Protection Paladin Raid Guide
Protection Paladin Raid Guide
11.1 - Undermine(d)
Welcome to the Protection Paladin raid guide for the World of Warcraft patch 11.1! This guide covers everything you need to know to understand your character! Are you starting out and leveling up from 70? Check out the leveling guide!
Overview
Protection Paladin
Protection PaladinRaid
Hero Talents
Protection Paladin
- Both Lightsmith and Templar are very competitive choices. The new tier set has more synergies with Templar, but Lightsmith still performs better on single target throughput wise. Therefore, for raiding as Protection Paladin we recommend Lightsmith.
Lightsmith
Templar
- As Lightsmith you recieve Holy Armaments, which is split between Holy Bulwark and Sacred Weapon.
- Holy Bulwark is an absorb shield for 15% of the Protection Paladin's health. It gives an additional 2% absorb every 2 seconds and lasts 20 seconds.
- Sacred Weapon is a damaging buff that has a chance to deal Holy damage or heal nearby targets. The effect is increased when Sacred Weapon strikes 1 target and is reduced above 5 targets. It also lasts 20 seconds.
- Holy Armaments has 2 charges and rotates from Holy Bulwark to Sacred Weapon.
- Holy Armaments are something that you can either bestow upon yourself or an ally. However, with Solidarity if you give them to an ally you also gain its benefits. Furthermore, if you bestow an Holy Armaments to yourself, a nearby ally also gains its benefits.
- Blessing of the Forge lets casting Avenging Wrath / Sentinel summon an additional Sacred Weapon. During Avenging Wrath / Sentinel your Sacred Weapon casts spells on your target and echoes the effects of your Holy Power abilities.
- With Divine Inspiration you can proc a Holy Armaments for a nearby ally.
- Blessed Assurance increases the damage of Blessed Hammer / Hammer of the Righteous by 100% after casting a Holy Power ability.
- Rite of Sanctification is a buff to armor and primary stat that replaces weapon oils.
- After casting Eye of Tyr, it is then replaced with Hammer of Light for 12 seconds. Hammer of Light costs 3 Holy Power and is a big damage nuke that hits up to 4 enemies.
- Essentially, you want to cast Eye of Tyr off cooldown and use Hammer of Light off cooldown as well. This changes Eye of Tyr to be more of an offensive spell.
- Shake the Heavens causes you to bring down a Empyrean Hammer on a nearby target every 2 seconds, for 8 seconds after casting Hammer of Light.
- Shake the Heavens gets extended by 1 second every time you cast a Blessed Hammer / Hammer of the Righteous, Hammer of Wrath and Judgment.
- Hammerfall causes your Shield of the Righteous and Word of Glory to call down an Empyrean Hammer on a nearby target. While Shake the Heavens is active, this effect calls down an additional Empyrean Hammer.
- You can cast Hammer of Light for free through Light's Deliverance which is gained through having as many Empyrean Hammer casts as possible.
- Eye of Tyr becomes a Holy Power generator through Undisputed Ruling, granting 3 Holy Power. Furthermore, it gives 12% haste for 6 seconds and grants Shield of the Righteous.
- You gain 5% damage reduction for 8 seconds to enemies hit by Shake the Heavens when it critically strikes, through Wrathful Descent.
- Unrelenting Charger fixes a lot of mobility issues for Protection Paladin by providing a 2 second longer Divine Steed and increasing your movement speed by an additional 30% for the first 3 seconds.
Talents
Protection Paladin
Standard Build
When to use this spec
This is the default loadout going into any boss unless specified otherwise. You have to adjust the class talent tree based on the utility needed for the encounter. To make your life easier, boss-specific talent loadouts are available in the Raids section.
Gameplay Altering Talents
Discover all talents that significantly alter your gameplay within the Spec and Class Talent trees. This section gives a concise overview of these talents and their applications but for a more detailed look check out the Rotation and Deep Dive sections below.
- Righteous Protector
- Allows for higher uptime on your strongest defensive Guardian of Ancient Kings, while also granting an increased uptime on Avenging Wrath.
- Blessing of Spellwarding
- Used to completely immune magic damage on yourself or your allies .
- Consecration in Flame
- Makes Consecration last 2 seconds longer and increases its damage by 20%. This makes Consecration last 14 seconds, which makes it much easier to weave into the rest of your abilities without having to worry about refreshing it very often unless there is heavy movement.
- Sanctified Wrath
- Increases duration of Avenging Wrath to 25 seconds. Additionally, gives Judgment increased Holy Power generation by 1.
