No class changes were made — the "OP" crying from ally just stopped - Now lets talk about the real problem

[Holydruid]

For months, this forum was flooded with threads demanding nerfs to Shaman burst and Feral Druid damage. No dev changes were ever made in response.
Now BGs are stacked with 50%+ Paladin on Alliance side, Horde is losing games it used to win clean, and suddenly the forum's gone dead quiet. No new "please nerf" threads. No outrage. Funny how that works.

The consensus was that Holy Paladin (often "Holy/Ret" hybrid) was the single most broken PvP and PvE healer kit on the server.
Holy Pallies were by far the best healers in PvE.. Nordanaar logs proved that, top healers all pally.
Arena when it was released, was mostly paladin team in the highest rating.
In AB, defenders on Ally side are always pallies. They can keep people busy for ages without problem.

This isn't a new complaint, either, paladin players themselves have admitted this for years, on the turtlewow forum:

"Holy and Prot in PvP"
A poster flatly states Holy/Ret is broken, capable of 3-second kills via Holy Strike, while keeping full plate, Immunity Shields, and Cleanse, nothing like the glass-cannon burst classes it gets compared to.
https://web.archive.org/web/20260109010 ... hp?t=13175
(before 1.18 pvp changes)

"Hows holy pal in pvp?"
A Paladin player says Holy Pala is by far the strongest PvP healer after the CC2 patch, calling geared Holy Paladins "almost unkillable" 1v1, beaten only by a best-in-slot Warrior.
https://web.archive.org/web/20260422134 ... hp?t=19520
(after 1.18 pvp changes)

"Ideas for fixing paladins"
A player states outright that Turtle Paladin has no hard counter and dominates every class, calling it a "broken/overpowered class."
https://web.archive.org/web/20260422172 ... hp?t=14918
(after 1.18 pvp changes)

"The Holy Paladin Problem"
Even in a thread arguing for buffs to Paladin's PvE healing, a reply flatly states Holy Pala is "already stupidly OP in pvp."
https://web.archive.org/web/20260409124 ... hp?t=20287
(before 1.18 pvp changes)

"Holy paladin needs changes"
A 20-year Paladin veteran openly says current gear makes Holy Paladins too hard to kill and calls for stamina to be stripped from their PvP sets specifically because a single DPS can't bring one down.
https://web.archive.org/web/20260422134 ... hp?t=24206
(after 1.18 pvp changes)

"PvP Update — Potential Changes"
A detailed dev-facing proposal lays out that Paladins can cleanse, immune slows, self-heal, stun, out-run most classes, hit hard, and wear plate all at once — concluding fights against them are "absurdly hard" to win.
https://web.archive.org/web/20260411222 ... p?p=124873
(before 1.18 changes)

Let's actually compare what "OP" means:

Shaman Enhance/Shockaman:
hits hard, but it's mitigated by armor and the Shaman has zero defensive kit to fall back on afterward.
Focus the Shaman, the burst stops. (they also need to cast to heal, no holy shocks)

Feral Druid:
Strong sustained pressure and flag carrying, but no plate, no bubble, no Lay on Hands, no Freedom. You can actually kill a Feral if you commit. They either need to choose between High armor, low damage (bear), squishy high damage (cat), or speed with no defensive or damage (travel form). Catch them in the right form and hes dead.

Holy/Ret Paladin:
comparable or better burst than Shaman (Holy Strike hitting for 3k+ that can't even be reduced by armor), stacked on top of:
- Plate armor
- Bubble (full immunity while still being able to stop caps in AB)
- Lay on Hands
- Blessing of Freedom (no CC sticks)
- Near-universal dispel (literally everything except curses in 1 button)
- Best sustained healing in the game, done essentially for free through Holy Strike procs
- Holy Shock for insta heals

That's not a DPS class with a burst window.
That's a class that
- Bursts like a DPS
- Heals like the best healer in the game
- Tanks like it's nothing, all in the same GCD.
There's no "commit and kill it" window like there is with Shaman or Feral, because you can't actually kill it with the amount of defensives and sustain they have.

So this isn't Horde tilt talking.
This is paladin mains on TurtleWoW, over multiple years, describing their own class as broken.
The difference is that back then it was inconvenient for Alliance to agree, and now it's inconvenient for them to complain.

If burst + survivability + healing all being top-tier on one class wasn't a problem when it was inconvenient for Alliance, it's not suddenly a problem now that it's working for them.
Pick a standard and apply it consistently, either burst-plus-survivability is OP regardless of which faction benefits.

