Avenging Crusader x Lightsmith Guide

[@EllesmereGaming]

Builds have had some minor adjustments since posting this video, check out the latest build for M+ and raid here: wingsisup.com/tww-talents#lightforged-avenger

[@Dr_2E]

Thank you

[@fmackenz]

Ellesmere, could you discuss your keybindings?

[@mike3667]

I don't know what we'd do without you Ellesmere. You are the light to our beacons. I could never dream of learning the nooks and crannies of this game for anything serious anymore. So, people who explain and guide are hypercritical if I am to have any success in healing my groups. You've been my HPal inspiration since BFA. Your videos and gameplay are what made me fall in love with the class.

[@EllesmereGaming]

Sheeesh you’re so kind!!! Thank you for saying that ❤️

[@michaelangarola7159]

@@EllesmereGaming I second this, your guides in BFA made me a healer main

[@EllesmereGaming]

For those asking about stats, stat priority for Lightsmith AC build is Haste > Crit > Mastery > Vers in raid, and Haste > Crit > Vers > Mastery in M+. As always, ilvl is most important so don't stress too much about secondary stats early on in the gearing process

[@TheKywar]

is it still - Haste > Crit > Vers > OR Haste > Vers > Crit for M+? as i see on your toon you're rockin double the amount of vers than crit right now?

[@Eyeball753]

This came just in time. I started getting interested in the Lightsmith build and this answered all my questions. Thank you.

[@KNOGGAAR]

I couldn't have said it all better

[@SeanoM7]

Thanks for putting out these vids and for maintaining Wings Is Up

[@monkeycrunch9324]

Thanks a lot. Never heard of you before, and now I have - I really appreciate the dedicated website to paladin as I am a huge pala player and doing my best to min/max and tryhard! Not yet at 10 keys imma bit behind, but doing my best. Appreciate talking through it and hearing things from the perspective of someone that has done like 14 keys. Cheers.

[@joshrhodes2988]

Hey dude! I just wanted to say that I'd been running herald - (cheers icyveins) and been struggling massively on Dawnbreaker 10 - just swapped to your build, absoloutely walked it.. cant quite believe the difference, but I am SO grateful for you and your guides, im absolutely flying and so happy that i've finally done something i'd been struggling with for a while - WINGSISUP bro! Take care :)

[@gruncleiroh5525]

Finally! I can step into normal raids and +2's without feeling so bad about playing the suboptimal setup.

[@baconbuddy6207]

Good vid! You'd think that after 10+ years they would finally bring back the SMART smart healing that was already implemented in MoP. Back when they actually prioritized healing the most heavily wounded allies. Chains, LoD, and Prayers of Healing all were at its best healing pinnacles.

[@grev.]

i hope the longterm design philosophy of hpal tends towards the current herald build, it's the best the spec has ever been.

[@EllesmereGaming]

Agreed, I enjoy it way more

[@michaelhelmer]

Thank you so much. I’ve been leveling a Paladin and looking up Holy specs and builds.

[@eXileris]

Oh nice I was already using this build. Finally an actual guide to spread the light :)

[@bigjollyeammon]

It isn’t a smart heal, it is just a clever and slightly sarcastic heal.

[@JongsungKim-s2f]

Thank u so much, btw how to track holy armaments on party/raid frame?

[@mitchellmonaghan6164]

I've been playing this and having an absolute blast

[@hudsonstokes7539]

Thanks for the video. Great timing considering the discord discussion ❤

[@MsLifeBreaker]

So on Wingsisup u say its the build for low m+ Keys. iam running 11/12 atm and i legit never played AC in my life. Does this count as low or may i just stick to Solar Crusader in m+. Lets say i wanna min max ^^ Feels like i need to learn a new way to play and learn new dmg profiles/ healing profiles. Might be overthinking it at this point and its will be just fine to switch. Will give it a try anyway.

[@EllesmereGaming]

I changed the wording on WingsIsUp, I recommend AC LS for key levels 2-13, and Solar Crusade for 14+

[@Brian-fp5vy]

Is there a way to set Vuhdo to show who has the sacred weapon?

[@jasonhill7331]

During AC windows, is it more HPS to spend holy power on shield of the righteous for more crusader strikes/judgments, or using it on WoG/LoD?

[@Scape974]

the fun part in all that is i can finally play my avenging crusader build without being insulted each time they check my talents. but in pug we still don't get invited 99% of the time, what a good game. Thx for the video as always !

[@coleharris1945]

That's a community issue, not a game issue.