- Zealot's Paragon
- Extends the duration of Avenging Wrath with each cast of Judgment and Hammer of Wrath.
- Shining Light
- Makes your Word of Glory free after 3 Shield of the Righteous and has a maximum of 2 stacks. This talent is integral to playing Protection Paladin!
- Barricade of Faith
- You want to use Avenger's Shield at least once every 10 seconds to keep this potent defensive buff active.
- Sanctuary
- The effects of Consecration persists for 4 seconds after leaving, which makes heavy movement more manageable.
- Light's Revocation
- Allows you to use Divine Shield even when you have Forbearance debuff.
Class Tree
- Sanctified Plates
- Increases your armor by 10%, Stamina by 10%, and reduces damage taken from area of effect attacks by 6%. This is an incredibly strong passive defensive talent.
- Resolute Defender
- Allows you to use Ardent Defender and Divine Shield a lot more often, which makes for higher uptime on some of your strongest defensive cooldowns.
- Greater Judgment
- Judgment causes the target to take 40% increased damage from your next Shield of the Righteous.
- Cavalier
- This talent gives Divine Steed 2 charges, which makes planning movement much easier.
- Divine Purpose
- Holy Power spending abilities can make your next Word of Glory or Shield of the Righteous free and deal 15% increased damage and healing.
Rotation
Protection Paladin
Tier Set
- 2-Set: Each time you take damage you have a chance to activate Luck of the Draw! causing you to cast Guardian of Ancient Kings for 4.0 sec. Your damage done is increased by 15% for 10 sec after Luck of the Draw! activates.
- 4-Set: While you have Luck of the Draw! Shield of the Righteous refunds 1-3 Holy Power and extends the duration of Luck of the Draw! by 0.5 sec, up to 10 sec.
Opener
- The goal of your opener as a Protection Paladin playing in a Raid is to minmax damage. Use high damage generators inside your offensive cooldowns, such as;Judgment and Hammer of Wrath, while also making sure you're standing in Consecration at all times.
Lightsmith
Templar
- Important thing to note when using Sacred Weapon is that it cannot stack. This means that the Sacred Weapon that spawns from Avenging Wrath / Sentinel should be used first and the normal cast one used later after the first one has run out.
- This can also occur with Divine Inspiration, so be careful and make sure you track this buff well.
- Other than the above, use Holy Armaments off cooldown.
- Cast Eye of Tyr always off cooldown to be able to cast Hammer of Light off cooldown as well.
- To optimise damage for Single Target you bascially dont want to cast Avenger's Shield at all as Templar.
- On 3+ targets and for survivability ignore this and use Avenger's Shield frequently.
Priority List
Lightsmith
Templar
- Always stand in Consecration for damage reduction, aiming for 100% uptime.
- Use Avenging Wrath on cooldown.
- If talented, cast Bastion of Light and Moment of Glory on cooldown.
- Use Judgment if you have 2 charges.
- Use Shield of the Righteous at 3-5 Holy Power.
- Consume Blessed Assurance with Hammer of the Righteous or Blessed Hammer
- Use Sacred Weapon if the remaining cooldown on Avenging Wrath is more than 20 seconds; you don't already have a Sacred Weapon active, or it's remaining duration is less than 6 seconds.
- Use Hammer of Wrath on single-target.
- Use Divine Toll.
- Use Avenger's Shield.
- Use Judgment.
- Use Hammer of Wrath on AOE.
- Use Blessed Hammer whenever you cannot press anything else.
- Refresh Consecration.
- Always stand in Consecration for damage reduction, aiming for 100% uptime.
- Use Avenging Wrath on cooldown.
- If talented, use Bastion of Light on cooldown.
- Use Judgment if you have 2 charges.
- Use Hammer of Light after using Eye of Tyr or with 60 stacks of Light's Deliverance
- Use Shield of the Righteous at 3-5 Holy Power.
- Use Eye of Tyr
- Use Avenger's Shield if it will kick a cast or to maintain Barricade of Faith.
- Use Hammer of Wrath.
- Use Divine Toll.
- Use Judgment.
- Use Blessed Hammer whenever you cannot press anything else.
- Refresh Consecration.
Defensive Cooldowns
- Ardent Defender
- This as your main defensive in Raiding, pressing it almost on cooldown, especially at the start of a pull. With Unbreakable Spirit and Resolute Defender, its low cooldown makes it ideal for frequent use. It also has a cheat death component, allowing survival against extreme hits.
- Eye of Tyr
- Used to smooth damage intake or for large tank hits, this ability is a debuff on enemies within 8 yards. In AoE with Inmost Light, spam it on cooldown for damage and survivability.
