Posted by Valaar on Thursday, February 26th, 2009 - 33 Comments
Tags: dual spec, healer, holy, Paladin, patch 3.1, protection, Tanks, World of Warcraft, wow
I’d like to talk about the Paladin class, but more specifically about the idea of dual speccing. I started WoW on the day it was released, and up until about six months ago, I was a retribution pally. I stuck to my guns and took all the punishment Blizzard gave us, but when they supposedly fixed us and gave us amazing DPS only to take it away a month later I finally had enough. It was then I decided to read up on tanking. I spent weeks researching the spec and trying out different talent specs to get the most out of my paladin. Currently I’ve become the Main Tank for my guild on Kargath, and we are kicking Naxx’s butt right now. A few weeks ago I got to a point where I was stuck, though. I’ve obtained every upgrade I possibly can for my tank spec outside of Naxx. So I asked myself, what do I do now?
I’m still running heroics and collecting badges for more gear, and during recent Naxx trips plate healing gear has been dropping left and right. Since nobody else wants it, I’ve started collecting it all. Now I’m spending those badges from heroics on healing gear. So aside from my tank gear I now have an epic healing set that’s got my skills as follows: 2005 Bonus Healing, 26% Crit rating, 388 mana regen and a 17K+ mana pool, all unbuffed.
Now that I have the gear, I’ve changed specs many times to work on my healing skills simply because I find it fun. The problem is I’ve done it so many times I’m capped at 50g per talent point reset. Personally I find this to be stupid and annoying. I know there are several things in the game that act as money sinks (Haris Pilton’s bag for instance) but respeccing?
Come 3.1, Blizzard is going to give us “Dual Specs” that will be 1000g and it will even change our glyphs and action bars. Great, but without an ETA on the horizon why don’t they just remove the fee to reset for now? Why are players penalized for wanting to try something new? I’ve even had to pay twice simply because I’ve put a talent point in the wrong spot once and had to reset (which they addressed finally). What’s worse is if I’m specced as a tank and my guild needs a healer, it costs me 100g to go holy and then back to protection.
Anyway, I’m curious to see how many more people are out there that play an active role in two specs in their guild and if they are tired of the fees. Do you think that while we wait for the dual spec feature, we should get the option to change for free or are you ok with paying 50g per switch till 3.1 and then paying another 1000g to have the option?
Related Posts: Dual Talent Specialization to Cost 1000 Gold, Why Stop At Dual Specs?, Are Dual-Specs Working Out?, Keeping Up with Specs - TalentChic and GlyphChic, Juggy’s Addons: Chronometer,
By Kalcifer on Thursday, February 26th, 2009 at 2:43 pm
First Maybe and great post. I have started a resto shaman but it’s getting harder and harder to level and i don’t want to have to respec everytime i want to heal an instance but 1000g at level 40 is impossible. Surely a better idea would be just to drop the fee for respeccing completely and then people would be just as happy without this whole dual speccing idea
By Dovehill on Thursday, February 26th, 2009 at 2:55 pm
There shouldn’t be a fee at all, one time fee fine, 50g per respec, that’s just stooooopid.
By rin on Thursday, February 26th, 2009 at 3:03 pm
Its weird that you should mention this because i am also a prot pally who is slowly moving towards healing!
I cant wait for the duel spec it will really help with this.
By Armeggadon on Thursday, February 26th, 2009 at 3:07 pm
If the guild needs you to play that role, they should be paying for it, not you. My guild will gladly pay my repair fees which are often over 100g, they should be willing to pay for changing roles if they need it as well.
I don’t feel that respeccing should be free, otherwise people would just start shouting what a group needs, respec to it, then head to the dungeon. There would be no point to play classes other than paladin and druid because then you can cover tanking, healing, and dps’ing.
By Sno on Thursday, February 26th, 2009 at 3:07 pm
dual speccing finally im fine with 10g a respec but 50g is ridiculous and the bars thing is just perfect
By Malinko on Thursday, February 26th, 2009 at 3:09 pm
This isn’t really a change for hunters. Changing DPS spec to… DPS spec?
By sevink on Thursday, February 26th, 2009 at 3:19 pm
I respec maybe 3-4 times a week and with how easy money is to get in Wrath its really not an issue. If i do my JC daily every day (about 15 mins) I make 120-150g. If I do my titansteel cd every day thats another 100. Gold really isn’t much of an issue like it used to be. Professions are your best friend.