[@RinaaaYa]

@@Scape974 i think this AC + LS has the potential to be Meta. Provides higher damage, a more consistent healing profile, more utility/damage mitigation and good survivability, insane burst healing with proper setup. Hpal as a whole has a lot of utility and is relatively tanky, has good cc/control though inferior to shammy. Its only weaknesses are spot healing outside of CDs and it can fall apart if you leave melee like MW.

[@xSintex]

I have no idea what youre pugging,but i have no issues finding groups at 10 and 11s.

[@coleharris1945]

@@xSintex I sincerely doubt the individual isnt getting invited b/c Lightsmith lol. It's prolly io or ilvl.

[@Scape974]

@@coleharris1945 I invite you to play on Europe servers MA dude, and you'll see

[@scottycheesecake]

Avenging Crusader is back? Revs up the paladin again

[@PrimarchRoboleonFrenchyman]

As long as that build will be playable, I'll be happy. I'm not asking for S or even A tier. Just good enough so that I can get all achievement if I play well.

[@marcosortega3984]

Thank you for this great tutorial! I dont enjoy AC. If i wanted LS+RegularWings, what kind of set up would you recommend? Would LS+AvengingWrath be superior to Heral+AvengingWrath?

[@EllesmereGaming]

No if you want to play Herald you should just run the solar crusade build, which is what I play: wingsisup.com/tww-talents#the-solar-crusade

[@endocry]

Thanks for the great content man

[@christoph3849]

When you have an awakening proc your judgement will auto crit which means it will always proc hammer and anvil in the lightsmith tree. I've found this interaction really strong in M+ especially for providing basically a group wide lay on hands during virtue by saving your awakening procs for damage events.

[@EllesmereGaming]

Yeah awakening procs are huge, such a satisfying button press

[@iZenomWoW]

thx for the guide of hpala!

[@arenvaren8805]

Thx a lot for the update info! Seems like Lightsmith build has way less tolerance toward your teammate's mistakes you as a healer can fast fix. Gonna be harder to heal in pugs

[@EllesmereGaming]

To a certain extent I agree but I also think it’s much easier to get a lot of throughput from this build so players less proficient with hpal will find it easier and more straightforward

[@Arotashi]

During wings I Judgement -> CS -> Spender but then without any haste procs next Judgement will be ~0.5 seconds until it's back, are you just meant to wait for it or press something else?

[@Khandurian.lusroc]

Hey! I'm kinda confused about your recommendation to play this in mythic plus and raid from +2 to 13+ but Solar Crusade from 14 onwards. What gives? Why is this better for basically all key levels but not the highest? Doesn't that mean that Solar Crusade should work well on any key level too?

[@EllesmereGaming]

Yes solar crusade works at any key level, but you deal with different types of damage profiles at different key levels. Once you hit a certain key level, getting the burst AoE and ST healing from Herald is required to counter the extreme high burst damage of +15 city of threads for example. AC LS excels and consistent throughput and damage, but is weak on burst healing and spot healing comparatively. That doesn’t really become a factor until the extreme damage profiles of the highest keys kicks in. It’s possible to play either build at any key level, but that’s just what I’ve found works best in my experience at those key levels

[@legopatbuilder]

How come Light of the Martyr is run in the raid build only? Is it not still an HPS loss?

[@ianhobbs3243]

I would also like to know this.

[@EllesmereGaming]

Lightsmith gives a TON of self healing through bulwark so it's a good way to help keep up your spot/raid healing outside of AC windows in raid. I don't run it in M+ cuz for keys you need Divine Favor and Righteous Judgment. overall these extra talents are pretty mid and you won't gain much from anything else so i wouldn't overthink it too much

[@knasen881]

I found the overheal from holy shock talent together with execute heal did jack shit tbh

[@noahjones6071]

Will you be running this build over your standard herald build in m+ as well? Or do you still prefer herald in keys

[@EllesmereGaming]

I will continue to run Herald in keys, as I find the group survivability and controlled spot healing to be much stronger while only loses a bit of damage.

[@MrBoosta]

I’ve been healing as lightsmith from the start I like to play more aggressively as a healer more fun that way I can heal up to 1.2 mil in raids and m+ but sometimes I just mess with different lighsmith builds for different dungeons see what works

[@DóraRácz-r7k]

Thanks for the video! Would like to ask what is the reason of using Faith in raids instead of Virtue? I was running Virtue with this build and seemed very strong during burst damage windows in raid as well.