- Note that it does not work on environmental damage.
- Guardian of Ancient Kings
- Use Guardian of Ancient Kings for extremely large tank hits or to smooth very high damage intake.
- Sentinel
- Use this spell almost off cooldown. The health and damage reduction bonuses decay over time, so ideally enter Sentinel with 5 Holy Power to keep it up as long as possible.
- Blessing of Spellwarding
- Use this spell for large magic damage hits or to preemptively prevent powerful magic debuffs from applying. Remember, it can be used on others as well as yourself. Occasionally, this spell can "bug" and cause certain mobs to target the second highest threat instead, but this is rare.
- Divine Shield
- With Final Stand talented, this becomes the most powerful defensive ability in the game, making you immortal for 8 seconds. Utilise it around very hard hitting tank abilities or to immune and prevent a debuff.
Offensive Cooldowns
- Avenging Wrath
- Use Avenging Wrath almost off cooldown due to high cooldown reduction from Righteous Protector, allowing you to spend a lot of Holy Power and get the cooldown back faster. Occasionally, hold it briefly to align with better cooldown windows, which is very boss or dungeon-specific. In progress raiding, you can talent into Sentinel if you feel unsafe.
- Divine Toll
- Use Divine Toll almost off cooldown. Hold it briefly only if delaying for boss add spawns offers more value.
- Bastion of Light
- 2 minute cooldown that makes your next 5 casts of Judgment generate 2 Holy Power extra. Basically use off cooldown inside Avenging Wrath if possible.
- Eye of Tyr
- Using Templar, Eye of Tyr becomes an offensive cooldown that you want to use off cooldown as much as possible.
Deep Dive
Protection Paladin
Holy Shield and Block
- Block is a mechanic exclusive to Protection Warriors and Protection Paladins. Block is more random since there isn't a 100% block chance active mitigation spell. It's good to know whether a tank mechanic is blockable to determine how threatening it is. Holy Shield for example allows using fewer defensives for spell-blockable tank busters compared to other tanks.
Consecration and Movement
- Keep Consecration up 100% of the time and stay inside it when possible for passive damage reduction. Don't press it off cooldown without thinking, or you lose Holy Power from abilities like Judgment and Blessed Hammer. Optimizing movement is important since it frees up globals for other abilities. With Sanctuary talented the Consecration buff lingers for 4 seconds after you leave it, allowing you to min-max Consecration more easily. I recommend using a Consecration WeakAura to track its duration, as tanking outside of it can be dangerous.
Shield of the Righteous and Word of Glory
- Shield of the Righteous is your main active mitigation, it costs 3 Holy Power and grants a 4.5-second armor buff based on Strength. Don't use Shield of the Righteous past 13.5 seconds duration of the buff, as it's capped at that amount. The only reason to keep on using Shield of the Righteous is for more damage or if you‘re otherwise overcapping your Holy Power.
- Word of Glory costs 3 Holy Power and heals up to 250% of your missing health. With Hand of the Protector it heals up to 100% of an ally's missing health.
- Make sure to cast Word of Glory with Shining Light procs.
- Use Word of Glory when you are at around >60% Health and have 9 or more seconds left of Shield of the Righteous.
- Get ready to cast Word of Glory if a big hit is coming and you need to be topped beforehand.
Utilizing Divine Shield, Blessing of Protection and Blessing of Spellwarding
Properly utilizing Divine Shield, Blessing of Protection, and Blessing of Spellwarding allows you to break certain fights and mechanics.
- Using Hand of Reckoning can be min-maxed where even inside Blessing of Protection or Divine Shield you can keep threat while the 3 seconds duration of Hand of Reckoning are in effect.
- You can then use a cancel aura macro, such as:
/cancelaura Blessing of Protection
/cancelaura Divine Shieldin order to cancel the immunity when the 3 second fixate is about to end.
- The idea is that you're invulnerable during the 3 second fixate of Hand of Reckoning. However, don't cancel too late as you lose all threat when inside Divine Shield and Blessing of Protection without the fixate.
- Remember that both Blessing of Protection and Blessing of Spellwarding have a shared cooldown.
- Blessing of Spellwarding prevents the application of many magic damage associated debuffs and Blessing of Protection does the same for physical damage debuffs, such as bleeds.
- Note that while Blessing of Protection removes any already existing physical damage debuffs, Blessing of Spellwarding does not remove existing magic damage debuffs.
- Blessing of Protection can be very useful for making a player that is fixated by enemies immune to their damage which allows them to minmax their DPS/ healing.
