Retribution Paladin DPS Stat Priority — The War Within Pre-Patch

Unlike many other specs, Retribution tends not to favour a specific secondary stat above all others regardless of the situation. The talent build you choose, as well as the amount of each secondary stat you already have, will have a large impact on the value of secondaries. In general, the best gearing strategy will be to use Raidbots to compare different gearsets. Our Raidbots guide has all the information you need to start using it.

Your general stat priority will be:

1. Strength;
2. Mastery;
3. Critical Strike = Haste = Versatility.

There are no stat breakpoints that you should aim for specifically for any stat or any build.

As mentioned above, these priorities should only be considered a general guide. There could be many gearing situations where stats ranked lower here end up being more valuable than ones ranked highly. Using simulations to help determine your gear will always be a better method since the relative value of stats can change significantly as you change your gear.

For the best gems, enchants, and consumables to use, see the dedicated guide for them:

Strength increases the damage of all your abilities and will generally be a higher priority stat than any secondary stat. As a result, item level will usually trump any other stat-specific comparisons since Strength increases significantly with item level on all non-jewellery slots.

Haste is valuable due to the resource generation it provides via Crusading Strikes as well as reducing the cooldowns of all of your major Holy Power generators. However, with Templar Strikes it loses some value, as Templar Strikes itself has a flat 1-second GCD that is not reduced by Haste.

Versatility increases all damage done and reduces damage taken. It does not have any innate synergies with any talents or abilities but ends up becoming more valuable as you gain more of other secondary stats. Notably, Versatility also increases the damage done of trinkets and other damage effects from items, which can make it more valuable when these effects make up a larger portion of your total damage.

Critical Strike does gain some value from talents like Adjudication and Heart of the Crusader, which increase the amount of damage that critical hits deal. Art of War also has a higher chance to trigger from melees that critically hit, which can make Crit more valuable than simply the damage increase itself.

Mastery increases the damage of all of your abilities that deal Holy damage. This includes abilities that deal Holystrike or Radiant damage, as they also count as Holy for the purposes of Highlord's Judgment. It also gives Judgment a chance to deal extra Holy damage when cast, and this chance can be increased with a number of talents.