More PVP questions from a holy pally

[kidvid]

This is in relation to a quad-boxing Ele shaman team..

A) Where should I stand?
Should I stay in the front of the shamans?

Normally, I stand a couple yards behind the shamans, but I'm starting to think that's not the best idea. For one thing, I'm close enough to them to be hit by whirlwhind, arcane explosion, and any other AOE they throw at us. Two, I'm often a target for a rogue who tries to lock me down to prevent me from healing, and the problem here is that with all hell breaking loose, it would be hard for the shamans to assist me much because their field of fire is in front of them.

B) Hammer of Justice
Would this be a good tool to help with a target switch? What I've been doing lately is to HOJ the warrior as he rushes in, and cross my fingers that we can burn him down before he gets healed..but if the other team is on the ball, they're pre-emptively healing him. So, I'm wondering -- should I HOJ a secondary target during a rush, hoping they focus their healing on that person giving the shamans a better chance of switching targets and getting an insta-gib?

C) What are some general guidelines on picking a first target?
Last night, a team came rushing in and we threw everything we had at a SL lock with a fel-hunter pet, and he only went down to 20%. Needless to say, it went downhill from there, with the insta-crit skill on cooldown.

D) For an all-caster team, is there anything I can do to try and bait them to come to us and make a mistake?
One of the teams we had a real problem with was an all-caster team, or to be more clear, a caster team with one warrior who didn't do anything at all but sit in the back. They wore down our mana through hit-and-run drains, totem knock downs and so forth.

[Darcla]

Are you 5 boxing them all? or just controlling a healer and another person is running 4?

I'll just give some general paly healing advice in arenas based on your questions:

a) The pillars. Depending on your rating, you will more than likely be the burn down target for a lot of teams. Most will bust out the dps to get you to burn your bubble, then focus on your shamans. I say use the pillars because this allows you to los their dps. If you are 5 boxing, stick your shamans in the middle of the arena (near the altar, under the bridge, or in the middle circle), and dance around the pillars, only popping in to heal.

b)HoJ is an excellent form of CC. If you are facing a 4dps squad then wait until you get one of their targets to 20% health and then hoj their healer. The tactic you suggested is not what HoJ is designed for and will put your paly at risk of being singled out. That tactic is usually reserved for fears and cyclons (the dps charge in and the warlock charges to the back of their train and aoe fears the warriors support while the rest of the team takes out the warrior).

c)This will greatly depend on what type of team you are facing and your rating. As a general rule of thumb, take out hunters, shamans, and shadow priests first. I rarely, if ever, will call out a warlock as the burn target, unless they are UA or destro spec. Warlocks, even with crap gear, are just too well equiped to take dmg, especially from casters. If you are facing a 4 dps squad, take out the squisher target, while your paladin goes and hoj's the healer. No way you should not be able to burn down 1 target with 4xele shamans and a hoj'd healer. Survive the initial burst dmg of a 4 dps squad and you will win.

d) This type of team is a blessing and a curse. Blessing in that they will die instantly with one chain lighting rotation. Curse in that it is a multi box nightmare. This team survives on the ability to LOS their opponents. my advice would be to rush in and pop your instant CL on their cloth healer or cloth cc (warlock, pirest). Avoid mages and paladins though (ice block and bubble)

I hope this helps

[kidvid]

Thanks for your comments Darcla. I'm just the healer for the team, Kicksome, a regular poster on these forums, is quad-boxing the shamans.

Regarding HOJ though, that gives me two options. Keeping it for the late game, or burning it early. Either way, I might have to expose myself in order to get within HOJ range of the healer. I could see this working out in different ways.

One example comes to mind -->The rush, usually by confident players with better gear:
Usually a warrior comes rushing in, followed by a lock and rogue, sometimes with a shadow priest with pain suppression turned on. The druid or pally healer is almost always way in the back pre-loading the heals on the warrior. I could HOJ him, but I'd have to cast Blessing of Freedom on myself, run up to him, HOJ him and hope that gives the 4 shamans enough time to make a kill. I'd be vulnerable at that point, and might or might not have to bubble/trinket out of a fear/CC/mana drain being out of totem range. Would this type of strat be too risky, or would the risk be worth the reward?

What comes nexto mind it he the more conservative approach. Kicksome would call out for a HOJ, obviously hoping I would be A) in range of the healer and B) not-CC'd and actually able to cast the HOJ.

So far, the only games where I've been able to really make a difference with their healer by HOJ'ing were games we pretty much had already wrapped up in the first 30 seconds of play by dropping two of their guys. At that point, it's just an endurance match against their pally or lock.

[Darcla]

I do not recall our paladin (my 2k+ 5v5 team) ever really using HoJ except on healers when other CC was already done. It is used A LOT in 2v2 though.

I would have to agree, running into the fray trying to HoJ a healer is bit of a risk, however if you are not the focus target then they will probably ignore you. Bottom line is if you are the focus target, then just keep running around that pillar while your teammate goes to work. If your health starts to drop and they have a priest (holy), run to him, HoJ, bubble, heal. You will want to do this to avoid mass dispel.