- Often times you can save someone with clever use of Blessing of Spellwarding and Blessing of Protection, which can make progressing a boss much faster than usual.
- An important thing to note with both Blessing of Protection and Divine Shield is that it can allow you to bypass a mechanic completely if used at the appropriate time, eliminating the spell cast entirely. For example; Divine Shield and Blessing of Spellwarding can be used before Mortal Stoneslam, which prevent Stoneslam Detonation from happening at all.
Understanding Mechanics
Rotational min-maxing is just one aspect of mastering a specialization, but there are numerous other key mechanics that influence your performance. Use the following guides to improve them.
Liberation of Undermine
Protection Paladin
The following tips are mainly applicable to Heroic Bosses. Mythic tips are going to be released after our progression concludes.
← Scroll for more Bosses →
Vexie
Cauldron
Rik
Stix
Sprocketmonger
One-Armed Bandit
Mug'zee
Gallywix
Tank mechanics
- Tank Buster is the only tank mechanic of this fight
- This mechanic does physical damage, knocks the active tank back and leaves a physical bleed on them. On Heroic and Mythic difficulties it also leaves an Oil Slick.
- As the inactive tank, taunt when the cast succeeds and move the boss out of the Oil Slick.
Boss Tips and Tricks
- Position the boss in such a way that there are no Oil Slick pools between the boss and the abandoned Geargrinder bikes. Otherwise the launched bikes will get stunned in the pools, which will prevent them from removing Protective Plating.
- Make sure to interrupt Repair casts during the intermission with Rebuke and Avenger's Shield. This will ensure that the damage taken increase from Mechanical Breakdown stays on the boss as long as possible.
Tank mechanics
- Flarendo will cast Eruption Stomp on the active tank.
- This is a heavy magic hit, have a big defensive ready such as Guardian of Ancient Kings or Divine Shield.
- Torq will cast Lightning Bash on the active tank.
- This is a big physical hit, part of unmitigated damage is additionally dealt to you as nature damage, meaning you need to mitigate as much of it as possible.
- Every time Colossal Clash happens, swap sides and taunt swap the bosses with your co-tank.
Boss Tips and Tricks
- Make sure to help your group soak every Scrapbomb on Flarendo side.
Tank mechanics
- Sonic Blast deals sonic damage in a frontal cone with every melee attack, and applies a stack of Tinnitus.
- Rotate your defensive cooldowns whenever you are tanking the boss.
- Keep an eye out for Tinnitus stacks on your co-tank. Try to keep them from going over 4 stacks, but do not taunt back before your own debuff fades.
- Never face the boss towards the raid so it does not cleave other players with the tank mechanic.
- Do not be in front of the boss when you are not actively tanking to not accidentally extend your stacks.
- Resonance forces you to always keep the boss at least 15 yards apart from Amplifiers. Any of them gaining too much additional power can lead to a raid wipe. This means you have to move the boss away from new spawned Amplifiers after each Amplification! cast.
Boss Tips and Tricks
- Try to move the boss close to Pyrotechnics after Sparkblast Ignition cast to allow an efficient cleave on them. However, keep an eye on nearby Amplifiers - its better to give up on good cleave than to give additional power to an Amplifier.
Tank mechanic
- This fight consists out of 3 tank mechanics - Demolish, Meltdown and Rolling Rubbish
- While Demolish and Meltdown are the two tank hits the boss does, Rolling Rubbish is the main mechanic of the fight, that the active tank is forced into when the boss starts casting Electromagnetic Sorting.
- The boss always does Demolish into Electromagnetic Sorting followed by Meltdown so make sure that the off-tank taunts the boss after the main tank has been hit by both Demolish and Rolling Rubbish.
- While affected by Rolling Rubbish make sure to roll over as many Garbage Dump as possible and then straight into the boss for maximum amount of damage.
- Using Divine Shield with Final Stand talented can help you get threat on incoming Junkyard Hyenas.
Tank mechanics
- Melee hits of Lockenstock apply a stack of Gravi-Gunk to the active tank.
- Use defensives at high stacks of this debuff.
- Do not get caught off guard by the movement speed slow from this mechanic.
- Pyro Party Pack is a raid-wide AOE that deals fall off damage.
- As the active tank - move away from the raid with this mechanic to minimize the incoming damage to the group.
- As inactive tank - taunt when the cast succeeds.
Boss Tips and Tricks
- Use Blessing of Freedom on yourself or you co-tank whenever they have to run away from the group with Pyro Party Pack to get rid of the slow from Gravi-Gunk.