[@EllesmereGaming]

Both are more than viable in raid and it’s really up to you which you’d prefer. I have a bunch of reasons for running faith over virtue in raid, especially in a GCD heavy build like AC LS. More than I can type here haha if you check out my raid faq video I talk a bunch about virtue vs faith

[@Enchantreess_gaming]

Hi Ellesmere, thank you for the video. Just one question - do you use the weapons more or less on CD?

[@EllesmereGaming]

Yes absolutely!

[@Pjakt]

Not speccing rightous judgement? all logs/guides so far says to spec it, but i never knew why, can you explain it? (for raiding)

[@EllesmereGaming]

I recommend it now because it’s needed to keep gale procs (our BIS trinket). Also just a lot of free dam. Updated build is on wingsisup

[@Ceechin23]

Please show us a rotation guide or raid gameplay with this build!

[@EllesmereGaming]

As I mentioned in the video there actually is no such thing as a set rotation, only the spell priorities I discuss. I’ll have a play by play breakdown of some of my lightsmith coming out in the next video!

[@daikennett]

​@@EllesmereGamingI have a 4 hour flight tomorrow so if it could be put by then..... 😏

[@DylanMoore-y7d]

Does anyone know how to track Holy Armaments through Cell. I tried to create a way to track it but Cell doesn't recognize the spell ids. Any help is appreciated!

[@EllesmereGaming]

Make sure you are tracking the buff ids, not the spell ids of the actual ability: **Sacred Weapon**: 432502 **Holy Bulwark**: 432496 **Dawnlight**: 431381

[@DylanMoore-y7d]

I appreciate this very much. I did get it set up in Cell . I did not even realize there were different IDs. Learned something new and thank you very much for the reply and the videos!

[@_alex_y.not_]

Hi Elle, your M+ build has Veneration but you don't state what the prio of HoW is inside or outside of Avening Crusade. Could you clarify?

[@EllesmereGaming]

it's a nice passive heal when judgment crits or mobs are in execute, so outside of wings it would be high prio when it procs similar to the regular wings build, but inside of wings it's just a filler if you don't have any other button

[@daikennett]

Any chance that 2h could see a resurgence for the extra Cs damage? Or does shield of the righteous just straight out beat it every time? Love the idea of full, offense hpal. Great content thanks!

[@EllesmereGaming]

Definitely not for m+, for raid you could but I personally think all the physical dr you lose from dropping a shield makes the fraction of a healing you’d gain not worth at all

[@Shockum2686]

Ells I have a question that I was trying to figure out. I added Both Holy Bulwark and Sacred Weapon to Cell to track with hots but it doesn't show on the frame. Am I missing something? How do you exactly track it?

[@EllesmereGaming]

Make sure you’re tracking the spell ids of the buffs, not the spell itself

[@Calthrasful]

Serious question regarding Holy Shock: Will HS be used primarily for healing or is it just used for generating HP (by doing dmg or healing) to dump it into the spenders to actually heal the targets. I've encountered, my spenders did far more healing than HS. Maybe I'm doing something wrong, but as far as I'm understanding the new holy pal, the emphasis is on spenders heal and not HS to spot heal? tl:dr: Holy Shock or word of glory to spot heal a target?

[@CartoreAOS]

Who should we beacon in raid?

[@EllesmereGaming]

www.twitch.tv/ellesmere_gaming/clip/VictoriousExquisiteSwallowPunchTrees-RyFICt8ySmLxSHH7

[@SuffragePriest]

Always loved ac playstyle. Ellesmere will get it nerfed probably lol. J/k live and let live.

[@daikennett]

Blizz over here checking his logs 🕵️

[@Temaire01]

Hey how is the priority in the following Situation: You have Blessed Assurance, Divine Puepose proc and 5HP. Do you cast „spender with divine purpose -> another Spender to 2HP-> crusader Strike with Blessed assurance-> spender - Prio Rotation Or is it: Spender with purpose proc -> crusader Strike buffed with blessed assurance (overcap HP) -> spender -> crusader Strike with blessed assurance -> normal prio Rotation Is it Worth overcapping or wasting one crusader Strike with Buff? Think thats a good question 😄

[@EllesmereGaming]

Always prio CS with BA over everything, overcapping is fine when you’re in AC

[@Temaire01]

@@EllesmereGamingThank you :)

[@4587144000]

Inflorence of the Sunwell just for Judgement? is that not a bit wasted on a Heavy Meleefocused build.. or is that just that strong in AC windows?

