Patch 5.0 Alpha vs Blood Knight Spells

Lets see what the damage is to Blood Knights in the current state of the 5.0 Alpha:

As Blood Knights are all  Blood Elves, lets look at the racials:
• Arcane Acuity is a new racial passive ability that increases Critical Strike chance by 1%.
• Arcane Torrent now restores 1 Holy Power for Paladins. Other parts of the ability remain unchanged.
Nice, nice! Now what is being removed and restricted?

• Blinding Light has been removed - I think I should have used this more. But I suspect it was more a PvP ability. Maybe I am wrong?
• Hand of Salvation has been removed - Haven't used this since Burning Crusade
• Holy Light has been removed - Haven't used this spell since I changed over to my current built
• Inquisition has been removed - One I actually used when I went Ret. This changes damage rotations.
• Divine Plea has been removed. Mana costs for Paladins have been adjusted accordingly. - I use this all the time! Well things better cost less mana!
• Divine Light has been renamed Holy Light - This change makes sense! The name Holy Light is iconic, so it may as well be the workhorse spell again.
• Avenging Wrath is now only available to Retribution Paladins - No more wings while healing then!
• Devotion Aura is no longer available to Protection Paladins - This hurts our guild Blood Knights tanks like Xyn.
• Guardian of Ancient Kings is now only available to Protection Paladins -There goes my heal & haste boost!
• Holy Insight no longer increases the chance to hit with spells.
• Sanctuary now also reduces the chance for attacks to be parried by 3%.
• Repentance cast time has been increased to 1.8 seconds - up from 1.7 seconds. Well if I have to crowd control it'll take slightly longer, but I rarely get called on to do it myself
• Turn Evil cast time has been increased to 1.8 seconds and now has a 6 second duration in PvP (down from 8 seconds). - Up from 1.5 cast time. I used it sometimes if there when there was absolutely nothing to heal before my current build.

Prot get Guardian, Ret keep wings, Holy get a boosted Divine Favor.

Weakened Blows was a debuff that mattered almost exclusively to tanks, and that every tank automatically applied. We removed the debuff and reduced creature damage to compensate.
The following abilities no longer apply the Weakened Blows effect: Crusader Strike and Hammer of the Righteous. - Wait, Crusader Strike caused weakened blows effect? Well I'm surprised. Well I guess it doesn't any longer!

Holy get their spells rearranged:

Paladin Higher Efficiency: Holy Light, Holy Shock, Word of Glory, Light of Dawn
Paladin Higher Throughput: Flash of Light, Holy Radiance

Well I don't see anything wrong with that...

• Eternal Flame now has a 1.5-second cast time (up from instant cast) for Holy Paladins.
• Light of Dawn now has a 1.5-second cast time (up from instant cast).
• Word of Glory now has a 1.5-second cast time (up from instant cast).
Wait, what! Isn't the point of the Holy Power resource to be spent instantly after building them up! That means I really can't heal and move, again! /mourns death of instant cast spell heals

• Guarded by the Light (Protection) now also makes Word of Glory and Eternal Flame instant cast.
• Sword of Light (Retribution) now also makes Word of Glory and Eternal Flame instant cast.

Oh! OH! I see how it is! Ret keep Templar's Verdict, Prot keep Shield of the Righteous & Barkskin (Symbiosis), and they both keep Word of Glory/Eternal Flame as instants! It is only Holy, being balanced against other healers, that loses the instant nature of Holy Power. Meaning Holy may as well just have those spells cost Mana now.

I am excited to see these changes in action and see how the removal of 'smart heals' impacts on my healing. It does sound like healing is going back to being slower and more measured. More clever spell rotations like a Death Knight would, to push up Holy Power so you can cast Holy Power spells as a normal spell.

This is all far more technical than during Burning Crusade where I stacked Crit/MP5 only spammed one spell over and over to get the job done (well two spells if you count putting Blessing of Salvation on those at the top of the Threat Meter).