Tank mechanics
- The Big Hit is the main tank mechanic of the fight
- The ability does heavy physical damage and leaves a Shocking Field at your location shortly after dealing damage.
- Since there is a short delay between you taking damage and leaving a Shocking Field, you can safely stack the new puddle in the old Shocking Field, greatly reducing area denial.
- As the inactive tank, you can taunt at any point during the cast or after it is over as it does not change targets.
- With high enough levels of haste Ardent Defender is available for every The Big Hit, which enables you to use your other defensives freely throughout the fight.
- The ability does heavy physical damage and leaves a Shocking Field at your location shortly after dealing damage.
- Some of the Token combinations will spawn a Coil as a Fabulous Prize. Activating them will do physical damage to you, knock you back, clear the 2 closest Shocking Field, and have an extra effect based on the type of the coil:
- Coils always spawn at the position of an active tank, so be aware of your position when Fabulous Prize is dispensed. It is recommended to place them at the edges of the room to make it easier for the group to deal with the coil mechanics.
- Use these Coils throughout the fight to clean the room if needed.
- Have Shield of the Righteous and a defensive up whenever you have to click a coil.
Boss Tips and Tricks
- Position the boss on top of new adds after each Spin To Win! cast.
Tank mechanics
- This boss has two tank mechanics, Molten Gold Knuckles and Double Whammy Shot.
- Molten Gold Knuckles does high physical damage and low magic damage, it also knocks you back and applies Golden Drip.
- You will be affected with 30 stacks of Golden Drip. To remove these, you simply have to keep moving your character. Until all the stacks are removed you will be taking heavy magic damage, so use Blessing of Spellwarding or Divine Shield to keep yourself alive.
- Double Whammy Shot is targeted on a random player in the raid, as a tank you have to stand in between the boss and the targeted player and try to mitigate as much damage as possible when the shot goes off.
Stat Priority
Protection Paladin
Understand your secondary stat priority and the tertiary stats needed for optimal performance during Raid as a Protection Paladin. For more detailed information, visit the Stats and Attributes guide.
Survivability
Damage
Higher Item level items are better in most scenarios. For an accurate representation of what item to equip you should use Simcraft! A static "Stat Priority" is just a starting point and can easily shift depending on your individual gear.
All secondary stats are affected by diminishing returns. Click here to learn more!
Tertiary
- Avoidance - Great stat to reduce the damage intake of "Area of Effect" abilities.
- Leech - Provides additional healing through damage dealing.
- Speed - Niche tertiary that can be very useful and has been proven useful in the past. Makes playing certain mechanics a lot easier.
In general, Leech is really strong for tanks. Avoidance is great but most of the time tanks are not struggling to survive the typical Area of Effect abilities.
Gear
Protection Paladin
Overall BiS
Farmable Alternatives
| Slot | Item | Location |
|---|---|---|
| Head | Fullthrottle Facerig | Vexie and the Geargrinders |
| Neck | Semi-Charmed Amulet | Rik Reverb |
| Shoulder | Aureate Sentry's Roaring Will | Tier / Catalyst |
| Cloak | Undercircuit Racing Flag | Vexie and the Geargrinders |
| Chest | Aureate Sentry's Encasement | Tier / Catalyst |
| Wrist | Everforged Vambraces | Crafting |
| Gloves | Aureate Sentry's Gauntlets | Tier / Catalyst |
| Belt | Venture Contractor's Floodlight | Operation: Floodgate |
| Legs | Aureate Sentry's Legguards | Tier / Catalyst |
| Boots | Everforged Sabatons | Crafting |
| Ring 1 | Miniature Roulette Wheel | The One-Armed Bandit |
| Ring 2 | The Jastor Diamond | Chrome King Gallywix |
| Trinket 1 | Eye of Kezan | Chrome King Gallywix |
| Trinket 2 | Chromebustible Bomb Suit | Chrome King Gallywix |
| Weapon | Rail Rider's Bisector | Darkflame Cleft |
| Shield | Titan of Industry | Chrome King Gallywix |
Below you are presented with a good list of farmable alternatives that are obtainable outside of WoW’s weekly lockout system. While replaced in time as you progress, these offer immediate character power.