By Gerandor on Thursday, February 26th, 2009 at 3:20 pm
my main being a warlock, i dont see much of a problem with speccing or respeccing. I can either DPS, or DPS, which makes it very easy, so the one thing im going to be using the dual spec thing for, is switching between a Demonology daily based spec and a destruction raiding based spec..
By HerofTime on Thursday, February 26th, 2009 at 3:22 pm
This is a great idea. I just switched guilds and, to suit the needs of the guild i whipped out the healing set I had been collecting over the last 5 months. I love healing, but tanking is my first WoW passion. So, what am I to do? I heal for my guild in Naxx 25 because they are overflowing with tanks. I have respecced once or twice to switch my healing spec and to tank a few isntances. I would love the waiving of fees just for the next few weeks or months till 3.1.
By Roriah on Thursday, February 26th, 2009 at 3:26 pm
I respec at least twice a week as a priest, be it for raids or heroics. Shadow to holy/disc has always been a pain, and I’ve had to write down the specs and paste them on the wall behind my computer.
Gold, however, IS an issue for me, since I have two 80s already (one of which JUST got an epic flying mount) and two approaching the need for level 77 flying training, as well as four lower characters that will soon need epic ground mounts. It will be tough for me to mess with dual-specs, and this has made me want to stop leveling all my hybrid classes, at least for a while (i.e., my 73 shaman, by 76 deathknight, and my 57 boomkin) so I can scrape together enough money. I have an estimate of about 7k-g needed, fairly soon.
I will definitely want the offspec for my priest and my shaman, though, and possibly my moonkin as well.
By Sensualcake on Thursday, February 26th, 2009 at 3:30 pm
With the way things are on the PTR at the moment, you don’t need a lexicon of power to switch between your two specs. All you do is press a button, wait for 5 seconds, and viola! You’ve just switched specs, along with your action bars and glyphs.
If it stays the way it is right now, for the amount of time and gold this feature would save me in the long run, 1000 gold is a bargain. 2-3k gold is more like what I would have been expecting to pay for this type of luxury.
As for removing the cost of respecing, I’ll have to disagree with that. When the next patch comes out, there are going to be plenty of characters that “are too casual” and “don’t have the time to save up that much money to pay for the feature”. Therefor, they are going to have to resort to going back to town and respecing that way. If blizzard removes the cost of respecing now, they would have to keep it that way even after dual specs comes out. And I believe that dual specs would lose some of its “pizzaz” if that were to happen.
As for the subject on if respecing fees should be removed entirely….. that’s another story for another day >_<
By marsh on Thursday, February 26th, 2009 at 3:39 pm
I play as a mage for my main. I’m eagerly anticipating the dual spec feature so that I can have a raid spec and a pvp spec since I love both.
By Nebyula on Thursday, February 26th, 2009 at 4:19 pm
I play a holy priest, and I’ll buy the dual spec feature just so I can heal as disc instead?
I also play an affliction warlock, and I’ll buy the dual spec feature just so I can dps as destro instead?
I can’t wait =)
…..No seriously, I’m allergic to respeccing, because I fall in love with the first spec I try, always. My warlock has been affliction since level 10, and yes, my priest was holy since 10, I levelled her as a healy girl. I love both specs, no matter how many nerfs blizz throws at them.
But this is a good excuse to finally get my BF to stop yelling at me to try somethng new =P
By Krytus on Thursday, February 26th, 2009 at 5:07 pm
I have an 80 Retri Pally, an 80 Resto Shaman and currently lvling a 73 Prot Pally (I didn’t feel like respeccting and carrying 3+ sets of gear -retri, holy, damage mitigation, high stamina, high block value, resistance gear-so I made another pally for tanking) As you can see my 3 higher toons are hybrids, i love the idea of double-specs but i still have to figure it out what am I going to do with 6 specs in 3 toons! =S
By Sathas on Thursday, February 26th, 2009 at 5:12 pm
I CONCUR
By Jaceman on Thursday, February 26th, 2009 at 5:28 pm
people say that classes such as hunters rogues mages and locks its not gona matter going from dps to dps …….but you could also have a PvP spec or an lvling or a instance spec like i do for my hunter i use BM for lvling cuz im to weak MM but in instance MM seems to give me more dps
By dakkon on Thursday, February 26th, 2009 at 5:44 pm
ok i saw some one say something about hunters…well as a 80 hunter here is how i look at the dual specing…you have 2 specs u can do one obvious choice would be a pvp and pve….another say ur surv right now..so raid utility and high dps…well if you need more dmg output for a specific boss you could go mm for the more shots and more dmg on a single boss..its simple as that..diffrent things for diffrent needs..i honestly think dual specing is nice and going to be awesome…as for the cost…to me the cost can get outragious..but i also agree if a guild needs you to fill a certain role then why cant they pay you to go that role..at least one way…so ur cost is only 50 not 100g..
