i love my Ret pvp. BG not arena
i used a build along the lines of
http://www.wowhead.com/talent#sZVGzhZVfMtbIuGdIfsu
happy for other ppl to look at it and see what they think

Eng is really handy for PvP also and i make alot of use, i enjoy using Hand Of freedom (removes stuns with the talents) and then rocket boots to get me out of trouble, MC helm can change the battle so fast.
grenades on the belt are also great for a escape/intrupt,
picking the fights u get in to is what i find important, no point running in when its 5+ horde , but if u can get 1 or 2 at a time its fun times

macros for casting hand of freedom on urself, sacred shield, flash of light and clense are very handy

i watched the viedos made by Thesus on wow movies thats where i picked up my info

looking forward to see what you come up with,

Thanks,

The reason hit cap is 5% only is that the 8% is required only for 83/boss lvl’d mobs, so you never miss them. When it comes to fighting enemies at your own level 5% is enough. Also, i was suprised taht no expertise is needed too, but still uncertain on that.

Also, great post Tazak

Ret like you said is very difficult to master in Arenas. Sure you can go into a BG and faceroll a guy one on one or pop Seal of Command in a group and tear them up, but when they are organized on a team in arena it’s a completely different story. Due to our limitation of only two interrupts (3 if you are a Blood Elf), our strategy and timing is very very important. Early on, like I have noticed gearing up for PvP, you do very little damage, I had 27% crit chance for a long time but I made up for that with high resilience which helped me and my partner get to 1800 by outlasting other teams. Now our games seem to be very very short as we kill them very quickly, if not they are long games which we can outlast our opponents. I run Boomkin / Ret which is an unorthodox comp and requires a lot of coordination. But because of our team work, timing of Sacrifice, Raid Shield, and BoP, we last a long time and do insane nuking when we get a team where we want to.

Talent wise, I strongly strongly recommend getting Imp Hammer, it is vital for staying in control and having a short CD on it. Use Seal of the Righteous always as SoC isn’t always viable. Get it glyphed and talented into a bit. Builds vary with comps but I find mine works out best for Arenas / BGs. Like you said Paladins vary a ton in personal talenting / socketing /glyphing, etc. The best way to find out what works in my opinion is to observe other high ranking Paladins, watch Paladin Arena / PvP videos, and the best thing is to just mess around and try new things out. Think you have a spec that works better than another? Try it out. Want to try a new Glyph to see if it makes a difference? Try it out. I see most Paladins with Imp Exorcism glyph but I have found that Fear Undead is much more viable for me in arenas as DK’s and Warlocks seem to be the bane of our existence.

Haha wow sorry for the meaty comment, but I hope it helped

Wow I realized t

One clarification I think I need is the hit cap…I thought it was 8% and you stated 5%. Looks like I have some more research to do!

Thank you so much for the tips!

Here’s few gemming/stat/talent things i learned. May not be 100% confirmed info, but, good to have something to start with.
1. Gemming for retri pvp is similar to pve – all str, 1 nightmare’s tear for agi/crit meta gem.
2. Same is with enchanting. I guess if low on resilience you can use the pvp enchants for head and shoulder.
3. Hit cap is 5% so you can get capped fairly easy (2-3 pvp pieces can do it i guess)
4. Afaik no spell penetration is needed for ret pallies, since we don’t use any school of magic that has resistances for it.
5. For burst dmg the best seal is Seal of Righteousness (which also should be glyphed for).

That’s about all i got, rest info i found on pvp guides on Wowwiki.com and all over the net.
Thx for all the hard work,
Elbozo