| Slot | Item | Location |
|---|---|---|
| Head | Waxsteel Greathelm | Darkflame Cleft |
| Neck | Strapped Rescue-Keg | Cinderbrew Meadery |
| Shoulder | Skyscorcher Pauldrons | The MOTHERLODE!! |
| Cloak | Cloak of Questionable Intent | The MOTHERLODE!! |
| Chest | Slashproof Business Plate | Cinderbrew Meadery |
| Wrist | Fuzzy Cindercuffs | Cinderbrew Meadery |
| Gloves | Jumpstarter's Scaffold-Scrapers | Operation: Floodgate |
| Belt | Venture Contractor's Floodlight | Operation: Floodgate |
| Legs | Galvanized Oxxein Legguards | Theater of Pain |
| Boots | Sabatons of Rampaging Elements | The MOTHERLODE!! |
| Ring 1 | Wick's Golden Loop | Darkflame Cleft |
| Ring 2 | Bloodoath Signet | Theater of Pain |
| Trinket 1 | Tome of Light's Devotion | Priory of the Sacred Flame |
| Trinket 2 | Ringing Ritual Mud | Operation: Floodgate |
| Weapon | Rail Rider's Bisector | Darkflame Cleft |
| Shield | Barricade of the Endless Empire | Theater of Pain |
Trinkets
Below you can find active and passive alternatives to our recommended trinkets. Do note that some trinkets are better than others depending on the Raid boss.
Active Trinket alternatives
- Ringing Ritual Mud
- A great alternative to Chromebustible Bomb Suit.
- House of Cards
- Provides you with a massive mastery buff for 15 seconds which can be used in combination with Avenging Wrath and Moment of Glory since they share an almost similar cooldown.
Passive Trinket alternatives
- Cinderbrew Stein
- A defensive trinket that will passively give you absorb shields, as well as primary stat to you and your allies. Comes with a downside of giving a lot less primary stat in comparison to other trinkets of the same item level.
- Improvised Seaforium Pacemaker
- Passive stat stick that gives you critical strike with close to 50% uptime.
- Tome of Light's Devotion
- Passive trinket that has its biggest value offensively, make sure to always have the "The 50 Verses of Radiance" buff up.
Embellishments
- 2x Elemental Focusing Lens.
- Craft preferred on Rings, Neck, Bracers.
- It's possible to put on any crafted piece.
A good option for early season is crafting a 675 weapon with Darkmoon Sigil: Symbiosis and a 675 Shield with Writhing Armor Banding. As soon as you get access to a 678 weapon and shield this option loses value compared to 2x Elemental Focusing Lens.
- Darkmoon Sigil: Symbiosis
- Passive secondary stats with almost 100% uptime.
- Has to be crafted on a weapon.
- Writhing Armor Banding
- Empowering your Darkmoon Sigil: Symbiosis.
- On Wrists, Boots, Waist, Hands or Cloak depending on your available gear.
Remaining Sparks
- Crafted items are 675 item level and regular items are 678 on max item level, therefore, it's a small loss to equip crafted items outside of your 2x Embellishments unless you don't have access to other high item level gear on that slot.
Simcraft
To find the best combination of gear available to you or identify the best possible upgrades, visit our Simcraft guide to learn how to utilize Simcraft easily and effectively.
Consumables
Protection Paladin
- Phials
- Flask of Tempered Swiftness
- Food
- Feast of the Divine Day
- Combat Potion
- Tempered Potion
- Health Potion
- Algari Healing Potion
- Weapon Stone/Oil
- Rite of Sanctification -- as Lightsmith in every situation
- Ironclaw Whetstone -- as Templar if you have a bladed weapon
- Ironclaw Weightstone -- as Templar if you have a blunt weapon
- Augment Rune
- Crystallized Augment Rune
- Sockets
- Deadly Emerald
- Culminating Blasphemite -- Unique, use one of each gem colour to enhance your Blasphemite.
- Quick Onyx
- Quick Ruby
- Quick Sapphire
- Culminating Blasphemite is the best raw output option but using Elusive Blasphemite can help you maintain uptime and dodge mechanics easier. This is an extremely minor dps gain in exchange for a valuable 10% movement speed.
Enchantments
| Head | S.A.D. |
| Neck | Magnificent Jeweler's Setting 2x |
| Cloak | Enchant Cloak - Chant of Winged Grace |
| Chest | Enchant Chest - Crystalline Radiance |
| Wrist | Enchant Bracer - Chant of Armored Leech S.A.D. |
| Belt | S.A.D. |
| Legs | Stormbound Armor Kit |
| Boots | Enchant Boots - Defender's March |
| Ring 1 | Enchant Ring - Radiant Haste Magnificent Jeweler's Setting 2x |
| Ring 2 | Enchant Ring - Radiant Haste Magnificent Jeweler's Setting 2x |
| Weapon | Enchant Weapon - Authority of the Depths |
You buy S.A.D. from the Great Vault Vendor to add sockets to your Helm, Wrists and Belt.
