Blizzard….Fix me….Please?

The major reason why you’re sitting at 9th-10th: you’re not in a group with a Shaman dropping WF Totem. It is a huge DPS boost to Paladins, pretty good for rogues, DPS warriors and the shaman themselves, and really is required to start breaking the top-7 consistently (many raiding Ret-Paladins see it as required). Unfortunately, you need to be pushing your GM hard for this buff, and optimal group composition, at a time when you may be worried that you aren’t pushing your weight in the raid.

As an aside, I’m surprised that your raid is running so many Paladins and so few Rogues and no DPS warrior. If you had them it would be much easier to make your case for a WF group, as they get much more of a benefit from WF than GoA.

As for 2k AP, yep that is pretty much a cap for Paladins. Even those Paladins such as Zurm (and I believe Avitus, EU armoury is down) on the EJ forums are packing only 2k in Sunwell. The key is though that they grab other stats (Esp. Expertise and Haste), min-max to the extent that they take up Leatherworking for Haste Drums, chain-consecrate @Rank1-4 and chain-pot Haste/Fel Mana. It can make a huge difference. Try not to see 2k as a cap, but rather an optimal target around which you decide other DPS stats (Expertise etc.). Don’t worry too much if you drop a little AP for a lot of Exp.

Oh, and you’re right about strength Gems, socket them in such a way as to ensure you still get the Meta bonus, but don’t forget to keep those Oranges, Greens and Purples as efficient as possible in terms of +Str and +Crit. Socketing for Meta’s are probably the most complicated part of gearing up and can really screw with your head if you let them. Check out Bananashoulders.com for a full list of all the available Gems.

Keep plugging away, improving your gear (got a Shard of Contempt yet? ) and fighting your corner. But above all work with what you have at your disposal, I’d be extremely surprised if Paladins got anything huge DPS-wise in Wrath – or at least anything that scales better than that acquired by other DPSers come the expansion – so the better a handle you get on what’s great for you the better it’ll serve you in the long run.

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Have fun with AoC if you do decide to give it a try, early reports of the released game (as opposed to the Beta’s) sound very promising.

Well, again the Math is on Elitistjerks, it’s better to swap out one of those Rogues for yourself (and sticking the Rogue in a secondary melee /w Hunter, Feral Druid and Shaman dropping GoA) for your raids overall DPS (and your sanity). Still, I wouldn’t want to be the one deciding which Rogue gets to be dropped.

I said you don’t seem to be in a group with a Shaman because the 3 WWS you linked earlier didn’t indicate any WF Procs or Buffs, but looking again you were obviously with a Shaman because you had the Mana Spring Buff. Perhaps you need to have a discussion with your Shaman about that (you may of course be out of range of the totem effect, of s/he may have died too soon) as it’s well worth tracking down and is a large percentage of your total potential DPS.

And I feel for you wrt the lack of Heroics, if your guild doesn’t want to go there’s probably not much you can do as a Ret Paladin :/. I can only suggest pushing you guildmate more if you can, perhaps by subtly reminding them of the Tanking trinket which drops there and that your DPS is still Raid DPS.

http://elitistjerks.com/733943-post3860.html

Go there, read the linked discussion. Then go buy Flask of Relentless Assault, Roasted Clefthoof, and get rid of all your weighstones. Threaten the life of your shaman to drop Windfury Totem. If the rogues aren’t asking for it too, they don’t understand how much of a benefit it is to them. Windfury Totem is a big damage boost to rogues, warriors, and ret paladins, larger than Grace of Air, and the largest boost is experienced by two-hander wielders.