[@EllesmereGaming]

Inflo is also for Valiance, the hero talent that reduces the cooldown of Armaments by 3 seconds each time Infusion of Light is used

[@4587144000]

@@EllesmereGaming ohhhh right.. ty

[@gerde033]

Does prio/usage of divine toll and holy prism change at all while in AC wings?

[@EllesmereGaming]

i don't prioritize holy prism during AC, only outside of it. As for divine toll, that one is kinda based on what you need at the time but again I usually use that outside of AC

[@davidherrera8528]

Interested to know why no one uses golden path in paladin tree.. your already in melee why not get passive heals while your fight in consecration

[@EllesmereGaming]

Because it’s like 0.3% of our healing lol they need to buff it by like 500% before it sees any good use

[@gabo4099]

How far off is crit better than mastery for AC LS? I dont wanna give up my haste mastery crafted items because I play ret in high keys :(

[@EllesmereGaming]

our stat weights are very similar in strength so I wouldn't worry about that

[@stonnyj]

With this build for raid, do you guys always run light of the maytar (or however its spelt)

[@EllesmereGaming]

You can run it or not, won’t make a big difference either way. I think it’s nice to increase raid spot healing outside of AC windows without much personal risk cuz this build has infinite self healing from bulwarks, but not running it is fine too

[@stonnyj]

@EllesmereGaming thanks for the response, I love your content! Also do you have any other Quick tips for getting better HPS in raids as hpal?

[@stonnyj]

@@EllesmereGaming do you offer coaching services for hpal?

[@ElBrauleo]

Man, as someone who really REALLY loves the battle paladin fantasy and have always wanted for AC to be viable, I'm so happy right now. Hopefully Blizz can buff Herald instead of nerfing AC + LS so that they're just two different playstyles.

[@EllesmereGaming]

agreed I think both should be viable

[@Retalin_]

Is there a link for a mouseover macro for holy armaments? I could only get it to cast one or the other not both with the same macro?

[@EllesmereGaming]

macro Holy Bulwark and it should swap between both, if you macro the weapon it'll only cast the weapon

[@Retalin_]

@@EllesmereGaming got it, I just used #showtooltip without any spell name and it fixed it ty!

[@Retalin_]

@@EllesmereGaming ty!

[@pingui43]

Any good macro for overplayer for the sacred weapons and the shield spell ?

[@MelvinDorkus]

Why do you take Divine revelations instead of inflorescence of the sun well? Especially with AC which has infinite mana

[@EllesmereGaming]

Inflo and divine revelations are on different tiers of the tree. If I could give up DR for Inflo I would but sadly DR is a t2 talent

[@Avenger21241]

Do you feel running AW LS instead of AC LS be a healing loss? Really want to avoid AC

[@EllesmereGaming]

If you don’t want to play ac, just run the solar crusade build on wingsisup. I run it in keys and sometimes in raid, it’s still very good just not quite as good as AC LS in raid

[@caelum9227]

How do the stats change in raid for this build? Feels like it should lean more into crit than mastery

[@EllesmereGaming]

aste > Crit > Mastery > Vers in raid, and Haste > Crit > Vers > Mastery in M+

[@jameskurosaki77]

Should we be using the armaments on cd or try to keep 1 in bank or something?

[@EllesmereGaming]

on CD

[@garfieldoftheweek]

When you say Herald is still almost as good, could you quantify that percentage-wise? Are we talking a 5% difference or like something as high as 15-20%?

[@EllesmereGaming]

Depends on the content / fight

[@garfieldoftheweek]

@EllesmereGaming since you said it was still good in mythics, let's say raid. Are there any fights you wouldn't recommend herald on at all or am I really gimping my raid if I don't learn this newer spec?

[@EllesmereGaming]

@@garfieldoftheweekworst one is definitely Broodtwister due to how spread the fight is.

[@TheFabulousEnby]

Ive been running faith onstead of virtue and it's been hreat in M+, neber drop beloe 90% mana. Why are we taking martyr in raid?

[@Ynnad13]

any way to get ur cell displays?

[@EllesmereGaming]

uipacks.wago.io/pack/ellesmere

[@Frost640]

I'm going to need to see this build in use, so far it feels pretty bad. Maybe I'm doing something fundamentally wrong, but at 620ilvl it feels horrible to even do +7.

[@EllesmereGaming]

That video is coming out Sunday!

[@WonderZZZ]

So for holy armament do you always want to have them out never sitting on a charge?