Races
Protection Paladin
In this section of the Protection Paladin Raid Guide, we showcase and explain how impactful certain racials can be in World of Warcraft:
- Stoneform -- Dwarf
- Might of the Mountain gives 2% crit damage and healing, which is very strong for Protection Paladin.
- Valuable due to the fact that you can dispel yourself or remove dangerous bleed effects.
- Gives 10% physical DR which can be like a small extra personal as a tank for 8 seconds.
- Arcane Torrent -- Blood Elf
- Strong racial to dispel or purge enemies, the value is very limited but sometimes can come in handy.
- War Stomp -- Tauren
- Strong AoE stun that can be used as a stop that lasts for 2 seconds.
- Brawn gives 2% crit damage and healing
Recommendation
I almost always play Dwarf since they are the overall strongest offensive (tied with Tauren) race, as well as being the strongest defensively because of Stoneform ability to remove nasty debuffs.
Macros
Protection Paladin
Discover recommended macros for Protection Paladin for Raids and watch a quick video guide on creating simple macros for your character.
Taunt at Mouseover --- Mouseover macro for Hand of Reckoning (Taunt) that allows you to get aggro easily from targets that just come into view or spawn without having to change target. If you have no mouseover it taunts your primary target.
#showtooltip
/cast [@mouseover,harm,nodead][]Hand of ReckoningBoss 1 Taunt --- Casts Hand of Reckoning on Boss1
/cast [@boss1] Hand of ReckoningBoss 2 Taunt --- Casts Hand of Reckoning on Boss2
/cast [@boss2] Hand of ReckoningBlessing of Freedom Mouseover --- Mouseover macro for Blessing of Freedom to use on allies (do not use this on yourself as it's less efficient than the next macro)
#showtooltip
/cast [@mouseover] Blessing of FreedomBlessing of Sacrifice Mouseover--- Mouseover macro for Blessing of Sacrifice that allows you to external someone quickly.
#showtooltip
/cast [@mouseover] Blessing of SacrificeWord of Glory Mouseover --- Mouseover macro to use Word of Glory on allies, as with Blessing of Freedom, do not use this on yourself as it is less efficient.
#showtooltip Word of Glory
/cast [@mouseover] Word of GloryLay on Hands Mouseover --- Mouseover macro to use Lay on Hands on allies.
#showtooltip Lay on Hands
/cast [@mouseover] Lay on HandsCleanse Toxins Mouseover --- Mouseover macro to use dispell on allies.
#showtooltip Cleanse Toxins
/cast [@mouseover] Cleanse ToxinsFocus Target Macro --- This is one of my favorite macros that puts a target in focus on mouseover and also marks the target as "Cross" (red). This is a very very good macro to have for high level play and it also comes with an easy way to clear focus as well.
/focus [@mouseover,exists]
/run if not GetRaidTargetIndex("focus") then SetRaidTarget("focus",7) end
/clearfocus [@mouseover,noharm]Focus Interupt --- This macro casts "Rebuke" or interrupt on your focus target. It also interrupts your main target if your focus target is out of range or if you do not have a focus target. Very solid macro for general use play.
#showtooltip
/cast [@focus,harm,nodead][] RebukeFocus Avenger's Shield --- Macro that puts your Avenger's Shield on focus target if you need to kick or silence your focus target
#showtooltip
/cast [@focus,harm,nodead][] Avenger's ShieldCancelaura macro --- Here is a very important macro that you want to fill with any buff that is an immunity that you would need to cancel in a given scenario. For example; Divine Shield Taunt fails and doesn't taunt so you need to cancel Divine Shield, or you used Blessing of Protection to get rid of a debuff quickly and need to cancel so that you can continue being the primary aggro target before your allies are tanking instead. In the case of Blessing of Spellwarding, sometimes certain mobs fail to do their primary threat ability on the tank if you are protected by Blessing of Spellwarding, although this is rare.
/cancelaura Blessing of Protection
/cancelaura Blessing of Spellwarding
/cancelaura Divine ShieldCasting Divine Shield --- Essentially this lets you have less delay on casting Divine Shield, if you are for example casting a mechanic in the Raid, or a trinket that has a cast time or pressing flash of light etc.
#showtooltip Divine Shield
/stopcasting
/cast Divine ShieldWord of Glory at Self--- This macro casts Word of Glory on yourself which is very efficient when you want to use Word of Glory as a self heal. I recommend using two binds for Word of Glory, just like Blessing of Freedom.
