deals reduced damage to secondary enemies.
Vanguard of Justice turns our 3 Holy Power spenders into 4 Holy Power spenders while also buffing their damage by 20%. This new talent helps us a lot, mainly because it allows us to use less of our global cooldowns on spending Holy Power.
Crusading Strikes is a new optional talent that can replace our automatic melee swings with
Crusader Strike. Every second swing generates 1 Holy Power.
Templar Strikes is a new optional talent that turns the manual
Crusader Strike into a much stronger 2 part combo. After casting
Templar Strikes, you have 4 seconds before the time window ends to use
Templar Slash.
Templar Strikes and
Crusading Strikes are 2 new exclusive talents that define how we progress in the talent tree.
Divine Toll and
Divine Resonance are now class talents.
Retribution Paladin Viability in Dragonflight
Retribution Paladin is currently a good DPS in Dragonflight in terms of viability. Retribution's greatest strength is its versatile talent kit which can adapt to all throughput requirements.
Leveling a Retribution Paladin
If you want to play a Retribution Paladin but currently do not have one at max level, you can check out our leveling guide.
Once you reach the max level, it can be overwhelming to completely change how you play by suddenly implementing many add-ons quickly, especially if they have a heavy visual impact on your UI. We recommend using some of the more basic add-ons recommended on our Add-ons page below while leveling so that you have more time to get used to them during the easier phases of playing your class.
Basics of Retribution Paladin Gameplay
Retribution Paladin is a spec about buffing yourself, managing cooldowns, and handling resource management simultaneously. The fundamental idea of the rotation is simple; you are building and spending Holy Power while mixing in cooldowns to maximize the effectiveness of your Holy Power abilities.
You will always figure out which Holy Power generator you should
prioritize over your others while not over-capping Holy Power. Then, figure
out the best Holy Power spender to use in your current situation. You will
also regularly be using your main cooldown, Avenging Wrath.
If you are an absolute beginner to the spec but would like to learn the fundamentals of the class, we recommend looking through the Spell Summary first and the Easy Mode page linked below.
If you are already somewhat familiar with Retribution Paladin, you can head straight to the Talents and Rotation pages to jump right into the more complex, detailed information.
How to Gear Up as a Retribution Paladin
Although gearing has become more challenging due to the many variables that depend on your character, you can find information on how best to gear as Retribution on our dedicated gearing page.
Once you have started to gear up, you must ensure you have the appropriate consumables, gems, enchants, and more. We have a dedicated page for exactly this, as shown below, and the stats page, where you can find more information on the possibility of a changing stat priority and the necessary changes you may need to make for consumables.
End-Game as a Retribution Paladin
Starting as Retribution Paladin can look very different from the absolute end-game raiding and progression as one. Our Mythic+, Raiding, and PvP guides can guide you to perform as well as possible, regardless of your focus on end-game content.
Improving as a Retribution Paladin
If you are finding your performance lackluster but unsure where you are going wrong, you can check out the pages below for tips or answers to questions you may have.
Changelog
- 21 Mar. 2023 (enchants page): Updated for Patch 10.0.7.
- 21 Mar. 2023 (spells page): Updated for Patch 10.0.7.
- 21 Mar. 2023 (talents page): Updated for Patch 10.0.7.
- 21 Mar. 2023 (rotation page): Updated for Patch 10.0.7.
- 21 Mar. 2023 (mythic+ page): Updated for Patch 10.0.7.
- 21 Mar. 2023 (FAQ page): Updated for Patch 10.0.7.
- 21 Mar. 2023 (easy mode page): Updated for Patch 10.0.7.
- 21 Mar. 2023 (how to improve page): Updated for Patch 10.0.7.
- 21 Mar. 2023 (Vault of the Incarnates page): Updated for Patch 10.0.7.
- 21 Mar. 2023 (simulations page): Reviewed for Patch 10.0.7.
- 21 Mar. 2023 (stats page): Updated for Patch 10.0.7.
- 21 Mar. 2023 (this page): Updated for Patch 10.0.7.
- 21 Mar. 2023 (gear page): Updated for Patch 10.0.7.
- 21 Mar. 2023 (addons page): Updated for Patch 10.0.7.
- 24 Jan. 2023 (easy mode page): Reviewed for Patch 10.0.5.
- 24 Jan. 2023 (addons page): Reviewed for Patch 10.0.5.
- 24 Jan. 2023 (simulations page): Reviewed for Patch 10.0.5.
- 24 Jan. 2023 (enchants page): Reviewed for Patch 10.0.5.
- 24 Jan. 2023 (spells page): Reviewed for Patch 10.0.5.
- 24 Jan. 2023 (talents page): Reviewed for Patch 10.0.5.
