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Sunday, March 7, 2010

The Bunsen Burner Problem: Why Paladins are so good

At yesterday's deathfest my given character was a Bunsen Burner. He had the ability to cast flames. He could also hit 3 targets he had already hit with flames with more flames. Or he could make one target easier to hit and take more damage from flames. Or he could cause a gas leak and do more damage with his flames.

He had no other abilities. This would become a problem when he needed to distract an enemy or to heal himself. Because he couldn't. All he could do was blow everything up.

This actually does make sense in the context of the subtitle- trust me.

See, what makes paladins very powerful is their versatility. In a pinch, with all the other healers down and the boss at 1% a ret or prot paladin can just drop whatever they are doing and start throwing heals on those who need it.

They can also manage other players threat, damage intake, and diseases, magic and poisons through the use of their 'hand' spells and cleanse. Their various seals and judgements allow them even more versatility when raiding or PvPing. They can change their playstyle abruptly with a few quick changes in their choice of seals, aura and judgement.

Very few other classes have such diverse functionality. Druids can also jump into the healer's spot or in some cases the tanks and shamans can do healing as well.

However, the pure classes have a very difficult time when it comes to doing anything other than hitting the boss. Warlocks, for example can't really help the party at all except for using fear- which often doesn't work and often is not actually helpful.

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