By drooid on Thursday, February 26th, 2009 at 6:24 pm
being not a harcore player and in a smaal giuld i love the idea of dual spec . i play a 80 druid tank so if there are not healers on i could switch and solve the problem rather than the old way getting new glyphs and everything the gold cost adds up fast …..
By Laeltis on Thursday, February 26th, 2009 at 7:07 pm
@Malinko
True, but Hunter’s can use it for PvP DPS and PvE DPS. which is BM-Survival. (I’m a hunter)
@Armeggadon
That’s bullshit. People play different classes because they like them. They’re tailored to each persons personality in a way.
Anyway, great post.
GJ ProjectLore
By Micah on Thursday, February 26th, 2009 at 9:17 pm
zomg you play on kargath look me up Micaman on my lock and Bluknight on my DK
By Irishsnout on Thursday, February 26th, 2009 at 9:44 pm
paying for a respec is dumb. I have a lvl capped resto shaman who just started with heroics. I reall love healing but questing with my current spec is horrible. I am looking forward to the dual spec patch to really start playing that toon again. Blizz needs to rethink the respec fees.
By Thorrhan on Thursday, February 26th, 2009 at 9:44 pm
I’ve recently gone full holy on my pally, and I really miss the dps. The idea of dual speccing is awesome, since I have full sets of Ret and Holy. I try not to respecc more than once per month, especially when main guild healers respecc to dps. So I’m at the point where if I respec back to Ret, the chance my guild and I running any heroics or raids gets lower substantially.
I do think blizz should at least lower the fee, at the moment, not necessarilly remove the fee. This will encourage players to try new specs, so they can choose which spec becomes thier dual spec.
I personally enjoy Holy and Ret, so they are my obvious choices. (I also have no prot gear)
By Moose on Thursday, February 26th, 2009 at 9:53 pm
I personaly like the change they made to the dual spec by bringing it down to 40, and I’m pretty cool with the 1000 gold fee to boot.
Up till around that time you can pretty much sham an instance. You can get by with a fury warrior tanking razorfen, or a balance druid healing shadowfang, but once you start hitting up ZF and Sunken Temple and the like you really start to need toons that are specced for the job, even more so for outland. I see this as giving new toons the first 40 levels to get familiar with the new class and the last 40 as giving them the tools to prep for endgame by being able to run more instances along the way. The gold thing at 40 is ok too, the original idea behind this was only giving it to a max level char because they don’t want to overwhelm new players, this stays true to that idea (and it’s a good one IMO). New players likely won’t be able to bring 1K gold together by 40 (it can happen though) so unless they put in some real work it keeps it out of their hands and they won’t be overwhelmed by trying to learn two playstyles. This ammount dosen’t put it out of the relm of possiability for new players (my wife started a toon on a brandnew server and had 300-400 gold before she was level 15 just by mining and buying up/reselling copper ore and bars that were listed low) but it makes it unlikely.
Now with all that said, I’m not real hot on the idea, but it will give me the chance to go back to a SL/FG build for dailies and farming and a deep destro build for raiding/heroics, that is if Destro is still going to be decent after all the changes they make to us before 3.1 goes live.
By Robojessus on Thursday, February 26th, 2009 at 10:10 pm
I am thrilled that blizz finally does something other than nerf my boomkin. i can’t wait for it. as for lowering the respec cost for now i think its fine no reason to lowering it
By Balius on Thursday, February 26th, 2009 at 10:31 pm
In my opinion, it’s fake money in a video game, and hording it seems silly. Especially since 50G is a trivial fee when there are daily quests worth 13 gold that take less than two minutes to do each. Meanwhile, gold-glutted max-level characters drive the price of low level goods upward over time, while high level items drop in value, and it’s only by bleeding each server of gold that the AH doesn’t become entirely unusable. If anything, the price jump per respec should be larger, to leech more fake money from players.