- 24 Jan. 2023 (stats page): Reviewed for Patch 10.0.5.
- 24 Jan. 2023 (rotation page): Reviewed for Patch 10.0.5.
- 24 Jan. 2023 (this page): Reviewed for Patch 10.0.5.
- 24 Jan. 2023 (FAQ page): Reviewed for Patch 10.0.5.
- 24 Jan. 2023 (mythic+ page): Reviewed for Patch 10.0.5.
- 24 Jan. 2023 (how to improve page): Reviewed for Patch 10.0.5.
- 24 Jan. 2023 (gear page): Reviewed for Patch 10.0.5.
- 24 Jan. 2023 (Vault of the Incarnates page): Reviewed for Patch 10.0.5.
- 17 Jan. 2023 (Vault of the Incarnates page): Updated Talents.
- 17 Jan. 2023 (FAQ page): Added Justicars Vengeance or Templars Verdict Question.
- 17 Jan. 2023 (stats page): Updated Stat priority.
- 17 Jan. 2023 (mythic+ page): Updated 2-min talents.
- 17 Jan. 2023 (easy mode page): Updated Talents and Stats.
- 17 Jan. 2023 (spells page): Shield of Vengeance now has a 90-second cooldown.
- 17 Jan. 2023 (gear page): Readded Idol of Tampling Hooves after it got fixed.
- 16 Dec. 2022 (gear page): Removed Idol of Tampling Hooves because it didnt hit raid bosses properly.
- 16 Dec. 2022 (gear page): Added second on-use trinket Manic Grieftorch.
- 13 Dec. 2022 (enchants page): Added fallback Versatility Phial.
- 11 Dec. 2022 (FAQ page): Reviewed for Dragonflight Season 1.
- 11 Dec. 2022 (how to improve page): Reviewed for Dragonflight Season 1.
- 11 Dec. 2022 (simulations page): Reviewed for Dragonflight Season 1.
- 11 Dec. 2022 (addons page): Reviewed for Dragonflight Season 1.
- 11 Dec. 2022 (enchants page): Added fallback Phial and Potion options.
- 11 Dec. 2022 (stats page): Reviewed for Dragonflight Season 1.
- 11 Dec. 2022 (Vault of the Incarnates page): Page added.
- 11 Dec. 2022 (mythic+ page): Updated for Dragonflight Season 1.
- 11 Dec. 2022 (rotation page): Updated Rotation and Notes.
- 11 Dec. 2022 (talents page): Updated the single target talents to Sanctify.
- 11 Dec. 2022 (spells page): Seal of the Crusader no longer affects allies.
- 11 Dec. 2022 (easy mode page): Updated Talents and Rotation.
- 11 Dec. 2022 (this page): Seal of the Crusader no longer affects allies.
- 11 Dec. 2022 (gear page): Updated for Dragonflight Mythic+ Season 1 loot tables.
- 28 Nov. 2022 (simulations page): Reviewed for Dragonflight launch.
- 28 Nov. 2022 (addons page): Updated for Dragonflight launch.
- 28 Nov. 2022 (stats page): Updated for Dragonflight launch.
- 28 Nov. 2022 (enchants page): Updated for Dragonflight launch.
- 28 Nov. 2022 (easy mode page): Updated for Dragonflight launch.
- 28 Nov. 2022 (this page): Updated for Dragonflight launch.
- 28 Nov. 2022 (spells page): Updated for Dragonflight launch.
- 28 Nov. 2022 (talents page): Updated for Dragonflight launch.
- 28 Nov. 2022 (rotation page): Updated for Dragonflight launch.
- 28 Nov. 2022 (FAQ page): Updated for Dragonflight launch.
- 28 Nov. 2022 (how to improve page): Updated for Dragonflight launch.
- 28 Nov. 2022 (mythic+ page): Updated for Dragonflight launch.
- 28 Nov. 2022 (gear page): Updated for Dragonflight launch.
- 24 Oct. 2022 (Castle Nathria page): Updated for Dragonflight pre-patch.
- 24 Oct. 2022 (Sanctum of Domination page): Updated for Dragonflight pre-patch.
- 24 Oct. 2022 (Sepulcher of the First Ones page): Updated for Dragonflight pre-patch.
- 24 Oct. 2022 (gear page): Updated for Dragonflight pre-patch.
- 24 Oct. 2022 (simulations page): Updated for Dragonflight pre-patch.
- 24 Oct. 2022 (mythic+ page): Updated for Dragonflight pre-patch.
- 24 Oct. 2022 (how to improve page): Updated for Dragonflight pre-patch.
