Cataclysm Protection Paladin review!

[kageneko]

This is still missing a ton of stuff from the PTR, so it's not the talent set I'm looking forward to.

ICC-geared people should be able to level just fine, but I feel sorry for people who go to Hyjal in leveling gear. Avoidance is pretty much non-existent in Cataclysm. Allern is running around with about 10% dodge, 10% parry, and 21% block. Block is a flat 30%, which is great for bosses, crappy for trash (and really crappy for old school raids).

Mana regeneration is no problem at all anymore. Holy crap.

Say goodbye to Improved Hammer of Justice. Protadins still do not have a real interrupt.

We have no way to do AOE debuffs.

There is no rotation anymore, there is only pain. I am completely serious. Protection's use of Holy Power is all about pain and suffering. It's practically impossible to have holy shield running before a battle now, and it takes 1.5-3 seconds to get it going. It takes 10.5-13.5 seconds to get Shield of the Righteous going. That's bad... for the DPS. ShoR is the #1 threat source for paladins and if it takes 10-13 seconds to get it out, threat will need to be watched hard.

Crusader Strike or Hammer of the Righteous are the only Holy Power generators and they're on the same 4.5s cooldown. This is the main cause of the ShoR pain. If Holy Power could be generated in other ways, it would ease a lot of the issues. All of our other abilities are on different cooldowns and, as a bonus, we have an ability that refreshes the cooldown of Avenger's Shield (which is also excellent threat).

Expect to have empty GCDs where everything is on cooldown and you're just listening to music or something. Most of them are single empty GCDs, but we do have some double empty GCDs.

I cannot imagine trying to tank without Power Auras and a cooldown monitor (like SexyCooldown) to keep track of things.

On a bright note: I think I've got less buttons on my bars now. And Inquisition and Word of Glory both suck.