Anyway…
You can’t really complain that future changes are not already implemented unless you’ve lived in a time traveling RV for most of your life and are having trouble readjusting to linear timelines. The patch is not out right now, it’s under development, however close to done it is. Even when it comes out, though, dual specs and respecing will be two different entities, one does not replace the other, and the fees will still exist. Some people will not spend the 1000G and will simply respec as becomes infrequently necessary. Others will save money by buying into the new system, since they just flip-flop between the same two specs.
Blizzard can’t grant boons on the future actions you might take, nor should they be concerned about how much money you would be saving had they used your time-traveling RV to add dual specs to vanilla WoW.
By Dan on Friday, February 27th, 2009 at 12:56 am
Although the Duel Speccing won’t be effecting any of us hunters, you have to remember that the gear sets thing they are implemented will be costing money(the one that lets you switch gear on the fly, opening up bag space), as well as the ability for hunters to summon pets from the stables. Both being 1000g a piece.
This expansion is becoming one big money sink. Knowing I have to save that much more money for an Alt I’ll ever want to level up makes me not want to level one that much more. I’ve been eyeing the Pally class for some time now but now I don’t know if I want to spend the money to make is as usable as it could be. Hmmmm Decisions.
By hai on Friday, February 27th, 2009 at 4:48 am
dont fucking type First!
By Voldenmist on Friday, February 27th, 2009 at 6:17 am
ou know, I’ve never really thought of that beforehand, but yea, it makes alot of sense that they should remove it. I mean I’m not activily playing two roles or anything, but still makes sense.
By Rasmus on Friday, February 27th, 2009 at 6:21 am
I am going to buy the Dual Spec as soon i can. Since i am enhance shammy ( Like Juggy ;D) I am often asked to respec healer for smaller raids and stuff. And the constant change of glyphs and actionbars is annóying. So i am looking forward to it
By dagimp007 on Friday, February 27th, 2009 at 8:32 am
You will run into the same problem healing… except you are out of the fight and your gear repair bill will be less on non wipe runs. while healing…. so IMO its pointless to switch back and forth.. now when 3.1 releases my prot pally will ethere have a 2nd spec for healing or… have a 2nd spec for PVP.. it all depends on what the guild needs and if i am still with the guild
By Alayea on Friday, February 27th, 2009 at 11:28 am
I love my shaman, who was my very first toon. I leveled her all the way to 54 before having it explained to me that “no, you really shouldn’t have the talents all over the place.” From thereon, I was a full-blooded enhancement nightmare against my PvE foes. (Don’t mention PvP, though. : / )
But then something happened. See, I was guildless at 70 for awhile until I joined up with another guild. I got to 80 when WotLK came out and I was having fun as dps. Sadly, my guild was frequently in need of a healer for stuff and I was the one hit up most with “hey, could you heal?” My respec cost zoomed up from 5g to the cap in no time. That was when I had to get realistic about what I wanted and what the guild needed. Been stuck as resto ever since then.
So I’m rather mixed about the dual-specing concept. I agree that it shouldn’t be cheap, but at the same time… Eh, I guess it matters little if I have a slim prospect of getting into a pug raid anyway. The dual-spec thing may not concern me, but I’ll still be keeping tabs on this matter.
By bullrog on Sunday, March 1st, 2009 at 10:35 am
Im a holy/ret pally im currently respeccin twice a day atleast and in total ive spent 5k+ on respecs but the gd thing is ma guild has started paying for it seeing as Im doing it for the guild so they can raid plus they are paying for dualspec when it comes out.
By Prower on Sunday, March 1st, 2009 at 3:11 pm
ok I wrote an essay for yall but none would read it so here is the highlights….
Duelspeccing:
max level hybrids: WIN
everything else: FAIL
and the players who are least affected by the changes it makes:
Max Level Raiders
Beacuse they can cope with the current system,there are plenty of other problems that could have been addressed instead …
Enalagy:
blizzard have pulled a thorn from a man with a broken back !
Popular saying:
There are bigger fish to fry