Question of AoE GrindingFollow

As far as the minimum level, I can't tell you exactly. You can tackle numerous opponents even at level 20, but most of the main tools you will get later. Speaking of tools, here's what you'll need:

Blessing of Sanctuary: You get this via talent at level 30. This is the blessing you want, even if the number might look rather small-ish (10 at rank 1), remember that you'll benefit more from it, the more mobs you fight against. 5 mobs means 50 less damage each round of hits. On top of this, Blessing of Sanctuary gives retaliatory damage everytime you block with a shield. And trust me, with Redoubt (must have talent) you will block a lot of hits.

Aura of Retribution: Another must have. Again, the numbers on it are small, but hell, we Paladins are made of a whole screen filled with small numbers. At level 30 you'll have rank 2 of AoR, which does 8 damage per hit. Again, more mobs are on you, the more damage you do.

Consecration: Area of Effect DoT spell. A mana hog. It's very useful, but you have to remember not to spam it everytime you can, cause it will drain your mana pretty quickly. I'd say, if you have to slam it, do it when you're refreshing your seals, so you don't needlessly interrupt your mana regeneration.

Seal of Light / Judgement of Light: SoL is another skill you get at level 30. If you feel like you can handle a group of mobs, don't use it, cast Seal of Righteousness instead. But for long fights this is absolutely necessary, as it can heal you each time you hit a mob and it procs about 70% of hits (i could be wrong, but it really procs very often). If I remember correctly, at level 30, a Judgement of Light will give you +25 hps and Seal of Light will give +39. Yes, these stack. And they stack with Reckoning, meaning that one hit might give you +39, +39, +25 and +25 hps for 128 total hps healed. To put it in a perspective, at lvl 38 I tackled three elites in SM (lvl 37 and 38) and after the fight I had lost something like 200 HP. That's how effective this skill is.

Reckoning: Amazing talent. At lvl 35, after putting 5 talent points into it, it will give you 10% chance of doing 4 extra attacks in 8 seconds after being hit. If you fight several mobs at a time it means that you'll have it triggering one after another. And since each hit you make when it's active, gives you an extra hit, it also gives you another proc of the seal you use.

Holy Shield: You get it via a talent at lvl 40. Use sparringly or you'll run out of mana. Basicaly it increases your chance to block by 30% for 10 seconds or 4 charges, while doing retaliatory damage each time you'll hit.

And another crucial thing is a shield spike. Basically it's an item that Blacksmiths mount on your shield (uses up the enchant slot) that gives retaliatory damage each time you block a hit. The damage is small, but it adds up. Plus, like I said, we're made of small numbers, but we flood the screen with them.

That's basically it. To recap. Slap on Retri Aura, Blessing of Sanctuary, Seal of Light (or Righteousness if your not facing difficult enemies), use Consecration and Holy Shield sparringly and get the best shield spike you can get. I hope I didn't forget anything. Oh, and one more thing. Get Imp. Righteous Fury and have it on at all times. It reduces all damage taken by a small ammount, but it'll help you big time.

That's nice, really. But judging that the OP asks what is the minimum level that you can start AoE grinding, I doubt he'll get it anytime soon. At lower levels I'd recommend Vile Protector, a horde-side quest reward for doing SM: http://wow.allakhazam.com/db/item.html?witem=7747 - 1% proc chance, but it's nice when fighting a lot of mobs. But SM offers something even better:
Aegis of the Scarlet Commander:
http://wow.allakhazam.com/db/item.html?witem=7726

Unfortunately, shields with retaliatory damage are pretty scarce, especially pre-60. If you can get your hands on one, do it, it'll help.

Edited, Apr 17th 2007 8:47pm by Kahmeel

Nah, it's not. Really. Getting Aegis is just a matter of doing a couple Scarlet Monastery runs, and this is a world drop, meaning it's got almost no chance of dropping - look at the statistics in wow.allakhazam.com - it dropped 188 times in 11 million kills. So the chance is less than 0.01%. And if you'll see it in the AH, it will have an insane price just because it's purple (Alla says that the lowest AH price was 89g). You'll be better off with Vile Defender or Aegis (and really, Aegis isn't that hard to obtain.

EDIT:

As far as weapons are concerned, try to get something that is 2.00 or faster, so you'll get all hits from reckoning. There was a nice post somewhere around these boards about reckoning vs speed, where someone tried to figure out if slower weapon, higher damage would overcome the loss of a reckoning hit, but I can't find it now.

Edited, Apr 18th 2007 8:06am by Kahmeel

I don't really agree wit that sentiment, I guess if it works for you, go with it. But it doesn't for me.

I'm spec'ed prot41/holy11, level 62 now, I use holy shield absolutely everytime it's available, just about. However, I don't use seal of light that often, I prefer to use judgement of wisdom and seal of wisdom. I prefer to receive the mana back, because then I can choose which I receive in its place, by either casting a heal spell or casting a damage spell, with seal of light, I don't get that choice, and I often run out of mana.

When I tank in instances, my spiritual attunement gives me back so much mana if someone else is healing me, and I can keep spamming holy shield, and have 75% of my mana left at the end of the fight.

I am a blacksmith(armorsmith), I do have a mithril shield spike. I'd like to get a thorium one, but only one person has recipe for sale, and he's retarded trying to sell it for 167g or so, no one is going to pay that. I'll just get exalted with thrallmar and get a better shield spike.

I wouldn't trade that mithril spike for any other enchantment, ok well, maybe one that increased my block percentage substantially.

edit: oh, i forgot to give you the reason I use holy shield everytime its available. And that's because it increases your block rate by 30% which is amazing, its like triggering redoubt whenever you want, plus you get the 150 damage it does(at my level, its starting to do a bit more, i see 170 if I just crusader), I've got some spell damage+ too though. Plus if redoubt triggers on top of it, its amazing because they stack, 60% increase to shield blocks.

It last for 10 sec and the cooldown is 10 sec so you can keep holy shield up inevitably if you want.

How I feel with my current build, as long as they aren't elite mobs, I can very literally take out a group of 5 mobs aoe grinding, without really being in any danger, by that I mean I never felt the need to bubble or use a potion or anything.


Edited, Apr 19th 2007 11:13am by djzombie

Edited, Apr 19th 2007 11:14am by djzombie

Depends on the area. If the runners will bring too many mobs for you to handle, JoJ is what you need. Otherwise let them run I guess. They always come back. >_>

As for healers, it depends too. If you're fighting only casters it'll be a pain cause Reckoning won't proc often. But if you're fighting something like 4 melees and a healer, target the healer first. The 4 melees on you will trigger Reckoning often enough to burn him down before he can heal. Use HoJ as needed, too.

Not really sure how "typical" this build is going to be, but I've taken all the info I've learned off the Pros here and made a build. Don't base your 2.1 Respec off of this unless someone else confirms it. Just a way to get an idea of what to do.


http://www.worldofwarcraft.com/info/classes/paladin/talents.html?055500000000000000000502513350002152015010500000000000000000000

Edited, Apr 21st 2007 1:29pm by Jungabon

Im going to have to disagree with this statement. I spam this thing like nuts as long as I'm fighting melee. What I use VERY sparingly is Consecration, I don't see the damage/mana ratio worth it unless I use it at the beginning with 7-9 mobs on me at once, then I feel like Im doing enough damage to compensate for the ridiculous mana cost.

As for Holy Shield, it's not that much mana, and if you use SoW on yourself or w/e you're attacking it's 100% worth it. It's more damage output, procs BoS, and with Redoubt you're always blocking.

Other than that, awesome post.