[@storathzaleric1141]

How do yo proc Gale of Shadow with this build?

[@storathzaleric1141]

Just noticed consagration damage procs it!

[@EllesmereGaming]

Yeah consecration is the only way so if you want to run gale it’s still great but you have to be pressing consecrate

[@Traison]

Is there a specific reason for no Infloresence in the Raid build?

[@EllesmereGaming]

Not as much need to play for damage in raid so glorious dawn + LotM makes for nice consistent spot healing outside of AC windows

[@Xanten7]

Solar Crusade is Herald of the Sun x Avenging Wrath? Is AC Lightsmith > AW Herald right now?

[@EllesmereGaming]

yes AC LS is better in raid and for key levels 2-13, for 14+ you'll want herald for most dungeons

[@Xanten7]

@@EllesmereGaming Oh man, all my gear is Haste/Versa ;(

[@Chriscx]

do we ever use light of dawn? i notice its not on ur bars visibly

[@EllesmereGaming]

We definitely do, it’s just grayed out when I don’t have holy power, you can see it’s my #2 button on my top action bar! I discuss LoD vs WoG in my raiding FAQ video in detail :) as for Mythic+, you pretty much never use LoD there that’s all just WoG

[@NKPhom]

I've been playing this build since the patch came out, and I love it so much more than Herald. 1 minute wings are so damn nice

[@gurraglad]

Thanks!

[@MichaelNewton-d3q]

So looks like the blessed assurance was fixed today it seems. How much of a hit is that to this build?

[@Scarledx3]

Do we do any more damage this patch ? Or is holy still hitting like a wet noodle ?

[@EllesmereGaming]

AC Lightsmith build is one of the highest damage dealing healer builds, only second to disc in M+

[@Scarledx3]

@@EllesmereGaming Cool, Thank you very much.

[@RinaaaYa]

I'll be honest. A lot of Hpals in the community don't like AC playstyle, even though it can resemble MW healing in a way which is really fun in my opinion But this build its really really strong both offensively and defensively, with a lot of utility that Herald just doesn't have with Tempered in Battle and Holy Armaments. I have always liked more its theme than Herald, but wish we could have a middle ground with LS + Regular wings to have more agency over healing and a way to have even stronger spot healing. LS stills feels clunky due to how the ability of armaments works and right now we know Blessed assurance shouln't be buffing CS by 120% Hope Hpal dev iterates on this and make LS work better with regular wings and improve LS gameplay loop as a whole soon without hitting us with another % aura nerf.

[@ZallKlos]

Do you Virtue before AC? Do you hard cast FoL often to consume the 2nd Infusion charge?

[@EllesmereGaming]

yes you should use virtue before AC, and no you should not be hard casting with this build at all

[@kevinneumayer8485]

in wings you can use both stacks easy with jugement, out of wings u can use SoR (if not that much healing needed) to reduce your cd from crusading strikes and than use crusading stikes to reduce the cd from jugement so you can use both stacks with jugement

[@Sean11194]

thx cutie

[@pokalatte8122]

So give sacred weapon to the warlock's pet got it

[@charlieh9820]

You jinxed it with season one guide lmao. I agree build is fun but not as fun as season one build.

[@lelivredegrimnir]

Dang, second

[@mrshuwaiterkun8010]

x) i was playing this build b4 patch now it will get nerf

[@GamingFr3aks]

3rd ok

[@Nibaw1]

I'm very annoyed at having to play this suddenly /:

[@EllesmereGaming]

Same, hope they fix the blessed assurance prot buff

[@Brainman234]

whyy T_T

[@dengo6716]

I just gave up on my holy paladin. I timed all dungeons to +11 and now every day i try to que for 20 mins to see if i will get invited by with no surprise i get decline from every group for +12 i had to check so many times if im qued by mistake as dps or something but nah i just get declined only because of my class.

[@tikkitv2149]

First 🎉

[@EllesmereGaming]

damn that was like 5 seconds after i published it LOL

[@maldithus]

So you're just using Light of the Martyr for raiding for the padding, right? Because the more fake HPS for parses, the better I guess.

[@EllesmereGaming]

Nope you cannot pad with LotM that has been changed on WCL, it now properly subtracts from logs. LotM with this build is used to help maintain our spot healing outside of AC windows without much increased risk to ourselves due to the immense amount of self healing we get from running Lightsmith (bulwarks all go one yourself)

[@Sengyizhe]

Gameplay?

[@EllesmereGaming]

Next video will be a play by play lightsmith ac build playstyle guide