#showtooltip Word of Glory
/cast [@player] Word of GloryBlessing of Freedom on Self --- This macro puts Blessing of Freedom on yourself instantly, which is more efficient in terms of pressing faster than if you used a mouseover macro for yourself. In general, it is good to have two binds for Blessing of Freedom, one for mouseover and one for player (self) as it is a lot more efficient.
#showtooltip Blessing of Freedom
/cast [@player] Blessing of FreedomLay on Hands Self --- This macro you should use in order to use Lay on Hands as a "self heal".
#showtooltip
/cast [@player] Lay on HandsCleanse Toxins Self --- This macro you should use for dispelling yourself as it is more efficient.
#showtooltip Cleanse Toxins
/cast [@player] Cleanse ToxinsAddons
Protection Paladin
Below, you see a screenshot of the author's User Interface for their Protection Paladin, outlining which addons are used and how they are utilized in Raids to make your life easier.
- Shadowed Unit Frames (SUF) -- Full User Interface replacement
- Addon to replace your Unitframes and other UI Elements with a more clean look. Takes quite some time to configure but there are plenty of pre-done profiles that you can easily import and check out.
- BigWigs -- Generic Boss Mod
- BigWigs is a boss encounter add-on. It consists of many individual encounter scripts, or boss modules; mini add-ons that are designed to trigger alert messages, timer bars, sounds, and so forth, for one specific raid encounter.
- Weakauras -- Jack of all trades
- WeakAuras is a powerful and flexible framework that allows the display of highly customizable graphics on World of Warcraft's user interface to indicate buffs, debuffs, and other relevant information. This addon was created to be a lightweight replacement for Power Auras but has since introduced more functionalities while remaining efficient and easy to use.
- Plater -- Advanced Nameplates
- Plater is a nameplate addon with an extraordinary amount of settings, out of the box debuff tracking, threat coloring, and support for scripting similar to WeakAuras and wago.io + the WeakAuras-Companion for Mod/Script/Profile updates.
- Details -- In-depth Damage Meter
- Most powerful, reliable, handsome, damage meter for World of Warcraft.
- MRT -- Notes, Raid cooldowns, and more
- Helpful addon for raiders, especially for raid leaders and officers.
- Echo Raid Tools -- Notes, Raid cooldowns, and more
- Echo Raid Tools is a World of Warcraft addon designed by Echo Esports to enhance raiding efficiency. It offers "Echo Approved" WeakAuras for each raid boss accessible through an in-game Dungeon Journal interface, allowing easy import and customization.
- Bartender -- Action Bar Changer
- Bartender4 is a comprehensive action bar replacement addon for World of Warcraft. It allows full customization of action bars, including scaling, alpha settings, and visibility based on macro conditions.
Divine Resonance
This aura shows how many Avenger's Shields you have left from Divine Resonance and when they are triggering.
Changes this Patch
Protection Paladin
Paladin:
- Seal of the Crusader healing reduced by 50%.
- Lightforged Blessing now heals 1% of health (was 2%).
- A Just Reward now has a more just reward, its healing increased by 140%.
- Blinding Light and Repentance now break on a damage threshold instead of breaking on any damage.
- Templar
- Empyrean Hammer now prefers player targets over creatures/summons.
- The Hammer of Light implementation has been revamped to resolve issues such as casting delays, tuning difficulties, and the limited scalability of its infrastructure.
- Hammer of Light now displays the correct amount of damage done by its secondary target damage effect for Retribution Paladin.
- Hammerfall internal cooldown reduced to 0.1 second.
- Lightsmith
- Tempered in Battle: Sacred Weapon’s health redistribution may only occur once per cast.
Protection:
- Strength in Adversity reduced to 3% parry per enemy struck (was 5%).
- Strength in Adversity now displays with stacks.
- Cooldown reduction from Uther’s Counsel reduced to 15% (was 30%).
- Refining Fire damage reduced by 30%.
- All ability damage increased by 15%
- Templar
- Undisputed Ruling has been updated – Hammer of Light grants Shield of the Righteous, erupts a Consecration beneath its target, and increases your Haste by 12% for 6 seconds. Additionally, Eye of Tyr grants 3 Holy Power.
FAQ
Protection Paladin
The biggest tip I can give is to always figure out why you died in any given scenario and how you can improve. Tanking is tough, with constant opportunities to better use your externals, rotation, and defensives. Recording your gameplay and reviewing Warcraft Logs are great methods. Being good at tanking requires cognitive flexibility—focus on what you could have done better instead of blaming others. This mindset is more rewarding and healthier for becoming a better tank!
Credits
Written By: Tief
Reviewed By: Rycn