- 24 Oct. 2022 (rotation page): Updated for Dragonflight pre-patch.
- 24 Oct. 2022 (FAQ page): Updated for Dragonflight pre-patch.
- 24 Oct. 2022 (talents page): Updated for Dragonflight pre-patch.
- 24 Oct. 2022 (this page): Updated for Dragonflight pre-patch.
- 24 Oct. 2022 (Torghast): Updated for Dragonflight pre-patch.
- 24 Oct. 2022 (Legendaries): Updated for Dragonflight pre-patch.
- 24 Oct. 2022 (spells page): Updated for Dragonflight pre-patch.
- 24 Oct. 2022 (easy mode page): Updated for Dragonflight pre-patch.
- 24 Oct. 2022 (enchants page): Updated for Dragonflight pre-patch.
- 24 Oct. 2022 (stats page): Updated for Dragonflight pre-patch.
- 24 Oct. 2022 (addons page): Updated for Dragonflight pre-patch.
- 24 Oct. 2022 (Covenants and Soulbinds): Updated for Dragonflight pre-patch.
- 13 Apr. 2022 (Patch 9.2 Analysis): Updated for tier set changes.
- 02 Mar. 2022 (Patch 9.1 Analysis): Updated for 9.2 Raid opening.
- 21 Feb. 2022 (Patch 9.2 Analysis): Reviewed and approved for Patch 9.2.
- 17 Jan. 2022 (talents page): Updated Talents.
- 15 Jan. 2022 (Patch 9.2 Analysis): Page added with initial thoughts and information.
- 01 Nov. 2021 (Patch 9.1 Analysis): Reviewed and approved for Patch 9.1.5.
- 14 Jul. 2021 (Patch 9.1 Analysis): Updated with retail information.
- 20 May 2021 (Patch 9.1 Analysis): Page filled with preliminary information.
- 10 Nov. 2020 (Ny'alotha page): Page updated for Execution Sentence and Final Reckoning changes.
- 13 Oct. 2020 (Ny'alotha page): Page updated for the Shadowlands pre-patch.
- 11 Apr. 2020 (The Eternal Palace page): Updated talent and essence recommendations.
- 14 Jan. 2020 (The Eternal Palace page): Updated for Patch 8.3.
- 05 Aug. 2019 (The Eternal Palace page): Updated for Mythic.
- 09 Jul. 2019 (The Eternal Palace page): Page added.
- 24 Jun. 2019 (Battle of Dazar'alor page): This page has been reviewed for the release of Patch 8.2 and no changes are necessary.
- 24 Jun. 2019 (Uldir page): This page has been reviewed for the release of Patch 8.2 and no changes are necessary.
- 24 Jun. 2019 (Crucible of Storms page): This page has been reviewed for the release of Patch 8.2 and no changes are necessary.
- 13 May 2019 (Crucible of Storms page): Added Mythic notes.
- 15 Apr. 2019 (Crucible of Storms page): Guide added.
- 15 Apr. 2019 (Battle of Dazar'alor page): Inquisition has been added as a viable Talent.
- 15 Apr. 2019 (Uldir page): Inquisition has been added as a viable Talent.
- 11 Mar. 2019 (Battle of Dazar'alor page): This page has been reviewed for Patch 8.1.5 and no changes are necessary.
- 17 Feb. 2019 (Battle of Dazar'alor page): Added Mythic recommendations.
- 21 Jan. 2019 (Battle of Dazar'alor page): Page added.
- 11 Dec. 2018 (Uldir page): Adjustments to talent advice for N'Zoth and Zul.
- 10 Dec. 2018 (Uldir page): Updated for 8.1.
- 12 Nov. 2018 (Uldir page): Added Uldir Mythic talent recommendations and tips. Updated a few Normal/Heroic boss talent recommendations.
- 03 Sep. 2018 (Uldir page): Added content for Uldir release.
More Paladin Guides
Guides from Other Classes
This guide has been written by Urthearso, theorycrafter for Retribution Paladins. If you have any questions about the spec you can reach him on the official Paladin Discord, on Twitter, and during his streams on Twitch.
- New Potential Evoker Spells Added in Patch 10.1 Build 48661
- Dragonflight Patch 10.0.7 Hotfixes: March 23rd
- Primordial Stone Hotfix Changes: March 23rd
- Dragonflight Patch 10.0.7 DPS Log Rankings for Vault of the Incarnates: Day 1
- Mythic+ Tier List in Dragonflight Season 1 (Week 15)
- Dragonflight Patch 10.0.7 Hotfixes: March 22nd
- Class Set Updates and Clarifications in Patch 10.1: March 22nd
- Dragonflight Patch 10.1 PTR Dev Notes: March 22nd