Spec and glyph for what your do

As much as many of us would like to claim otherwise - we are not in one of the top 25 guilds in the world. Hell, I'm pleased that we've managed to eek into the top 10 on Stormscale - though I'm hoping that we'll be pushing a little higher and faster with the content patch that we should see around May or June.



Now, I mention this because I've seen quite a few blog posts and forum threads about proper raid specs and glyphs. Discussions of Tower of Radiance vs Blessed Life - Improved Judgements vs Eternal Glory - and should you go for Cleanse, Aura Mastery, or the Last Word. There are a lot of discussions about how you should spend your Holy Power as well - on Light of the Dawn or Word of Glory.



The bottom line



Unfortunately, there's no hard and fast answer for any of these questions. What you can't do however is look at one Paladin's build and copy it, and expect it to work as well for you. The reason for this is, we're all raiding different levels of content with entirely different groups. Lets look at some of the more common builds I've seen, and some reasons why they work better (and what glyphs you should be using) in certain instances.



A baseline build



This is what I consider to be my baseline build - 33/5/3. This build will server you well in pretty much any circumstance you might find yourself in (PVEwise anyway). You have access to all the tools you might need, loads of hit from your Spirit, and a 10yd boost to your judgement spell. You gain the ability to cleanse magic debuffs, as well as all the defensive and offensive cooldown reductions. This spec works very well when you're starting out in 5 mans and heroic dungeons, and has served me well so far (11/12).



Gaining more Holy Power



Now, if you're getting into tougher content, or need to generate more Holy Power, this build is looking to work really well. It's still a 33/5/3 build, but we're giving up 5yds of Judgement, and one point in Last Word. This build requires you to have enough spirit to support getting hit from only 50% of it, which you should have by the time you're in 346 gear (unless you've just said bugger off to Spirit).



You can work this build a little bit, depending on your raid composition. If you have enough cleansers in the raid, you can drop Sacred Cleansing for 1/2 Imp Judgements. I would highly recommend you keep Aura Mastery though, as it is an excellent mitigation tool.



Switching to Light of the Dawn



This is a setup I would only recommend for 25m progression raiding. All of your Holy Power will be going to LoD casts, so go ahead and drop the points in Eternal Glory in exchange for Imp Judgements. You will want the extra range, plus you'll want to make sure you glyph for it.



Glyphs you can move



Beacon of Light - Until recently, I've been running with BoL glyphed, but I've found that I don't have to recast it often in raids. I've even begun to doubt its usefulness in heroics, since you can always stop and drink. If you're switching BoL targets regularly in raids this will really help, but you're spending a GCD to save about 1400 mana. Why am I using this again?



Cleansing - I only run this glyph on Cho'gal, and only because it's so important to get the corruption cleansed ASAP. Once we're ruining with two priests in the raid, this will go off my list even for that fight. A great mana saver in 5mans though, especially when you're first starting out.



Word of Glory - If you're not using all your HP on LoD, this glyph is definitely worth having. Feel free to swap it out with Divine Favor though, especially if you're dumping most of your HP into LoD.



Light of Dawn - A must have if you're doing the LoD build above, as having the 6th transfer to your BoL target is what really pushes this spell's HPs over WoG.



Divine Protection - 40% magic damage reduction every 40sec. This is a clutch glyph.



Divine Plea - I don't use DP as often as I should now, but when it drops to 9sec in 4.06, this will give us 18% of our max mana in 9 sec. I don't see how this will cease to be a standard glyph.



Divinity - We just have too many great glyphs in our majors. If you use DP more than 2x a fight, you'll get more from that glyph. Having 10% return on call though is really nice.

What I'm really getting at

Don't change a glyph or a build just because that's what the boys in Vodka/Paragon/local awesome guild are doing. Think about your build, and how it ties into your actual play style. More importantly, think about the encounter and what's required. Don't drop Sacred Cleaning if you don't have sufficient backup for it. Don't lose your range increase if you shouldn't be in melee. All of these things have to be considered.

When in doubt, err on the side of caution. You can't heal stupid, and your HPS when dead is zero.