[Duraluminium]

The main topic about shamans was not moved to this forum and was locked.
Devs told that they are not going to fix it until January.
The real problem is still there, we just gave up talking about it with no real feedback.

p.s. Also after reading your topic name I decided not to waste time on reading all the stuff below, cause it's obviously is just a pile of biased nonsense

[Knifewrench]

The main topic about shamans was not moved to this forum and was locked.
Devs told that they are not going to fix it until January.
The real problem is still there, we just gave up talking about it with no real feedback.

p.s. Also after reading your topic name I decided not to waste time on reading all the stuff below, cause it's obviously is just a pile of biased nonsense

Guy is cluelue, thinking shocksham need casting or resto shams not getting healinh from earthshield or their ls with earthshield WICH can be cast during silence and school locks. All 3specs are overtuned by far. Horde has lack of healers. Op eveb plays as pve tank in pvp then crys about not being able to kill a healer. Also holy pvp doesnt even touch retri tree in correct build. Nor can we burst people to deatj , also thinks freedom makes u stun imune. I just cant with this nonsense man.

[Crackadia]

Huh

[Duraluminium]

Guy is cluelue, thinking shocksham need casting or resto shams not getting healinh from earthshield or their ls with earthshield WICH can be cast during silence and school locks. All 3specs are overtuned by far. Horde has lack of healers. Op eveb plays as pve tank in pvp then crys about not being able to kill a healer. Also holy pvp doesnt even touch retri tree in correct build. Nor can we burst people to deatj , also thinks freedom makes u stun imune. I just cant with this nonsense man.

Lol so my decision not to read his wall of text was actually a good one

[Spicyahi]

It's always nice when the two most deranged active posters are flooding the thread. One is lobbing insults because you disagree with him and the other is just flat out admitting he's posting in bad faith, but he must love the smell of his own farts that much!

As for the topic, yea. Holy pal is da goat, and sham is very manageable if opponents have a brain, but otherwise a nightmare.

[Wubc]

As a resto shammy, I might of course have some bias based on perspective, but generally I can see some merits for the complaints, but if I were to compare resto shaman to holy paladin purely in a PVP healing context, I don't see how a paladin does not come out on top every time. The toolkit is simply better.

Now, that is not a complaint. Some classes are better at some things. Just the way it works. That's fine. And from what I was seeing the issues with Shamans were generally more towards them being tanks while maintaining substantial burst potential (i.e. enhancement/spellhance specs) not specifically purely resto shamans. Hell, when I que, I rarely even see other healers on our side. Yes, resto is can be quite tanky. But I would argue it kinda has to be (to some extent), due to not having some of the tools other classes have, like CC, mobility, immunities, instant casts and so on. So, I would simply hope that any possible balancing done takes in to account the impact of changes to different specs. "Enhancement shaman burst is high and they are tanky, therefore nerf resto" makes very little sense to me.

I do however echo, from both sides, how the situation has seemingly changed from solely the team compositions queing changing. Alliance now seems to have substantially more healers. Again, not a complaint, just an observation. One team having 3-4 times the healers is going to outlast the other as the damage potential for landing kills is still absolutely present even with the increased amount of healers. This is not an alliance problem though, this is a horde problem. However, it also highlights how little of a change was required to flip the situation.

[Knifewrench]

just another bg where micayah basicly solod whole WSG. but shocksham aint op man.

[Defiant]

This is exactly what I predicted. Too funny.

just another bg where micayah basicly solod whole WSG. but shocksham aint op man.

Have you tried getting five of your team mates to focus fire him down because that would 100% kill him. It wouldnt kill a Paladin though. Hell you could have 20 people trying to kill a Paladin and they would survive at least 12 seconds while preventing all 20 of you from capping a flag in AB.

As the gear improves across the board Shaman will be less and less relevant and Paladins will become absolute gods.

This is why the Devs dont want to make knee jerk class balance changes at the start of the server.

[Knifewrench]

This is exactly what I predicted. Too funny.

just another bg where micayah basicly solod whole WSG. but shocksham aint op man.

Have you tried getting five of your team mates to focus fire him down because that would 100% kill him. It wouldnt kill a Paladin though. Hell you could have 20 people trying to kill a Paladin and they would survive at least 12 seconds while preventing all 20 of you from capping a flag in AB.

As the gear improves across the board Shaman will be less and less relevant and Paladins will become absolute gods.

This is why the Devs dont want to make knee jerk class balance changes at the start of the server.

unlike you i played on TA, and pvp'd as shaman vs pals. u are delusional.